I’m not OP but I am a long time DA fan (in the sense that I have played each game as a non-completionist at or shortly after release, and have often listed Origins as one of my favorite games of all time) and I’m right there with you on the previous games. I found the game totally fine. It was on par with inquisition and better than DA2 imho. If you liked the others and are a fan I think you’ll enjoy it well enough. Sure, some of the dialogue and story is a little stiff, but I think people have rose colored glasses on when they remember DA:O’s story.
It’s really hard to get people’s real opinion about the new game because a lot of them just wanna use it as a culture war proxy and either hate it because it because they’re anti-LGBTQ, or vehemently defend it to show how pro-LGBTQ they are. Both groups are annoying even though I am a leftist. I don’t really give a fuck about any of that in the context of the game. The game is fun and anyone who is obsessing over the game for political/social stuff probably didn’t actually play it, because it’s a tiny tiny portion of content in the middle of a huge game. People just want to paint this as a bellwether on the future of wokeness in games, when in reality it’s just a bellwether on if people are still into the same ol (fun as hell) BioWare formula.