Incredible news here. Dragon Age: Inquisition has been announced to be on the cover of Game Informer’s September issue and they’ve supplied us with a video that contains Pre-Alpha footage that shows off a host of new features!
They’ve also announced a huge list of features that will blow your mind.
- Multiple races to choose from
- Wants to make the action less frantic and more deliberate, returning to more tactics-oriented approach to encounters. Big return to party-based tactics
- Part of that is slowing down speed of attacks, more important is designing enemies that force you to examine the battlefield and choose actions carefully
- Instead of swarming enemies, your foes have specialized roles; work together and force you to size up the battlefield
- Battles veer away from button mashing toward a structure where observation and reaction take precedence
- PC gamers getting an optimized version; “PC actually is different, especially from a controls standpoint”, trying to “recapture the very tailored experience of DA:O on PC”
- Going from Eastern Ferelden to Western Orlais; repetitive environments are nowhere to be found in DAI like in DA2.
- Players aren’t just funneled down narrow corridors, the demo showed a bog, desert, a mountain range, all enormous and freely explored in third person.
- Lots of hidden things to find, caves, dungeons, corpses, etc that create other unique sidequests
- Want to make sure there a sufficient number of caves in the game that are each unique, and optional. If you have a mage in your group, you can use a spell to reassemble a crumbled bridge to reach a new area.
- Can also restore a ruined desert outpost into an Inquisition stronghold
- So much ground to cover that mounted creatures are implemented
- Monsters, and dragons for example, do not level up with you. Some are vastly more powerful, forcing you to come back later with proper experience
- Some environmental destructibility
- Enemy scenario: Fighting a massive, armored dragon, you can target a leg, send warrior into melee range to bash off armor, rogue can sneak up and poison the exposed limb, dragon stumbles around allowing others to unleash spells etc
- Weather effects can impact exploration, ex. Rainfall, desert sandstorms
- Rainy weather can make areas muddy, slowing down your traversal/agility in combat, while sandstorms can inflict damage causing you to seek shelter
- Both Varric and Cassandra also join you, presumably as companions, and there will be a new female mage companion named Vivienne (how not surprising)
- Collect resources/materials and craft armor for you and all your party members; heavy emphasis on customization
- A lot of loose ends will be resolved in the story; expect full resolutions to things like Red Lyrium, the activities of the Grey Wardens, and Flemeth, and also Morrigan
And some screenshots.
Most of us already knew that Dragon Age: Inquisition would most likely end up being the best game of 2014, but now it may rival Dragon Age: Origins for the title of best game of all time.