BioWare Blog: Dragon Age: Journeys, Part Two

EA producer Ethan Levy returns to the BioWare blog to talk about how the team came up with the subtitle “Journeys” for their Flash-based Dragon Age game.

We recently had to decide on a name for the game, as the placeholder Dragon Age 2d wouldn’t hold. As we were clearly banging our heads against the wall, Pete told us a story about the naming session for Lionhead’s flagship franchise. At the beginning of the night that with a gang including Hawley and Peter Molyneux, Pete and a few others made the suggestion that they go with the short, simple descriptor that fit their storybook heroics, Fable. As with any meeting that involves a handful of creative friends working on a problem with no clear solution, the night went long, and soon the clock read 3am and when Molyneux says, (Enough. I’ve got it. Jesus 2000. He’s back, and this time, He’s pissed!) But the answer had been staring them in the face all along. Our naming session began with Dragon Age: Journeys as one of the top contenders. But the naming session stretched on, we got increasingly exasperated and our suggestions became a string of gaming nerd in jokes, such as:

‘¢ Ages of Dragon Age
‘¢ Dragon Age: Origins’ Origins
‘¢ Dragon Age: Origins: Origins
‘¢ Dragon Age: TitNS (This is the New Sh*t)
‘¢ Heroes of Dragons and Magic
‘¢ Paper Dragon Age
‘¢ Dragon Age: Tactics Advance Online
‘¢ Dragon Age: Sexy Browser Adventures
‘¢ Dragon Age: Age of the Dragon
And of course:
‘¢ Imagine: Dragonz Age Fun Time Babyz Party

But, the more we went back to it, the more true Pete’s advice rang and the better Dragon Age: Journeys started to sound. The problem was that we already planned on releasing three separate chapters of single player gameplay to start, and more in the future. How would we differentiate each forthcoming chapter?