Dragon Age wrap up.

[atolnon]

I'm pretty self-conscious about venting, even on my own LJ - a place online that's basically synonymous with angsty complaints about things that nobody else cares about. So let's let that be, and move on.

I added Dragon Age : Awakening to the list of completed games a few days ago, which should free up a little time to devote to other things, like a convention costume and some writing I'm really close to completing. Katie's pressing me to begin Dragon Age II, but that's probably not going to happen until October. I had buckled and paid something like 15 bucks for some downloadable content - The Stone Prisoner, I guess. I really wasn't impressed.

I got one new dungeon and a character that I didn't need. Katie really liked it, so I know that there are people out there that are enthusiastic about this stuff, but I felt a little cheated. Awakening, on the other hand, was plenty of fun. I guess I played it for about 12 or 14 hours, and you can get through it in 10, but I felt for about the same amount of money that it was a much better deal. Generally, I feel like Bioware's been hitting its marks, even though I know I'm coming late to these parties and weighing in on things that people have already hashed out for ages now.

It's unlikely that I'll play it again, but I'll probably talk about it at least once more after I've thought about it for a little while.

So, I've been thinking about gaming for a while. Exalted, Changeling, running games, and playing in them. I've hit a block where I feel like writing my opinions on this stuff, no matter how much I think about it, is just totally spurious. I've always personally felt like role-playing can be a really great experience; it's not exactly like writing a text, but it's a form of telling a story and playing a game that's smashed together into something that's not just greater then the sum of its parts, but almost becomes something related but different then either of those things. Paying as close attention to role-playing as I did to writing feels natural to me, but these days I don't know if I'm really doing anything more then complaining and when we've got a world as fucked as we do now, I feel like as much relief as it can afford me, it might be so much misdirected effort.

Comments

[baronsamedi.livejournal.com]

Technically you get two dungeons and a village that may as well be a dungeon. Plus Shale was easily my favorite Origins character. I liked most of the Origins dlc, though Darkspawn Chronicles was the standout exception, it was terrible. And nothing wrong with coming in late IMHO. Just means the wiki is all filled out. ;)

I agree on a lot of what you say about roleplaying. The web has ample amounts of complaining though. I try to stay positive when I am posting now. It helps keep me positive. It means not commenting on some stuff, but while plenty of people are happy to hear I also liked,say, Geist, most people don't really care if I don't like Tribe 8, it just bugs those who do.

[atolnon.livejournal.com]

I pretty much got that DLC because I was currently doing the Orzammar quests in Origins and Shale adds depth to that. Once I had Shale I really liked her, but I was playing a Warrior already, and I had Oghrin, Sten, and Dog (aka Barkspawn), so my front lines were already pretty well populated at that point.

As an aside, I thought that controlling the party I didn't bring to the last battle as a side-combat was a terrific idea to use characters you're not currently fielding, and I wish games did that *all the time*.

When it comes to role-playing, I really don't want to spend a lot of time complaining, yeah. I really hear what you're saying about that. Basically, if I'm not bringing some ideas or constructive thoughts to the table, I'm keeping my mouth shut. XD