Dragon Age: The Veilguard had fans waiting a decade, and it seems so far the wait was worth it, but the latest entry isn’t a return to the franchise–it was a return to the Golden Age of BioWare. Along the way in its development, Dragon Age: The Veilguard originally included multiplayer elements until EA and BioWare changed course.
The massive decision for the overhaul was supported by EA and has seemed to have been the right call. Speaking on the My Perfect Console podcast, The Veilguard directors Corinne Busche and John Epler described taking the game back to its roots and going against the stream with some gaming trends.
“I felt very supported through this by BioWare and EA,” Busche said (via Eurogamer). And I’ll tell you, it’s intimidating to buck the trends in an era where it feels like almost every game must be an open world.
The Good and The Bad of Dragon Age: The Veilguard
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Epler, a BioWare veteran of 17 years and Dragon Age: Inquisition producer, said that the push to return to form was deliberate from the studio.
“You know, I personally love Mass Effect Andromeda but there was also, we had open-world that was a big thing in the industry at the time and that starts to dilute your focus,” Epler said. “We had Anthem-live-service dilutes your focus. So for us, it was really understanding what it is that people come to the studio to do–they work here for a reason, they want to make big stories that allow you to be a big hero of your own creation, but also a focus on characters, a focus on that experience of living in a different world.”
When the decision was called for the change, Epler said he looked at the things that made the studio what it was known for: storytelling and epic single-player RPGs.
For The Veilguard we just wanted to get back to those things that made the studio what it was, that contributed to what I would call the Golden Age of BioWare, when there was hit after hit being turned out,” he added. “The Veilguard was a very conscious return to that with a focus on characters, storytelling and being just this really bombastic single-player RPG.”
For more info on BioWare’s latest fantasy RPG, check out GameSpot’s Dragon Age: The Veilguard review-in-progress.