8 minutes of actual gameplay footage was demoed for Dragon Age: Inquisition and I must say it looks extremely interesting.

I have been somewhat indifferent with how I feel about the game but the strategic combat, beautiful lighting, and large environments may have turned this into a day 1 purchase for me. Has anyone else felt the same? Did the footage change your mind or justify your feelings?

Batman?

Edit: Ok! Just watched the video. Now some thoughts.

- 150 hours! Hm
- it does actually look *super nice*, environments and spells are wild
- still unclear on party system.. I guess you have generic NPCs on your team sometimes? Kind of like Xcom?
- how much can you queue up in tactiCam? Just 1 move and 1 action per character, or what?
- can't tell if I love or hate the UI. Very colourful anyways.

All in all I'm very excited for this game but I have *a lot* of reservations.. Just don't want to get too excited.

This looks beautiful, and more importantly the gameplay and story depth sounds super-promising. I've been keeping an eye on this one for a while now and this footage has pretty much locked me in for day one.

This looks super cool and as one of the 3 people in the world who wanted controller support on the PC version, I'm super happy. Have they talked about system requirements yet?

Getting way more of an Origins than a 2 vibe, which is great in my book. Also glad to see they're putting some work into the tactical view especially since the game seems to move so much faster. Here's hoping this slice is representative of the game outside of the dialog stuff.

That avvar seems more like he's about some 'war strength' mechanic a la Dragon Age Origins or Mass Effect 3. Your party is still made of BioWare-Ass BioWare Party Members. They all have family issues you have to deal with; most of them want to bone you.

Anyways, this looks really good. I like that hairstyle their lady has, I might roll a lady mage with that hair. It would get me out of having to bring any mages with me. Mages are always so obnoxious.

I was extremely disappointed by DA2, but this game looks great. Might be the first one I play with a controller, too.

Still looks like Dragon Age's clunky combat to me. Not that it's unplayable or anything, but it falls in that realm where it's pretty much impossible to balance due to the range of automation/micromanagement available to you. It just ends up with this situation where it's most likely a complete walkover even if you don't use any of the strategic stuff, or you end up having to depend on it and it gets tedious.

They should really just focus on the singular player character. That's not to say that you can't have any henchmen, but they could've really taken some lessons from Mass Effect, or even gone the even more passive route of something like Diablo. The group combat concept in RPGs just struggles to really work outside the traditional strategy style games.

Good God I hope this is good. I feel there hasn't been a good character based RPG for ages...

Having watched the video I am reasonably encouraged, the tactical view is there and it looks deep-ish. The main thing is the story and the variety and Bioware normally do well. - I really, really hope they get back on track with this game.

@ares42 said:

That's my concern as well; can they strike the balance where the friendly AI is competent enough to not get killed, and react to the enemies around it, but might still need the occasional prod in a non-obvious direction?

hmmmm oh yeah. I remember War Strength now. Battle Readiness or whatever. I really hope the dialogue has a little more nuance to it than the Baby/Neutral/Jerk triangle.

That demo told me nothing I didn't already know about the game, which leaves me in exactly the same place I was before - it looks . . . O.K.? Bioware has unfortunately put themselves in a position where I have a hard time believing a single word coming out of their mouths.

Once - just once - I'd like to see a developer have the confidence to show someone just playing the damn game rather than giving these really scripted experiences. I get why they do it, but the problem with them is that they tend to be so far removed from the way an actual human is going to play that it's hard to evaluate what the actual experience is going to be like.

Also, developers need to stop writing presentation scripts that sound like a bad high school play and then giving them to a presenter who has the Most Annoying Voice in the Universe.

This is one of my main concerns, to be honest. I think there should be situations in which acting in a noble way doesn't only have negative consequences, but can also be considered morally wrong. At least this way they'll force you to think about what you're saying rather than spamming the same dialogue options, because you're role-playing a "good" character.

Before the demo, they've shown a glimpse of the customization options, which looked very promising, particularly the crafting system.

Probably my most anticipated game ever. Can't hardly stand the wait! :D

I'm liking the look of this game a lot. Kind of worried it might be too easy, but the higher difficulties will probably pose some challenge.

What was the point of the dialogue choice at the end? It was basically tell dude to join you or leave the conversation. They could just have you press a button on the dude to initiate the end of the stage. It would be nice if they could think of something more interesting to choose from at the end of the level.

I was already onboard. The delay, even though it was only a month, was a bummer for me.

• don't really like the arbitrary preset combo system they are still going with
• the weapon stats seem to be much deeper then in DA2 however, so that's good
• lol the axe they looted was completely different from what they had show up in the inventory and equipped, ooops :P
• they talk about storytelling at the end and how this is just one of the awesome stories you will experience, but there was no story, just a smile skirmish

Yeah 100% on this point. @champinmaking's threads about KOTOR 1 v KOTOR 2 touched on this point and I think the Kreia one was almost entirely about this idea.

This has always been a challenge but some games have really done it right. Fallout as a series is much more successful in this vein than the Bioware games. The Witcher is maybe not a fair comparison but that's a very grey game too - you really think about what you're going to say. Really hope Bioware has been taking notes the last 5 years.

I might pick this up in a year or two. I've played the other two but never finished either.

Does it seem to anyone else like you can keep it in that overhead management view without it paused? Otherwise combat looks like it could be kind of random and all over the place. Messy.

My hope for this game relies on turning the difficulty up and maintaining that overhead view.

@rowr: I believe they mentioned that you can resume the action while in the "tactical view".

@veektarius: Yeah, after the footage from the last couple of days I am so ready for it to release and knowing that was pushed back a month really sucks...

I love this typo. It makes me picture guys duking it out by seeing who has the best smile.

Strangely, I'm reminded of Dragon's Dogma by that footage.

Looks good. The conversation camera at the end looked odd. Nice to see pausing in combat doesn't automatically pull up into tactical mode.

Also, Hawke is totally in that trailer at the end. Looks like the female default model is the one they're going with. Wonder if they'll have some depiction of the Warden in here too.

Well, there is some measure of save importing, so it's likely that Hawke would appear however he/she was in your version of DA II.

First 10 seconds into this i was sold, that map somehow makes me want to play this game even more then i did already.

First thing I thought when I saw the UI was "thats one ugly ass UI". Im specifically talking about the menu/inventory stuff. In game UI isnt terrible

boy for a game so focus on companionship and building a team, the companions shown so far are so very unappealing. Except for my boy Varric. Lelianna is still amazing tho so there is that. I really like the new look they have for this game, evironment, gfx everything but wow the characters are ugly. Almost look like Bioware caught the fallout syndrome.

@ll_exile_ll: Have they said it'd be actual save importing? I thought it was just the Dragon Age: Keep stuff you'd have to use to sort of recreate your choices.

I fucking hope so. My Warden went off with Morrigan and since she's in it there had better be a reason why he isn't with her.

Yeah it's very reminiscent of DA2 and I didn't like their menus either. Black background + giant primary colour icons does not an appealing menu make.. Not for me anyways.

IGN has a different demo of the game; it takes place in the same region though. It's mostly exploration and some UI stuff. It feels less scripted to boot. On the subject of the UI, I personally disliked the skeumorphic interface from DA:O; this one looks better in comparison.

I've been enjoying these videos for the most part, but where do their weapons go when they put the on their backs? They just seem to ... float there? I know that most games still handle sheathed weapons like this but something about the way the camera draws my attention to it and now it is all that I can see. I hope that I can play from an overhead camera.

Yeah I've watched these videos and have been equally excited before and after them. Game's looking good.

Ok I'm pretty sure that this will be my favorite game of the year. I could be setting myself up for major dissapointments but it really looks like exactly my kind of game.

Now you just have to avoid looking at anything more from the game and avoid all possible spoilers for a few months.

They just stick to their backs like Shepard's longarms.