To be fair each Story Mission can last a couple hours in and of themselves. You can always just main line the story for the quickest playthrough in any of the games. I also dig that it isn't the usual BioWare formula of "Go to these 3 places, view the star map / use the warden treaty / look for reaper stuff" then finally "Start end mission".
Definitely more cohesive this time around.
I think people would simply love a BioWare game with an incredible number of rich cinematic main story missions to flesh out a narrative to a remarkable level. Ideally I want that too, but I've never played one with such a bedazzling amount, and I doubt I ever will. So I take what I can get, and DAI doesn't feel lacking relative to its peers.
I think I'd love that too. If wishes were fishes. For a lot of different reasons, I think it's the best game they've made in a long time, so far. But I'm also still not done with my first playthrough.
I just think it's dumb that so many people seem to be intentionally looking for some arbitrary number, the smaller the better, to lord over Bioware as a sign of broken promises. And I also feel sorry for the people who bullrush their way through the game, missing out on all the things that do make it great and pre-emptively killing their enjoyment (assuming they're able to enjoy anything), and then complain it's too short.
You know when you think about it Origins only had what...7 main quests? Eight? Broken Circle, Paragon of Her Kind, Nature of the Beast, the Arl of Redcliffe, the Origin Story (maybe) The Landsmeet sequence, and the main end game sequence.
Just that for most of those stories and quests BioWare made it very episodic in nature where you had a bunch of mini main quests feeding into the much larger one. Made it like a TV show in a lot of regards. Except for the ending really which just felt like one continious quest.
And then BioWare added a lot of 'padding' (for lack of a better word) in certain areas of the quests, for instance you were just running around the Deep Roads (which I loved) and the Fade (not so much).
Add to that in DA O it seems that they combined side quests into the main story that were not directly related to it, whereas in Inquisition, they (for some reason) decided to segregate 'exploration' and story areas. So for instance you might be running around the Deep Roads doing a 'Paragon of her Kind' for six hours but might only be spending four hours doing content relating to that quest.
All of this serves to make DA Os 'main quest' feel longer. Now not saying it isn't but I do personally wonder...
Everyone's experiences are going to be at least a little different. You'll forgive me if I take mine over yours with regard to my personal reckoning of the comparitive lengths of the games as per how I treat such matters.In my first playtrough i finished Inquisition in about 31 hours flat on normal. I cleaned Hinterlands, Crestwood, Storm Coast and Hissing Weasts, finished cold and spirit rooms in temple, freed Inquisition soldiers from Avvar, cleaned Wester Aproach and Exalted plains to the point of needing operations to build bridges.
That didn't happened with Origins, although i had Stone Prisoner DLC.
To be fair each Story Mission can last a couple hours in and of themselves. You can always just main line the story for the quickest playthrough in any of the games. I also dig that it isn't the usual BioWare formula of "Go to these 3 places, view the star map / use the warden treaty / look for reaper stuff" then finally "Start end mission".
Definitely more cohesive this time around.
I always kinda thought it was funny that Dragon Age and Mass Effect had the exact same plot 
I even joked about changing the line in the DAO trailer spoken by Flemeth (and I'm going from memory, so wording is likely off).
"Elve's, Dwarve's, Mage's, this sounds like an army"
"Krogans, Quarians, Geth, this sounds like an army"
the Fade
mandatory
(Never again)
You know when you think about it Origins only had what...7 main quests? Eight? Broken Circle, Paragon of Her Kind, Nature of the Beast, the Arl of Redcliffe, the Origin Story (maybe) The Landsmeet sequence, and the main end game sequence.
Just that for most of those stories and quests BioWare made it very episodic in nature where you had a bunch of mini main quests feeding into the much larger one. Made it like a TV show in a lot of regards. Except for the ending really which just felt like one continious quest.
And then BioWare added a lot of 'padding' (for lack of a better word) in certain areas of the quests, for instance you were just running around the Deep Roads (which I loved) and the Fade (not so much).
Add to that in DA O it seems that they combined side quests into the main story that were not directly related to it, whereas in Inquisition, they (for some reason) decided to segregate 'exploration' and story areas. So for instance you might be running around the Deep Roads doing a 'Paragon of her Kind' for six hours but might only be spending four hours doing content relating to that quest.
All of this serves to make DA Os 'main quest' feel longer. Now not saying it isn't but I do personally wonder...
Sure, can do that, the names are pretty unspoilery:
The Wrath of Heaven
The Threat Remains
In Hushed Whispers
Champions of the Just
In your Heart Shall Burn
From the Ashes
Here Lies the Abyss
Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts
What Pride had Wrought
The Final Piece
Doom Upon All the World
Two are mutually exclusive, so you'll actually only be doing ten.
Also, listing them like this makes it look like the track listing of a Slayer album. I greatly approve.
I'm currently on Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts, everything above that is done.
Without spoilers, how fast does everything unravel after the ball? Is the sense of urgency really high? Does it make sense to go out and explore the world still? I
I have this thing, stems from my appreciation of sci-fi TV growing up, where I envision all the games I play as television seasons or miniseries in my mind as I play them, giving a lot of thought to my modest familiarity with the industry of television production in the process. For a long time I thought no one would find it interesting except me but a few months back I posted an outline for the Mass Effect trilogy as 65 episodes and got a lot of positive feedback. 'Twas enlightening.
I did one for Origins and it clocked in at 20 episodes. I hypothetically expand a few sidequests into bigger ordeals in my head though. At the rate I've been contemplating Inquisition even this DLC-less format is going to eclipse it slightly, but that's because some of the regions would stand to get their own episodic free-for-all sidequest-centric episodes. Plus I have to fit companion quests in as B-plots across various episodes, too... (ME2's episodes are the nightmare project. Getting to a comfortable scenario with that game took me weeks of thought.)
Indeed. There seems to be two thoughts in game writing, what I call anyways. The 'TV approach', or the 'movie approach'.
In the movie approach you roughly get one continious experience mission/ game, with lots of explosions and cut scenes and just...Michael Bay in a lot of regards. Or if you prefer the BioShock approach which is not 'cinematic' but is still roughly one continious experience.
Or the TV approach. Where you can have one continious main story but then you have a bunch of minor and side stories, and sometimes the side stories support the main story and sometimes they are entirely stand alone, and somtimes it just supports the theme of the main story, or is just a character episode expanding on a character or causing a moment for 'character growth.'
I prefer the TV approach.
Indeed. There seems to be two thoughts in game writing, what I call anyways. The 'TV approach', or the 'movie approach'.
In the movie approach you roughly get one continious experience mission/ game, with lots of explosions and cut scenes and just...Michael Bay in a lot of regards. Or if you prefer the BioShock approach which is not 'cinematic' but is still roughly one continious experience.
Or the TV approach. Where you can have one continious main story but then you have a bunch of minor and side stories, and sometimes the side stories support the main story and sometimes they are entirely stand alone, and somtimes it just supports the theme of the main story, or is just a character episode expanding on a character or causing a moment for 'character growth.'
I prefer the TV approach.
Meeeee tooooo.
Though don't get me wrong I reallllyyy love the stories of the BioShock games, I just feel you get more bang for your buck from an RPG or even a BioWare RPG because, well the characters are a lot better, and then when side quests are interesting and add to the experience they are really helpful and can greatly enrich the experience, and you want to talk to people and find out things. And in theory, and it depends on the game difference between a BioWare and a 'normal' RPG you can do whatever you want and you do not have to do a story mission. Like if you are sick in bed one day and not feeling well but really want to play Inquisition for an hour just go do a bunch of random side quests and meaningless crafting and selling and you do not have to touch the main story and the characters which is the 'meat' of these games...I guess that makes the side quests the potatoes.
I'm currently on Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts, everything above that is done.
Without spoilers, how fast does everything unravel after the ball? Is the sense of urgency really high? Does it make sense to go out and explore the world still? I
There is more of a sense of urgency after Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts but not much more then the rest of the missions. You can still explore everything, etc, just like all the other mission. My understanding is that The Final Piece flows right into Doom Upon All the World so I think if you start The Final Piece then you've started the endgame. I'm not 100% sure though as I haven't started The Final Piece yet just in case that's correct.
Final Piece feeds into Doom Upon All the World in the sense that it's super short and basically leads into the endgame, but it doesn't actually trigger the "you are now entering the endgame" warning until you start the Doom operation from the wartable.
I don't want to spoiler either, but does that mean I can still explore and do side quests after "What Pride has Wrought"?
I'm wondering at the moment whether to start that quest, as I have not been to the Hissing Wastes yet,
I don't want to spoiler either, but does that mean I can still explore and do side quests after "What Pride has Wrought"?
I'm wondering at the moment whether to start that quest, as I have not been to the Hissing Wastes yet,
You can continue exploring even after you finish the main quest.
I don't want to spoiler either, but does that mean I can still explore and do side quests after "What Pride has Wrought"?
I'm wondering at the moment whether to start that quest, as I have not been to the Hissing Wastes yet,
Yep, you're safe after that. The game will make it very, very clear when you reach the point where some things will be impossible to do.
Semi-irrelevant, but did anyone check the subtle fact of...
Ah, it's probably nothing, but I'm pretty sure the quest names are referencing the Chant of Light.
Isn't that odd? I'm 35 hours in and I'm still finishing Hinterlands only and I'm only in the middle of the 3rd main quest line. We are obviously playing the game very differently as I'm listening to every conversation, talking to my companions and npcs, crafting, exploring every nook and cranny, reading some books and codex, I did also visit that Fench City whatever it's called and did a fantastic chasm in south hinterlands as well, but you have to be ignoring most conversations to finish the entire game in 31 hours or missing things, or everything you just wrote is bs.In my first playtrough i finished Inquisition in about 31 hours flat on normal. I cleaned Hinterlands, Crestwood, Storm Coast and Hissing Weasts, finished cold and spirit rooms in temple, freed Inquisition soldiers from Avvar, cleaned Wester Aproach and Exalted plains to the point of needing operations to build bridges.
That didn't happened with Origins, although i had Stone Prisoner DLC.
Just play the darn thing and see for yourself, Jazz. Seriously, individual interpretation goes a longer way with this stuff than people realize. The main quest feels hardly much shorter to me than Origins was because it's diverse and packed full of excellent story beats.About half of those main quest are during Haven/just go Skyhold. Damn, the main game isnt large at all....
About half of those main quest are during Haven/just go Skyhold. Damn, the main game isnt large at all....
But Maker's breath the main quests are awesome. Like really, really awesome.
Just play the darn thing and see for yourself, Jazz. Seriously, individual interpretation goes a longer way with this stuff than people realize. The main quest feels hardly much shorter to me than Origins was because it's diverse and packed full of excellent story beats.
Origin
Ostagar
Lothering
Redcliffe
Circle
Dalish
Orzammar
Landsmeet
Denerim
"A full third of the main quests are before we're even given the open range of Ferelden. Plus, the Landsmeet and Denerim are practically linked, and Origin and Lothering are super-short, and this subjectively-listed list is smaller numerically than Inquisition's! Sheesh, Origins isn't so long after all!"
Would I have traded an open-world region for another main quest? Fellas, I'd trade three of 'em for just two more main quests. I'm kind of narrative-obsessed like that. If BioWare thought it was a better idea to make a main quest that in terms of shear length was hands down Origins' destroyer I'd jump for joy, but that's not how games are made anymore. Instead I can just be glad that regardless of comparisons, Inquisition's narrative feels fulfilling.
I guess my point is that only the main quest are fun and feel important cause they have cutscenes. The rest of the 90% of the game has that stupid 3rd person conversations and thus does not feel as integrated into the story as the sidequest in other Bioware games.
Except companion quests, but yeah I'd like to have at least some of the side quests have cutscenes. Like the main ones for each zone (The stuff with the lake in Crestwood, stopping the demons in Exalted Plains, etc.) But I don't think what we have now is any different from the cutscenes in previous games, they're just zoomed out more. It's not like anything interesting happened in 90% of conversations in DA:O, it was just the camera switching between two people talking.
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