Gothic IV Demo Impressions

Today I tried playing the recent demo of ArcaniA: Gothic IV, and found it a somewhat interesting experience. So, here are my impressions based on the short stint it gives you within the game.

The first thing to hit you upon starting ArcaniA (What's with the second capital "A", anyway? Did reality become like eXistenZ without me noticing?) are the beautiful and vibrant graphics.  It seems to me that certain studios could learn a thing or two from Spellbound Studios, because this has got to be one of the more attractive games I've seen in a while.  It looks pretty. There are some graphical issues like bushes disappearing when you get too close to them (yes, you did read that right), but the environments are pleasing to the eye and have a vibrant feel that you just don't get from the bleak or gritty atmosphere present in so many games.

For example, when I compare ArcaniA to the Dragon Age 2 shots that have been shown so far, I can't help but think that BioWare's next offering is going to feel a little bit drab.  And this isn't even anything to do with the model detail or the texture quality, I'm talking simply about the colour palette. The worry I have is that DA2 is going to feel like the original Quake did: using a computer that can show millions of colours to show every single shade of brown. Now, I know that I'm being unfair to Dragon Age 2 because I'm going on the only area of which screenshots have been shown, and there's most likely more colour diversity in the game as a whole. However, from a marketing point of view, I must confess I really can't understand why potential players haven't been shown more interesting scenery. If I had to pick between the two based on visual impression only, I know who would be winner...

Wasteland versus lush island. Not exactly a fair comparison.

Once I'd stopped staring at the scenery, I went into the local village to talk to the people. The character animations and subtitles within conversations quickly left something to be desired, because they didn't entirely match the words being spoken. Yes, that's right, the subtitles and the actual lines being spoken aren't the same. I'm not sure if this was the cause for the poor lip-syncing of the characters, but it was a bit of a weakness. Or maybe I've just been spoiled by AAA titles to expect good lip sync, but characters giving a full bellied laugh with their mouth closed just didn't quite work for me. They also called me shepherd, because apparently that's my profession. If people are saying "Shepherd", then I'm going to hear "Shepard" and expecting my character to be an awesome space soldier. Sorry ArcaniA, but Commander Shepard trumps a nameless sheep herder.

However, one thing I thought was excellent about the dialogue system was the way that certain dialogue options were treated. If an option would pursue a quest and move the story forward, as opposed to being purely for investigation, the dialogue line was presented in green. This way a player will never accidentally pursue dialogue at the expense of asking more questions and finding out more information should they so desire, but also, it allows a player to ignore all "extraneous" dialogue choices if they choose.  I imagine some RPG purists might argue against this mechanic, but I really think it's a excellent mechanism.  Much like Mass Effect's dialogue wheel placing its "investigation" nodes on the left hand side of the wheel, it allows players to get as much or little information with simple yet elegant UI design. I'd actually like to be able to implement coloured text like this in Dragon Age: Origins for The Shattered War.

A little touch a colour is a definite touch of class

Then we reach the game's combat, and I really don't know what to make of it here. It seemed interesting enough to begin with, a simple click-to-swing system. There seemed to be a slight speed increase if I timed my clicks "right", but I couldn't be certain. You can also right click with a direction to roll out of the way of enemy attacks, which is generally what you want to do when the enemy starts to light up with a fancy particle effect letting you know they're about to do a "super-special big attack". The problem is that this effect gives you so much warning it's ridiculous. If you thought you got a bit of warning with the lightning bolt markers in Batman: Arkham Asylum, then you've got years to react in ArcaniA. You can easily get in a few extra hits and still have time to get out of the way. If you get injured it's probably because you decided to go for that one last extra hit before dodging.

Before the end of the demo you did get access to some spells, which could either slow enemies, set them on fire, or electrocute (stun) them. This really didn't help the combat much at all, because it quickly became a trivial process of: Stun enemy, smack enemy with weapon, repeat until enemy death. Groups make this slightly more difficult, but it was still a fairly straightforward process to dispatch enemies, simply time consuming. It also seemed to be giving you more powerful weapons and enemies than would seem reasonable for how early it was in the game, but rather than endearing me to the trappings of being a mighty warrior, it made me feel like "high-end" combat would be tedious rather than exciting.

Super Saiyan Telegraphing Attack

Overall, the demo for ArcaniA: Gothic IV piqued my interest in the game, but I'm unsure whether it is worth a purchase. Unsurprisingly, they don't give away a lot of plot in the game, but I did get to find out that I'm an orphan apparently with some kind of latent power. Classic RPG cliches like that don't fill me with much hope for a gripping main plot. I can see the combat getting repetitive very quickly, and if a large portion of the gameplay is dull and uninteresting, then that doesn't really bode well for the game itself. But I still feel like I have some interest in the game because it's trying to do something that requires more interaction for player combat, it's the fourth installment in a series I've never played, and I'm an RPG fan. That said, I suppose I still have The Witcher to go back to. Plus, do I really need another distraction keeping me away from modding?

Personal Review: Quests and Consequence

A few days ago I talked about learning from past mistakes I'd made in my modding creations. I'd like to continue in that theme again today, this time concentrating on quest design. I'll be discussing my Neverwinter Nights 2 (NWN) mod Fate of a City again, but also referring to Alley of Murders.

Fate of a City (FoaC) had a few problems with the quests I'd developed, particularly the sidequests.  The most notable weakness of these was my tendency to "extend" quests further than players initially expected.  A simple quest to talk to someone to solve a problem would never be that simple. There would almost always be new information that would force the player to talk to yet another person in the chain and then potentially return to one (or both!) of the original people involved within the quest. While this is fine to do on occasion, repetition of this can frustrate players.

For one, the begin to feel like they are getting the run-around. They begin to realise that every quest is not going to be straightforward and there is going to be something to throw a spanner into the works. They start to become jaded - it's like watching a M. Night Shyamalan movie - you know there's going to be a twist. Worse, if the player has to traverse areas in order to talk to person a, then person b, then person a again, then back to ... you get the idea. This quickly becomes tedious. In case any game designers or modders haven't got a message they should have heard long ago: backtracking is not fun and should be avoided whenever possible!

Force Speed: Making backtracking (slightly) less painful since 2003

Backtracking is whenever you're covering ground you've covered before. Walking back over the same territory quickly becomes tedious, and doubly so if there's nothing new to make the journey interesting. Commercial games seemed to have learned from some past mistakes. The original Halo made you backtrack for almost half of the game, simply with different enemies. KotOR involved a lot of backtracking for quests that force speed helped make bearable. The Witcher "investigation" has a hideous amount of backtracking. Morrowind used silt striders to help eliminate backtracking to a degree, but it still proved tedious at times. But even Grand Commute Auto, I mean Grand Theft Auto IV had far too much menial travel with little real enjoyment - some people still haven't quite got the message. I tried to reduce backtracking tedium in FoaC by using a world map, but there was still "dead" transit time involved. Backtracking can tend to give people "courier/fedex syndrome", where they feel like a messenger running back and forth delivering or collecting packages. This isn't enjoyable, and it certainly isn't heroic. People don't play games to feel like they're doing a day job.

The issue isn't when you have quests that have twists or are lengthy and complex. The issue occurs when every quest is like this.  Quests should vary in both content, length and pacing, just to keep the player guessing. Two of the most popular quests (and probably my two most favourite) were very different in style and length. One involved exploring and finding a set of clues to lead you to a deadly "Shadow Being", one whom you had to defeat in a puzzle style manner rather than combat.  The other involved a daughter complaining about strange noises in the night, which eventually led to the discovery of two creatures having inflicted a death sentence on the father and the daughter unless the player intervened.  It started off as an investigation, resulted in a short combat, sent the player on a quest to find a cure, and finally deciding how they wanted to resolve the quest. The player had a variety of solutions, ranging from the noble path of spending exorbitant amounts of money to saving both their lives, to fleecing the family for their money and their lives.  The two quests were very different in terms of style and length, providing interesting variety for the player.

A family's fate in your hands

However, the latter brings me to another point, specifically that of unexpected consequences.  If the player chose to kill the family, then later on in the main quest one of the NPCs would choose to limit the assistance they provided. I also implemented a similar consequence in Alley of Murders (AoM), in that if the player helped an elf in one quest, it would result in someone's life being spared in another.  In FoaC, the NPC in question directly tells you that you previous actions are why she will not help you, whereas in AoM the link is only hinted at. But in either case, the consequence cannot be predicted when the player makes the initial choice.  It exists so as to enhance the cohesive nature of the world and demonstrate that actions have consequences, but the player cannot possible foresee the long-term effects of their decision.

This raises the question: Are unexpected consequences a bad thing?  Should the player's progress potentially be affected in unforeseen ways because of decisions they made in quests that seem unrelated to their current actions? One issue of concern is whether to ensure that the consequences do not penalise the player when dealing with such choices.  In FoaC, the NPC provided help in a reduced form, but this did not have any significant impact on the rewards the player received in terms of experience or money, but it may have increased the difficulty of battles at the game's climax. In AoM, the potential death of the NPC had little real effect on the player. The player received a minor monetary reward if the NPC remained alive, but otherwise had little effect on the game's mechanics.

One of these templars will always die, but the other might live

Is having unexpected consequences fair on the player? Should players be expected to have a clear understanding of the consequences of their actions in order to make a reasoned decision, or should they potentially be penalised (or alternatively be rewarded) at a future time due to past decisions? In a way this is somewhat of an argument of the visibility of mechanics versus the verisimilitude of the setting. To an extent, I must confess that I'm more of a fan of the latter because I love being presented with choice in games, but I understand that a balance must be struck between the two. The designer must strive to reinforce the basic mechanics of choice in the majority of cases, for too many decisions that result in unexpected consequences will not only serve to frustrate the player, but also ruin those special moments when the player realises that their previous decisions have come back to haunt them.

The main take home message is to ensure variance in a player's experience. Presenting the player with something unexpected will get their attention and usually make them remember their experiences, and creating something memorable and enjoyable is what designers should constantly strive to achieve.

Update: Small Changes

This is just a quick post to say that in the little spare time that I've had for modding has been spent working on some minor changes to Alley of Murders.  These have mostly been cosmetic changes to improve things "around the edges" so to speak: giving it a custom icon within the game's main menu, having accurate text if the player decides to save the game in the area, and a few other cosmetic changes.

I'll be putting the update (hopefully the final version) to both the BioWare Social Network and DANexus before too long.

Personal Review: Alignment Roleplaying

Something I have to consider as a modder and aspiring game developer/designer are my previous creations and the design choices that I made for them.  In this post, I'm going to concentrate entirely on my Neverwinter Nights 2 (NWN2) module Fate of a City and discuss a core part of its design philosophy.

Fate of a City (FoaC) was highly roleplay focused, in no small part due to my initial idea for the module being entirely roleplay based. I'd first imagined it being more like an adventure game than anything else. I figured this probably wouldn't actually be terribly popular amongst the NWN2 community, so ditched that idea, but instead decided to focus heavily on alignment based roleplaying. D&D has two separate alignment axes, good and evil versus law and chaos. It is also possible to be neutral in either axis, giving a possible 9 alignments.

D&D's alignments meet Batman

In light of this, I decided to base most conversation choice around 5 possible options: Good, Lawful, Neutral, Chaotic and Evil. These options were presented in that order each time (thus giving the player some meta-game information about the tone of their choice), and every choice would modify your character's alignment in that direction to varying degrees. This did not extend to conversations where the player was simply gathering information or other factual situations - only conversations where the player was expression an opinion about a subject or making a choice. This was a core part of the module as a whole, almost every significant action or choice that the player could make was able to be tied into one of these alignment categories

This system allowed me to have players make a decision, but provide an emotional or thought process behind each choice that they could roleplay. There was a difficult balance in making the choices apply to the specific alignment while not prescribing an exact reason for a decision. Even better, because of numeric system of 0-100 in each axis used to implement alignment within NWN2, I could let the player know exactly how far they were modifying their alignment to let them know if they were perhaps drifting away from what the player considered to be their "core" alignment. I was also able to use the alignment to dictate how people in the city reacted to the player in general - a character who had an evil alignment would have an equivalent reputation because this would almost certainly be as a result of their misdeeds within the game. The alignment even affected the overall outcome at the end of the game, as the player's demeanour had a significant effect on the ending of the game also taking into consideration their other actions within the game. I'm going to pick on Fallout 3 again and say that it probably had fewer endings than FoaC, or more accurately, fewer meaningfully different endings.

Using different pictures is not providing a different ending

However, while this system had a great many benefits, it wasn't perfect. Some players did not agree with the "tone" of some of the decisions, and I received some complaints about the severity of some of the alignment swings that could occur as a result of player actions. I feel I could happily defend my choices (I think murdering people in cold blood should demand a fairly serious alignment change), but it doesn't change the fact that some people disliked them. However, more importantly, the some of the reason for this dislike is that some class choices demand that characters adhere to specific alignments: Barbarians cannot be lawful, druids must always be at least partially neutral, Warlocks must be chaotic or evil, etc, etc. By tying choices to alignment, it meant that I was tying specific classes to particular roleplaying choices within the game.

There were plenty of choices to modify a player's alignment during the game, allowing them to quite easily go from one end of each axis to the other and then back again. However, some players may have been stuck making decisions they weren't necessarily happy with because I was forcing the D&D alignment system on them and forcing them to adhere to it. While this is arguably sticking to the spirit of alignment as it is used in D&D in that it forces players to adhere to those limitations, they are precisely that: limitations. By implementing choice within alignment, I was effective limiting player choice. From a setting and D&D system point of view, it was somewhat purist, but this doesn't work as well within the context of a computer game because of those limits you are placing on the player. Sure, it prevents the paladin player from going around kicking puppies, but it also potentially prevents the warlock having a slight benevolent streak without penalising them.

Is forcing alignment a bad idea?

In hindsight, it may have been better to implement two different axes of "reputation" or something similar to keep track of the player's decisions (in a general sense rather than dealing with specific choices), and have NPC interactions be affected by these scales rather than those that could actually have an effect on core game mechanics. It is an interesting case of setting/lore consistency versus gameplay enjoyability, and one that I may have been better erring on the side of "fun" rather than the side of "mechanic correctness".

To highlight this in the context of a commercial game, a similar argument has also been raised in regards to Mass Effect 2, where players have voiced concern about being forced to pursue either the renegade or paragon path in an almost exclusive manner if they wish to be able to use the associated speech skills to obtain desirable outcomes during conversations. Players who attempt to cover their bases or maintain somewhat of a middle ground will actually end up being unable to persuade people, including party members, which will potentially result in squadmate deaths. Is this a bad thing, or is it simply providing consequences for the choices the player is making?

Extra Credits on Day 1 DLC

A short post today commenting on the recent episode of Extra Credits and their discussion of Day 1 DLC.  While I've found the series quite good, I must say that I feel they missed the mark horribly with this discussion. Some of their suggestions for improving or removing Day 1 DLC, selling more games and making gamers happier:

Reducing the cost of games
This doesn't work. If it worked, then people would be buying new games in the US. What do I mean? I like in Australia. We pay typically $90-100 for a new game. This might drop to $80 after the game has been out for 6-12 months.  For anyone complaining about paying $60 or $50 for a brand new game... I am afraid to say that people living in America have virtually no right to complain about games being too expensive.

Recently Fallout: New Vegas was available for pre-order on Steam for $49.95. After a while, someone realised that this price was not the "norm" for Australia, and immediately increased the price to $89.95. This is game being digitally distributed. One that does not cost the publishers any more to have transferred to prospective buyers in Australia compared to anywhere else in the world, and they are being paid directly in USD, so why should Australians have to pay a $40 premium for exactly the same product that everyone else is getting. This is a disgusting practice. I'd like to support Obsidian, but I cannot stomach being ripped off in this fashion by those in charge of setting the price.

Selling multiplayer separately
Now, this is actually something I'd be happy with.  This could potentially be a nightmare in terms of technical implementation, but I'd actually be content with it.  Of course, it does raise the question of what a title does when it is entirely a single player experience.  Hrm, guess it has to be full price again... And if players then can pay $30 for a multiplayer title or $60 for a single player only title, then I imagine single player titles would become even harder for developers to justify to publishers.

Including content on the disc
Now, this might not be the case with all Day 1 DLC, but sometimes it's not on the disc because it wasn't ready by the time the game went gold. It wasn't available to be put on the disc when the master copy was being made. I imagine it also wouldn't happen on PC, because the potential for piracy of DLC would be too high for a publisher to be happy about it. And I'd probably say that's a fair call.

But, I'm sure people disagree with me in my comments here, so I guess everyone has different tastes and opinions.

Mass Effect 2: DLC Done Right

Part of the reason I discussed DAO's DLC was not only to lament that it could have been so much more, but also so that I would have a good counterpoint when analysing the DLC released for Mass Effect 2. So let's give a quick recap of each of its (playable) DLC and discuss why they've succeeded in a way that Dragon Age's offerings have not.

Zaeed
Roughly equivalent to DAO's Stone Prisoner, it adds a new party companion with a personal quest.  Perhaps a little less content than Stone Prisoner, but Zaeed has a group of dedicated fans for being one of the toughest characters in space.

Normandy Crash Pack
This was a bit of a let down, although it appeared to be mostly for nostalgic reasons and closure regarding the destruction of the Normandy and the deaths of its crew members. It was effectively a treasure hunt.

Firewalker Pack
This was another shallow DLC, but free. It was basically designed to introduce the Hammerhead, a new land vehicle to replace the (unwieldy) Mako. This was largely a bit of platforming/driving with the Mass Effect universe, and while it did not receive overwhelmingly positive reviews, it did do something different.

The Hammerhead: Agile and Fragile

Stolen Memory
Adding the master thief Kasumi to Shepard's crew, this DLC offered a few interesting things.  A new weapon got many players excited, as did Kasumi's new combat abilities. The mods also featured an investigation sequence where the player had to determine how to get into a locked vault. While the solution could be pursued in a mostly linear fashion and was fairly straightforward, it did offer something different in terms of gameplay.

Project Overlord
Overlord took the Hammerhead and showed its true potential, and delivered a nice story in addition. Turning the Hammerhead's exploration into an interesting game element, including a set piece fight in the vehicle and "frogger-like" sections. It also featured "regular" ME2 gameplay, wit a surreal cutscene and an enjoyable set-piece boss fight for its conclusion, not to mention a great moral choice.

Lair of the Shadow Broker
While it was always going to gain attention and sales because it reunited Shepard with Liara from Mass Effect 1, Lair of the Shadow Broker was the real deal in its own rights. While it started with another clunky investigation (arguably worse than in Stolen Memory) it soon hit its strides.  Combat sequences featuring enemies using Kasumi's Flashbang Grenade, followed by a car chase sequence, a defense segment and two set-piece boss fights all combined to make the gameplay really enjoyable.

Hold the line!

So what is it that makes ME2's DLC successful and popular, whereas DAO's wasn't as warmly received?  For starters, ME2's DLC took more risks. There was no Warden's Keep or Return To Ostagar which just offered "more of the same" as had been given to the player in the main game.  The firewalker pack consisted entirely of flying around in the new vehicle, and none of the standard combat present in the main game. So while it was fairly straightforward, it was a testbed for what was truly to come in Overlord, which really put the new vehicle through its paces and showed that it was capable of integrated smoothly into the main game as a viable alternative to ME1's Mako. The flying vehicle section of Lair of the Shadow Broker (I'm going to use the abbreviation LotSB because that name is simply too long) was another out-of-the-box bit of gameplay, which was fun despite not being terribly difficult.  It perhaps erred on the side of being too easy, but it was really well implemented because you really felt under pressure, and combined with Liara's "encouragement" it really felt like you were taking charge of a chase scene in a sci-fi movie. It was fun.

LotSB chase scene: better than a silly pod race

Stolen Memory tried something different when it tried to integrate an investigation into the game, but unfortunately it amounted to little more than moving around and talking to people. It was almost as though it was trying to bring an adventure game playstyle in Mass Effect, but there wasn't a whole lot of thinking the player had to do, meaning it didn't quite work. This was reduced even further in the beginning of the LotSB, amounting to little more than hunting for the interactive items in the level. This was probably the weakest part of both respective DLCs, but again, it was experimenting with something different. I imagine it could provide an interesting diversification of gameplay if it were more enjoyable and required a bit more grey matter. 

Mention should also be given to the set combat pieces of Overlord and LotSB that help make them standout, and truly showcase that Mass Effect 2 has managed to bring its gameplay mechanics on par with actual Third Person Shooters. Hardline RPG fans might decry this as an example of how it is no longer an RPG, but I'd argue that the genre need not be constrained to mechanics that rely purely on character leveling and the luck of invisible dice rolls. But that's a digression I could spend a whole post on... in fact, I'll probably do that in the future.

The point is that ME2's maturity and mastery of its mechanics as evidenced in its DLC brings with it more challenging and more interesting fights within the game. Putting the player into new situations not only makes for increased variety and interest, but it makes the game more fun. No one wants to do the same boss fight over and over again. Simply shooting or attacking an enemy until it dies doesn't really make a fight feel special. It just makes a game repetitive and repetition leads to boredom, which is something a designer never wants their players to feel.

We just need to kill 65,340,285 boars

The reason that ME2's DLC have worked better than DAO's is because they not only fully integrated with the main game (only 3/7 of DAO's DLC do this), so that they contribute to the overall storyline of the series and the game itself in a coherent fashion, but they also experiment with new gameplay. Not simply choosing to present the same gameplay from a different perspective (Darkspawn Chronicles), or the same gameplay to act as a hook for the sequel (Witch Hunt), ME2's DLC changes the gameplay dynamic significantly. It takes risks.

It is doing something even better because it's using the existing player base as a test bed for potential new gameplay styles and sequences that could be adapted for use within the final chapter of the series. Taking fans of the series and giving them a cheap way to explore new types of content for a low cost allows the developers to see what works and what doesn't and then use this to inform their decisions for future games.  They don't have to spend time creating a full game for millions of dollars that could potentially be a failure, but instead can dedicate time to producing a small amount of content for an already established and eager audience to see how it is received. If something works, then it can be taken and used in a sequel as part of its gameplay and fans will be happy. Similarly, if a particular mechanic does not work, then it can either be tweaked to correct the issues and potentially get another test run in a second DLC, or it can be ditched entirely.

Kasumi's "heist" didn't quite work, but the DLC still did

In my opinion, this is a good use of DLC. This is what DLC should be used for by commercial studios. Using DLC to test out the mini-games and new gameplay styles that the developers are contemplating putting into the next installment of a franchise. Using them to push the boundaries of the game and see if players would like to have a taste of a slightly new direction in addition to the core gameplay that they've already demonstrated they love by buying the game in the first place. But it should not replace the existing content wholesale, as that's not what players want.

This is exactly why Firewalker wasn't well received, as it wasn't until the Hammerhead was combined with the original gameplay that players loved it. Admittedly, in Overlord the developers had already experimented with the Hammerhead once before, but this only reinforces the point. They didn't get it quite right the first time, but on its second outing, the Hammerhead was a lot of fun. It still needs a little bit of tweaking, as it feels as though it has less firepower and durability than Shepard does on foot, but if we see it in yet another DLC or even in Mass Effect 3, I imagine those issues will be addressed.

Frogger minus frog and cars, but with bonus molten lava

While DLC has been maligned by players at times, it offers both players and developers a means to improve games. The ideal DLC isn't a new weapon, outfit, vehicle or map. ME2 has these as well, but they don't interest me. These are micro-transactions, or just regular transactions if you're milking people for $10 for maps they've already played before - yes, I'm looking at you Modern Warfare 2! (I know I'm making a small habit of attacking MW2, but it did so many things wrong that it's hard not to come back to it) The ideal DLC also isn't simply a mini-expansion offering an hour of gameplay in the same vein as the original game, which is where the Dragon Age: Origins DLC suffered.  They act as small improvements to a game, but they're not the best use of DLC to benefit the game itself.

The ideal DLC adds to the game as a whole, developing it and any franchise it might be a part of into something better. It should help explore what the game can and cannot do, and how it might improve or modify its gameplay. Ultimately, the ideal DLC will serve to make the core gaming experience more interesting and more engaging for the players.

DAO DLC: A Missed Opportunity?

DownLoadable Content aka DLC has become an increasingly popular phenomenon, and Dragon Age: Origins happily ascribed to this methodology of providing new content that players can pay for after the release of the game.  While its DLC is enjoyable, I'd have to argue that it hasn't done enough to push the Dragon Age experience forward. Let's take a quick look at the individual bits of content to explain why...

Stone Prisoner
Arguably the best of the DLCs, but arguably that's because much of it was developed in concert with the actual game, but it simply wasn't ready by the time the game went gold. A fully integrated companion with a full repetoire of interjections and opinions on events within the game, Shale has been compared to HK-47 from Knights of the Old Republic. The DLC also features two quests, and when combined with Shale's hilarious pigeon-killing desires, it feels like a part of the core game.

Inquiry: Shall I crush the bird for you now, master?

Warden's Keep
This DLC prompted complaints from players because of the in-game advertising of adding a person to the player's camp (which they go to frequently). This person had a bright exclamation mark indicating that they had a quest to give, but this required the player to purchase the DLC to accept it and hence get rid of the exclamation mark.  Marketing furore aside, Warden's Keep was a fairly standard "dungeon" crawl (set in a keep). Cutscenes featuring ghosts to explain the history of the keep gave it a weird cinematic touch, and it added some interesting points to the Dragon Age lore, and more importantly for some players, a chest to keep their belongings that they weren't using.

Return To Ostagar
I can't comment too heavily on this, as I haven't played it.  However, by all reports, it was a fairly standard dungeon crawl featuring some quite powerful equipment as a reward at the end.

Darkspawn Chronicles
This odd stand-alone DLC gave the playet the opportunity to play as Darkspawn, and attempt to kill all the citizens of Denerim.  While it offered plenty of combat, it didn't actually do a whole lot that was terribly new.  Playing as an ogre was similar to the abilities of a golem, though you did get to use a shriek to turn invisible and taking out ballistae operators so you could bring the rest of your darkspawn party around. As such, it offered a small tactical variety in combat, but otherwise was fairly similar to what the player had already experienced. This was one review summary: "More than anything, The Darkspawn Chronicles is plain and simply fun. There’s none of the dialogue, the decisions, the weight of destiny hanging over top of you. The end result is exhilarating, and I heartily recommend that all Dragon Age fans try The Darkspawn Chronicles out for themselves." I think that this reviewer should not be playing RPGs, because they're obviously missing the point.

Hurlock angry! Hurlock smash!

Leliana's Song
This was perhaps the most original of all the DAO DLCs. Characters were introduced with their own "splash screen" during the middle of gameplay, which initially felt a little surreal and out of place in Dragon Age, but it gave the DLC a very unique feel.  Combined with Leliana being a voiced protagonist, it had a definite "cinematic RPG" flavour albeit with a stylised delivery that reminded me of Zombieland or some equally fourth-wall breaking title. It also starts off trying to encourage you to avoid combat, though it hits a section of almost pure combat as it approaches the end.

Golems of Amgarrak
Another heavily combat focused mod, this delivers probably the most difficult combat scenarios within the Dragon Age franchise thus far. It definitely succeeded in pushing characters to their limits and putting them through the combat wringer.  The story was somewhat weak, though credit must be given for utilising a weird "reality phase shift" (ie alternate realities of the same area) to implement backtracking in a relatively small level layout without actually making it painful. While this isn't something I'd like to see repeated regularly, it was an interesting technique that deserves a mention.

Golems: They're big, hard and angry.

Witch Hunt
Again, I've not played this one, but I instead watched a youtube video playthrough of the mod.  Despite being pitched as a "meet up with Morrigan" mod, Morrigan is in it only very briefly at the end, and raises more questions than provides answers.  Again, it's mostly a dungeon crawl with lots of fighting. There are a few pieces of intrigue, most notably regarding a talking stone statue, but the mod on the whole seemed to be trying to pose questions to potentially be answered by Dragon Age 2 rather than bring closure to the story of the Warden in DAO.

So having listed all that, it's clear that the DLC for DAO has been quite heavily combat focused, though there were attempts within Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt to push forward knowledge of the Dragon Age world of Thedas somewhat, albeit in vague terms with unfinished answers. While they delivered stories that were complete, they raised peripheral questions regarding characters or monsters that were left wide open with only the smallest snippet of information given to the player. I understand the need to leave hooks open to provoke interest by curious fans, but this should not be done at the expense of providing a narrative that feels complete.

Why do statues always have to speak in riddles?

While the DLCs were mostly enjoyable, there's something that they just didn't quite do right. Expanded dungeon crawls with many recycled areas comes across as a little lacklustre, even with a small $8 price tag. There is a lot effort involved in producing content, that's true, but apart from the inherent polish required by commercial releases, I'd possibly argue that most of these DLCs could have feasibly been produced by a team of modders in a slightly longer timeframe.  Now, polish does take a long time (and of course, there were the issues with the initial release of Witch Hunt), but I can't help but feel that Dragon Age's DLC could have been so much more.

There's some really great content within DAO, and there's some good content in its DLC, but with perhaps the exception of Leliana's Song, the DLC didn't push the boundaries of the DAO experience. It didn't try hard to give players new gameplay experiences, a different slant on the gameworld, or develop the overall lore of the Dragon Age setting in a palpable form. Allusions are great because players will get to see and understand the correct interpretation when DA2 comes around, but they leave players feeling a little hollow in the meantime. This is why Golems and Witch Hunt somewhat lack a powerful punch that they otherwise could have delivered to really spark excitement for DA2.

Leliana broke the fourth wall and the mold of DAO DLC

DAO's DLC is enjoyable, but ultimately combat focused and simply delivering "more of the same" as what the player experienced within the original game. This isn't to say that this is a bad thing, as DAO was fantastic, but it was perhaps a missed opportunity to really push the buttons of players and get them even more excited about the Dragon Age franchise by exploring new territory with its DLC.