Dragon Age: Origins

this is a glorified dating sim

Really nice story, but it's mechanics are hard to come to terms with. It's not player-friendly at all, but still a good game

why’s it look so ugly

great game. Completed it two times. Recommend

Dragon Age Origins has a great story, likeable characters and an intriguing setting. The combat, however, is not fun. It has potential, which Bioware finally capitalised on in Dragon Age Inquisition, but in Origins it is simply too clunky and unintuitive to work. Some enemies require you to plan out every single frame of combat or they will absolutely destroy you, (even on Casual difficulty) and doing this is incredibly tedious. The alternative to this is that you can essentially program the AI to fight how you want, but even this doesn't make the game any easier. Too many times my ranged teammates (who barely have any defence) will rush into close range of enemies just to be cut down in seconds, or do something else stupid that gets everyone killed. Everything else about this game pulled me through to the end and I'm glad I finished it but at times the game felt incredibly draining.

Although it is cool that you can import your save file over to the next games, I don't recommend starting with Origins. The story might not make as much sense or be as impactful if you start at Dragon Age II or Inquisition but I think the overall gameplay will be a lot more fun for newcomers. I feel the same way about Mass Effect too; start at Mass Effect 2 it is so much better than the first.

Also I would recommend playing as a Rogue and putting your points into lockpicking. Nearly every chest in this game is locked and it is so frustrating, especially if you are a loot hoarder like me.

The story is amazing and the decisions you make are actually changing the plot. But the mechanics is really odd. I couldn't kill some enemies even on easy mode.