Dragon Age: The Veilguard - A woke disaster? Yep!

[Weltraumfürst]

I think I mentioned it before, but the fact that we're looking fondly back at DA2 of all games now is baffling.

 

[BlankSpaceBaby]

That's also a big part of the reason why the game was hated when it came out - aside from the reused assets, human only main character, etc - unlike Dragon Age: Origins where you have full control over your companions' actions and decisions, here you can't. Anders will Anders no matter what, your sibling will die if you take them to the Deep Roads without Anders, etc etc etc. You can't save everyone, and the ending victory is Pyrrhic.

However, the game IS barebone and lacking in features in many ways, and those annoying waves that swoop in and ruin your tactics have to go. Also, I"m tired of needing to rush across the whole stage/scene every time to catch that one mage or else the entire party gets wiped in a single attack from that bastard.

I love the story, and I will always wonder what could have happened had this game got a few years instead of just one to gestate.

The fact that I replay that game every now and then while most newer games today fail to catch my attention for long is a testament to the potential in that game that was squandered by EA suits.

 

[Ishtar]

I think DA2 is kind of ill fitting as an RPG-you can’t stop Anders or the Arishok. Hell I complain you can’t become Viscount during the game.

But that’s because it’s telling a very particular story-a tragedy about a hero that tried and failed to beat history into submission but was himself beaten down by it.

You see this with the framing story-Cassandra thinks Hawke and his associates all came together as part of a plot to undermine the chantry. Rather than a bunch of people being swept in events beyond their control.

DA2’s narrative is ultimately linear, but that’s because it’s telling a story that the player ultimately is there to experience not directly shape.

Hawke isn’t completely passive-but the point of DA2 is it’s not enough. Nothing they do is enough.

It’s not enough to romance Anders to make him not fulfill Justice. It’s not enough to get the Arishok’s respect or romance Isabela to make them act in any way other than what they are. It’s not enough to love Merrill to prevent Merethari’s death. It’s not enough to side with the Templars to prevent the mages from rising up. Hawke kills Corypheus but again, it’s not enough.

Hawke does things-but they are just…never enough.

I think you can summarize the game of a hero that tries hard, fights hard, loves hard-but they just can’t win.

You can’t really make that a dynamic RPG. It is however a great story.

All that remains is such a great quest for this reason. Hawke gets the name, and the mansion. And they can’t save their mother. They just weren’t fast enough, not observant enough, there weren’t enough guards, etc…

The best Hawke can do is find love, comfort, and help his/her companions overcome personal problems(and even then to limited degrees), a small win is meeting Charade-but even that is basically a small consolation.

One of my favorite scenes is when Bodahn tells Hawke that he and Sandal are moving on-and Hawke stares into the fireplace. He’s losing friends and family. They are alone. Just an unpleasant uncle(and a cousin they don’t know), and maybe a sibling they barely interact with anymore. If said sibling is even alive.

Every victory is either hollow, temporary or basically a consolation.

No other BioWare game has a protagonist actually lose. Hawke despite all their efforts just can’t win. It’s just never enough.

And that I think is what separates it from basically every other BioWare game.

 

[Mettaur]

 

[Brap God]

Capitalism and art are inherently opposed.

Wrong, it has nothing to do with with capitalism, the same thing would happen any time art has to fit a certain mold. In the case of capitalism, art that becomes mainstream has to fit the mold of mass appeal. If we existed under some other system, you think the most far reaching art wouldn't buckle under some pressure? Sounds like naivete to me.

That's why in the old days, artists have patrons - sugar daddies/mommies that will give them what they need to live and more so that they can do art in peace, without worrying too much about how to pay the bills.

And as we know, all aristocratic patrons just sponsored their artists without input? Most likely not, this is the same thing as I brought up above, it's silly to think that external factors won't veer the ship off course, for better or worse.

So speaking of acting, who are everyone’s favorite VAs or if you don’t know that the best acted scenes in the series?

In DAO it's the segment that introduces Broodmothers for the first time. In DA2 it's that one monologue sarcastic Hawke can have after Following the Qun quest if you don't have any companions with you. I do think after a certain point I got bored to tears of Bioware's obsession with quippy sarcasm, but I did like that monologue. Sucks that they didn't make similar monologues for the other personalities.

 

[Mettaur]

Every single Dragon Age game has been a product of capitalism. It's a nonsensical discussion point. If anything DA:V is an example of the developers trying to appeal to a demographic that wasn't interested in their games.

 

[Ishtar]

DAV was rebooted 2 times-project Joplin, then resources were shifted to Anthem, then rebooted to Project Morrison(the live service game), and then again in 2021(at the same time a lot of the writers were laid off).

BioWare corporate wanted to do Anthem admittedly-but they are still a corporation. The entire development cycle of the game and some of the problems it has-trend chasing(admittedly every DA game does this), the confused marketing, all comes down to corporate pressure and mixed priorities.

Imagine no Mass Effect Andromeda, no Anthem, and no stupid live service requirement, no Gaider and other people fired or being pressured to quit in 2015-2016.

I think we can imagine that in that case-the game would have come out by 2019 at the latest and would it have been a much superior product. Admittedly BioWare has to make money for their shareholders and they didn’t have the foresight to know they’ll have two flops in a row. But hindsight is 2020

Point being-capitalism places pressure on artistic endeavors that can and do its affect its content and quality. Whether that be layoffs, or a demand to meet some sort of broader casual market, or sanding off rough edges for the sake of inclusivity and evading bad press.

One doesn’t have to be some sort of communist to understand this. It’s true in Hollywood as much as it is the video game industry.

 

[Brap God]

Point being-capitalism places pressure on artistic endeavors that can and do its affect its content and quality. Whether that be layoffs, or a demand to meet some sort of broader casual market, or sanding off rough edges for the sake of inclusivity and evading bad press.

Every single Dragon Age game has been a product of capitalism. It's a nonsensical discussion point.

 

[Tanner Glass]

Imagine no Mass Effect Andromeda, no Anthem, and no stupid live service requirement, no Gaider and other people fired or being pressured to quit in 2015-2016.

I think we can imagine that in that case-the game would have come out by 2019 at the latest and would it have been a much superior product. Admittedly BioWare has to make money for their shareholders and they didn’t have the foresight to know they’ll have two flops in a row. But hindsight is 2020

No, I don't imagine that.

Those people you're describing made Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 3, and Dragon Age Inquisition even in a fictional world where Andromeda and Anthem don't exist - which weren't Veilguard levels of bad, but were mediocre-to-bad and major steps back from earlier titles. That team - even if given nothing but time and money - had demonstrated their potential was down and not up. Anthem, while dogshit, at least was them trying to make some kind of new game on a new IP - without Anthem they would have literally just milked DA and ME for ~16 years straight.

They also had a very clear lack of vision - which is why each game feels like such a massive questionable departure between installations. The jump between DAO and DA2 was wild in terms of how regressive it was and Baldur's Gate 3 winning GOTY really highlights how there was a large audience who liked turned based (not action oriented) combat that they just threw in the garbage. Then to kind of revert for DAI and then to try and double revert it for DAV is insane. Even Ubisoft managed to keep Assassin's Creed more consistent. You mention the "shareholders" making money - but the shareholders would very much have preferred a very predictable product being sold to a very predictable audience instead of whatever the fuck Bioware has been cooking for ~15 years.

There's a 0% chance that Bioware would have not become more "progressive" even if those specific people didn't leave the company (see also, every other major game studio during that same time) and this rot would have seeped in no matter what; if not been made worse by all the above.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

I miss Jade Empire

 

[30+GameOvers]

I miss Jade Empire

Very mid game with some good ideas, but essentially falls flat on it's face for multiple reasons. It was a good sign that Bioware doesn't have much going for it without a big IP to back them up, even Dragon Age isn't anything brand new and more of a reboot of Baldur's Gate(irrelevant as now Baldur's Gate is alive again).

 

[Weltraumfürst]

It was a good sign that Bioware doesn't have much going for it without a big IP to back them up

Counterpoint: Mass Effect.

 

[Brap God]

It was a good sign that Bioware doesn't have much going for it without a big IP to back them up

Brother, are you forgetting the fact that their biggest cash cows ever were original IPs? This statement is retarded.

 

[Weltraumfürst]

Brother, are you forgetting the fact that their biggest cash cows ever were original IPs? This statement is retarded.

To be fair, their most well-received games, the ones they built their reputation on (BG, NWN, KOTOR) were licensed titles.

 

[regalterry]

The jump between DAO and DA2 was wild in terms of how regressive it was and Baldur's Gate 3 winning GOTY really highlights how there was a large audience who liked turned based (not action oriented) combat that they just threw in the garbage

The really funny thing is that they already had a product (Mass Effect) catering to the action RPG crowd, but they decided that games in the style of titles that put them on the map and propelled them to popularity was not worth it, only for Larian to utterly humiliate them.

 

[Brap God]

To be fair, their most well-received games, the ones they built their reputation on (BG, NWN, KOTOR) were licensed titles.

Never denied any of that, the statement I was arguing against was that Bioware was nothing without a pre-established IP. Which is ludicrous when you consider how most of their IPs took off. Jade Empire being a one and done thing was more the exception than the rule. The only thing you can gleam from that release is that it followed the trend Bioware would never buckle of having a very basic and binary morality system.

 

[ParasiteSteve]

Call me a sellout, but I actually felt that Dorian’s gay stuff was handled with deftness and tact.

You know, you can deal with the expectations of birthright without having to make it all fag shit every fucking time. Thats the issue, they have no other concept other than "I like cock up my arse, my father is angry because that's what 80s, 90s 2000s and 2010s television has shown me". You can take that in a myriad of different directions but the modern mainstream writer (or those trying to be that) will always go to the "oh he is a gay, that's the conflict". Couldn't just have him differ in his outlook, or wanting something else, or driven to dark thoughts by the unending pressure. Nope, gotta be the gay. If it was a woman they could have done the "I want to fuck niggers, but my father is unhappy with that choice". Do you notice how its always about sex? its never any other aspect of persons life, its always the sexual stuff.

Even the new one, for all its failures, does play the same game really, just amped up to 11. Its still based around sex, its a never ending game of playing with cocks and cunts. Any other part of a human is forgotten with the exception of race.

Its all so fucking boring and tiresome, and its been going on and on for close to 50 years in the media.

 

[Ishtar]

I have literally said in this thread that I wasn’t particularly sympathetic to Dorian’s actual whining-“I don’t want to marry the girl” stfu you over privileged diva.

The point being Dorian’s homosexuality was handled in an artistically engaging and mature manner.

Dorian’s dad tried magic conversion therapy, Dorian found out and basically joined the inquisition to spite him. It was for Dorian a betrayal, and he also felt a sign of weakness and hypocrisy “blood magic is a crutch”.

At the same time-one can examine the plot and find Dorian’s behavior overwrought and unsympathetic on the whole. An aristocrat from a powerful family ultimately throwing a fit because he was expected to put the family’s interest over himself.

Regarding the plot itself-it was AIUI Gaider basically drawing on his own background.

Just as an addendum, homosexuality is (unfortunately) real, and thus I don’t think it’s wrong for it to be represented in narrative form. Dorian in particular with the whole “I can’t not be what I am” is something many homosexuals will admit-they don’t necessarily want to be gay, they just can’t help who they are and what their desires are. Whether or not others understand or condone. One doesn’t have to even condone homosexual behavior to understand that this is part of the human experience.

That said…I can understand being tired of it being done again and again. But as far as “gay son in conflict with dad” stories go, DAI’s handling of it is sensitive and mature.

 

[30+GameOvers]

Counterpoint: Mass Effect.

Mass Effect is just a spiritual successor to KOTOR much like Dragon Age is to Baldur's Gate

Brother, are you forgetting the fact that their biggest cash cows ever were original IPs? This statement is retarded.

Old Bioware, maybe. That one was long gone by the time they started making consolized action-RPGs for the wider masses, ie what they are actually known for today.

 

[Brap God]

Old Bioware, maybe. That one was long gone by the time they started making consolized action-RPGs for the wider masses, ie what they are actually known for today.

True, I forgot that 2005 was New Bioware. Did you forget you were talking about Jade Empire? lmao