Rating 8.5/10

The short review

This game is a cross between: Neverwinter Nights/World of Warcraft

It’s good because: • Great story • In depth NPC relationships • Cool combat animations

It’s bad because: • You must travel with a balanced party

The long version

Kick ass storyline

The storyline of Dragon Age: Origins is by far one of the best story lines from any RPG that I have played. For starters depending on your race and class the first chapter of the game is different.

I went with a Human Noble in an attempt to recreate my character from the original Neverwinter Nights. That’s all I’ll say on the matter as to not give away any spoilers.

Sex?!?

One of the rather odd things I found about Dragon Age: Origins is the ability to have sex with your companions. Som

e companions even swing both ways depending on how you want your character to act. These sex scenes are accompanied by some absolutely awful cinematics (with great ‘O’ faces) that just made me cringe.

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While I was dreaming in my sleep last night about slaying dragons and what not, the mysterious countdown timer on Bioware’s page reached zero. For those who don’t know, about a week ago Bioware placed an untitled timer on it’s main website as well as the Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age: Origins. Today the mystery is solved!

So what was realeased?

A new expansion? The announcement of Mass Effect 3? No, it is a super awesome competition to win free stuff simply by participating in community activities. It’s called:

So how to you win stuff?

The bazaar is a place you can compete in Auctions using Bioware tokens. You earn these tokens by doing stuff like signing up, registering your games and answering questions. Pretty easy yea?

The items you can auction on range from US$2,000 Mass Effect 2 computers to Bioware branded beanies and books(full list here). Auctions start on April 5 so you have around one week to get as many tokens as you can get. If you want to get started now, head over to the Bioware Bazaar. Don’t worry about having to make yet another account on yet another website again, you can simply log in using your EA Master Account and clicking the Bioware Bazaar picture at the top.

If you don’t own DAO or ME2 you can still win

Bioware have guaranteed that you won’t need to spend any money to enter this competition. If you don’t own the games that you get tokens for registering, you can simply fill out a questionnaire to prove your awesomeness and pick up the points anyway.

If you want to grab the games anyway (like me), I just picked up Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening including shipping for A$113.85. They would not let me ship DAO to Australia. I did however get it on eBay for just A$30 including shipping! If I can though I usually stick to Amazon simply because I trust the brand and they have always looked after me with troubleshooting.

To buy in a store here in Australia it would have cost me A$258.95 for all 3 games. Simple proof that it’s better to go online for your games.

For more info and to start earning tokens follow the link.

Before I go, I want to know if anyone wins an Auction next week so let’s keep everyone up to date in the comments below.

UPDATE: This competition is only available to those who live in the USA (except for New York and Florida who are also out). This is due to Bioware not making sure that the terms and conditions met competition laws of every country and state. Big stuff up by them which has resulted in quite a kerfuffle on the Bioware forums.

Bioware has promised more competitions for the excluded countries at a later date.

It ends Monday, March 29 2010

Today Bioware intrigued fans and gaming sites across the world by adding a countdown timer to it’s main website, as well as it’s Dragon Age and Mass Effect websites.

Best guesses have been that a release date for Dragon Age 2 will be announced. Or will it be something completely new? Only time will tell.

To fill out this post with some extra information, Blizzard have released a new Sound Blaster World of Warcraft headset. It is available in either USB (currently $120) or wireless ($160). Check out these user reviews of the product.

The first paid DLC for Mass Effect 2

Bioware is expanding on their already cool game with a new playable and very shapely character, Kasumi Goto, in a new downloadable expansion called Stolen Memory.

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Unfortunately, I haven’t had a chance to play Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening, (damn uni eating up all my hours) but the reports around the net are saying it’s fantastic.

Gamespot says…

Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening doesn’t reach the high standards set by its illustrious precursor, but it’s still a great game on its own terms. The combat and questing are as fun as they ever were and will keep you involved up until the very end, in spite of the uneven quality of the story and the characters that fill it. Oghren once said, “Misery, vomit, and malt liquor. Ah, reminds me of home.” You know you’ve missed such delights too, and now’s the time to head back.

Kevin says it’s good fun but lacks the memorable experience of the first game. Read more.

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So you loved Baldur’s Gate? And then you loved Baldur’s Gate II? Well Neverwinter Nights is exactly what you are looking for.

Based on Dungeons and Dragons 3rd Edition rules, this fantasy style game gives you the choice of 8 classes to choose from. The original game alone contains over 50 hours of gameplay not including online gaming. 2 expansions provide you with nearly double the content as well as epic level feats and skills.

The storyline is a typical save the world and kill all the bad dudes. There is plenty of options to create your character into a super being of your choice. Take the path of a heavily fortified warrior with many layers of armour or become a sorcerer who can blast away all of his enemies in one fireball.
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