What's The Deal With: Dragon Age?
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The dragon age gets all the attention, but before that age came the blessed age, the storm age, the steel age, the exhaust age of the tower. Sy, welcome to triple click. And why don't they make a game about the tower age? It's got a nice ring to IT this week.

We are, of course, talking about dragon age, a storage R, P, G series with a new entry out this week. How does the veal guards stack up to the series legacy? I'm kr kelson, i'm my mires and i'm jascha.

Hello.

hi.

hey t set up .

R N dearly .

departed. Is forts slowly falling apart? It's so funny that there is a time when we thought that not only was east for survival, business is justified like an entire vertical website.

you know, IT was fun, well lasted and IT. I feel like the beginning of the end happen before the pandemic. And then that was really just the nail in the coffin, although I did really enjoy reading those chapters on overwatched and play nice of a book by Jason trial, I I was excited to get to that. I was like, I hope Jason doesn't skip over that, jill. And you did.

you didn't. And I was thinking.

I was second to .

my colleagues at the other day. I went to the office and I like her about a how overwatch is just not enjoyable to watch SHE SHE kind of disagrees with me on that.

but I feel like would love IT always do and yet it's really hard to follow IT just is sure you may .

not able to read mattis exports coverage to compete any longer, but you can hear her talk occasionally about overwatch and its watchband and other east ports. Topics here are on triple click because of our listener support. We are very happy to be a totally listener supported show.

If you want to support the creation of this show, go to maximum fun data slash join. You can become a member and you can get access to our monthly bonus episodes. There are so many one for every month that we've existed, which is quite a few months. And at the moment, we are in the middle of a very fun adventure, something new that we've never done called a triple quest, which is a three part dunes and dragon's campaign that the three of us work through with our guest, dm.

Matthew mercer, of critical role episode two, or act to, I should say, is now live in the bonus feed for members that is the continuation of our daring highest and actually in the main feed a earlier this week, everybody got access to our session zero planning episode as well as act one. So uh, everyone, i'll get attitude at the end of this this coming month, at the end of november. But if you want to hear back to right now, you can become a member, maximum found out or slow join, you can see what happens.

Acto is pretty spicy. 你看 be， be pretty. Have a good time with IT. I certainly have a good time coming up with some weird sound effects for IT. So there's a lot of fun .

yeah current me music and sound effects for triple quests. You always always don't mention that part. It's something really cool about IT.

Yeah yeah there's there's a lot of music and they're i've learned a lot. IT has been part part of listening to triple quests, also getting to hear me learn in real time how to do the music for getting Better and Better at IT as we go. It's kind of a fun skill to develop.

So I feel like the problem is you're going to be like after we finish this thing, going to be like now we should just do IT a whole play like life, play well, play skills.

My god, yeah, yeah.

It's it's quitter .

jobs and play .

d nd day is enough that I don't .

know that I could replicate IT on on a regular basis. But that's that's what we do for our listeners and for our members who support us. Say maximum fund at works such join become a member support triple click.

One more quick thing before we start um last week, we asked you all to send in burning advice questions and we got enough I think i've been screwing through. We got enough that we're going to do an episode on advice, kind of like a burning questions except just for like life advice, career advice, romantic service. But I wanted to put out yeah gaming vah.

I wanted to put another call for advice related questions. If you have any advice related questions, you want to our advice on something email as triple C A maximum found that org. I think we're going to do that episode a few weeks to stay tuned for that.

Yeah, nice. good. All right.

So this week, we are talking about another massive RPG that is just coming out today as people are listening to this, though Jason and matty have both had this game for a couple of weeks. I did not get an early code because I am a supporter of apostate majors, and I just does not overwell with a chantey, so i'm on their shit list and they would not give me a review code. Just kidding.

I don't know why they didn't give me a code, but a youtube have been playing quite a bit. And of course, that game is dragon age the veil guard. So we'll be talking about this game more in depth in a couple of weeks once i've had a chance to play some.

But for now, we just want to to talk about dragon age in general and a little bit about that game as well just because it's this pretty story RPG series at this point, and I at least a huge fan of the series, and it's been really interesting to watch IT sort of grow and shift and evolve over the past jees like fifteen years, so so on. Anyways, let's start just by talking some about the wheel guards since youtube have been been playing and I am very curious to know what you both think matter. How about you go for how much have you played and what do you think of dragon age.

the veil guard? Ah sure. I'm not very far Jason's little further than I am. I have gotten up to the companion cannas, who I think is my favorite so far. I would say I ve liked IT more.

The more i've played, it's got another slow start, which i'm certainly not alone in voice our our review of polygon notes this so I just kind of win in being like, okay, the campaigns are onna get more interesting the conflict we're going to get kind of nice at first and then more interesting as as time goes on. So excited for more conflict. But lucanus I really enjoy, and i'm i'm really just here for the story.

I am playing as warrior. The combat, I think is is more action oriented than other dragon ages have been. You can really feel the god of more influence, especially if you pick warrior.

There's three classes. It's roke, mage and warrior. And predictably, ly, I have an acts and a shields.

No surprise there for me. But I started to really like IT after a while. I did. I didn't like the combat first, but i'm really enjoying IT. I am enjoying dodge rolling around and a fighting weird demons and ghost and guilds.

The very beginning of the game is like a confrontation with solis, who people probably remember is one of the antagonists. This game from dragon age two, he has kind of a heel turn situation. He was a companion now his maybe not on our side anymore and he's causing all sorts of magical shanae ans that we have to fight against.

But of course, it's far more complicated than that seems. But i'm having a good time so far. I feel like i'm too early to have some grand proclamation but i'm also in slack with a lot of other dragon age die hearts who are further than I am and are really liking IT.

So i've also been spoiled on a few things as happens when you work or Polly on that com. So I also kind of curious to get to some of the pop points that I know happening later in the game and just going to see how they play out. But really, I I just want to see what happens in the story. And i'm taking IT so far.

But Jason, yeah, Jason.

I am having a hard time with this game for a few reasons. When is that? The combat just bores me. There isn't a ton of variety, is very repetitive. The enemies to have like an unusually high amount of health, they all just feel like they take five seconds longer than they each should to kill, which is very annoying.

IT feels it's like, kind of like a water down version of got of war, but with way less N M E varied and less fighting playing around combs and stuff, there is nothing about the story that is griping me. My understanding is that the interesting stuff happens much later and it's a really, really slow burn. But like I don't know how much long as I can bring myself to keep playing, the rating is really feels like it's it's gone a little bit down in quality from previous situations of the franchise.

IT feels very marvel. IT feels very raw, raw. We're all having a good time together and has less of that kind of Greenest that previous start dragoned schemes have had.

I actually, I went on youtube and was watching some footage from inquisition and also from origins. And the tornado difference is really start even at the beginning of the game. Like the begin of the game is meant, feel really dark, I suppose. And like IT starts off with this kind of fake out where you think is dead and oh, actually he's not and it's that kind of the tone for the rest of the game. We're like even they can even like bring themselves to kill someone even after making you think that they did.

Um and then the other thing the other thing that is really just uh probably the biggest turn off for me is that like the level design and the way it's all put together is just so straightforward and just lacking an interesting decisions um which is such a contrast from most apogee, including previous dragon age games. And not give you an example, which is that like um you get to in an early mission, you get to this warehouse and the door is locked and it's like, okay, the prompt pops up. But as I find another way into the warehouse in the next story, you see this little thing and it's a note and you pick IT up and IT says like something like fellow Victory Victory or that called that you're fighting against please stop leaving the roof open IT is letting in drafts um and then one of your party members says, ah IT lets in both drafts and people yes.

And can smashing down here though, it's like the kind of the silliest thing and there isn't even another way to get in. It's not like you can make a decision of like we're going to barge and we're going to like choose a combat router. You just jump ed down the room for then you fight more due.

There is never any options to like talk your way out of combat or and make decisions. In fact, there's a part of the beginning of the game. The very first thing you do in the game is you want up with this bar and you have this option.

Do you want to fight these dudes or do you want to, like, talk your way out of IT? And it's almost IT feels very deceptive that that is the first choice in the game because like I haven't made a single other choice like that, like there are no other choices. The levels are just kind of straightforward linear action levels where there's only one way to go.

And along the way, you're kind of solving these really basic boring puzzles that just don't like involved moving one block to another or like rotating statues es or something in this very rudimentary way and then just going more on this action path, like this linear straight ford action path, where you're like you might go down a few gliders to get to different areas, city, but there is no decisions to be made. And that fundamentally, is the reason that i'm probably not gonna play much of this game, is that you are not making decisions. You're not making decisions about what gear might be optimal because ever turn me to pick up a new piece just shows you whether the arrow is Green going up or the error is down going right.

And and you choose to equip IT based on that. You you're not making decisions about what your party members should do because um you only control your main character. And like your party members, you can control their abilities through this radio menu.

But it's not like done in a strategic way because they're each they are all on cool down. So like you can just kind of pick, okay, I want harding to shoot at this enemy and then all of her abilities will beyon cool down. So you're just just of balancing meters the way you would in any action game and you're not making any decisions about anything. Mass effect, right? Yeah the mass effect yeah is is IT is very similar to massive CT and it's just you're not just not making interesting decisions and the characters in the story, you're not compelling enough for me to just kind of what past that stuff.

So yeah, i've been having a hard time with this game and I say this is someone who is a big fan of the dragon age games, uh especially origins which really uh still stands out to me uh as as a really good game and then this obviously is coming out in the shadow balers gate through which I think really revolutionized and set A A new bar for what we might think of us like. Um just the capability of choice in R P G S. And that kind of makes us feel even more underwhelming for me. But yeah, i'm really having a hard time with that.

I mean, I don't disagree about the literary of the levels. I think I probably am a little more and dear to the characters than you are and willing to stick IT out just for them and to see what more people get introduced, what happens with them. And I know there are big choices, story choices later, but I can't disagree like it's not great to have the first ten hours of i'm hearing forty hours if you just mainline IT like that's that's not great to have that first chunk can be pretty slow, but i'm willing to give IT a longer try and i'll check back in later what you yes.

can I I want to zoom out for a second, bring you back to the whole series just for a second. This feels to me like drag me just been on this kind of like this really interesting evolution, where the first game was one type of game, more of kind of the in the mold of the first two batters, gates and never went her nights, and vireos earliest games, and IT was more of a strategy, have a kind of tactical RPG.

We're like to beat when you entered combat, if you didn't choose your powers correctly and like position in your characters correctly, you were probably have a hard time. And gradually through dragon, each two and the inquisition. And now this is just become way more of a straightforward button mashing action game and this is really the pinna of that and I find that just really disappointing.

Um but even when I was doing that, like even into an inquisition, you still had enough kind of minor choices are kind of mini minted choices that I still felt like you are engaging in an interesting way and I remember an an inquisition having a good time juggling party members, playing around with iron ball and and others in the crew saw less, of course and just like having them interacted with like fight enemies in ways that were a little bit different than the party could and also just having more options and more kind of interesting choices as you went but this to me IT just feels like it's kind of this um uh the pinacle of where the series has been heading since origins like origins, if you look back at IT was a very different game. Then the three games that followed IT IT sort of like, I don't know, like rainbow or something, we're the first game. First first century is very, very different and maybe the one that people remember friendly and the other is just kind of didn't quite at that, mark.

Yeah the origins has has an interesting finger on with combat where it's real time but you pauses IT all the time which is not really a style comment that I see very often in um in anything like just seems like that kind of gone by the wayside IT.

I actually prefer straight turn based combat like I loved the combat and border scape, just like I love divided originals into just like I preferred gr pages with turn base systems to like active time battle, like final fantasy. I think it's like I prefer all or nothing, either just full term based. It's totally tactical. I'm like looking down on everybody and like really taking my time to maximize my turns or it's just an action game and i'm like learning enemy attack patterns and dodging and like, you know, like mixing IT up, like got of war or something, and and then anything in between can be kind of frustration.

Could do IT all turn base, like in really the first three dragon games, all three of them. You could play this entirely change if you want IT to just IT would go a little more slowly.

Remind me how the turns worked. Like how turns? Just kind of the origin .

of this is those old ice metric infinity engine games is like about those gate one and about those two and ice day. And so and the idea was that, like common and falls in real time, but you're position constantly to make your characters like engage and actions. And in those games, like you, you were pausing and unpausing constantly, because like to unpausing would actually make the actions fold.

IT was a smart system for its time and the reason worked Better than just like straight up p term bases because um IT was faster. The reason that the only term base works in a game like get three is because there are no real kind of minium encounter like every encounter has some way to IT where is in the dragon age games? There's a lot of just kind of male like counter yeah mobs and encounter is that you fight that are just kind of waste of time. And so you want to go through those a lot of a faster and that's where the kind of real time with pause entered the factor to allow you describe IT up.

So yeah, that is think what i'm doing is like that. I just don't think of that as turn based like I find myself with like like ability stacking in weird timing is not really possible to like have my guy is go and have their turn be done and then consider the exchange is always like i'm like trying to work at that way but then someone's being attacked or someone has a status effect that I need to go deal with, and then someone needs healing, but I have to like front load the healing and then opposit long enough for them to heal.

But in that time someone else is get like taking a bunch of damage. And I always find a kind of frustrating and hard to handle. And actually that difference you lay out in the way that the encounters are designed is a big reason that I prefer others gate, and like, really kind of went up, bouncing off of a lot of games.

not origin, that three levied. Well, in general.

the design ethos .

of having every encounter be meaningful, I think, is most players prefer that like, prefer not encounters be a waste of time.

And it's the larian style, right? The original, this is well, but yeah, so I don't love that. So if you're gonna have like just trash mobs that are kind of fundable, low through, at least give me like action combat, where I can just serve in my way through them.

If it's a little more, I can m mo, where you just press a button in your party. Auto fights, not less. My thing that said, I really liked dragon age origins, like I loved that game. And he was totally on the strength of the narrative, the combat, really never that satisfying or fun to me. I wonder if the two of you had a similar relationship with that.

Yeah.

I did not like the combat in origin at all. Yeah, just part of why heading into a vail garage, I was like you could not pay me to replay all the drag mage.

You're more happy about the action I trajectory i'm having.

I think a Better time in part because in this game i'm playing as a warrior yeah it's pretty bog standard warrior combat but I don't mind fighting these moves. I'm out here. I'm swing in acx like that does feel different to me in a good way.

It's not like it's a life changing converter. Anything but some of those physique aspects of older by reward games? And I include mass effect in this.

That's my least favorite part of revisiting them, replying them. I think back on IT all the you yi screens. I mean, these are the kinds things I complain about this show.

And like, god knows, I was a person in my bodies. Gay three was a real chAllenge for me. I was like, is so phinney. This is just pinny up the wz o and I I was in IT for the story, but the combat for me was like, at least favorite. And IT became the thing that I grew used to, grew to tolerate in order to get through a story that I thought was really excEllent and worth IT. So for me, vague guard and like A, I just had these mobs with a, with a hammer over and over and just get to the part of the story that people say is good, not be fine.

but yeah right and will still come down to whether the story yeah is any good, which really was the thing like and I think is kind of the defining, the defining thing of dragon age is the story like as as much as the change toward action combat has been like one of the articles of this series.

To me, anyways, it's always come down to how good is the story, how good as the character is, like what happens, how exciting or the twist and turns help impact for the choices. And that for me, I mean, that's what made dragoned George gans so remarkable IT. Was this a really like striking world that started out seeming kind of similar to other fantasy worlds, but very quickly revealed a lot of interesting wrinkles and then let you to just have to make some really serious decisions.

especially by the yeah, and you are constant making this decision. I me drag ggt IT starts out with this like, rich, where things go ride and like have to watch your mentor duncan, like, murder some dudes and it's all very, very bleak. And then it's compartment is not like the is divided into these different areas, really going around and trying to get different people to help you.

The olives in the majors in such and you have to make a really tough decision in each of those sections. Um very different than than this new game. Also, I mean, I want to talk about the company for more sextus because I think the characters really tie into that.

I think part of the appeal for me, I mean, i've been played origin since I came out. So what? Fifteen years? So I can't really speak to whether the combat has aged well, but I do remember that one of the highlights is building a party in one of the highlights, building a party.

Is that like you kind of I think at least for me, I grow more fond of characters when they play a role in the game play. And so like I was like, oh OK more again, she's got quite an attitude on her, but she's a very useful mage and so she's probably to grow on me over the course of this game oh liana, she's a little bit annoying, but oh well, she's useful healer here. Maybe you will grow me too.

And they did, in part because of their game play. They can act like they're used in in the party structure. In this game there is no party composition and you just kind of like you don't really need a healer or whatever. IT doesn't quite work like that um which I think .

also kind attracts what you do if your plane is a warrior. I really like having a healer .

around personally like people just have a random healing and like harting as a random healing ability or like that as a random healing. It's not like healers and mages and IT sounds like a party build quite the way that like origines.

That's true, I guess. But there also skilled trees and you can like select whether you want them to like max out healing or right. And there's there's a little new answer, but I agree with you, it's less strategic. They're kind of just there like you, Elizabeth, and biotic and fitter or something like there are just there like throw potions like you and they can't get hurt and battle seemingly either.

They are just kind of like your buddies in that same way that Elizabeth was where the things that they do to endure them to sells to you or just kind of throw throw in just sticks and stones in positions and and that doesn't feel like, oh, i'm selecting my fighter. I'm selecting my mage. I'm selecting my specific lineup of people for this very specific fight that needs like these elemental attacks.

that kind thing yeah but yeah the characters are always a highlight and um I think origins and even two has a even though that game as much line because I was developed in lesson year and a half and so I was only taking place in one city and i'll never forget like picking up random accessories and instead of the names that was just like ring, ring, ring going to the same .

warehouse for the seventeen .

times of those waves of of enemies but even that came with anders, had an incredible capture.

development and dangers was a really interesting story.

was heavy and ferry was introduced in dragon aged to digg. Two had a .

lot of great and have a lot of interesting stuff time and yeah inquisition also. Um remember that poker game and some of the really um just real real special moments I think are getting together in in the inquisition they had .

the part where everybody started singing and they found their hope again by sing song like one of the greatest moments of any video game because i'm a huge cheers ball I looked that stuff and that again, actually an inquisition doesn't happen for a good ten hours or something, sort of an RPG eternal tourism that the game always get Better off.

Do you need need some of that, right?

Like you do need some of that because you can't know the characters and you can at the impact of an emotional moment without having some time to IT. But um I think you can you can have a slow story that is kind of mitigated by other things and an inquisition. So in position the best of vecu was really weird.

And a lot of people wound up just kind of enlist ly doing filter quest in the first area, the hinter land. To the point where I could talk to is to do a big story that like p leave the hinter lands because everyone felt compelled to do everything. Um but once you got out of the hinterlands and started doing other regions, there is a lot of cool suffer there.

There is a lot of stuff that I made you feel like you are making good progression. There is a power system where you had lock new regions, a new quest based on, like this inquisition power that you would add to by doing other quests, another kind of side activities, and at all. I found me for an interesting game play loop that also tied into the characters. Because as you were doing these questions, if you might build up, you may make small decisions that impress your characters in some way, or they built relationship with the characters in some way.

Yeah, position was a classic big table game, where your party gets around a big table and then you looked down at the map of the world and like, unlock new area there is stable and you know a certain type of RPG and action RPG. Yeah yeah.

I mean, to talk about the characters a little bit more and the way that the way that you interact with characters in these games, being out in the field with your favorite party members is a big part of the dragon egy experience. It's also the mass effect experience. It's like the bioware experience.

And really all of these arches do this. But I really have fond memories of the banter between party members in various dragon age age games. And that was something that inquisition allowed for a lot of space for, because IT was much more than open world game, certainly than two, but also the origins. And I don't actually know how open the rail guard is, but like a big part of dragon age is walking around with your faves, especially as you get to know them Better. Like everybody wind up with a group of, I guess it's usually four people maybe is .

IT a smaller party in various .

this yeah so IT really is more so yeah yeah so so having that that sort of group of people IT was really fun because the characters bounce off of one another in really interesting ways. And that's always been a staple of the series. And I think it's also a mass effect like the moments when you're sitting around the table, maybe the the the big table and people are kind of fighting like they have different views of where things should go and part of what you're doing when you're making decisions in the story IT isn't just okay.

What's gonna follow these people whose village we just saved? Do we sacrifice them to the wolves? Or do we help them plant crops? Like sometimes it's like what this character really wants the world's to feed tonight, and this person is really into this time having crops.

And so you're also kind of lake playing alliances of characters against one another. And that's something i've always found really compelling about this series. It's like really cool about the way they write characters and sort of fit them into the story.

That's something i'm really looking forward to also unveil the guard, but isn't quite happening yet. But I I totally agree and like to kind of speak to what Jason was referring to before. I almost feel like the point of designing your party for different illegal quest or really any quest in a dragon aged game is, well, who's fighting right now?

Which two characters are going to bounce off of each other in an interesting way, or say, funny, equipped to each other, like ideally you get that sweet, sweet conflict. And again, at the any of the game, because they don't. They have kind of a group of characters who all get along.

I do think that's a mistake to start off a dragon age game that way because I have come to think of dragon and to a less extent, mass effect. But really, dragon age is a game where the characters do get along and they have core ideological and sometimes religious conflicts with one another. And some of the characters are like, kind of bigoted against certain fantasy races.

There's some fancy races of involved in in this series and like that part of the story telling us, like, okay, how is this going to unfold? What is IT like? These characters are forced into this diverse group of people. How are they going to deal with this? There's like stories about the character's sexuality, like dorrian stories of a favorite of mine.

I think it's really fascinating and like to have the characters have those opportunities like bounce off each other because the nature of their identities, I think, is part of what makes building a party so successful in those games and so cool because it's like it's not just that. It's like, oh, plot beats are unfolding. It's like, no, there's like most these little secret dialogue choices that you that feel like a special present because you don't know what you're not seeing. You're like, oh, imagine what the conversations would be if i'd chosen two or three different characters here. And like that illusion is part of what makes the serious seem so much more powerful.

Something that was remarkable about dragon age gorgons, when I first came out, was the fact that there is no explicit morality assigned to decisions that you make, which was a design decision by the narrative team, and stood, in contrast, massive c, which had just come out well, I guess, a couple of years earlier and has the theme of this point parag on relegate system where you're and and it's interesting because parag on and reneging aren't exactly good and bad.

Like the kind of our but in mass effect, you're always shepherd, like you're always kind of trying to save the world and eventually make one of those three decisions at the end of mass effect. tory. But like you can just kind of be a dick about IT or you can be like a really nice person of, but your eyes kind of moving in the same direction in dragon age. There are like much more consequential choices that you can make, but IT doesn't scribe anything color coded or even really just any morality at all, any decisions that you make.

which is pretty cool. A has been pretty good. So something that a another thing that change pretty drastically from origins is that in origins you'd have a dialogue tree that was kind of like old school borders taking, or even like borders gate three, where IT was like five or six different options. Just kind of presented one after another one, two, three, four, five, and then starting in, dragging each two, and then into incredible and now into vile guard you that was replaced with this radio system where was more like a little prompt and then your character would say something loosely related to the prompt kind I fell out three, going to fall out four um and so starting with the dragon age two and then inquisition and vel guard. That prompt also came with little icon in the center of the rail shows you what kind of choice you're making so it'll be like the sums up for the good choice or like a like a guy like with his arms crossed in heavy army for likely evil choice, like the tough choice, or .

whatever wasit stoic, good and goofy.

Now there is more than a two.

And so to get into that, this is one way that the series has my origins. And what was remarkable about origins. And actually, I think that one of the reasons that that games legacy is what IT is like.

I do feel that dragon age origins, at least until now, I haven't played veal guard. But I wouldn't be surprised if even after validation looms large over the serious always, the one that the true fans are like that was the best one, that why not they just do that again? I think that that kind of thing is actually at the heart of IT.

It's not like about like combat design exactly or character ating exactly. It's A A kind of combination of all of these little choices. And a really big one is that you're just sort of row play like you're free to just role play and you can just be like, well, I don't know like what decision do I want to make you? How do I want respond without the game prompting you and having all these U I prompts, which right then began to change in trigger age two and then also in inquisition and IT sounds like it's also the case in vae guard that they're just more like they're kind of laying in on thicker with what IT is you're doing in the kinds of choices that make.

Yeah, dragon age origins was a fascinating game for so many reasons. One is that IT was E A. IT was by a belief, first game after getting acquired by yeah, I was went through like a turbulent development at the time, like at the time, IT seemed incredible.

IT was in development for something like five or six years, which was unusual in two thousand and nine when I was released. IT was rebooted a few times that had a lot of issues. And one of the reasons for that, I believe, is how ambitious IT was. IT was called dragging age origins, because at the beginning of the game, you could pick from six different origins that was each like, or two of a problem. They were all.

everyone has tough races of the of the world.

I know that was crazy. IT was the type of thing that I was impossible for a game to get away with today because like all that development, time and money would be spent on different things that, like most players are not sick, as most players .

only use one of six. And you say that's .

that's one of the reasons that others gay three is so special. But at the time, I mean, those were incredible and really started things off being, especially if you went with one of the best ones, like the Darwin noble, which was everyone.

of course, nobody, I feel like nobody did that to start with.

And then when I did, like son, who started.

everybody tell the good.

well, I was like politics and IT is that game, I think more so than than later games, was really a direct descendent of those old school ARP ges that people really love because by which started to change a lot after E S. acquisition. And after all that happened I mean the the doctors who started the company ramaz a and greg my shock they left um shortly after that. I think he was like they left four years after E A to go over something like that five years after the typical golden and c um and h some other people who are just kind of like interview parts of dragon age and by war and the old buyer staff boulders gained cota and such um left started to leave after that which is one of the reasons that you started to see the series evolved indifferently for Better and or for worse um after that the time line is interesting .

just because of how weird IT is that IT starts in two thousand and nine with origins which yet bio accounts was many years in development and was just kind of this massive project that they finally got done and then really quickly after that in twenty eleven we get dragon age to which you know now infamously had this whatever IT was sixteen months turn around something crazy and then dragon age inquisition, which was, you know, okay, now we're going to take our time with this one. We're going to give people they want lots and lots of content, maybe too much content, we're going to give them thing. But that comes out in twenty years .

yeah like that comes out after IT feels .

like a really best general .

in today's years, ten years and .

now it's been ten years. And like and in the ten years since inquisition came out, bioware has just like gone through this totally wild heva. Their whole reputation has been turned shed anthem came out and was a disaster mass effect in drama that came out and was like very widely disliked like there's just a sense that by war is over this everything is writing on the whale guard and the really showed they are still got IT IT must be very stressful for them. It's it's just been wild a wild ten year people.

Then we get a little context here for people who haven't like read every single article that i've written about all this or like kept up on every single detail, which is that, like.

first of all.

shame on you. Shame me what you do this is this is all in under the under the thumb of ea just kind of having a few year period, maybe decade long period of insisting that everything with multiplayer at first IT was like ea other like season past stuff because they didn't, because use games were a big problem for them. And they were trying to counter that in every way that there's like codes that you have to get inside the games and registered .

before a game stuff was a mean stock. IT was actually a place .

where people bought you game.

sir, the used to see IT as a big problem. And then they went into multi player dragoned change position at this multiplayer more, basically, everything had to have multiplayer for a while. And then there was also A A huge contention of people, including casey hudson, who was the city, had a buyer or who wanted multiplayer.

And they started working and them. But what happened was, so inquisition came in twenty fourteen, and the dry, yeah, that's saying. And then the dragon team started working on this new project.

Could name join that was under my late lie, is a creative director of inquisition, a bunch of those folks. And the idea was that would go to to venter, and I would be like a spice type of game. And for various reasons that I rebooted in twenty seventeen, actually I got cancelled and IT was like we're going to do something totally different for dragon age.

Essentially, we want to add more multiplayer to this thing, among other things. Um at the same time, master drama just come out and that was causing problems for the whole company because I was widely pan, I think it's sold decently, but I was pretty IT was IT became a mean because of all the facial animations at the time, people really didn't like IT. And then two years later and then came out and that was the biggest disaster by where could have had IT was this kind of mediocre life service shooter game that was just flawed in many, many ways.

Um remember how how you had to do others figure tomes that this grading tunes on my good anyway and then at the same time, like this new version of dragon age was totally multiple player or not totally, but that was largely multiplayer was under development until another year after that when buying war finally, but essentially casey had to let firework Carry mci. This new studio had took over. And as part of that whole process, E A gave them permission to make a single player only.

So the current iteration of dragon for the one that we are getting today is basically been in development for four years. Maybe add a little bit to that. Um and um that was because E A essentially shifted gears again and was like, oh, je, I felt order the, well, maybe we don't have to do multiopolis a disaster may be we do to make drag for and with .

just picture that some cleaned evil suit executive being like, you know, I think you guys should do is a heist in the divider .

in period yeah like would be great.

The sickest .

idea ever. yeah. But along the way, with all this turmoil, in addition to all the other problems that they face, and like the hardships and the turbulent, troubled development and crunch, all of their bats of, they lost a lot of people on the way.

So yeah, there are the credits i've not done this um maybe I will but if you compare the credits of valida to like inquisition, even let alone origins, IT is almost certainly almost entirely different people there. Few people have been there since early days. John apple, one of the directors, has been there since since at least dragon age origins.

I believe I have the fact this one, but he's been there for a long time, definitely worth on inquisition. But like most people have not been there this whole time. So IT is a very different crew of people that just happens to be working at a company called bioware.

Yeah, yeah. So weird. yeah. They got rid of a lot of the writing staff I know, which concerned me anyways, since the writing has always been so strong in dragon age.

And I went back, I periodically go back to check this. Usually when i'm getting ready to talk about dragon age. I wrote this for kata KO in, I guess I must have been in twenty fourteen for inquisition.

There was a lower explainer, a beginners guide to everything dragoned. And it's it's a fun article. It's it's when you're writing explaining ers in the style of like the bold face questioner like you're into the cuter kind of asks you stuff.

But then sometimes they're funny and they are like they kind of derail the conversation and you get kind of have a conversation with yourself anyways, IT was when that side of explainer was really big, and I was, like explaining all the law. And I went back and reread IT because i'd forgotten half of IT. And IT just reminded me how rich the world is and how IT is considering that data. The setting stand for thd dragon is setting which makes you think you would think that would be the most generic fantasy ever. And even if you look at that, I mean, it's called drag age is just a dragon and .

yeah there's .

like a hot store doesn't wear much gone that it's going to be a big cliche. And then you get into the particulars. And the particulars are almost always interesting. Are so the fact that they lost so many writers over the years and so many the people who were responsible for shaping the world, that is a big loss. Because that's not easy to do to take those kinds of fantasy troops, dragons and majors and, you know, whatever elves and doors and the rest, and turn IT into something that feels distinct, even though IT still has all of the half Marks of talking and talking ism whatever .

you want to call the yeah most notably David gator, who was the lead writer. Drag gorgons and raging dragon position then left the C D. O.

A few years after that um but yeah there a bunch of people as well who who are just no longer at the co. So yeah I mean, again, just worth keeping in mind as you watch the kind of evolution of this series a cook. I did read that explainer before I start playing billboard, and that was very, very up.

Yeah, I need to and I wrote that.

explained having played through inquisition. So I like knew what people would need to know. But it's good to know that that information is still helpful for going into this game. I do remember even an inquisition. They're just immediately like or lays this the century that in your life day.

the proper nouns are common and like a lot of IT is coming back to me, but they're definite somewhere like I remember.

I appreciate that that they don't throw IT out. They make you remember that because the stuff is interesting, like they might as well, you know, if they're not committed to remembering everything in the world.

like why should we be? Yes, yeah, yeah. Although I keep thinking about something that you said a couple, we see when we are talking about metaphor about how unique that world felt and how this is just kind of Fanny europe of a lot of those robes and dig. I don't want to sell IT shark because it's got a lot of cool ideas in this idea of this conflict, especially between the mages and the temper and how like neither side is is really evil or neither .

side is .

really it's really interesting and there's a lot of new on to the characters and the lower in general um but still coming off of metaphor, which is kind of feel so different and so unique. It's a little bit of IT overshadowing really beyond that. I mean, if i'm comparing traditional because that's kind of comparing, I don't know, apples and hammers, but like if you're looking at traditional fantasy about just get three really hangs over the scheme for me in terms of law and characters, res and decisions.

And um that's the thing I was I was worried about that just knowing how incredible that game was and the share scale of the decisions that you can make and also knowing how this game went through this turbulent development cycle and how IT wounded up going more towards the action, got to a type of game play. I was worried the bold's get through with hanging over IT. And unfortunately for me, IT had i've been thinking about others.

gate three and something that IT does that none of these bioware games do is IT really embraces its table top routes because in a lot of different ways, but in a big way, because there's a narrator, there's basically a dune master narrative is going on and sort of describing your character and the different things they're doing and painting a picture for you that goes beyond what you're seeing on the screen.

And that's such a big part of role plane, like playing dungeons and dragons as we all learn. Like it's something that map brought to our know a triple quest that his ability to evolve timely paint a picture and just his amazing voice, the way that he is so good at sort casting this spell, like that's that's such a big part of fantasy of, like of having an adventure like that. And it's something that all of those all their bioware games really up through origins kind of did well as well.

I don't know which one's had narrators or not, but they kind of kept that table top. Something like the core of the tables of experience was always kind of there and origins moved away from its somewhat, but it's still kind of felt tethered to that. And then this series has been gradually moving away from that and toward a more like hollywood style, cinematic style story telling.

And I feel like bothers gate three was just a reminder of how powerful that is. Like they just brought IT all back. And like, never mind, what if none of that other stuff happened? We have a totally fresh slate, and we can just do this like you're playing A D campaign. And as IT turns out, at least for a game that works really well, I don't know Better or worse, they're very, very different. But like he really does work to go back to the table tops.

I just wants to say rock quick. Since i've been so down a val guard, i'm not necessarily against the series moving into action or moving away from or evolving a different way like open mining and comes to that. It's just that in this case, the evolution just doesn't work for me.

And final fantasy sixteen is another, I think, good comparison because that also is just heavy on the action and that im, I mean united issues with the story, especially in the last third of that time. And some of the other design choices like I was that can me, but the combat for the game is just so much Better than the combat in this. Me just feels so much Better and doesn't feel like you just mashing buttons against sandomir enlistment. So a lot of IT really for me, and a lot of my negativity towards guard just comes towards the the actual um kind of feel of the game rather than in evolving in a way that I don't like. I'm not necessarily a traditional is when he comes to game play evolution IT just doesn't feel good in this case.

right? You want them to evolve in a more fun direction that evolve.

evolve in a good.

evolved to be Better.

Vote yes. good. Okay.

but that isn't like a .

darling Darwin one. Heard t what? I'm really looking for you to playing this game and forming my own thoughts.

We'll be talking about IT.

So curious you're going yeah yeah me too to be talking about IT again in a couple of weeks once i've had a chance to play and everyone in the world has played so. So i'll be able to talk a little more freely like we won't to worry about boiling stuff and whatever. So that'll be fun. Until then, let's take a break and then we will come back with one more thing.

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And are five hundred. We've got this super mark in how is available now. IT is supersized .

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all right. And we are back with, uh, one more thing. I'm actually going to go first because it's sort of in line with what we were just talking about. My more thing is a show that i've been watching called the legend of vox ma, which i'm sure a lot of our listeners no features front of the show.

And one time danger master Matthew mercer, who, as that happens, you know, he's also got the little thing called critical role, the matter part, and they made they did an actual play. So that was so popular that they have made IT into an animated series that's now on amazon prime. So I knew about this.

I've seen headline es about IT especially recently because there is a new season, their headlands all over the place being like the new season is devastating. Emotional, like kind of overheat and stuffing like man, is that show really good? Like the adaptation of their DNA campaign.

So Emily and I decided to give this a shot. And I do have to say the first couple of episodes didn't totally grab me. It's like to capture the tone.

So this is an adaptation, I believe, of one of the seasons of critical role. I haven't like listen all the way through critical role, but I believe this is like a loose adaptation with like some changes to make IT work as A T V. show.

And it's an animated show. It's very much an adult animate show. So there's a lot of swearing. There's some really hard core violence that's actually pretty awesome. Like if you're into like pretty creative and exciting fights and like some really like nearly stuff happening, it's got a lot of that.

But it's also like it's got a lot of um blue humor and a lot of sort of dick jokes and sex jokes and at least at first especially what's his name the um the bard uh sandline is his name and he's kind of their barred character. He's a half ling. He's like the singer and so he's always singing songs he was not doing IT for me and it's I think any time you have got a character, we're like everyone is always talking about how annoying character isn't telling him to shut up. There comes a point like .

you i'm going to say I make griff in, if you will yeah there .

comes a point well, you I don't know that with me, but dead poll is a good yeah yes, there comes a point where you should maybe consider you ready in the character, which they are doing over. But that was like a little bit tough for me. So but I will say sk IT out, I don't know if this is, if this is because I think this was originally a short that they made that may have just been the first two episodes where they like fighter dragon, but that those the first two episodes is like a kind of a standard and like a one shot where they go and there's a dragon and they get hired by the kingdom and they have to go deal with IT. And you get to know all the members of box making a, which is the name of the party.

So if you know the barbarian and the cleric and the elvan magic user and the twin half elves who are like rose, and it's kind of pretty standard adventure RPG characters, so you get to know them and they do a quest, and then that ends, and then the actual storyline begins of the season, which is about like this empire couple who've taken over the home town of, like one of the members of the party, percy. And that's like a really good story, like once that it's cooking, which is an episode three, I was like, oh well, now I really want to know what happens next and we wanted just watching the whole thing and it's really great. It's really fun.

It's got killer voice talent know because so does so does critical role. It's like Laura bai and um actually Johnson of courses in IT and of course, matt mercer is. And it's very fun because i've been spending so much time editing his voice because i've been editing all these triple quests that says he's not any one character.

He's like all the n pcs because he was the dune master. So just over and over again, some guy like a guard, i'll be like, hey, what was that? And like rain. And then he also plays kind of the big bad, like one of the villain.

So then you get to really hear him doing lines just every time that sort of fun to hear him because i've been working with his audio files so much but really IT is very good. It's very fun. It's like kind of a mix of silly modern humor with like some really incredibly great action sequences.

IT doesn't look amazing. It's not um for example, delicious and dune, the show I talked about couple of weeks ago, the studio trigger show. That show is like an artistic CS smaller er's board. It's like amazing visual art like so much creativity.

It's like to look at this show is not amazing to look at IT looks just kind of like I don't know any of those netflix animated is from when they were Green lying anyone with a pitch for an animated show for like four years. So they're like seventy of them where they are all kind of a little cheap looking like people people know that are to that i'm talking about it's pretty straight forward. But what they lack in that kind of visual art and actually like the music doesn't do a lot for me either like all of the esthetic qualities are a little lack.

They make up for that stuff with like really inventive action scenes and like really bone crunching action and some really awesome stuff, like it's like very inventive, the actual ideas that are happening and it's great. I really recommend IT. So I um I think we are started season to and you know totally watch up to to the new season and if the figure headlines can stops boiling stuff, that would be nice.

But but yeah, i'm i'm really enjoying it's it's a pretty easy watch. And if anyone out there is thinking about IT and hasn't given IT a shot, give me a shot and like me, get up through pisos three, because that's where the real plot of a first season kicks into gear. And that's the good stuff. Say, at legend of oxygen, IT is on prime video. Jason.

what's your one more thing? What you said about mama reminds me thunder folk aches my one more thing last week. The game from dreams even that has the voice actor in on jolie by money who plays metra, plays the dune measter in that came and he voices every character in the game and unit but it's one would be funny, cool yeah yeah.

I like to just become a change and my .

room thing is a new book called we solve murders by Richard om. Richard om being the h uh kind of T V personality who is also known for running the phenomenal a book series um uh what's thursday murder club is that the name of IT right yes about um a group of a retiree's of elderly folks to summer pensioners in .

his the language yes .

and we saw murder is a brand new kind of series and IT set up as the first century and what will be a franchise and will be a series. And IT is just as brilliant. I might even like IT more than his previously.

He is a phenomenal talent.

He's gone Better as he's gone. Oh, well, I mean, that's what happens. good.

I ve never finish the second, third book. No, I just two of the third. I haven't read the third of four year, but I will. Um good. We some murders is really cool. Just give you a quick plot, uh description basically there this lady um named amy who is this kind of rain tough body guard for higher and her father in law who is this retired a cup sush investigator and the two of them team to solve uh a series of a murder and shenanigans ensue when the book starts off amy is like working for this treat that like billion aire possible least hundred millionaire author on a private island um protecting her and uh ah the plod just Carries on from there and IT is A A lot of fun influencers get murdered and old people going up and have great relationships and work together to solve crimes and there is hydrant taking you from uh island to dubai, a private islands and it's just a tenniel an I love this book it's called we save murder which is just a phenomenal title and yeah really really enjoyed IT Richard dizen man do can can write and he can craft a fantastic supercell ing mystery that is .

for sure he's funny. Yeah, he's a funny rider. He's really got his finger on the polls of the people. We want to watch old people get together and solve murder, and we want to watch .

influencers get kill .

and a little bit .

more so the the thursday murder club runs into is that like you can't go on globe traversing escapees with your main characters? Well, at least the first couple of books have been and enough the third of fourth book of them traveling around the world.

But they're not really.

They keep pretty clear yeah y're in a retirement community, they're like they're not capable necessarily of like getting involved in heavy duty action sequences um and he does have other characters like Younger options, stuff like that have more action stuff. But in this the main character um can get involved a lot more action high drinks and there's a lot more versa and globe tradin escapees and that adds to the entry in the overall sense of action in mystery and stakes high just really enjoyable. But wish murder Richard has been check IT out.

I would definitely read IT read all of his books. He cracks them out to, I admire his work ethic. Oh my god. yes. So perfect that what .

is your one more thing? So IT is long as we put out the episode and that means the movie night, we wash a horror vie. And IT was one that my beautiful wife had never seen, which is the movie scream from nineteen ninety six. And if you've never seen this movie before, you must watch IT. It's incredible for .

the film and .

all timer I saw for the first time myself last year. And somehow. The identity of the killer was never told to me.

And if that's you, if you're listening to this nearly, I don't know who goes faces, I don't know who the slashing is in scream from nineteen ninety six. You should wash this movie because it's also an extremely fun mystery. It's very well told.

And gina loves to guess who the killer and everything we ever washed together. We watched a lot of mysteries together. And the beginning I was like, so I know who he is and i'm going to reveal nothing as we go along, which was very fun.

And I also said, if you guess that, I will be very impressed and deny. I guessed these things very easily. And he did not he did not guess this.

And I will also say the other good review, usually at at some point over the course of a film, my wife will pick up her phone and checked text. Mesage did not happen. Screen one thousand and eighty six.

Incredible film. IT really moves. IT really freaking moves. And if you're like, I know everything i've been, i've seen IT. I've seen the opening scene with through very more on the phone I mean, your house like you think you know, you don't, you don't know IT, it's so good. It's just like a ten and ten movie.

This is like when I recommended the movie jaws and I was like, have you guys heard of this movie jaws? But you know what? People should still watch these movies.

There's so good me west cavet is a good frequent director who knows how to make a movie. He's not just like a fluke success also.

like every actor in IT, is so incredible like cory cox as gill weather is incredible iconic performance neve campo.

Matthew a and it's great. I guess I I won't spoil IT, but it's funny because I wash this would be not that long ago though I saw this when I first came out, I think I thought in this and I was like this, this gonna too scary for me during the first thirty.

it's more funny .

than the first. But the opening sequence with is like, truly a hour maybe. And everything after that is, I was like, okay, this is finally can hang yeah. But at the time, I I thought I might be too scary. It's funny, I think that I won't spoil, but that the motivation of the killers is the most nineteen and ninety end of history s motivation .

for a killer ever. It's very of its time. But in a perfect way.

you watch all the other .

and .

there's a lot .

and they're not all good. And after we watch SHE was like we should watch all of them. But so the continued I guess i'm not sure how far we're .

going to make IT. If you you love I man going the nineties.

those screen masks were everywhere possible. They get away from them. Know goes face, yeah.

First go face appearance, genuinely scary, becomes a little less scary one. Then scary movie with the like I stone ghost face mass, like ghost face has been deluded over the year.

I'm kind of sad that I saw ghost face is kind said that I saw scary movie as a kid and I never saw scream because then when I saw scream, I was like, oh, scream just like a worse version of this like, it's just like a kind .

of like more reason IT.

yeah. I mean, there are also like forty scary movie movies. And then there was not another teen movie .

that was a .

the nineteen ninety thousands are weird from.

and we loved .

people think was eating its own tail.

Austin powers, like, what even was that?

There was a time well, I guess it's kind of the parallel here is dead pool .

and super hair .

movies yeah no.

it's funny that scream a movie that is explicitly about horror movies like that kind of both. The fourth wall in the certain way was also the movie that reinvigorated horror movies. Because the movies doa and like ninety, ninety four, there was like nothing.

And then at least that kind of jump started horror movies that made everyone, remember, all these are fun. And I don't know, feels like now, like horror. Man, we could just do a bonus episode, horror, or sometimes, I guess maybe not. Anyways, horror movies are really interesting. There are so many .

kinds of horror movies. Yeah, I feel in some ways Jordan peel, as here now, like we have other kinds of horror movies now.

And yes, really diverse. An interesting fiel there's like endless all kinds of them. They're just every worth it's pretty .

cool to see yeah but the classics there are so .

worth yeah that makes me want to rewrite scream right? Well, that has been our spooky halloy episode. We hope you all have a safe and key field hallows out there.

Go listen to triple quest. If you haven't, we hope you enjoy IT and become, remember to hear, react to is live in the feed right now. Alright.

many and Jason, I will see both .

of you next week. See bye.

Triple click is produced by Jason share many mires and me kr hamilton, I had a mixed the show and also read our thee music or show wer is by tom D. J. Some of the games and products we talk about on the webisode may have been sent to us for free.

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