Dragon Age The Veilguard Criticism Thread (formerly Skepticism Thread) [Spoilers]

Wasn’t around when DA II launched. Was the reception similar to this game?

Way way worst.
This is all tame.

Either way it's the third or fourth time, Rook said to Davrin "Turlum, DAvrin, Perhaps It mEANS You TWo Should HaVE Faith In One Another"
Yeah Rook keep on saying the same old thing over and over perhaps DAvrin will take a hint.

I can't believe it. Don't they have editor to catch when you're repeating things over and over.

Possibly related is this 2022 extract from Weekes' blog, which is written as an internal dialogue between different parts of their psyche. Note that I think they are talking about their books, not their game writing:

Source: patrickweekes.com/2022/07/15/of-gender-and-genre/

Venting this here. Not really a spoiler, but it could color your opinion (if so, welcome to your very first online message board! I'm hookntackle.)

I don't like Neve. Yet.
That really is a bummer cause she used to be the character I found most intriguing (you cannot overdo the noir detective cliché for me). When I listened to the podcast, I figured it was because the whole thing was maybe more rushed and unusual; but I just do not get her voice direction at all. Hard-boiled sure, aloof even, but her delivery is downright disinterested and for lack of a better word, detached. Which is inconventiently amplified to infinity by being directly next to high-energy-Harding and hyper-energy-Bellara, during the phase we're you're getting to know them all. To illustrate this further, Bellara can be annoying - because of the type of person she is. The acting works perfectly as intended. With Neve, I feel like something is "off". Clearly one hears the actress is a trained performer, but it seems like the director figured this would be "signature" thing for her to double down on. To me, it often feels like a continuity slip rather than "flair".

It's annoying in the same 4th wall kind of way as when in DAI everyone in a single conversation would read Thom Rainier's name wrong, yet completely differently, too.

Redditors don't represent the majority. Inquisition did sell very well on consoles (more so than  on PC). But It also had much better player reception and overall more hype

Some of the questions and options are ridiculous

Ha, way worse. You know when this skepticism thread was at its worst before the mods intervened? Imagine the whole forum being that way.

Even the few friends who played and loved Origins despised 2 and wouldn't even bother humoring me to discuss it.

I've been playing since Thursday evening on PS and wrapped up the game with 37 hours. Played on story difficulty and didn't explode everything, but has done ~ 85% or all quests. My critique so far:

1. Writing-wise, for me it was a game of contrasts. Every conversation with Solas is top notch, as is the main storyline and it's pacing. Harding, Emmrich, Bellara companion arcs compliment story and lore nicely. I really enjoyed Gray Wardens side quests. On the other hand, we have abysmal moments when I cringed SO HARD. Most of it in relation to Taash. Gosh, she has the coolest qunari woman design even, but every time she speaks I want to press skip. It got to a point that she is the only companion whose story arc I didn't finish, because I couldn't handle hearing her dialogues. Idk what is says either of me as a person, or of the quality of writing, She has no hook whatsoever beside being an angsty, obnoxious teenager. Baffling, that Weeks has produced both her and Solas.

2. Rook as a character is both inconsistent and bland. No matter what you choose, it's most of the times positively neutral. Purple options is a fucking trolling: non of them are funny, rarely sarcastic. I can't understand HOW they didn't include property angry and emotional dialogue options, especially since the whole narrative is about the ending of the world.

3. Often I felt there was a disconnection between main story and what has been happening in Lighthouse with companions. You travel to location, see the blight, suffering, you can feel the stakes are high (especially in Anderfels). Then you go back to your homebase, and companions are planning a camping trip to Fereldan and actually take it. What the hell. Why do you cheapen their arcs?

4. Mission and level design has some fundamental issues. Half of the quests are: get a quest, go to the location, do something 3 times, return for reward. More enjoyable puzzles are kind of an exception (loved level with lst Solas statue for the murals), a lot of time (and I kid you not) it's bring the rock that's 10 meters away and open the door. Whoever decided that it's okay to arrange a conversation as a separate quest you need to travel to, instead of old fade to black screen, needs to be put in the cone of shame. Imagine the frustration when it happens frequently, you don't have a shortcut for a journal as it's nested in main map, and you need to manually do it every single time .

5. Armors are ugly. There, I've said it. whoever designed mourn watch stuff must really hate fashion. It's the stuff from the Alien movie.

6. UX/UI decisions were baffling and a nuisance. As I predicted, these disclaimers that pop up on the left when you take a decision are both: 1) distracting, as often your reading is interrupted as cutscene ends. 2) often do not reflect what Rook has said 3) spoil consequences quite a bit. It's a if someone thought "huh, we need to show them that we have a system tracking your replies and impacting future events". It has zero information weight, as it mostly reaffirm what has just been said and paraphrases it that you go "huh?"

7. They mistranslated Lavellan elven words. This one hurt, because how ending was executed was far from ideal, but actually following lore you previously established would give her words more grace.

Did they actually say Ferelden?

Andromeda-like design was my first hint that this game was not for me.