As I feverishly slashed, attacked, courted, looted, and slashed my way through the stunning, captivating world of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, I kept having one thought: “Wait, BioWare made this? 2024 BioWare?” With this game coming out on the heels of the Anthem debacle, preceded by Dragon Age: Inquisition and Mass Effect: Andromeda, both of which were okay in hindsight, I wasn’t sure these former masters of the craft of role-playing games could make it. It’s not a game like this anymore, but assembling my team of interesting and likable companions to save the world was like bringing the old band back together in more ways than one.
The scope of this adventure is all of northern Thedas, sending you from the coasts of Rivain to the devastated wilds of Anderfels as you attempt to prevent the rise of an ancient and menacing evil. It was exciting as a long-time fan of the series to finally see many of the places I had only read about in a magazine in 2009. And the way BioWare helped us do this exploration was very focused and intentional.
How do you classify Dragon Age companion characters? How do you classify Dragon Age companion characters?
Veilguard’s level design was one of the first things that caught my attention, as it reminded me more of the original Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic than anything else. The smooth, winding corridors with enough little nooks and crannies to explore are cleverly interconnected in a way that demonstrates how a BioWare-style RPG gains a lot and loses almost nothing by ditching the idea of an open world entirely. (Exceptions to this are a couple of the more vertical sections of Minrathus City, which can be difficult to navigate.) Across the board, the environment art is truly stunning, from the deserted peaks of Cal-Sharrock to the surreal elven ruins floating in the Arlathan Forest.
I was very pleased with the character designs as well. The armor and costumes are great. I spent over an hour on the character creation process, as I usually do, and came up with a version of our heroine, Rock, that delighted me every time she was in the frame. This might be one of the best hairstyles I’ve ever seen in a video game.
The Veilguard combat is an improvement on what we saw in Dragon Age 2 and Inquisition.
Even with all this visual splendor, I was able to get a steady 60fps at 4K on my RTX 4070 Super with DLSS set to maximum performance, which typically doesn’t affect image quality in very noticeable ways. The only exception to this was late in the game, when there would be so many spell effects going off at once that not only would I lose frames, but it would also be difficult to see what was actually happening.
From crackles and sparks, Veilguard’s combat is definitely an improvement on what we saw in Dragon Age 2 and Inquisition. I’ve always preferred the tactical style of Dragon Age: Origins or Baldur’s Gate 3, but that ship has long since sailed for this studio, and not even Evanuris remembers what it looked like. So, judging this action-focused combat system for what it is, it’s pretty good! BioWare has fully committed to the fast-paced style and improved it to the point that I enjoy it very much. And the ability to pause to issue orders to party members, just like in Mass Effect, still gives some opportunities for more tactical players like me to look at the battlefield and think about our next move. It sure feels better on a controller than a mouse and keyboard.
What we said about Dragon Age: Inquisition in every IGN BioWare game review
When I finally slayed my first dragon in Dragon Age: Inquisition, I felt a little sad at the thought that I might have begun to exhaust my seemingly endless stream of content. But then I saw the taskbar: “Slaying dragons – 1 out of 10.” In all my hours, I saw only three. It’s a surprisingly large and dense world, and I quickly realized that there were still entire sandboxes I hadn’t even set foot in. Even in my 100th hour, I’m still discovering. Despite its unconvincing plot, I still want to go back and explore and fight in every nook and cranny of Dragon Age: Inquisition, until I have every dragon’s skull pinned to my wall. – November 11, 2021
Score: 8.8
Read our full Dragon Age: Inquisition review
I was somewhat disappointed that the party members feel more like an extension of your character in combat at this point than they are entities of their own. For example, they don’t even have health bars. They cannot be eliminated in combat, while the encounter will be lost instantly if Rook falls. They have equipment slots and skill trees, although less than what Rook gets. But overall, the amount of customization available to the entire team through piles and piles of interesting, upgradable loot was more than enough to satisfy my RPG appetite, if not fulfill my wildest fantasies of complex battle management.
During my roughly 100 hours of 100 percent playthrough, which was almost obsessively complete, I crafted Rook as a Spellblade — a mid-range mage hybrid — and really enjoyed the gameplay once I unlocked all my basic tools. Dancing with a dagger through a thunderstorm you’ve summoned, getting out of danger and then back again to deliver a killing blow, is just a really good time that rewards precise timing and wise target prioritization. This isn’t the tactical Dragon Age of my youth, but it’s a Dragon Age I can enjoy.
The highlight of the combat is definitely the boss battles, which offer a truly satisfying challenge even on the default difficulty. While the standard mob battles with Darkspawn or Venatori minions eventually became a little repetitive after more than 90 hours, the encounter against the High Dragon never failed to get my blood pumping as I had to carefully consider attack patterns and think on my feet.
Your entire group is made up of complex, memorable, and likable companions.
In the sense that a BioWare RPG is about your companions, aka the friends we make along the way, this may be the most BioWare game ever. Not only is the entire team made up of complex, memorable, likable and distinct characters from across Thedas, but they are all treated like the stars of their own story. Veilguard is light on those classic type of side quests like, “Help Bingo Bongo find some grease,” and I don’t miss them so much because they’ve been replaced by full-length heroic arcs for each companion, with twists, turns, personal enemies, major character developments, and… Triumph suits the protagonist rather than the sidekick. It’s as if the writers took the loyalty missions from Mass Effect 2 and blew them up into seven mini-games of their own. Almost every side quest is linked to one of these, blurring the feeling that you’re juggling busy work.
Choosing a favorite member among the seven Veilguard members to talk about truly seemed like an impossible task. I really want to say that all of them are my favorite. But I had a rewarding romance with the Gray Warden, Davrin, and became a mother to his budding friend, Assan, so he would have to be my choice for this play. Seriously, if anything happens to that little guy, I’ll wash Theda away in a wave of fire. The Vincent Price-inspired noble necromancer Emmerich is also a delightful twist on the usual gothic death wizard tropes.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard Review Screenshots
And while the developers asked us not to spoil specifically who I’m talking about here, as a non-binary person, Veilguard includes some of the most authentic representation of coming to terms with gender issues — and having to navigate your family’s reaction to that — I’ve yet seen in a game. It’s not like it’s an after school special or that I’m being tempted. It was handled well, and I wasn’t surprised to find out that the writer of this character is a non-binary person.
The larger world-threatening plot in the background while we go about all these personal quests isn’t anything particularly special in its overall structure. We need to unite some factions to fight some evil gods who are trying to do bad things with their tentacles. But the main thing that makes this interesting is Solas – also known as the Dreadful Wolf, the elven god of lies and rebellion – who is waiting in the wings, keeping me guessing whether he’s friend or foe.
This story feels like a farewell and a little reboot in a way.
As a continuation of the Dragon Age series, Veilguard feels a bit disconnected from where we left off a decade ago. If you were expecting the decisions to continue from previous games in the series, I’m sorry to say they’ve never mattered less. You can only import three selections, only one of which appears in the context of a single character that you may or may not find or read. You can recreate your Inquisitor from Dragon Age: Inquisition, in the same way that Inquisition lets you recreate your Hawke if you played Dragon Age 2. The Inquisitor ends up being a fairly important character, which is cool.
But things like who you chose to be the head of the church at the end of the Inquisition never came to light. There’s no sign of the Warden from Origins, despite having visited their order’s stronghold. Hawkeye gets only a passing mention. There are some other characters from Origins and Dragon Age 2, but these characters clearly don’t reference any important choices you may have made in their presence. This story feels like a little farewell and reboot, in a way, which was ironically a bit refreshing and disappointing at the same time.
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The early pacing was also weird, and I felt like I could practically smell the rewriting. For example, it’s funny that no one ever said the word “Veilguard” out loud in the 100 hours I played this dialogue-heavy campaign, exposing a last-minute marketing pivot for what it was. But it doesn’t take long for things to get on track, story-wise, and when they do, they stay on track.
The sacrifices I had to make during the closing hours were painful. The wise decisions you made paid off.
Aside from the huge choice you’ll make early on, the most interesting parts of the narrative design don’t come until the end of Veilguard’s story. Again, it’s hard to delve into this too much without spoiling something, but the ending is also very much in the spirit of Mass Effect 2, which had an ending that, to date, was perhaps the best of a series of complex consequential choices. Ever featured in an RPG game. The sacrifices I had to make during closing hours were painful. The wise decisions you made paid off. I even had the opportunity to pull a crushing blow out of my sleeve in a big way at the last minute, precisely because I took a very thorough and careful approach to everything leading up to it. That seemed like the ultimate reward.
Through it all, the cinematic flair has been off the charts, proving that BioWare is unparalleled in the world of RPGs in this niche. There are so many best things I can’t even tell you about them, but parts of it feel like watching a big budget fantasy movie in the best ways. The triumphant and effective – if not exactly inventive – score elevates these moments even further.
