Perfect Game. No notes. Gameplay, story, music, design - This is everything I want from an RPG. A must play.

Updated as my GOTY 2025!

Coral Island is my "Labor of Love" 2024 Steam Awards choice! Following its development from initial successful crowdfunding effort to realisation has been a delight! Content released in chapters over time and checking in periodically for what's new has been great fun. Both developers and supporters seemed to begin with a passionate dream of collecting all the best aspects of previous farming sims games into one beautiful tropical paradise; complete with large cast of characters, ocean themed activities, a "saving the island" narrative - and mermaids! This is a game I play when I feel like something super cosy and cute :)!

Note: After a patch things can get a bit buggy (I see concerned posts recently). Though Stairway seem to be super active on their discord about communicating fixes/what they are up to, so I recommend following them there! That's another positive to me!

Old DA fan, 1 1/2 playthroughs, completed 100% achievements.

Recommended for new players to the DA series? Yes.
Recommended for old school DA fans? No.

Positive:
If you approach this game like a traditional collectathon-platformer rpg (think: Spyro, Jak and Daxter, etc) this may be enjoyable. My perfectionist brain is satisfied by collecting every chest, outfit and achievement, and being rewarded each time with pieces of story or world-lore. Steam achievements are not bound to difficulty level, so playing it on the easiest it is possible to achieve them all in one playthrough.

It is also a visually stunning game, which makes scenery while exploring enjoyable. Try not to be put off by how linear it seems at the start - you'll notice lots of blue barriers blocking you initially, but each area opens up in pieces relating to different sidequests, so they end up quite large. I think VG may overcompensate for "The Hinterlands Problem" from the last game, where exploration was largely free and some found it easy to get lost. This time: do story = more exploration, exploration = more story, repeat.

Emmrich is my favourite character in the game, with what I found to be the most interesting story! I wanted more of him!

Negative (HEAVY SPOILERS):
For old school fans, VG could be infuriating. Poor dialogue, childish tone, pixer/disney cartoon style, boring combat, lack of role-play, and lack of continuity with older games - all topics already widely discussed.

I am personally stunned at how shallow the scope of this game is. We drop into very limited locations of Minrathous (Tevinter), Treviso (Antiva), a random Rivaini coastline, the Nevarran Necropolis, ruins of Arlathan, and Weisshaupt fortress (as it is being destroyed!) using the Eluvian system. Each of these locations could potentially have been their own game - we saw how rich and complex one city could be with Kirkwall in DA2, and there is SO much established lore surrounding every place.
I was particularly frustrated at the treatment of dwarf and titan lore - like some footnote in Harding's "personal journey". Harding is given all the answers by touching the magical "macguffin" item aka Solas' dagger (Doctor Who's sonic screwdriver that can apparently do anything, only... completely out of place). Her personal quest culminates in one short scene where a titan speaks through Harding, yelling about how angry they are, and thousands of years of rage gets solved... with a hug? Which all feels pointless since... Harding dies anyway, shooting her bow as if she doesn't have titan powers (?!)
I guess I imagined, just like Inquisition had been a slow-burn mystery reveal for elven lore, we would experience the same with a dwarven-centric game - perhaps centred around Kal-Sharok and the trade with Minrathous; an exploration of the history of lyrium, where we explore not just VG's "Dock Town" common quarter but politics of the magisterium, the "Black Divine", and what a city steeped in magic is capable of. Instead we get a film noir detective questline following Nev, and a Shadow Dragon "rebels against the state" story that frankly could have been located anywhere.
Similarly, other games could have been: 1) exploring Qunari and Rivaini locations, fully explored the war with Tevinter, Qunari history, and the "mist warrior" mystery. 2) Exploring Death through Antiva and Nevarra (featuring Dirthamen/Falon'din lore?). 3) The big ending at Anderfels and Weisshaupt as the series has SO OFTEN hinted toward, providing symmetry to the story by having started with the wardens, and ending with the wardens. I was so disappointed with the VG Weisshaupt treatment.

Coincidentally this is also where we fight Ghilan'nain - who also suffers from shallow treatment. Ghilan'nain and Elgar'nan are the most cartoony, most straight-forward, cackling-about-how-evil-they-are villains I could imagine. It is impossible to take them seriously - even Corypheus was more entertaining? Each of the Evanuris are "king" spirits representing a concept - wisdom, benevolence, power?, creation? etc. We could have easily explored each of their realms in detail, and have each Evanuris "character" be a final boss. But this game shoves two "gods", Solas himself, and two whole archdemons (you know, one being the threat the entire first game was dedicated to) into the category of cartoon villain. Likewise, almost every adversary belonging to a side/personal quest has the sole motivation of: "I will conquer [insert territory here], and you cannot stop me!!!1!" Which gets tiring quickly. What's worse - Rook and the party are confident in beating everything from the start, so you never feel like there is much at stake in the first place.

"The Gods" threatened to "conquer the world" - I didn't care. Characters died - I didn't care. Romances were available, I didn't care to try any of them.

I bet we are going to see a lot of discussion on lore inconsistencies, but here is one that bugged me. Just the ability to USE these Eluvians is questionable. If I recall correctly, "The Masked Empire" by Trick Weekes describes the Eluvian system as difficult (if not impossible) for anyone who isn't an elf to use. A party of humans is led through a path from one eluvian to another, and experience headaches, nausea, and an inability to successfully comprehend their surroundings as they walk. This is also alluded to in Inquistion's Trespasser DLC, as only an elf PC can witness the Fade in full colour, the inquisitor is sort of an exception with her "elven mark", yet still the party agrees to "not linger long here". VG just... ignores all of this for convenience (If anyone has a logical rebuttal, please comment!)

And then that Marvel-esque end credits scene. Excuse me? So... your big next story is... Ascians from FFXIV were behind everything all along? Really?

That said, I am not sure how enjoyable this story would be to newcomers since everything is summarised so quickly in dialogue. Perhaps the simplicity would make it easier to digest? Or would there just be too much to remember as it skims over everything?

It really does feel like Bioware was rushing to tie up loose ends with this game, for whatever they are planning next.
So I am happy for the enormous exception bestowed upon Solasmancers being given the gift of their happy ending with Solas!

Final thoughts: Play it when you feel like sinking 70-100hours into exploration and solving puzzles with a bit of simple combat inside a pretty game. It isn't Dragon Age, but go in with low expectations, and you'll probably have a good time!