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

[Tor Lugosi]

Cole was definitely ugly. Dude looked like sad Pepe.

Skyhold was a huge wasted opportunity. When it's introduced the game sets up the idea that Corpheyus will eventually attack it, so you gotta update it and your army as well as you could. But that never happened and the game literally tells you that all your upgrades are just cosmetic. Both DA2 and DAI are nothing but a lot of really interesting or otherwise good sounding ideas, all executed terribly.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

If they were smart Meredith would come into play. Only because she was such a psychotic magnificent bitch and Jean Gilpin's performance was so damned iconic. Would have been fun to see her involved in Flemeth and Solas arc but logistically wouldn't work.

I'm still wondering if Flemeth is actually dead. Knowing she can easily come back is interesting and I feel like you wouldn't just do Kate Mulgrew like that so easily.

 

[The Ugly One]

This, most people irl are average looking and I think most gamers would be ok with average looking characters.

These characters aren't average looking, they look like diseased feet.

Most female game designers are butt-ugly, though.

Inquisitor is a dumb character and the plot falls flat.

Am I the only person bothered by the fact that the Inquisitor was not actually inquiring into anything at all, whether heresies or witchcraft? It's like they just grabbed words that sounded cool.

 

[Mega Black]

and a sort of peasant piggish look with a wide face, he's not meant to be a model.

This is my major issue. If I wanted to see ugly British peasants I'd just watch one of their football games on the telly, not play a highly unrealistic fantasy game.

These characters aren't average looking, they look like diseased feet.

Pretty much. Average to slightly better than average looking is what I'd rather see, especially if I'm going to be staring right at their fucking mugs for sixty percent of the game while they ramble.

 

[Mega Black]

Am I the only person bothered by the fact that the Inquisitor was not actually inquiring into anything at all, whether heresies or witchcraft? It's like they just grabbed words that sounded cool.

This always fucking bothered me too. Inquisition implies a sort of shadowy spy group operating throughout the land, sussing out evil with brutal efficiency.

Instead the Inquisition is much more like a crusade. But for some reason rather than being The Crusade they picked some other stupid organization name. Probably because Templars are already a faction.

It's just more of Bioware being retarded I guess.

 

[LovisXVI]

This is my major issue. If I wanted to see ugly British peasants I'd just watch one of their football games on the telly, not play a highly unrealistic fantasy game.

Well what would you have him look like then? Because him being wonky and unassuming is kind of the point of the character, and I would hard pressed to come up with a better design, because if you went more generic, then you'd hit on actually unmemorable nothing town NPC look, and that is just bad design then.

 

[Ishtar]

Am I the only person bothered by the fact that the Inquisitor was not actually inquiring into anything at all, whether heresies or witchcraft? It's like they just grabbed words that sounded cool.

"Herald of Andraste" is a better title honestly. The Inquisitor is more a prophetic figure or a religious cult leader than an inquisitor as we define that term.

This always fucking bothered me too. Inquisition implies a sort of shadowy spy group operating throughout the land, sussing out evil with brutal efficiency.

Instead the Inquisition is much more like a crusade. But for some reason rather than being The Crusade they picked some other stupid organization name. Probably because Templars are already a faction.

It's just more of Bioware being retarded I guess.

The role of the Inquisition is solving an immediate supernatural crisis, dealing with the mage-templar war(both groups no longer under the authority of the chantry), and then cleaning up, and "restoring order". Its more of a political and military body whose remit is stabilizing Southern Thedas, rather than dealing with heresy. Which is why the word Inquisition and Inquisitor are honestly poor descriptors of what it actually does in game.

 

[BlankSpaceBaby]

The entire story in Dragon Age Inquisition is broken.

It requires pious Andrastians like Cassandra and Leliana to go, "You know what, this Tal-Vashoth/elf/dwarf will be the non-divisive figure to unite all Andrastians together in this time of need!"

It requires Andrastians to put aside centuries of prejudices and willingly accept said Inquisitors. Mother Giselle is more horrified over a filthy mage from Tevinter potentially inquisiting the Inquisitor than the fact that the Inquisitor is a Tal-Vashoth.

It requires the acceptance of the premise that the Inquisitor, the figurehead of a movement, will still run around doing fetch quests after the formation of Haven, when there are so many soldiers and aides around to do these things in their stead.

It transposes a quest that is supposed to be an urgent race against time with the leisurely exploration of large maps that are devoid of interesting nooks and crannies. Crestwood is the only map that shows genuine changes before and after you did your thing there. This isn't an Obsidian or even FromSoftware game, that's for sure, as the open world is more like an offline MMORPG where you are playing all by yourself.

On the whole, the story and premise of the game clash with the open world elements, and parts of it also contradict with past lore without much effort to reconcile things. Also, the whole game is an open world game made by people that don't understand what makes open world games work, and it shows.

As much maligned as Dragon Age 2 is, at least it has a focus and a tighter plot, with the mage Hawke being sort of hand waved by the fact that they are a noble by the second act and money and pedigree buy you privilege and protection. Plus, they and their companions are the only ones able to bring back some order to Kirkwall, and the people appreciate that. Even that horribly dull and hypocritical Sebastian isn't so bad because he is voiced by the delicious Alec Newman. I'll take that game over Inquisition any time.

 

[Lightning]

I think what bothered me most about the Inquisitor as a character is how flat their voice acting is, I heard they picked some fangays to voice him/her so maybe that's why they sound like they're reading lines off a script most of the time? In comparison even nice!Hawke has a more interesting tone to listen to, to say nothing about troll!Hawke or angi!Hawke.

 

[CAPTAIN HAPPY]

Is Solas being a voice in your head some kind of reference to troon lunacy?

 

[Weltraumfürst]

It transposes a quest that is supposed to be an urgent race against time with the leisurely exploration of large maps

To be fair, that's a problem with many BioWare games. In Mass Effect, the main quest is literally called "Race Against Time".

 

[BlankSpaceBaby]

I think what bothered me most about the Inquisitor as a character is how flat their voice acting is, I heard they picked some fangays to voice him/her so maybe that's why they sound like they're reading lines off a script most of the time? In comparison even nice!Hawke has a more interesting tone to listen to, to say nothing about troll!Hawke or angi!Hawke.

Male Hawke is voiced by the delicious Nicholas Boulton. He, Ramon Tikaram (Dorian), Adam Croasdell are some of the voice actors in the business that excel in being theatrical and charismatic while making it all seem so effortless. Boulton makes the poor guy playing Male Inquisitor sound so bland and personality-free... although it's unintentionally amusing when his polite voice is used on a Tal-Vashoth or dwarf.

 

[Sailor Swift]

Male Hawke is voiced by the delicious Nicholas Boulton. He, Ramon Tikaram (Dorian), Adam Croasdell are some of the voice actors in the business that excel in being theatrical and charismatic while making it all seem so effortless. Boulton makes the poor guy playing Male Inquisitor sound so bland and personality-free... although it's unintentionally amusing when his polite voice is used on a Tal-Vashoth or dwarf.

Boulton also does romantic audio books. Just saying.

 

[Ishtar]

The fact is people wanted to play different races in Inquisition, and DA2 was criticized because it limited your options. Open world games were also all the rage IIRC at the time.

So what makes sense IU doesn’t jive with the game’s choices and mechanics. I think they call that ludonarrative dissonance in academic work on video games.

It works more in Origins(the race choice) because you are a grey warden and it’s a blight and you have Duncan and Alistair to vouch for you, as well as the treaties. Whereas in Inquisition, a dwarf or dalish inquisitor has to be squinted away.

Not to mention they only added this option relatively late in development, so you get gems like a dalish inquisitor not knowing who Mythal is, Qunari and dwarf inquisitors get even less attention.

The demands of an rpg clashing with the setting. You see this with Bull to some extent-Sten is a true Qunari through and through, and remains loyal to his people always. He’s also not a very pleasant character to interact with, and he‘s not romance able. Qunari as the lore have established should pretty much never side against the Qun, so you need either very peculiar circumstances like in Origins or a spy sort of plot to even have a Qunari companion at all.

Having played inquisition a few times-I can say the dissonance between gameplay and narrative is even worse with the final Corypheus fight, it’s so casually easy it’s hard to take it seriously at all. Not just because you beat Corypheus throughout the game after Haven, but because you are a level 27 character and the recommended level is 17.

DA2 and Origins both have a greater sense of challenge escalating throughout the game, and a greater sense of urgency. Whereas in Inquisition, you spend dozens of hours on various maps doing dozens of fetch quests and then go back to do main missions. The side content doesn’t enliven or enhance the main story, it completely drowns it out.

 

[Weltraumfürst]

Not just because you beat Corypheus throughout the game after Haven, but because you are a level 27 character and the recommended level is 17.

I think it's just an overall problem with the open world-design, because if you do all side-content before tackling the main quest, you'll inevitably end up severely overleveled, because the game has to account for people who don't.

It's hard to fault BioWare for this, though, because, again, this issue is kind of fundamental in open world-RPGs with a lot of side content, other examples that come to mind would be TW3 and pre-2.0 Cyberpunk. I also have no idea how to solve it. Bethesda-style games have level scaling, but this has its own issues.

 

[Sniperwoof]

Inquisition is too over the top and goofy in its humor. You can really see where the reddit writing started seeping in. Compare that to stuff like this from Origins. A lot of the time less is more, keep it grounded.

 

[Green Kitbash]

Besides all of the story contrivances and issues. Inquisition really made it feel like a wasted effort when you spent 60 to 100 hours getting everyone on your side only for the main bad guy to out of nowhere just show up outside your door. Anti climactic and it just made the whole game feel pointless. Not unlike in Game of Thrones when Arya just offs the Night King.

 

[Divine right to rule]

Besides all of the story contrivances and issues. Inquisition really made it feel like a wasted effort when you spent 60 to 100 hours getting everyone on your side only for the main bad guy to out of nowhere just show up outside your door. Anti climactic and it just made the whole game feel pointless. Not unlike in Game of Thrones when Arya just offs the Night King.

Inquisition has a lot of wasted potential. Corypheus is one of the worst ones. That guy could have given us so much insight into the fade, the maker, old tevinter....
Instead he only has one good scene, his first one in Haven "I saw the throne of the gods and it was empty"

The mechanics of building up Skyhold and the Inquisition are also pointless, they only gate main missions, and Skyhold never even gets besieged.

The only main mission that really nails it is the one in the Orlesian Winter Palace.
It is probably the best single mission in the series.

 

[Ishtar]

Corypheus has a compelling backstory.

Priest of Dumat
At the time he and the other magisters went into the fade the religion of the old gods was declining, so he was disillusioned, this was a man who was genuinely religious and loved Dumat, the chief god of the Imperium.
He gets a vision telling him to go to the golden city from his god, as a devoted follower it’s the most amazing thing he could hope for.
They get there with the other magisters-the city is empty and corrupted. His gods aren’t there, what happened?
He wakes up to find himself villified as one of the arch devils of the new religion.

He concludes that if the old gods either weren’t real or have left-he’s going to become a god, not for the power but because his people deserve one. Because the world needs one.

It parallels Solas in a few ways-demonized by modern religion, his motives were less malevolent than many say. But he was completely wasted.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

I was pissed. All the talk about Empress Celine and it ended up just like that? Winter Palace was my favorite part of Inquisition yes but still. The thing that bothered me was that even the very first part is too much. When it gets to the point that people and devs are telling you that it is better to not do the Hinterlands in its entirety....they should have made it easier to understand. Like I'm pretty sure 'Still in the Hinterlands' is a joke meme now.