Just a bit of news today before I go to write a paper for one of my classes.

Steam’s offering a rather epic sale this week. As of this writing, you have 6 or so hours to pick up a ton of discounted games, including Dragon Age: Origins and Fallen Earth. When the timer reaches zero, a new set of games will be made available for people to go and buy at discounted prices. If you’re itching for an MMO or want to try your hand at shooters, or even want to pick up a pack of games, it’s all available there on Steam, right now.

I’d personally go for the DA:O sale, the Far Cry 2 Sale, and Fallen Earth, if I had the money, time, or connection speed. Check it out.

This just in from the Dragon Age Twitter. They’ve announced the latest bit of DLC for Dragon Age: Origins, and it’s called Return to Ostagar. As the name states, this DLC lets you go back to Ostagar after visiting Lothering, and will allow you to find what appears to be a new set of special armor, as well as the possibility of another surviving member of the ill-fated battle at Ostagar. No word yet on who this survivor is, but I doubt it’d be the king or Duncan… though I SOOOOOO wish it was.

It’s coming this holiday season and will set you back 5 bucks. More info can be found here.

Source: Exhibit in Hôtel de Cluny, Paris, France; Feb 6, 2008

So Pete over at Dragonchasers was mentioning that there were a couple of things that would have made a good game like Dragon Age: Origins even better. One of the issues he has, which I agree with, is the storage space issue for the game.

In Dragon Age, items of a specific type or name take up one point of storage in your pack, regardless of its size. That means that the Silver Ring you picked up eats up the same storage point as your plate armor. Now, it’s a convenient thing to have if you’re a console gamer, as weight management in an inventory system can be a pain in the butt, but since we’re both playing on the PC, we kinda just have to suck it up, unless someone wants to retool the system.

Now, while there isn’t a full-fledged change for this issue at present at the moment, there is a temporary solution for it, which I found out thanks to Syp over at Bio Break.

There’s a game modification out now that places a storage chest back in your camp near the tents. All you have to do is go to this link here, read the instructions, and then download and install the modification. If done properly, you should be able to see an additional piece of content under the DLC listing, which is the storage chest modification itself.

Do note that this is a temporary solution, as future Bioware patches may wreck this mod. Also, note that the mod itself isn’t 100% perfect, as there have been some complaints of people losing abilities from the Warden’s Keep DLC or losing their weapons and armor. As such, download and use at your own risk.

So I’ve had a bit more time to think about the whole Replayability thing, and as some commenters in the previous article have pointed out, replayability ideally comes out more when one looks not only at story and characterization as underlying motivations to replay a game, but also at other aspects of the game, such as the gameplay.

While I can’t really wrap my head around all the angles just yet to make a definitive stand on my own, I can at least illustrate the point of replayability by talking about two games that have been mentioned here a fair number of times already: Borderlands and Dragon Age. Bear in mind that they are two different beasts altogether, but they are both games that I play, which is perhaps the most important common denominator in my mind (they both are enjoyable games worth playing).

Borderlands has the gameplay mechanics down pat. It is a first-person shooter with role-playing elements (such as randomized loot) which is very satisfying to pick up and play. For a solo gamer though, there’s not as much incentive to play through the game a second time because the story in itself is flimsy, and to some extent predictable, and nothing changes from playthrough 1 to playthrough 2 (as far as I know). Furthermore, you don’t really get to connect with any of the quirky characters of Pandora. You can’t even really connect with your own self, because you’re led through the story, forced to do most of the quests to get stronger to tackle on stronger baddies, and eventually make your way to the endgame with little deviation from that path.

Dragon Age: Origins, on the other hand, carries a story that allows characters to take subtle meanderings to learn more about yourself, other people, and the world you live in,  even whilst being slowly pushed along a specific path. Unlike Borderlands, Dragon Age isn’t a casual game in the sense that you need more than thirty minutes to get any sort of real tangible progression through the story. The story itself probably has a happy enough ending in the sense that you’ll either defeat the darkspawn or learn what brought it about, though I’m not entirely sure as I haven’t finished it yet.

Of the two, you can probably already guess which one I’m more partial to replaying. Dragon Age lends itself to my sensibilities more because of its solid story. Borderlands tries to appeal to the lootwhore in me. Between the loot lover and the story seeker, I’m definitely more of a story seeker to begin with.

Perhaps that’s the point of all this reflection. It goes back to what I said a few months ago about game mechanics and preferences: a game has to appeal to one’s personal set of preferences for enjoyment. Hack-and-slash (or shoot-and-loot) games are definitely things I enjoyed replaying a long time ago back when Diablo II was still the awesomest thing on Earth, but it seems my preferences have changed. Other people will obviously have their own ideas of what is worth replaying based on what they value most in a game, whether it be min-maxing, looting, story-seeking, or team play.

One thing I will say though about both games: just having decapitation attacks makes both games oddly satisfying, and worth coming back to after finishing them, at least for a little while.

Stillwater during the City Elf Origin storyline

Over on Tobold’s Blog is a thoughtful question for folks to ponder. Seeing as everyone is talking about Dragon Age these days, his concern is that because the story essentially has specific points crafted to end up in one specific way no matter what you do (for instance, Ostagar), the game (or perhaps any game) would lose its replayability.

I find myself disagreeing with sentiment that a story can diminish replayability. A good number of the commenters on Tobold’s blog cited books as having stories that you’d want to reread, but I find that while it is true to a certain extent, it’s an analogy that is lacking, because video games aren’t simply read, but rather are experienced.

I think that the replayability of Dragon Age comes with creating different personalities. Whether honorable knight or dastardly scoundrel, the thing about DA: O is that the game becomes replayable because different characters are progressing through the story, and having different sets of experiences.

In one of my first communication classes back in college, we learned about semiotics, and one of the basic ideas behind it was that meanings behind a particular structure (such as language) change if we change one aspect of the structure. In language, changing one word in a sentence, or even the stress in one word in that sentence, can create a different meaning than the previous iteration before it.

In the case of DA: O, changing the character who goes through the story may not change the overall story, but it refines one’s appreciation for the story as it plays out. A knave would be more willing to take on contract killings, whereas a noble man might choose to stop the contract killers in their tracks. Sure, the act doesn’t help with stopping Darkspawn, but it shows the strength of one’s chosen character, and also makes certain events more memorable for certain characters played.

The different origin stories also provide the gamer with new ways of looking at the world and at events that occurred within Ferelden. If you’re a city elf, like I am, then you’ll know why a certain Tim Curry-voiced character got a certain position close to the regent. If you’re a human noble, then the path to that Tim Curry-voiced character’s rising through the ranks becomes even more pronounced.

In any event, let me conclude by saying this: story is only the death of replayability if the story is roughshod and ill-conceived. A good story, made up with strong characters, can increase the replayability of a game beyond its original single-play confines, and I think Dragon Age, as far as I can tell, has the characters and stories that can make for many good replays ahead.

This is a Sloth Demon. He wants you to sleep.

Continuing my travails through Ferelden, I decided to see if I could go to the mage tower and request their aid against the darkspawn. Alas, they’ve been beset by evil forces themselves, and have seen fit to ask for my help instead of the other way around. Of course I offered to help.

As I reached the fourth floor of the tower, this slobbering pile of human death appeared and put my entire party to sleep, leaving us in this Sloth Demon’s domain in the dream world.

Now, that wasn’t bad in and of itself… it’s just that, when I try to transition to another part of the damned area in the Fade, the game crashes.

Recreated the issue at least three times with the same sad result of having to restart DA: O, to no avail.

Alas, I think I’m going to have to take a break and let my computer rest or something, and see if that does the trick. If not, then I’ll have to wait for a patch, or reroll another character.

If any of you have any helpful links from the forums about crashing during the Fade portion of the Broken Circle Questline, I’d quite appreciate any assistance. Does lowering the graphics settings temporarily help?

The pain with my teeth lessened enough for me to give enough attention to Dragon Age for a few hours, so I continued my adventure with my warrior. As it happens, there are two things of note I have found today that need to be mentioned, so without further ado, here they are.

1. The 1.01 Patch for DA: O creates a rather glaring problem that might be solved by downloading something else.

As it happens, when you install the patch, there’s a chance that the game won’t actually play when you press the Play Button. A bit of digging in the forums revealed to me that this might be the result of some Visual C++ that needs updating.You’re supposed to grab the Visual C++ x86 update for the thing, and I lucked out myself because I chose that one before I found out which one had to be downloaded.

The Bioware Forum Post on the patch issue  is here.

The Visual C++ update can be downloaded here.

Before anything else though, check the forum post for updates to the issue, and any resolutions or statements from the devs.

2. The first questline I did after getting Shale from the DLC was the one in Redcliffe. It’s a very long chain that eventually drives you to look for the Urn of Sacred Ashes, which are supposed to contain Andraste’s disintegrated remains. One part of the questline asks you to go through a veritable gauntlet of tasks, and I found difficulty with doing the second task, which happened to be a floor puzzle.

In the floor puzzle, there are six tiles on either side of a chasm that create spectral floors. Stepping on the proper combination of tiles makes the floor solid, and there are four spectral floors you have to solidify and move across to get to the other side.

Here’s a quick set of instructions for this particular puzzle, though I can’t find the original post on the Bioware forums I found it on.

First, set your companions to hold their positions, so they don’t run after you.

Second, imagine the floor tiles as being numbered. The crude diagram below shows floor tile number on the left side of the chasm, a dash indicating the chasm, and then the floor tile number indicating the right side of the chasm.

6 – 12

5-11

4-10

3-9

2-8

1-7

Set three characters to step on tiles, 3, 6, and 8. This should unlock two tiles, as I recall it. Move your remaining character forward.

Next, move the character on tile 3 to tile 10, the one on tile 8 to tile 1, and then move your main character forward.

Finally, move the character on tile 6 to tile 7, the one on tile 10 to tile 11, and then the one on tile 7 to tile 2. Move your main character forward and unlock the path so everyone can move across.

After that, the rest should be smooth sailing. Enjoy!

I currently stopped playing Borderlands on my PS3 to try out Dragon Age: Origins on my PC, and so far, it’s been an interesting, if not frightful experience to say the least.

I say frightening because I’m the type of person who does reconnaissance on a game (or much of anything, really) before making a purchase. However, I ignored Dragon Age at the beginning, and despite the numerous posts on Dragonchasers.com that brought some hype to it, I largely went along with my own business, playing other things and not thinking about it.

I bought it on a whim yesterday, mostly to soothe my psyche at the impending need for surgery to remove two wisdom teeth, and it’s been quite the distraction. I picked up the regular version, managed to download the Stone Prisoner DLC and Blood Dragon Armor armor unlock, and went merrily on my way through Ferelden… until I realized I had no idea what the hell I was doing.

It was scary. No one had a repository of information regarding how to progress through the game, or  make effective fighting builds. No one was telling me what to do. No recon (other than some forum posting to find out how to grab the DLC and access the extra character), no ideas, and under most circumstances, no hope for me to get my butt in gear to enjoy the game.

Then I just started playing, and I just enjoyed the game for what it was. A story told from different viewpoints depending on what kind of person you choose at the start, that leads into an epic adventure.

The game is tough, markedly more difficult than Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2, and yet I was enjoying dying and learning. Dragon Age has tons of choices, and some of them are so grey that I had no idea what to do (“Rescue” a girl by killing a demon possessing her, free a demon from containment to save the girl, parley with the demon and free it, parley with the demon, free it, get double crossed, then kill it, etc.). Hell, even picking my party is difficult, because some people are just too pretty, too charming to have around, or so powerful that you  want them to stay.

It was scary. It was liberating. It was Dragon Age: Origins.

If you’ll excuse me, I have more meandering to do. Must defend a town from the undead and all. I’ll be back with some additional thoughts after some gaming, and some sleep!