Incoming brief translation (my commentary in italics):
"The first impressions after viewing the intro are so-so, it reminds of titles from a few years ago, and not an AD 2009 blockbuster. Times when RPGs could look worse than other genres are long forgotten (
in other words, not enough bloom 
), but fortunately menus look a lot better, the music is also great, which makes character creation in a much better atmosphere.
There are three character classes: warrior, mage, rogue, and each of them offers several paths of character progression, for example, a warrior can specialise in ranged, two-handed, one-handed weaponry + shield or dual wielding. Each ability has three branches with four talents each. You don't have to limit yourself to only one ability, all you need to remember is that to unlock the second (of a total four) level of an ability, you have to learn the first one (
Well, who would have thought about that?) but some also have secondary requirements, like a certain level or high enough other skill.
Specialization gives access to many powerful feats, so investing in many abilities is not worth it, and specing has no side-effects, since you'll have four party-members almost all the time, so finding specialists for all possible situations isn't hard (
there goes interesting party/character creation, then). The only exception is the main character, because only he can talk with NPCs, so it's well-worth to invest in dialogue skills.
The magic system is similar, but with one small detail - the number of possibilities. Even without prestige classes, there are four specialisations with 16 spells each (four branches with four spells each). In addition, depending on how you allocate your skill points, you can create a cleric like-mage or one of the three 'combat' versions, specialising in elements, spirit and entropy. Moreover, I think that high-end spells give more advantage than maxed skills of the other two classes, so strict specing is a lot more recommended.
Rogues are not typical thieves from other RPGs, because every class can learn how to spot/use traps, pick pockets or use poisons. They do however possess a different combat skill tree (based on 'tricks' like stunning), they can also turn invisible and pick locks. They also have skill trees with dual-wielding and ranged weaponry, the same as the warrior, so thanks to that they are useful both in combat and in trap-filled dungeons.
As for prestige classes, you can choose a max of two from four available for each character, and it gives the possibility of leveling up four additional abilities - but to learn them, you have to allocate skill points that you use to upgrade normal skills/spells. Is it worth it? Well, you can pass, and they are mostly available in the later, mainly optional, parts of the game.
There's one more thing to choose when creating your character - your background. Dwarves can be nobles and commonfolk, elves are tree-hugging rebels or inhabitants of elven ghettoes (
JUDEN). Only humans have no choice - they always start as nobles, unless they choose to be mages (only humans and elves), which makes them start in one of the Circles of Magic. Depending on your choice, you'll get unique first two hours of the game. Starting all of them is kind of a good idea, since it gives a good view of the social and political situations of various places, like dwarven politics or human love for the 'first night' tradition, especiall with female elves (
durr hurr, mature).
The 18+ rating is not because of the cybersex0r (although there are brothels and romances with party members, but that's mostly light erotics like in ME). DA is advertised as dark fantasy, and that's what it really is. While you can meet good people and fight evil all the time, it doesn't change the fact that the world is far from perfect. On the other hand, playing an evil or good character gives many possibilities which adds to replayability.
The combat is largely tactical. It's not ME, where twitch-combat was dominant. Here it's completely different, and you'll have to think a lot, even at the lowest difficulty. There's an active pause, and you can take control of each party member as you please. The AI can be disabled, if you don't want your characters to do anything you don't want them to do. There is also a largely AI-based way to fight. Each character has a number of 'tactical slots' (depending on, among other things, current level and chosen talents), through which you can specifically set their behaviour in combat. The formula is simple - you choose a condition that needs to appear, and the effect that will be done by the character. Thanks to that, you can script healing, buffing, helping and attacking. Things like 'use fireball when there are more than 3 enemies', 'help the main character', 'turn the strongest enemy into stone' or 'coup-de-grace the lowest threat' can make the fights fully automatic. It needs a lot of practice, but the effects are worth it, because the party works as well as with the use of pause, but you don't have to hand-hold each character.
Skills and spells need a certain amount of energy and mana to use. HP/mana regenerate during fights very slowly (but uberfast after combat, which eliminates the problem of resting (
sigh) ), but you can speed it up with various unguents and potions, skills, gear and spells. Regular attacks are the basis, special attacks are only a neat addition, that can turn the odds into your favour, but they need good management, or you may run out of mana for the strongest enemy, and that usually means reloading the game (
oh my).
There are four difficulty levels, and even the 'normal' (second) one is rather demanding. Fortunately, you can change it at any given time. Unfortunately, even if you have problems with fights on the lowest difficulty, then, well, tough luck. There is also no attribute re-specing like in MMOs, so if you're not satisfied with your character build, you're toast. I'd like to believe this is temporary, because the current system may prove frustrating for many players (
Oh yeah? Well, fuck you). In theory, there are many people you can take into the party, but the main hero is only one, and the need of running around with a useless character is... well... Not to mention that re-starting the game isn't an easy decision, especially when you've played for 20 hours already...
The devs claim that DA takes 120 hours to complete with all the sidequests. Even if they're exaggerating, it would appear that not too much - after 26 hours and getting to something that looks like a final boss fight, it came out that I completed only 34% of the game, while exploring 86% of the map. Plus, I spent a lot more time with it, since I had a lot of reloadings caused by deaths.
The sidequests are a lot better than in ME (you can, for example, support mercenaries, or try to change the situation of renegade mages by aiding them), and there's a lot more of them - the main story is about 30-40% of the game.
Applause is needed for the mass of dialogues (all of them voiced) and interesting characters, but to be honest, the game looks a lot older than it really is. While the maps are big, and there are no problems with loading times, the world has seen a lot better-looking rpgs before, and while graphics aren't the most important, it counts for a lot too. On the other hand, you have to appreciate the scope of the game and the hundreds of possibilities it gives. You could also nitpick that it has no multiplayer or the editor will come out later, but what we have here is one of the most interesting RPGs of the last years. Not perfect, and not too beginner-friendly, and generally rather old-school, but very satisfying in the end."
Well, so much for a 'brief' translation, but I left out the various tables with additional info.
