Now that Dragon Age has gotten the official PR kick off, how good does it feel to finally be able to talk about the game? It's a really impressive demo in person and I know many people who have sat through it multiple times. It must make you feel good to see this kind of excitement for a game that is still a ways off.

It is quite exciting, though part of me wishes that we could just open the floodgates and talk about everything. There's so much about the world and about the game itself that we just haven't even touched on, yet. Intellectually I know that release is still a long ways off and we want to have something left to talk about in six months time, but it's hard when you've been working on it for so many years. You want to beat off your brain with a stick and tell someone the really good bits that will make their head explode with envy.

But that would be cruel, no? So I'll have to survive with seeing the fans excited over finally seeing the game personally -- a very different experience from showing it to industry folks. (During the E3 demo we all sat quietly because we're too hip to get excited. -- ed) The fans watch the demo with their mouths open and laugh and cheer, they get right into it. This one guy kept loudly whispering, "Traitor! Traitor!" every time King Cailan's advisor came on-screen. Not sure why, really, but it was quite funny.

Throughout the demo Chris emphasized that Dragon Age, as an original IP, has a gritty more mature story. Was this a conscious choice or did the story just evolve from creating the world? Does writing a game with this tone allow for more freedom?

It was a conscious choice, probably stemming from the fact that we faced a lot of road blocks whenever we attempted to do even mildly risqué things in the D&D games. Which is fine, right? It's their property; they should get to make sure it's portrayed in whatever manner they wished. Part of the thing about BioWare having its own property, however, was that it was going to have free reign to put out something that was intended for adults right from the start.

Not that you want to go crazy, necessarily. It's not like we have naked people running around beating each other with bloody arm stumps while eating children. Though now that I think of it, wouldn't that be awesome? It's just nice to have the option, and I think that exercising that option made Dragon Age possible.

We've made a world where bad things happen even to beautiful people, where things don't always get restored to goodness and light once the adventure is over. Personally, I like that a lot more. In High Fantasy settings it always seems like heroes are more of less commonplace. Magic is everywhere and an adventurer is always just around the corner. In a darker world, a hero not only rare but needed. That makes them special right there, even without being anointed as such by gods or prophecies.

Obviously there are certain things that you probably can't discuss yet, but what is your favorite thing about Dragon Age? Is there a particular NPC or story arc?

You're killing me. Of course I have my favorite NPC and story arc, and could gush about them for an hour, but no such luck just yet.

I can talk a little about the world, however. One of my favorite things about the world is the way we've handled the religion. Many fans expected us to go with the obligatory pantheon of gods, just as in D&D, but we haven't done that. In Dragon Age, the humans have a single dominant religion that is also monotheistic. The Chantry believes in the Maker, a god that once ruled from the heavenly Golden City and watched over all of His Creation until mankind's own arrogance and pride drove Him away and made Him turn his back on those he made.

Thing is, there is no proof that the Maker exists. He does not give spells to His priests, never makes personal appearances or directly intervenes in worldly affairs... yet people believe in Him. They see His hand in events and believe with all their heart that mankind must redeem themselves to regain His favor. Why? Because they have Faith. Faith is real in Dragon Age -- you can't have it if gods are walking around and providing proof wherever they go. They have faith without proof, just as in our own world, and that makes it feel all the more real. The Chantry is complex and represents something you could actually see yourself believing in rather than being some name you put on your character sheet that supposedly you provide token worship for. I know many people won't see this as a big thing, but to me it's just such a marked change from a standard fantasy convention that I adore it. I know, I know, crazy writer guy right?

Touching a bit more on writing, who is your favorite NPC that you have crafted while working for Bioware?

The easy answer would be HK-47, the assassin droid for Knights of the Old Republic. It's so funny how he was made -- originally he didn't have any dialogue at all, and when I had a free week at one point James Ohlen (the lead designer) asked me to go ahead and give him some follower dialogue just so he wasn't as quiet as T3-M4.

I complained and complained but finally got down to it, deciding that I may as well make the droid funny as that would make him more entertaining to write. If you've ever seen the old TV show "the Littlest Hobo" (it's a Canadian show, I think, so probably not) it was about this dog who went from owner to owner helping them improve their lives before moving on. So I decide to make him the anti-Littlest Hobo -- he would go from owner to owner, helping them to engineer their own self-destruction!

Muaha-ha! I had him be really acidic and rude so he would be the polar opposite of C-3P0, almost Bender-like. Take that, Star Wars! Writing him was indeed a giggle, but I didn't think much of it. The voice over actor did a stellar job, so I was pleased.

And then -- pow! He was incredibly popular. I scratched my head. Go figure, right? Just goes to show that you never really know how people will react to a character. We have our bets on who will like the Dragon Age characters, but it's a crap shoot.

At any rate, my favorite isn't *really* HK-47. Like I said, he would be the easy answer. My favorite is actually Jolee Bindo, from the same game. But I don't have a funny story for him other than the fact that I still remember the day that QA came across the "I did it all for the wookiees" line. They were howling in laughter across the hall and I had a smirk on my face for the rest of the day. Good times.