Dragon Age delayed

NewsPosted 04/02/2009 - 10:34am GMT

Will now be released on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 between October-December 2009.

EA's BioWare development studio announced last night that its upcoming role-playing game Dragon Age on PC will now be released alongside the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions between October and December 2009.

"Dragon Age: Origins is shaping up to be quite amazing in its level of quality and polish," said Dr. Ray Muzyka, General Manager and CEO, BioWare and General Manager and Vice President, EA. "I'm really proud of our team, who are working very hard to make Dragon Age: Origins the biggest and most exciting BioWare game yet, and we will work to ensure it not only meets, but exceeds the expectations of our loyal audience of fans."

During its Q3 earnings call last night EA added: "... we're moving the PC launch to Q3 FY10 to coincide with the console launch, giving us the opportunity to make a bigger splash with this epic BioWare RPG title. Of course, the BioWare team will continue to polish the game for even greater quality."

Dragon Age: Origins is the spiritual successor to BioWare's critically acclaimed Baldur's Gate and promises to feature deep character customisation, morally challenging decisions, tactical party-based combat, and gritty, mature sub-plots.

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Triggerhappytel @ FantasyMeister

This is a bit of a joke now, though. This game has been pretty far into development since at least 2004 (I specifically remember it because Edge covered it in their E3 2004 issue).

Let's hope it doesn't go all Too Human on us.

Posted 12:04 on 04 February 2009

FantasyMeister

Bioware were nice enough to give their fans a heads up on the announcement yesterday too on their forums. 24 hours later, and 35 pages later, and I think Chris Priestly (their Community Manager) did a pretty good job of containing things.

From wading through that thread, I'm guessing the reasons for delaying the PC version to coincide with the console versions were really three-fold:

a) Purely a business decision, allows EA to run just one marketing campaign so that all versions hit with maximum impact whilst keeping the advertising budget manageable.

b) Bioware needed just a little more time to tweak the PC version to their satisfaction, now they have that time and can spend any leftovers polishing it to death.

c) Bethesda did a simultaneous PC/360/PS3 release with Fallout 3 and it worked out very well (would have been even better if the pirate version hadn't shipped a couple of weeks beforehand), so I think EA/Bioware had this in mind too.

The only real danger here is if they take too much time finishing the PC version, then compound that by discovering that when they port it to consoles that the consoles need more work too. Risky business, but if Bethesda can do it I'm pretty sure EA can too.

Posted 11:58 on 04 February 2009