Dragon Age: Inquisition's Codex Entries Have The Politics The Game Is Missing

Summary

Dragon Age: Inquisition's writing hasn't aged as well as previous games.
As the stakes became larger, companions became less passionate about politics and societal issues, removing some of the series' bite.
Inquisition's codex entries, however, are a rare exception, injecting character and personality into the politics of Thedas.

168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dragon Age: Inquisition is an odd game to return to. It was, for the time, an incredibly advanced RPG that looked stunning and was ambitious in its scope. Hell, coming back to it in 2024, it still is in many ways, and that’s half the problem. With a bit less jank and fewer textures struggling to load in before a cutscene starts, it could easily pass for a game that launched this generation, not on the PS3 and Xbox 360.

However, even if I can grin and bear this in good faith, I can’t say the same for its writing, as this has aged worse than anything else. The characters are, on paper, great - they just don’t really care about anything. The opening few hours take place in the backdrop of the highly emotive mage vs templar war, and the majority of your companions just 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:eye-roll at the politics of it all. When they’re giving me no pas🌳sion, it&rsqu🦄o;s hard to feel much in return,

I don’t include Vivienne in thi🌃s at all - arguing with her is one of ♏the highlights of my latest run.

The passion and rage that made 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dragon Age: Origins and, especially, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dragon Age 2 so great 🀅is largely absent in Inquisition. This was inevitable, as the series shifted away from inner conflict and moved on to grander, world-ending concerns that span the entirety of Thedas. Gone are the days of the Landsmeet or the rights of mages in a single Circle feeling like the centre of the universe.

That’s why my favourite part of Inquisition is when I can slow down and read through some codex entries. These books, scribbles, and notes ཧare so full of personality and are written by characters who feel that their issues are the single most important matter in the world. They’re passionate, and often extremely biased, breathing some much-needed humanity into the conflicts the Inquisitor is forced into.

Dragon Age Codex Entries Are Hidden Gems

This is something 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dragon Age has always handled far better than its sister series, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Mass Effect. Here, the lore is part of the world, with the long history of Thedas told through a variety of unreliable narrator🔯s. Inquisition doubles down on this, as you find Skyhold full of notes that were written by everyone from in-universe historians, religious figures, or just loved ones exchanging private letters. These codex entries might not contain the truth in the traditional sense, but they offer the only truth we🐲 have.

My favourite examples though are found in the Emerald Graves. These entries tell the story of the Exalted March against the Dalish elves, as seen from the perspective of the Chantry that committed the genocide in the first place. It is one o🍌f the most deeply uncomfortable experiences in this series when you’re playing as a Dalish elf, standing over the graves of your people and culture, only to find a note that reads: “Elves were guilty of the greatest sin, of turning from the Maker”. The note is c💖alled “Andraste’s Mercy”, because they consider the fact that any of you live at all merciful.

We see a similar story told with the mage and templar conflict in the Hinterlands. Here, we can read manifestos penned by rebel mages, notes from villagers who are terrified to leave their homes because of the fighting, and promises from templars th✤at they will stop at nothing to bring back the Circles. There’s passion, there’s emotion, there’s writing that’s actually engaging with the issue. Like Hawke in Dragon Age 2, the mages, templars, and villagers who leave these notes across the Hinterlands don’t have the privile🌱ge of pretending the war isn’t happening.

Speaking of - why is my Hawke acting like she didn’t say Anders 🍨was right at the end of the last game? That cameo was rough.

Since these are all text-based, they also allow for much more creative freedom. Repeatedly, it’s been heavily suggested that my decision to make Alistair the king in Dragon Age: Origins was pretty awful for the long-term stability of Ferelden, at least according to notes made by nobles and the Chantry. The game itself never gets a chance to dive into this, treating him and Anora as equally competent rulers. But tucked away in these notes,🦩 we see Thedas reacting to our choices.

Given the sheer amount of conflicts - and different choices made within those conflicts - that BioWare has to contend with in 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Dragon Age: The Veilguard, I really hope that most of the references to previous game♏s are contained to codex entries like these. At this point, we need to stop pretending that every choice is equal if it just results in a world state that’s largely the same, with some aesthetic changes.

But above all else, I hope The Veilguard can make me 🌠half as uncomfortable as I felt when Inquisition made me read lie after lie about the Dalish, as my character stood as a walking testament to how wrong the Chantry was. Dragon Age is nothing without its bite, and the writers of Inquisition’s codex entrie🔯s understood this perfectly.