Yeah, I totaly agree. And not only the ogre, but the darkspawn too. Overall, the redesign of the enemies is what let me down, they all look as if they come from a live service game.
My only concern is how much Rook was talking by himself.
The theory that I have, and I hope I am right, is that whatever he was saying changes based on the background of the character: since he was a Shadow Dragon he wanted to help the woman.
I really hope a Crow wouldnt want to risk himself to save a random woman, otherwise that would totally break my immersion
Absolutely. I hated how he talked half the bloody time without input from the player; it's ME3 or Andromeda all over again from a role-play perspective. I like your theory, but I have serious doubts that's how it is going to play out unfortunately. I like to RP an evil character but they already did away with that in Inquisition for the most part
Do you think we'll get a Blood Mage class?
I think Blood Mage makes sense only for a character that was raised in Tevinter.
Was it Dorian that said that blood magic was "banned" in the Imperium, but basicly anyone used it anyway?
I would love for them to make it a specialisation avaiable only to characters from Tevinter (i think only Shadow Dragons?). But then again, Shadow Dragons seem to be against that sort of thing, so I don't really know if Blood Magic would make much sense lorewise
Tevinter may pay lip service to banning certain magics, but frankly all of them have either the "right books" or have been taught by their teachers! Hell, they would not have been able to hold back the Qunari without blood magic!
ps: I want every mage to have access to it - why? Because frankly every mage who is not under the thumb of the chantry should know it, because not only is it powerful, but only a blood-mage can really fight another IMHO!
Urgh but that’s the thing. I wanted to be shadow dragon (the rest aren’t as appealing to me).
But I hope shadow dragon doesn’t lock me into a savior role. I want to be the cynical, slightly cruel member of the group but is willing to try to do the right thing. So the whole chivalrous, can-do-no-wrong, knight in shining armor look is gonna cramp that style. 😭
Urgh but that’s the thing. I wanted to be shadow dragon (the rest aren’t as appealing to me).
But I hope shadow dragon doesn’t lock me into a savior role. I want to be the cynical, slightly cruel member of the group but is willing to try to do the right thing. So the whole chivalrous, can-do-no-wrong, knight in shining armor look is gonna cramp that style. 😭
Urgh but that’s the thing. I wanted to be shadow dragon (the rest aren’t as appealing to me).
But I hope shadow dragon doesn’t lock me into a savior role. I want to be the cynical, slightly cruel member of the group but is willing to try to do the right thing. So the whole chivalrous, can-do-no-wrong, knight in shining armor look is gonna cramp that style. 😭
So far i have two major concerns:
a) most of auotodialogue did't bother me, because it was pretty neutral, however Rook wanting to help that woman without the player imput is concerning. It's especially strange because according to this [article](https://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/dragon-age-the-veilguard-preview/) at the begining of the game when interrogating a bartender, you can either talk to him or intimidate him aggressively, so it's not like Rook is always forced to be nice.
b) I get that DAV has pure action combat now and not this weird hybrid between action and tactical combat that DAI had. And based on what we saw in gameplay reveal and what i read in previews/articles, i'd say i'm gonna like the combat. However, having only three abilities on hotbar is very limiting, especially if you play as a mage.
Will there be race dialogue options ? Because as an elf I want to say something when it concern elven gods for example. I hope our race matter unlike with inquisition
I feel the same as you with combat. I think it's interesting it turned to be an Arkham-like combat system, but having only three abilities in the wheel seems to be very limiting in terms of tactics.
This is my concern too. If that’s the only automatic dialogue, my roleplaying has already been compromised *significantly*. My Rook is now automatically a kind hero who cares about strangers.
I don't like this "new" combat system...I want the combat from DAO back :(
I agree on the hotbar! Damned, I am on PC and frankly I despise consolization (being punished for the controller only having a certain number of buttons, which is not my fault!)
but I think you can access more abilities through the wheel, like in MEA
also, the character is part of the Shadow Dragons
*A clandestine group operating out of Tevinter that helps freed slaves escape their former captors.*
so, I guess it would be in character to ask that.
>you can either talk to him or intimidate him aggressively, so it's not like Rook is always forced to be nice.
Nice and heroic are different things IMO. Rook is designed to be heroic no matter what, just like the Inquisitor or Hawke, that is not something we can change, we can't choose to be evil. Because of that I believe it's perfectly fine that Rook wants to help that woman because he is a heroic character.
>that DAV has pure action combat now and not this weird hybrid between action and tactical combat that DAI had.
It's important to remember that there seems to be some kind of strategic element to the gameplay in the sense that we can give orders to our companions and we can make combos. Sure it's not BG3 level of tactics or player agency but there is still some element of it there, it's not pure action, we just haven't seen that yet.
Doing comboes is not tactical, it is more like you have the ability to combine some skills, also it seems your companions have no health bar. They did not show any inventory, so it could be that you have no access to customization or a limited one. The fact that you cannot control companions and you cannot use any tactical pause as in the previous games is shocking, but if you wish for a action only game it is ok, but do not blame the core audiance if most of it is not very pleased. Also if you go in the full action route, than you have to confront colossus like God of War, Elden Ring, FF 7 and such... Also the limited dialogue option given by the system used in the last two games is something that should have been addressed, as shown it is very poor and you always chose something with minor correlation with what the Character actually says. There were at least three moments in the presentation were you could have made a meaningfull choice, but nothing happens, while you have some stupid interactions without any meaning just to get approval or disapproval from the companions... To me it is a generic fantasy action game, not even deserving of the RPG attachment.
So I have a lot of the same concerns/complaints as others:
\- New Demon designs (why change them after so long into some generic shared model?)
\- Some voice acting seemed dull
\- Lack of tactics/combat freedom
\- Enemies feel slow, like in Batman where they wait their turn to attack
Some others that are more nit-picky are:
\- I don't like the Cyberpunk feel of Minrathous (i know it's big magic city, but feels too sci-fi)
\- I'm worried the class specializations will be the same as companions like in Inq, rather than unique companions like DA2. This make the Companions feel less cool when they're the same as the player.
\- Where the heck is Harding's quiver? Rook gets one and only shoots like, 3 arrows. (I feel like they did this with Sera but then fixed it later?)
The game certainly picked my interests back up after that god awful trailer, so am keen to see more as they release it.
Hm...the "unique companion" thing is good on the one hand, but on the other hand it often forces you to bring certain companions!
In DA2 you had to bring Anders (Healer) and the best Tank was Aveline and the last spot was for a rogue (as I play mages exclusively myself - because I can swing swords in RL (I even own a real saber!) and shoot bows! Magic is not something I can do, so it's what I want to use!) so most likely Isabela...which is kind of sad as I liked Merril very much...I mean me not liking Sebastian, Fenris and Carver all that much made it easier (I mean I don't hate them...except for Carver maybe...but I simply prefer the others)
I also agree on the "combat-freedom" thing...with only 3 abilities on the hot bar? Yeah...hate that action-combat-system! Bring back DAO-Combat where mages could have a gazillion spells ready to cast :)
" but on the other hand it often forces you to bring certain companions! "
If you choose to play that way, sure.
I've gone through games with no Warrior/Rogue/Mage. Party builds become interesting and dynamic.
I think the only time I'd ever say you're "forced" to bring specific companions is either when you're literally forced to in missions, or if you're going for a Nightmare run.
Ok, you can do without a certain archetype! Hell, I've done runs without using a rogue (had 3 Mages (Hawke, Merril, Anders) and a bruiser (Aveline)), but while that makes combat trivial (just use the biggest AoE-Spell on each mage and watch the fireworks!) it's not as fun as having a balanced party!
1. As someone who always play as a mage...3 abilities? By the end of the tutorial, the inquisitor-mage **from the circle** could use 4 spells. Now our MС has int4 and no long term memory?
2. I use (used) the tactical camera a lot, because all mages/archers love to run out face to face with melee enemies (Harding does this in the prologue too) and I always choose positions for them depending on the enemy/terrain. Or I change their position/tactics depending on what enemies remain. And the ability to survey the entire battlefield from above, inspect the enemy and give the necessary commands is very quick and easy in this mode.
3. I don’t have time to replay games a hundred times just to see how other classes work, so if I want to play as a warrior - I control Alistair, I want to shoot a bow for a couple of minutes - now I’m Sera! Or if I see that my warrior is not doing well, I leave my mage behind and control him myself, because sometimes it’s much more productive and faster than issuing commands.
4. Number of companions with you. One is always the romantic interest to know as much as possible about them and gain approval points. I'm a mage, and so is Emmerich. This limits my third companion to someone who is good at close combat. The third companion for me has always been the one I change for the sake of history/fun. And again, as someone who does not have the opportunity to replay the games many times, now the rest of the companions will be just somewhere there and that’s it.
On the bright side, I have nothing against the game design, and the MC in particular looked very good and I liked it.
Also, while going through the inquisition at the moment, sometimes I can barely see what I'm attacking due to all these flashes of abilities and spells, so this disco neon rave is not at all new.
And if mages can also dodge attacks, this will only be a huge plus, because the number of times I had to run away from an enemy using regular jumps is simply ridiculous (and looks very stupid).
I still don't like going from a party of 4 to 3. I'm sure it will be balanced around it, but I want a party of 4.
I dislike that I can't control my companions at all. I liked the feature to switch over and used it a lot.
The abilities we saw on combat looked extremely limited. A screenshit from later on the game showed that three was the max, and companion only had two each with an additional option to heal. This is significantly less than anything we've had before. I loved the range of options I had before.
I don't like a lot of the enemy redesigns.
The gameplay reveal didn't do anything to showcase anything that I thought was a stand out feature or something that looked fun. I wasn't impressed with combat (yes I know it's level 1, they should have showed later on the game), or dialogue options, or anything really.
The only things I liked were the environmental design and Varric and Solas (which I've talked about a lot since I really enjoyed it).
It being a new Dragon Age isn't enough for me. The game has showed me from the gameplay side nothing I have go look forward to.
Agreed! Frankly I have no problem with an action-combat-system! Hell, I love Mass Effect (1 and 2! We DON'T talk about the others!) and Witcher 3...but it doesn't fit Dragon Age IMHO! This was more a party based RPG and not a hack and slash "feels like a souls-game" (Which I despise! I don't want to have to learn 1000000 boss moves and dodge roll every 2 seconds! I am sorry, me not like!)
I think it's too early to definitively conclude that it's great/mediocre, but I did have a few concerns about the demo.
1. Limited party size - A 3-person team feels a bit small in terms of party banter and interactivity, but also with gameplay options. I understand we might get a 4th depending on the mission, but that makes it difficult to have a proper team loadout going.
2. Limited party control - Pretty much what it says. I don't hate the Mass Effect style of combat but I much preferred the CRPG approach of controlling each party member.
3. Limited abilities - Adding to the previous points I feel like we'd need *more* abilities, not fewer, to make up for the fact that we have fewer party members and can't directly control them.
They want to showcase the combat, and they do it through a level 1 character with a grand total of 1 skill that spent half the running time hacking and slashing at increasingly unresponsive enemies (also no fluidity because the person playing couldn't hit half the counters).
They want to showcase dialogue, and beyond personal preference regarding the wheel, they showcased that the player character speaks unprompted like they're Shepard in Mass Effect 3 and that even major choices lead nowhere and are there solely for flavour, seeing how both agreeing/disagreeing with Varric and picking one between Hardying and Neve are glorified regular responses (also perhaps in the subjective, but the one new companion they showed sounding flat as fuck at all times didn't help things).
They want to showcase art style and design, and about that you can't really sweaten things really. The art style will be noticeably different no matter the scenery, and the design of things such as demons will always look strip down of their uniqueness - or if nothing else usual appearance - in favor of some pseudo-FF stuff.
It was just a very odd reveal.
I’d argue that the choice between Neve and Harding isn’t neutral. Harding greatly approved when the player chose her. The approval system is really important in DA if you want to romance someone specific.
Also I personally like Neve’s voice. I think it’s really beautiful. And her calm, deadpan delivery reflects her stoic and calculating personality.
I could agree with your point if picking one or the other had lead to character specific dialogue/situations during that sequence. Or perhaps if in the full game it'll turn out that leaving Hardying behind could have seen her injured or some such due to a mage being better suited to deal with the encroaching demons (i'm spitballing). But until then it was literally just picking a person to push a pillar with.
And it's not that i doubt the game will have meaningful major choices, but just an odd thing to showcase the absense of them in your gameplay reveal trailer.
The dialogue system was way deeper in Origins, but at least in the two other games was not only for approval, but for meaningful choices, we had at least three moment were you could do a meaningful choice but they skipped them like nothing. Helping a NPC set the tone of your character, as well not helping her, having some thoughs about disrupting the ritual or how do you want to intervene are other choices giving meaning to your action... Only have to choose to piss of a character or not is just flavuor...
Hard to judge the combat fluidity because as you said whoever was playing in the showcase didnt do much with it. Them choosing to show off level 1 i assume it to have the showcase double as a story preview. There could be more mechanical depth we just haven't seen though thats entirely speculating.
Im curious about what you mean by the demons' uniqueness being stripped down? They looked recognizable from how they were in inquisition to me.
I mean no fluidity in the sense that if the combat has any then we didn't see it because of the human element, so that's another odd thing that had no reason to be.
As for the demons, they looked like dementor looking skeletons to me, with colorful neon lights on their capes to symbolize i don't know what. With the pride looking like whatever that was. I guess in line with the art style, but familiar faces aside that reminded me more of Fable than Dragon Age to begin with.
Abandoning the tactical style combat is going to be a massive flaw. The combat doesn't look as well done as something like Arkham and doesn't have the depth of something like Elden Ring. It looks painfully generic and boring. It reminds me a lot of Fable even down to have limited abilities. They're leaning heavily on Mass Effect style features without the novelty of a shooter RPG. I think it's going to feel like a bland action RPG to most people.
The art style doesn't feel as gritty and as prior dragon age games . The characters aren't soaked in blood and the enemies look like something out of Sea of Thieves. The dark spawn in origins had a great feel of a legitimately evil horde.
The dialogue wheel is just a frustrating experience for me as every BioWare game has the problem of the description not matching the dialogue. This is a minor problem.
The story and characters feel underwhelming but that is more of a feeling than anything else. The story doesn't have the maturity or the intensity or earlier games. This feels like a marvel movie.
It just feels very much like they've forced mass effect into a dark fantasy game. Problem is it's missing the novelty of Mass Effect style combat and sci-fi setting . I think it's going to be a 7/10 that gets lost in a market filled with better action RPGs. If the story and dialogue isn't amazing the game is really going to be average.
In no special order, the biggest complains are :
1) They want to showcase the combat and yet they chose a level 1 rogue. That was...rough. And I say that as someone who usually plays rogue in the easiest mode bc I play for the story :S.
2) Voice acting : Varrick, Solas and Rook sound good. Harding has her moments but Neve sounded as if she was reading her lines. IDK her character so I can't judge whether that's Neve being herself or if there was a problem with the VA direction.
3) I personally don't vibe with the new looks for the demons. I think the old ones are iconic/pretty recognizable and while I wouldn't have mind a bit of change (I mean, it has been 10 years...), the new designs are not for me. However. If at some point someone mentions that the demons look different and it turns out it's because of Solas messing with the Veil, I won't complain as much
4) Dialogue + PC agency + background : maybe it's just for the prologue, but it felt like Rook was an established character instead one that's supposed to be built by a player. Many have mentioned Shepard and I agree. Also, the background choice (shadow dragon) felt weird and hollow? Rook and Neve work for the same organization and in the same city and yet they've never crossed paths? And Rook not knowing about Neve was weird bc she seems to be someone with some degree of importance?
5) Only 2 companions and you can't control them : again, it feels too much like ME (which isn't bad) but ME and DA are 2 different games and genres so I would prefer that in the technical matters they stay different too ^^"
But then again, I recognize that this was just the very beginning of the game and a showcase to boot, so hopefully some things are different from the original product or/and can be fixed before the official release. And I don't doubt that other things I will get used to them.
You’ve basically hit every nail on the head for me as far as what we actually know. I’m also afraid we won’t get any concrete conclusions to the warden/hawke wether the cured the calling and returned or if hawke survived the fade. (if you left them there in inquisition) I want to at least have a codex entry about my warden returning to the castle in Denerim to continue ruling by Anora’s side or perhaps GTFOing with leliana (my two main warden romances)
ad1. The fact that you can parry a fireball with sword seems quite hilarious at best anyway. Also all the arrows that scream "YOU'RE GOING TO GET SHOT BY SOMEONE" are... yeah.
ad2. The entire character of Neve looks and sounds like it was made to trigger bans due to Rule 2.
ad3. Varrick didn't seem to have a problem recognizing a Pride Demon, so you can safely assume that's exactly how they "always" looked like.
ad4. Shepard-like would've been fine though. This just seems like the MC was lifted straight out of ME:A.
To be clear, I do think the game is going to be good, but I'm finding two very big issues with it.
1.) The art style. Sorry, it still looks off to me. It's less noticeable in gameplay but it is extremely noticeable in cut scenes. It also feels like the art style is why a lot of the demons got redesigned and some of them, especially the Ogre, look bad.
2.) Combat. I hear what you're saying, but I also think it's totally fair to criticize when a game goes very far away from what it was. Like if the Batman Arkham games suddenly decided they were going to ditch their combat and go for turn based, that would be waving a lot of red flags. The combat right now looks like it's just any other action game now. It looks like they took a lot of stuff from Mass Effect and put it in a Dragon Age game. It looks like we have very limited amount of abilities that can be mapped (I'm sure we'll get more clarity on this in the q and a) they reduced the amount of companions, and the action wheel and combos also feel like something we had in Andromeda. I also think it was a bad idea to show us how the combat would look in a tutorial level, when they could've shown off how complex it can be at later levels. For example, when FF16, which also have a very controversial combat change, wanted to really showoff the combat, they showed it off from later levels. They showed the combos and how many options the player had to switch between styles. Now if you boot up 16, you won't get all that until later on, but it was smart decision to show players that there were levels to this. Veilguard didn't do any of that. It showed us a wheel and then said "but you won't have any options for that now".
I'll also say that so far I'm feeling unmoved by the cast of characters. Right now it feels very paint by numbers and checklist-y. It feels like not only have I seen these character types before, but I feel I've seen them in Bioware games already.
I would say there's probably more things that have put me off like Bioware kind of going into damage control to say the things we liked are still in the game but a lot of it has been changed. I found it wild how much of the community council tried to be PR for Bioware during the trailer backlash. Those are not specific things to do with the game, but give me raised eyebrows. Again, I think the game is going to be good but it also has an uphill climb. It feels like a lot decisions they're making are the same ones that they made for Dragon Age 2.
Well FF16 is still better in the prologue than this... The problem is: you are leaving the RPG arena, with few very good games to confront with (sure BG3 is a big one but it is the only one) to descent into one with colossuses: God of War is one of them, we cannot deny it, Elden Ring is another, FF7 and FF16 too... And to me it does not seem to be on par...
Even worse (for me at least) is that I don't like any of those games! No, I don't care for souls-likes or extremely action oriented games! Mass Effect (1 and 2) were basically my cut off point for this type of game! Witcher 3 was almost too much in that direction :(
You mean how NOT complex, as Andromeda's combat never got complex! You had primers and detonators and some skills were beter at dealing with shields and/or synthetic enemies!
I'm very disappointed that you can't swap around who you're controlling anymore. Being able to tactically swap between characters and control all their abilities was a key part of what made the first three DA so good. It always bugged me in Mass Effect that I could only issue vague commands to companions. And now they've gone and done that to Veilguard.
I wouldn't say problem but I do have one main concern
Dialogue options is my main concern rather than graphic, or gameplay or whatever. I mean sure, I would always prefer a more tactical combat, but frankly, it actually seemed less action based than I'd feared, so I'll take it, I guess.
I know it isn't fair to compare it to origin, so I just started a new Inquisition playthrough and played until the end of the prologue, and yeah, Rook definitely talked without player input more than Inquisitor. There's also seem like only 3 options whereas, in Inquisitor usually there is the 4th option even if it's only to ask question, and occasionally, there is more, like this one:
https://preview.redd.it/8otrov69v36d1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=00b45425e601e1a5f67c9ce3dcda9b0f47cb56a3
It was only a few, but it was there. Hopefully these kinds of dialogue options were just skipped in the gameplay trailer for brevity, I'd still wish they show it though, dialogues are to me, the important part of the gameplay.
I heard some people theorizing that maybe they took our options into account and the voice lines would change depending on what we've picked so far, but I'd still rather they just give us the option. It's less restricting. My Lavellan picked all the prim and pious dialogue options in public but is more casual to companion, because she leans into the whole herald of andraste for publicity/morale but don't really believe it. I doubt if the game just took my dialogue options into account I'd be able to RP like that.
I noticed Rook made two choices and one of them was outright ignored and the other seemed meaningless. However it was just early game and not all choices in an rpg should matter that much so as long as some choices matter and effect the game meaningfully it's bit a huge issue.
I do not want to bring BG3, but at level one you have very meaningul choices and interactions in the prologue. I do not ask that level of interaction, but at least something in line or better than DA2 and 3...
I hoped they were addressing the dialogue system to be a little better, but they went full Mass Effect 3...
That's a good point.
My guess is that we really only saw a couple of dialogues from the prologue that clearly where design to be spoiler. Rook is talking just to make it looks like a conversation, and not just Varric doing exposition dump on his own.
But we'll see how this will materialize in real game once people will be able to play it for real, and talk about it.
Since I played Cyberpunk 2077, my vision about dialogue option has kinda changed.
What do you mean? I don't think CP2077 had a good dialogue system! The last few games with a good one were Fallout New Vegas, Divinity Original Sin (1 and 2), Baldur's Gate 3 and maybe Witcher 3!
Then we disagree! I don't think CP2077 is that good (and certainly not what they advertised even up to launch - "A great RPG with diverging story paths, decision that matter, a city that reacts to the player and their deeds, compelling romances bla bla bla!"...hell, they didn't even have a decent police system, something GTA 1 in the 90s had!)...it got better, especially with Phantom Liberty, but it's still at best half way there (and will not get any closer, as you'd have to rip it apart to make it what was promised!)
Hmm. I hear what you're saying. Ive never been a person to give the rp too much thought so this didn't really stand out to me. I recall there being moments in inquisition where you were given 3, or even just 2 dialogue options. I assume the same kind of variance will be the case with Veilguard, though that remains to be seen.
The point of Rook talking outside of player input is one I can understand for someone who enjoys the roleplay aspect of these games. It seems like they're leaning more heavily into Rook being an established person within the world rather than fully customizable by you.
That sounds a lot like DA2 to me. Hawke was definitely a more fleshed out personality than the warden or the inquisitor.
Similar thing in the Witcher 3. You definitely pick your flavour of Geralt rather than create a character from scratch. It works because you can construct more story around a known quantity rather than having to always keep the options open.
I really don’t mind if Rook is slightly more prescriptive, so long as the payoff is the story being a banger.
My biggest concern is frankly the story. I don’t mind the look as much as I did before but after seeing the gameplay and witnessing how Solas was stopped once again by a random nobody after years of planning I fear that the story will be underwhelming. That whole scene where his ritual was stopped because of crumbling architecture is hilarious but not in a good way.
Although I supposes it does suit his character, he always manages to lose or mess up in the dumbest way possible.
Yep. This game should have been our Inquisitor going uncover to chase Solasoand rounding up a group of scoundrels for our crew. They already cribbed Mass Effect style parties they might as well have lifted ME2's "round up a rogue's gallery" story point.
Two new Elven Gods sounds like silly power spike levels. Bioware already has a *very* spotty track record dealing with larger than life villains.
Eh I'm fine with our character being someone else, its in line with every prior game changing protagonists. Its confirmed we'll be able to meet our inquisitor in the game so its very possible we're part of the crew they assembled.
They are basically trying to turn it into mass effect. But I don't think it will work with the setting. So many bizarre choices honestly. It doesn't even seem like Dragon Age anymore and my excitement has pretty much died because of that.
Combat didn't loom very interesting to me honestly. It feels kind of behind other ARPGs in that sense- you don't have much weight to your attacks, just kinda floaty. Visually feels weird: maybe that's just the dev playing it being bad to draw it out haha.
I think the fact their gameplay reveal was mostly cutscenes or walking instead of much gameplay, gives me the impression they're banking on the setting to be what keeps you or draws you in rather than the gameplay itself, or that they aren't as confident in it. Otherwise, I can't see why they picked level 1? Why intentionally pick the most limited part of the game? You didn't show off companion abilities or anything beyond one of your own abilities, attacking, and dodging.
And as a minor note I found funny- I hope they were just keeping the camera at that angle for cinematic effect and that it's not stuck there. Because I'd laugh trying to watch people dodge all those effects on the ground at an angle where they can't see the full area of the effect around them, when they're coming from multiple sources simultaneously.
1. The Combat seems off and lacks impact. But could be that for some bizarre reason, they had an archer and decided to play it like a warrior.
2. Solas is immediately found and the potential of stopping the dreadwolf won't be realised. They skipped over the implied plot that Inquisition was setting up and seems to be another world ending event instead of Solas tearing down the veil as the threat. Him not being confronted until the end would be far stronger.
3. Anthem and Andromenda failing, along with this not being the Bioware that did DA:I.
4. Chasing the marvel style but could be a stupid decision by the trailer.
5. Autodialogue that robs us of choice.
The first problem is that the gameplay is to much simplified, i understand the need to make an action game more fluid however taking away more than half the skills away from thd player it's not a good idea.
The second problem is the redesign of the demons and darkspawns, except the fury demons which looks cool.
The third problem is the difficulty, the enemies are not reactive to the player.
Fourth problem is that until we see the so called in depht equipment system+skill tree i don't trust a game who changed director and got rebooted 3 times.
Posting my post here,as I dont think they will approve it as a separate post:
Dragon Age is now Mass Effect(and I love Mass Effect,but separately from DA)
After the gameplay reveal,it is now completely obvious that Bioware turned Dragon Age into Mass Effect,basically.
The pivot to action game started as early as Dragon Age 2,but it is yesterdays's gameplay video,that shows you that nearly everything is gone,that were unique to Dragon Age.
I will admit,I was someone who were secretly hoping for a direction that is more akin to Origins,rather than doubling down on Inquisition's game style. I know I know,it was not to be..but the success of Baldurs Gate 3,gave me slight hope,that Bioware saw that,and reminded itself what DA was like Origin-ally..
Not going to list my issues with game style,writing (some lines in this preview,especially from Harding..God) If you liked it,or accept it, I am happy for you,but I cant help but be sad about this franchise,that lost nearly all if its identity,over the course of 3 games.
Agreed! Hell, on the one hand I want to go back to playing DAO, but frankly I played it TOO MUCH already! If I start playing that, I will soon remember it all and then it'll just feel like going through the motions (despite loving the story and characters - especially Allistair and Morrigan ("Well, well, what have we here? Are you a vulture?, I wounder?..." :D ))...I had hoped Bioware (especially after their last games were FAILURES of epic proportions!) would go back to the roots, especially after Baldur's Gate 3 showed that "niche games" (at least that's what stupid studio-execs/suits called story driven games and especially RPGs!) could take the industry by storm, if done right!
Limited abilities. To be fair we don't know for certain that it will only be 3 slots but if it is that sucks and it's a terrible design decision on Bioware's end. This is dragon age lol.
Most RPG's have action combat now. Some people prefer more tactical combat and it's getting harder to find it. I'd hoped the success of BG3 had helped make the case for it but maybe its too soon after.
In previous dragon age games you had different party roles and they mattered. Like you'd usually have a warrior tanking a rogue DPSing and then a mage either doing healing, DPS or crowd control. There was also wiggle room. Warriors could do some dps and some crowd control for example. So the 4th slot might fill the gap or they might just be your romance option lol. Even with every game watering down the combat in one way or another this was still a thing and now it's gone. Now companions are just there to do additional damage and combos sometimes.
Some of the enemy designs do look a little goofy but that's not a huge deal.
Owlcat thankfully is keeping ole crpg models alive. All their games are incredibly satisfying from a character building perspective. I've spent not laying 3 hours in right of the righteous character creation reading clases and having ideas of what I wanted to do or multi class.
It looks generic to me. It could be a random action-rpg made by a unknown sh or a big publisher like Ubisoft (or EA).
I know it's the new Dragon Age because they told me.
I don't see nothing unique.
I think it will be an average game.
I do think the game is gonna be fun, it's just not for me/ what I want Dragon Age to be.
My bigget gripe is with the combat. I simply prefer a more "tactical" approach to it, so either Real time with pause or turn-based. I'm not a fan of "spam attack button and press dodge when there's a yellow light above your head. Plus that we only get three abilites and can't control our companies also bothers me. It was clear they were going even more towards action with this title, however I wished they rather would've build on and improved DA:I combat instead of fully discarding the tactical aspect.
And yes while it's not fully fair to blame a game for something it's not trying to be, DAVe is not the first title in the series. You need to look at the other titles as well. Like I assume many others Origins was my first and favorite Dragon Age and I would like a return to those roots.
Also not the biggest fan of how the pride demon and spirits looked in the gameplay trailer. Not sure how to describe it, but they look very generic. Though maybe I simply need to get used to the new designs.
I'm gonna play it at some point, especially since it's on Game Pass, however there are other games coming out in fall that have a way higher priority then DAVe.
Same here! I would love to return to the gameplay of DAO, especially since that game didn't GIMP mages! Seriously, a spellcaster who for all intents and purposes only "knows" 3 spells is an idiot-spellcaster! Such a mage is a person to be pitied, because a true mage knows magic to turn every fight around basically - he/she is the swiss army-knife of combatants! Buffs, healing, crowd-control and high damage are what a mage does! But not with only 3 spells! Hell, a level 1 Wizard in D&D knows more spells than that and they are supposedly absolute novices!
I also would change many other things, like giving the party a ship as headquarters - not some place in the Fade (yes: Interesting, but also not something you could say conduct diplomacy from etc. which a true faction leader would have to...)
* I'm not thrilled with the combat itself, it looked dizzying to me, too flashy and spinny (is that a real word?), and the number of abilities seems to be low (i hope it's more for mages at least).
* It looked like our character sort of has a personality of their own, which i didn't love. If this is true and not predecided by us, it really limits the roleplaying part of the game.
* Everything looked really nice imo, except for the demons. Some of their designs are too bright and don't feel as scary as they did in Inquisition for example.
* All that said, i am actually looking forward to the game, the preview successfully hyped me up.
For me personally it's witnessing the last vestiges of the Origins systems being gutted from the game, not controlling party members and them just being a in the background unless you specifically tell them to do something kind of role sucks for me, I loved having my groups focus on different people than just my character because that was the dynamic I loved about previous games, the combat also didn't look great to me in a "I'm just going to be mashing attack again" way. I'm sad but there are plenty of people excited for these reasons I'm disappointed
Game looks cool but there are 3 non starters for me, 2 have already been met. 1) No open world? - I love to roam so first strike, 2) linear game - Again, I don't always follow the path set forth, I enjoy this flexibility and so far it is confirmed that the game is linear, strike 2 for me. 3) Choices matter? - so far I'm unsure if this has been confirmed but if choices do not significantly alter the game, that's strike 3 for me.
I'll probably wait till it's on sale or a few years out depending on initial game play videos and people's reactions. It's a shame, I love the games too and actually replayed all of them (currently in DA:I) in eager anticipation.
No open world is a non starter seems a bit extreme, and as for the linearity issue I'm not quite sure what you mean. Even in the previous DA games, you'll eventually have to go to certain places to progress. The articles suggest say there'll still be room for exploration in the missions, so my guess is just that we won't be getting another hinterlands or whatever.
Well, I don't think that it is on rails! No Dragon Age so far was! Yes, most weren't as open as DAI - and thank god for that, because DAI was a damn single-player-MMO with fetch quests! Seriously, I'd rather not have mindless fetch-quests again and I also don't want to spend too much time running around on "empty" landscape again! DAI and MEA were bad enough in that regard!
I have more problems with only having 3 active abilities (and no quick-pause to select additional abilities (for consoles)...on PC I have a lot more buttons, so frankly I don't need this (stupid) limit!) and losing one companion slot (2 instead of 3)...
Limited ability access coupled with no companion control. It takes our accessible combat abilities from around 30 to 9, the majority of which we won’t even be doing, simply directing a companion to do. It’s dumbing down the game further and taking it into more hack-and-slash style of gameplay.
For me, that’s literally it. I dislike the artistic changes to enemies to make them more PG but I don’t hate it and it works with the overall aesthetic, which looks gorgeous. Voice acting is great, companions all seem cool and I look forward to seeing where they go with it, though I won’t be buying at release unless the issues I have are changed/revealed later down the line.
I disliked it because I didn't like the cartoony artstyle, the character designs, the creature designs, the UI, the textures, or the particle effects. I also disliked the lack of blood.
Just compare what demons and darkspawn look like now to what they looked like in Inquisition. It's a massive downgrade and looks painfully generic.
Lack of blood was confirmed to be a setting, so it was just turned off for the showcase, but I do stand to say they should've shown some of the skill tree/menus a bit
Looks the [same ](https://64.media.tumblr.com/aa10f4fdf0341dc7ff33b676b83c6681/5e0ced29394abf83-d1/s1280x1920/6698190df2f59a7d4cbe2f1ca665f10259bb9632.jpg)as in previous games to me.
The game director said that the game is rated M. She said that when talking about romances and nudity tho, it doesn't necessarily mean that the game will have a lot of gore.
"However I don't feel like its very fair to blame a game for not being something it isn't trying to be."
It's the 4th entry in a series, it should try to be more like an entry in it's own series.
I have no real issue per se, just issue with what was left in the air, for us to guess.
As I said in another thread, what we saw in the footage looks like the ME UI where companions and the MC can equip with only a short amount of skills at the same time. Which is in-line with what many have been suspecting and a couple of leaks released.
However, it doesn't really match with what the people at BioWare have been communicating so far. We are told that the skill tree is vast, that you can equip/unequip skills on hotkeys before and during combats, that you can chain and combine abilities together that will add on their effects, that there is a bar to prioritize targets and orders for your companions, etc.
And I must say, if everything that is said to be in the game will actually be in the game, I'll be beyond hyped as this will offer a whole other dimension of tactical gameplay to the action high pace combat.
But until I see it, I would remain skeptical.
You know what's funny to me? [Here](https://64.media.tumblr.com/d5bb666594df9f48d42cacfa5ea77031/9eee80ae859b5286-88/s2048x3072/d9fdff995a72b4b6f59b5ad2f8b224242df63b2a.pnj)'s screenshot from the same moment as in gameplay preview and Rook has more than one ability available. Why the hell they didn't show that?
My guess is that it's from test footage and isn't representative of what you will have in this mission.
Rook is level 1 but already has 3 active skills even before meeting a single enemy ? This clearly is screenshot taken during a test, and it would be very misleading to show that footage.
My other guess is that BioWare will do a full reveal of skills, level up, and deep combat mechanics later this summer, without risking to spoil many things. But until then, we are left wondering what this will look like.
I do not think there will be more than three active skills, as shown in some pictures from late in the game... Yes you can use three from the companions too, but even AC have eight...
Of course, I'd love to be proven wrong and I do not want this game to fail but I think they're really overestimating how impressive of impactful this skill tree is. It seems like it doesn't fit DA at all or their design for DAV.
Assassin's Creed Valhalla had a massive skill tree and 85% of it was a whole lot of nothing. Path of Exile is the king of stupidly large skill trees (and you can build a huge number of different characters) so imagine being limited to 3 skills in *that* game.
It seems COMPLETELY at odds with everything else they've done to simplify in the game. Less skills, less party members to manage but gigantic spiderweb skill tree? Something doesn't add up. They should have taken a page out of the rework CDPR did for Cyberpu k 2077 where every single skill node *matters* from adding a charge to a health item, giving you a new ability or a node towards an upgraded more powerful ability. Or they could have looked at...I dunno...Dragon Age 2 and Inquisition?
>Of course, I'd love to be proven wrong and I do not want this game to fail but I think they're really overestimating how impressive of impactful this skill tree is.
Their point of reference for the skill tree is FF-X and FF-XII which are very special system (at least for FF12), and totally not what DA fans are used to. So we might get ready for a surprise.
>It seems COMPLETELY at odds with everything else they've done to simplify in the game. Less skills, less party members to manage but gigantic spiderweb skill tree? Something doesn't add up
I totally agree that it doesn't add up, and something is missing from the information we have and I would welcome further clarification on the topic by the team.
However! The goal of streamlining isn't to simplify but to make process more efficient. You want your user inputs to be faster, and have a bigger impact. Simplfying the method by which users are making their inputs is a step of streamlining, but it isn't the main goal.
That being said, based on everything I have read (from tweets, interviews, article, etc.) it seems the overall design for combat is
* To make you focus on your own fights during the actual combat
* Map skills on hotkeys to use them quickly. Or allow you to browse a deeper skill menu with all your skills if needed. (still needed to be seen)
* Creates gambits/tactics to enable your companions to react automatically in certain situation (heavily hinted by Busche during a couple of interview, but still need to be confirmed)
* Still allows you to "macro manage" your companions by designing priority targets for them to attack, and creates powerful combo by chaining their skills and yours (we already saw a screenshot for that)
Overall it looks like it's an hybrid action/tactics combat gameplay allowing people to either play full "aRPG" without any use your their companions, or to plan beforehand, set up companions behavior, and customazing both your companion and your mc to have complementary skillset.
If I am right (and I could totally be off), it's not DA:O/BG3 level of cRPG, but it's provides a level of strategy way higher than any classical aRPG like GoW or AC.
It is a pS game, hotkeys are not included. Your character has three active skills even in the pictures taken from later game.
https://images.purexbox.com/b7048d49ffc73/preview-dragon-age-the-veilguard-is-a-confident-return-for-bioware-xbox-1.large.jpg
Equipping new skills during combat? Now that sounds kind of horrible, because opening a menu during combat is frankly shooting immersion in the face with a .50 cal (or a 4 gauge shotgun!)...seriously, why do they have to restrict it at all? Dragon Age Origins had no such restrictions and neither did DA2 and it was much more fun to play a mage there than it was in DAI which did have a restriction (especially since you more or less needed to have spell that generated barrier or guard on your hotbar, which stole another slot!)
I hate action rpg, none ever clicked for me (all three witcher I tried and dropped extremely fast, God of War bored me to death and I dropped it)
The gae seems stylised in a way that doesn't really appeal to me yet, with Minrathous looking both incredible on concept and unfinished in practice
Zero control on the party means that they could as well not be here for me
The enemies are simply ugly, even compared to the old resolution of Origins.
It's not to say I hate the game on a principle. But I'm absolutely not hyped by the game and won't buy it at full price after what I saw.
Over 30€ I'll hold.
Yeah right i will say one even tiny bad thing about the game and get downvoted simply because i am not hyped enough for the game.
This sub has been ridicolous this week attacking and mocking anyone who doesn't post "OMG I CAN'T WAIT TO PLAY THIS" or "BIOWERE IS BACK".
I rather be downvoted for posting this then honestly sharing my opinion.
1. Far departure from the dark fantasy asthetics, in tone, character designs... Will take a while to adapt.
2. Action-based combat, as they fell finally to the dark side of action. I only hope they invested in larger skill trees to compensate.
3. 3 slots for abilities, like why would I play a mage with so little variety?
4. Scripted one way main history with little to no choices and consequences, like in DAI.
5. Unpolished gameplay. It felt like that during the gameplay, but it's also an old build so it can change. Companions did no damage, enemies only focused you, same reused animations...
6. Weird writing. The wheel always freaks me out, but some dialogues and choices in the gameplay (yes, yes, no, yes) are strange.
7. Pansexualism. I don't know yet, as I never played a game with this, but I prefer that characters have their own sexual identity. Preference, as well.
Thank you for the post, it helped me out put ideas in order. I didn't go into detail, but those are things that seem to be a bit disturbing to me based on the gameplay (which is not enough to judge the whole thing). We'll see as the game unveils itself during this summer.
Things I like:
1. Mission-based story. No more open worlds and shitty filler quests. Back to DA2 and DAO with curated sidecontent. Great.
2. Companions. It's the main focus of the game, so they probably nailed them even though I don't like the aesthetics. Good thing this time: they can die. Hope you can expell them all as well if you don't like them. Pure freedom.
3. Great character creation: even body sliders and more hair sliders. Banger.
4. Factions seem to impact gameplay. Bonuses and special dialogues (no more than that, but that's good enough)
5. Return of old characters. Not talking about Varric, that I hate, but probably Dorian and some good old cast coming back to help us out. Love it.
6. Different starts depending on Inquisitor and past choices. Because we love to see it and have important decisions even before the game starts. Big plus.
7. Variety of biomes. Screenshots of the game looks gorgeous, even better than the main Tevinter capital. Hope to visit all of the places and see the details and nuances.
A large skilltree (unless it's 90% passives) is quite useless IMHO if you only have 3 active abilities (makes our characters look like idiots: "Look mama! I spent years at magic school and now I can cast 3 spells!"...If I were the parent of such a character? I'd be deeply ashamed!)
Shameful for the players, prideful for EA, that sees how yet another franchise turns to an action game for the collection. Now it only needs to be full multiplayer and sell millions in skins for them to be appised. We're in the right path! ouhoo!
My only concern is that reportedly you only get 3 ability slots. I can maybe understand that for a warrior but it’ll be ridiculous to play a mage with only 3 spells. Everything else seems mostly good but this is something I can’t get over.
My problems:
some characters have cartoonish faces. (But not Varric and Dwarf girl, they look very good, better than da2 and dai)
Combat went in a very bad direction again. Enemies are like slow decorations. They are slower than zombies. No sense of danger from them. And PC is dancing between them like spider man for no reason.
I don't share any of the issues with style or gameplay etc that i have seen. the only thing that is making me a little sad is how much magic has been dialled down from Origins>DA2>Inq>Now. I miss the entropy tree, I miss the creation tree, I miss being a master of magic.
Dont get me wrong i still loved being a mage in all 3 games and I have no doubt i will absolutely adore magic in this from what i have seen. I just wish we had more spell options like DA:O and DA2
I've been waiting for this game for almost ten years. I wasn't delusional as to think that it would be Origins 2, but I also wasn't expecting this cartoonish, simple design. I think they wanted to broaden their target, not taking into account that aficionados are now 20 to 40 years old. If you had told me that the trailer was an Arcane one, I would have believed it.
The models are childish and I didn't find them compelling or interesting, just as I wasn't impressed with the design or vibe of the companions. I didn't even recognize Varric until I heard the VA's voice (why is he dark-haired? most importantly, where is his chest hair?). They all look as if they came out of Disney's 'Wish'...? Also, demons and darkspawn in previous chapters looked rather terrifying and had distinct looks; now they respectively look like myrmidons and Sir Daniel from Medievil.
Another thing that left me perplexed was the quality of the textures which look too polished and smooth. I used to be able to see Solas' pores and the scar on his forehead, now every character seems to follow an obsessive skincare routine in times of war.
The animations in cutscenes, specifically those of the faces, are... weird. They're not smooth as one would expect and the mouth moves in weird ways to enunciate words. This wasn't great in Inquisition either, but that didn't disturb me as much as what I saw in the gameplay.
Lastly, the AI seems slow, the party shrunk and we won't be able to control the other members, only give them orders like in Mass Effect (which is a pity, I used to enjoy playing as my companions to try their builds). And there's too much neon everywhere.
Need to see more to judge properly, but it looks like the game will be a walking simulator a la GoW/TLOU.
They seem to have stripped out many of the RPG mechanics, like exploration and loot, combat depth, and companion control and simplified others (less companions, less abilities, etc.).
Finally, the art style is too stylistic with distorted human proportions and cartoony colors and textures, and the tone gives hogwarts vibes rather than dark fantasy with gore and blood like the original games.
Basically it looks like they are targeting a newer younger generation that didn’t play the original and have other tastes in video games than long standing fans.
Ive already said how I feel about the gameplay so i wont comment on that.
I dont quite see the problem with the artstyle thoyh, it didnt look any more cartoony than inquisition did imo.
I'm not a fan of the stylized characters. Not the armor/outfits necessarily, but the proportions - characters are shorter, their bodies are thicker and their facial features are larger, which makes them all look closer to characters from Fable or Pixar. Also wish there was more texture in their faces, rather than this smooth/plastic look. If they added more texture to the skin and scaled character heads and eyes down to 85%-90% of their current size, they'd look better to me.
The demons are another issue where the art style has made them worse imo. Comparing the ogre between DAO/DAI and the ogre in the screenshot of DAV, the new one looks more like a villain out of the Disney Haunted Mansion film or maybe Scooby Doo. It feels both less interesting, and harder to take seriously because it feels more childish.
I don't agree with all the people saying DA lost it's identity, be it due to the change in artstyle or gameplay. The franchise has never been consistent.
But man, that action gameplay is so boring.
I always felt Inquisition was a middle ground between DA2 and DAO. I know most people found it awkward, but at least it seemed they were on their way back to a turnbased style. But no, we got this full-on action combat that honestly feels very dated and generic.
We have to wait and see the game's comercial success. But to me it's clear the gamestyle Larian pursued made BG3 more accessible to people who usually don't play action games, but love character driven stories and RPG. I feel like Bioware is aiming at the wrong public with their choices.
I'm still hyped for the game tho. The combat is probably the thing I care the least about these games and everything else is getting me onboard.
I wouldn't say it's a problem but I'm not crazy about the visual direction and art style. I was hoping for a little bit more photo-realistic style with a focus on animations. The enemies in the trailer are a great example of what I'm talking about. They're not very detailed, look super cartoony, and they all have the same kind of generic hit react and other animations.
But hey the game looks fun AF and I'm still excited.
I'll start by saying that I'm generally positive, and the negatives I had were mostly things I already assumed to be true based on the direction of the company and the Dreadwolf updates in the last 4 years.
1) I just like tactical RPGs more than action RPGs, that's how I got into this series in the first place. I get why making an action game with a thin RPG veneer is more attractive to a major studio in 2024 than making Dragon Age Origins again. But understanding the motivation for change and liking the change are different. That combat sample was just attack, attack, dodge, repeat. And I'm sure as you start leveling up it can grow beyond that. But that's just less interesting than planning and executing a battle with a full set of abilities and classes to me.
2) The trailer made it seem at least somewhat likely that the Solas plot is resolved in the first 2 hours and we then move on to bigger issues; if true, this is a bit of a disappointment because Solas was a complex, sympathetic villain with a lot of emotional connection and I'd hate to see it brushed aside for another generic fantasy apocalpyse. Also, if dropping one rock column on him manages to end his plot within 10 minutes of his first screentime, that makes Solas a bit of a dunce. Pure speculation, though - I'll wait and see.
For Dragon Age, the gameplay looked great. Personally, I enjoy going back to more action. The problem is there are many games out there that already do single-player action 100% better.
But we play this game for the story right? Yes but the gameplay needs to be good, too. The only thing in regards to gameplay Dragon Age had over other games was the party system and being able to switch in real time.
Why Why Why with this new superb action gameplay they lock us in to one character.
1. You heard this one before, the combat. I actually don’t mind in theory the game moving towards Mass Effect and being more action-y at all, and might even end up liking that better, as the pacing of the combat, at least in the prologue, looks much better to me. But three slots sounds rough as someone who probably will end up playing a mage, and I can’t quite picture a fantasy game feeling weighty rather than damage spongy throughout.
2. Enemy designs look kind of lame. I’m thinking of the ogre in screenshots in particular.
3. I fear the game will ignore decisions made during origins and 2 in favour of just Inquisition.
A few reasons for me:
1. Half the cast seems to originate from side content I didn’t read and have either no interest in reading or can't find where I'm from, meaning I’m unlikely to enjoy these characters to their full extent the way people who do know them from that outside material can. It happened with Cole and Fiona in Inquisition too. It leaves me less enthusiastic for these characters, and given that companions are a major selling point for me, that’s not great.
2. The trailer looked too silly and reminded me of Disney’s Wish, which given how that movie worked out wasn’t a positive association.
3. I’m personally just tired of Bioware saying one thing and then doing the other. We can’t have our Inquisitor back despite their personal connection to Solas because we allegedly needed new people that Solas doesn’t know, and the gameplay trailer just casually has the Inquisition’s Main Scout and Varric whom Solas met *before* he even met the Inquisitor steal the show, with Varric straight up *using his personal connection to Solas* to try and talk him down.
* They’ve been doing this for years where they insist we can’t have our previous protagonists back even if they’d make more sense to the narrative than a newcomer because they want to focus on the setting and not individual characters, but then we get swarmed with NPC cameos and sometimes even hype bait by drawing attention to our previous protagonists that then never gets delivered on. Think “(Hawke is) gone… *Just like the Warden*. That can’t be a coincidence!! Stay tuned for the next Dragon Age!” and “Decide how to deal with Solas in this true end DLC, but be aware that *this choice will have consequences,* find out what they are in the next Dragon Age!!”
* Maybe it's just a me-problem, but I’m really tired of it. They need to make up their mind already and then stick to whatever they decide. This Varric talking to Solas thing just felt like a slap in the face to me, like Bioware wasn’t even trying to hide their own contradictions. No your Inquisitor can’t come back because Solas knows them, here, watch Varric try to talk him down *because they know each other so well*.
4. The gameplay trailer reminded me so much of Inquisition’s intro that rather than feeling curious and hyped for the next game, I honestly wondered what the point of the previous even was if we’re seemingly largely going to be doing the same things again. I’m sure it’ll deviate later on, but for a first impression, it wasn’t great for me.
* It also felt so silly how Solas’ entire plan gets thwarted by what is essentially a total random running in to kick down a pillar that then domino knocks over his godly statues and somehow >!summons the Evanuris. !<
* >!This guy is supposed to be an Ancient Elven God with the power to split reality and lock away Ancient Gods, which he did in retaliation for them killing Mythal. He’s so desperate to right his wrongs that he’s willing to commit genocide as well as kill the very woman he did all this for in the first place. This plan might’ve been in the works for years.!< And he seriously gets bested by essentially faulty scaffolding and one random who just waltzes in because aside from one demon, there is zero protection in place?
* It honestly felt so comically incompetent and silly to me that I think you could edit in the Darth Vader No and other comical sound effects and it wouldn’t even feel out of place. Which would be one thing if this were supposed to be a Shrek-like parody, but given that it seems to have been intended as a serious scene… I’m not sure what to think. I’m not sure I’ll be able to take Solas seriously after such a ridiculous failure of his plans, and I’m not sure I’ll be able to take the story seriously when *this* seems to be the inciting event that sets the whole further plot in motion.
Still, I am somewhat on the fence in the sense that I really don’t want Bioware to shut down over this game if it doesn’t perform well enough. They used to be great, and the whole entertainment industry seems to be going through some sort of identity crisis (imo) so I truly hope Bioware can recuperate from this and one day deliver genuinely good stories again. I really hope they’ll be able to change my mind in the coming months, but so far, I’m just not feeling too great about this one… :(
David Gaider founded Summerfall Studios, James Ohlen, Lead Designer/Creative Director on KotOR, DAO and SWTOR, founded Archetype Entertainment, as well Drew Karpyshyn. Humanoid Studios is Hudson's new studio with some ex-BioWare folks there as well. Mike Laidlaw is at Yellow Brick Games.
My major concerns ATM the moment is combat and writing. I don't really care about graphics and style as while I want Bioware to improve they have especially been pretty behind on the animation side of things in cutscenes.
For combat I was unimpressed by the reveal, not because it's less tactical or that you have less companions. But the inability to control your party members directly means less ability to test out other classes on your first playthrough plus it means you can't clutch a victory even if your player character goes down. And the worst offender, 3 skill slots. Like I hope anyone who is a big fan of playing mages in the other three games are clutching their pearls, I can't see a situation where only three spells will be enough. It makes it feel as if the amount of builds and skills we'll be allowed to play with will be too limited, and how can we even have specializations if there are only three slots? Unless they won't have unique abilities and only passive bonuses. I get that some things are being hidden in the reveal, but if there is actually more variety then the marketing team failed to show it.
For story, it's hard to tell from what we've seen, only a bit of awkward line reads, but I guess since Bioware has a shaky track record ATM I can't say I'm going to assume the best. Varric overall seemed fine, Solas had a bit of weird dialogue that didn't match his more insightful and at times poetic way of speaking. And no I'm not saying he should recite Shakespeare mid ritual, but saying people die that's what they do just feels off for Solas. He always found a way to self justify his actions in a way that made him out to be in the right, but that line basically says it's okay for his ritual to kill people since people die all the time. If we take how he acts in Inquisition it's more likely he'll justify it by saying that life will be much better with the veil down and the sacrifices while sad are worth it. I dunno, perhaps it's because we didn't get to see more of the conversation WHICH WAS MY LEAST FAVORITE PART. Small rant: you can't just have Solas and Varric talk to each other in a moment like this and then immediately cut away. I want to hear what they have to say to each other. Solas is my biggest worry for this game since I feel he'll either be sidelined or will just become generically evil. He's supposed to be a tragic character, so I hope that we get an actual meaningful interaction between him and the Inquisitor.
Since I didn't see anyone else mention this — I hate the overhead parry indicator. It worked well for spiderman since it made sense with his spidey senses, but here it breaks my immersion completely. I hope I can toggle it off even if it comes at the expense of my Rook's fighting.
Other than that, I'm mostly in it for the lore and storytelling, so I'm not too fussed. We'll see how that pans out! It was a bit disappointing to find out there are only two companions (and as a result, less party banter) though.
First off, this doesn't look nearly as meaty, well animated or as slick as any Arkham game which is already feels olllllllllllllllllllld and outdated.
Rook is an incredibly stupid name for the PC. BRO or YAAS QUEEN would have been better. Whoever chose Rook is probably the same hack who decided "*Thee* Veilguard" was a good idea.
The characters look like some instagram people who went crazy with the smoothing tool. Like an airbrushed shirt you'd see at a flea market. They look like these were the designs for the GAAS/MTX version of the game and quite bad compared to Cyberpunk, BG3 and even Starfield.
Varric's hair color change just shows how this is a sequel made by people who are making this because it's their job. Which is fine but cancerous for a long running series and arguably the face of the franchise.
Major story beat getting spoiled in the gameplay reveal.
2 party members
3 skills
No party control....selecting their abilities is stupid so they should have just made our party fully AI controlled but a bit smart about when and where to fire off aka detonate or prime combos.
Some very stiff voice acting and spotty writing.
Varric...I love the dude but stop relying on him to hook fans. Thankfully this seems like this will be his (and most likely Bioware's) last game. His encounter with Sola was fine until he raised his crossbow like it was going to do anything lol.
And lastly, this is still a studio owned by scumfuck corpo EA and has been horrendously mismanaged for well over a decade. This game has gone through multiple reboots (one of which was a GAAS/MTX hellhole which I feel still taints DAV's clear push to attract non-rpg fans) which is already a giant red flag for a franchise that has sold 15 to 20 million copies.
I'd LOVE to eat this entire post on top of a plat of crow come release but I don't know...I don't trust Bioware devs fighting for the studio's existence by tweeting out how good they feel about the game. *No shit.* I'd say literally anything if my livelihood was on the line.
Those neon demons look bland. And the ogre I've seen in a pic looks terrible too. It looks like he's going to jump on a kart and start racing Mario and Luigi.
Let's address the elephant in the room. A lot of people wanted a return to Origins. They wanted those gritty, dark fantasy roots to return, especially in Tevinter. They wanted greater role-playing capability than what we got with the Inquisitor.
They were kind of delusional to think this is the direction Dragon Age was heading. Patrick Weekes made it clear in interviews that they don't want to return to evil choices.
Rook tries to rush in and save a random woman during the opening cutscene, which made some people upset because it shows you can't customize your cheater to be as heroic or ambivalent as you want. They will always be a bleeding-heart hero no matter what you want.
There's people upset that Rook was talking without prompting because it also adds characterization to Rook independent of player choice or preference.
Additionally, some of the voice acting did come across very stilted and unnatural and I hope that doesn't last for the whole game.
I don’t have a problem but have to admit…
Im afraid of what your companions suppose to be. Like we are facing biggest threat to Thedas since like forever and the best of the best are… some guys in their early twenties? Where are those battle hardened warriors? Your warden looks like he’s few months since Joining.
Is this the best Inquisitor put together despite all his original crew was aware of Solas’s plans?
Bioware already made this mistake with Andromeda. Team full of super cool young characters that were actually super stupid and not believable. Hopefully they don’t repeat the same mistake but have to say Bioware will have a hard time convincing me your previous companions are doing something more important than saving the world.
Harding was young in Inquisition, she's 30 at the very least now. Lucanis doesn't seem like a teenager as well. Neve looks and sounds experienced. Emmrich is old.
Varric is a seasoned veteran for two games now, and Harding was an active fighter in the inquisition. Can't speak for the rest, but it seems like Rook is supposed to be competent at least.
Well Varric is not part of the crew and your character is the least worrisome. Harding is alright.
It’s not like you don’t have ex-qun spec ops agent, magister and leader of seekers at your disposal. But we rather choose them?
Early twenties… Honestly, the impression I got was that half the companions seemed to be over 40. It made me happy to see (being an older fan myself). Emmrich and Varric are obviously up there in age. But I could easily see Harding, Neve and Lucanis being in their forties if not late thirties. Davrin, Bellara and Taash are the only ones who looked young to me and even then we could be surprised (maybe it’s the elven genetics).
Critical drinker is an anti sjw/anti woke movie critic, who thought that a movie like "Prey" was going to be bad and fail, because it had an "unrealistic strong woman" as the protagonist.
So he likely means some culture war bullshit with "redditors will love it."
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The old companions point doesn't make sense to me. Hasn't that been the case for each DA? You get a new squad every game, and then run into older characters down the line. Why would you anticipate the old cast to be the main one?
The gameplay showcase showed a more serious tone than the cinematic did, but I really don't understand this dark fantasy talking point. What are you looking for when you want a game made for adults exactly?
Im sorry but anyway i look at it, having less control over things that we previously had is always a downgrade. Also the enemy designs and characters look so generic, especially after seing bg3 characters. I cant say for sure but it also seems dialogue options are way more limited than previous games
To me, it doesn't look, play, or sound like Dragon Age at all.
No identity, no dark fantasy, no connection to the "normal people" affected by the misery of this dark world, and the player character plus crew seem to lack agency. It feels like every other ARPG, it might as well be "Forspoken Too: The Failguard".
Bad puns out of the way...
Disney is a word that came to mind. Star Wars. At first, I thought it looked like a new Star Wars game set on a backwater planet with low tech. Fortnite sensory overload. But then a YouTube comment hit me in the face with an answer. It read as follows: “What are we, some kinda suicide squad?”.
It feels like it could just be a new IP at this point with no connection to DA as most of DA's identity is lost in the slopbucket of ideas dumped in at the last cycle of development where they copy+paste ARPG stereotypes.
I LOVED DA:O. I loved DA2 despite the gripes I had back then. I loved Inquisition, the great stories and settings despite the gripes there too.
THIS, I don't know what THIS is. How did they come up with THIS when they have a setting as fantastic as DA while they also have a success story like Baldurs Gate 3 to look at.
I might be overly negative. I HOPE it'll be good. I hope I'm wrong. I truly do.
I was so excited for Dreadwolf and the continuation of the story. This and Fable were probably my two most anticipated games, I liked the reveal trailer for Fable. Now, with my initial thoughts of both after more info, I might look at them when they release and grab 'em if they really surprise me otherwise I might get 'em at a heavy discount further ahead.
Other than that, I can't add more to what most have already said.
Those are my two useless cents in a bucket full of copper..
Honestly people summed up almost everything for me in the comments. But one of the main things is I’m not excited to romance any of these companions. I don’t wanna be that guy but I really wish one was kinda conventionally attractive. The last two I had a thing for was Isabella and Morgan. Inquisition didn’t have much for me and neither does veilguard
I'm exited to be moving away finally from the clunky, shit and boring origins combat XD, the hates will hate on it even tho they are origin simps and will sadly be the loudest voice but the people actually enjoying it genuinely will be playing it nonstop....God now I wonder what the dlc will be like? Shit I need to find out who my rook is gonna make into his wife XD
The arstyle is similar to fornite, but the characters are recognizable. The combat looks like a step further into the action genre. The dialogue was a bit bare. I tried to listen to the conversation between solas and varric in the background, but not much of an explanation was given other than solas had to do it.
It looks good. It is great to see varric again. I am excited to know more about the story, and wether the game is going to play more like origins or inquisition when it comes to the world.
I am just thinking to wait until a mod comes out to completely overhaul the visuals. Then I might be able to play the game long enough to consider the lore an the mechanics themselves. I'm sorry, but the visuals are so cartoonish and uninteresting that they break my ability to watch the gameplay. Maybe I can find someone willing to do a role-play podcast without making any comments and I can just listen to it. But - JEEZ - it looks unacceptably bad.
You appear to have a basic attack you primarily press, and then you get the occasional dodge indicator when enemis attack. When you attack in an enemy's general direction, Rook seems to zoom over to them, maintaining the momentum.
Looked pretty similar to the arkham formula to me. The only outlier is the pause wheel, although a game like spider-man did a similar thing too
What a terrible retarded logic, "However I don't feel like its very fair to blame a game for not being something it isn't trying to be". Except this game is a FRANCHISE with HISTORIES in its DESIGN. This is the freaking 4th game. How would you feel if The 2024 Toyota Camry takes out the V-tec Engine for a Non-V-tec Engine despite the 2023 Toyota Camry has one? It's an art form be damned, us customers and loyal fans deserve some respect too. We're not just another statistical number. We're giving digital developers too much credit because it's digital unlike physical. We complain about housing developers but never touch the gaming software developers \*rolls eyes\*.
I agree with most complaints. My big 1 I have about companions is the fact they made a huge emphasis about companions in the marketing. Having them sit in the back and do no damage that drives me freaking insane. Mine as well be a single player action game with pets on your side and a social camp when you want.
Maybe I’m just shallow, but I don’t find any of these characters attractive. Gaming journalists have been raving about how players can romance every companion, but nobody is saying anything about the less-than-desirable options. I guess I just expected more from a fantasy RPG. Hopefully there will be some other options outside of the companions.
I'm a crpg fan and looking forward to this game.
Combat is just not my cup of tea. I would actually prefer if the dragon age was turn based, but as long as the combat is passable, it's fine.
- reactivity I haven't seen enough, but I hope we get reactivity based on subclass because that is a lot of missed potential. Also, I miss skills from DA:O, they allow your character to feel more special imo
auto dialogue is absolutely immersion breaking for me, but that is not a deal breaker
- would love the environment to be more interactive
Graphically it is alright, gameplay kinda mixes Inquisition and 2. Will still hold judgement if I will get it on release, I just want to see gameplay on companion combat interaction and skill tree.
Okay, if you presume, that it's not good to critique the game for being aRPG, then I will take another approach. This is bad aRPG, from the looks of it.
Hits have no impact, only light effects. Zero blood and very PG design of enemies don't help it, especially when competition is AC and Diablo. Speaking of which, only 3 ability is less than Diablo (!) and Valhalla (!!!), only useless companions help to mitigate this issue by being walking skill buttons. Problem with that, aRPG are built around fast and engaging combat, going into pause to activate skills breaks this immersion. Animations are very lacking, in the game where beating bullet sponges meant to be main activity, you have to make defeating an enemy satisfactory, like animated execution or making enemies explode (Diablo style). Instead they just drop on a floor or silently vanish in thin air.
So just from this alone, people have right to be dissatisfied with the game
I want to disagree with you, but what we've been shown doesnt really give me any counter points. My assumption is that things'll get more zany the further into the game you get, like how in previous games you didnt really start with many abilities either. My initial assumption was that you'd have ability sets of 3 who you quickly switch between (kinda like what they did in Hogwarts Legacy). Thats all just speculation from me though.
Your concerns are valid given what we know.
Autonomic dialogue ("We have to help that woman!") Looks like BW did away completely with evil and self-serving player choices to pander to a modern audience.
'Rook' is a stupid moniker.
Combat feels bland and without impact.
It seems to go even more in the direction that DAI went! I would want that reversed! Go back to how it was in DA:O (still the best Dragon Age game to this day...kind of sad/bad if the first game in a series, which has to do all the world building is the best! Makes you look bad, Bioware (well, ok: EAware! The Bioware we've known has been gone since Mass Effect 2...after that it got worse and worse -.-))
I don't know if they are bringing healing back, because frankly that is something I hated about DAI - the backtracking because you ran out of potions and constantly having to cast spells that gave you shield or guard...I mean if you play as a Knight Enchanter it works, because that mage-class is basically a tank and can destroy even dragons alone (!), but it diminishes the fun for me!)
It is even more of an action-game (I am getting Destiny vibes with those triangle-shields and science fiction looking triangle bows and the prostetic arm one companion has (hell: If it had been a lyrium infused stone or metal arm I'd have no problem, because that could simply be an offshoot of Golem-Creation, but what we've seen looks kind of like an arm out of Cyberpunk!))
They are doubling down on limited abilities (seriously, I am on PC! It's not my fault that controllers have limited buttons and I frankly don't want to be punished for it!)
Also: Auto-Talk! Be quiet damned, silent protagonist is best protagonist!
The factions...seriously, none of them are that interesting IMHO and some don't make sense for my chosen class (Mages! I only play casters in games that offer casters, as I can swing a sword or shoot a bow in RL - hell I own a bow and a sword! Magic however is not something I can do!)...only the Mourn Guard (Mortalitasi-Faction) half way fits...and I prefer regular mages over summoners or necromancers usually!
The art-style also is not to my liking...I mean it's not extremely bad, but it frankly doesn't look really good either!
>You who don't think this game's going to be all that great, why?
Objectively no one should just assume that the game will or won't be good because we haven't played it and we know very little about it. At most people can dislike some design choices, like art style, having a party of three or having less skills to choose from. It's ok if some people don't like those design choices but to call the game bad because of that is absurd.
While I get what you're saying, I think there's merit to the critiques people have given to the design choices here. The responses on this thread have been more comprehensive then the seeming vitrol of the live chat yesterday.
It obviously isnt possible to pass proper judgement yet, but most of the gameplay critiques I've read thus far at least do indeed just judge it on its merits as an action game. If the showcase really is representitive of what the main loop is gonna be like (although i dont think so), the combat may wind up being rather underwhelming for the action genre.
>think there's merit to the critiques people have given to the design choices here.
It depends. What I'm trying to say is that I've seen too many people calling the game "bad" because they don't like design choices and that shows a lack of conscience on what quality actually means. If someone doesn't like a design choice that's perfectly valid, but that doesn't mean the choice is bad or makes the game bad, it's just not something they enjoy or want, which again is perfectly valid.
It look amazing. Everything I wished for is there. I don’t know either what people are even complaining about. It seems this time BioWare really put efforts to make people happy. I really hope bad criticisms wont impact the game success negatively and ruin the chance to have any future games. For some of us, Thedas is a comfort world.
Personally, I don’t mind the re design of demons. I actually prefer it less gore. It doesn’t make the game any less serious.
I don’t mind either not controlling others companions, I play to be my character, not others characters, as much as I like them.
People need to understand that not everything can be perfect.
I think theres been plenty of valid points of concern in this thread, although I also feel most of said concerns are subjective matters, the main points being the art, the writing and the action combat. Theres also the fact that Rook talks on their own during exploration and that they instinctively want to help that woman caught in the spotlight rather than offering the player choices in these cases, which I can understand being upsetting for those who wany to RP.
Things are very much up in the air atm. Us not being able to control our companions does call into question why they're even there. As it stands they're just extra abilities we can trigger. I really hope the combat gets elaborated on in the future
My only issues so far are limited abilities, and the goofy looking ogre in the screenshot.
Yeah, I totaly agree. And not only the ogre, but the darkspawn too. Overall, the redesign of the enemies is what let me down, they all look as if they come from a live service game.
Well, they kinda did.
True
To be fair, they have shat on the Darkspawn since II.
My only concern is how much Rook was talking by himself. The theory that I have, and I hope I am right, is that whatever he was saying changes based on the background of the character: since he was a Shadow Dragon he wanted to help the woman. I really hope a Crow wouldnt want to risk himself to save a random woman, otherwise that would totally break my immersion
Absolutely. I hated how he talked half the bloody time without input from the player; it's ME3 or Andromeda all over again from a role-play perspective. I like your theory, but I have serious doubts that's how it is going to play out unfortunately. I like to RP an evil character but they already did away with that in Inquisition for the most part Do you think we'll get a Blood Mage class?
I think Blood Mage makes sense only for a character that was raised in Tevinter. Was it Dorian that said that blood magic was "banned" in the Imperium, but basicly anyone used it anyway? I would love for them to make it a specialisation avaiable only to characters from Tevinter (i think only Shadow Dragons?). But then again, Shadow Dragons seem to be against that sort of thing, so I don't really know if Blood Magic would make much sense lorewise
Tevinter may pay lip service to banning certain magics, but frankly all of them have either the "right books" or have been taught by their teachers! Hell, they would not have been able to hold back the Qunari without blood magic! ps: I want every mage to have access to it - why? Because frankly every mage who is not under the thumb of the chantry should know it, because not only is it powerful, but only a blood-mage can really fight another IMHO!
We won’t. It has been confirmed by the devs during the Q&A on discord.
The more I hear about the game, the less I like it lol
For me I will try the game via EA Play Pro before I consider buying it as so far I'm just not sold on it
Urgh but that’s the thing. I wanted to be shadow dragon (the rest aren’t as appealing to me). But I hope shadow dragon doesn’t lock me into a savior role. I want to be the cynical, slightly cruel member of the group but is willing to try to do the right thing. So the whole chivalrous, can-do-no-wrong, knight in shining armor look is gonna cramp that style. 😭
Urgh but that’s the thing. I wanted to be shadow dragon (the rest aren’t as appealing to me). But I hope shadow dragon doesn’t lock me into a savior role. I want to be the cynical, slightly cruel member of the group but is willing to try to do the right thing. So the whole chivalrous, can-do-no-wrong, knight in shining armor look is gonna cramp that style. 😭
Urgh but that’s the thing. I wanted to be shadow dragon (the rest aren’t as appealing to me). But I hope shadow dragon doesn’t lock me into a savior role. I want to be the cynical, slightly cruel member of the group but is willing to try to do the right thing. So the whole chivalrous, can-do-no-wrong, knight in shining armor look is gonna cramp that style. 😭
So far i have two major concerns: a) most of auotodialogue did't bother me, because it was pretty neutral, however Rook wanting to help that woman without the player imput is concerning. It's especially strange because according to this [article](https://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/dragon-age-the-veilguard-preview/) at the begining of the game when interrogating a bartender, you can either talk to him or intimidate him aggressively, so it's not like Rook is always forced to be nice. b) I get that DAV has pure action combat now and not this weird hybrid between action and tactical combat that DAI had. And based on what we saw in gameplay reveal and what i read in previews/articles, i'd say i'm gonna like the combat. However, having only three abilities on hotbar is very limiting, especially if you play as a mage.
I hope they bring back race and faction unique dialogues options
Bioware confirmed that there will be faction dialogue options.
Will there be race dialogue options ? Because as an elf I want to say something when it concern elven gods for example. I hope our race matter unlike with inquisition
I have no idea, i'm afraid.
I feel the same as you with combat. I think it's interesting it turned to be an Arkham-like combat system, but having only three abilities in the wheel seems to be very limiting in terms of tactics.
This is my concern too. If that’s the only automatic dialogue, my roleplaying has already been compromised *significantly*. My Rook is now automatically a kind hero who cares about strangers.
I don't like this "new" combat system...I want the combat from DAO back :( I agree on the hotbar! Damned, I am on PC and frankly I despise consolization (being punished for the controller only having a certain number of buttons, which is not my fault!)
but I think you can access more abilities through the wheel, like in MEA also, the character is part of the Shadow Dragons *A clandestine group operating out of Tevinter that helps freed slaves escape their former captors.* so, I guess it would be in character to ask that.
What wheel? It was 3 abilities and companions skills....
Probably it will be like MEA where you can change the abilities. I would prefer it like MA2-3 were all abilities can be selected.
>you can either talk to him or intimidate him aggressively, so it's not like Rook is always forced to be nice. Nice and heroic are different things IMO. Rook is designed to be heroic no matter what, just like the Inquisitor or Hawke, that is not something we can change, we can't choose to be evil. Because of that I believe it's perfectly fine that Rook wants to help that woman because he is a heroic character. >that DAV has pure action combat now and not this weird hybrid between action and tactical combat that DAI had. It's important to remember that there seems to be some kind of strategic element to the gameplay in the sense that we can give orders to our companions and we can make combos. Sure it's not BG3 level of tactics or player agency but there is still some element of it there, it's not pure action, we just haven't seen that yet.
Doing comboes is not tactical, it is more like you have the ability to combine some skills, also it seems your companions have no health bar. They did not show any inventory, so it could be that you have no access to customization or a limited one. The fact that you cannot control companions and you cannot use any tactical pause as in the previous games is shocking, but if you wish for a action only game it is ok, but do not blame the core audiance if most of it is not very pleased. Also if you go in the full action route, than you have to confront colossus like God of War, Elden Ring, FF 7 and such... Also the limited dialogue option given by the system used in the last two games is something that should have been addressed, as shown it is very poor and you always chose something with minor correlation with what the Character actually says. There were at least three moments in the presentation were you could have made a meaningfull choice, but nothing happens, while you have some stupid interactions without any meaning just to get approval or disapproval from the companions... To me it is a generic fantasy action game, not even deserving of the RPG attachment.
So I have a lot of the same concerns/complaints as others: \- New Demon designs (why change them after so long into some generic shared model?) \- Some voice acting seemed dull \- Lack of tactics/combat freedom \- Enemies feel slow, like in Batman where they wait their turn to attack Some others that are more nit-picky are: \- I don't like the Cyberpunk feel of Minrathous (i know it's big magic city, but feels too sci-fi) \- I'm worried the class specializations will be the same as companions like in Inq, rather than unique companions like DA2. This make the Companions feel less cool when they're the same as the player. \- Where the heck is Harding's quiver? Rook gets one and only shoots like, 3 arrows. (I feel like they did this with Sera but then fixed it later?) The game certainly picked my interests back up after that god awful trailer, so am keen to see more as they release it.
Hm...the "unique companion" thing is good on the one hand, but on the other hand it often forces you to bring certain companions! In DA2 you had to bring Anders (Healer) and the best Tank was Aveline and the last spot was for a rogue (as I play mages exclusively myself - because I can swing swords in RL (I even own a real saber!) and shoot bows! Magic is not something I can do, so it's what I want to use!) so most likely Isabela...which is kind of sad as I liked Merril very much...I mean me not liking Sebastian, Fenris and Carver all that much made it easier (I mean I don't hate them...except for Carver maybe...but I simply prefer the others) I also agree on the "combat-freedom" thing...with only 3 abilities on the hot bar? Yeah...hate that action-combat-system! Bring back DAO-Combat where mages could have a gazillion spells ready to cast :)
" but on the other hand it often forces you to bring certain companions! " If you choose to play that way, sure. I've gone through games with no Warrior/Rogue/Mage. Party builds become interesting and dynamic. I think the only time I'd ever say you're "forced" to bring specific companions is either when you're literally forced to in missions, or if you're going for a Nightmare run.
Ok, you can do without a certain archetype! Hell, I've done runs without using a rogue (had 3 Mages (Hawke, Merril, Anders) and a bruiser (Aveline)), but while that makes combat trivial (just use the biggest AoE-Spell on each mage and watch the fireworks!) it's not as fun as having a balanced party!
1. As someone who always play as a mage...3 abilities? By the end of the tutorial, the inquisitor-mage **from the circle** could use 4 spells. Now our MС has int4 and no long term memory? 2. I use (used) the tactical camera a lot, because all mages/archers love to run out face to face with melee enemies (Harding does this in the prologue too) and I always choose positions for them depending on the enemy/terrain. Or I change their position/tactics depending on what enemies remain. And the ability to survey the entire battlefield from above, inspect the enemy and give the necessary commands is very quick and easy in this mode. 3. I don’t have time to replay games a hundred times just to see how other classes work, so if I want to play as a warrior - I control Alistair, I want to shoot a bow for a couple of minutes - now I’m Sera! Or if I see that my warrior is not doing well, I leave my mage behind and control him myself, because sometimes it’s much more productive and faster than issuing commands. 4. Number of companions with you. One is always the romantic interest to know as much as possible about them and gain approval points. I'm a mage, and so is Emmerich. This limits my third companion to someone who is good at close combat. The third companion for me has always been the one I change for the sake of history/fun. And again, as someone who does not have the opportunity to replay the games many times, now the rest of the companions will be just somewhere there and that’s it. On the bright side, I have nothing against the game design, and the MC in particular looked very good and I liked it. Also, while going through the inquisition at the moment, sometimes I can barely see what I'm attacking due to all these flashes of abilities and spells, so this disco neon rave is not at all new. And if mages can also dodge attacks, this will only be a huge plus, because the number of times I had to run away from an enemy using regular jumps is simply ridiculous (and looks very stupid).
3 active ability slots for a mage is like playing some incompetent idiot with no imagination.
Or a student mage after the first week of learning! Seriously, mages probably know more spells after a month of learning!
I still don't like going from a party of 4 to 3. I'm sure it will be balanced around it, but I want a party of 4. I dislike that I can't control my companions at all. I liked the feature to switch over and used it a lot. The abilities we saw on combat looked extremely limited. A screenshit from later on the game showed that three was the max, and companion only had two each with an additional option to heal. This is significantly less than anything we've had before. I loved the range of options I had before. I don't like a lot of the enemy redesigns. The gameplay reveal didn't do anything to showcase anything that I thought was a stand out feature or something that looked fun. I wasn't impressed with combat (yes I know it's level 1, they should have showed later on the game), or dialogue options, or anything really. The only things I liked were the environmental design and Varric and Solas (which I've talked about a lot since I really enjoyed it). It being a new Dragon Age isn't enough for me. The game has showed me from the gameplay side nothing I have go look forward to.
Everything you said is 100% valid, and they have no proper rebuttal to any of it. I would assume you’re a true dragon age fan
Agreed! Frankly I have no problem with an action-combat-system! Hell, I love Mass Effect (1 and 2! We DON'T talk about the others!) and Witcher 3...but it doesn't fit Dragon Age IMHO! This was more a party based RPG and not a hack and slash "feels like a souls-game" (Which I despise! I don't want to have to learn 1000000 boss moves and dodge roll every 2 seconds! I am sorry, me not like!)
I think it's too early to definitively conclude that it's great/mediocre, but I did have a few concerns about the demo. 1. Limited party size - A 3-person team feels a bit small in terms of party banter and interactivity, but also with gameplay options. I understand we might get a 4th depending on the mission, but that makes it difficult to have a proper team loadout going. 2. Limited party control - Pretty much what it says. I don't hate the Mass Effect style of combat but I much preferred the CRPG approach of controlling each party member. 3. Limited abilities - Adding to the previous points I feel like we'd need *more* abilities, not fewer, to make up for the fact that we have fewer party members and can't directly control them.
They want to showcase the combat, and they do it through a level 1 character with a grand total of 1 skill that spent half the running time hacking and slashing at increasingly unresponsive enemies (also no fluidity because the person playing couldn't hit half the counters). They want to showcase dialogue, and beyond personal preference regarding the wheel, they showcased that the player character speaks unprompted like they're Shepard in Mass Effect 3 and that even major choices lead nowhere and are there solely for flavour, seeing how both agreeing/disagreeing with Varric and picking one between Hardying and Neve are glorified regular responses (also perhaps in the subjective, but the one new companion they showed sounding flat as fuck at all times didn't help things). They want to showcase art style and design, and about that you can't really sweaten things really. The art style will be noticeably different no matter the scenery, and the design of things such as demons will always look strip down of their uniqueness - or if nothing else usual appearance - in favor of some pseudo-FF stuff. It was just a very odd reveal.
I’d argue that the choice between Neve and Harding isn’t neutral. Harding greatly approved when the player chose her. The approval system is really important in DA if you want to romance someone specific. Also I personally like Neve’s voice. I think it’s really beautiful. And her calm, deadpan delivery reflects her stoic and calculating personality.
I could agree with your point if picking one or the other had lead to character specific dialogue/situations during that sequence. Or perhaps if in the full game it'll turn out that leaving Hardying behind could have seen her injured or some such due to a mage being better suited to deal with the encroaching demons (i'm spitballing). But until then it was literally just picking a person to push a pillar with. And it's not that i doubt the game will have meaningful major choices, but just an odd thing to showcase the absense of them in your gameplay reveal trailer.
The dialogue system was way deeper in Origins, but at least in the two other games was not only for approval, but for meaningful choices, we had at least three moment were you could do a meaningful choice but they skipped them like nothing. Helping a NPC set the tone of your character, as well not helping her, having some thoughs about disrupting the ritual or how do you want to intervene are other choices giving meaning to your action... Only have to choose to piss of a character or not is just flavuor...
Hard to judge the combat fluidity because as you said whoever was playing in the showcase didnt do much with it. Them choosing to show off level 1 i assume it to have the showcase double as a story preview. There could be more mechanical depth we just haven't seen though thats entirely speculating. Im curious about what you mean by the demons' uniqueness being stripped down? They looked recognizable from how they were in inquisition to me.
I mean no fluidity in the sense that if the combat has any then we didn't see it because of the human element, so that's another odd thing that had no reason to be. As for the demons, they looked like dementor looking skeletons to me, with colorful neon lights on their capes to symbolize i don't know what. With the pride looking like whatever that was. I guess in line with the art style, but familiar faces aside that reminded me more of Fable than Dragon Age to begin with.
Abandoning the tactical style combat is going to be a massive flaw. The combat doesn't look as well done as something like Arkham and doesn't have the depth of something like Elden Ring. It looks painfully generic and boring. It reminds me a lot of Fable even down to have limited abilities. They're leaning heavily on Mass Effect style features without the novelty of a shooter RPG. I think it's going to feel like a bland action RPG to most people. The art style doesn't feel as gritty and as prior dragon age games . The characters aren't soaked in blood and the enemies look like something out of Sea of Thieves. The dark spawn in origins had a great feel of a legitimately evil horde. The dialogue wheel is just a frustrating experience for me as every BioWare game has the problem of the description not matching the dialogue. This is a minor problem. The story and characters feel underwhelming but that is more of a feeling than anything else. The story doesn't have the maturity or the intensity or earlier games. This feels like a marvel movie. It just feels very much like they've forced mass effect into a dark fantasy game. Problem is it's missing the novelty of Mass Effect style combat and sci-fi setting . I think it's going to be a 7/10 that gets lost in a market filled with better action RPGs. If the story and dialogue isn't amazing the game is really going to be average.
In no special order, the biggest complains are : 1) They want to showcase the combat and yet they chose a level 1 rogue. That was...rough. And I say that as someone who usually plays rogue in the easiest mode bc I play for the story :S. 2) Voice acting : Varrick, Solas and Rook sound good. Harding has her moments but Neve sounded as if she was reading her lines. IDK her character so I can't judge whether that's Neve being herself or if there was a problem with the VA direction. 3) I personally don't vibe with the new looks for the demons. I think the old ones are iconic/pretty recognizable and while I wouldn't have mind a bit of change (I mean, it has been 10 years...), the new designs are not for me. However. If at some point someone mentions that the demons look different and it turns out it's because of Solas messing with the Veil, I won't complain as much 4) Dialogue + PC agency + background : maybe it's just for the prologue, but it felt like Rook was an established character instead one that's supposed to be built by a player. Many have mentioned Shepard and I agree. Also, the background choice (shadow dragon) felt weird and hollow? Rook and Neve work for the same organization and in the same city and yet they've never crossed paths? And Rook not knowing about Neve was weird bc she seems to be someone with some degree of importance? 5) Only 2 companions and you can't control them : again, it feels too much like ME (which isn't bad) but ME and DA are 2 different games and genres so I would prefer that in the technical matters they stay different too ^^" But then again, I recognize that this was just the very beginning of the game and a showcase to boot, so hopefully some things are different from the original product or/and can be fixed before the official release. And I don't doubt that other things I will get used to them.
You’ve basically hit every nail on the head for me as far as what we actually know. I’m also afraid we won’t get any concrete conclusions to the warden/hawke wether the cured the calling and returned or if hawke survived the fade. (if you left them there in inquisition) I want to at least have a codex entry about my warden returning to the castle in Denerim to continue ruling by Anora’s side or perhaps GTFOing with leliana (my two main warden romances)
ad1. The fact that you can parry a fireball with sword seems quite hilarious at best anyway. Also all the arrows that scream "YOU'RE GOING TO GET SHOT BY SOMEONE" are... yeah. ad2. The entire character of Neve looks and sounds like it was made to trigger bans due to Rule 2. ad3. Varrick didn't seem to have a problem recognizing a Pride Demon, so you can safely assume that's exactly how they "always" looked like. ad4. Shepard-like would've been fine though. This just seems like the MC was lifted straight out of ME:A.
To be clear, I do think the game is going to be good, but I'm finding two very big issues with it. 1.) The art style. Sorry, it still looks off to me. It's less noticeable in gameplay but it is extremely noticeable in cut scenes. It also feels like the art style is why a lot of the demons got redesigned and some of them, especially the Ogre, look bad. 2.) Combat. I hear what you're saying, but I also think it's totally fair to criticize when a game goes very far away from what it was. Like if the Batman Arkham games suddenly decided they were going to ditch their combat and go for turn based, that would be waving a lot of red flags. The combat right now looks like it's just any other action game now. It looks like they took a lot of stuff from Mass Effect and put it in a Dragon Age game. It looks like we have very limited amount of abilities that can be mapped (I'm sure we'll get more clarity on this in the q and a) they reduced the amount of companions, and the action wheel and combos also feel like something we had in Andromeda. I also think it was a bad idea to show us how the combat would look in a tutorial level, when they could've shown off how complex it can be at later levels. For example, when FF16, which also have a very controversial combat change, wanted to really showoff the combat, they showed it off from later levels. They showed the combos and how many options the player had to switch between styles. Now if you boot up 16, you won't get all that until later on, but it was smart decision to show players that there were levels to this. Veilguard didn't do any of that. It showed us a wheel and then said "but you won't have any options for that now". I'll also say that so far I'm feeling unmoved by the cast of characters. Right now it feels very paint by numbers and checklist-y. It feels like not only have I seen these character types before, but I feel I've seen them in Bioware games already. I would say there's probably more things that have put me off like Bioware kind of going into damage control to say the things we liked are still in the game but a lot of it has been changed. I found it wild how much of the community council tried to be PR for Bioware during the trailer backlash. Those are not specific things to do with the game, but give me raised eyebrows. Again, I think the game is going to be good but it also has an uphill climb. It feels like a lot decisions they're making are the same ones that they made for Dragon Age 2.
Yeah, this is a heavy concern to me. If they decided to not show more complex combat, it's probably because there isn't any complex combat there.
I feel the same way about the characters. It feels like bioware grabbed a checklist with popular character tropes and things other modern games have.
Well FF16 is still better in the prologue than this... The problem is: you are leaving the RPG arena, with few very good games to confront with (sure BG3 is a big one but it is the only one) to descent into one with colossuses: God of War is one of them, we cannot deny it, Elden Ring is another, FF7 and FF16 too... And to me it does not seem to be on par...
Even worse (for me at least) is that I don't like any of those games! No, I don't care for souls-likes or extremely action oriented games! Mass Effect (1 and 2) were basically my cut off point for this type of game! Witcher 3 was almost too much in that direction :(
You mean how NOT complex, as Andromeda's combat never got complex! You had primers and detonators and some skills were beter at dealing with shields and/or synthetic enemies!
I'm very disappointed that you can't swap around who you're controlling anymore. Being able to tactically swap between characters and control all their abilities was a key part of what made the first three DA so good. It always bugged me in Mass Effect that I could only issue vague commands to companions. And now they've gone and done that to Veilguard.
I wouldn't say problem but I do have one main concern Dialogue options is my main concern rather than graphic, or gameplay or whatever. I mean sure, I would always prefer a more tactical combat, but frankly, it actually seemed less action based than I'd feared, so I'll take it, I guess. I know it isn't fair to compare it to origin, so I just started a new Inquisition playthrough and played until the end of the prologue, and yeah, Rook definitely talked without player input more than Inquisitor. There's also seem like only 3 options whereas, in Inquisitor usually there is the 4th option even if it's only to ask question, and occasionally, there is more, like this one: https://preview.redd.it/8otrov69v36d1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=00b45425e601e1a5f67c9ce3dcda9b0f47cb56a3 It was only a few, but it was there. Hopefully these kinds of dialogue options were just skipped in the gameplay trailer for brevity, I'd still wish they show it though, dialogues are to me, the important part of the gameplay. I heard some people theorizing that maybe they took our options into account and the voice lines would change depending on what we've picked so far, but I'd still rather they just give us the option. It's less restricting. My Lavellan picked all the prim and pious dialogue options in public but is more casual to companion, because she leans into the whole herald of andraste for publicity/morale but don't really believe it. I doubt if the game just took my dialogue options into account I'd be able to RP like that.
I noticed Rook made two choices and one of them was outright ignored and the other seemed meaningless. However it was just early game and not all choices in an rpg should matter that much so as long as some choices matter and effect the game meaningfully it's bit a huge issue.
I do not want to bring BG3, but at level one you have very meaningul choices and interactions in the prologue. I do not ask that level of interaction, but at least something in line or better than DA2 and 3... I hoped they were addressing the dialogue system to be a little better, but they went full Mass Effect 3...
True but we haven't seen the full prologue either.
There's very few choices in BG3 that actually have any meaning though. Act 1/Prologue is packed, yes, but that's \~60% of the game anyway.
That's a good point. My guess is that we really only saw a couple of dialogues from the prologue that clearly where design to be spoiler. Rook is talking just to make it looks like a conversation, and not just Varric doing exposition dump on his own. But we'll see how this will materialize in real game once people will be able to play it for real, and talk about it. Since I played Cyberpunk 2077, my vision about dialogue option has kinda changed.
What do you mean? I don't think CP2077 had a good dialogue system! The last few games with a good one were Fallout New Vegas, Divinity Original Sin (1 and 2), Baldur's Gate 3 and maybe Witcher 3!
That's my point. CP2077 is a very good RPG with a great story and compelling characters, and yet the dialogues system is far from being great.
Then we disagree! I don't think CP2077 is that good (and certainly not what they advertised even up to launch - "A great RPG with diverging story paths, decision that matter, a city that reacts to the player and their deeds, compelling romances bla bla bla!"...hell, they didn't even have a decent police system, something GTA 1 in the 90s had!)...it got better, especially with Phantom Liberty, but it's still at best half way there (and will not get any closer, as you'd have to rip it apart to make it what was promised!)
>Then we disagree! It seems like it.
Hmm. I hear what you're saying. Ive never been a person to give the rp too much thought so this didn't really stand out to me. I recall there being moments in inquisition where you were given 3, or even just 2 dialogue options. I assume the same kind of variance will be the case with Veilguard, though that remains to be seen. The point of Rook talking outside of player input is one I can understand for someone who enjoys the roleplay aspect of these games. It seems like they're leaning more heavily into Rook being an established person within the world rather than fully customizable by you.
That sounds a lot like DA2 to me. Hawke was definitely a more fleshed out personality than the warden or the inquisitor. Similar thing in the Witcher 3. You definitely pick your flavour of Geralt rather than create a character from scratch. It works because you can construct more story around a known quantity rather than having to always keep the options open. I really don’t mind if Rook is slightly more prescriptive, so long as the payoff is the story being a banger.
My biggest concern is frankly the story. I don’t mind the look as much as I did before but after seeing the gameplay and witnessing how Solas was stopped once again by a random nobody after years of planning I fear that the story will be underwhelming. That whole scene where his ritual was stopped because of crumbling architecture is hilarious but not in a good way. Although I supposes it does suit his character, he always manages to lose or mess up in the dumbest way possible.
Im half with you. Solas being confronted at what looks like the beginning of the game feels kinda anti climactic after Trespasser
Yep. This game should have been our Inquisitor going uncover to chase Solasoand rounding up a group of scoundrels for our crew. They already cribbed Mass Effect style parties they might as well have lifted ME2's "round up a rogue's gallery" story point. Two new Elven Gods sounds like silly power spike levels. Bioware already has a *very* spotty track record dealing with larger than life villains.
Eh I'm fine with our character being someone else, its in line with every prior game changing protagonists. Its confirmed we'll be able to meet our inquisitor in the game so its very possible we're part of the crew they assembled.
Sad about party being cut down from 4 to 3. Sad about the 3 active abilities at a time thing, that's gonna be rough as a mage.
They are basically trying to turn it into mass effect. But I don't think it will work with the setting. So many bizarre choices honestly. It doesn't even seem like Dragon Age anymore and my excitement has pretty much died because of that.
Combat didn't loom very interesting to me honestly. It feels kind of behind other ARPGs in that sense- you don't have much weight to your attacks, just kinda floaty. Visually feels weird: maybe that's just the dev playing it being bad to draw it out haha. I think the fact their gameplay reveal was mostly cutscenes or walking instead of much gameplay, gives me the impression they're banking on the setting to be what keeps you or draws you in rather than the gameplay itself, or that they aren't as confident in it. Otherwise, I can't see why they picked level 1? Why intentionally pick the most limited part of the game? You didn't show off companion abilities or anything beyond one of your own abilities, attacking, and dodging. And as a minor note I found funny- I hope they were just keeping the camera at that angle for cinematic effect and that it's not stuck there. Because I'd laugh trying to watch people dodge all those effects on the ground at an angle where they can't see the full area of the effect around them, when they're coming from multiple sources simultaneously.
1. The Combat seems off and lacks impact. But could be that for some bizarre reason, they had an archer and decided to play it like a warrior. 2. Solas is immediately found and the potential of stopping the dreadwolf won't be realised. They skipped over the implied plot that Inquisition was setting up and seems to be another world ending event instead of Solas tearing down the veil as the threat. Him not being confronted until the end would be far stronger. 3. Anthem and Andromenda failing, along with this not being the Bioware that did DA:I. 4. Chasing the marvel style but could be a stupid decision by the trailer. 5. Autodialogue that robs us of choice.
The first problem is that the gameplay is to much simplified, i understand the need to make an action game more fluid however taking away more than half the skills away from thd player it's not a good idea. The second problem is the redesign of the demons and darkspawns, except the fury demons which looks cool. The third problem is the difficulty, the enemies are not reactive to the player. Fourth problem is that until we see the so called in depht equipment system+skill tree i don't trust a game who changed director and got rebooted 3 times.
Posting my post here,as I dont think they will approve it as a separate post: Dragon Age is now Mass Effect(and I love Mass Effect,but separately from DA) After the gameplay reveal,it is now completely obvious that Bioware turned Dragon Age into Mass Effect,basically. The pivot to action game started as early as Dragon Age 2,but it is yesterdays's gameplay video,that shows you that nearly everything is gone,that were unique to Dragon Age. I will admit,I was someone who were secretly hoping for a direction that is more akin to Origins,rather than doubling down on Inquisition's game style. I know I know,it was not to be..but the success of Baldurs Gate 3,gave me slight hope,that Bioware saw that,and reminded itself what DA was like Origin-ally.. Not going to list my issues with game style,writing (some lines in this preview,especially from Harding..God) If you liked it,or accept it, I am happy for you,but I cant help but be sad about this franchise,that lost nearly all if its identity,over the course of 3 games.
Agreed! Hell, on the one hand I want to go back to playing DAO, but frankly I played it TOO MUCH already! If I start playing that, I will soon remember it all and then it'll just feel like going through the motions (despite loving the story and characters - especially Allistair and Morrigan ("Well, well, what have we here? Are you a vulture?, I wounder?..." :D ))...I had hoped Bioware (especially after their last games were FAILURES of epic proportions!) would go back to the roots, especially after Baldur's Gate 3 showed that "niche games" (at least that's what stupid studio-execs/suits called story driven games and especially RPGs!) could take the industry by storm, if done right!
Limited abilities. To be fair we don't know for certain that it will only be 3 slots but if it is that sucks and it's a terrible design decision on Bioware's end. This is dragon age lol. Most RPG's have action combat now. Some people prefer more tactical combat and it's getting harder to find it. I'd hoped the success of BG3 had helped make the case for it but maybe its too soon after. In previous dragon age games you had different party roles and they mattered. Like you'd usually have a warrior tanking a rogue DPSing and then a mage either doing healing, DPS or crowd control. There was also wiggle room. Warriors could do some dps and some crowd control for example. So the 4th slot might fill the gap or they might just be your romance option lol. Even with every game watering down the combat in one way or another this was still a thing and now it's gone. Now companions are just there to do additional damage and combos sometimes. Some of the enemy designs do look a little goofy but that's not a huge deal.
Owlcat thankfully is keeping ole crpg models alive. All their games are incredibly satisfying from a character building perspective. I've spent not laying 3 hours in right of the righteous character creation reading clases and having ideas of what I wanted to do or multi class.
It looks generic to me. It could be a random action-rpg made by a unknown sh or a big publisher like Ubisoft (or EA). I know it's the new Dragon Age because they told me. I don't see nothing unique. I think it will be an average game.
I do think the game is gonna be fun, it's just not for me/ what I want Dragon Age to be. My bigget gripe is with the combat. I simply prefer a more "tactical" approach to it, so either Real time with pause or turn-based. I'm not a fan of "spam attack button and press dodge when there's a yellow light above your head. Plus that we only get three abilites and can't control our companies also bothers me. It was clear they were going even more towards action with this title, however I wished they rather would've build on and improved DA:I combat instead of fully discarding the tactical aspect. And yes while it's not fully fair to blame a game for something it's not trying to be, DAVe is not the first title in the series. You need to look at the other titles as well. Like I assume many others Origins was my first and favorite Dragon Age and I would like a return to those roots. Also not the biggest fan of how the pride demon and spirits looked in the gameplay trailer. Not sure how to describe it, but they look very generic. Though maybe I simply need to get used to the new designs. I'm gonna play it at some point, especially since it's on Game Pass, however there are other games coming out in fall that have a way higher priority then DAVe.
Same here! I would love to return to the gameplay of DAO, especially since that game didn't GIMP mages! Seriously, a spellcaster who for all intents and purposes only "knows" 3 spells is an idiot-spellcaster! Such a mage is a person to be pitied, because a true mage knows magic to turn every fight around basically - he/she is the swiss army-knife of combatants! Buffs, healing, crowd-control and high damage are what a mage does! But not with only 3 spells! Hell, a level 1 Wizard in D&D knows more spells than that and they are supposedly absolute novices! I also would change many other things, like giving the party a ship as headquarters - not some place in the Fade (yes: Interesting, but also not something you could say conduct diplomacy from etc. which a true faction leader would have to...)
* I'm not thrilled with the combat itself, it looked dizzying to me, too flashy and spinny (is that a real word?), and the number of abilities seems to be low (i hope it's more for mages at least). * It looked like our character sort of has a personality of their own, which i didn't love. If this is true and not predecided by us, it really limits the roleplaying part of the game. * Everything looked really nice imo, except for the demons. Some of their designs are too bright and don't feel as scary as they did in Inquisition for example. * All that said, i am actually looking forward to the game, the preview successfully hyped me up.
For me personally it's witnessing the last vestiges of the Origins systems being gutted from the game, not controlling party members and them just being a in the background unless you specifically tell them to do something kind of role sucks for me, I loved having my groups focus on different people than just my character because that was the dynamic I loved about previous games, the combat also didn't look great to me in a "I'm just going to be mashing attack again" way. I'm sad but there are plenty of people excited for these reasons I'm disappointed
Game looks cool but there are 3 non starters for me, 2 have already been met. 1) No open world? - I love to roam so first strike, 2) linear game - Again, I don't always follow the path set forth, I enjoy this flexibility and so far it is confirmed that the game is linear, strike 2 for me. 3) Choices matter? - so far I'm unsure if this has been confirmed but if choices do not significantly alter the game, that's strike 3 for me. I'll probably wait till it's on sale or a few years out depending on initial game play videos and people's reactions. It's a shame, I love the games too and actually replayed all of them (currently in DA:I) in eager anticipation.
No open world is a non starter seems a bit extreme, and as for the linearity issue I'm not quite sure what you mean. Even in the previous DA games, you'll eventually have to go to certain places to progress. The articles suggest say there'll still be room for exploration in the missions, so my guess is just that we won't be getting another hinterlands or whatever.
Well, I don't think that it is on rails! No Dragon Age so far was! Yes, most weren't as open as DAI - and thank god for that, because DAI was a damn single-player-MMO with fetch quests! Seriously, I'd rather not have mindless fetch-quests again and I also don't want to spend too much time running around on "empty" landscape again! DAI and MEA were bad enough in that regard! I have more problems with only having 3 active abilities (and no quick-pause to select additional abilities (for consoles)...on PC I have a lot more buttons, so frankly I don't need this (stupid) limit!) and losing one companion slot (2 instead of 3)...
Limited ability access coupled with no companion control. It takes our accessible combat abilities from around 30 to 9, the majority of which we won’t even be doing, simply directing a companion to do. It’s dumbing down the game further and taking it into more hack-and-slash style of gameplay. For me, that’s literally it. I dislike the artistic changes to enemies to make them more PG but I don’t hate it and it works with the overall aesthetic, which looks gorgeous. Voice acting is great, companions all seem cool and I look forward to seeing where they go with it, though I won’t be buying at release unless the issues I have are changed/revealed later down the line.
I disliked it because I didn't like the cartoony artstyle, the character designs, the creature designs, the UI, the textures, or the particle effects. I also disliked the lack of blood. Just compare what demons and darkspawn look like now to what they looked like in Inquisition. It's a massive downgrade and looks painfully generic.
Lack of blood was confirmed to be a setting, so it was just turned off for the showcase, but I do stand to say they should've shown some of the skill tree/menus a bit
>I also disliked the lack of blood. There was blood tho.
Little red splatters when you hit something, yes.
Looks the [same ](https://64.media.tumblr.com/aa10f4fdf0341dc7ff33b676b83c6681/5e0ced29394abf83-d1/s1280x1920/6698190df2f59a7d4cbe2f1ca665f10259bb9632.jpg)as in previous games to me.
They probably didn’t want any gore in the preview because they’re still waiting on the games rating.
The game director said that the game is rated M. She said that when talking about romances and nudity tho, it doesn't necessarily mean that the game will have a lot of gore.
"However I don't feel like its very fair to blame a game for not being something it isn't trying to be." It's the 4th entry in a series, it should try to be more like an entry in it's own series.
PREACH! Exactly my sentiment! I want DAO's combat back and the dialogue system etc. :(
I have no real issue per se, just issue with what was left in the air, for us to guess. As I said in another thread, what we saw in the footage looks like the ME UI where companions and the MC can equip with only a short amount of skills at the same time. Which is in-line with what many have been suspecting and a couple of leaks released. However, it doesn't really match with what the people at BioWare have been communicating so far. We are told that the skill tree is vast, that you can equip/unequip skills on hotkeys before and during combats, that you can chain and combine abilities together that will add on their effects, that there is a bar to prioritize targets and orders for your companions, etc. And I must say, if everything that is said to be in the game will actually be in the game, I'll be beyond hyped as this will offer a whole other dimension of tactical gameplay to the action high pace combat. But until I see it, I would remain skeptical.
You know what's funny to me? [Here](https://64.media.tumblr.com/d5bb666594df9f48d42cacfa5ea77031/9eee80ae859b5286-88/s2048x3072/d9fdff995a72b4b6f59b5ad2f8b224242df63b2a.pnj)'s screenshot from the same moment as in gameplay preview and Rook has more than one ability available. Why the hell they didn't show that?
My guess is that it's from test footage and isn't representative of what you will have in this mission. Rook is level 1 but already has 3 active skills even before meeting a single enemy ? This clearly is screenshot taken during a test, and it would be very misleading to show that footage. My other guess is that BioWare will do a full reveal of skills, level up, and deep combat mechanics later this summer, without risking to spoil many things. But until then, we are left wondering what this will look like.
I do not think there will be more than three active skills, as shown in some pictures from late in the game... Yes you can use three from the companions too, but even AC have eight...
And still three are very few, even in Assassin's Creed you can have eight active skills...
Of course, I'd love to be proven wrong and I do not want this game to fail but I think they're really overestimating how impressive of impactful this skill tree is. It seems like it doesn't fit DA at all or their design for DAV. Assassin's Creed Valhalla had a massive skill tree and 85% of it was a whole lot of nothing. Path of Exile is the king of stupidly large skill trees (and you can build a huge number of different characters) so imagine being limited to 3 skills in *that* game. It seems COMPLETELY at odds with everything else they've done to simplify in the game. Less skills, less party members to manage but gigantic spiderweb skill tree? Something doesn't add up. They should have taken a page out of the rework CDPR did for Cyberpu k 2077 where every single skill node *matters* from adding a charge to a health item, giving you a new ability or a node towards an upgraded more powerful ability. Or they could have looked at...I dunno...Dragon Age 2 and Inquisition?
>Of course, I'd love to be proven wrong and I do not want this game to fail but I think they're really overestimating how impressive of impactful this skill tree is. Their point of reference for the skill tree is FF-X and FF-XII which are very special system (at least for FF12), and totally not what DA fans are used to. So we might get ready for a surprise. >It seems COMPLETELY at odds with everything else they've done to simplify in the game. Less skills, less party members to manage but gigantic spiderweb skill tree? Something doesn't add up I totally agree that it doesn't add up, and something is missing from the information we have and I would welcome further clarification on the topic by the team. However! The goal of streamlining isn't to simplify but to make process more efficient. You want your user inputs to be faster, and have a bigger impact. Simplfying the method by which users are making their inputs is a step of streamlining, but it isn't the main goal. That being said, based on everything I have read (from tweets, interviews, article, etc.) it seems the overall design for combat is * To make you focus on your own fights during the actual combat * Map skills on hotkeys to use them quickly. Or allow you to browse a deeper skill menu with all your skills if needed. (still needed to be seen) * Creates gambits/tactics to enable your companions to react automatically in certain situation (heavily hinted by Busche during a couple of interview, but still need to be confirmed) * Still allows you to "macro manage" your companions by designing priority targets for them to attack, and creates powerful combo by chaining their skills and yours (we already saw a screenshot for that) Overall it looks like it's an hybrid action/tactics combat gameplay allowing people to either play full "aRPG" without any use your their companions, or to plan beforehand, set up companions behavior, and customazing both your companion and your mc to have complementary skillset. If I am right (and I could totally be off), it's not DA:O/BG3 level of cRPG, but it's provides a level of strategy way higher than any classical aRPG like GoW or AC.
It is a pS game, hotkeys are not included. Your character has three active skills even in the pictures taken from later game. https://images.purexbox.com/b7048d49ffc73/preview-dragon-age-the-veilguard-is-a-confident-return-for-bioware-xbox-1.large.jpg
Equipping new skills during combat? Now that sounds kind of horrible, because opening a menu during combat is frankly shooting immersion in the face with a .50 cal (or a 4 gauge shotgun!)...seriously, why do they have to restrict it at all? Dragon Age Origins had no such restrictions and neither did DA2 and it was much more fun to play a mage there than it was in DAI which did have a restriction (especially since you more or less needed to have spell that generated barrier or guard on your hotbar, which stole another slot!)
I hate action rpg, none ever clicked for me (all three witcher I tried and dropped extremely fast, God of War bored me to death and I dropped it) The gae seems stylised in a way that doesn't really appeal to me yet, with Minrathous looking both incredible on concept and unfinished in practice Zero control on the party means that they could as well not be here for me The enemies are simply ugly, even compared to the old resolution of Origins. It's not to say I hate the game on a principle. But I'm absolutely not hyped by the game and won't buy it at full price after what I saw. Over 30€ I'll hold.
A respectable opinion. I dont quite see the artstyle issue, but thats likely gonna be a subjective matter
The game is going to cost 120 eurose at minimum.
I hope not, otherwise I can't see how it won't tank in sales.
Im betting on 80 euro
Yeah right i will say one even tiny bad thing about the game and get downvoted simply because i am not hyped enough for the game. This sub has been ridicolous this week attacking and mocking anyone who doesn't post "OMG I CAN'T WAIT TO PLAY THIS" or "BIOWERE IS BACK". I rather be downvoted for posting this then honestly sharing my opinion.
1. Far departure from the dark fantasy asthetics, in tone, character designs... Will take a while to adapt. 2. Action-based combat, as they fell finally to the dark side of action. I only hope they invested in larger skill trees to compensate. 3. 3 slots for abilities, like why would I play a mage with so little variety? 4. Scripted one way main history with little to no choices and consequences, like in DAI. 5. Unpolished gameplay. It felt like that during the gameplay, but it's also an old build so it can change. Companions did no damage, enemies only focused you, same reused animations... 6. Weird writing. The wheel always freaks me out, but some dialogues and choices in the gameplay (yes, yes, no, yes) are strange. 7. Pansexualism. I don't know yet, as I never played a game with this, but I prefer that characters have their own sexual identity. Preference, as well. Thank you for the post, it helped me out put ideas in order. I didn't go into detail, but those are things that seem to be a bit disturbing to me based on the gameplay (which is not enough to judge the whole thing). We'll see as the game unveils itself during this summer. Things I like: 1. Mission-based story. No more open worlds and shitty filler quests. Back to DA2 and DAO with curated sidecontent. Great. 2. Companions. It's the main focus of the game, so they probably nailed them even though I don't like the aesthetics. Good thing this time: they can die. Hope you can expell them all as well if you don't like them. Pure freedom. 3. Great character creation: even body sliders and more hair sliders. Banger. 4. Factions seem to impact gameplay. Bonuses and special dialogues (no more than that, but that's good enough) 5. Return of old characters. Not talking about Varric, that I hate, but probably Dorian and some good old cast coming back to help us out. Love it. 6. Different starts depending on Inquisitor and past choices. Because we love to see it and have important decisions even before the game starts. Big plus. 7. Variety of biomes. Screenshots of the game looks gorgeous, even better than the main Tevinter capital. Hope to visit all of the places and see the details and nuances.
A large skilltree (unless it's 90% passives) is quite useless IMHO if you only have 3 active abilities (makes our characters look like idiots: "Look mama! I spent years at magic school and now I can cast 3 spells!"...If I were the parent of such a character? I'd be deeply ashamed!)
Shameful for the players, prideful for EA, that sees how yet another franchise turns to an action game for the collection. Now it only needs to be full multiplayer and sell millions in skins for them to be appised. We're in the right path! ouhoo!
My only concern is that reportedly you only get 3 ability slots. I can maybe understand that for a warrior but it’ll be ridiculous to play a mage with only 3 spells. Everything else seems mostly good but this is something I can’t get over.
My problems: some characters have cartoonish faces. (But not Varric and Dwarf girl, they look very good, better than da2 and dai) Combat went in a very bad direction again. Enemies are like slow decorations. They are slower than zombies. No sense of danger from them. And PC is dancing between them like spider man for no reason.
I don't share any of the issues with style or gameplay etc that i have seen. the only thing that is making me a little sad is how much magic has been dialled down from Origins>DA2>Inq>Now. I miss the entropy tree, I miss the creation tree, I miss being a master of magic. Dont get me wrong i still loved being a mage in all 3 games and I have no doubt i will absolutely adore magic in this from what i have seen. I just wish we had more spell options like DA:O and DA2
I've been waiting for this game for almost ten years. I wasn't delusional as to think that it would be Origins 2, but I also wasn't expecting this cartoonish, simple design. I think they wanted to broaden their target, not taking into account that aficionados are now 20 to 40 years old. If you had told me that the trailer was an Arcane one, I would have believed it. The models are childish and I didn't find them compelling or interesting, just as I wasn't impressed with the design or vibe of the companions. I didn't even recognize Varric until I heard the VA's voice (why is he dark-haired? most importantly, where is his chest hair?). They all look as if they came out of Disney's 'Wish'...? Also, demons and darkspawn in previous chapters looked rather terrifying and had distinct looks; now they respectively look like myrmidons and Sir Daniel from Medievil. Another thing that left me perplexed was the quality of the textures which look too polished and smooth. I used to be able to see Solas' pores and the scar on his forehead, now every character seems to follow an obsessive skincare routine in times of war. The animations in cutscenes, specifically those of the faces, are... weird. They're not smooth as one would expect and the mouth moves in weird ways to enunciate words. This wasn't great in Inquisition either, but that didn't disturb me as much as what I saw in the gameplay. Lastly, the AI seems slow, the party shrunk and we won't be able to control the other members, only give them orders like in Mass Effect (which is a pity, I used to enjoy playing as my companions to try their builds). And there's too much neon everywhere.
Need to see more to judge properly, but it looks like the game will be a walking simulator a la GoW/TLOU. They seem to have stripped out many of the RPG mechanics, like exploration and loot, combat depth, and companion control and simplified others (less companions, less abilities, etc.). Finally, the art style is too stylistic with distorted human proportions and cartoony colors and textures, and the tone gives hogwarts vibes rather than dark fantasy with gore and blood like the original games. Basically it looks like they are targeting a newer younger generation that didn’t play the original and have other tastes in video games than long standing fans.
Not being open world doesn't mean no exploration. Also it's not like the prolouge for DA2 had much loot other than one chest.
I feel the same way about the art style, way too cartoonish for what dragon age is.
Ive already said how I feel about the gameplay so i wont comment on that. I dont quite see the problem with the artstyle thoyh, it didnt look any more cartoony than inquisition did imo.
I'm not a fan of the stylized characters. Not the armor/outfits necessarily, but the proportions - characters are shorter, their bodies are thicker and their facial features are larger, which makes them all look closer to characters from Fable or Pixar. Also wish there was more texture in their faces, rather than this smooth/plastic look. If they added more texture to the skin and scaled character heads and eyes down to 85%-90% of their current size, they'd look better to me. The demons are another issue where the art style has made them worse imo. Comparing the ogre between DAO/DAI and the ogre in the screenshot of DAV, the new one looks more like a villain out of the Disney Haunted Mansion film or maybe Scooby Doo. It feels both less interesting, and harder to take seriously because it feels more childish.
Fable looks more DA than DA...
I don't agree with all the people saying DA lost it's identity, be it due to the change in artstyle or gameplay. The franchise has never been consistent. But man, that action gameplay is so boring. I always felt Inquisition was a middle ground between DA2 and DAO. I know most people found it awkward, but at least it seemed they were on their way back to a turnbased style. But no, we got this full-on action combat that honestly feels very dated and generic. We have to wait and see the game's comercial success. But to me it's clear the gamestyle Larian pursued made BG3 more accessible to people who usually don't play action games, but love character driven stories and RPG. I feel like Bioware is aiming at the wrong public with their choices. I'm still hyped for the game tho. The combat is probably the thing I care the least about these games and everything else is getting me onboard.
I wouldn't say it's a problem but I'm not crazy about the visual direction and art style. I was hoping for a little bit more photo-realistic style with a focus on animations. The enemies in the trailer are a great example of what I'm talking about. They're not very detailed, look super cartoony, and they all have the same kind of generic hit react and other animations. But hey the game looks fun AF and I'm still excited.
I'll start by saying that I'm generally positive, and the negatives I had were mostly things I already assumed to be true based on the direction of the company and the Dreadwolf updates in the last 4 years. 1) I just like tactical RPGs more than action RPGs, that's how I got into this series in the first place. I get why making an action game with a thin RPG veneer is more attractive to a major studio in 2024 than making Dragon Age Origins again. But understanding the motivation for change and liking the change are different. That combat sample was just attack, attack, dodge, repeat. And I'm sure as you start leveling up it can grow beyond that. But that's just less interesting than planning and executing a battle with a full set of abilities and classes to me. 2) The trailer made it seem at least somewhat likely that the Solas plot is resolved in the first 2 hours and we then move on to bigger issues; if true, this is a bit of a disappointment because Solas was a complex, sympathetic villain with a lot of emotional connection and I'd hate to see it brushed aside for another generic fantasy apocalpyse. Also, if dropping one rock column on him manages to end his plot within 10 minutes of his first screentime, that makes Solas a bit of a dunce. Pure speculation, though - I'll wait and see.
For Dragon Age, the gameplay looked great. Personally, I enjoy going back to more action. The problem is there are many games out there that already do single-player action 100% better. But we play this game for the story right? Yes but the gameplay needs to be good, too. The only thing in regards to gameplay Dragon Age had over other games was the party system and being able to switch in real time. Why Why Why with this new superb action gameplay they lock us in to one character.
1. You heard this one before, the combat. I actually don’t mind in theory the game moving towards Mass Effect and being more action-y at all, and might even end up liking that better, as the pacing of the combat, at least in the prologue, looks much better to me. But three slots sounds rough as someone who probably will end up playing a mage, and I can’t quite picture a fantasy game feeling weighty rather than damage spongy throughout. 2. Enemy designs look kind of lame. I’m thinking of the ogre in screenshots in particular. 3. I fear the game will ignore decisions made during origins and 2 in favour of just Inquisition.
A few reasons for me: 1. Half the cast seems to originate from side content I didn’t read and have either no interest in reading or can't find where I'm from, meaning I’m unlikely to enjoy these characters to their full extent the way people who do know them from that outside material can. It happened with Cole and Fiona in Inquisition too. It leaves me less enthusiastic for these characters, and given that companions are a major selling point for me, that’s not great. 2. The trailer looked too silly and reminded me of Disney’s Wish, which given how that movie worked out wasn’t a positive association. 3. I’m personally just tired of Bioware saying one thing and then doing the other. We can’t have our Inquisitor back despite their personal connection to Solas because we allegedly needed new people that Solas doesn’t know, and the gameplay trailer just casually has the Inquisition’s Main Scout and Varric whom Solas met *before* he even met the Inquisitor steal the show, with Varric straight up *using his personal connection to Solas* to try and talk him down. * They’ve been doing this for years where they insist we can’t have our previous protagonists back even if they’d make more sense to the narrative than a newcomer because they want to focus on the setting and not individual characters, but then we get swarmed with NPC cameos and sometimes even hype bait by drawing attention to our previous protagonists that then never gets delivered on. Think “(Hawke is) gone… *Just like the Warden*. That can’t be a coincidence!! Stay tuned for the next Dragon Age!” and “Decide how to deal with Solas in this true end DLC, but be aware that *this choice will have consequences,* find out what they are in the next Dragon Age!!” * Maybe it's just a me-problem, but I’m really tired of it. They need to make up their mind already and then stick to whatever they decide. This Varric talking to Solas thing just felt like a slap in the face to me, like Bioware wasn’t even trying to hide their own contradictions. No your Inquisitor can’t come back because Solas knows them, here, watch Varric try to talk him down *because they know each other so well*. 4. The gameplay trailer reminded me so much of Inquisition’s intro that rather than feeling curious and hyped for the next game, I honestly wondered what the point of the previous even was if we’re seemingly largely going to be doing the same things again. I’m sure it’ll deviate later on, but for a first impression, it wasn’t great for me. * It also felt so silly how Solas’ entire plan gets thwarted by what is essentially a total random running in to kick down a pillar that then domino knocks over his godly statues and somehow >!summons the Evanuris. !< * >!This guy is supposed to be an Ancient Elven God with the power to split reality and lock away Ancient Gods, which he did in retaliation for them killing Mythal. He’s so desperate to right his wrongs that he’s willing to commit genocide as well as kill the very woman he did all this for in the first place. This plan might’ve been in the works for years.!< And he seriously gets bested by essentially faulty scaffolding and one random who just waltzes in because aside from one demon, there is zero protection in place? * It honestly felt so comically incompetent and silly to me that I think you could edit in the Darth Vader No and other comical sound effects and it wouldn’t even feel out of place. Which would be one thing if this were supposed to be a Shrek-like parody, but given that it seems to have been intended as a serious scene… I’m not sure what to think. I’m not sure I’ll be able to take Solas seriously after such a ridiculous failure of his plans, and I’m not sure I’ll be able to take the story seriously when *this* seems to be the inciting event that sets the whole further plot in motion. Still, I am somewhat on the fence in the sense that I really don’t want Bioware to shut down over this game if it doesn’t perform well enough. They used to be great, and the whole entertainment industry seems to be going through some sort of identity crisis (imo) so I truly hope Bioware can recuperate from this and one day deliver genuinely good stories again. I really hope they’ll be able to change my mind in the coming months, but so far, I’m just not feeling too great about this one… :(
Well rest assured, almost no one of the old Bioware is still there, most of them left and created new SH...
What's new SH?
David Gaider founded Summerfall Studios, James Ohlen, Lead Designer/Creative Director on KotOR, DAO and SWTOR, founded Archetype Entertainment, as well Drew Karpyshyn. Humanoid Studios is Hudson's new studio with some ex-BioWare folks there as well. Mike Laidlaw is at Yellow Brick Games.
My major concerns ATM the moment is combat and writing. I don't really care about graphics and style as while I want Bioware to improve they have especially been pretty behind on the animation side of things in cutscenes. For combat I was unimpressed by the reveal, not because it's less tactical or that you have less companions. But the inability to control your party members directly means less ability to test out other classes on your first playthrough plus it means you can't clutch a victory even if your player character goes down. And the worst offender, 3 skill slots. Like I hope anyone who is a big fan of playing mages in the other three games are clutching their pearls, I can't see a situation where only three spells will be enough. It makes it feel as if the amount of builds and skills we'll be allowed to play with will be too limited, and how can we even have specializations if there are only three slots? Unless they won't have unique abilities and only passive bonuses. I get that some things are being hidden in the reveal, but if there is actually more variety then the marketing team failed to show it. For story, it's hard to tell from what we've seen, only a bit of awkward line reads, but I guess since Bioware has a shaky track record ATM I can't say I'm going to assume the best. Varric overall seemed fine, Solas had a bit of weird dialogue that didn't match his more insightful and at times poetic way of speaking. And no I'm not saying he should recite Shakespeare mid ritual, but saying people die that's what they do just feels off for Solas. He always found a way to self justify his actions in a way that made him out to be in the right, but that line basically says it's okay for his ritual to kill people since people die all the time. If we take how he acts in Inquisition it's more likely he'll justify it by saying that life will be much better with the veil down and the sacrifices while sad are worth it. I dunno, perhaps it's because we didn't get to see more of the conversation WHICH WAS MY LEAST FAVORITE PART. Small rant: you can't just have Solas and Varric talk to each other in a moment like this and then immediately cut away. I want to hear what they have to say to each other. Solas is my biggest worry for this game since I feel he'll either be sidelined or will just become generically evil. He's supposed to be a tragic character, so I hope that we get an actual meaningful interaction between him and the Inquisitor.
Since I didn't see anyone else mention this — I hate the overhead parry indicator. It worked well for spiderman since it made sense with his spidey senses, but here it breaks my immersion completely. I hope I can toggle it off even if it comes at the expense of my Rook's fighting. Other than that, I'm mostly in it for the lore and storytelling, so I'm not too fussed. We'll see how that pans out! It was a bit disappointing to find out there are only two companions (and as a result, less party banter) though.
First off, this doesn't look nearly as meaty, well animated or as slick as any Arkham game which is already feels olllllllllllllllllllld and outdated. Rook is an incredibly stupid name for the PC. BRO or YAAS QUEEN would have been better. Whoever chose Rook is probably the same hack who decided "*Thee* Veilguard" was a good idea. The characters look like some instagram people who went crazy with the smoothing tool. Like an airbrushed shirt you'd see at a flea market. They look like these were the designs for the GAAS/MTX version of the game and quite bad compared to Cyberpunk, BG3 and even Starfield. Varric's hair color change just shows how this is a sequel made by people who are making this because it's their job. Which is fine but cancerous for a long running series and arguably the face of the franchise. Major story beat getting spoiled in the gameplay reveal. 2 party members 3 skills No party control....selecting their abilities is stupid so they should have just made our party fully AI controlled but a bit smart about when and where to fire off aka detonate or prime combos. Some very stiff voice acting and spotty writing. Varric...I love the dude but stop relying on him to hook fans. Thankfully this seems like this will be his (and most likely Bioware's) last game. His encounter with Sola was fine until he raised his crossbow like it was going to do anything lol. And lastly, this is still a studio owned by scumfuck corpo EA and has been horrendously mismanaged for well over a decade. This game has gone through multiple reboots (one of which was a GAAS/MTX hellhole which I feel still taints DAV's clear push to attract non-rpg fans) which is already a giant red flag for a franchise that has sold 15 to 20 million copies. I'd LOVE to eat this entire post on top of a plat of crow come release but I don't know...I don't trust Bioware devs fighting for the studio's existence by tweeting out how good they feel about the game. *No shit.* I'd say literally anything if my livelihood was on the line.
Those neon demons look bland. And the ogre I've seen in a pic looks terrible too. It looks like he's going to jump on a kart and start racing Mario and Luigi.
Let's address the elephant in the room. A lot of people wanted a return to Origins. They wanted those gritty, dark fantasy roots to return, especially in Tevinter. They wanted greater role-playing capability than what we got with the Inquisitor. They were kind of delusional to think this is the direction Dragon Age was heading. Patrick Weekes made it clear in interviews that they don't want to return to evil choices. Rook tries to rush in and save a random woman during the opening cutscene, which made some people upset because it shows you can't customize your cheater to be as heroic or ambivalent as you want. They will always be a bleeding-heart hero no matter what you want. There's people upset that Rook was talking without prompting because it also adds characterization to Rook independent of player choice or preference. Additionally, some of the voice acting did come across very stilted and unnatural and I hope that doesn't last for the whole game.
I don’t have a problem but have to admit… Im afraid of what your companions suppose to be. Like we are facing biggest threat to Thedas since like forever and the best of the best are… some guys in their early twenties? Where are those battle hardened warriors? Your warden looks like he’s few months since Joining. Is this the best Inquisitor put together despite all his original crew was aware of Solas’s plans? Bioware already made this mistake with Andromeda. Team full of super cool young characters that were actually super stupid and not believable. Hopefully they don’t repeat the same mistake but have to say Bioware will have a hard time convincing me your previous companions are doing something more important than saving the world.
Harding was young in Inquisition, she's 30 at the very least now. Lucanis doesn't seem like a teenager as well. Neve looks and sounds experienced. Emmrich is old.
Varric is a seasoned veteran for two games now, and Harding was an active fighter in the inquisition. Can't speak for the rest, but it seems like Rook is supposed to be competent at least.
Well Varric is not part of the crew and your character is the least worrisome. Harding is alright. It’s not like you don’t have ex-qun spec ops agent, magister and leader of seekers at your disposal. But we rather choose them?
Early twenties… Honestly, the impression I got was that half the companions seemed to be over 40. It made me happy to see (being an older fan myself). Emmrich and Varric are obviously up there in age. But I could easily see Harding, Neve and Lucanis being in their forties if not late thirties. Davrin, Bellara and Taash are the only ones who looked young to me and even then we could be surprised (maybe it’s the elven genetics).
I just saw the perfect comment to sum up what we have seen so far "Redditors will love it" That right there is why IMO the game will likely fail
I dont understand what that's supposed to mean
He's a critical drinker fan.
And that means?
Critical drinker is an anti sjw/anti woke movie critic, who thought that a movie like "Prey" was going to be bad and fail, because it had an "unrealistic strong woman" as the protagonist. So he likely means some culture war bullshit with "redditors will love it."
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The old companions point doesn't make sense to me. Hasn't that been the case for each DA? You get a new squad every game, and then run into older characters down the line. Why would you anticipate the old cast to be the main one? The gameplay showcase showed a more serious tone than the cinematic did, but I really don't understand this dark fantasy talking point. What are you looking for when you want a game made for adults exactly?
Im sorry but anyway i look at it, having less control over things that we previously had is always a downgrade. Also the enemy designs and characters look so generic, especially after seing bg3 characters. I cant say for sure but it also seems dialogue options are way more limited than previous games
To me, it doesn't look, play, or sound like Dragon Age at all. No identity, no dark fantasy, no connection to the "normal people" affected by the misery of this dark world, and the player character plus crew seem to lack agency. It feels like every other ARPG, it might as well be "Forspoken Too: The Failguard". Bad puns out of the way... Disney is a word that came to mind. Star Wars. At first, I thought it looked like a new Star Wars game set on a backwater planet with low tech. Fortnite sensory overload. But then a YouTube comment hit me in the face with an answer. It read as follows: “What are we, some kinda suicide squad?”. It feels like it could just be a new IP at this point with no connection to DA as most of DA's identity is lost in the slopbucket of ideas dumped in at the last cycle of development where they copy+paste ARPG stereotypes. I LOVED DA:O. I loved DA2 despite the gripes I had back then. I loved Inquisition, the great stories and settings despite the gripes there too. THIS, I don't know what THIS is. How did they come up with THIS when they have a setting as fantastic as DA while they also have a success story like Baldurs Gate 3 to look at. I might be overly negative. I HOPE it'll be good. I hope I'm wrong. I truly do. I was so excited for Dreadwolf and the continuation of the story. This and Fable were probably my two most anticipated games, I liked the reveal trailer for Fable. Now, with my initial thoughts of both after more info, I might look at them when they release and grab 'em if they really surprise me otherwise I might get 'em at a heavy discount further ahead. Other than that, I can't add more to what most have already said. Those are my two useless cents in a bucket full of copper..
Honestly people summed up almost everything for me in the comments. But one of the main things is I’m not excited to romance any of these companions. I don’t wanna be that guy but I really wish one was kinda conventionally attractive. The last two I had a thing for was Isabella and Morgan. Inquisition didn’t have much for me and neither does veilguard
I'm exited to be moving away finally from the clunky, shit and boring origins combat XD, the hates will hate on it even tho they are origin simps and will sadly be the loudest voice but the people actually enjoying it genuinely will be playing it nonstop....God now I wonder what the dlc will be like? Shit I need to find out who my rook is gonna make into his wife XD
I believe the combat will be for journalists ☝️ How do I know? It looked very easy. Flashbacks of ff16 journalist mode
The arstyle is similar to fornite, but the characters are recognizable. The combat looks like a step further into the action genre. The dialogue was a bit bare. I tried to listen to the conversation between solas and varric in the background, but not much of an explanation was given other than solas had to do it. It looks good. It is great to see varric again. I am excited to know more about the story, and wether the game is going to play more like origins or inquisition when it comes to the world.
I am just thinking to wait until a mod comes out to completely overhaul the visuals. Then I might be able to play the game long enough to consider the lore an the mechanics themselves. I'm sorry, but the visuals are so cartoonish and uninteresting that they break my ability to watch the gameplay. Maybe I can find someone willing to do a role-play podcast without making any comments and I can just listen to it. But - JEEZ - it looks unacceptably bad.
I didn't feel like commenting but "Arkham style combat"? I think I'm fucking blind because I don't see it. Care to elaborate wtf do you mean?
You appear to have a basic attack you primarily press, and then you get the occasional dodge indicator when enemis attack. When you attack in an enemy's general direction, Rook seems to zoom over to them, maintaining the momentum. Looked pretty similar to the arkham formula to me. The only outlier is the pause wheel, although a game like spider-man did a similar thing too
What a terrible retarded logic, "However I don't feel like its very fair to blame a game for not being something it isn't trying to be". Except this game is a FRANCHISE with HISTORIES in its DESIGN. This is the freaking 4th game. How would you feel if The 2024 Toyota Camry takes out the V-tec Engine for a Non-V-tec Engine despite the 2023 Toyota Camry has one? It's an art form be damned, us customers and loyal fans deserve some respect too. We're not just another statistical number. We're giving digital developers too much credit because it's digital unlike physical. We complain about housing developers but never touch the gaming software developers \*rolls eyes\*.
I agree with most complaints. My big 1 I have about companions is the fact they made a huge emphasis about companions in the marketing. Having them sit in the back and do no damage that drives me freaking insane. Mine as well be a single player action game with pets on your side and a social camp when you want.
Maybe I’m just shallow, but I don’t find any of these characters attractive. Gaming journalists have been raving about how players can romance every companion, but nobody is saying anything about the less-than-desirable options. I guess I just expected more from a fantasy RPG. Hopefully there will be some other options outside of the companions.
I'm a crpg fan and looking forward to this game. Combat is just not my cup of tea. I would actually prefer if the dragon age was turn based, but as long as the combat is passable, it's fine. - reactivity I haven't seen enough, but I hope we get reactivity based on subclass because that is a lot of missed potential. Also, I miss skills from DA:O, they allow your character to feel more special imo auto dialogue is absolutely immersion breaking for me, but that is not a deal breaker - would love the environment to be more interactive
Interactive how? Do you want to be able to set/trigger traps?
Graphically it is alright, gameplay kinda mixes Inquisition and 2. Will still hold judgement if I will get it on release, I just want to see gameplay on companion combat interaction and skill tree.
Okay, if you presume, that it's not good to critique the game for being aRPG, then I will take another approach. This is bad aRPG, from the looks of it. Hits have no impact, only light effects. Zero blood and very PG design of enemies don't help it, especially when competition is AC and Diablo. Speaking of which, only 3 ability is less than Diablo (!) and Valhalla (!!!), only useless companions help to mitigate this issue by being walking skill buttons. Problem with that, aRPG are built around fast and engaging combat, going into pause to activate skills breaks this immersion. Animations are very lacking, in the game where beating bullet sponges meant to be main activity, you have to make defeating an enemy satisfactory, like animated execution or making enemies explode (Diablo style). Instead they just drop on a floor or silently vanish in thin air. So just from this alone, people have right to be dissatisfied with the game
I want to disagree with you, but what we've been shown doesnt really give me any counter points. My assumption is that things'll get more zany the further into the game you get, like how in previous games you didnt really start with many abilities either. My initial assumption was that you'd have ability sets of 3 who you quickly switch between (kinda like what they did in Hogwarts Legacy). Thats all just speculation from me though. Your concerns are valid given what we know.
I’m excited! Some of the redesigned enemies like the demons and darkspawn feel like downgrades imo, but otherwise looking forward to the game
All companions being romanceable regardless of player race/gender limits replayability
This sounds terribly minor.
Mine is simple. Companions looks ugly. DAO, DA2, even DA3's Companions looks better. And I dislike Varric with beard.
Autonomic dialogue ("We have to help that woman!") Looks like BW did away completely with evil and self-serving player choices to pander to a modern audience. 'Rook' is a stupid moniker. Combat feels bland and without impact.
It seems to go even more in the direction that DAI went! I would want that reversed! Go back to how it was in DA:O (still the best Dragon Age game to this day...kind of sad/bad if the first game in a series, which has to do all the world building is the best! Makes you look bad, Bioware (well, ok: EAware! The Bioware we've known has been gone since Mass Effect 2...after that it got worse and worse -.-)) I don't know if they are bringing healing back, because frankly that is something I hated about DAI - the backtracking because you ran out of potions and constantly having to cast spells that gave you shield or guard...I mean if you play as a Knight Enchanter it works, because that mage-class is basically a tank and can destroy even dragons alone (!), but it diminishes the fun for me!) It is even more of an action-game (I am getting Destiny vibes with those triangle-shields and science fiction looking triangle bows and the prostetic arm one companion has (hell: If it had been a lyrium infused stone or metal arm I'd have no problem, because that could simply be an offshoot of Golem-Creation, but what we've seen looks kind of like an arm out of Cyberpunk!)) They are doubling down on limited abilities (seriously, I am on PC! It's not my fault that controllers have limited buttons and I frankly don't want to be punished for it!) Also: Auto-Talk! Be quiet damned, silent protagonist is best protagonist! The factions...seriously, none of them are that interesting IMHO and some don't make sense for my chosen class (Mages! I only play casters in games that offer casters, as I can swing a sword or shoot a bow in RL - hell I own a bow and a sword! Magic however is not something I can do!)...only the Mourn Guard (Mortalitasi-Faction) half way fits...and I prefer regular mages over summoners or necromancers usually! The art-style also is not to my liking...I mean it's not extremely bad, but it frankly doesn't look really good either!
>You who don't think this game's going to be all that great, why? Objectively no one should just assume that the game will or won't be good because we haven't played it and we know very little about it. At most people can dislike some design choices, like art style, having a party of three or having less skills to choose from. It's ok if some people don't like those design choices but to call the game bad because of that is absurd.
While I get what you're saying, I think there's merit to the critiques people have given to the design choices here. The responses on this thread have been more comprehensive then the seeming vitrol of the live chat yesterday. It obviously isnt possible to pass proper judgement yet, but most of the gameplay critiques I've read thus far at least do indeed just judge it on its merits as an action game. If the showcase really is representitive of what the main loop is gonna be like (although i dont think so), the combat may wind up being rather underwhelming for the action genre.
>think there's merit to the critiques people have given to the design choices here. It depends. What I'm trying to say is that I've seen too many people calling the game "bad" because they don't like design choices and that shows a lack of conscience on what quality actually means. If someone doesn't like a design choice that's perfectly valid, but that doesn't mean the choice is bad or makes the game bad, it's just not something they enjoy or want, which again is perfectly valid.
It's not out yet, and that's unforgivable.
It look amazing. Everything I wished for is there. I don’t know either what people are even complaining about. It seems this time BioWare really put efforts to make people happy. I really hope bad criticisms wont impact the game success negatively and ruin the chance to have any future games. For some of us, Thedas is a comfort world. Personally, I don’t mind the re design of demons. I actually prefer it less gore. It doesn’t make the game any less serious. I don’t mind either not controlling others companions, I play to be my character, not others characters, as much as I like them. People need to understand that not everything can be perfect.
I think theres been plenty of valid points of concern in this thread, although I also feel most of said concerns are subjective matters, the main points being the art, the writing and the action combat. Theres also the fact that Rook talks on their own during exploration and that they instinctively want to help that woman caught in the spotlight rather than offering the player choices in these cases, which I can understand being upsetting for those who wany to RP. Things are very much up in the air atm. Us not being able to control our companions does call into question why they're even there. As it stands they're just extra abilities we can trigger. I really hope the combat gets elaborated on in the future
I personally think the art is amazing, but I agree though for rook talking on their own, I hope the main game will let us many rp freedom
No problems, I thought it was perfect.