This is an older game that I never got to experience until now, and I’m glad I did. It’s a world with deep lore and a great story to tell. It’s pretty clunky and took me a while to get running properly, but it has some great dialogue and solid gameplay systems, despite some difficulty tuning issues. If you’re wondering why people are still talking about it so many years after launch, let me tell you why.

The story follows you, which makes this a bit complicated to start. Depending on your race and class, your starting area changes. I usually choose mage in these types of games, so I started at the Circle of Magi. It’s essentially a training tower for magical people that is overseen by the Templars from the Chantry. After completing the initiation ritual, I was recruited by a group called the Grey Wardens to fight against the Blight and protect the land. As a new recruit, Alistair is assigned to work with you. He’s been a Warden for some time and he’s a great companion to learn from as he’s noble while also being an aloof comedian. You help the war effort around the camp and get to know your fellow Warden, before heading onto the battlefield to fight the Blight directly. (They’re basically twisted souls of men reborn into demonic creatures full of bloodlust.) It’s a relatively fast introduction accented by the death of the king from a betrayal within his army. You can easily tell that it’s going to happen as the guy just looks evil. There really wasn’t much emotional impact for me as I barely got to know him, but later on this is rectified if you come back to the area of his death. During this battle you fall as well, but you’re rescued by the witch of the woods and her daughter, Morrigan. Morrigan accompanies you and Alistair on a quest to gather the armies of Ferelden under a united banner to destroy the armies of the Blight once and for all. This is when the game opens up and you can tackle the tasks ahead of you in any order. Throughout your exploration of the world, you’ll come across humans,elves, dwarves, werewolves and sentient trees, all with their own stories to unravel. It’s a desperate situation as the Blight closes in and the only way to survive is to band together.Your mission is dire and I felt that urgency as I gathered reinforcements.

There’s a lot of decision-making to be done throughout the game. You choose dialogue options for every conversation that can wildly swing the outcome. It’s a complex system, but many choices you’ll need high persuasion to actually use. Speccing into it can seem like a waste of points but it really does come in handy. There’s a bit of a disparity between the levelling up system and the combat in this way as the only way to get experience is to kill stuff. If you avoid a fight through dialogue, you miss out on experience. It ultimately doesn’t matter though, because even on normal, the endgame is insanely hard. There are many layers to combat and as the game progresses, you’ll find that options you thought were optional, are not. There’s a tactical system here which is relatively deep for what I’ve seen. You can set a list of prioritizations for each member of your party based on specific conditions. An example would be, use the strongest health potion available when your health is below ten percent or when you’re surrounded by at least three enemies use your aoe ability. It’s wholly necessary to adjust these after the first third of the game or you will lose every battle. You can also take control of each character individually to queue up their actions manually while paused. It’s a tactical rpg with mmo combat, with the option to pause time. It’s a serviceable combat system, but the power scaling is way off. The end game fights were almost impossible for me and I had done almost every single quest in the game. It was infuriating at points as I reloaded saves about ten times per fight. It does enhance the feelings of desperation and overwhelming forces that the Blight has, but it was just annoying. When I did figure out a way through some fights, it was a relief but I didn’t feel like I accomplished anything and came away with more frustration than anything.

The game itself is very sincere overall. The dialogue and voice acting were way better than they have any right to be. Characters are complex and realistic, not blindly following your lead as the protagonist. They bite back and have their own motivations for working with or against you. The emotion in the delivery of every line helped me buy into the world wholeheartedly. Flemeth (Morrigan’s mother) was a standout for me as the voice actress really gave her all to the role despite not being a main character. All the party members, including the dlc character Shale, were all uniquely distinct and full of personality. Though most of the game I didn’t use Zevran, Liliana or Sten, when I did talk to them, they had some interesting things to say. I liked getting to know them and in an rpg, that’s a must, so they nailed it here.

Since everyone’s playthrough is going to be different on some levels, I can’t say how well you’ll enjoy it, but having a unique experience is severely underrated. There is some streamlining as there’s a clear story they wanted to tell though. It’s about overcoming social boundaries created by discrimination and generalization to band together against an overwhelming force. What brings people together like a common enemy? There’s a lot of politics here that adds layers to the societal structure. The motivations for the betrayal weren’t answered in my playthrough so I was unsatisfied there, but I still like the game overall. It’s because of how sincere they wrote the characters and the story they wanted to tell. It’s great because of its flaws and the various outcomes for different playthroughs. It’s unique and is a true example of how great writing can carry an experience. Despite combat that wore on me heavily by the end, I can say that this is one of the alltimers. For those that crave a deep rpg with carefully crafted lore in a medieval setting, this will knock your socks off.