I don't know if it's okay, but I feel like it'd be pretty handy if we'd make an E3 video dump thread for each of the games we're interested in, where we collect all new related E3 footage.

I found this Dragon Age: Inquisition demo especially enlightening and surprising, because what they showed at the conference didn't do a great job at showing off how much improved the game really is. This is the demo the game should have had at the conference. They could have stolen the show!

Graphically this is a huge step up from the previous games. Visuals was never a strong point of the series. Looks great though. Been looking forward to this.

Have they said how carry over data will work? Could've swore they said they had some system where you can just answer some questions and it will set things up for you or something.

@kishinfoulux:

Dragon Age: Keep, I believe.

I didn't know about this video thanks.

Nice. This looks very promising to me. I really like what they are showing with the combat.

It looks really good. They should've shown some of the exploration and fighting people combat like The Witcher 3 did rather than that kinda boring dragon fight.

YEAH.

this is out in a few months. i will be upping the difficulty to nightmare straight away, and if previous first runs are anything to go by, i will spend about eighty hours playing the game, and probably about two hundred just sitting on pause control, taking each fight down to the wire, trying my best to get through them all first time around.

- a character i can create, battles i can savor and execute in any level of detail, and a party strategy i can design from the ground up.

why are these cornerstones of the genre so hard to find these days? if all the new weekend witcher fans insist on making the comparison it has none of the above, and thus holds no interest for me as an rpg fan.

Not a video, but I stumbled across some posts on their website about two of the new characters. Elf Lady seems kind of vague. They go into a ton of detail about Qunari Dude though, so much detail that I actually stopped reading cause I'd rather figure that stuff out in game.

Whilst not an E3 video, if you are interested in this game I would recommend looking at this video from Digiexpo 2013, its not the best quality (its shot-off screen), it does, however, touch on the optional Fort battles and how the Inquisition expands which I have not seen in other videos:

Sheeit I think I need to upgrade my rig. Sheeeeeeit I just bought a Wii U. Sheeeeeeeeeeeit.

Same footage. More in-depth interview. It seems like the campaign is partially procedural, which sounds great. Acquiring power and influence, and spending it as one sees fit.

Dump is right.

Who the hell is named Daemon?

I'd really have to nitpick to find things I don't like about that demo, so here they are:
1) The font on health bars. What is that, Arial bold?
2) Elves - continue to look more deformed than alien.

That looks much better than anything I've seen from the game before, and is the first thing to get me kind of excited for it.

The Fade looks really cool, hopefully the gameplay there isn't as bad as it was in DA:O.

@poisonmonkey: wow, that video answered a bunch of questions i had about the game, and it answered them all correctly, and then it surprised me with a few things. this is looking to be more than the game i was hoping for, cannot wait.

I like the fact that they allow you to create your own character again and not just a human. And since we finally have a black character in the game i hope they finally allow you to make different races for humans this time too.

I just wonder if i need to finish DA 2 before i play this, that game got real boring real quick.

A bunch of new hands-on impression videos.

I was already sold on this game long ago, but the more I see the more I get excited! Apparently there'll also in fact be multiple voices to choose from as well, which sounds insane to me. Though maybe they'll be the same voice per gender, just... pitched slightly. If it's like a Saints Row with unique voices per race & gender (or at least a handful across all races per gender), then Holy Shit that's a lot of VO.

@oursin_360: Don't take this as gospel, but from what I can tell, there are three things in this game you'd get out of playing DA2.

1) You'd witness things going sideways between the templars and mages (addressed far more briefly in DA1), though then again, it doesn't sound as if the conflict in Inquisition is a result of what happened in Kirkwall
2) You would get to know Varric (then again, you probably already know him well enough from a few hours in DA2) and kind-of-not-really know Cassandra.
3) You would become more familiar with the Tevinter empire

It seems to me that Bioware knows exactly how people feel about the last game in the series and are not going out of their way to link it into the current one.

alright yeah i guess i will be getting you, you dragon age game you.

@hh: Yeah, i'm really impressed with what I am seeing with this one, so much so I have pre-ordered it and I rarely pre-order!

It's all looking alright so far, my only remaining mechanics concern is whether or not they got rid of the terrible stat and enemy scaling to levels. (and of course it remains to be seen if they will manage a good narrative this time around)

@tennmuerti: Enemies scaled to your level in the previous games? I don't remember that to be honest, especially in Origins. The dwarves are, if I remember correctly, was pretty difficult to tackle early on. I could be wrong of course.

@tennmuerti: I saw an interview saying there is no scaling (I think it was the Twitch one), you can wonder into a place and be totally under or over levelled, also Eurogamer have confirmed it: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-06-11-10-minute-dragon-age-inquisition-gameplay-demo

There is literally nothing that interests me about the Dragon Age games.

@militantfreudian: Origins had a hybrid system, with sort of tiers, as in zones would have a range of enemy levels and it would adjust to that, but it would never go below a certain level or above a certain level, the ranges were also relatively tight, so overall it was quite alright and never really made itself felt.

I was mainly speaking of DA2 where enemies not only scaled to your level everywhere but your level also affected your stats, meaning if you over leveled anything your gear started to matter less and less, for example when you got the best possible armor in the last DA2 act you could have 80% dodge vs. same lvl enemies, but then as you did side quests and leveled up all enemies leveled with you and your dodge would now be 50% against enemies of your level (in the same gear!), it basically made the game too safe while simultaneously punishing you for playing more of the game. It also created bad rubber banding of stats, where each time you leveled up all your stats vs. the same level enemies would go down, then you spend points on stats just to try to keep up with inflation, but never actually managing to do so.

@poisonmonkey: Thanks a lot for this! This is the best news on the game I've heard this E3, it's quite important to me. Now looking forward to Inquisition more then ever.

The games did have scaling, at least in Origins. Yes, there are some places like Orzammar that have a higher level requirement, but when you pass that requirement the enemies and the loot would continue to level with you. It's fairly unnoticeable though, it feels natural.

To answer @tennmuerti 's question, the interview videos above explicitly said no.

My body is ready for this. I love a good Bioware RPG and I have enjoyed every single one of them I have played.

@tennmuerti: Oh, yeah, I forgot about that. I didn't know exactly how it worked, but I definitely noticed it. Thanks for the detailed explanation. I'm glad they've done away with that.

I wish one of these previews was just 5 minutes going over skill trees and menus and shit. I guess that's not sexy enough. I'd really like to know if party members are confined to a single weapon tree. I'd like to know if there's still a big focus on upgrading the skills you have rather than getting new ones. I want to know if they have that weird subclass system from the first one. I imagine this is stuff I will not know until the game is actually out.

Ditto. I'd also love to see how they're handling party AI. It's nice to be able to stop & swap member to member, but I'm curious to see how they handle the AI when you're not just issuing orders. The DA:O system could be cumbersome, but I liked the option of being able to make the party fight to the death, or run like wimps, depending on the situation.

@sarahsdad: DA2 had a very in-depth individual logic system.

@veektarius: Hmm. I may have to re-play that; my main memories of DA2 are repeating environments, and feeling that the sides I took ended up making very little difference in the outcome of the story.

@sarahsdad: You aren't wrong, but it did have a couple redeeming features, and it being possible to get the AI to generally do what you want is one of them. I don't think they'd even need to significantly improve that for Inquisition.

Yeah at all. That all worked fantastic in II, the only issue was the fights in that game were so often guys just spawning in from all around you that it was tough to maintain your positioning tactically like you could in Origins. But the logic has worked great all series if you really tune it.

Hmm. I do remember the combat being satisfying, even if I couldn't put my finger on it. I haven't played it in a few years, since I traded in my 360. I'll have to check for a used copy next time I go out. Thanks guys for reminding me about that.

I wish that we could see these E3 stage demos in their uncut entirety. I was always annoyed by how they would just show what they think looks interesting. I guess I'm savvy enough to know that behind those curtains are menus, shops, and lots of walking. I want to see how those things are handled, too.

I still don't have a solid sense of how this game plays. OK, sure, they say you can play it either tactically or more like an action game, and that's fine, but somewhere in that IGN video they noted that you won't have "a ten second cooldown time or anything like that". That sounds less tactical, more action-y. I'm excited for either approach, but I just want to see skill trees, mechanics, etc.

As someone who wasn't really a huge fan of Dragon Age Origins and never played 2, I find myself more excited for this one than I thought I would be. It's beautiful. It's open world, or is at least massive. It's apparently got a lot of content. Its gameplay, despite the fact that I don't have a good sense of what it really is yet, looks pretty awesome. I'll say count me in, it looks like a pretty great, expansive RPG.

@sarahsdad: to be clear I am no big fan of the game. I thought it was pretty good up to a point and then the repetition really got to me too. But their logic system for the party has always been a great feature to me. That all ended up mattering less in II than Origins for a number of reasons (overall the combat got more shallow, to me). But anyways, Inquisition to me looks a lot like Origins, which is good.

Just saw this thread ... female Qunari!!!! OMG!!!!!! Inspired on Joan Arc OMG!!!!!!!! (she is a heroine of mine) Also the world looks gorgeous, I was sad to see the stylistic visuals from DA 2 go away but this is just as great (Im glad they didnt go back entirely to murky uninspired looks from Origins).... man I wasnt hyped for this game but now Im ULTRAAAAA hyped :D , question is should I wait till I get a next gen console or get it on PS3 :/ I wish I had the cash for a PS4 this year but that aint happening.

My first question off the bat with that initial demo is why does the Qunari have mage as an avalible job? If I remember right (and its been awhile) the Qunari cut the tongues their mages and bound them so they couldn't use magic. Their entire culture was against magic. I could be thinking of something else but Im pretty sure it was the Qunari.

I should also add I hope they address what happened to Hawke. Dragon Age 2 basically ended with the idea that there was a larger threat and they were searching for where Hawke went to.

The real reason is because people wanted it and horned chicks are cool/hot so ... $$$

Nah not really, the real-real for realzies real reason is marketing. So that people like you and me would ask this exact question, thus creating more engagement, making people more interested in the material, bumping threads and making new ones. THEY ARE SUCKERING US IN MAN!

The lolore reason is that Qunari is not a race but a people who follow the Qun, the race are some Kiblablablafuckidontknow, who are mostly Qunari. Like say Muslims for example. But there are a few of their race who are outside the Qunari religion/society/wayoflife/culture. So if you play as her she is not a Qunari, just of that race.

Polygon did an interview. It's the same footage we've seen in most of these interviews, and a lot of the information is redundant (be sure to mention this area is bigger than all of Dragon Age Origins combined!) but there's a couple new tidbits in there.

@believer258: This is the demo shown behind closed doors at E3. It's basically 16 minutes of uncut gameplay footage. We also get a glimpse of companion customization and skill trees.

EDIT: From what I can see, Iron Bull has about 5 skill trees. Each character in DAII had 6 skill trees including the specialization, so this might be the case in Inquisition too. There seems to be relatively more skills per tree compared to DAII.

Here's an official version of the above video. Skip to 9:00 to get to the good shit. Apparently this is only part 1 as well.

Mage combat looks very cool, the visual effects and whatnot. Also, from what little I've seen, archery looks kind of fun. The sound design seems to be much improved -- I really like the sound effect of the lightning spell. I don't know how I feel about Iron Bull being voiced by Freddie Prinze. I'm not freaking out or anything, but the companions seem to have only helmet and armour slots (no gloves or boots). Just saying.

EDIT: Cameron Lee, one of the producers said:

A suite of armor can be modified with separate boots and gloves in our crafting system, that's why you see only one slot, it's all combined. The same goes for weapons where you can change the hilt, blade etc. We'll go into crafting and loot in a lot more depth later on.

People flipped their shit about Freddie Prinze Jr. voicing James Vega in Mass Effect 3 and he turned out great. After that, any trepidation about him being in DA: I is entirely without merit.

Here's part 2 of the demo -- that is, if anyone's interested.

Although it looks really nice, I'm definitely waiting on reviews before I come anywhere near this one. There were several red flags for me when watching those videos:

1. I was really wishing that they'd moved the combat more back towards the strategy-first DA:O. However, it looks like they went whole hog for "fantasy COD."

2. I hope that you can change the default camera angle when out of combat. In the video, it's way too low to the ground and too centered behind the character. I'd like to be able to see more than my character's ass when I'm exploring.

3. I also hope that there are multiple selectable voices for your character. The voice-actor they have feels completely out of place for a female qunari.

4. When they guy giving the demo says "unique mounts to collect," all I hear is "there will be tasteless micro transactions."

5. It'll be unfortunate if the mage-templar thing is the main focus of the story line. They've done it to death in the prior games, and frankly, it isn't interesting enough to rehash a third time over.

I've finally pulled the trigger this Steam Summer sale and I'm about 40 hours into Dragon Age: Origins and as before I was quite indifferent towards this game now it's my most anticipated release of the year.

Origins is a great game but you can really feel the cobwebs on it. Inquisition seems to have moved adequately forward while retaining the systems present in the first game - or so they claim anyway.