As most gamers know by now, early 2010 has been a good time for BioWare.  The Tolkien-esque Dragon Age: Origins came out in early November to rave reviews and healthy sales, only to be followed in late January by the sequel to the critically-acclaimed space opera Mass Effect. To release two blockbuster RPGs so close to one another is almost unheard of for any developer, but it has offered a unique opportunity to compare two games that are very closely related and yet completely different in nature. Each game has a very loyal and widespread fanbase at this point, so the questions become: What do the games do differently? What does each game do right? And if you have to choose one over the other, which should you pick?

Dragon Age: Origins is as high fantasy as a game can get, but is not your grandpappy’s fantasy setting. There are Elves, sure, but they are a people divided, scattered, and subjugated under the heavy boot of the human populace. There are Dwarves, yes, but they are a people more concerned with politics and social castes than beer and battle (though beer and battle place a close second). There are orcs and trolls and dragons and other evil creatures, but they are generally referred to as Darkspawn, and have a much more nefarious creation process than the sinister mud baths Peter Jackson treated us to. In the end, the fantasy is instantly recognizable, and yet the world feels very nuanced and fully realized, distinct from merely being some bland, suburban province of Middle Earth.

Mass Effect, similarly, has shades of Star Wars while being wholly apart from it. There are no Jedi or Sith, no Lightsabers or rancors, but there are adepts who can manipulate invisible forces with their minds, myriad distinct alien races all living together, plenty of droids you aren’t looking for, and even a few wretched hives of scum and villainy. But where Star Wars is primarily focused on the struggle between the Jedi and the Sith, two factions of Force users, Mass Effect is more concerned with the struggle of humanity—and all alien life as we know it—against an ancient race of malevolent, techno-organic machines bent on destroying all life in the galaxy.

Dragon Age is a gritty, bloody, D&D kind of affair.So with that backdrop set, a look at the gameplay of the two games will quickly highlight just how different these games are. While both are ostensibly epic RPGs, Dragon Age: Origins is relatively standard fare, with swords and shields, magic and potions, levels and attributes and skills and abilities. The combat is active rather than being turn-based like RPGs of yore, but otherwise the game largely adheres to the same sort of rules you might expect to find in a game of Dungeons and Dragons.

Mass Effect, conversely, plays like a frenetic tactical squad-based third person shooter. You still gain levels and distribute points in abilities, but many traditional RPG elements are glossed over or removed wholesale. In this case, the game is generally the better for it. There is no melee combat to speak of, aside from a quick elbow you can throw at any opponent who gets too close for comfort. As such, your character classes do not focus on melee fighting, sneaking, or spellcasting as in Dragon Age, but rather are differentiated along lines of specialization between gun-centric abilities, technology-centric abilities, and force-centric abilities.

Both games are epic in story concept and length. The hero of Dragon Age: Origins must rebuild the scattered Grey Wardens—the sworn enemies of the Darkspawn menace—so as to prevent a full-scale blight from enveloping the land and destroying the lives of everyone in the area. The hero of Mass Effect 2—Commander Shepard—must amass a crew willing to put their lives on the line to bring the fight to the doorstep of the sinister Reapers who threaten the lives of every being in the galaxy. Each game will see you putting in a good 40 hours to complete on your first playthrough, though Dragon Age: Origins boasts a high end of playtime closer to the 100 hour mark for completionists. In Mass Effect 2, the player would be hard-pressed to stretch the game far past the 50 hour mark.

Where both games really shine, though, are in their characters and dialogue. With characters like the ever-disapproving Morrigan and the bird-hating Shale in Dragon Age: Origins and like the brutally just Samara and the “biotic god” Niftu Cal in Mass Effect 2, there’s no shortage of interesting conversations to be had in either game. However, there are plenty of differences here, as well.

In Dragon Age: Origins, your conversations often have four or five response options at each branch point, and generally, each option is written well and is not clearly “good” or “evil,” though some are obviously more polite or rude than the next. The player character does not personally speak outside of a few token grunts and combat phrases, but the other characters are fully voiced. Perhaps the most outstanding characterization tool that Dragon Age: Origins uses is the simple fact that your party members converse while you travel. If you have party members who don’t like each other, they’ll exchange witty barbs. If you have a party member who’s attracted to another, he (or she) may hit on him (or her). These short conversations go a long way for making your party seem like real characters leading real lives.

Mass Effect 2 has new worlds, new aliens, and all new enemies for you to gun down.In Mass Effect 2, conversations are significantly different. Commander Shepard is fully voiced, and done well to boot. Your choices in conversations, however, are generally more limited; you typically have a “Paragon” (read: Good), neutral, and “Renegade” (read: Evil) response to any conversation branch. This is an understandable limitation, however, when you consider the sheer number of lines that must be recorded for Commander Shepard—particularly when they have to be recorded twice, once for each gender! In contrast to Dragon Age, the party of Mass Effect 2 seems solely concerned with the mission, and do not have conversations while traveling, instead settling only for the occasional shout or comment during combat. The characters still generally feel pretty fully realized despite this shortcoming, however, and your one-on-one conversations with them on the Normandy will more than make up for their lack of flavor outside the ship.

Despite these differences, the two games have many things in common. The graphics, writing, voice acting, musical accompaniment, and level architecture are all generally very good or even outstanding in both games. Each game has its own shortcomings, too. In Dragon Age: Origins, there are some needlessly long or toilsome sections to the game, and there are a great many graphical bugs for a major title from a major developer and publisher. In Mass Effect 2, there is a feeling of disconnectedness about the universe you’re exploring and the places you visit, and the level design is extremely linear. However, despite these flaws, both games manage to be outstanding in their own right, and are absolutely worth playing.

So which one is better?

Well, there’s no easy answer to that question. If you have a 360/PC and have played and enjoyed the original Mass Effect, I would say there’s no question; with its already established cast of characters, universe, and backstory, Mass Effect 2 has something of an edge on Dragon Age, which by necessity has to introduce players to every character and location and mechanic. Moreover, Mass Effect has had time to refine and mature its design; where the original was a great game with a few rough edges, Mass Effect 2 is smooth, simplified, and polished. However, if you have a PS3 or have never played the original Mass Effect or are just more generally interested in fantasy than sci-fi, you are definitely not settling for second best to pick up Dragon Age: Origins instead. Whichever way you go, though, if you enjoy one, you may want to seriously consider trying the other.