Fans have been looking forward to what BioWare’s now callingDragon Age: Dreadwolfsince developers teased it at the end ofInquisition’sTrespasserDLC. However, seven years afterTrespasser’s release, many unanswered questions remain about the upcoming game. Among them is if and howDragon Age: Dreadwolfmight continue the tradition of Origin Stories.
While Origins were present in bothDragon Age: OriginsandDragon Age Inquisition, each game tackled them in very different ways, and some felt Inquisition’s Origins left much to be desired. Still, the original game’s fully playable prologues also represent a significant investment of time and money that developers might not consider worthwhile. Nevertheless, there are ways thatDragon Age: Dreadwolfmight improve onInquisition’s Originswithout breaking the bank.
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Origins in Dragon Age: Inquisition
Character Origins did not play as significant a role inDragon Age: Inquisitionas they did inOrigins, and it’s understandable why some fans were not impressed by this version of the feature. There is one each forDragon Age: Inquisition’s Elves, Dwarves, and the newly playable Qunari, with Humans getting either the Mage or Noble backstory. Instead of a playable prologue, players would get a brief summary of their character’s backstory followed by a short chain of War Table missions later in the game.
However, these Missions were easily missed, especially by anyone who wasn’t fond ofDragon Age: Inquisition’s War Table. Also, unlike otherchoices inDragon Age: Inquisition, the outcome of these missions don’t meaningfully impact the rest of the game, even when it seems like they should have. For example, the Elven Inquisitor’s entire clan can die during one ofInquisition’s War Table Missions, but it goes completely unremarked upon by them or any other main character. Limiting the Origin Stories to text boxes also makes them feel less important and personal than they did in the original game.
Origins in Dragon Age: Origins
Compared toInquisition, it’s easy to see why some might preferDragon Age: Origins’ playable prologues. The player’s choice ofDragon Age’s Races and Classesdetermined which of the six different opening chapters they could choose from. These prologues helped to establish various places, people, concepts, and plot points for later in the game, with each Origin having at least one point where it intersects with the main story. Players get Origin-specific dialogue during these scenes in addition to the added context provided by each of the six prologues. These origins stories are also great for role players since it gives them context to build their character’s personalities around.
However,Dragon Age: Origins’ approach also represents a lot of content that not every player will see. While BioWare can get away with reusing assets and sometimes entire locations for some of the Origins, it still takes time and money to code and record dialogue for each of them. Adding to that, 80% ofDragon Age: Originsplayers chose Human charactersaccording to a comment by formerDragon Age WriterDavid Gaider on the now-defunct BioWare Social Network. This implies that relatively few people experienced all six prologues. Thus, it may not make sense to devote so many resources to Origin Stories instead of working on other parts of the game.
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What Dragon Age: Dreadwolf Could Do
Assuming that a fully playable in-game prologue is off the table, there still are a few options that might allowDragon Age: Dreadwolfto improve uponInquisition’s Origins. In fact, some of these possibilities are things BioWare has already done with some of their earlier games.
The most straightforward option might be to followMass Effect’s lead. For those who don’t remember,Mass Effecthad players determine Shepard’s backstory by choosing a Pre-Service History and Psychological Profile during character creation. These would unlock and significantly alter certainside quests inMass Effect 1, all of which served to flesh out Shepard’s backstory. Developers could copy this system almost one-to-one inDragon Age: Dreadwolfby giving players one unique quest for each race and another based on the character’s class.
Alternatively, BioWare could get a bit more creative with how it incorporates Origins intoDragon Age: Dreadwolf’s prologue. For example,Obsidian Entertainment’s 2016 RPGTyrannyfeatured a unique interactive prologue where players made choices on a map of the game’s setting. This allowedTyranny’s introduction to cover a significant amount of time very quickly while letting players decide which choices their characters made at each junction. While this technique might suit some stories better than others, it is something developers could think about.
Dragon Age Keep May Hold The Answer
Other options might be to open the game with something likeMass Effect: GenesisorDragon Age: The Last Court.Genesiswas a comic-book style DLC forMass Effect 2that recapped the previous game’s events and let the player make important decisions from that game. Meanwhile,The Last Courtwas a text adventure fromSunless Seadeveloper Failbetter Games, which served as an official prologue toInquisition.
However,Dragon Age: Dreadwolf’s best bet might come from theDragon Age Keepwebsite. In addition to letting players record theirdecisions from across theDragon Agefranchise, it also featured an interactive animated short film narrated by the fan-favorite recurring character Varric. LikeME2’sGenesiscomic, it allowed players to make important decisions from the previous game. It wouldn’t be impossible for BioWare to create something similar that would function asDragon Age: Dreadwolf’s in-game prologue. Perhaps its artwork could take inspiration from in-universe artwork, such as the ancient Elven murals seen inTrespasserand featured heavily inDragon Age: Dreadwolf’s earlier promotional content.
Ideally,the upcomingDragon Age: Dreadwolfwould refer back to these decisions later in the game, perhaps even having origin-specific side quests. However, even on its own, aDragon Age Keep-inspired prologue might serve as a unique and memorable introduction to the game, especially for anyone coming toDragon Agefor the first time. If nothing else, it would be a significant improvement over howDragon Age: Inquisitionhandled its Origin Stories.
Dragon Age: Dreadwolfis in development.
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