Sacred Haven of Debauchery

And what do you even mean by "classic"? It's clearly not the system.

To a greater or lesser extent, it's an open world, with some similarities to a sandbox game like Morrowind, but only to a certain extent. There is character development and dialogue for companions, as well as the ability to dismiss or recruit them. The same can be said for most NPCs – they have their own dialogues, which are more developed than what we see in DA2. Overall, there is a fairly significant degree of freedom in actions, movement, and lines of behavior. This makes it a classic RPG in my understanding, although it doesn't necessarily make it a good one. The same qualities that make any other game good also make a good RPG.

No. There is role-playing in DA, and it is a role-playing game. Mass Effect is an action game with role-playing elements and, for the most part, a lack of role-playing (essentially, there are two well-developed characters, and we choose one of them).

DA2 is not an RPG to a greater extent than Mass Effect. There are three lines of behavior and the ability to make choices in quests, key plot points, and some dialogues. Please don't deny the obvious.

I considered Tevinter to be that way even in the first DA.

I did too, but after some reflection, I changed my mind.

More likely, he was influenced by mages, not their detractors.

Yeah, the bloodthirsty Orsino against the despairing Meredith, who is frustrated by the arbitrariness of the mages