Former Dragon Age executive producer Mark Darrah left BioWare in 2020, commenting, “I know Dragon Age will not only survive without me, but thrive”. We’ll never fully know the truth of that claim, as Darrah has now rejoined BioWare to work as a consultant on the recently revealed Dragon Age: The Veilguard. He thinks it’s flourishing. Specifically, he thinks this has been the most fun fight in Dragon Age ever. Shhh, no one tells the Inquisition.
“What I see in Veilguard is a game that finally bridges the gap,” Darrah told internet magazine Game Informer in a new preview that digs a little deeper into the game’s new tactical management-lite fistfights. “It’s a shame that previous Dragon Age games reached the level of ‘the combat wasn’t that bad.’ In this game the combat is actually fun, but it does maintain the thread that was always there. You have the focus on Rook, on your character, but still have that control and that character that feeds into the combat experience of the other people in your party. .”
The piece also includes some commentary from game director Corinne Busche, who notes that Dragon Age’s combat has been in flux for a long time and justifies the shift to real-time by making it feel like you’re actually there. “Each entry reimagines what combat is like and I would say our goal was to make sure we had a system that made players feel like they could actually enter the world of Thedas,” Busche told the site . “They are not players observing from a distance – they are in this world. Because it’s an authentic world brought to life, the combat system has to support that, so you’re in control of every single action, every block, every dodge, every swing of your sword.”
I’m always a little grumpy about arguments that real-time combat is more immersive, authentic, or whatever than, say, turn-based. Dragon Age is a game where I float in the air outside my character’s body while they shoot purple lightning at demonic incarnations of pride. I will never feel like I am ‘in this world’ even when I press the button that fires that particular bolt of lightning. I’m more convinced by Busche’s following comments that she wants Dragon Age: The Veilguard’s battles and upgrades to depend on “real numbers” – i.e. big numbers like +25% whose impact can be seen at a glance understood.
Overall, Veilguard’s upgrades are “about changing the way you play, not the statistical details,” Busche explains, with passive abilities including guaranteed critical hits and jump attacks. I’d say Inquisition’s trickier percentages change the way you play, but Veilguard’s system certainly sounds like it takes less time in menus that do sums. The transition here reminds me of the transition from Darkest Dungeon 1 to Darkest Dungeon 2, which also simplifies the stats to multiples of 12.5, and doesn’t make it any worse.
There are also some details about companions, who get smaller upgrade trees than that of main character Rook (in Inquisition, each character has access to roughly the same number of options). They level up by ranking your relationship with them, which earns a skill point; it sounds like they’re not collecting XP the old fashioned way, although the picture is unclear.
“[Companions] are their own people,” Busche said of how the Companions behave in battle. “They have their own behavior, they have their own autonomy on the battlefield, they will choose their own goals. As their plot progresses, they learn how to use their skills more competently, and it really feels like you’re fighting in battle alongside these realized characters. “However, it is still important to use character skills together. Busche gave the example of one character slowing down time so another can fire a heavy knockdown attack, allowing the player to deliver the finishing blow. “It’s a game about creating this organic sense of teamwork.”
In my own first look at Dragon Age: The Veilguard, I wrote, “I’m definitely mourning the less kinetic, more strategic Dragon Age that might have been, but I’m more excited about Veilguard than I thought I would be.” buy the first trailer”. We’ve since learned that the game limits you to a few companions in battle, another step away from Inquisition’s party-based tactics. So yeah, I’m still mourning a bit, but I remain hopeful that The Veilguard will prove to be an entertaining action RPG, if not the Dragon Age fourquel I wanted. The most important thing for me will be the plot. I don’t mind this being a slick punch-fest as long as it has a beautiful dark fantasy melodrama is involved. Fingers crossed I can play again before release and get a sense of what happens after the prologue.