Review ‘Dragon Age: Inquisition’ From The Editor

Getting to an ideal point to write this review has been difficult, because it’s taken dozens of hours to see the whole game and most of that time has been sunk into the side quests. The game certainly has its ups and downs, and when I really think critically about a lot of the gameplay, its repetitions do really start to bother me. Despite its problems, Dragon Age has an engrossing story and engaging support characters that help you to overlook its occasional flaws.

In the midst of the Templar-Mage civil war that broke out at the end of the last game, a conclave is called to try to negotiate an end to the conflict. Choosing to play as one of several races and classes, you are present at the council  when a massive explosion opens a rift in the Veil, exposing Thedas to a demonic invasion. You are bestowed with the rather dubious gift of being able to close breaches in the Veil, and an Inquisition is declared to fix the breach and uncover who set these events in motion.

While Dragon Age II was a claustrophobic affair, Dragon Age: Inquisition gives players a Skryim-level of freedom, with vast areas to explore, all full of quests to complete, tombs to raid, and monsters to slay. It’s easy to get sidetracked from the main storyline, and that’s okay, because getting sidetracked is half the fun.

Each area has so many great little stories tucked away inside that you may play through the same area as someone else and yet have a very different experience. Plus, with the sweeping landscapes, incredible character detail, and fittingly haunting soundtrack, you’ll probably find yourself wandering around quite a bit out of pure curiosity.

As with most RPGs, you can expect to spend plenty of time locked in combat. Inquisition takes some of the best elements of the combat from the previous two entries and creates battles that are both immediate and strategic. You can control a single character at a time, striking with advantage through clever positioning or ability use, or you can switch to a more tactical view to command your entire party at once (something that’s pretty necessary given how stupid your AI-controlled party members can behave at times).

Whether you’re focused on the details with a lone hero or thinking more large-scale and strategically, combat is a joy. Enemies are smart and relentless, and DA:I offers clever players a variety of ways to create and seize the advantage thanks to your myriad of powerful, satisfying skills and flexible character progression system.

The game does have a few bugs. I didn’t find anything on the scale of Dragon Age II, but what I did find was irksome. The game quit on me a few times, and there were a few minor graphics issues. Those didn’t bother me as much as the tactical issues. There were numerous instances where I would try to select a different target in combat, only to end up continually swinging toward the same guy I was hitting before.

However, the tactical bugs are balanced out by the fact that the combat system basically keeps its kiddie gloves on, even at harder difficulties (dragon fights are the exception to this). Targets are auto-selected for you and your companions, and the only adjustments you need to make in the companion behaviors are on who to follow in attacking. Bioware talked about designing more tactical combat, and there is a tactical system here you can use. It continually felt clunky to me, though, and I did what I did in Dragon Age II: switch back and forth between characters as needed. But even that doesn’t happen all that often, as most fights are easy enough to be resolved by holding down the “R” key and throwing in an occasional skill.

The only time the game broke with this (thus far) has been a section in the Fade, where you are perpetually short of healing potions and the supply caches you find are few in number. Even that didn’t really count, however, because you have not one but two AI companions with you who are impossible to kill. My companions would eventually get knocked out in combat, but my lone survivor would simply stand back (at one point, for ten minutes while the other two finished the fight) and revive the others when the battle was finished.

In general, the difficulty curve is pretty low. Plenty of RPGs have this frustrating trope of attaching urgency to a quest where none exists: you can come back and complete just about anything at any point in the game. Likewise, the operations you can conduct have no cost associated to them apart from the time it takes to finish one. It would be nice to see a timer attached to this to give the plot some extra urgency and force the player to make some difficult decisions about which side-quests to chase. Not everybody would enjoy this and it would drive obsessive completionists a bit crazy, but it would make for a more immersive experience.

Character building is sort of a mixed bag. Your actual character development feels pretty limited between being a nice person or a tough person. The option to be evil is conspicuously missing, and there’s no track like many of the other Bioware games to see where you stand. That will likely bother people who want to count the points of approval to maximize their relationship, but I like the feeling of having to trust your instincts with your companions and what they want.