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

Considering the action shift in the gameplay, and the likely possibility that if present they'd work as in Inquisition, I don't mind at all the lack of those attributes in Veilguard.

It's just my personal opinion, but I see no point in having those in when you have no control over them.

I honestly can't tell if Veilguard is a corridor-action RPG. The last gameplay video is heavily cut and edited, as the prologue was. I am concerned the shift back from the more open world vision of Inquisition (which had its problems) will be closer to ME2/ME3 then Origins, which I'd quite dislike, but it's not something we can assert at the moment. 

I do agree that, due to the timeline from the last game, it's going to be hard for a good number of players to keep track of certain plot elements, even more so new players...but the answers to your question are mostly answered in Origins, outside of how exactly the darkspawn came to be. 

There are enough indications that many plots and secrets will be revealed in this game, though, given the darkspawn seems to be connected with the gods you face in the game, as well as the connections with the 'dragons' you mentioned. 

I think that, regardless of how good or bad the game will turn out to be, the marketing campaign made a disservice to the game, because the release date trailer and the high-level gameplay video, with the fair concerns that could be drawn from them, are better indication of the game then the reveal trailer and first gameplay video. There mere fact that the reveal trailer seem to indicate Rook is recruited in the bar fight (they aren't), and that Varric and Harding are discussing who to recruit in the group to stop the gods (it's Neve that is going to give the protagonist  the contact of the companions to recruit) is baffling, and that's without considering the rest of the issues of the trailer.

I don't see a read problem with the 'roadmap', given that it's not really similar to Star Citizen's. They're simply telling people when expecting the news on the game, and I think the gameplay they shown is enough indication for many to decide to not buy the game, given the changes in the gameplay.

The companions work basically like ME2/ME3, which I dislike. The action shift didn't necessitate them to make the companions a lesser version of the protagonist, combat-wise, but I loved (some) companions in ME2/ME3, so I hope the same could happen with this game.

I think both sides have rabid people that are more similar to fanboys and haters, defending and criticizing the game in an extreme way, while there are many people on both sides that can discuss more rationally the things they like and dislike about it. It's no different from other fanbases.

In Veilguard's case roadmap is for the marketing campaign only. Bioware didn't release any roadmap for the game itself.

I played all three DA games shortly after release and then again after all DLCs and final patches came out. I have not replayed anything since then or read anything apart from Gaider's books.

When I look back now (after 14 years for DAO and 10 years for DAI), the only thing that sticks is more or less cohesive parts of the DAO plot, including dragons, darkspawn, veil, grey wardens, and the Logan/baby/Claudia Black part. Claudia never disappoints, so that is fair. I cannot say what was the plot of DA2 if any and have very fuzzy recollection of DAI plot except that we had to close the rifts all the time by holding E forever due to some mark that we got accidentally due to some messed up whatever in the beginning. Oh, and we had to crawl through some snow for some unknown reason to hear a nice theme song about dawn that comes. The song was good, and music was generally very decent for the most part. Solas being some ancient wolf also sticks but the memory fails to retrieve any interesting details. Overall, DAI plot was the most disjointed, and since I cannot remember the plot of DA2, it was probably OK, just nothing special or memorable.

Memorable companions of all three games include Morrigan, Leliana, and Varric. I fail to recall the names of the rest of them or any intricacies/dramas or even basic plotlines.

With regard to combat, nothing beats the first DAO ogre fight, which was simply brilliant, visually and technically. All the rest combat-wise was generally passable, if primitive and repetitive at times.

Must admit that it is not that bad considering how much time has passed.

I watched some more of the marketing of DAV today and here is something that's been bothering me a bit. Not enough to skip the game, but still.

The talk of the companions and how Bioware is approaching them this game. Particularly in The Making of Dragon Age:The Veilguard Cover Story Feature. There has been a lot of talk this marketing cycle about how Bioware is focusing on the characters more than ever. This could be simple marketing, but I don't know.

They said that DAV felt like instead of the characters where going on adventure with the player it was the opposite. The player is going on an adventure with the characters. That's not really an RPG, that's an adventure game.

The fact that all characters are mandatory signals to me that the story is written in a way that will unfold how Bioware wants. This will inherently cut down on roleplay. My main playthroughs have all turned away several companions in each DA game.

I read this as Bioware wants to tell a story with the characters more in this game than allowing the player to tell a story on their own. It looks closer to ME, which I love, but DA always felt a little different. I liked how they felt different.

That's pretty much my experience. I'm old school rpg material so I never really liked the interim mechanics in these 3d realtime rpgs/adventures: enemies would always yolo through the front without penalty and gang on the mages. I played DAO once because I couldn't stand that. But I played each of the intros - it was a very compelling intro.

This is my personal biggest point of contention with DAV and I flip flop on it from time to time. Sometimes I'm ok with the new direction it's going in, sometimes I'm not. I preferred DA to ME in a lot of aspects and I don't like how DA's distinctiveness is being reduced and brought closer to ME in some design philosophies. Differences are good. DA and ME started out as separate things meant to stay separate in Bioware's new era of having their own IPs instead of licensing. DA was always treated like the red headed step child, despite selling better than ME, and yet it was supposed to be turned into a live service (and I still believe some of the more action oriented gameplay is in part due to that... there's test footage from the BTS video from before the singleplayer reboot that has a warrior moving around like what we saw in the leak and in the high-level warrior gameplay) and now there's a few more things confirmed closer in design to ME.

Regarding the companion stuff, I'd say that's pure marketing fluff. Bioware has done this before, they did it with DAI, where they diminished DA2 and said some stuff about DAO, as well, to prop up DAI, they're doing it now with DAV, diminishing in particular the characters and combat of the previous DA games, they'll likely do it with the next ME game. It comes off kind of unprofessional or at least questionable but it's a combination of marketing and some unfortunate word choices. The whole "we're making great companions now on purpose, not by accident like before" from Game Informer seems to just be unfortunate phrasing on the part of the devs, where they actually may have wanted to say they focused on creating companions that are all integral to the plot instead of some cool companions that ultimately didn't impact the plot at all.

I think light novel is a little extreme, but it does make me wonder if Veilguard is an RPG or an adventure game. In modern games, the lines between adventure games and rpg's has gotten very blurry. I won't even get into western vs Japanese rpg's as that's a whole nother can of worms. However, has there ever been an RPG in which your companions are all uncontrollable?

With western rpg's, typically you define your character, however Bioware is already defining our character by making them a hero. For example, one of the reasons Patrick Weeks gave regarding not allowing Rook to use Blood Magic.

"Blood Magic is unlikely (editor's note: even in future games for player characters) because we've shifted it from a power boost to really being the key to a lot of nasty stuff we aren't interested in having the heroes do."

And continues with'

"...it's just not a road we want the hero to walk right now."

This is a huge red flag to me. Specifically, lack of Blood Magic isn't my issue, the reasoning behind it is. Especially in this day and age, why is Bioware dictating our character for us? That breaks a core RPG element. It really makes me fear for a very generic and possibly preachy adventure awaits. Frankly, I've already had writing concerns from the story scenes in the Gameplay reveal.

I'm sure Veilguard will be fine, not fantastic but fine.
Thing is I'd have to buy a new gaming pc to play it, 1000 euro just for DATV.
I know regret is the main theme of the game but I don't want it to be about my actual bank account.

The definition of an RPG is indeed a subjective matter, but Mass Effect is overall considered an RPG, even if of the action RPG variety, by the community. I can see if you wouldn't consider Veilguard an RPG if you don't consider Mass Effect one, although TW and Bethesda games are also considerd RPGs and have some of the issues you elencated.

I'd also say that some of the things you mention about DA were gone of diluted in DA2/Inquisition as well, especially in regards of the character's stats and non-combat abilities. And it's also fair to point out that DAO was also criticized by some RPG fans because it was a diluted version of the classical RPGs...and if one compared DAO to their previous RPGs it's not a stretch to say that DA from the start diluted or streamlined certain RPG elements of the past. 

Some of the things that you mention about DA might still be in Veilguard. I don't think the conversations with companions will be less then past games (indications are that there might be more interactions), they clearly stated that there'll still be some big explorable areas, and I think the faction/background will influence how you're see by others.

oof, i hope all the helmets are dope and kissing animations out of this world that they needed to make qunari just humans with horns instead of modeling unique heads