After leaving Lothering I went to Redcliffe. I met the people I was supposed to meet and when I was convinced there was nothing further to do in preparation I said "Bring on the night and the accompanying attack of the undead".
The zombies were not too hard to fight off by Dragon Age standards, though I clumsily let one significant NPC die (I cannot remember his name).
After it was all over I went to Castle Redcliffe where I had more problems. The battle in the castle courtyard was a real pain and after several attempts and several views of the hated "Your Journey Ends..." screen I won this one by a slight fluke. The very tough enemy crossed the courtyard to take on my party but his allies hung back and did not seem to notice us so I got the chance to finish the big guy off first.
I went into the Castle to find that the zombie invasions of the town were being caused by the Arl of Redcliffe's stepson who had been possessed by a demon. He had also poisoned the Arl. I sorted out the immediate problem but the Arl remained ill and his wife theorised that Andraste's Ashes (a religious artefact lost in the mists of time) might make him better so, since scholars have failed to find it for centuries and as I also have a darkspawn horde to fight I am the obvious person to go and look for it.
Having picked up some more work to do from the Chanters and Blackstone Irregulars I made my way to Denerim. On the way I was waylaid by an assassin hired by Teyrn Loghain. He had quite a few friends and killed my party a couple of times before I killed him. As he lay dying he seemed to have enough energy left to say "Hey, why don't I join your party..." but I finished him off and we went on our way.
The city of Denerim is a world in itself and you travel between one location and another and can be attacked along the way just as you can in the wider world. You first arrive in a market area and most of the game's main groups have a base there where you can pick up and cash in jobs. This was the first time I encountered the mage's collective and I picked up work from them as well as from the Chanters and Blackstone lot. By now I have so many quests either not done or half done that I was beginning to feel a bit swamped.
It was in Denerim, while trying to clear out some Blood Mages (kind of like necromancers) from their base in a warehouse that I met my first serious problems. By the time I got to the leader, who had three allies with him, my party had one Greater Health Poltice and no ingredients for making others. Morrigen had a Drain Life spell which she could sometimes us to improve her own situation but that was it.
I spent more than half a day repeatedly trying to win this fight and failing and just started to hate and resent the game so much. I especially hated the fact that the leader had a fireball spell which, in this enclosed environment just seemed like a "you lose" button he could press when he felt like it.
I went to bed having still not got passed it but in the morning I realised I should have just gone back to the market and bought all the health poultices I could find and returned with them. So that's what I did and I won the fight at the third attempt. The fireball was still very annoying, though.
I have recently started playing AC Revelations on the PS3. My first impression of it was positive. Its version of Constantinople is a beautiful city and full of colour. But it is for its understated lack of novelty that I like it best. The ordinary houses and buildings of the city take me back to the less spectacular areas of Florence from ACII.
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| Constantinople - Between Florence and Acre. |
Unfortunately, there seems to be less content than in Brotherhood, though that is yet to be seen for sure. The fact that the city is smaller does not concern me but that there is less to do does. The real problem with the game is that the real story is happening not to Ezio, who only has a bunch of sidequests to perform which are cobbled together and called a game. The real story is Desmond's story. After all his time in the animus his brain is coming apart and the memories Ezio is catching up on in Constantinople are even described by Subject 16 as a few leftovers which need mopping up (or words to that effect) if Desmond is to recover.
When Ezio arrives in Constantinople he soon finds himself in an underground environment where a workman is trying to break through an impenetrable door. The door requires several keys in order to be unlocked and that appears to be the game.
As Ezio travels around the city he encounters animus data fragments. When he has collected enough you can go back to being Desmond (hooray!) and do a 3D platforming puzzle (first person). As Des goes through the stages of this he agonises boringly about his past life in a wining fashion that anyone would enjoy listening to. What the culmination of all this will be I do not yet know.
How the same writers who created the aloof and taciturn Ezio also came up with the self obsessing Desmond remains a mystery.
Despite all these complaints and despite one or two glitches with the controls I am enjoying Revelations and will write more about it soon.
I have received Need for Speed Undercover through the post today. I have never played this one and I saw a clip on YouTube of a race featuring wide roads and fast corners and had to have it.
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