Dragon Age: Keep 101
Welcome to your introductory crash course on Dragon Age: Keep! See it directly on Youtube [here].
Transcript
Welcome to Keep 101, a short guide on what is Dragon Age Keep and how it will help you this October for the release of Dragon Age: Inquisition.
In the Dragon Age series, the player makes many decisions that change the course of Thedas' history. Who rules Ferelden? How was the Fifth Blight stopped? Who should we support - the Mages? Or the Templars? Many decisions transfer from Origins to DA2. And DA2 to Inquisition. But how?
The Keep. The Keep is a free, cloud and web-based service that allows you to mark and identify each important choice made throughout the Dragon Age series, in both the games and their DLCs, and have those choices affect the world state you will see in Inquisition.
What's a "World State," you ask? Thedas, its world and how you affected it through your actions as the Warden and Hawke.
You will be able to shape and share your World State, though the details regarding sharing have yet to be revealed.
Let's go over the Keep step-by-step.
Step 1. Sign into Dragon Age Keep with your Origin account
Step 2. Choose the decisions you want to be represented in Thedas.
And step 3. Import your decisions from Keep directly into Dragon Age: Inquisition.
Currently, the Keep is in closed beta. It will be released approximately within a month of Inquisition's release (October 7). If you would like to partake in the beta and experience it in the making, you can go to DragonAgeKeep.com, sign in with your Origin account, and sign up. Keep in mind what e-mail address you sign up with and make sure to check your spam folders, so you are prepared when the e-mail comes your way.
Frequently Asked Questions. If you'd like to skip to a particular question, enable the annotations and choose any of the questions. Or sit tight, and we'll jump to the first question: Why the Keep?
Why the Keep?
Several reasons. With the transition to next-generation platforms like Xbox One and Playstation 4, using Keep offers a chance for players to keep their decisions while upgrading platforms, like PS3 to PS4, or moving to completely different platforms, like Xbox 360 to PC.
Further, the Keep also allows a smoother, hopefully bug-free transition of world states. In doing so, your Wardens or Hawkes have less of a chance of having a decision accidentally tampered.
As a personal example, I used Gibbed Save Editor when switching from Origins to 2. However, while you can choose certain choices, sometimes you produce double positives by accident, which will cause your save to mess up. In a particular option, you can side with the Werewolves but choose Zathrian to sacrifice himself, two crossed decisions that incorrectly display in DA2. That save editor is a wonderful tool, but that and other mods and tweaks do not completely fact check itself against the player, and may cause discrepancies between the player's wishes and the World State. Keep makes sure to properly import the world you intend on living in for Inquisition.
Will my choices in mods be represented?
No. Only the choices from the Vanilla game, or the original game and all of its DLCs, will be offered in Keep.
What if I didn't play Origins or Dragon Age 2?
Don't worry! You do not need to play the previous games. Though, playing the games will offer you more context to your experience in Dragon Age, of course. You can choose the decisions you know and leave the ones you don't know. If you have not played either Origins or 2, and choose not to use the Keep, a default World State will be in place. I highly suggest playing the games, however, to prepare and open up opportunities for more content for Inquisition.
Will there be an Inquisitor character creator in Keep?
No.
If I played Origins and 2, can I still import my saves into Inquisition?
This option is currently being investigated. A few circumstances play into importing saves. Dragon Age Origins and 2 run on the Eclipse game engine, while Inquisition runs on Frostbite 3. Creating a solution to transfer saves, when Frostbite never had an imported save system in the first place, is something Bioware is working on. Also, as I mentioned before, a priority is making sure your World State properly honors your decisions after import. Additionally, Keep can add missed decisions, including plot points that weren't transferred from Origins or 2 for Inquisition and future games. When information regarding save importing is announced, I will update you all.
When will I be accepted into the Keep beta?
It depends. Bioware picks its waves carefully, based on a criteria of player traits. They not only want players who have extensively played Dragon Age, but also players who are new or unfamiliar with the series. In gathering feedback from a wide range of players, Bioware can ensure the Keep's experience is accurate and helpful for all. So even if you decide to sign up now, you still have a chance to join the beta.
If you have an additional question regarding Keep, please put it in the comment section below and I will do my best to answer, if I am able to do so.
I've been part of the beta since the beginning, and while we're not allowed to say anything specific about the...specifics on Keep, we are now green on giving our overall impression of our experiences for Keep. The people that have been there since the beginning and those who've joined up along the way have been wonderful. Lot of feedback from us, scrutinizing everything that has been tossed our way. But I think the awesome part is that Bioware has been extremely receptive of the feedback we've given them and have been updating and implementing our suggestions into Keep. I hope the many of you get a chance to join and experience it during its development - it's definitely a lot more than what's been expected, and from what I've seen that's to come, it's going to be quite awesome for its release. Oh, and if you join us early for the beta, and you have a pet, bring pictures. You'll know what I mean when you get in.
That's it for Keep 101, but definitely expect a Keep 102. Many things are still being changed for Keep at this moment, even the information in this video may change in the immediate future. But thanks to the wonderful people at Bioware, I'll be able to show more in the future.
Thank you for watching. My name is Ashe. Take care and I will see you next time.