Dragon Age 2 has 103 mins of cutscenes

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 25 January, 2011

Eat your heart out Killzone 3.

BioWare fantasy role-playing game Dragon Age 2 has a whopping 103 minutes of cutscenes.

The impressive figure was revealed by the BBFC, which has given the game its expected 18-rating certificate for "strong bloody violence".

Dragon Age 2's 103 minutes of cutscenes eclipses Killzone 3's 70 minutes worth, revealed by the BBFC earlier this month.

Dragon Age 2 was cleared for release with no cuts made.

Its age rating comes as no surprise. Dragon Age was a particularly gory role-player. After combat blood would remain on armour and clothing – which made for some hilarious cutscenes.

With Dragon Age 2, developer BioWare's love of blood continues. Christian Donlan went hands-on for Eurogamer in November.

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (35) Latest comment 1 year ago

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  • PixelPirate #1 1 year ago

    Kojima has 103mins of cut scene for breakfast.

  • Lexx87 #2 1 year ago

    Christ EG okay fair enough story pointing out the length and the passing by the BBFC , but the fuck does this comparison with Killzone 3 have to do with anything what so ever.
    Edited by Lexx87 at 25/01/11 @ 10:12

  • geeza2020 #3 1 year ago

    This little bit of "news" tells me nothing I wanted to know about the game, but I'm excited about it anyway!

  • yoomazir #4 1 year ago

    the difference between KZ3 and DA2 is that in KZ3 you will probably see all the cutscenes in one playthrough while in DA2, I guess depending of your actions, you will be able to see only half of those custcenes.

  • hiddenranbir #5 1 year ago

    Awesome Bioware. More things you made fun of in JRPGS you're doing now yourself.

    Cutscenes in rpgs(or in general) ARGH, if they want to make a movie just do that. Hell, that way I can avoid killing a monster or two and running from end of the map to the other to just watch the story.

  • arcam #6 1 year ago

    Is this including the actual conversations you have? I guess not.

    What's so good about cutscenes anyway, and why is 103 mins of them impressive? I don't think I have ever heard someone say of a game: "it was OK, but it needed more cutscenes".

  • space_ace #7 1 year ago

    reminds me of the FMV age
    /old

  • ryandsimmons #8 1 year ago

    I'd say you will see maybe 30% of those in a playthrough max.

    Each "chapter" end you'll probably get a 3 minutes cut scene. But you'll only see the scene for the choice you made. Same with each branch of choices you make with your party. Not to mention 5 minute ending cutscene, of which you will see one of 5.

    You can't compare it at all to Kojima or JRPG games where you see every cutscene in the game.

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #9 1 year ago

    That sounds like a lot, especially seeing as if these are pre-rendered movies we're talking about, that would be 103 minutes of cutscenes not featuring your own customized characters.

  • sneetch #10 1 year ago

    That's 103 mins of cutscenes split over, what, somewhere between 30 and 100 hours of gameplay? Many of those will be cutscenes will presumably be mirrored between good and bad versions.

    I don't think that'll be all that difficult to endure, we're not talking about FF XIII levels of "walk down the corridor, encounter a cutscene, kill the monster in the cutscene, walk down the corridor, encounter a cutscene" here. Now that was tedious.

    In contrast the original Dragon Age Origins had 61 minutes of cutscenes. They can if not overdone help set the tone.

  • metalangel #11 1 year ago

    Oh goody. Nothing says 'quality game' more than the screen going dim and my controller automatically powering off because it's been so long since I last pressed a button on it. (and then the cutscene freezes because your controller has disconnected)

  • NegativeZero #12 1 year ago

    So if the violence was stronger would it be bloody strong violence?

  • midnight_walker #13 1 year ago

    DA2 will probably be 40 hours long minimum. 100 minutes of cutscenes won't be so bad. Killzone 3 will probably be less than 8.

  • f1r3storm Verified Redakteur, Eurogamer Deutschland #14 1 year ago

    I don't think I have ever heard someone say of a game: "it was OK, but it needed more cutscenes".

    Lots of games could need some more cutscenes.

  • Golgo #15 1 year ago

    Pfft: you'll never be MGS4, never...y'hear!

  • SuperFanBoy #16 1 year ago

    So the amount of cutscenes is something to brag about now? Hey, developers, here's a tip: Less cutscenes, more gameplay.

  • arcam #17 1 year ago

    @f1r3storm

    Any examples?

    The frustration that always arises when a game has unskippable cutscenes tells the story I think. I guess it depends what you consider cutscenes though. Are Dragon Age's conversations cutscenes? Does Half-Life 2 have cutscenes?
    Edited by arcam at 25/01/11 @ 11:04

  • golem09 #18 1 year ago

    As a fellow RPG, Xenogears Episode I is just laughing it's ass off.

  • miiiguel #19 1 year ago

    @f1r3storm

    Any examples?

    Halo Wars.

    I love cut-scenes, I never ever skip them.

  • StooMonster #20 1 year ago

    Why can't cutscenes have FasrForward, Rewind, and Pause as well as Stop (I.e. Skip)?

    Unskipable cut-scenes are awful, nearly as bad as pages of speech bubble text that one needs to bash keys to get through.

  • midnight_walker #21 1 year ago

    Unskippable cut scenes are fine IF it's the first time you've seen them. If you then subsequently die and get checkpointed back to 1 step before the cutscene triggers and it's unskippable then it's hulk smash time.
    Edited by midnight_walker at 25/01/11 @ 11:32

  • MojoDex #22 1 year ago

    star ocean had alot more than that! i also really enjoyed star ocean, epic cutscenes and all(one was 45 mins long!). i say bring it on!

  • AaronTurner #23 1 year ago

    Cutscenes are shit

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #24 1 year ago

    I wonder how many hours of cutscenes there is in FFXIII..

  • Skurmedel #25 1 year ago

    space ace: I liked the ones in Red Alert or the Kyle Katarn one's... those were rewards for completing a mission :D

  • TelexStar #26 1 year ago

    space ace - "reminds me of the FMV age
    /old "

    I still look back fondly at the likes of Star Craft, Z, and Quake II.

  • makariel #27 1 year ago

    PixelPirate made my day :D

  • Subi #28 1 year ago

    expected 18-rating certificate for "strong bloody violence"

    And probably cringe-worthy polygonal sex. Don't forget this is BioWare we're talking about.

  • SvennoJ #29 1 year ago

    Will they be struggling in the in game engine highlighting all the shortcomings, be horribly compressed by Bink video, or actually be a treat to watch in a 1080p vc1 encode with high-res textures and models. That would be more interesting to me.

  • arcam #30 1 year ago

    a 1080p vc1 encode with high-res textures and models

    Is this even possible when you choose the looks and armour of your characters?

  • Ranger101 #31 1 year ago

    I picked up a game called Berserker on the Dreamcast once...Never played it though, it's still showing cutscenes.

  • SvennoJ #32 1 year ago

    @arcam it's been possible since early film/tv with blue/green screens. I'm sure it can't be that difficult for cut scenes, inserting a high-res model into a pre rendered background with simple occlusion geometry and a light map. It's been used for decades in adventure games.
    It's just a shame that the artists spend so much time on creating beautiful artwork to then see it chopping along in low res or tainted by compression artifacts.

  • dagas #33 1 year ago

    What is this the late 90's? I remember FF7 having "120 minutes of cut scenes" on the back of the box. Not really something to brag about...I prefer playing the game rather than watching it.

  • immateriaux #34 1 year ago

    As others have mentioned, 103 mins of time sitting watching shit in stead of actually playing a game. That's really crap. Basically, if I wanted that type of entertainment, I'd rent a DVD. Watch Youtube. Stare out the window. That sort of thing.

    Bioware's new attraction towards eschewing the complexity of believable, living environments and just "shooting" more movies instead is a real betrayal of the RPG ideal they helped create. But, more importantly, it makes for linear, predictable, yawn inducing gaming.

    Dragon Age 2 is definitely not a purchase I'll be making.

  • Sevens #35 1 year ago

    Cutscenes are good.