Trivia / Dragon Age: Inquisition

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• Banned In India: Obscenity Laws prevent the release of Inquisition in India.
• Beam Me Up, Scotty!: Though he often uses the same reason, Solas never actually says "I saw it in the Fade" to Hand Wave his expansive knowledge of ancient elven lore. (Usually what he does is tack on something like "during my travels in the Fade" to the end of a sentence.)
• The Cast Showoff: Greg Ellis (as Cullen) and Corrine Kempa (as Leliana) get a moment of focus in the "Dawn Will Come" singing scene.
• Creator Backlash: While Bioware generally stand by that the game was ultimately a success they were fine with, some employees have publicly gone on to say that they actually wished the game had been more of a commercial failure due to the game's success being a major factor in what lead to the Troubled Production issues of all their games post Inquisition. This is because many of the game's issues and development had to be fixed in a crunch, causing EA to essentially think Bioware was good at making great/profitable games quickly. It also led to the studio heads believing in "Bioware Magic" — that if they just crunched on a half-finished game hard enough, it would nigh-miraculously turn out amazing. Both Mass Effect: Andromeda and Anthem (2019) were made in the same manner as Inquistion, and unfortunately yet more realistically, both were major failures for the company.
• Creator's Favorite: The developers have been pretty vocal that The Iron Bull was one of their favorite companions (along with Varric and Sera). Bull's romance was going to be tamer, but the wives of his head writer and animator found him so sexy that they encouraged Weekes to write more steamy content. Bull was also going to be a restricted romance due to animation issues, but Mike Laidlaw and Bull's animatiors animators loved him so much that they spent hours of unpaid overtime every night for several weeks to resolve the issue in time for launch.
• Cross-Dressing Voice: Played with in the case of Krem, who was assigned female at birth and accordingly voiced by Jennifer Hale, but is regarded by himself and others as a man.
• Defictionalization: Well shit, Varric's writer Mary Kirby has released Hard in Hightown as a book. It contains all the codex entries (which can be read on the wiki) plus a few expanded scenes and a lot of illustrations. And, just like in Thedas, it was an immediate best-seller.
• Development Gag:
  • Hawke reveals that he/she left Kirkwall to attempt to dissuade the Divine from sending an Exalted March against it, but after the mage rebellions, it never came anyway. This likely refers to the cancelled Exalted March expansion pack for Dragon Age II.
  • There's a quest at the Western Approach keep where you have to deal with a poisoned well. Poisoning that well as part of taking the keep was part of a mechanic which never made it into the final game, but was featured in the 2013 PAX demo.
  • Cassandra mentions in conversation with the Inquisitor that she had hoped to recruit Hawke to lead the Inquisition. This is rooted to Development in which Inquisition was originally planned to be an expansion of Dragon Age II, with Hawke still as the lead.^note (If the Hero of Ferelden is alive, Hawke was the second choice.)
• Discredited Meme: Downplayed. As soon as the title was announced, the Monty Python's Flying Circus-references began flying. Eventually the devs asked the internet to please stop... because they had done all the jokes to death in the dev room before pre-production was over.
• Fan Community Nicknames: It's common to add "-mancer" (Cullenmancer, Dorianmancer, etc.) to a character's name to denote fans of a particular Romance Side Quest. After The Stinger, Solasmancers have started calling themselves the Wolf Pack. The devs are aware of this and even address the fans as such: writer Patrick Weekes apologized to Solasmancers for the Downer Ending to his romance, and voice actor Gareth David Lloyd had a message addressed to the spoilered name.
• Fandom Nod: A large portion of the Dragon Age fanbase is freaked out by the giant spiders. When the party is sent into the Fade, they face the embodiment of people's fears. Both the Inquisitor and Hawke see them as spiders. Players that go out of their way will find one called "Ironically, Spiders."
• Lying Creator: In promotional videos, Mark Darrah and Creator Mike Laidlaw claimed they wouldn't have non-human (particularly Elven) Inquisitor face too much racism since constantly hearing slurs like "knife-ear, knife-ear, knife-ear" would get real old real fast, and they wanted to include more nuanced examples like Threnn mistaking an Elven Herald for the help, or Master Dennit being Mistaken for Racist with his "halla-rider" comment, and concluded with, "You won't be dumped on for being an elf all game." Problem? The devs made it so the Elven Inquisitor has to be Dalish, and the game includes countless examples of Screw You, Dalish!" throughout the story. So if you play an Elven Inquisitor, you really DO get dumped on for being an elf all game.
• One-Steve Limit:
  • The game has two Templars named Mattrin. One is in Haven, where he keeps trying to persuade his friend Lysette to leave the Inquisition; the other is found dead in the Hinterlands, and is carrying the phylactery belonging to Enchanter Ellendra.
  • The name Evangeline also appears in two places. Evangeline, as those who read Asunder know, is a female Templar who befriended Cole; she doesn't show up in the game in person, but she and Rhys can be rescued via a war table operation. Meanwhile, a couple of codex entries about Orlesian royal history mention Princess Evangeline, the daughter of Emperor Florian, who died as an infant during the Hundred Days' Cough (thereby clearing the way for her younger cousin Celene to take the throne later).
  • A super obscure one connects back to the original game of the series. There's a war table operation called "Grand Cleric Iona," in which the Inquisition must choose the means by which a very outspoken Chantry sister will be made to stop slandering them. Iona is also the name of Lady Landra's handmaiden, an Optional Sexual Encounter for the Human Noble Warden during their origin story, in Dragon Age: Origins.
• Playing Against Type: Jon Curry as the Inquisitor, using a baritone, can be a surprise to those are familiar with some of his other work, especially compared to Zevran.
• Promoted Fanboy: Josephine's voice actress, Allegra Clark, has been a fan of the series since 2009 and has cosplayed as Isabela.
• Prop Recycling: Quite a few animations from Dragon Age II and Mass Effect 3 are reused in this game.
• Queer Character, Queer Actor: Much like her character Josephine, Allegra Clark is openly bisexual.
• Real-Life Relative: Morrigan's son, Kieran, is voiced by Odin Black, Claudia Black's son.
• Shrug of God: The writers for Josephine and Solas (who do not have an explicit Optional Sexual Encounter in-game) have stated it's up to the player to decide exactly how intimate they were. Questions about Solas in general tend to be met with a reply of "Spoilers!"
  • Though a lot of fans try to interpret some of Solas' words as definitive proof one way or another with the line "Getting you into bed is just an enjoyable side benefit" often used as proof that they did, or his line in Trespasser "I would not lay with you under false pretenses" as proof that they didn't, Patrick Weekes has stood firm that the statements were meant to be ambiguous and left up to player interpretation. It's almost Word of God that Shrug of God is canon.
• Spared by the Cut: Cole has a Loyalty Mission where he must either become more human or more spirit-like in order to protect himself from being controlled by Corypheus. The plan was that Cole would protect himself and survive if the mission was completed, but if it wasn’t he would fall under Corypheus's influence and had to be fought and killed. The developers were unable to get this to work in-game, so in the final game Cole cannot be taken to the battle against Corypheus.
• Star-Making Role: This game has brought Allegra Clark into prominence as a voice actor. Since then, she has branched into other roles in video games and even anime.
• Teasing Creator: Despite (or maybe because of) knowing how much an Ensemble Dark Horse Cullen is, the writers and creative director neither confirmed nor denied him being a companion and seemingly avoided talking about him. Case in point, from Twitter:
  Fan: You can always spend the day giving us Cullen information. :)
  Mike Laidlaw: Cullen's name starts with a "C."
  Patrick Weekes: What the HELL, man? You didn't tell them he was a Templar, did you?
• Trans Character, Cis Actor: Trans man Krem is voiced by cisgender actress Jennifer Hale.
• Troubled Production: The production of Inquisition was quite hectic for Bioware and began the trend of their games having hellish development cycles that would carry on into Mass Effect Andromeda and Anthem. Coming off the cold reception of Dragon Age II, the team felt unsure of themselves and often second-guessed their creative choices. Thus, many important decisions weren't finalized until late in the development cycle, making the final months of production into a difficult crunch period. The developers also faced severe technical challenges. The first was producing the game for a total of five different platforms, including consoles from two generations. Further complicating things was EA's decision to force Bioware to use DICE's Frostbite engine, which was made primarily for First Person Shooters and lacked key features needed in other genres like Role Playing Games. This lead to a lot of struggles throughout development thanks to Bioware essentially having to teach the engine how to do anything not related to combat. EA and DICE also gave limited support to Bioware on using the engine, preferring to give their help to the team behind EA's much more profitable FIFA series instead. Speaking to Kotaku about Anthem's development, a Bioware employee was reported to have lamented that the game did well, since it gave Bioware's higher ups the idea that the "Bioware magic" could save a game in the final months before release, normalizing this kind of production environment for Bioware's games going forward.
• Urban Legend of Zelda: For a while both before and after the game's release, there were rumors that playing with a world state in which Varric kept the red lyrium idol would have dire consequences, ranging from Varric going insane and needing to be killed to him being possessed by a demon and becoming a Token Evil Teammate. This was quickly proven to be false, however; Varric has it sealed in a purpose-built-vault, and any examiners and experimenters have to follow a very strict regimen to avoid red lyrium madness.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The Iron Bull's romance was originally intended to be restricted to certain races because of animation issues (with the in-story justification that the Bull won't sleep with anyone he fears he might "break"), but the animators were able to solve the problem in time for the Bull to be available to Inquisitors of all races.
  • Early in development, Focus Abilities were at the bottom of the standard skill trees rather than early in the specializations. Three were either removed or repurposed into a normal ability.
  • Originally, the player would have been able to walk around the Conclave and talk to attendees pre-Breach. The devs concluded that it really dragged down the pacing, however, and went for a more explosive opening.
  • Datamining the PC files revealed Cullen was intended as a bisexual romance, having male Inquisitor voice files for Cullen's romance and Dorian and Cassandra (both male exclusive romances) having reactions to the Inquisitor flirting with them in addition to Cullen.
  • Similarly, there are data mined audio files which indicate that Solas was also intended as a bisexual romance. The writer canceled this plan explicitly because they wanted to avoid him falling into the Depraved Bisexual trope.
  • At one point in development, it was discussed what would happen if the Inquisitor got enough influence to name him/herself Divine. On its own it was considered a bit far-fetched; but then it was pointed out that a male Qunari Inquisitor could declare himself Divine. After that, the team backed away from the idea when they considered how badly such an action would be a "game- and lore-breaking act of heresy."^note In the Southern Chantry, only women are allowed to be appointed Divine, and Qunari are more or less the sworn nemeses of Thedas and the Tevinter Imperium.
  • Concept art exists of a bearded and disheveled Anders, who would presumably have been encountered if spared in Dragon Age II.
  • The original intention for the "Champions of the Just" quest apparently involved the envy demon tricking the Inquisitor into believing they had already won and trying to find out more about them to take their place; this included a moment where it took Leliana's form and attempted to seduce them, an option that could be accepted with consequences. However, it was pointed out that this in some ways could be taken as rape of Leliana, which led to the entire idea being scrapped.
  • Solas, who is bald, was initially designed with hair◊.
  • The three Dales regions (the Exalted Plains, the Emerald Graves, and Emprise du Lion), were originally going to be a single massive region.
  • The demo shown at PAX Prime in September 2013 was markedly different from the final released version, and it appears a lot of the mechanics and levels had to be cut in the intervening 14 months.
  • Originally, the Inquisitor would have been able to besiege fortresses in an event similar to the attack on Adamant Fortress. This would have involved gathering your army and defeating whoever held it. Once done, you would have the option of making the fort work for you as either a military outpost, a economic/diplomatic base, or a intelligence gathering base. These bases would have made some manner of impact on the player's resources, and been set up as major moments in the game. This feature was almost completely scrapped, replaced instead by the much smaller sieges of Caer Bronach, Griffon Wing Keep, and Suledin Keep (all of which are liberated from enemy forces). Oddly enough, this mechanic was seemingly removed extremely late, as the footage remains in trailers leading up until the last few months, implying it to be a last minute removal.
  • Unused dialogue seems to imply it was possible at one time to spar with Cassandra and that your companions would have their own horses to ride when you mounted up (instead of simply disappearing as they do now). Even more unused dialogue implies it was possible to allow Cole to kill the Templar that killed the real Cole
  • During the quest line "Here Lies the Abyss," the Grey Warden assisting the Inquisitor and Hawke was supposed to be the Hero of Ferelden. Ultimately, BioWare decided that, given the Warden's "blank slate" personality, implementing them in a satisfactory way was too difficult and the role was given to Stroud/Alistair/Loghain. Considering how difficult it is for many players to accept the option to sacrifice Hawke, this is probably for the best - imagine trying to choose between both of your previous heroes! In addition, at one stage in production it was intended for the Architect to appear.
  • Iron Bull was a woman in the very early development stages.
  • Vivienne was originally going to be an advisor who was not a mage, and early concept art depict her as a blonde, white woman. She was almost cut from the game entirely before a concept artist suggested her current design, and she was reworked into a mage companion. She was also originally a lot more cold-hearted and murderous. Bastien's death was originally a result of her poisoning him.
  • Hawke was originally going to be the Inquisitor, becoming the main character of two Dragon Age games not unlike how Commander Shepard was the protagonist of the original Mass Effect trilogy. The negative fan reception to Hawke and Dragon Age II as a whole led to this plan being scrapped, and the Inquisitor was re-imagined as a new character entirely.
  • Group concept artwork of the companions and advisers shows Dorian using a Spirit Blade, suggesting that he was at one point intended to be the Knight Enchanter companion, but switched with Vivienne.
  • The developers seriously considered making Viddasala and her followers rogues so as to not have to kill a Qun-loyal Iron Bull, but decided against it because it "lacked teeth". A note from the Qunari claiming that they are is still in the game, but it's little more than an Easter Egg.
  • Krem's backstory was originally going to be much darker, but was changed after trans consultants let the writers know of the Unfortunate Implications. In addition, Krem was originally supposed to be voiced by Gwendoline Christie.
  • Solas was originally going to be a much more Obvious Judas, with elves as his Single-Issue Wonk (not unlike Anders' mage rights obsession), constantly complaining that elves were so much better back in the old days, before basically saying, "No, I'm not Fen'Harel! Shut up!" The writers struggled to think of some other hook to flesh out his character. Then Weekes came up with the idea to make him the Fade expert that players know.
  • Early concept art shows Leliana being devastated by the Inquisitor allowing Empress Celene's assassination at the Winter Palace. However, in the final game not only is she fine with it if it occurs, but she is the one to suggest getting Celene out of the way to put Briala in power.
  • Sera's concept art show a variety of hairstyles they considered for her, and some early designs even depict her as a dark-skinned blonde. They apparently had trouble settling on her final look until as late as the reveal trailer, where she's depicted with brown hair.
• Word of God: Necromancy is Blood Magic.
• Write What You Know:
  • Dorian's personal quest involving his homosexuality and his father not accepting him was based on lead writer David Gaider (who is gay) coming out to his own father.
  • Patrick Weekes has since revealed that they based Cole on their autistic nephew.

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