Dragon Age Legends
A freemium browser tie-in to Dragon Age II.
Dragon Age Legends was a 2011 freemium Flash game developed by EA2D and published by Electronic Arts for Facebook and Google+. Set in the Dragon Age universe, it served as a tie-in to Dragon Age II and was the successor to the 2009 browser game Dragon Age Journeys. Despite generating significant media coverage and social media attention, the game was not a commercial success and its servers were decommissioned in June 2012.
Quick Facts
- Developer
- EA2D
- Publisher
- Electronic Arts
- Series
- Dragon Age
- Platforms
- Facebook Platform, Google+
- Genre
- Tactical role-playing, strategy
Facts from the source article.
Gameplay
At the start of Legends, players created a character with customizable gender, appearance, and name, and chose a class among warrior, rogue, or mage. From the world map, players viewed a road at the top of the screen representing mission progress; walking along the path moved the character from node to node, each node being a potential conflict. Visiting the next node cost a predetermined number of energy points, which recovered over time. Combat was turn-based and depended on agility statistics, with two opposing squads of fighting characters lined up against each other. Players could target enemy units with various attacks, while special moves required mana. Characters could consume potions to recover hit points. Each battle yielded in-game currency and item rewards such as armor and weapons, which could be equipped in the inventory menu. The player character's abilities improved through a skill tree advanced by level progression. Players were encouraged to recruit characters into their party during combat; the bottom of the screen listed potential recruits, including non-player characters and avatar characters of the player's Facebook friends. After a battle, players had to wait a certain time before characters who had just fought could be used again. To bypass waiting, players could spend real money on in-game currency called Crowns, or invite more Facebook friends to play. Avatar characters representing Facebook friends were not player-controlled; their statistics and personas were imported into the player's game. A party could include up to six characters, but the number recruitable depended on the player's level.
Development and release
Legends was developed as a Flash game by a team from EA2D, later reformed as BioWare San Francisco, led by designers Soren Johnson and Ethan Levy. It was announced in November 2010 for a February 2011 release and promoted as companion gaming, a social glue for friends to quest, loot, share rewards, and grow a kingdom, with a major incentive being the opportunity to unlock additional content in Dragon Age II by playing Legends. Beta testing via registration on its official website began shortly after announcement, and a closed beta on Facebook started on February 1, 2011. The marketing campaign promoted key art, press releases, and blog posts on various platforms. EA offered the BioWare Signature pack as a tie-in incentive for players who bought and logged into Dragon Age II by March 15, 2011, granting Hawke as a companion along with other items and bonuses. Legends went live on Facebook on March 16, 2011, and the Google+ port went live in August 2011 with no functional differences; both versions were linked to the player's EA account. A modified version called Dragon Age Legends: Remix 01 was released in May 2011 on IGN, co-developed by Levy and Evan Miller using original assets. Levy cited Bayonetta as inspiration and described the game as fast, fluid fun. In May 2012, EA announced server closure for June 18, 2012, citing insufficient revenue; the in-game store shut down a month earlier. A standalone version running on Adobe Air, with social features and microtransactions removed, was released as a free download after server closure, allowing players to download their pre-existing characters as a Saved Game and continue offline.
Reception
Kotaku recommended Legends as one of the best games on Facebook before updating its list on June 21, 2012, after the game's deactivation. Stephen Totilo of Kotaku enjoyed playing Legends; he initially expressed skepticism that it was merely a marketing ploy due to Facebook games' reliance on chain letters and word of mouth. Totilo found the overall gameplay pleasant and was impressed by the amount of gameplay options. He praised the combat as swift and fun and felt the social media elements never became obnoxious, though he considered the enemy AI weak. Nicole Tanner of IGN called it one of the best games on Facebook at release. Conversely, Alec Meer of Rock, Paper, Shotgun was highly critical, calling it a modern reworking of old coin-op side-scrolling beat 'em ups that shamelessly made money off Dragon Age fans. Meer noted that the alternative to spending real money was unnecessarily long wait times, and opined that the game was essentially an advertisement one needed to pay to keep watching, questioning whether compulsion equals legitimate entertainment. He concluded that while he supported good social or freemium games, he was unimpressed by Legends, which he called a slovenly, cheating, cynical wolf in RPG's clothing. In October 2011, Levy disclosed at GDC Online that Legends received up to 100,000 Facebook likes and its trailer over 100,000 views, but conceded that attention from journalists and social media was overly optimistic. Levy noted the game failed to retain its huge early audience and identified the premature launch due to strict adherence to the marketed release date as the main issue.
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