Bugs (Origins)

Graphics Configuration
Problem: The Steam installer defaults to launch the game the first time without configuring graphics setup. This has been known to cause the game to crash (tested: Windows Vista 64 and Windows 7 64).

Solution: Choose option 2 from the Steam launcher and bring up the splash screen, then choose Options. Create and save a graphics profile. Subsequent launches should work.

Registration Codes
Problem: The Steam installer says you need to enter a registration key to play the game and get bonus items. No key is required to play the game but they are required to unlock special items in both the Standard and Deluxe editions of the game.

Solution: Right-click on the Dragon Age Origins game in your Steam Games list, and select the CD-Keys option from the context menu. In this window you will see two or more codes (depending on whether you purchased the Standard or the Deluxe edition of the game, and whether you pre-purchased the game). One of them registers the game, and the other one or more are promo codes to unlock bonus items.


 * Go to the BioWare registration page to register the game using the Dragon Age: Origins Standard Game CD Key
 * Go to the "Redeem Promo Code" page to redeem the other codes.

Note that you need to create an account on the BioWare social site to be able to access these pages and redeem these codes, and you will need to be logged in when running the game (click the button in the lower-left corner of the game's main menu screen).

DLC and Dragon Age Updater Service
Problem: The Steam and Impulse versions of the game (and perhaps other Digital Download versions) do not show the DLCs in the Downloadable Content window of the main game menu (the list is always empty), or the DLCs say "Unauthorized" beside them and I lose the DLC in-game items.

Solution: If Steam is not running as admin, it will not be able to install the Dragon Age Updater service when it installs the game. The first symptom of this is that the DLCs that should be available with your version of the game will not be in the list of Downloadable Content (the list will be empty).

To install the service, run cmd.exe as administrator, change to the bin_ship directory under the Dragon Age install directory (for Steam this will be ...\Steam\steamapps\common\dragon age origins\bin_ship) and run this command:

(Note: if you don't have .NET 2.0.50727 installed, you might have installutil.exe somewhere else on your system, search for it)

The next problem you will probably have is that after downloading the content and playing for a while, your downloadable content will disappear. Do not save whenever you see this happen, just exit. In the Downloadable Content window, Installed Content tab, you will probably see that most or all of the DLCs will be marked "Unauthorized". This is because the service you installed above needs to be running anytime the game runs, but the game is supposed to start it and stop it automatically when the game starts up and when you quit, respectively. This will happen even if you set the service to Automatic. The problem is that because of broken permissions, the game can stop the service but cannot start it. So you would have to start it manually every time you want to play the game. To fix the permissions, once again run cmd.exe as administrator, and run this command:

From then on, the game will be able to start and stop the service correctly and you can leave it in Manual mode so it only runs when needed. Note however that it may happen, if you start the game and skip the intro screens too quickly, that the service will not have had time to start when you load your game, and it will say "This game relies on premium content and cannot be loaded". Just wait a second and try again, this will give the service time to start and confirm that you have the right to use the "premium content" your savegame was referring to.

XBox 360
Dragon Age: Origins, like many new games, has a few glitches. The following contains information regarding glitches in the Xbox 360 version:

Rogue: Strength vs Dexterity Issue
When playing as a rogue, or with rogue characters such as Zevran and Leliana, Dexterity is meant to represent the Rogue's attack power and in fact high dexterity is required to equip the best daggers. Unfortunately, according to the official Bioware Forums, there is a problem with this. At the moment, the rogues attack power is being represented in strength alone, meaning that increasing dexterity to use better quality daggers, will not increase attack power as it is supposed to. Bioware released 1.02 patch that should fix this problem.

Romance Sub-Plot Completion with Zevran and Male Character
If you complete the romance sub-plot with Zevran as a male character and choose to travel, the end quotes will refer to your male character as 'her' and 'woman'. It's not known if this will be fixed by any patches or if this is just developer oversight.

Leliana Romance Glitch
It is rumoured that there is a glitch involving Leliana which allows you to romance both her and Morrigan at the same time as a male playable character. There has not been any suggestion from Bioware that this will be corrected as it does not interrupt gameplay.

When The Romance Dies...
If you are romancing Alistair and choose to recruit the secret companion, Alistair will leave the party (which we're all aware of at this point I think), but because the two of you never officially ended things, you will be prevented from romancing anyone else in your party. Despite high approval ratings even up to love, you do not have an option to invite anyone to your tent or partake in flirtatious banter with them once this has happened because you are still 'officially' seeing Alistair.

Level/XP Glitch
When you are doing the quest "Tainted Blood" you can turn it in before you have done the other parallel quest called "The Grey Wardens Cache". If you do this you will still have the 3 vials and the quest won' be counted as done even though you get the XP. This glitch can be redone infinitely. This means that you can be in lvl 20 when you drink the blood to join the Grey wardens.

Game Save Errors/Corrupted Save Files
According to posters on the official Bioware Site, many players have stated that the Xbox 360 version of this game has save game corruption issues. Based on the posts, these seem to begin to happen after 40+ hours of gameplay. The saved game becomes corrupted, forcing the player to start a new game. There have also been cases where a corrupted save file will corrupt the saves around it. In one case, a player had 10 different saves for their character and 5 of the files became corrupted. Though another had 8 separate saves and all became corrupted. (Bioware Forum link)

There has been another case where once the files became corrupt it was not possible to save because the moment the save was complete the file became corrupt. This means every time you play the game you must create a new game making play almost impossible.

There has been no official word from Bioware, nor any non-official word as to the release of a patch, but a patch has been released for the PC already. It can be assumed that until further notice, there will be no patch on the Xbox 360.

Graphic Glitches
Experienced Graphical Glitches:
 * Disappearing people
 * Vibrating head movements
 * Playable character becoming 'stuck' in a certain physical position that will not change despite drawing of weapon, changing of armour or entering/leaving a loading screen area, such as wandering around Redcliffe with arms outstretched and continuing to hold this position even when in battle or having the playable character or other characters in the group getting stuck in 'combat position'.
 * Failure to show changed shape.

Movement / Game appearance Glitches
In some cases of a character becoming stuck in certain physical positions that can't change, save the game and reload it. This should change the playable characters posture. Unfortunately this does not work in all instances.

In my personal experience, this frozen character syndrome has been severe enough to force me to have to start a new game, so make sure you save often until a patch is released to correct this problem. Although it has been suggested to use another character and move them to correct your frozen character, at a certain point in the game, this is not possible as you lose access to your created character. I will investigate this error further as it has only occurred when my created character was a mage and was imprisoned with Alistair. No amount of waiting around or leaving the area with the rescuers would prompt the player character to activate despite the fact that all armour and weapons had been returned and the jail cell was opened. My created character remained in kneeling position despite all of my attempts to change her position.

>As a workaround, close the door from INSIDE the cell using L2/LT and open it again. it should trigger the cutscene. ''I am unable to close a door once it has been opened using both L buttons. Could someone please confirm this work around works?''

For vibrating head movements and disappearing people, there is no solution for this and although they look odd, the game is of course still playable!

Sound Errors
Missing voice on NPC's during one on one conversations. Again there does not seem to be a solution for this. The vocals will eventually come back when the camera angle changes or the NPC moves onto another point of conversation.

If you have your options set to display text, you will notice that often times the NPC will repeat an already stated portion of the conversation whereas the text above clearly notes they should be saying something else, they will repeat a sentence they have already said. The movements etc make it clear they should be saying the line listed in text, but they never will, they will repeat a line and then move onto the next line in the queue.

Delays in Triggering of Plot Relative Conversations/Enemies Spawning Treasures/Quest Updates
At the end of a battle or the completion of a task, it is sometimes difficult to actually start that end conversation. Though they are usually triggered automatically by completion of the quest. During the Circle of Magi quest, despite wandering around and nearly leaving an area, it is difficult to complete the quest. When this happens, the only solution is waiting for the trigger to happen. Although some say to install the game to your hard drive corrects this problem, I have had the game installed to my hard drive from day one and this problem still occurs.

Plot dialogue following an important fight, in which the main character was in a changed shape sometimes resulted in the combat "mode" not ending, requiring the fight to be done all over again ending with the player in regular shape.

Sometimes during gameplay, you can run into an instance where enemies not spawning to treasure/piles of blood have an impact on gameplay. You can have party members getting trapped by bodies of vanquished enemies (attempting to run to the PC) while you're waiting for them to be spawned to treasure or just into a pile of blood. Although this will happen eventually, the delay (if it exists early in a game) becomes more pronounced as the game goes on and there seems to be a relationshp between this delay and the delay of triggering plot relative conversations. This is especially annoying when you need something off of one of the enemies you have just beaten (Eirik in Haven for example). You may have to stand around for extensive periods of time with your party waiting for this occurrence.

Delays in Quest Updates Hampering Gameplay
This delay could seriously impact your survival rate in areas where the PC is able to pass through a previous blocked passage ( such as the door on which Wynne had a forcefield during the Broken Circle quest) but your companions are unable to pass through this doorway as it is still 'unavailable' to them. You could end up being on your own fighting the first group of monsters you encounter before you realise your group isn't with you.

Triggering of Quest Updates seems to also be related to this delay (i.e. having to stand there or run around in circles until the quest updates in the Fade allowing you to reach a Nightmare or the Sloth Demon as these paths will not be opened until the quest updates).

Another one of these pesky bugs for the quest delays would be the dead trenches. There have been multiple reports of players on the Xbox 360 being unable to find the Dead Trenches, the western entrence being another way to the deep roads which has no Dead Trenches button. So far no one has a solution for this bug

Achievement Glitch
For anyone who purchased and played the game in the first 4 days may not have properly received their DLC achievements. It would show that the Achievements were unlocked and when they looked at their achievements it may or may not have shown them. If it did show them they were not reflecting points wise in your Gamerscore. MS said try recovering your Gamertag and if you did this they disappeared. They would show through your Dragon Age Community Website but not on your Xbox 360 or xbox.com. All attempts to redo the achievements have also failed. Testing included, deleting the DLC, recovering your gamertag, clearing the cache, downloading the DLC again, disconnecting from live (also ea servers), and replaying. This still didn't unlock the achievements which means something is being stored in the gamertag itself. There is still no official word other than they are aware of the problem and an EA forum admin said if and when they know if you can receive your achievements they will post about it. Here is a link to the EA forum post: EA Forum

Action Circle
If you bring up the action circle (Left Trigger) when entering a new area but prior to your view fully loading then the game will not pause while you have it up. After you select an action or close the circle the game will pause. This is the inverse of what SHOULD be happening. To fix this pause the game using the start button and then unpause it.

Pathfinding Glitches
During the Attack at Nightfall in Redcliffe it is possible that the corpses attacking the city will become stuck on the docks or refuse to come down the hill at the windmill. The only way to correct this is to have the Warden and group find the trapped corpse at the docks or attack the corpses up the hill with arrows or go to them up the hill and attack them with melee. This glitch is also applicable to the PS3 version.

Rise of the Vanquished
It is possible for an already vanquished foe to rise from the dead and become an unkillable menace to your party. The newly risen vanquished will have no HP so all damage you to do it will be zero, but they will still be able to do normal/critical damage to your party. The only way to correct this is to revert to a previous save as once in combat mode, you will be unable to leave an area, meaning you will be fighting an unkillable foe for eternity.

This instance happened to me in Lothering with the 'Bandit Leader' on the bridge. He rose from the dead, I went to investigate and he was an undead/unkillable machine who chased me around Lothering. I was forced to revert to an autosave. The following are some ways to attempt to resolve this without being forced to use a save or autosave:


 * Using some form of knockdown ability. Stone Fist/Shield Pummel/Pommel Attack/etc.... If you get them down again they usually die.
 * Forcing the cutscene/dialogue with the woman and merchant (or other cutscene dialogue). When the scene ended, the Bandit Leader was gone and it was no longer in "combat mode."

Orzammar Glitch
If you complete either of the quests "A Prince's Favor: The First Task" or "A Lord's Trust: The First Task" at any point it is possible to betray either Bhelen or Harrowmont and begin working for the other side. If you do this you either need to speak with Vartag or Dulin. They will ask why you were working for the other side, and it is possible to tell them that you only completed the other's quest in order to spy for their side. If you complete both quests then tell Vartag and Dulin you want to spy on Bhelen and Harrowmont respectively, neither side will trust you. The inability to effectively speak with either candidate or their agents will break the "Paragon of her Kind" quest. Can't have your cake and eat it too.

Captured! Bug
If you choose to get captured after completing the mission where you have to fight Arl Howe and you also choose not to try and escape there is a bug where when you get to the end of the mission you cannot talk to your main character and continue with the mission. I used my mabari and Wynne and i do not know if using different characters changes this. I reloaded my save point and it worked fine after this.

Warden's Keep Bug
If you decide to kill Avernus, it is possible that the skeleton's he spawns to assist him in battle will be stuck inside the back room, trapping your party in combat mode after Avernus is dead. Being unable to open doors in combat mode and being unable to get far enough away from the skeletons to end combat mode makes this a game ending situation as you are unable to actually reach the skeletons because they are behind a locked door and appear to be stuck in a pathfinding issue. I was forced to reload from the last autosave and thankfully the skeletons spawned when Avernus summoned them and immediately entered the room.

Profile Transfer Glitch
It is possible to lose all saved information if your XBOX 360 profile is transfered to another XBOX 360 console. Despite this, all downloadable content as well as completed achievements remain. There is no way around this other than re-transfering the profile, however, it is not guarenteed to fix the issue.

Locked Specializations
It is possible to have all unlocked specializations become locked once more, forcing the player to go through the trouble of completing the quests/buying the manuals. If a specialization becomes locked after completing a specialization quest, the player will no longer be able to give any characters those specializations.

For instance: I have 2 Arcane Warriors in my party, myself and Wynne. I want to teach Morrigan how to be an Arcane Warrior but the specialization has become locked and the quest that unlocks Arcane Warrior has already been completed. Morrigan will never be an Arcane Warrior.

I did not notice what caused this but I did not have this problem until after the latest update for the 360 version. It may be related or it may not. Other than that the cause is unknown at this time. The problem is the most recent title update which most likely erased the file that contains all of the stuff a player has done across all playthroughs and saves. All gamesaves are corrupted. There is no fix at this time and Bioware has not given word about a fix. source

Successful way to re-unlock your specializations if you did download the patch is as follows; You have to do a Gamertag Recovery. This forces Microsoft to re-sync your profile and therefor corrects the error applied by the patch. To do this, sign out of all your profiles then select the box for Profile Sign-In, select Recover Gamertag and input the information for your Xbox Live ID. It wont erase or change any of your data because you are simply re-writing the profile you already have back onto to your hard-drive. Then go into an old save file, find a way to re-unlock just one specialization (I suggest using some party members' dialogue options) then save in a NEW file. Exit the game completely, then when you go back in all specializations you had unlocked will be re-opened across your entire profile. Yay!

Darksnow217 06:05, January 17, 2010 (UTC)

XBox 360 - Specializations
After some playing, an error has popped up for me that slightly hinders gameplay. Any specialization that requires a book to learn, such as Spirit Healer or Ranger, will not be attainable should you continue playing several other characters and progress through the dialog with characters to unlock specializations again. Example being you played a Warrior, and missed buying the Ranger book or could not afford it, and on your next playthrough you did not unlock the specialization again, but continued unlocking other ones, and continue this chain until you bother to finally purchase the specialization, and now it is no longer available for purchase.

A similar bug will keep specializations locked, even if you have completed the prerequisite requirements. For example, learning Assassin specialization from Zevran, when levelling up the specialization remains 'locked' despite having been taught.

With the newest patch for the game, all of my unlocked specializations have also gone away.

XBox 360 - Berserk bug
The Berserk sustained ability will almost always turn itself after battle; this can be very frustrating, as it has a 30 second cooldown before it can be activated again, and should be considered by anyone interested in becoming a Berserker.

Another Achievement Glitch
After having used the latest bugged patch for the game, certain achievements for the game did not pop at their appropriate times for me, including "Recruiter" and "Traveller" (Despite my party statistics saying I've explored 100% of the world). Perhaps the patch disabled some other flags in addition to the specialization ones? I am currently seeing if clearing the hard drive cache and recovering my GamerTag will allow me to obtain it on another playthrough.67.84.224.173 16:55, January 18, 2010 (UTC)

PC
Dragon Age: Origins, like many new games, has a few glitches. The following contains information regarding glitches in the PC version:

Graphic Glitches
Experienced Graphical Glitches: -Shaded box surrounding character.
 * Switching between ranged/melee weapons can sometimes leave you with the wrong visual models; although the game acts as if you're fighting with a bow it may show you performing bow attack animations with a melee weapon - this looks very odd, but doesn't otherwise affect gameplay
 * Melee weapons may sometimes be 'sheathed' upside down; this may or may not be linked to the visual model issue above, and likewise looks odd but has no effect on gameplay

-Game can run too fast on dual-processor systems, making everyone bounce around hyperactively. Can be fixed by pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL, going to "processes", right-clicking on daorigins.exe (which is probably eating 100% of the CPU), selecting "Affinity", then making sure that only one CPU is selected (e.g. CPU0). You have to do this each time you run the game (including after crashes).

-While in the fade (The Fade: Lost in Dreams), sometimes shapeshifting does not change your apperance while you still gain their abilities. Usually resolved by restarting the game.

Gameplay Glitches
When the character is captured by the Sloth Daemon In the Fade, you can get trapped in one of the bonus rooms. There's a slight depression in front and under the spirit door leading to the room with a Viking ship. If you go far enough below the door, it activates and takes you to the other side. The other door doesn't have the depression underneath and it's impossible to get back if you haven't learned the spirit form yet.

Actually, it's not completely impossible. I got this same problem and i satyed with my back turned to the door and i was teleported back. I tryed a few times, because I didn't save for while at that time... Well, at least, I escaped, and so can you.

Arl of Redcliffe
There is a glitch that prohibits the journal and achievement from finishing, but the storyline continues. When entering the castle from the courtyard with Ser Perth and defeating the controlled Bann Teagan, make sure not to talk to Ser Perth before the cutscene. If you do, Perth will ask whether or not you want him to follow you into the castle. Then when given the choice of killing Connor or sacrificing Arlessa, if you choose sacrificing her the game will not progress to the appopriate cutscene. Instead you will be taken out of dialogue as if you chose for more time to think, yet you cannot interact with anyone in the room and Arlessa disappears. In order to advance the quest for the gameplay you have to travel upstairs and kill Connor. Arlessa appears for the cutscene but her and Connor are referred to as dead in the next dialogue with Bann Teagan. The journal now has you down as choosing someone to enter the fade, but since you never send the person, it cannot update and the achievement for completing the quest is never given. The rest of the game acts as if you killed Connor..

I completed the main story quests, gathering of the armies and what not, but had left almost all of the side quests incomplete. I wanted to get rid of Alistair quick as possible, get Loghain on the team early as possible, so I could be more in control of character progression. After speaking with Arl Eamon and leaving for Denerim to begin the Landsmeet quests, I discovered that if I returned to Redcliffe, any saved game after this point would suffer a load error. I read on another internet source that after the Landsmeet, you can travel anywhere except Redcliffe, because this initiates the end of the game sequence. Understanding this, I believe the glitch I ran into is a result of my attempt to thwart the natural programmed progress of the game. I returned to Redcliffe after beginning the Landsmeet quest, but before finishing it. If you should find yourself similarly inclined to do things out of order, please bear this glitch in mind. It's a real show stopper.

=== Of Noble Birth === This quest will appear in any codex as a failed quest if you did not begin the game as a Dwarven noble after completion of A Paragon of Her Kind quest in Orzammar. To complete this quest successfully, you must begin the game with the appropriate background and then complete the quest by speaking to either Bhelen or Harrowmont about your son (whichever you are working with) before completing the main story quest.

PS3/Xbox 360-Epilogue bug
After defeating the Archdemon the epilogue failed to load and re-loading the game took me to after the epilogue when you can play the DLC quests.

This bug also shows up in the 360 version of the game, and can usually be fixed by resetting your hard drive cache.