MadCap's Game Reviews - "Dragon Age II: Mark of the Assassin"

Sheesh, EA should have me on the ten percent by now, huh? Considering the last three weeks have been dominated by their greatest dark fantasy adventure series since the Ultima series that hasn't been thrown to the dogs or to the MMO territory (and don't get any ideas you people who probably aren't even going to read this!).  And so, I come to the end of what most would call a retrospective of Dragon Age II with the other big name DLC - Mark of the Assassin.

And what does Mark of the Assassin bring that the vanilla game and Legacy did not? Why, new areas! Orlesian intrigue! Wyverns! Though most people probably know it for the voice talents of actress Felicia Day, who plays the titular assassin Tallis. Her voice acting is really rather good here, though it is odd to hear a normal Welsh accented elf voiced with an American dialect (y'know, that rare American elf voice).  I'm not entirely certain why they didn't ask her to try to put on an accent, but it's something I can look past.

Like Legacy, Mark of the Assassin can be accessed from the Hawke home - be it Gamlen's shack in Lowtown during Act One or the Amell Manor in Acts Two and Three - by touching the statue of the lion. Doing so will trigger a cutscene of fan-favorite Varric once more being interrogated by the Seeker Cassandra, who demands to know about a little aside that resulted in the death of an Orlesian noble and nearly caused an international incident. And being, of course, that it has to do with the ongoing tale of the illustrious Hawke, Cassandra wants to know the nitty gritty.

It begins, innocently enough, with Varric getting Alyssa Hawke to meet a contact, whereupon she and her party are ambushed by Antivan Crows. Aided by a fiery-haired elf by the name of Tallis, they defeat the group and she explains that she was, in fact, looking for Hawke due to an invitation she received from a Duke Prosper. Tallis aims to steal an jewel from him called the "Heart of the Many" and needs Hawke's aid in order to do so.

What follows is a wyvern hunt, followed by some of the funnier scenes in Dragon Age II due to Alyssa Hawke having the "Witty/Sarcastic" personality and the interactions with Tallis and others - even getting a snort-worthy one-liner upon finishing the final boss. I will say, this story doesn't have anything to do with the vanilla game (then again, neither did Legacy besides connections to the Hawke family), but it is a fun aside from the rest of Dragon Age II. The tone, overall, is a bit more fun and colorful - something that the vanilla game was sorely lacking in a great deal of the time. Beyond that, it's not a recycling of all the environments in the vanilla game that were boring and tedious and were the subject on in-game jokes.

We also, through Tallis, get some more insight into the Qunari and how they work.  Apparently, the Qunari are far more spread out in Thedas than many would believe, having agents all over Thedas. The "shocking" twist of the game involving Tallis' true origins and intentions and the true "Heart of the Many" proving that there is far more going on with the Qunari than we've seen. Perhaps there will be more in the upcoming Inquisition? Who knows?

I will say I rather enjoyed Mark of the Assassin. It was a nice tone shift from the sour and dark tone of most of Dragon Age II and I wouldn't mind seeing Tallis again in the future.

Seriously.

Dragon Age II: Mark of the Assassin is now available from EA and Bioware for Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and PC.

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