Bioware: "We wanted to change how we tell stories."

GamesCom 2010: Speaking in a behind closed doors presentation at GamesCom, Bioware's David Silverman has said that Dragon Age 2 represents a new way of telling stories for the RPG developer.

"We wanted to change the way we tell stories," David told bit-tech, discussing Dragon Age 2's framed narrative approach.

Framed narrative is when media use stories within stories, in this case by having two characters discuss the legend of your character and switching between two points in time – the characters telling the story and the story itself.

"This approach allows us to play with time and show the long-term consequences of your choices," Silverman said. "It also lets us use exageration in funny ways too."

One sequence we saw had the main character fighting a horde of Darkspawn with just his sister, Bethany, to help. After a dragon appeared the story cut forwards to two other characters, one accusing the other of lying about the story. Cutting back, the story re-told the scene, this time with less Darkspawn and more allies.

Dragon Age 2 will feature other structural improvements too, such as a new "unifying art style" which ties the world together in a more stylised way.

"If you put two screenshots from different areas of the first game next to each other, without watermarks, then you might think they were totally different games," admitted Silverman. The new art direction should help fix that.

We'll have a more in-depth Dragon Age 2 preview coming soon, but in the mean time you can let us know your thoughts in the forums.