Dragon Age Inquisition: News Update (November 2nd)

 

At long last the Dragon Age Keep beta has been opened up to the public and fans can finally discuss what the various choices will mean for DAI.  Rather than going through every single decision, I've grouped them up into edible slices below (if there's a desire from enough readers for a full breakdown, I shall attempt it).  A few broad observations: there are far more fiddly decisions from the DAO choices than DA2, which comes as no surprise given how linear the latter's narrative is.  Clearly many (most?) of these decisions are a matter of flavour, unlikely to have any reflection in DAI save for a codex entry or line of dialogue--that's not a criticism, as there's only so much optional content the devs could squeeze into the game.  It's worth noting that content was locked in May, but choices have continued being added to the Keep since, so there's material that might have no reflection at all in Inquisition.  Joe Juba goes through some of the choices via the link, and my thoughts on select elements are below.

 

Companions/romances: most of these choices are very elementary (recruited or not, alive or dead, etc), but there are a few that I find interesting.  The fact that Sten's sword is mentioned, a surprising detail compared to what isn't included for other companions, suggests that the current Arishok (as per the DA comics) could appear or have an indirect impact on the story.  The same could be said for Merrill in DA2, suggesting she could appear (as, indeed, has been speculated).  Finally, the question about making Tallis angry or not is an odd inclusion--a hint, perhaps, that she will appear or be referenced, since it's hard to see how else it could be relevant.

 

Redcliffe: I believe all of the choices will be reflected in the game, largely because we'll revisit the area.  There's a chance we'll even meet some or all of Bella, Bevin, Connor, and Valena (assuming they are alive in your world state--if not, references will presumably appear).

 

Orzammar/Brecilian Forest: these tiles include some seemingly extraneous questions and my feeling is that part of the reason for this is race-specific content (dwarf/elf).  The biggest head-scratcher is the Ironbark query, which is right up there with the Ostagar prisoner question.

 

Denerim: there are a lot of flavour-based questions here and I'm not quite sure how those will be incorporated into the storyline other than advisor-based missions.

 

DLC: there's very little depth to the questions associated with the DLC content, so while we know that the heart of Witch Hunt and Legacy have DAI story resonance, it does not appear the rest will have an impact.

 

DA2: a number of the flavour questions here I suspect are cues for dialogue with Varric, although it would be interesting to reconnect with Athenril, Javaris, Idunna, etc.

 

Final observations: Oghren is not included in the DAO companion page, which is likely an oversight--he appears in the Awakening tile.  The question of Wynne being alive or dead is a funny one, since in the canon she survives DAO, but dies in Asunder, so the question can only be flavour (this is somewhat similar to the option of having Leliana dead when she's our advisor in DAI).  The lack of depth in the Isabela questions makes me suspect she won't appear in-game (following that logic I'd have to say the same for Fenris, but take that assumption with a grain of salt).  Finally, some fans have speculated that only the choices narrated by Brian Bloom (Varric) are important, but I think that's far too simplistic--having Bloom narrate all choices would be cumbersome and the point of his dialogue is simply to guide people through the main storylines of both games (note he doesn't address the DLC at all, even though some of it we know impacts DAI).

 

I've seen fans suggest we see Iron Bull in both Storm Coast Demos, and for those wondering that idea comes from this sequence:

 

I'm convinced Bull is on the beach below.  The conclusion that this is where you recruit him seems logical (and given that this region has been called optional, then so is recruiting Iron Bull).

 

 

PAX Australia streamed some DAI over Twitch with Mike Laidlaw showing off the Hinterlands (where we learn it has 29 regions).  As per usual in these scenarios, conversations between Laidlaw and the host blot out most of the in-game conversations, but it's clear this is very early in the story and follows the quest we saw in the PC UI demo from a couple of weeks ago.

 

There was also a short return to the Storm Coast via yet another Twitch stream with Cameron Lee.  Not much new was shown, but Lee did say that the world master system populates locations based on what's relevant to where you are in the story.  We also got to hear Sera mocking Vivienne's uppity attitude, and witness another party-wipe (Lee needs to stick to normal difficulty).  One irritant was that the game sound was so loud it periodically made Cameron's commentary inaudible.

 

 

Mike Laidlaw showed off crafting at PAX Australia, with no new information except for some of the visuals.

 

Freddie Prinze Jr was on a podcast and talked a bit about Iron Bull and DAI (31:30-42:00).  There are no spoilers, but it's fun listening to the enthusiastic Freddie talk about his character (particularly enjoying some ad libs he was allowed to make).

 

The DAI soundtrack has been unveiled and the tracks have a number of spoilers I won't get into here (it's a bit too much for my tastes).

 

It almost goes without saying, but DAI has officially gone gold.

 

With less than three weeks before release we can look forward to at least one more trailer and an avalanche of reviews (not to mention EA Early Access).  It will be interesting to see how much more the devs choose to show off before players get their hands on the game.

 

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)