Closure in gaming.

My journey into Dragon Age: Origins as a Dalish Rogue is now ended. It has been a couple of weeks since I completed my first playthrough and I am quite satisfied with the way the game wraps things up after one has defeated the last boss. I have also started the origins of every other character type combination I hadn't hitherto and am very pleased with those. Every origin is very well thought out, so far my favorite, however is that of the Dwarven Noble.

One thing Bioware does well is endings. For every game since Baldur's Gate to DA:O, the closing scenes and accompanying narrative have been handled with great care, making sure the player gets the most out of the decisions he/she made earlier in the game. I wonder what sort of surprises the Awakening expansion will hit us with...

Finishing off Xenosaga 2 from my pile of backlogged games. The gameplay is scant and the game seems to have been shortened greatly by way of montages, especially at the end of disc 1 and starting disc 2. This way of presenting the story reminded me of the way Xenogears' second disc was handled, i.e. narration by one or two of the main characters with little to no involvement from the player. Can't say it's a bad game, but if does feel like much was left out for the sake of releasing it on schedule.

The original Persona on PSOne is trickling slowly. I've taken it for a spin only once this year and a short spin at that. Once Xenosaga 2 is out of the way I'll be hitting this baby as my DA:O alternative and making sure I keep up with my resolution to play through all Persona's before the year is through.

On a sad not, Crispy Gamer is no more. I will miss this site dearly as I only discovered it 3 months ago and have personally found that most gaming journalism sites and magazines are sorely lacking in editorial content. The Escapist Magazine is the only other such publication of that kind. Let's see what sort of thing comes out of the refuse there...

The Dalish playthrough coming to a close and the year of playing Persona.

So, 40+ hours into my Dalish Rogue playthrough of Dragon Age: Origins and I've had a few surprises. for one, I only recently discovered that the town of Lothering, somehow, became a ghosttown. It got wiped out completely. It seems I somehow neglected certain quests or missed events that would have prevented the town from dying. Interesting, non? I am about to embark into the mines of Orzamar, a section of the game that seems to turn off a great many players or so I've read in many diverse forums, and find my enjoyment of the game still going strong. It has been nothing short of awesome and it makes me pine for the days when I could spend a barrage of hours sitting in front of a screen with little care in the world save for the basic needs and perhaps school or work somewhere on the horizon.

As I am writing this, I can't wait to get back home and plunge back into the realm of Ferelden and do away with the darkspawn. It is only with great effort that I am able to pry the controller from my hand and remove my stiffening frame from the place where it rests. Maybe I'll get back to my evil mage playthrough on my laptop sometime soon...

As for new year's resolutions, I came across those at 1UP in an article where the staff listed their game related vows for the newborn year and decided to follow through on something I intended to do anyways. I will retake the playthroughs of Persona on PSone as well as Innocent Sin and continue onto Eternal Punishment, Persona 3: FES and 4 to cap it all off. It will be the year of Persona, with a few games in between these. This is my gaming goal for 2010.

Have at you!