Dragon Age: Origins Reviews
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The first is at RPGamer with a perfect score of 5/5:
Dragon Age: Origins is a complete package. It offers true role-playing, a diverse and engaging story, plentiful customization options, humorous dialogue, deep gameplay, and lots of variety. The only awkward aspect is in the control interface, but even that is completely manageable with time. This game can be challenging at times, but swapping to causal without shame saved me lots of headaches I'm sure others might experience. I began my experience with Dragon Age: Origins optimistic, but not really knowing what to expect, apprehensive that I would not enjoy it. I am leaving with a deep appreciation for what BioWare can do, and I cannot wait to see more from this world. It is hard to say if it is due to my inexperience with other games like this, but as far as a role-playing experience goes, this is as close as I've seen to a true one. Now if you will excuse me, I have more darkspawn to slay. A Grey Warden gets no rest.
The second is at Games On Net with a perfect score of 5/5:
Bioware have created a masterpiece in Dragon Age, taking their already established supremacy over the genre and mounting it on to a pedestal made of solid gold. That is both praise and a warning: if you are after a deeply moving, engrossing single-player RPG which will suck you in and hold you there for hundreds of hours, Dragon Age is the game for you. But Dragon Age is so completely devoted to this idea, so focused on providing you with this experience, that it has little to offer anyone else. The casual gamer may find it hard to jump in and out, and the button-masher will be disappointed at the tactics required, both socially and in combat. This is unabashedly a game by the fans, for the fans - but if you're not one, it's never too late to get started.
The third is at AtomicGamer with a score of 91%:
...there's something here that's holding Dragon Age back from being Bioware's best game. It's hard to put a finger on, but the plot, characters, and fighting don't all mesh together the way they should, and the feeling left is that this latest effort is just missing that "glue" that has made gamers fall completely in love with every RPG Bioware has made. Maybe repeated playthroughs will change that, or maybe the added longevity through mods and paid DLC will be the difference later on. For now, though, unlike with their other games, it doesn't seem like Dragon Age is quite good enough to be one of those instant classics that people keep going back to over the years.
It's still a fantastic game, though, and Bioware is to be commended for taking what could have been a tired fantasy setting and injecting just enough newness into it to addict us all over again. The characters are by far the best part of Dragon Age, but the combat, fantasy settings, and plot are all great as well. If you love western RPGs, you owe it to yourself to pick up Dragon Age - on PC, if you meet the rather lenient system requirements - and get hooked all over again. Just try and block off a couple of weeks on your schedule first, because you'll be unavailable for a while.
And the fourth is at EGC Games with a score of 81/100:
Dragon Age Origins tries to balance single character and group playstyles in the almost traditional Bioware way of doing things. An evolved Baldur's Gate with a few compromises due to the game's multi-platform nature, it can keep role players busy for quite some time. Low detailed textures as well as other graphics issues place it a few steps behind a true PC title. Although not a bad game per se, it fails to dethrone a certain white-haired master of sword and magic that goes by the name of Geralt.
