Dragon Age IV

[Razosh]

Greetings everyone, today I'd like to talk about an interest I've had for quite a while. My favorite game of all time is Dragon Age: Origins and if there's anything I love it is making theories about the lore of video games that I adore. The theory I will make today is what main protagonist and story we will follow in Dragon Age IV.

So first thing we need to check out is what big events happened during Dragon Age: Inquisition and see if we can find any clue as too what protagonist and organization we will follow. To do that we must first see what main event occurred, first we had the conclusion to the mage-templar war and while I think the aftermath of that will play a big part in Dragon Age IV but it wont be the core of it. Second we have the decision of whom you want to put on the throne of Orlais, Celene, Gaspard or Briala. This story-line I feel more could be the prelude to the main theme of Dragon Age IV but I don't believe it to be the most likely. Third we have the decisions to either let Hawke or the warden commander (either Loghain, Allistair or Stroud.) Fourth we have the the decision on whether you want to banish or keep the grey wardens in southern Theadas.

So in conclusion the four major factions that are touched in Dragon Age Inquisition (aside from the Inquisition of course) are the Templars, the Circle of Magi, the Empire of Orlais and the Gray Wardens. Of these I think that the Wardens have the most ground to stand on. First of all we have the fact that they played a huge part in Inquisition and their story felt as it was building up to something and the only other major faction that had that feel to it was the Empire of Orlais. There are however a few key differences that makes me believe that the Grey Wardens will be the faction we'll play as. First of all we have the fact that you as a player will never be able to climb to the top of the Empire while in all the previous three games you were always at the top eventually. In Origins you could get half an infinity of titles at the same time, for example my main Kallian Tabris became Warden-Commander of Ferelden, the Bann of the Alienage, Champion of Redcliff and Hero of Ferelden. In Dragon Age II you were the most important person in all of Kirkwall and in Inquisition your inquisition spread through the entire chantry and one of your employees even became the divine. In the same fashion I would believe that you would climb to the top of the Empire and if you were to play as a Talvashoth, dwarf or elf that would be virtually impossible and would probably feel shoe-horned in. The third reason and biggest reason I believe that the Wardens will be the center of the next game is because in the 42nd year of the Dragons Age a clutch of thirteen griffon eggs were found in the Anderfells. The Anderfells is also the location of the Wardens headquarters where the banished Wardens were sent by the inquisitor if you banish them in Inquisition. The forth and final reason we have to why my main suspect are the Wardens is because if the Warden (the main character in Origins) survived the events of Origins she/he went out to look for a cure for the blight that the Wardens suffer. It has in addition been said by the developers that this is a quest of vital importance.

So to summarize it all I believe that the Wardens will be the main focus is because their story has been built up in Inquisition, in it you would play the leading role, a clutch of griffon eggs were found and the Warden is looking to cure the blight. I would also in addition like to say this out of personal preference that I would love to see having the option to have the Warden as a main character again.

So what did you think of my theory, did you like it, do you agree with me or do you believe someone else will be the lead of Dragon Age IV?

 

[WhiteFang]

a clutch of griffon eggs

I want a griffon.YASH!

I would also in addition like to say this out of personal preference that I would love to see having the option to have the Warden as a main character again.

That makes two of us,it felt awesome in DA:O to be a badass slayer of monsters who has no fear.You really felt like a hero.

So what did you think of my theory, did you like it, do you agree with me or do you believe someone else will be the lead of Dragon Age IV?

I sense some truth in your theory and I personally like it but somehow I can't see it working out.I can't recall if there is something major happening at the moment which a warden could play a large roll in.Unless they make it like 20 years after Inquisition and something else is happening

 

[Razosh]

I want a griffon.YASH!


That makes two of us,it felt awesome in DA:O to be a badass slayer of monsters who has no fear.You really felt like a hero.


I sense some truth in your theory and I personally like it but somehow I can't see it working out.I can't recall if there is something major happening at the moment which a warden could play a large roll in.Unless they make it like 20 years after Inquisition and something else is happening

Alright lets speak about villains I believe the next villain (and I know I said this for Inquisition too) but I believe it will be one of the Great Dragons awoken by Yavana. Now the question is how would one fight a Great Dragon one would need aerial access, who are the only ones with access to aerial combat? The Grey Wardens.

 

[WhiteFang]

The Grey Wardens.

......on griffons!

 

[Razosh]

......on griffons!

Yep, assume a Great Dragon awekens, that creature is going to probably have a power equal to or greater than Old Gods of Tervinter and there is only one character that by canon lore has defeated such a foe, the Warden.

 

[Shar Dundred]

Might be just me, but after Inquisition, I'm having real doubts about BioWare's competence to create a decent game. I'm already pretty scared that Mass Effect IV will suck as hell.
BioWare lost my trust (might or might not be EAs fault, I dunno, seems a bit too easy blaming the publisher only, I blame both) on making good games.
I think I'll rather stick with the old games.

 

[Razosh]

Might be just me, but after Inquisition, I'm having real doubts about BioWare's competence to create a decent game. I'm already pretty scared that Mass Effect IV will suck as hell.
BioWare lost my trust (might or might not be EAs fault, I dunno, seems a bit too easy blaming the publisher only, I blame both) on making good games.
I think I'll rather stick with the old games.

I agree from a gameplay point of view the quality of Dragon Age has decreased for every game but I love the story still, especially in Inquisition.

 

[WhiteFang]

IMO the only thing that improved in Dragon Age is the graphics since that's all gaming is about these days.People don't appreciate good story or gameplay anymore

 

[Shar Dundred]

@Razosh: I will write a more detailed version of my thoughts about the story tomorrow. Short foreword: I can understand and respect that tastes are different. I don't like the story anymore.

@WhiteFang: It's a shame, really. But I consider Origins graphics better than DA2. To me, DA2 locked worse (not to mention the constant re-use of the areas.. What idiot had that idea anyway?)

 

[WhiteFang]

not to mention the constant re-use of the areas.

Yeah that was just stupid.Really made the game feel rushed.But then again,the entire game felt rushed

 

[Budbuds]

Everyone should have played it by now but just incase.

Spoilers Maybe

I think the next game will take place around the Tevinter Imperium or will at least be part of the game world. The Anderfells aren't too far from there (Grey Warden HQ) if its not just one open world in DA4. I would like it to be like Fallout 4 but better in the story, like you can choose a faction to follow (Grey Wardens, Magisters, etc). For the games main enemy, I'm going to say either Fen'Harel or one of the last two Arch Demons. I would like to see both since the ending of the last dlc with Fen'Harel and I want to see more darkspawn and deep roads. I could go on forever.

I've spent like 300 hours playing Inquisition this past year and I haven't played the earlier two but I have watched playthroughs and read a lot about them so I know what happened. If I wasn't working on "Azeroth: Fires of War" I would do a map that's like a hybrid of Wow and DA.

 

[Dr Super Good]

So in a game where Dragons are bad guys suddenly Griffons would be good? I have a feeling that being monsters they will fall into alliance with the "evil" side just so you have more monsters to slay. Welcome to pointless killing RPGs!

 

[WhiteFang]

In the lore of Dragon Age griffons were used by the grey wardens for a long time

 

[Shar Dundred]

The following post contains heavy spoilers about Dragon Age 2 and Dragon Age: Inquisition. If you haven't played these games yet and don't want to get spoiled, don't read this post.

@Razosh: I will write a more detailed version of my thoughts about the story tomorrow. Short foreword: I can understand and respect that tastes are different. I don't like the story anymore.

Alright, here we go. Just gonna talk about the story and not all the other things I didn't like.

Dragon Age 2

Personally I found Dragon Age 2's story very, very, very bad.
Let's start with the story itself before I get to the characters. You are a survivor from Ferelden, trying to create a new life in the Free Marshes. Your uncle has, of course, lost everything valuable, so you gotta rebuild your family's wealth. The concept *could* be interesting, but it's not in this case. You run around, do stuff, fight scum, run into new characters until you got enough done to start the expedition. After that expedition, you're like the errand boy for basicly EVERYONE in that damn city. Have I mentioned that I don't like that city you're playing in the whole game while in Origins you could run around in a whole freaking kingdom? No? I loath that city, it's boring and repetitive running around there. Then everything gets screwed up because one of your companions is a retarded idiot! But I'll get to the characters later. Then, no matter what you choose to do, you got to kill the leaders of both fighting factions since both are insane and then it's over. The ending was just BAD.
And don't even get me started talking about the DLC crap.

So, now the characters:
- Hawke: Hawke himself was one of the most uninteresting and unepic characters I ever had to play. I admit, I found it kinda annoying that I was forced to play human while I could choose the race in the other games, but that was not THAT bad. What WAS bad, however, was his character. When he was peaceful, he was boring, when he was funny, most of his jokes - not all, I admit, but MOST - were bad. The aggressive Hawke wasn't any interesting either. I was really glad when I was done with the game and didn't have to play Hawke ever again. A game with bad main character has a very hard time from story perspective. I played DA2 only once and I will never ever play it again or install it anywhere.
- Anders: I remembered that guy from Awakening. He was sometimes funny back there, but I didn't like him back there nevertheless. Now he came back, combined with Justice (what have they done to good ol' Justice?!) and turned emo. He was crying around about unfairness and that crap all the time and wouldn't shut up, no matter what I said. I don't regret one bit that I killed him when I got my chance to do so.
- Aveline: That she-hulk she-male thing is pretty obviously annoying. Only good thing I can say about her, is that she plays her role as non-selfish and helpful guard pretty well. Also, she did me the favor to punch Hawke for me, something I will never be able to repay.
- Bethany: Completely uninteresting character.
- Carver: Unintersting character who was annoying me with his existance most of the time. At least that's what I got from him, he died pretty soon in my only playthrough, but as far as I know, he remains like that.
- Fenris: First off: He's an elf and I hate elves. However, this one was very special. That means that he was even MORE annoying than the usual elf. The wannabe-cool guy Fenris who, for some reason unknown to me, actually has fans. Urgh, the guy was a pure emo annoyance. What the hell is wrong with Dragon Age 2 that so many characters behave like emos? I mean, in Dragon Age: Origins they'd have much more the reason to be like that and they still weren't crying around all the time. It was a real pleasure sending him back into slavery.
- Isabela: Well, what do we have here? A minor character from Origins! I think many romanced her over other characters (I want to use this moment to say that I didn't like the games romance options...) because she was the most flirty one. But seriously, she behaves pretty much like a slut. Dunno about you, but I'd be afraid to get quite a few sexual illnesses from her. I wanted to give her to the Qunari because she was stabbing me and I don't appreciate people doing that. Too bad I missed my chance on that one.
- Merril: Yay, an naive elf, who also appeared in Origins! What a surprise! Seriously, she was like an annoying child - and no, that didn't make her sweet or lovely, it made her just annoying. Also, another emo character, yay!
- Varric: He was the ONLY character that didn't want me to quit playing when I heard him talk. He was pretty good written and voiced, it was the only logical decision that he'd be the one to return in Inquisition as character - despite the story, I mean.
- Sebastian: Self-righteuos bastard annoying me with his preaches all the time. Church characters can be quite good characters (i. e. Leliana), even if they can be annoying at times, but this one was not. He was just annoying.
- Tallis: A minor DLC character with almost no character. Just an attempt to create a funny character - obviously a failure.

Overall, I was glad when it was over. The only thing that made me keep going, was the thought that there'd be a Dragon Age 3 one day. The most fun I had with that game was uninstalling it.

Dragon Age: Inquisiton

So, Inquisiton had a a better story than Dragon Age 2, but let's be honest, that wasn't hard at all. You're the Inquisitor who has to save the world from the demons and that ancient Tevinter mage from one of the Dragon Age 2 DLCs.
I have to admit, I don't have that much to complain about the story as in Dragon Age 2. I guess that's because after Dragon Age 2 I felt like I was in heaven in comparison. However, it can't catch up with Origins. It feels very, very mediocre at times. The gameplay watered every story aspect down for me. While I think that huge areas to play in can be fun, I was so damn busy with running around and gathering shit in that game, I was just banging my head against the wall at some point. Seriously, I stopped doing any Side Quests at some point and just went on to the game's final because I was so sick of it. Witcher 3 did this a good way, Inquisition failed.

I will just give a short opinion about the characters here since, unlike in DA2 they didn't make me want to throw up at every dialogue (Well, Solas was kinda going on my nerves a lot, but still far from being as annoying as Anders in DA2). They're all okay, but not superb. Sure, Iron Bull is funny and Sera is nuts, but that's basicly it.

Overall, Inquisition was better, storywise, than DA2 (as I said, not hard, even C&C games could do that) but still not really good. In the beginning I thought the game could be GREAT, but then I slowly realized that it wasn't.
I only played it once and only watched videos about the DLCs instead of playing them myself. No idea why I bought them in the first place when I didn't even play them.
I started a second playthrough, but eventually stopped when I reached the first big area and I doubt I will ever finish that or another one.

I don't know, I just feel like the series went into a completely wrong direction after Origins and Awakening and didn't really get back. I'm really not optimistic about a Dragon Age 4, a Mass Effect 4 or whatever other game. I used to play SW:TOR sometimes (Yes, throw stones at me) and had to witness what BioWare did to the gameplay & story there not too long ago. Both was never that good, but even that has been messed up completely.
BioWare lost my trust, that's why I'm highly suspicious of every game they're going to create.

 

[TheLordOfChaos201]

I believe in the new dragon age game we will get to play as the blight. why? the simple fact is that they are the only faction that hasn't been played. the wardens are too strong and generally as a player you play on the loosing side.

we will be the blight and as the blight we must decide whether to destroy all man kind, run and hid or try and form a fragile agreement of peace with the stronger humans we have been killing all these centuries.

my source is dragon age origins: warden expansion pack. the blight are revealed to be more then just mindless animals.

 

[Eagle XI]

Dragon Age 2

Personally I found Dragon Age 2's story very, very, very bad.
Let's start with the story itself before I get to the characters. You are a survivor from Ferelden, trying to create a new life in the Free Marshes. Your uncle has, of course, lost everything valuable, so you gotta rebuild your family's wealth. The concept *could* be interesting, but it's not in this case. You run around, do stuff, fight scum, run into new characters until you got enough done to start the expedition. After that expedition, you're like the errand boy for basicly EVERYONE in that damn city. Have I mentioned that I don't like that city you're playing in the whole game while in Origins you could run around in a whole freaking kingdom? No? I loath that city, it's boring and repetitive running around there. Then everything gets screwed up because one of your companions is a retarded idiot! But I'll get to the characters later. Then, no matter what you choose to do, you got to kill the leaders of both fighting factions since both are insane and then it's over. The ending was just BAD.
And don't even get me started talking about the DLC crap.

So, now the characters:
- Hawke: Hawke himself was one of the most uninteresting and unepic characters I ever had to play. I admit, I found it kinda annoying that I was forced to play human while I could choose the race in the other games, but that was not THAT bad. What WAS bad, however, was his character. When he was peaceful, he was boring, when he was funny, most of his jokes - not all, I admit, but MOST - were bad. The aggressive Hawke wasn't any interesting either. I was really glad when I was done with the game and didn't have to play Hawke ever again. A game with bad main character has a very hard time from story perspective. I played DA2 only once and I will never ever play it again or install it anywhere.
- Anders: I remembered that guy from Awakening. He was sometimes funny back there, but I didn't like him back there nevertheless. Now he came back, combined with Justice (what have they done to good ol' Justice?!) and turned emo. He was crying around about unfairness and that crap all the time and wouldn't shut up, no matter what I said. I don't regret one bit that I killed him when I got my chance to do so.
- Aveline: That she-hulk she-male thing is pretty obviously annoying. Only good thing I can say about her, is that she plays her role as non-selfish and helpful guard pretty well. Also, she did me the favor to punch Hawke for me, something I will never be able to repay.
- Bethany: Completely uninteresting character.
- Carver: Unintersting character who was annoying me with his existance most of the time. At least that's what I got from him, he died pretty soon in my only playthrough, but as far as I know, he remains like that.
- Fenris: First off: He's an elf and I hate elves. However, this one was very special. That means that he was even MORE annoying than the usual elf. The wannabe-cool guy Fenris who, for some reason unknown to me, actually has fans. Urgh, the guy was a pure emo annoyance. What the hell is wrong with Dragon Age 2 that so many characters behave like emos? I mean, in Dragon Age: Origins they'd have much more the reason to be like that and they still weren't crying around all the time. It was a real pleasure sending him back into slavery.
- Isabela: Well, what do we have here? A minor character from Origins! I think many romanced her over other characters (I want to use this moment to say that I didn't like the games romance options...) because she was the most flirty one. But seriously, she behaves pretty much like a slut. Dunno about you, but I'd be afraid to get quite a few sexual illnesses from her. I wanted to give her to the Qunari because she was stabbing me and I don't appreciate people doing that. Too bad I missed my chance on that one.
- Merril: Yay, an naive elf, who also appeared in Origins! What a surprise! Seriously, she was like an annoying child - and no, that didn't make her sweet or lovely, it made her just annoying. Also, another emo character, yay!
- Varric: He was the ONLY character that didn't want me to quit playing when I heard him talk. He was pretty good written and voiced, it was the only logical decision that he'd be the one to return in Inquisition as character - despite the story, I mean.
- Sebastian: Self-righteuos bastard annoying me with his preaches all the time. Church characters can be quite good characters (i. e. Leliana), even if they can be annoying at times, but this one was not. He was just annoying.
- Tallis: A minor DLC character with almost no character. Just an attempt to create a funny character - obviously a failure.

Overall, I was glad when it was over. The only thing that made me keep going, was the thought that there'd be a Dragon Age 3 one day. The most fun I had with that game was uninstalling it.

The story was entirely rail-road, it didnt give the player any real choice at all.
There are outways other than what the ending offers, its just the game doesnt even allow the main character to even think about it.
DA2 felt to me like gaming tabletop with an bad GM that is only interested in seeing others playing his story, but nothing else.
The way the combat had been redone was inferior to DA1, it had became all about brute force Leeroying and having enough potions to chugg instead executing carefully planned assaults.
There was no real thrill to it, i mean think about the hard fight you had first time you have encountered a dragon in DA1 in the mountains, and then remember how the dragon was only an optional side boss in DA2 that gets slain so easy, with adds being the -perhaps- only challenge in the encounter, as they can snare your freeze-stun casters. Otherwise its just hack on it till it falls over.

 

[Shar Dundred]

Totally agreed.

 

[TheLordOfChaos201]

The best DA game by far was Dragon age origins: awakening.

you as a gamer just felt far more powerful and in control. you got to make major choices and even were allowed 3 alternate endings. I do remember one choice making absolutely no effect to game play, which was deciding where your army guards(made absolutely no difference to game play, heck I didn't even see any of my guards.)

still it was the damn best DA game. I still wish you could play all the DA games with 1 character. I mean they could have just made your origins character immortal. a magical elf could have cursed you with immortality just like that danish keeper.

still I mainly wish they created a world editor type deal for that game. I wanted cooler abilities and more tournaments... there weren't enough tournaments where I could prove my glorious unstoppable strength of Chaos!

I still remember in awakening one of the soldiers asked if I need help in defending the castle and I was presented with 2 options.

yes help me.

No, defend the castle. The Blight will fall before my might!!!!

perfect game!

 

[Razosh]

Alright so lets talk about the games, first of all we have Origins which is an absolute 10/10 in my opinion I could go on and on about the good parts about Origins and to be honest the only downside I would be able to mention is that mages are quite overpowered in that game. That's pretty much it as far as serious complaints go.

Second we have Dragon Age II which in my opinion is the perfect personification of an average. The gameplay is average, the story is average and the companions are average. The gameplay is copied and re-skinned from origins which in my opinion gave it a really solid set of legs to stand on sadly it was ruined by enemies that jumped out of nowhere so that was average. The story was average, it was a very interesting theme the templar-mage conflict but it felt that your actions regarding the mage-templar conflict made little difference, though otherwise it performed quite well in making it seem like many things mattered. The companions were also average in my opinion we had some good like Varric, Isabela and Bethany, some awful like Fenris and Carver and then the others who were average like Merill, Aveline and Anders. To summarize it Dragon Age is a perfect example of a 5/10 game and overall just a "meh" experience. If someone asked me if it wasted my time I would say no, if they'd ask me if it's something I'd recommend to someone who hasn't played Origins I would say not really.

Dragon Age Inquisition on the other hand had an awful game play, I mean really not my taste. The story on the other hand was epic, we had more companions, we had eight companions in Origins compared to nine companions and three advisors in Inquisition. The party banter in Inquisition spans 5 ½ hours plus the extra half hour of advisor banter compared to Origins 3 hours and 40 minutes of party banter. We in addition had more interesting companions in Inquisition in my opinion such as Iron Bull who was noticeably more interesting than Sten. Lelliana and Morrigan in addition I felt were much more developed and less one sided than before. (especially Morrigan) I am going to give it to Origins though, no villain has ever been better than Loghain but one better antagonist I don't feel make up for so many good characters. (Although I never liked Vivienne.)

As for tips on how to improve game-play I think that what really made Origins story popular was that it had no voice actor which allowed the characters to give a wide variety of dialog for the voice actor that Mass Effect and the later Dragon Age games didn't. Also in Dragon Age II it still bewilders me why they didn't use Velanna without Justice rather than Anders, she feels like she could associate much more with so many characters not least of all Merill.

 

[Budbuds]

Alright so lets talk about the games, first of all we have Origins which is an absolute 10/10 in my opinion I could go on and on about the good parts about Origins and to be honest the only downside I would be able to mention is that mages are quite overpowered in that game. That's pretty much it as far as serious complaints go.

Second we have Dragon Age II which in my opinion is the perfect personification of an average. The gameplay is average, the story is average and the companions are average. The gameplay is copied and re-skinned from origins which in my opinion gave it a really solid set of legs to stand on sadly it was ruined by enemies that jumped out of nowhere so that was average. The story was average, it was a very interesting theme the templar-mage conflict but it felt that your actions regarding the mage-templar conflict made little difference, though otherwise it performed quite well in making it seem like many things mattered. The companions were also average in my opinion we had some good like Varric, Isabela and Bethany, some awful like Fenris and Carver and then the others who were average like Merill, Aveline and Anders. To summarize it Dragon Age is a perfect example of a 5/10 game and overall just a "meh" experience. If someone asked me if it wasted my time I would say no, if they'd ask me if it's something I'd recommend to someone who hasn't played Origins I would say not really.

Dragon Age Inquisition on the other hand had an awful game play, I mean really not my taste. The story on the other hand was epic, we had more companions, we had eight companions in Origins compared to nine companions and three advisors in Inquisition. The party banter in Inquisition spans 5 ½ hours plus the extra half hour of advisor banter compared to Origins 3 hours and 40 minutes of party banter. We in addition had more interesting companions in Inquisition in my opinion such as Iron Bull who was noticeably more interesting than Sten. Lelliana and Morrigan in addition I felt were much more developed and less one sided than before. (especially Morrigan) I am going to give it to Origins though, no villain has ever been better than Loghain but one better antagonist I don't feel make up for so many good characters. (Although I never liked Vivienne.)

As for tips on how to improve game-play I think that what really made Origins story popular was that it had no voice actor which allowed the characters to give a wide variety of dialog for the voice actor that Mass Effect and the later Dragon Age games didn't. Also in Dragon Age II it still bewilders me why they didn't use Velanna without Justice rather than Anders, she feels like she could associate much more with so many characters not least of all Merill.

I agree with your statements on DAO and DA2.

Spoilers Maybe

In my opinion Corypheus could have been such a good character in DAI but they had to just make him as evil as possible and make us forget how he was in the DA2 dlc.

I wish Anders could have made an appearance somewhere if you let him live, do to the Mage/Templar conflict still going on.
Also I enjoyed the combat in DAI, it was fluid and there was plenty of variety for me, I played all 3 classes which is why I have 300 hours or more in the game do to each playthrough being 100+
I did Knight Enchanter on the mage but reloaded and did Rift do to it just being so boring.
My Warrior was a Templar and the rogue was tempest and I enjoyed both of them.
That is all my opinion so what exactly about the gameplay made you dislike it?

 

[Zwiebelchen]

My favorite game of all time is Dragon Age: Origins

... and Jesus wept.


Just kidding... I liked DA:O, it's just that I was so hyped on this (as it was marketed as the "spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate II") and when the game finally released, it was kind of a disappointment because nothing about it felt BG'ish to me.

 

[Razosh]

... and Jesus wept.

If you want good fantasy you should read LotR, not the bible. ;D

Just kidding... I liked DA:O, it's just that I was so hyped on this (as it was marketed as the "spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate II") and when the game finally released, it was kind of a disappointment because nothing about it felt BG'ish to me.

If that was your aspiration I can see how it could be dissapointing.

 

[TheLordOfChaos201]

oblivion was still a better game then both, morrow would be even better buy that game play was bloody annoying