There are not so many companies in the world that allow themselves to make large, expensive and epic role -playing games. More precisely, there are three of them – Bethesda (series The Elder Scrolls), CD Projekt Red (" Witcher") And BioWare, who recently released the best role -playing game of the year – Dragon Age: Inquisition. Each has its own characteristics, each is unique.

Series Dragon Age for BioWare it turned out to be largely experimental – when compared with the same Neverwinter Nights, Many tactical capabilities and development of the characters are limited here so that it is comfortable for those who have come for one fascinating story, and the bet is made on the studied characters and the study of the game world.

But at the same time, all three parts Dragon Age radically different from each other. BioWare seems to explore their own capabilities and try to choose the further path. So it's time to determine what the main features of the games of the famous Canadian studio, which at all costs should be preserved.

Overflow epic

The scale of action in BioWare Games always grow by exponent. In the first Baldur’s Gate We participate in the local, but epic conflict of the children of the gods, but already in the second part (it was made not only Bioware, but still) the whole world is threatened. IN Neverwinter Nights It all starts with the salvation of the city from the plague, and ends with the struggle with the real ancient evil. IN Knights of the Old Republic And Mass Effect We start immediately with the fate of the planets and end with the fate of the universe.

It would seem that there is nowhere else to. But no, c Dragon Age: Inquisition Canadians intervene a shadow in the conflict, the other world of dreams, from where demons break into reality through the faults. However, even this is not the worst. Many parties participate in the conflict, and everyone has their own motives. The player will manage the whole army – the Inquisition – to find allies, mercilessly punish enemies and … equip the fortress, choosing the color of the curtains.

People like to feel like really powerful heroes; It was thanks to this that Captain Shepard gained such popularity. But there is another feature: in the games of BioWare your Shepard you “sculpt” yourself.

► This time the player does not just fight evil, he fights for influence and place among the powers that be.

The hero is you

Bioware has no ready -made main characters in principle – we always create a character from scratch. We come up with (or choose from the existing options, if it affects the plot) to him the past, form him the present (profession, skills and even appearance) and decide the whole game how he will behave in different situations.

Dart Revan is a man or woman? Hardened soldier or, say, a former smugglers? Knows how to fight on light swords? Perfectly controls force? Solves conflicts by negotiations or immediately climbs into a fight? Captivates interlocutors with innate charm or intimidates a threatening look?

► So Hawk looks on the covers. But how he looks in the game is to decide.

► c Knights of the Old Republic Revan wore a mask, and the whole game under it was hidden by our face. ► But already to The Old Republic The authors still had to come up with a canonical look-and approve the canonical biography.

In every dialogue, in every task, in every battle we add new strokes to the character of our character. And there are hardly two exactly identical captains Shepard, Gray Guard or Baal heir on earth.

Inquisitor in this regard even more depends on the player. Unlike Dragon Age 2, In Inquisition, you can again fly the hero’s face on your own, but, in addition, when recruiting a team and the army, you will constantly have to make a choice. To whom to trust – magicians or templars? Whether to take the Magician from the hostile empire Tevinter to the team? Well, yes, what color of the curtains to hang on the windows in your fortress? Role Games Bioware regularly force the player to make decisions, and this also depends on which hero will be obtained as a result.

► you can fly out anyone, the editor allows a lot. It would be funny if the appearance influenced the tonality of dialogues and sexual interest: “Lord, you are bald! What a horror, I see my reflection on your head ". Maybe in the next game?

Moral choice

BioWare loves to put players before all kinds of elections and moral dilemmas of varying degrees of scale. Many of them almost do not affect anything and are needed only so that the player can clearly outline the character of his character: the hero will abandon the beggar of the coin or send him away, ask for a reward for a good deed or limit himself to a simple “thank you”.

But some solutions come in the plot in the future. They took a stranger on a long journey, who really asked – and he would have it and if he had a sewn -in Cossack. They spared the bastard who tried to kill you – maybe he will be ashamed and repay good for good. Sometimes bets grow to completely indecent values, and one unsuccessful phrase can lead to war, and one well -aimed shot can stop the mass deadline.

In addition to the plot consequences of the hero’s solution, they usually leave spots of the corresponding color on his virtual conscience – say, in Baldur’s Gate The character of the character is determined by the classical scale DND (between "good" and "evil" and between "decent" and "chaotic"), and in Kotor Evil or good deeds shift the balance of power in the soul of the hero to the dark or bright side.

► In this famous dialogue from Mass Effect We can only choose between “agree politely” and “agree rudely” … ► … but the closer to the finals, the more truly fateful decisions will be the face of the galaxy.

IN Dragon Age: Inquisition The player generally adds or throws whole pieces of the plot with his own hand – decides with whom he will fight, with whom to be friends. The script is changing right during the play, and you are the director yourself.

And in all Bioware games, the hero’s actions influence relations with comrades. Never Kindle Aeri will help a scoundrel, never skeptical Morrigan will appreciate an altruistic act, never a stinging droid will lower the hero of softness.

► since you are the head of the Inquisition (and you even have a throne), you will have to choose with all responsibility. Execute the criminal, or let him rot in prison? Your mercy, the decision is yours.

Star team

Therefore, Bioware deliberately makes the team as multi -manner as possible, as in comics about superheroes. For characters, they select clicked types – a stupid strong man, a clever thief, an acute girl with a heavy fate, which manage to work out until the last comma, or even completely turn the inside out in the course of history.

Where another author will simply indicate the type of “noble warrior”, BioWare will think out the biography from birth and to get to know the hero, justify why the warrior and where the nobility came from, provide personal motivation and not always, but often – a chain of personal tasks.

This approach gives a curious result-a dear person who has attracted you after a couple of quests can easily be an evil tyrant, the most faithful friend-a traitor, a charming shirt-party-a killer or someone else. And in general, it is always surprising to find out that the mighty heroes can torment the most that there are everyday problems, and the brave wise paladin has a wife for a long time to his neighbor, and the children forgot his father’s face – he plunges the whole life of hellish monsters and saves worlds when he saves the worlds when He will show up at home?

► Extravagant dwarf Jan Jansen could serve as an excellent illustration for Mikhail Zhvanetsky’s stories about Odessa. ► HK-47 robot killer can forgive his owner except softness.

However, recently, Bioware stopped completely shocking (everyone remembers the scene on the beach with missy and Zalbar from Star Wars: Knight of the Old Republic?). Delving into other people's cabinets in search of skeletons is still somehow scary, but meanwhile very, very interesting.

Team Dragon Age: Inquisition It turned out quite in the spirit of BioWare. Dorian Pavus – dandy, esthete and impudent. A subject of the Tevinter Empire, where magicians rule (in the rest of the world are afraid and despise) and where slavery is absolutely legal. Loves to show off and infringe on someone's rights, but at the same time-gay, sexual minority. Gray Guard Blackwall, the owner of the analytical warehouse of the mind and a chic beard, in every possible way wants to find out what hole his order fell into, but in fact … Well, okay, we can do without spoilers. The rest are not behind either. And, most curious, with the heroes from the party you can often start a novel.

► Heroes of the "Inquisition" constantly interact with each other. And often the dialogue is really alive.

Many love lines

Games have yet to grow to other types of art in terms of love relationships. BioWare here, perhaps, succeeded most of all. More Baldur’s Gate 2 could write out whole love novels before us – and far from always with a happy ending. Not everyone decided to answer Vikunia and seize the initiative, watching the panic and the confusion of the cheeky dark elven – and those who decided, often spared about this in the final.

BioWare regularly change the form of feed and content, enhance the effect on the plot. Love can save, if not life, then at least the soul of Lady Aribet. Love – by the way, forbidden for the Jedi – will be able to return to the light a Bastille Shang Bastille Bastille. Love, which Morrigan is diligently strangled, will decide the fate of a gray guard at the end of the first part Dragon Age.

► Jaheira and Morrigan are more similar than it might seem. Each of them needs a male shoulder in their own way, but both are equally ashamed of this and are desperately trying to hide.

And Bioware is increasingly experimenting with same -sex relationships. Sometimes such experiments are possible: Little to anyone was prevented by the hidden bisexuality of Leliana and the obvious – damn charming, but completely the immoral lecherous of Zeves. But no less failures. After Anders’s obsession, with whom you either kiss or enjoy the eternal forever, and an ever -growing over the dead husband of Cortes in the Trumin of Normandy, the status of almost advertising homosexuals has been assigned to the BioWare Games.

IN Dragon Age: Inquisition finally got to the desired formula. Although it still turned out funny – almost the entire team is bisexual. But at least you can’t sleep with anyone by accident, confusing love with ordinary sympathy. And you will learn about the sexual preferences of the character only if you start to knock down the wedges to him – it is not customary to poke your personal life here in the face.

► If you have chosen a male character, do not even try to roll up to Sare. But the rest of the team is at your disposal.

A lot of conversations

Such attention to the characters leads to an interesting side effect – very often the detachment is selected not on the principle of “who is more necessary in the party”, but on the principle of “who is there to talk about”. Dialogues in BioWare games are not just a lot, but a lot – and sometimes partners can wedge into them, influencing the course of the conversation or throwing new information.

During conversations, it usually flies up to half the game, and many problems can only be solved by negotiations. In the early BioWare games, we were usually offered to choose whole replicas from the set of options. In later – after Mass Effect – We mainly set the conversation with an emotional tone (speak polite, rude, joke), switching to a specific choice of replicas only in separate key plot moments. The options for the choice are not displayed by a list, but in the form of sectors on a circle – and this "dialogue wheel" has become one of the business cards of BioWare.

► In Dragon Age 2, heroes are no less talkative than in Kotor – just at the stage of choice, we do not know what the character will say.

In some games ( Neverwinter Nights, Kotor , Dragon Age: Beginning ) the main character can Casino Charles sister sites develop conversational skills like belief, oken or intimidation – they help to get out of a difficult situation without assault.

And, say, in the series Mass Effect Options for replicas in dialogs can depend on the character of the character – in a critical situation, “good” Shepard will be able to choose a convincing argument, and “evil” will resolve the conflict, the act of the opponent or by crashing him. In Inquisition, additional dialogue options open for special inquisition glasses. Depending on the chosen path (troops, secrets, communications, inquisition), you will learn to communicate in the language of the underground world, with a smart look to speak of magic, politics and the powerful of this world or shine with knowledge of the history of Tedas and the Church. In the formation of complex diplomatic relations, all.

► as always, chatting with comrades is recommended as often as possible. Over time, each of them will offer an interesting personal quest.

A guided pause

Baldur’s Gate The phrase "controlled pause" has popularized as no game before it. Since then, all BioWare RPGs without exception flow in real time, but at any time the game can pause to calmly evaluate the situation and give the instructions to the characters. As a result, the battle proceed quickly and dynamically – which could not be achieved with the help of step -by -step mode – but they demand from the player planning, and not a quick reaction.

It's funny that Bioware managed to put a controlled pause even in Mass Effect – The game, it would seem, is the most not suitable genre for this. But there she came to the court: During a pause, Shepard gives direct orders to his partners – get there, use that skill – and slowly studies his own capabilities – what weapons he has at hand, what cartridges to him, what skills can be applied directly Now. Without a pause, the same thing is done only with a panic hollow on all hot keys indiscriminately.

► sorting out the effects of spells in real time – the occupation is unpleasant. Is it a pause!

It’s a pity that in Dragon Age The priority of actions has disappeared-now you can order the character either, for example, to drink a potion, or use some kind of skill. The chain cannot be built. But each enemy has a set of properties (say, we vulnerable to fire, invulnerable to stunning, heavily browned), and in a tactical pause you can plan a massive attack on it – first we break the armor, then set fire to, and then the roller from the feet.

And also a controlled pause is a great way to catch a great moment for a screenshot or just admire the battle exploding special effects while the time is still in place.

► Location is especially important for archers. They have the ability, due to which shooting from the hill succeeds better.

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Here are the seven features that make Bioware roofs unique. As you can see, something is constantly changing from the game to the game-experiments are conducted with nonlinearity, with love relationships, and with a controlled pause. Canadians constantly try something, but, I think, if they don’t forget about these seven features, then everything will be good at the role-playing games.