Game Information
Game Details |
|
Explore a vast, fantasy world at the brink of catastrophe in Dragon Age™: Inquisition, a next-generation action RPG, where your choices shape and drive the experience. In this upcoming video game from BioWare, makers of Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age: Origins, you'll make your mark in an expansive, story-driven open world filled with complex characters, challenging combat and difficult decisions.
A cataclysmic event has plunged the land of Thedas into turmoil. Dragons now darken the sky, casting a shadow of terror over a once-peaceful kingdom. Mages have broken into an all-out war against the oppressive Templars. Nations rise against one another. It falls to you to restore order as you lead the Inquisition and hunt down the agents of chaos - your choices will forever change the Dragon Age.
Dragon Age: Inquisition uses the spectacular Frostbite™ 3 engine to bring to life a vast and varied open world including ice-capped mountains, twisted marshes, and scorching deserts.
Choose and lead a group of characters into challenging, visually spectacular battles against a variety of enemies – from earth-shattering High Dragons to demonic forces from the otherworld of the Fade. Go toe-to-toe in visceral, heroic combat as your followers fight by your side, or switch to tactical view to coordinate devastating offensives using the combined might of your party.
See the tangible, visible results of your journey through a living world – raise structures, customize outposts, and change the landscape itself as environments are re-shaped in the wake of your Inquisition.
Lead a party chosen from nine unique, fully-realized characters – each of whom react to your actions and choices differently, forming complex relationships both with you and with each other.
Create your own character from multiple races, customize their appearance, and select their powers and abilities as the game progresses. Extensive customization options allow you to choose everything from the color of your follower's boots to the features of your Inquisition stronghold.
Become an agent of change in a time of uncertainty and upheaval. Shape the course of empires, bring war or peace to factions in conflict, and drive the ultimate fate of the Inquisition. Will you stop the cataclysmic anarchy gripping the Dragon Age?
The Grey Wardens and the Darkspawn
The Grey Wardens
At Weisshaupt fortress in the desolate Anderfels, a meeting transpired. Soldiers of the Imperium, seasoned veterans who had known nothing their entire lifetimes except hopeless war, came together. When they left Weisshaupt, they had renounced their oaths to the Imperium. They were soldiers no longer: They were the Grey Wardens. The Wardens began an aggressive campaign against the Blight, striking back against the darkspawn, reclaiming lands given up for lost. The Blight was far from over, but their victories brought notice, and soon they received aid from every nation in Thedas.
They grew in number as well as reputation. Finally, in the year 992 of the Tevinter Imperium, upon the Silent Plains, they met the Archdemon Dumat in battle. A third of all the armies of northern Thedas were lost to the fighting, but Dumat fell and the darkspawn fled back underground. Even that was not the end. The Imperium once revered seven gods: Dumat, Zazikel, Toth, Andorhal, Razikale, Lusacan, and Urthemiel. Four have risen as Archdemons. The Grey Wardens have kept watch through the ages, well aware that peace is fleeting, and that their war continues until the last of the dragon-gods is gone.
- From Ferelden: Folklore and History, by Sister Petrine, Chantry scholar
The Darkspawn
No one knows where the darkspawn come from. A dark mockery of men, in the darkest places they thrive, growing in numbers as a plague of locusts will. In raids, they will often take captives, dragging their victims alive into the Deep Roads, but most evidence suggests that these are eaten. Like spiders, it seems darkspawn prefer their food still breathing. Perhaps they are simply spawned by the darkness. Certainly, we know that evil has no trouble perpetuating itself.
The last Blight was in the Age of Towers, striking once again at the heart of Tevinter, spreading south into Orlais and east into the Free Marches. The plagues spread as far as Ferelden, but the withering and twisting of the land stopped well beyond our borders. Here, darkspawn have never been more than the stuff of legends. In the northern lands, however, particularly Tevinter and the Anderfels, they say darkspawn haunt the hinterlands, preying on outlying farmers and isolated villages, a constant threat.
- From Ferelden: Folklore and History, by Sister Petrine, Chantry scholar
Additional Information
Dragons Keep:Within the Dragon Age Keep, you'll be able to customize a Dragon Age historical world state to your exact specifications drawn from Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age II.
You will be able to transfer over the modifications you made to your Warden in Origins or your version of Hawke in DA II. Your companions and romances can be carried over, and who rose to power or succumbed to defeat will also be taken into account to determine the overall legacy you'll take into Dragon Age: Inquisition. All of your settings customised in the Keep will be imported into the new game, avoiding the issue of porting saves between current and next-gen consoles. Dragon Keep has been said to use the Cloud.
Gameplay
BioWare is planning on fusing elements of both earlier games in the series, Dragon Age Origins and Dragon Age 2, into the creation of Dragon Age: Inquisition. The game will feature larger environments with much more opportunity for exploration.
BioWare has confirmed that multiple playable races are returning, both female and male. Players can play as a Human, Dwarf, or Elf, additionally, Qunari are also playable.
The romance aspect of the game has been overhauled. As opposed to Bioware's previous gift and dialogue based system, romance will occur in reaction to events and variables specific to each character.
Players will be able to gain influence in areas of the world by capturing keeps or forts. This is achieved by defeating the occupants of the keep or fort. Once The Inquisition has a base in the area new areas, if applicable, will open up and become available to the player. These areas were blocked before such as by a hazardous gas. With the opening up of such areas players will not only be able to explore the whole of an area but will also be able to visit previously unreachable locations and side quests.
Inquisition will also feature two forms of combat system. The first is reminiscent of that found in most action-RPG's, including Dragon Age II. This system is action orientated and follows the player in a typical over-the-shoulder third person style. The second is closer to that of an old RPG, including Dragon Age: Origins. This combat system allows players to pause the game, assign locations and orders to the characters in their group and then resume the game to see it played out.
Player choice is said to play a large role in Inquisition because players control the leader of the Inquisition, The Inquisitor. This means that choices made by the player may close quests and whole areas off. Once such example would be the destruction of a village, which means that while this area can still be reached no associated content for that area can be accessed. This though works both ways as areas previously unreachable can be reached, such as capturing forts or keeps
Inquisition possesses a Skyrim-esque style compass bar across the upper section of the HUD. This navigation bar marks both discovered, visited locations and those that are yet to be found. Undiscovered locations appear with a ? on the navigation bar
Players are able to take control of any member of their party during battle and use each characters special abilities to aid them against particular types of enemies in battle.
As The Inquisitor players also decided how to deploy agents and troops of The Inquisition. This includes withdrawing from attacks by enemies.
The game features some destructibility, as players can destroy wooden bridges to help dispatch enemies quicker, gates, crates, etc. The various regions that make up the game world do not scale in level. They have a fixed level, which means players can be either too weak or strong for the enemies found in that region.
Multiplayer
Inquisition's story is an enormous, 200 hour commitment for completists, so BioWare wants multiplayer to work in short 20-30 minute bursts. Each of the three multiplayer campaigns available at launch randomly generates a large level comprised of smaller sections. you'll fight through five of 10 pre-designed areas in one go, each with distinct variables. Next time, you may see the same stage in a new spot, or an entirely different collection of arenas entirely, all with different enemy encounters, ideally making multiplayer missions replayable indefinitely.
Missions have a loose connection to the campaign, but the signature BioWare storytelling is reserved for single-player. “The campaign is a story about you, and your growth, and your Inquisition,” Creative Director Mike Laidlaw said, so there's little room for dialogue wheels in a group setting.
Multiplayer runs sort of parallel to the Inquisitor's story -- you're working for the Inquisitor, running behind-the-scenes Operations with a squad. “One of the things that came out of early explorations is that we wanted the multiplayer characters to be characters,” Laidlaw said. BioWare didn't want templatized, boring heroes lacking personalities. “They're kind of like mini followers, and they banter among themselves.”
Single-player is aiming for a smart marriage of narrative and gameplay systems. Multiplayer is pure, meant to attract role-playing junkies with a passion for loot, combat, and team-based battles in the gorgeous, brutal world of Dragon Age. After completing a multiplayer quest, you'll take home your found gold to spend on treasure chests, which include items such as item recipes, new equipment, potions, grenades, and salves of varying rarity. Some may even unlock a new hero or character skin. Nine heroes join Dragon Age: Inquisition's multiplayer roster at launch -- three for each mage/melee/archer class, each unique in their appearance, abilities, and characterization.
If you'd rather not grind, you can purchase Platinum, which is an “optional time saver” currency. “Nothing is behind a paywall,” Costa said. “We will never sell you an item.”
Like League of Legends' business model, you'll have to play plenty to earn enough for a prize, or you can pay outright to accelerate your unlocks.
The real-time combat doesn't allow for Inquisition's tactical camera, but instead requires careful coordination of magical buffs, timely heals, area-of-effect slows, damage-over-time grenades, and ranged-fire coverage as broadsword-wielding fighters assault enemies in an area.
Costa hopes fans “commit to a multiplayer service. That means lots of DLC, lots of new heroes and levels.” Service? Fortunately, BioWare isn't planning any sort of subscription or premium plan for additional multiplayer content. Costa said, “It's all free DLC for everyone.”
