#working on some da2 ones

[neves-trouble]

Origins text posts

[perplexingly]

Oghren’s bisexual awakening 🤭

[maythedreadwolftakeyou]

another day on tumblr reading another post that implies im a miserable racist bigot for thinking i would perhaps like some role playing variety in my role playing game

[vaguely-concerned]

Origins is of course the DA game most closely in conversation with and playing around with Tolkien (right down to the walking talking poetree haha) -- and even more so than most works in the larger western fantasy tradition derived from Tolkien's work that DA:O also hails from and owes a lot of its Stuff to, what makes the game so great to me is that it's doing so very deliberately, and is subverting and deconstructing those tropes and entrenched ideas in some very interesting ways without at all denigrating what it's commenting on. (it doesn't have the almost disdainful undertones of the vein of fantasy that seeks to make the world more 'realistic' ala the more tedious reactions to G.R.R.Martin's work, for example, despite having the darker fantasy bent to it.) among other elements it adopts, what I find the most fascinating is the choice to use the same literary device/conceit Tolkien did in ostensibly only having in-universe biased sources and works to deliver the world through (which I feel is an underappreciated thing about his approach but is part of what makes his world so enduringly compelling and real-feeling -- the feeling of real scholarship devoted/applied to a made-up world. the grounding effect of a good diegetic footnote about source criticism, truly).

many things to be said there, and I'm glad each following game has taken on different perspectives and lenses and traditions to view the world of Thedas through because if you stick with that one too closely for too long I fear we could teeter precariously close to Pratchett's famous and bitingly accurate accusation of most modern fantasy of that era just being about rearranging the furniture in Tolkien's attic lol. and while you could accuse DA2 (my perfect wife who has never done anything wrong in her life to be clear) of many things, that's not one of them, they are pulling on some completely different strings for that one and both the game and DA overall is better for it, to my mind. as so many things in this series: worth staying with and exploring for an installment even if it might get stale if all of it was like this! people are understandably sad about the elements from previous games that they liked which were lost along the way, but that capacity for reinvention is to my mind a huge strength of dragon age as a whole.

(I think Veilguard is coming in as a close second in Tolkien conversation-ness if only in outlining/revealing the worldbuilding that indeed may have been planned since DA:O around the animosity that SHOULD by all rights exist between dwarves and elves in this universe (as per Tolkienesque tradition standards). but doesn't really because you see: politics and the many pitfalls of conservation of knowledge over the ages. our ancestral enmity got semi-intentionally lost between the floorboards of history and you know what. maybe for the best. the humans are already up to so much shit you gotta keep your eyes on them at all times you can't be brawling with each other in the deep roads while they're still around getting up to their nonsense or they'll just pile up even more of it)

[daggerbeanart]

felt like doing a wip wednesday after all :]

💜 tags: @ndostairlyrium @greypetrel @transprincecaspian @plisuu @dungeons-and-dragon-age @shivunin

(no pressure of course as always <3)

[ayrennaranaaldmeri]

Weisshaupt mission definitively proving that da is at its sexiest when it's wardens and yet here I am feeling an unbearable amount of salt because we walk through a FUCKING WARDEN LIBRARY and they could've put in a fucking NOTE about the HERO OF FUCKING FERELDEN IN THERE. SO GLAD THE FUCKING JOINING CHALICE WAS RECOVERED FROM FUCKING OSTAGAR THOUGH.

[waterdeeps]

how i look trying to explain to bioware fans how video games are made and that they first and foremost have to be fun to play

[icharchivist]

"removes disapprovals" you mean all four of them?

not to blast the mod and i understand wanting to level them up faster. but removing the disapproval? on the game least impacted by it?

[mabaris]

i do like the art they use when varric is narrating but part of me is just like. why is he here. is this another frame story. who is he talking to

[unreadpoppy]

I think the biggest reason I struggled to connect with the Inquisitor as a character is because of the 'chosen one' trope

[rivilu]

I want an origins remake/remaster so bad it's not even funny

[carlsdraws]

i need to draw some comics so it stops feeling like such a huge undertaking

[1ncend1ary]

i have this disease and it's called ALWAYS BEING RIGHT!!!! (making all my fave chars as warrior cats)

[danielnelsen]

the 'talktables' in dao and da2 are the files containing all the text ever used in the game and are typically separated into two talktables per module (in which a module is like.. the base game or a specific dlc): one in the 'module' data folder and the other in the 'core' data folder (typically sorted under 'packages', rather than 'module').

the core talktable generally contains asset text (eg, ability, item, and creature names/descriptions, most codex entries, loading screen text, gui buttons and tooltips, error messages, etc). while most modules have a core talktable, the whole idea of the base game's core resources is to be available to any addons.

the module talktable is where all text specifically related to that module is listed (eg, mostly dialogue, but also specific character names, plot item names/descriptions, plot-related codex entries, etc). this is where the vast majority of dlc text is stored (and the vast majority for the base game too; there's a lot more text in dialogue than in menu options).

[vaamiel]

Reblogging this to say both thank you for all the love on this AND I think it's so fucking cute when this gets cycled between fans of the different characters hehe. Everyone's comments are always so fun to read!!

Little group picture!

I think I'd like to do one of these for DA2 and DAI romances as well 🤔

[maintitle]

The funny thing about the whole 'I'm worried about DA's gameplay and you should be too' crowd to me is that, yes you're right, but also I'm a console gamer. Origins is my second favorite game of all time and it has all the fun of combat entirely gutted out of the game. I actually LOATHE Inquisition's combat. DA2 is my favorite combat system of the series (outside of PC Origins which I've barely played) and it's also my least favorite game in the series. The gameplay mechanics I'm worried about and what you're worried about just aren't the same.