How To Create Your Own "Remaster"

This section is all about making you familiar and set up for modding this game. Modding Dragon Age: Origins isn't as straight forward as other games, where you just put mods in a folder, as there are different steps for different mods, as well there are two different locations the game installs, one being steam (or whatever launcher you bought the game on) and in your documents folder (Bioware>Dragon Age). On top of that, some mods need the Dragon Age Mod Manager to install them.

DAO and games of the time by default can only use a max of 2 gigs of RAM. Which normally isn't that much of an issue in those games, but once you start adding higher resolution textures you start running into crashes very often. The 4-gig patch will also greatly reduce the game's memory leak issue, where the game's framerate will be greatly reduced after playing for awhile. Download the 4-gig patcher from: https://ntcore.com/?page_id=371, unzip the file, click on the 4gb_patch exe, then lead the patcher to the game's exe, which will be in the file in Steamapps>common/where your launcher installs games>Dragon Age (Ultimate Edition), then go to bin_ship and click on the DAOrigins exe. Once you do that, it will tell you it has been patched. To further reduce the memory leak issue and crashes you can download this mod: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/6435?tab=description that makes the game run run in Vulkan which will reduce the memory usage and the memory leak issues, just make sure your computer supports Vulkan. To download the Dragon Age: Origins Mod Manager go to https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/277, then follow the install directions from there. Unlike the 4-gig, this is really only going to be useful for some mods, mainly a certain body mod, so you don't need to install it unless you want the mods that use it. Most Dragon Age: Origins mods will have two places mods will go into, the Addins (Documents>Bioware>Dragon Age>Addins) and the Override folder (Documents>Bioware>Dragon Age>packages>core>override). But for some mods, mainly patches, you will have to use the DAUpdater that's in the bin_ship folder.

I will provide links to install the mods and tell you the pros/cons of them. Some of the mods will override each other, so pick which one you like more (overriding is based off of reverse alphabetical order, so if they are in a folder, a folder titled "B" would override a folder titled "A"). Also, mods will be categorized by type.

*The vanilla UI doesn't scale with resolution, so the higher the resolution the smaller the HUD gets. A mod does somewhat fix this by just making the HUD elements bigger. (Character Health, Abilities quick slots, Mini-map, etc.) Recommended to not go over 1080p without the mod, but 1440p is playable, anything higher, the HUD is too small.

• DAFix, uses ASI Loader to add HUD scaling, Ultrawide improvements, borderless windowed and more graphical improvements.
  Pros: Adds both tweakable and automatic HUD scaling, Ultrawide improvements and fixes, Borderless windowed mode, tweakable draw distance improvements and shadow resolution options
  Cons: crashes for me unless launched directly from the exe
  Mod Link: https://codeberg.org/Lyall/DAFix

• Nathanael's 4K Resolution Mod - Doubles the size of the HUD
  Pros: Makes the game playable at 4K (or 2K).
  Cons: Doesn't do the Fade map, setting menu sliders are misaligned. recommend using DAFix instead of this mod unless DAFix doesn't work for you
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/6332?tab=description

• FtG UI Mod - More Readable Fonts and UI, does what the title says it does.
  Pros: Highly customizable (can change font size), removes the drop shadow effect on the Tactics menus.
  Cons: Doesn't do every HUD element.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/73?tab=description

• Mouse Cursors for 4k DAO, makes the mouse cursor bigger
  Pros: multiple sizes you can choose
  Cons: cursor can look low quality from the mod just making the cursor bigger
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5167

• Clean UI, removes the blood stains from the UI
  Pros: Makes the UI cleaner, can make it easier to see certain things, mainly the map screen.
  Cons: Can be seen as a art direction change
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5799?tab=description

• 1080p Cutscenes, makes the pre-rendered cutscenes 1080p instead of 720p
  Pros: Cutscenes become clearer
  Cons: since it's upscaled using AI some minor issues can come up/some details get lost, only has 1080p 30 fps option.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5437?tab=description

• Dragon Age Origins 4K 60FPS Cinematics Mod, makes cutscenes higher res, up to 4k, and 60 fps
  Pros: Cutscenes are higher res, multiple resolution options, can download the original cutscenes from the mod page incase you want to go back the the original cutscenes.
  Cons: Upscaled and interpolated with AI so some minor issues can come up/some details get lost.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5497?tab=description

Some glitches can be caused from playing the game at high framerates, so capping the framerate to 60 can fix some issues.

• Qwinn's Ultimate DAO Fixpack, fixes multiple bugs, adds some minor scraped content.
  Pros: fixes more than 850 bugs, restores some scrapped content.
  Cons: only fixes the base game not Awakening and the other DLC, can conflict with other mods (a lot of the same-sex romance mods aren't.)
  Mod Link:https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/4689

• Dain's Fixes, fixes gameplay bugs and adds QOL improvements.
  Pros: Fixes bugs related to combat, easily customizable.
  Cons: Not compatible with some mods (list on the mod page), can make big non-vanilla changes, but those are easily removable
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/4384?tab=description

• DLC Item Integration, puts the DLC reward items into the stores instead of your inventory
  Pros: Fixes the early game balance by making you have the originally intended items.
  Cons: Some of the items are priced way too high or priced too low.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5190?tab=posts

• Awakening Fixes and Tweaks, different fixes for the Awakening Expansion (download the recommended mods at the bottom of the mod's description)
  Pros: Fixes a lot of issues in Awakening, lists different mods for more fixes.
  Cons: minor incompatibilities with other mods (listed in Description)
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5944?tab=description

• Improved Atmosphere, makes NPCs less static in the environment
  Pros: NPCs look like they have actual lives, improves variety of NPCs equipment, adds more friendly NPCs to areas, makes dead bodies last longer, and more
  Cons: may increase amounts of crashing, may be incompatible with some mods (including DAO Fixpack.)
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/577

• DLC Transfer To Awakening Patch (UPDATED), makes DLC items work properly
  Pros: Makes DLC items work in Awakening, works for all launchers
  Cons: some items may get duplicated, No Mac version (Only Windows)
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5354?tab=description

This section will be a collection of different types of graphical mods.

• Theta HD, improves the "lowest" quality textures.
  Pros: makes the worst items look better, vanilla friendly, low spec friendly.
  Cons: only improves the low quality items.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/3869

• HQ Eyebrow Stubble and Scalp Hair Replacers, changes what it says.
  Pros: Hair effected looks high quality.
  Cons: Doesn't effect long hair styles, may not work with some character model retextures.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5528?tab=description

• Dragon Age Origins Unofficial Remaster, a collection of different mods in one download.
  Pros: Easily customizable (remove folder of things you don't want), effects multiple items.
  Cons: Art style changes (makes things/Characters look like how they do in 2/Inquisition, could be a pro and can be removed easily)
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5728

• Real Pigment - a skin tint fix, makes darker skin look better.
  Pros: Makes character with dark skin look better.
  Cons: not compatible with some makeup modes.
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5559

• Clouds Retextured, changes the cloud textures.
  Pros: Clouds are higher resulotion
  Cons: Cloud type changes (not really a con just an art style difference)
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5993

• AP Neural Enhanced Textures v4, improves multiple textures
  Pros: textures are high quality
  Cons: Can cause crashes, some minor texture issues
  Mod Link: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5402?tab=description#

• Pixelated Shaders begone, improves resolution of bloom and DoF.
  Pros: Removes the pixelated effect of Depth of Field and bloom.
  Cons: Bloom effect was changed but is fixed with, Bugfix for Pixelated Shaders Begone.
  Mod Link:https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/3801
  Bug fix for Pixelated Shaders begone: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5509?tab=description

From the list of mods I provided, you can improve multiple elements of the game from textures, bug fixes, and UI elements. If a mod you use isn't in any of the list, post a comment of the mod and I will put it in the category it belongs in (any NSFW mod will not be listed). Also, if you liked this remaster guide, I made one for Knights of the Old Republic as well: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2836753578

Now go end the Blight Grey Warden.