Reviews// Dragon Age 2

The city is a pressure cooker. Civil unrest hangs in the air. The Templars of the Chantry screw ever tighter down upon Kirkwall’s fearful mages. A shipful of Qunari warriors has become stranded here, and now roosts above the docks. Everywhere there are rumours of apostates and their wild blood magic.

Even the surrounding lands aren’t safe, with pirate slavers taking up residence on the coast and a band of Dalish elf travellers practicing their witchery at the summit of Sundermount. And you, a poor wretch, who’s limped into Kirkwall dragging your family behind you, you must find your path through it all. The wildswoman Flemeth says you have a great destiny ahead of you. It’s up to you to prove her right.

“Do you ever feel like the world’s getting simpler? Like everything from eating to fighting is a lot less complex than it used to be?”

Complaining Gamers
As soon as the first footage of Dragon Age: Origins was released, gamers complained that the series had been dumbed down. This was supposed to be the spiritual successor to the classic PC RPG Baldur’s Gate, but it was going to be released on - and please, feel free to affect a toffee-nosed sneer of disdain as you read this - video games consoles. There were hilarious blood splatters in the trailer, and terrible blurry textures and - oh my days! Is that Marilyn Manson music on the soundtrack? The game was sure to be a disaster.

But it wasn’t. Woeful angst-metal marketing aside, Dragon Age turned out to be every bit as engrossing an epic as RPG fans had hoped for. With a cast of vivid characters and a wry sense of humour, Dragon Age: Origins was very much a success.

And now Dragon Age 2 comes along, and once again the air fills with cries of ‘Dumbed down, dumbed down!’

For a start, Dragon Age 2 isn’t set in the ransacked kingdom of Ferelden but in the fortress city of Kirkwall. Taking an adventure as big as Dragon Age and cramming it into a single city - and for a console audience at that - seems like an impossible task; the magic, the history, the people, the adventure. It just isn’t possible. Something has to give.

Mass Effect
Yet, while certain compromises have been made, the game doesn’t suffer for them. Locations are liberally reused and yes, combat has been streamlined for a faster, more Mass Effect-like experience. In fact the spectre of Mass Effect 2 haunts every aspect of the game from its inventory to its characters. But it’s the scale of the story that counts here and the breadth of the issues it deals with.

Dragon Age 2 is a city adventure that eschews countryside travels and colourful locations to focus on the internal strife and politics of Kirkwall. It’s never afraid to make you question your beliefs; it takes a morally ambigiuous viewpoint between the various warring factions, and when it makes you choose between them, your choice will never come easily.

As with any Bioware RPG it’s those choices that shape the story of the game. But with such a strong emphasis on character, the story writhes and becomes impossible to grasp. Trust can be misplaced. Kind actions beget sour deeds. With many twists turning on the most innocuous of decisions it never feels like you’re being led down a particular path, or following a bluntly branching choose-your-own plot. Instead you contend with the personalities of those around you, or bow to their needs - after all, you are only one character in a city filled with them.

Never before has a game used its characters to such startling effect. Every one of them is as rich and as fully formed as your character, Hawke, is himself. They have their own desires and they’re willing to fight to get what they want. As much as your decisions shape the city around you, so do theirs.

And they aren’t just there for colourful banter, or to take part in some end-of-game suicide mission. The story of Dragon Age 2 takes place over many years and, as you progress through the game, your team mates fall in love; their obsessions deepen, they ascend to positions of great power or sink into despair. As in real life, when things fall apart and your relationships disintegrate you’ll be left wondering what you could have done to change things, and how you could have been a better friend to them.

A Memorable Bunch
Friendship is a large part of the game. Every character in your party receives a different set of attribute bonuses depending on whether they’re your friend or your rival, and this friendship or rivalry is determined by how you treat them throughout the game. At times during conversations with NPC you can defer to them, and allow them to make choices in your stead.