You may disagree with what I am saying and that is your prerogative, but I need to vent. The following is strictly my opinion, but it is based on thousands of hours of play-time for all of the games in both of the franchises that I mention.
To me, an RPG game is a player-influenced narrative and the action sequences are solely to advance the story line. Inquisition is an action/adventure game with some RPG functionality but it is not a real RPG. Yes, it has a story line, but a player probably spends less than 1/3 of their overall play-time advancing that story line. The rest is devoted to action sequences where a player fights bigger and badder enemies for treasure or points, or the player completes adventure quests that have no real impact on the story line, all for the sole purpose of... I don't even know why. This is not an RPG game... but Inquisition sure fits the definition of an action/adventure game.
In an RPG game, there are activities that are devoted to developing the depth of a player's character, to growing as a character and toward building relationships with other characters. There is an emotional attachment to your character, if the game is well done. Dragon Age Origins was such a game. So are the Mass Effect games. And though the Dragon Age and Mass Effect games are both developed by BioWare, it is obvious they were done by different development teams. Dragon Age kept stumbling down the ladder from a true RPG game to an action/adventure game, while Mass Effect 3 brought RPG games to new levels (even if the ending was emotionally wrenching).
Mass Effect understands what romance is, though there were still complaints over who could be romanced by whom. That will exist until developers let any character be romanced by any player character. Dragon Age Origins had wonderful romance options, though there were complaints there too. Compared to Inquisition, those were stellar implementations of romance with feeling. Dragon Age II fell way off in the romance departments but in Inquisition, the so-called romance options are more 'throw-away", just to say there is romance. I could write pages on the miserable quality of the romance in Inquisition... but I won't.
In an RPG game, a player should develop an emotional attachment to the characters, and care what happens to others in the game. That was almost impossible to do in Inquisition. In fact, most of the characters are 2-dimensional and demonstrate the worst of humanity. Sera was a selfish crazy. Solas was arrogant and distant. Vivienne was shallow and image-conscious. Blackwall was a murderer and liar. Cole was too strange to even include in my party. Cullen was more human, even if he did want to solve every problem with a club. Varric was so far removed from his character in Dragon Age II that I couldn't recognize him. Cassandra eventually showed some emotional content. At least Dorian, though a bit of a pompous ass, displayer a sense of humor and caring, as did Bull. Otherwise, humor was sorely lacking in this game. It was the one thing that saved Dragon Age II. In Inquisition, the character I found myself caring the most about was Mother Giselle. She was at least kind and emotionally uplifting, though she didn't have a very large roll.
This game took the smart. cute, and very likeable Leliana from Origins and turned her into a jaded and cold shadow of what she once was. And then turned the calculating user, Morrigan, into... okay, she was still a calculating user of people. I didn't care if anyone, including my character, lived or died, which was probably good, since I died a lot. After two play-throughs, and many starts that I just can't find the interest to finish, I am bored silly.
I guess it's back to a good RPG game like Dragon Age Origins or Mass Effect 3. I'll be playing those games until I'm old and gray... okay, older and grayer. But Inquisition is ready for my trash bin.
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