From Capone666's interview with David Gaider:
Well, speaking to that Age of Ultron meet up where everyone's there, the use of epilogue in Dragon Age: Origins, when was that - because to me, what you were describing there is kind of an example of the epilogue. That did that for me. When did that come into play and how do you feel about that kind of mechanism in terms of storytelling?
Well, the Dragon Age: Origins epilogue existed because initially I don't know that we were certain we would get a second game. Ideally, we were hoping that we would put out Dragon Age: Origins and it would be successful. We didn't know. So, the epilogue came late in the game, and it was something we had done previously. At the time it was the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate. And we had the epilogue slides at the end of Baldur's Gate, so that seemed like an appropriate thing. And what happened to these characters? Because we'd also cut so many things, there was a lot threads left were dangling. So it was like, oh, it'd be kind of neat if we had, you know, at the end of a movie where as the credits are going on you can see, oh, so and so went on to go to college, and then robbed a bank, and, oh, neat. So, to tie up those threads and give the players sense of how this plot that they had spent so much time with, how it had continued on so they could imagine it in their head.
I think ultimately I came to regret exactly how we had done that. Because the epilogues were put together very quickly and some of them cast so far into the future that, okay, now we are doing the sequel and it takes place two years into the future or whatever. And it's like, we're trying to have a plot and we're trying to have some call backs, yet there are things that were forecast that went so far ahead that now we're contradicting it. Can we honor those all? Here we have a plot which works in every facet expect for this one epilogue slide. And it's like, god dammit, past Dave! Why did you write that?
What was one that was too far reaching?
Oh, there were some like with, say Cullen that talked about his career progression, and how he eventually years later would become Knight Commander or something. I don't even remember the exact process. Some of them talked about Orzammar years and years into the future and their society. And you're like, oh, wow, that's a giant check to write. Especially, if you are then asked later, now pick up the plot and have some tie backs. And you're like, um, okay. You're sitting there and you're laying out all the epilogue slides in front of you and you're figuring, how do I honor every single one of these? Wow. I didn't think that through at the time.
We're getting a little better at that. I think the ultimate lesson was that we have to be a little bit more careful. What we intended with the epilogue slides was while they did tie things up, they're meant to remain as subjective as everything else. A lot of it talks about this understood or it's heard. There was a time when the origin story had a historical framing. It was being told as a story in the distance past by an old woman that you initially would have thought was Flemeth and at the end you realize is Morrigan many, many years later.
So the epilogue slides were intended as a, from what we know of this story this is what happened to these people. And then that got cut, which is good. I'm glad it did because I really didn't like that. But that was how it happened, and at the time the idea that maybe Dragon Age: Origins was going to have to live on its own as its own game. Like, Jade Empire never got a sequel. So at the time it didn't seem so unrealistic to consider the fact that this might be our only shot at this one particular story. So it seemed fine.
So, then Dragon Age: Origins went out, and it was a big hit. But that wasn't a guaranteed thing in our heads at the time. There were some people who thought that traditional fantasy wouldn't really catch on. I mean, this was – was this before the Lord of the Rings movies? Before or maybe around the same time. But before Lord of the Rings came out, I don't think the idea that traditional fantasy could have commercial weight was really a thing.
It's hard in my head to take all that out and put myself back in those shoes. It's like putting gay romances into the game. There was a time when that was, you wouldn't even conceive of that. Even if you personally supported it, you just wouldn't do it because it wasn't done. It's hard to remember what your mindset was that long ago.
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