Dragon Age II

Dragon Age II shifted the series from a classic party-based RPG toward a more action-oriented style that placed greater emphasis on fast combat and a dynamic camera. The player takes on the role of Hawke, a refugee from Ferelden, whose story unfolds over ten years in the city of Kirkwall and is told retrospectively through a conversation between the dwarf Varric and a templar investigating his role in the events that shook the entire city. This narrative framework gave the game an unusual three-act structure, over which political conditions and relations between the mage and templar factions gradually shifted, culminating in an open conflict between Knight-Commander Meredith and First Enchanter Orsino. Unlike the silent protagonist of Origins, Hawke was for the first time in the series fully voiced, lending the dialogue a more personal, cinematic tone.

The combat system was faster-paced and more visually flashy than in Origins, with an emphasis on ability combos and quick switching between party members, which drew mixed reactions – some fans appreciated the fluidity, while others missed the tactical depth of its predecessor. The game also reused a number of environments, just with different decorations and waves of enemies, which was criticized at the time due to the shorter development cycle forced by the publisher. On PC the game ran smoothly even on mid-range configurations of the time and offered detailed visuals of Kirkwall's environments along with strongly voiced characters, including the return of companions like Varric, Merrill, and Aveline, joined by new faces such as Fenris and Anders.

Despite its mixed reception, Dragon Age II remains an important milestone for the series – it showed that BioWare was willing to experiment with narrative structure and with a morally ambiguous ending in which no side of the conflict is unambiguously in the right. To this day it retains a following of fans who appreciate its more personal, intimate story focused on a single city and a single family, in contrast to the more epic scope of its predecessor and successors.

Why play it: Anyone who appreciates a more personal, intimate story focused on a single city and family rather than the epic scale of the surrounding entries will find here a bold experiment in narrative structure.