Following Dragon Age: The Veilguard‘s long-awaited release at the end of October, BioWare‘s art director has been sharing pieces of concept art from early in the game’s development, including the very first piece he did for the project.
Games these days take a long time to develop, and that was especially true for Dragon Age: The Veilguard, with developers like then concept artist, now art director Matt Rhodes already thinking up ideas for the follow-up to the not-yet-released Dragon Age: Inquisition. One such piece, shared by Rhodes on Twitter, shows off the first piece of concept art he made for Veilguard, featuring a magister, slaves, and an adventurer in a foggy cityscape.
VeilguardThe first real piece of concept art I made for this project. We knew we were going to Tevinter, so this was the first attempt to flesh that out. A powerful magister being carried on a palanquin by her elven slaves, and scrappy adventurer’s trying to evade mage patrols… pic.twitter.com/j8q7B6Ys1pNovember 15, 2024
Along with many of the pieces recently shared by Rhodes, he confirmed that it was from 2014 and that before Inquisition had been released, he and the team were already coming up with ideas for where the series would go after that. “All the way back in 2014, before Dragon Age: Inquisition had even shipped, I started sketching out what cool things might come next. We had momentum, so these quick mock ups explored where some of the unfinished story threads might lead.” he wrote on Twitter.
10 years after the initial concepts were made up by Rhodes and other BioWare artists, it seems fair to say that the forward planning has paid off, with the game receiving plenty of positive attention from players and critics alike—our own review included.
If you’ve finished Veilguard, you might want to check out our list of the best RPGs for an idea of what to play next.