dragon age game review
Dragon Age InquisitionHear, see, brave citizens of Thedas, sharpen your blades, raise your shields, crackle the magic, the hour of the Inquisition has arrived. After a Dragon Age Origins with roots rooted in classics of the genre such as Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter, then a second much more action-oriented component with a bitter taste of course error, BioWare's mission is to restore the image of his high fantasy RPG license with an ambitious third iteration that looks like mea culpa to a skeptical audience after the Dragon Age II cold shower, but still hopeful given the studio's past. In short, forget the monotonous corridors and the lack of strategy and make way for a semi-open world where tactics finally seem to take pride of place in the gameplay. On the way to the vast regions of Orlais and Ferelden.
As the sky is torn apart by a strange rift in the Veil from which a horde of demons thirsty for destruction escapes, the world of Thedas is more than ever divided by factional conflicts. Between political plots, ancestral hatreds and personal interests, the balance of peoples rests on a thread that can be broken at any time. While many seem to ignore the threat that hangs over their heads, others take it very seriously. Grouped under the banner of the Inquisition, our hero and his cronies will have the heavy task of filling the ranks of their faction to fight against this sudden invasion. Especially since our character is the only one capable of closing the loopholes, a power that arouses as much lust as mistrust. Everything in this new episode seems to be surrounded by mystery, from our role to play through to the real intentions of the protagonists, the storyline of this Dragon Age Inquisition offers a wealth of great scope.
TAILORED INQUISITOR
RPG requires, it all starts with the usual character creation phase. As in the previous sections, Humans, Elves and Dwarfs are in the game; they are joined by the Qunaris who can already be seen brandishing a heavy ax over their heads. We then draw from three archetypes, Warrior, Mage or Thief. If each one offers several talent trees to the varied gameplays, it will be necessary to wait a good thirty hours of play before unlocking secondary specializations in order to flesh it out. Where the creative tool impresses is in its panel of face customization options. Everything can be drawn, moved, reshaped with amazing simplicity. Without much harm, BioWare is placed here at the top of the basket in terms of facial customization in the RPG genre. Too bad this fiddling with sliders and sliders is not available for the body of the characters. The latter also retain this smooth appearance, bordering on the plastic already in use in Star Wars: The Old Republic for example. The game also bypasses the multiple starting areas specific to Dragon Age Origins. Everyone will therefore start the adventure in the same place with however some variations in the dialogues according to the race and the class chosen. Let the owners of backups from previous sections be reassured since Bioware gives players the opportunity to keep their choices thanks to Dragon Age Keep. Text role-playing game accessible on browser, the tool allows you to reconstruct a personalized background to import from the start of the game. By default, the script will use a canonical model defined by the developers.In terms of character development, we gain one talent point per level, to be spent on the different skill trees. Classic at first, we will still seek how to improve our statistics and our secondary capacities. Where did our points go to in hooking, alchemy or social skills? How can I improve my strength or my intelligence? The answer lies in the developers' bias to link all this to the very development of the Inquisition. To summarize the situation, each action in the areas to explore gratifies the troop of points of influence to spend on various and varied assets once back in a stronghold of our faction. We will therefore have to go through the command center to improve our rhetoric towards certain castes, our inventory capacity or our picking. All of this gives false airs of a light mode management game to be put into perspective by the absence of punishment in the event of improper allocation of resources. The increase in the character's statistics goes through two options: talent points, some of which grant some bonuses, and equipment carried by loots of variable quality to be found around the world. Crafts also allow you to craft and evolve your stuff thanks to a fairly complete system of materials to combine to improve its primary statistics. A good way to upgrade by taking advantage of all the harvest moments in open areas.
WILL YOU TAKE BACK A LITTLE EXPLORATION?
There may be better to do than stand on the corner for quarrels that will seem futile once the world devastated by demons, right? The bulk of our actions will revolve around this specific goal, recruiting good people to swell the ranks of the Inquisition. Please leave your differences in the locker room, the common goal: to patch up the Veil and establish a new world order. The perfect opportunity to finally walk with your foot or your hoof a nice panel of countries evoked since the beginnings of the saga. Because Dragon Age Inquisition saw - and did - big things to avoid falling into the model of cloned corridors that caused the sad reputation of the previous episode. BioWare here displays its know-how with vast, diversified areas, but above all full of quests and secrets. An advantage, you say? Yes when it comes to well-crafted missions with obvious scriptwriting impact; a little less, however, when the game has the annoying tendency to use the low-end quest that looks like it is mistaken for everything we do not like in the MMORPG. Go get me five field flowers, help I lost my husband in a cave, could you help me? So many secondary missions, all in all very relative, but nevertheless necessary for the rise of the Inquisition.A glance at the map could almost scare us, there are so many things to do in the areas. It would even tend to move us away from the main frame. However, we will see more of a huge game of tactics where each mission brings its share of resources to invest thereafter. Because the whole game is based on command centers in which the player will launch numerous missions, some automatic, others very scripted. These actions cost points of power that our different wanderings in the vast regions of Thédas allow to harvest. All our actions therefore have a direct impact on the quest for power and the objectives are therefore voluntarily numerous to make us feel at the head of a movement endowed with growing power. If cleaning an area from top to bottom can be a bit tiresome in the long run, fluttering between different tasks will make the game take on its true flavor. From this point of view only, one emerges from the Inquisition experience with the strange impression of dealing with a sort of solo MMO boasting a few touches of political management. To avoid falling into the monotony of the farm, we will therefore alternate between the phases of searching for crystals, taking fortresses, closing faults, exploring dungeons or even establishing camps before returning to the fold to finally launch a scripted quest in the pure dramatic spirit of the license.
Here, on the other hand, we swim on familiar ground with epic missions with beautifully crafted writing. Count around fifty hours for the main frame of the game and double everything to finish all the extras. A colossal lifespan punctuated by several epic moments driving a scenario that tends to advance painfully during the first twenty hours before taking a decisive turn thereafter. We find in these missions everything that made the charm of the license, dialogues with choices fraught with consequences (the game has more than 40 different endings), long cutscenes and battles against various creatures ranging from the basic demon, to the doped templar at the red Lyrium passing by the emblematic dragons of the saga. The dialog wheel is still there to inject the dose of RPG BioWare DNA into the game. There are of course several choices of responses responsible for presenting a range of reactions capable of transforming our hero into an illustrious pragmatic bastard or a virtuous defender of the oppressed. As usual, the absence of simply binary choices contributes to reinforcing the feeling of narrative immersion since it will be necessary to use cunning and knowledge of the interlocutor in order to avoid unpleasant situations which can sometimes lead to the unexpected departure of fellow travelers.
HIS TACTICAL IS ATTACK!
Expected at the turn by a community disappointed with the action orientation operated by the second opus, Inquisition has the heavy task of rekindling the flame of the tactical combat of the license. So, tactical or not tactical? The answer actually lies in the level of difficulty chosen. In Normal mode, the spirit of combat is close to that of Dragon Age 2 with a focus on action and the spectacular. The tactical break is indeed there, but as the first gameplay videos of the game suggested, its usefulness is far from obvious as the confrontations give the impression of indulging in a “simple” hack'n slash low ceiling. Especially since the title had the idea not necessarily very clever to deactivate the friendly fire by default. The result is a joyful massacre on the screen where the need to plan one's actions and switch between the characters is annihilated by this imperative to put your eyes on it. A very dark picture, you say? Not when you raise the difficulty up a notch and activate the damage between allies. Here, there is no question of going headlong into the fray at the risk of suffering stinging defeats on most meetings. Planning, buffs and judicious use of potions are imperative to triumph. We thus find what made the charm of the fights of the first game, with a difference however, no character has healing spells.And this is not an unfortunate oversight, but a wish of the developers. The idea is to motivate the player to make the best use of the protection buff system, management of potions by characters and orientation of health regeneration statistics on weapons and armor. The number of potions and their effects can, for example, be improved via a few requisitions from the alchemist; one will then take care never to leave in combat the empty belt of well filled flasks. And if it is always possible to identify an ally fallen in combat via a well-placed spell or by interacting with it, the maxim "prevent rather than cure" seems more than ever erected in key words here. Especially since life will not automatically go back up outside the fighting. The gameplay still revolves around a system based on various interactions between spell effects that the player will take pleasure in optimizing by creating group synergies. Some larger skirmishes like encounter with dragons have a solid scripted scene just enough to make us feel all the noise of the fighting. Too bad the targeting of enemies is still far too sensitive to changes in camera angles, a pitfall that will have the annoying tendency to make us swing an attack on the wrong target when we do not bother to pass the game in active pause mode.
UNPROTECTED TEXT RELATIONSHIPS
The gameplay is always structured around a quartet of characters to control and interchange as we see fit. Between group synergy and sometimes pungent dialog exchanges between fellow travelers, the regulars will not be disoriented for a penny. The recruitment of all these beautiful people (9 acolytes in total) goes through quests, most of which lack a little unexpected or even depth. Because unless we categorically refuse, enrollment will be done through a few dialogues run in advance, sometimes preceded by a more or less scripted combat phase. There will be one or two well-known faces including the Dwarf Varric and his dear crossbow Bianca (playable), the spy Leliana or Morigan (both not playable) for the fan service side. If a handful of companions stands out through a strong character and a few lines of tasty dialogues, the troop nevertheless gives off much less immediate charisma than the characters in the original game. It is still possible to go chat with them and some of our choices will have the gift of annoying or satisfying them; nothing new under the threatening sky. On the other hand, we draw a line under the small gifts to be chosen with distinction in an attempt to improve their loyalty. In this episode, our companions approve of our choices, remain loyal but may end up slamming our door in the face in the event of repeated spat. Their charisma is exacerbated in the end over a fairly long period and some characters, rather tasteless and cold at first, gain in roughness and depth over the main plot. Of course, hetero / homo / bisexual romances are always on hand to somewhat spice up the long cold nights of the Inquisition.BEAUTIFUL AND FINALLY OPEN
Dragon Age Inquisition has decided to play a fairly high-end technique in the service of an aesthetic unique to the saga. The result does not take long to appear on the screen, the game looks pretty good. Thanks to the Frostbite 3 engine kindly loaned by DICE, the environments offer a good depth as well as convincing light effects. Aliasing and clipping are a little more present here than on the PC version and the distant textures seem a little more blurred than on the other versions. The framerate is maintained at 30 fps even if there are sometimes a few drops in the most loaded environments in detail. Overall, this version should not be ashamed of its PC counterpart in terms of graphic rendering since it displays a rendering close to high settings, less framerate but 1080p more compared to the Xbox One version " limited "to 900p. Artistically, we welcome BioWare's ability to revive an entire architectural background drawn from the first two episodes and to add a good big layer of new features on top. By quibbling a bit, we could put our finger on some collision issues or a few decorations a little below the overall quality of the game. Graphic promises kept for Inquisition. The joystick controls are rather intuitive and ultimately adapt well to gameplay that we feel thought with several supports in mind.But all is not rosy under the Ferelden sun and the title also blows hot and cold with somewhat dated animations. The movement of the characters, their jump, the ascent of the slopes, all of this suffers from a certain stiffness accompanied by some pathfinding concerns. Red card here with a very inconvenient user interface. Reviewing its inventory via the drop-down long lists as the arm is quite weary in the long run. Its management is however facilitated by tabs of categories allowing to sort all this happy bazaar. Already long on PC, loading times are not the fastest on this version either. The camera, especially in tactical mode, will also have the gift of getting stuck in certain elements of the decor. It is also impossible to zoom out in this configuration, which could have been handy in certain situations. A word now on quality French dubbing for the most part with the possibility for the player to choose between two voices for each combination of race and sex when creating the character. The soundtrack does an honorable accompaniment, it is epic when it has to be and relatively discreet most of the time.
A final point now concerning the multiplayer mode of the game. At the moment, we have not been able to test this aspect in real conditions since the servers are not yet used by players. The experience proposed will therefore be judged once the community is installed on the game. Be aware, however, that multiplayer and story share the same gameplay, but that the two modes remain independent of each other. Tinted with a multi spirit straight from Mass Effect 3, we will give you more details on this aspect during an upcoming Gaming Live. The rating for the game therefore only relates to the solo aspect of the Dragon Age Inquisition experience.
The notes
+ Positive points
The world of Dragon Age finally open to exploration, finished levels, make way for rich and varied areas!
An à la carte combat system oscillating between action-RPG and tactical RPG according to the chosen difficulty mode
Technically and artistically successful
An intelligent fabric that is built over time
Colossal content
Choices and consequences not to be taken lightly
Control of the Inquisition's Forces and Destiny
Overall successful writing and dubbing
A craft system at the heart of character development
The character creation tool is damn well provided!
Negative points
Secondary objectives of little interest
Obvious filling in many areas
An interface that is inconvenient to use
A cast of companions a bit less charismatic than expected
Long loading times
Perfectible animation and pathfinding
Slightly indented soundtrack
Let the most skeptical be reassured, Dragon Age Inquisition revives the glorious origins of the saga while infusing it with a wind of features drawn here and there in previous RPGs from BioWare. Beautiful and open, it finally allows you to explore from top to bottom many regions of the kingdoms of Thedas. If the main plot against the backdrop of demonic threats and political plots will keep you going for many hours, we are more skeptical about the orientation of a tote of secondary objectives. Fortunately, the whole is served by an à la carte combat system whose face will largely depend on certain adjustments to be made by the player. Inquisition is therefore a large-scale episode, generous in content, which manages without any difficulty to make us forget the wanderings of Dragon Age 2. It would undoubtedly have been better if it had dispersed over certain mechanisms that it only hovers over to focus a little more on other more fundamental aspects in the eyes of fans of the genre.
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