Review:
A Review of Dragon Age: Origin Add-On "Warden's Keep"

 As you travel around killing darkspawn in Bio-Ware’s latest game, you may notice that you get more loot than your bags can hold and have to sacrifice items in order to make room. In this review, I look at an add-on for “Dragon Age: Origins” (DAO) called “Warden’s Keep” which, amongst a few of its additions to the game, attempts to alleviate this dilemma.

Whether you have or do not have the add-on, you will find a man in your camp that tells you about an ancient fortress that once belong to his family and was a bastion for the Grey Wardens. If you have the add-on or download it after taking to the man, you are given the chance to travel to Soldier’s Peak, the fortress, which has fallen on hard times thanks to being overrun with demons and the undead. As you explore the fortress, you are able to see glimpses of the final battle that occurred at the site and learn more about the history of the Grey Wardens and how the place came under the control of several powerful demons (one of which is on control of the corpse of a former commander of the Grey Wardens, and she did not look well for her age of several hundred years). Since DAO is a game with a deep, rich lore, I think any add-on that further enriches the lore is always welcome since it makes the game more interesting and engaging. Also, since most of the time you learn about the game’s lore through reading, it is nice to finally see cut scenes of what happened in the past, which occurs as you explore the fortress.

By completing the quests that are associated with the fortress, you are given the chance to learn two new abilities that harness the tainted blood in your main character’s body that came from the initiation into the Grey Wardens; the abilities help you in regenerating mana/endurance and can deal extra damage to your foes. Also, you are able to earn new loot, including an armor set of a former Grey Warden commander, and I must say it comes with some nice attributes and looks good to boot.

Once cleansed, the fortress serves as another area to find a merchant and blacksmith who sell higher-level items compared to other merchants and blacksmiths in the game. A note about the blacksmith: while traveling you will get the chance to harvest ore from a meteor after a “Superman” inspired cut scene that you can give to the blacksmith to make a very powerful weapon. For those finding their packs too full of weapons, armor, and other items, a chest with unlimited space that can hold your party’s unused items is also found at the cleansed site. Out of all the items introduced in the add-on, this was the most welcomed since I hated to sell or throw away any items (I am a hoarder in role-playing games), but this caused problems when I had no room to earn new and better items. Now I just donate my loot to the chest and go out to collect more loot with a lighter backpack.