I’ve played 5 hours of Dragon Age: Origins, and it is the best gaming experience I’ve had since Final Fantasy 7. I plan on purchasing a copy of my own as soon as possible.

The story is gripping; every action I have in casual conversation has a direct consequence to how the game will be played afterward. You actually care about when you win a fight, because you feel the story is important. Not to mention that there are 6 different stories in the game altogether.

The Globe and Mail’s game reviewer puts it well:

And don’t worry that all of your time spent reading and listening will result in nothing more than knowledge of some obscure monsters and made up history. There’s some emotional and philosophical meat attached to this dragon’s bones. Casual discussion topics range from women’s equality and racism to slavery and same-sex relationships. Indeed, there are plenty of interesting ideas to chew on here.

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In fact, even if you want to do the right (or wrong) thing you may find it difficult to recognize it when it comes along. While trying to convince a stubborn dwarf that he should help defend a village from invading ghouls I tried to intimidate him a bit to get him to see reason. He attacked my party. My guys defended themselves, and before I knew it had slain the dwarf and his friends. It felt wrong, and I wished I would have tried some other avenue of persuasion, but it was too late. Still, it’s scenes like this that might make the world of Dragon Age Bioware’s most realistic yet.