I’ve enjoyed playing a number of RPGs (Role-Playing Games) over the years. I’m old enough to remember when they consisted of typing “turn left” and “open the door” and receiving some text-based response to tell me what I found.
The first really stunning graphic-based game I played was “Myst” back in 1993. It was beautiful for its time, but quite static. The company Sierra put out a lot of animated looking games and provided hours of fun. Then, in the 2000s, computers and graphics cards became robust enough to create worlds that could be explored on one’s own terms rather than having to follow a linear plot.
I prefer games that concentrate on storylines and characters as opposed to shoot-em-ups and over the years I’ve enjoyed most of the Fallout series and the Elder Scrolls series. But by far my favorites have been BioWare’s Mass Effect and Dragon Age series. The first Mass Effect came out in 2007 and the first Dragon Age in 2009 and I have played every game in both the series.
Because these games are so involved, they don’t come out very often. There have only been 4 main games in the Mass Effect universe. The 4th game in the Dragon Age series just came out this Halloween. I waited a bit to buy it, knowing I would probably become quite immersed in it, but then it went on sale for a mere $39 and I bought it on December 16th and installed it on the 17th.
It took BioWare 10 YEARS to complete “Dragon Age, The Veilguard”. If you’ve ever played one of these games, you’ll understand the huge amount of effort that goes into making these programs. Frankly, I don’t know they do it.
All of which is to say that so far, I have clocked just under 75 hours in the game since the 17th. I’m estimating I’m probably 1/2 to 2/3s through. So if you don’t see much from me for another little while, it’s because I’m off in the northern realms of Thedas trying to figure out how my little team is going to bring down 2 rogue gods!
Tuples and Attributes 