Customer Reviews

Dragon Age: Origins Awakening

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(19)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Dragon Age: Origins was a real treat for me. I was absolutely absorbed by the lore Bioware created for it, and instantly fell in love with the characters with whom I eventually traveled Ferelden. On the whole, I almost liked it BETTER than even MASS EFFECT 2, because I felt like I was playing out MY story, not Shepard's story. That's a feeling I've not had since KotOR. But, similarly to KotOR, the production values of DRAGON AGE: ORIGINS felt last generation, which hindered the experience in many ways.

So, I was surprised to hear about this expansion so soon after the main game's release. I mean...when I first heard about this at the beginning of the year: barely two months after DA:O came out. I was concerned that this was just going to be a moneygrab by Bioware/EA, since...who has ever made an expansion that quickly? (Maybe EVERQUEST). Additionally, though Bioware have proven that they are the best at creating absorbing story/character-driven video games, they absolutely suck at DLC. (Pinnacle Station RAGE!)

Is this expansion worth buying? That's difficult for me to say. Hopefully my experience will help you make up your mind.

Chances are very good that this expansion will not snugly sync up with your ending from the main game. In my case, I had made it pretty clear to everyone that I was going to leave with Zevran to track down Morrigan. Then, I begin DA:O - AWAKENING to discover that I had apparently changed my mind and decided to become a commander of the Crown's army. A small scene to show how my character was drawn back into the fray would have solved this, but this is just one of many instances where your decisions from the last game have almost no effect on this storyline. (And to the poor souls who began the game wearing nothing but their underwear: my condolences.)

This was a major downer, and I am very disappointed that Bioware didn't put a little more time (god knows Bioware fans are used to the long development cycles by now) to make the transition much easier. Don't even get me started on the import system. It's not as fine-tuned as that of MASS EFFECT 2; it takes data from your last save point. I had started up an old save at some point on DA:O, so I began AWAKENING with my character at level 17. It was an hour before I had realized what had happened. EDIT: Just so there's no confusion, I was able to open up an "advanced" menu and select the right save file, but words cannot communicate the frustration involved with immediately replaying that bit again.

But that's not to say I hated this game; I enjoyed the story in AWAKENING and I REALLY enjoyed the new characters. At times, it felt like the best parts of DA:O. In addition to this, some new talents and specializations, a higher level cap and, finally, someplace to store equipment: I was a happy camper for a while. I also enjoyed having the opportunity to rule Amaranthine, and I wish that Bioware had expanded upon this a bit more. Carrying out prisoner sentencing in a fantasy setting has to be one of the coolest features ever.

On "normal" difficulty, getting all (but one) of the achievements, and completing almost every quest in the game, I enjoyed just over 13 hours of gameplay.

Was it worth $40? No, probably not. I think anyone who has reservations about this expansion should trust their instincts and wait for the price to drop. Bioware really should have taken the price down to justify the content, rather than place it at $40 and keep people like myself wondering why there isn't more. I don't exactly feel cheated, since I really did enjoy the expansion, but I paid just as much for the first 4 expansions of FALLOUT 3 and those actually felt like EXPANSIONS. DRAGON AGE: ORIGINS - AWAKENING feels like an episode: almost completely isolated from the last game in terms of both content and story.

There is much that can be loved in this "expansion" for fans of DRAGON AGE, but this should be a very clear example to Bioware of why some gamers insist on buying their video games used.

I had high hopes for this after giving an absurd amount of hours of my life to DA:O. Admittedly, my expectations may have been raised by the wonderful Mass Effect 2, which managed to import almost all your plot decisions from the first game over. Here however, there is hardly any connection to the story in the first one. Not only that, your DLC gear from Warden's Keep, the Stone Prisoner and even the Blood Dragon Armor that came with the game won't transfer over! They did somehow let you keep Return to Ostagar gear. Now this alone wouldn't be so bad, except, you start the game in your underwear if you were wearing DLC gear! I don't mean you wake up at camp in your undies. I mean you are trekking down the road, ready to battle, wearing a diaper! Even if you can look past this, there are numerous import issues people are having regarding stats, spells and talents. In some cases people are missing half their talents. The blood powers you got from Warden's Keep show up in your talent list, but when you try to use them, nothing actually happens.

It is clear this product was hastily rushed to release with minimal quality control. Not only that, but the lack of connection to the original story makes it seem like this was a cheap cash grab on the part of EA/Bioware. They didn't put the same love and care into it as they did with the original game. Compared to any other Bioware game or expansion, this is by far the worst, and easily the biggest letdown. If you can stomach how much your decisions from DA:O are basically disregarded, and can get past the first 40 minutes of ridiculous, inconsistencies and poor storytelling, there is actually a decent adventure in there. However, it does not live up to the greatness of the original and is not worth the $40 pricetag. I would wait several months until the price drops, and then try it out. If you want to enjoy this, lower your expectations. It is best to think of it as a "non-canonical" spinoff than a true expansion.

I am a long time Bioware fan and loyal customer. I have bought everyone of their games since Baldur's Gate. But the poor quality of this release may just do it for me. Perhaps EA is to blame, but I feel Bioware should be ashamed to have their company name on this clearly inferior product.

I have to admit that based on the somewhat lackluster bang-for-your-buck pricing of Dragon Age's downloadable quests, I was a bit hesitant to drop $40 on an expansion that according to some reports could be done in under 10 hours. As a big fan of Bioware and Bethesda games, I expect a solid amount of gameplay for my money, and the DLC just wasn't delivering.

But here my fears were unfounded. A solid 20 hours of fun later, I wrapped up Awakening having enjoyed a full-fledged and very enjoyable Bioware experience. An experience that can change next time around thanks to story choices that impact the game, adding even more bang for your buck.

That's not bad at all for a $40 expansion.

Adding to my fun was importing my character from Origins and watching as he climbed to godlike levels of power, with equipment that would make the archdemon weep with fear. Awesome.

If you're already a fan of Dragon Age or Bioware you know the gist of how their games work. RPG, moral choices, yada yada yada. So let's just cut to the chase and throw out some pros and cons:

CONS:
The beginning and ending are both a bit abrupt; you're plunged right in with a too-brief intro, and the game ends two seconds after the final battle.

You don't see enough of former allies (the one cameo is from my least favorite character). After spending 60 hours with them, I'd like to have seen them again.

A few bugs made at least one quest impossible for me to finish.

Some "new" monsters are just old monsters with new colors. Didn't palette-swapping die in the 16-bit era?

The elf chick was a total dud of a character.

PROS:
Some great new characters; Anders is a new favorite, and the new dwarf rocks.

Solid story that adds a lot to the world's mythology. Door is wide open to sequels, yet this story here feels self-contained, too.

Cool new creatures keep things varied.

Abrupt into and finish aside, it honestly felt like a complete Bioware game, with the traditional multiple paths, ups and downs and twist and turns to the story, many side quests, and an epic finish.

LOADS and LOADS of new talents and spells and skills and more. LOADS of them, allowing you to specialize your characters like never before.

Those books that let you reset all your stats and skills? Awesome. Big help when you realize you've gone down an undesirable character path.

Decisions that actually seem to MATTER to the story.

At 20 hours, more gameplay than I expected out of an expansion. And I left several side quests unfinished, too. I probably could have squeezed a few more hours out of it.

More side quests than I expected out of an expansion, too.

OVERALL:
This was great fun. The couple of bugs and such were minor irritants, but easily overlooked in the face of the Dragon Age goodness to be had here. For anyone who liked Dragon Age, this is essential.

I became an addict of Origins, playing it all the way through about 12 times or so without playing a different console game. I dreaded what I thought might happen in Awakenings, but I bought it anyhow. Like other reviewers have said, Awakenings was a corporate strategy to bring in quick revenue.

Here are some details.

One of the things that kept me addicted to DA-O, was that I cared about many of the party members. Many of them were genuinely likeable characters. In DA-A, the only character I cared about was killed in the first hour of game play. I don't think there is anything on earth I could care less about than the welfare of the party members in DA-A. You have a zombie, a murdering maleficar, a murdering elf mage, the drunken sot/perv from the DA-O, and so on. Give me someone to care about!

The voice acting got an A+ from me on DA-O. Sorry, but the voice acting gets a C from me in DA-A. Very average.

The official strategy guide says you get to keep all your cool gear from DA-O. Actually, I have not been able to keep the Helm of Honnleath nor the Starfang sword (one-handed or two-handed). It didn't matter whether this gear was equipped or just in inventory, it didn't arrive with my characters in DA-A. I tried several times with many combinations. Just FYI. If the Starfang sword is the *only* sword your main toon has in DA-O, your character will import into DA-A into a battle situation with no weapon.

The ending in DA-O was incredibly satisfying, and did an excellent job at bringing closure to the game. You got to walk around and talk with your party members, seeing them off on their new adventures. By comparison, the door is slammed shut at the end of the DA-A. Of course, it doesn't really matter that you can't say goodbye to your party members, because you don't care about them anyway.

DA-A would have been worth the (...) if *all* of the same characters could have been brought forward from DA-O.

One note about the OSG. So far I have found two errors in the official strategy guide (both of them was with regard to what mob dropped what piece of special gear). I looked in the guide when I can't find the final piece of matching gear, only to find that such-and-such a mob was supposed to have dropped it. I go back to the place where the battle took place, and sure enough, there is no such gear to be had.

The good news about DA-A is that it will break me of my addiction of playing Dragon Age.

Huge kudos to Bioware for Dragon Age: Origins. It is possibly the best RPG I have ever played. Huge jeers for Dragon Age: Awakenings. The mucky-mucks in the corporation saw a way to filch more quick money from the existing fan base, and shoved a P.O.S. out the door.

Like many of the reviewers, I loved Dragon Age: Origins and was honestly sad to see it end. So when I heard about the expansion pack, I couldn't wait to return to Ferelden and get back to my darkspawn-killing ways. Unfortunately, Awakenings was a let-down. It's basically just like DAO, except...slightly off. Others have already addressed some of the big problems with the expansion, so I'll just highlight a few things that really struck me:

Plot - Badly paced, which is pretty strange for a Bioware game. The game starts out strong with an attack by smarter, more organized darkspawn. Where are they coming from? Who is leading them now that the archdemon is gone? Unfortunately, the plot then stalls out, leaving most of the answers for the final hour of the game. In the meantime, there are a bunch of quests that don't further the plot. The Blackmarsh quest, for example, is fun and has some great bosses, but why did I even go there? To look for a man who might have some answers, although he actually didn't? For most of the game, I wasn't working on quests because they furthered the story; I was working on quests because that's just what you do in an RPG. Which brings me to...

Quests - Too many sidequests seemed to build up to a payoff that never actually materialized. The Blight Orphans quests, in particular, seemed like a pretty good joke without a punchline. Another quest involved a problem with the mages, so I figured that I would deal with the Circle eventually. Answer: nope, I just found a mage, who then went off to deal with the unspecified mage problems. Boy, I'm sure glad I could help with that!

Companions - As many people have noted, the companions are promising, but the game is too short to really flesh them out. You basically just keep them in your party until they trot out their side-quest, take care of that, and then replace them with a new party member. Bah. And while I liked some of them, the elf mage was just a dull knock-off of Morrigan, and Anders was just basically Alistair, with magic. Oghren is back, and still irritating, especially since his approval level from the original game didn't transfer over the to expansion; he went back to neutral, which means that all that wine and ale I gave him in DAO was wasted. Although to be fair, Oghren did have the single funniest line in Awakenings, if you take him into the Silverite Mine.

Bugs - Oh, yeah. The game froze a couple of times, forcing me to restart. Some of the sidequests are also bugged, and I never even got one of the companion quests because I had helped a guard with an unrelated matter some ten hours previously. There were also some technical issues, like the screen going black for part of a dialogue, sound cutting out in another dialogue, and yeah, a disturbing shot of Justice's skull floating outside his face. None of these bugs stopped me from finishing the game, but they really break the mood.

Bottom line: Awakenings brings back some of the fun of Dragon Age, and has some neat innovations, including the runecrafting system and some impressive bosses. Still, it lacks the heart of the original, and for every improvement, there's also something to indicate that the expansion was slapped together quickly for a fast buck. If you're a fan of DAO, it's worth getting, but I'd suggest waiting for the price to drop before buying.

Awakening may not have as much content as the base Dragon Age: Origins game, but its presentation is more polished and in some ways it's a better experience than Origins.

Most noticeably, it looks a lot nicer. Facial animation seems improved from Origins, lighting effects are more impressive, the textures look less smeary. The overall environment design has been stepped up-- maybe since the designers are more comfortable with the strengths and limitations of the engine.

Aside from Morrigan and Shale, the cast of Dragon Age: Origins mostly left me cold. In Awakening however, even with less screen time to go around, each party member adds a compelling personality to the mix, from Nathaniel Howe's conflicted feelings toward his family legacy to Sigrun the dwarf's endearing mix of fatalism and vulnerability. The random party interactions have been beefed up and are frequently hilarious.

It is a shame that they removed the ability to romance your teammates since that's always a fun aspect of the Bioware formula. And the lack of any significant connections to Origins was disappointing. The Mass Effect series has raised the bar, and it feels like a cop-out that Awakening is basically a reboot that doesn't acknowlege the different plot possibilities from Origins.

Like Origins, Awakening suffers from its share of major and minor bugs. I personally never ran into anything that crashed or corrupted the game so badly that I couldn't continue playing (which happened to me three separate times in Origins), but I did have a number of times when conversations triggered incorrectly or characters got stuck in strange gestures and couldn't reset.

Overall, Awakening is a strong continuation of Dragon Age: Origins that bodes very well for even greater improvements in the series' future.

It's very simple. If you liked ORIGINS, you will enjoy AWAKENING. You really don't need to read any further.

But in case you do, a few thoughts.

It's short. 25(ish) hours if you follow all the side quests (I did), but it's an expansion so I cannot really complain about that. I did notice a few (very few) "graphics anomalies" but no actual bugs and I'm halfway done on my second playthrough. Character development for the other members of your party is somewhat limited, and you won't really develop the same depth of relationships as in ORIGINS. You will encounter some (OK, two) "old friends" from ORIGINS, but only one will actually rejoin your party (one of my personal favorites though). And, as you may have heard, the ending is somewhat abrupt. I would've preferred something like the ending of ORIGINS where you talk with your party before you all go your seperate ways and they roll the epilogue cards. And AWAKENING's cards are not necessarily in keeping with events as you experienced them.

HOWEVER, it's a good story, the gameplay is there, the voice acting is still very good (IMO), and the interface wasn't overhauled so you will feel very comfortable very soon. I suppose that could be good OR bad depending on how you felt about the interface, but I liked it so I consider this a plus. AWAKENING does play a little differently if you don't import your ORIGINS character, but not significantly so. Mostly in the sequencing of events and how people react to you. I've tried it both ways and it works quite well either way. The only reason I gave it 4 stars for the overall rating is because I can't give it 4 1/2 stars. It's really a great expansion, but because of that there are fewer surprises and some of the "WOW" has now worn off.

But if you liked ORIGINS..., oh yeah, this where we came in.

After recently completing Awakening and seeing the varied opinions of my fellow gamers, I thought that I would take a moment to share with everyone my experience of the game in the form of a review, highlighting what I did and did not like in the game, as well as my own personal rating of this expansion pack and what I hope to see in future installments.

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Storyline:
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Being someone who read "The Calling" by David Gaider and loved it, I went into this game with many expectations and expecting the game to live up to those standards. And thankfully, in my opinion, they did. Balancing between politics and war, your Warden has much to do and plenty of twists and turns along the way. Finishing my first playthrough, I am left wondering, "What would have happened if I did `X' instead?" - A signature question any good RPG will leave you with.

I found myself surprised at some of the references made to Origins, and although they are sparse, they are apparent enough to make you feel like not everything you did was irrelevant. Since this is not a spoiler review and instead my attempt at telling the hesitant buyers how much I enjoyed it, I cannot get into too much detail in this section.

In a lot of ways, Awakening does a much better job at conveying the urgency of the task at hand. I felt as if the clock was ticking, even though it was not. Where as in Origins, you can make a pit stop to deliver lyrium to a random Templar or otherwise perform trivial tasks that have no attachment to the roles of the Warden recruit.

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Companions:
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I found the companions of Awakening to be exciting, humorous, and very deep. I was worried originally that I would not allow myself to be attached to new characters in quite the same way as I was in Origins, but boy was I wrong. These characters live up to the standards of the original and then some. Again, I cannot get into details without ruining it for others, but expect there to be a number of twists and turns with these companions that will shock you. I was especially happy that Velanna did not ignore that my Warden was Dalish.

For whatever reason Oghren was truly brought back, they definitely improved him as a character. However, he went from being the last minute companion you didn't quite get to know, to the has-been companion who was not as exciting as the shiny new friends you've made.

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Voice Acting:
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Some of it was amazing, in fact, most of it was amazing. However, there are too few voice actors overall. You'll hear a side character sounding vaguely familiar to your latest companion, or have a brief chat with the Senechal will make you say... "Lord Harrowmont?" This is not drastically different from other RPG's or even from Origins (nickel for every time you heard Jowan's voice), but was a mild immersion breaker, especially reusing companion voices.

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(Lack of) Romance:
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We all know that there should have been more information on the romances in Origins translated into Awakening. There's no doubt it would have added a richer feel to the game, and make players feel a little less cheated. But no reason to dwell on this. Hopefully in the future Bioware will take into account the subtle nuisances of a game that makes it great, and translate it better to its expansions.

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Villains:
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The Darkspawn have a real face of evil now, and it is your duty to stop it at all costs. But what will you choose? Even the villainy of Awakening is a deep shade of grey. The new types of darkspawn are very fun to hack and slash, and some of the minor villains are deep and make storming their lair and gutting them that much more sweet.

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Side Quests:
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These quests were phenomenal and much more immersive than in Origins. In Origins, you'd be doing side quests that seemed to divert your attention away from the main threat of the Blight. However, in Awakening, every side quest has some relevance to your duties as both Warden-Commander and ruler over Amaranthine. Anything from the stopping of smugglers bringing in illegal goods, to meeting with the court of Amaranthine and making the tough decisions. There's even a Romeo and Juliet-eqsue tale that you have to uncover the clues to determine their fates.

There was one awkward quest description that tells you to find a woman in her home, and it turns out she's in a Chantry (hindsight is 20-20), but typically the journal is pretty detailed and easy to follow.

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Abilities, And Spells:
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Some of the new abilities in the game are amazingly exciting (Rain of Arrows!), but overall there were just too many of them. By the end of the game, leveling up became much more of a hassle than a decision. Nearly all of my companions as well as my Warden had far more spells than could fit on the toolbar, and most of the collected dust as I used the few spells I needed to perform the task. This was probably inevitable as the design of Origins pushed the number of abilities to the limit by the end, but it really hurt Awakening as a whole.

I feel as if a better system of managing spells, in particular "Activated" and "Sustained" abilities having a separate toolbar, as well as cutting down on the overall number of abilities to a more manageable level. I hope that, in future DA games, the sheer number of abilities will not drown out the specializing and decision-making process of leveling a character, because having a Battlemage who can heal and tank and use supporting abilities downplays choice.

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Runecrafting:
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I did not take the time to invest into this system, but it seemed fairly simple. Convert a lesser rune to a higher rune, then that rune to a better rune, and so on. It could have been a little more introductory and allowed more gradual usage of it (they toss out recipes like candy), but like I said I didn't fool around with it enough to claim good or bad.

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Items:
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Lots of amazing stats that will overshadow your cheap gear from Origins. One aspect that I found odd, being the packrat for rare items that I am, was that random merchants carried the rare items you'd expect to be unique in the world of Thedas, even if you brought it over with you. The legendary blade Yusaris magically gains an identical twin sold by a generic weapon merchant in Amaranthine. Nice for those who sold the original. Not so nice for those who kept it as a collector of rare treasures.

My Warden chose to bring Leliana's pendant (Restricted to Leliana necklace) with him into Amaranthine to remember her by while he was gone. He must have lost it on the trip over because it vanished from his inventory when he arrived).

Random DLC items also carried over into Awakening, such as the Harvest Festival Ring from the Shale DLC. Not sure if more items will carry over, as I did not take the time to check (perhaps it was because it was equipped on my Warden?)

The ability to add heraldry of many diverse backgrounds to your shields is really cool, and an example of something small that Bioware didn't have to do, but made the game that much more fun.

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Graphics and Textures:
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Overall amazing. There's some new weapons and armors (an AMAZING looking bow you'll find where you least expect it), although the generic rogue and mage armor has not changed at all. There are a beautiful array of new landscapes and a gruesome slew of new foes to slay. There is nothing overly groundbreaking or extremely different, just more of the same design that made Origins great. A few things here and there were a bit buggy, especially the Architect's facemask glitching into his face at some of the more pivotal moments (immersion killer).

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Playtime and Replayability:
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Complaints of the game being too short and not worth the money are relative to the amount of time you want to put into it. If you're constantly skipping dialogue, side quests, and non-essential areas, of course you can finish it in plus or minus 8 hours. Given that it is a smaller realm to explore, Bioware does an amazing job of making each area much denser and giving you much more to find that you wouldn't expect. Each area can have anywhere from 3 to 8 quests to complete.

Skipping most of the Runecrafting and only 2 side quests, I finished the game in about 15.5 hours. Granted, I took the time to read codex entries, double back and vendor goods when my pack was full, and respec'ing companions to suit my team. That being said, expect around 15 hours of gameplay if you intend on experiencing the game and not flying through it.

Naturally this expansion does not hold quite the same amount of replayability as Origins. I'd suspect you'd want to play it at least twice: once for your favorite Warden and once as an Orlesian Warden.

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Conclusion:
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This expansion does not expand your previous game so much as it expands the universe of Dragon Age. You will experience all of the thrills, twists, and turns that you came to love from Origins. There are tales of love, rejection, betrayal, and misunderstanding that all boil into a great expansion that you'll be happy you took the time to play through. It would be easy to blow through this game's smaller region in 7-8 hours and complain that it's too short, but if you take the time to explore and complete everything there is to offer, you'll find a lot of hidden treats in Awakening.

4.0 out of 5.0

Okay. I got an Xbox for Christmas and the first game I played was Dragon Age: Origins. I was hooked. I could not put it down. I actually cared about my choices and how it changed my relationships with the other characters. I waited with baited breathe for Awakenings. I have played through it once and I am "disturbed" at the changes. There were lots of cameos, but no real connection other than Ohgren. What I disliked the most was that you had no real dialogue with the other characters. It is an okay expansion. If I had never played Origins, I would have given this game five stars. Having played Origins, I would give it 3.5.

Its a fun game If you enjoyed Dragon Age you will love this game way more abilities new enemies and Ohgren comes back over all its a great game and I would reccomend it to anyone who likes rpg games