Dragon Age Dragon Age: The Veilguard Thread

[Raghar]

I have never played Anthem or Andromeda. Are they worth having a look?

I am dead.

I hope they never stop producing these slops, holy shit. I am ENTERTAINED, thank you Bioware.

It's better without that laugh mixed into the audio.

 

[Elttharion]

As I've said this game concurrent player numbers are GREAT for a indie/AA game. For a AAA game developed in a decade, is trash.

Kingdom Come deliverance got 90k peak players.

gamalytic estimates 536.5k unity solds > https://gamalytic.com/game/1845910

It is a mediocre launch so far but personally I will wait until the end of the weekend to gravedance.

 

[Cryomancer]

• Flashy but very ineffective spells,
• 3 abilities only, in NwN1, I could have F1~F12 full of abilities + CTRL F1~F12 + Shift F1~F12
• Melee combat has no impact
• Enemeis are bullet sponges
• No blood magic
• Spells scale with your weapon which is nonsensical. Every Bioware fantasy RPG before DA2 didn't had it
• In place of blood magic, the WORST necromancy ever, with no OHK spells like BG1/2 finger of death nor animate dead style spells.
• Character creation. The game has the mindset that "straight sexuality" is heresy and everything "queer" is "progress". You can't make busty woman for eg but can make a busty woman that removed her breasts,
• Awful writing full of cringe compilations
• Awful Fallout 4 style dialog wheel
• Zero reactivity
• Companions are boring
• You can't do ""evil things"". In Origins, I could offer a child possessed by a demon in a deal with a demon in exchange of blood magic. In this game, I can't do anything bad.
• The tone is too Disney.
  (...)

Good job bioware, you did it. You brought everything that sucks in modern games into a single product.

 

[Xorazm]

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous"

Oh, it's not just romances. He does it all. the. fucking. time. Looking into the distance? Hero pose. Telling a teammate their new haircut looks amazeballs? Hero pose. Standing in line trying to decide what to do order at Wendys? Hero ... well, you get the idea.

It's one of the incalculable number of things that might not notice the first time ... or the second time ... but once you do, all these things start adding into an immersion shattering experience. Same way you notice characters using modern slang, once or twice is odd, over and over and you feel like you're in a BO drenched writer's room, not a fantasy world.

Again, if this was some indie or AA studio, who cares, you get a pass. I've pushed through plenty of indies that had straight up spelling errors - they brought the gameplay, they brought the heart.

But if you have no gameplay, no heart, and no soul, everything wrong stands out like someone barved all the floor.

 

[salaciousbcrumb]

Every romance-affirming line Rook makes reads exactly the same. They're variations of "I'm here for you / you're interesting / you're a really fun person / I couldn't do this without your help / I care about you more than you realise". Even AI girfriends have more interesting things to say to keep you hooked.

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous". I get that everyone has a very limited number of poses here outside of cutscenes, but that little feature just makes Rook seem even more like the unbearable milquetoast hero caricature. Christ, what an abomination of a main character. He has no personality beyond that of your supportive but professionally distant therapist.

Now onwards to the next one...

So hang on, in a fantasy RPG romance simulator we are offered the choice of trannies and Chinese elves with saggy small tits? Can't they magic push up bras and tesla cars into their medieval fantasy, since they have dragons and orcs and californian trannies and everything.

Not a breast man myself but I really find saggy small tits a turn off. I guess that is why Bioware designed their character like this because they are freaks and want to "normalize," freakishness. Most other games just have ghouls and zombie females with these defective breasts.

 

[Skinwalker]

You can't make busty woman for eg but can make a busty woman that removed her breasts,

I don't even know what this means, and at this point I'm afraid to ask.

 

[Larianshill]

Every romance-affirming line Rook makes reads exactly the same. They're variations of "I'm here for you / you're interesting / you're a really fun person / I couldn't do this without your help / I care about you more than you realise". Even AI girfriends have more interesting things to say to keep you hooked.

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous". I get that everyone has a very limited number of poses here outside of cutscenes, but that little feature just makes Rook seem even more like the unbearable milquetoast hero caricature. Christ, what an abomination of a main character. He has no personality beyond that of your supportive but professionally distant therapist.

Now onwards to the next one...

So hang on, in a fantasy RPG romance simulator we are offered the choice of trannies and Chinese elves with saggy small tits? Can't they magic push up bras and tesla cars into their medieval fantasy, since they have dragons and orcs and californian trannies and everything.

Not a breast man myself but I really find saggy small tits a turn off. I guess that is why Bioware designed their character like this because they are freaks and want to "normalize," freakishness. Most other games just have ghouls and zombie females with these defective breasts.

The point is to demoralize and disgust you, a man.

 

[Cryomancer]

I don't even know what this means, and at this point I'm afraid to ask.

Simple. You can make a THEY/THEM that removed they/them breasts and have surgery scars but can't make a woman before she did it because "muh male gaze".

 

[jaekl]

Every romance-affirming line Rook makes reads exactly the same. They're variations of "I'm here for you / you're interesting / you're a really fun person / I couldn't do this without your help / I care about you more than you realise". Even AI girfriends have more interesting things to say to keep you hooked.

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous". I get that everyone has a very limited number of poses here outside of cutscenes, but that little feature just makes Rook seem even more like the unbearable milquetoast hero caricature. Christ, what an abomination of a main character. He has no personality beyond that of your supportive but professionally distant therapist.

Now onwards to the next one...

So hang on, in a fantasy RPG romance simulator we are offered the choice of trannies and Chinese elves with saggy small tits? Can't they magic push up bras and tesla cars into their medieval fantasy, since they have dragons and orcs and californian trannies and everything.

Not a breast man myself but I really find saggy small tits a turn off. I guess that is why Bioware designed their character like this because they are freaks and want to "normalize," freakishness. Most other games just have ghouls and zombie females with these defective breasts.

They think that if they can brainwash every man on earth into wanting to bang gross chicks with repulsive personalities, they can finally get a boyfriend. It will all be worth it.

 

[Tytus]

I finally played long enough to find the first area that actually feels explorable: Treviso, a city in Antiva. It has districts, branching paths, etc. – the kind of thing this game should really feature more of. Unfortunately, parts of the city are level-gated, so while it’s more intricate, it’s essentially wasted, since you’re still forced to stick to pre-set paths. Try to go elsewhere at level 10, and you’re faced with a level 25 boss and can do little about it. You can only fuck off and do something else.

But the worst part of that city? The dialogue. It all feels like placeholder lines – a first draft written with the intent to polish later, but they never did. Not only is the dialogue heavy with exposition, constantly repeating information, but it also completely lacks any… pizzazz. Old Bioware could write dialogue well enough that you wanted to hear what characters had to say. Here, everything sounds flat. Did they fire all their writers or something? (The dialogue in other parts of the game was not much better, but here it was just abysmal)

The game’s also been streamlined to death, like it’s targeting people with no attention span. For instance, say you find a piece of gear that’s for a companion who isn’t currently with you. The game notifies you of the item, for whom it’s intended, and with a press of “Y” you can equip it on that companion right then and there, even though they’re not present. Combine this with the auto-equip option, and inventory management is basically gone. In DAO you could put the same gear you had on your companions (if they had the same class etc.). I miss those times.

Companion interactions have also been streamlined. There’s no more walking around your camp/ship to see if someone has something to say. Now, you get a notification that “Character X wants to talk.” You go to where they’re sitting, and as soon as you approach, a cutscene triggers. If you visit them without the notification, you can’t talk to them at all. In theory, I should like this because it “saves time,” but it makes companions feel lifeless. I’d rather hear that Garrus is “in the middle of some calibrations” than know that nobody will say anything unless I get a cutscene notification.


And when it comes to main and side quests, the dialogue keeps circling back to the same topic. You go to help the Crows in their fight against an occupation by a Qunari splinter group, but all you can talk about is elven gods. Elven gods. The gods in every sentence. Yet, on the other hand, no one ever says, “LISTEN! WE HAVE NO PROOF THOSE GODS EVEN EXIST, AND IF THEY DO, WE HAVE NO PROOF THEY ARE WORKING WITH THE OCCUPATION FORCE, SINCE ALL OF THIS HAPPENED BEFORE YOUR SO-CALLED GODS GOT LOOSE. BRING US PROOF!” Nope. Everyone believes whatever you say at face value. The way the city was captured is equally absurd; it’s like no one involved in the game even skimmed a page on siege warfare or medieval logistics.

The writers seem to have picked up the detail that Antiva has no standing army but interpreted it as “Antiva has no army.” That’s not the same thing. No standing army means they rely on militias, mercenaries, and citizen-soldiers. Instead, a Qunari splinter group waltzed right in.

Enemy variety, or rather the lack of it, hit me really hard at some point. There’s a recruitment mission where you need to recruit Lucanis from a lab experimenting with putting demons into corpses to create slave-soldiers. You first encounter failed experiments (shambling corpses), Lucanis even comments on that these are the failed experiments. Then, when you face the “successful” experiments, the other companion shouts, “WHAT KIND OF DEMONS ARE THESE?!” Except… they’re the same demons you’ve been fighting this whole time throughout the game, just with more health. It feels like they had planned unique enemy models and even recorded dialogue to match, but never actually made them.

When it comes to quests, there’s a really strange quirk in the game. For example, in Mass Effect 2, if you go on Garrus' recruitment mission, you can still bring two other companions with you. Garrus will be there as an additional character, assisting you in the background. Here, however, if you go on a recruitment mission, you can only bring one other companion, since you need to keep a slot open for the character you’re recruiting. …Why? It feels so odd. (It was like that when I had to recruit Lucanis)

The puzzles also get dumber as they go on, but this was to be expected, worse they turn onto busy work. Destroy three things to unblock the door. You can feel your brain dying doing them.

Shops are odd, too. They sell both “style” items (apparently for transmog) and actual gear. But style items cost the same as gear. The first time I bought a helmet, I was confused – it wasn’t equippable because it was a style item. I haven’t experimented with transmogrification yet, but I can’t see why they felt the need to split it like this.

The models for Qunari splinter group army are awful as well. In Dragon Age II, they looked decent. Now, every Qunari in Treviso is barefoot, dressed only in underwear and helmets. Just odd.

There are also other nonsensical details, like “spirit refugees” who need to warm themselves by a fire… even though they’re spirits. Did they really want to have a refugee theme in their game but did not know where to put it?

Or get this: As the player, you can see a purple guy (Lucanis' demon stuck inside him), but your character doesn’t. So, you have these super dramatic scenes between Lucanis and his demon, but then you’re supposed to role-play as if you don’t know what’s going on. …Why? Who thought this was a good idea?

I chose the Grey Warden background, hoping it would offer interesting dialogue options, especially with the return of Darkspawn. But in the eight hours I’ve played (according to EA’s app), I’ve had only one meaningful choice tied to this background and one dialogue line to pick myself. The rest of the time, it’s been thoughts as the protagonist arranges relics in their room and… not much else.


If I encountered so much crap during these 8 hours, I dread what still yet to come.

 

[Tyranicon]

Top-tier cope just dropped:

Bro, you got Stockholm'ed.

 

[salaciousbcrumb]

Every romance-affirming line Rook makes reads exactly the same. They're variations of "I'm here for you / you're interesting / you're a really fun person / I couldn't do this without your help / I care about you more than you realise". Even AI girfriends have more interesting things to say to keep you hooked.

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous". I get that everyone has a very limited number of poses here outside of cutscenes, but that little feature just makes Rook seem even more like the unbearable milquetoast hero caricature. Christ, what an abomination of a main character. He has no personality beyond that of your supportive but professionally distant therapist.

Now onwards to the next one...

So hang on, in a fantasy RPG romance simulator we are offered the choice of trannies and Chinese elves with saggy small tits? Can't they magic push up bras and tesla cars into their medieval fantasy, since they have dragons and orcs and californian trannies and everything.

Not a breast man myself but I really find saggy small tits a turn off. I guess that is why Bioware designed their character like this because they are freaks and want to "normalize," freakishness. Most other games just have ghouls and zombie females with these defective breasts.

The point is to demoralize and disgust you, a man.

I don't see that. I just think Bioware is overrun by freaks who are self inserting themselves into AAA games and living "their best life," through their own scripted shite.

Nobody in reality wants a saggy ugly small titted woman who jibbers on and won't shut up.

I mean Ben Affleck was the most miserable man in the world when he had JLO jibbering at him and she was hot and he was as leftist as she was and a millionare A list actor.

So Bioware is basically AAA tumblr. They would be better embracing their identity as a degenerate, furry, rule 34, incel (FBI WATCHLIST) content producer, made by freaks for freaks.. Trying to make their game have gameplay is seriously cramping their style.

 

[damager]

WTF! The post credit scene is one big fuck you to DA fans.

NIGGA WHAT DO YOU MEAN? I ALREADY QUOTED IT ONES FROM THE OLD THREAD AN ASKED!

 

[salaciousbcrumb]

Every romance-affirming line Rook makes reads exactly the same. They're variations of "I'm here for you / you're interesting / you're a really fun person / I couldn't do this without your help / I care about you more than you realise". Even AI girfriends have more interesting things to say to keep you hooked.

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous". I get that everyone has a very limited number of poses here outside of cutscenes, but that little feature just makes Rook seem even more like the unbearable milquetoast hero caricature. Christ, what an abomination of a main character. He has no personality beyond that of your supportive but professionally distant therapist.

Now onwards to the next one...

So hang on, in a fantasy RPG romance simulator we are offered the choice of trannies and Chinese elves with saggy small tits? Can't they magic push up bras and tesla cars into their medieval fantasy, since they have dragons and orcs and californian trannies and everything.

Not a breast man myself but I really find saggy small tits a turn off. I guess that is why Bioware designed their character like this because they are freaks and want to "normalize," freakishness. Most other games just have ghouls and zombie females with these defective breasts.

They think that if they can brainwash every man on earth into wanting to bang gross chicks with repulsive personalities, they can finally get a boyfriend. It will all be worth it.

No self respecting man would play this though, so it's an epic fail. They are only preaching to the perverted.

 

[Padzi]

Yeah, this is what I'm searching in fantasy.

 

[shimadamada]

Personally I think the signs were there earlier but w/e

DA 2 was a bad game, but it wasn't the worst storywise.

DA2 story was "Homo wizard tries to destroy the world due to muh opression, thus proving the Templars right."

Based story proving all mages are homosexual demon-worshipping terrorists. I doubt Gaydar intended it like this though.

DA2 had an entire middle chapter dedicated to wiping out a group of immigrants who belong to a quasi totalitarian religion which demands total submission to it's precepts and has a death sentence for apostates as well as having a secret (or not so secret) expansionist agenda. This is contrasted to Hawke who is also an immigrant/refugee but loyal to the city that accepted him.

That's pretty based in my opinion and a story like that would be impossible to do for a triple A studio in the current year.

 

[Odoryuk]

Can anyone explain the pushups thing to me? I'm seeing it everywhere now

 

[jaekl]

Every romance-affirming line Rook makes reads exactly the same. They're variations of "I'm here for you / you're interesting / you're a really fun person / I couldn't do this without your help / I care about you more than you realise". Even AI girfriends have more interesting things to say to keep you hooked.

And Rook takes that annoying heroic pose with the arms on his sides in nearly every conversation when he says something positive or "humorous". I get that everyone has a very limited number of poses here outside of cutscenes, but that little feature just makes Rook seem even more like the unbearable milquetoast hero caricature. Christ, what an abomination of a main character. He has no personality beyond that of your supportive but professionally distant therapist.

Now onwards to the next one...

So hang on, in a fantasy RPG romance simulator we are offered the choice of trannies and Chinese elves with saggy small tits? Can't they magic push up bras and tesla cars into their medieval fantasy, since they have dragons and orcs and californian trannies and everything.

Not a breast man myself but I really find saggy small tits a turn off. I guess that is why Bioware designed their character like this because they are freaks and want to "normalize," freakishness. Most other games just have ghouls and zombie females with these defective breasts.

They think that if they can brainwash every man on earth into wanting to bang gross chicks with repulsive personalities, they can finally get a boyfriend. It will all be worth it.

No self respecting man would play this though, so it's an epic fail. They are only preaching to the perverted.

Yeah but when they started doing it, a lot of us still played these new big budget games. As more and more men start to get too annoyed to keep buying fat chick propaganda, it's clear that their plan has ultimately failed and is having an opposite effect even.

So sad! Time to order a new vibrator, ladies.

 

[kigmathelm]

Boys, we broke the concurrent record again. Third day in a row. New wave of incline is coming and its going to be fabulous like Morrigan new titties.

 

[Padzi]

Can anyone explain the pushups thing to me? I'm seeing it everywhere now

When you write something that Codex absolutely hates, you do 10 push ups.
To think more about your mistakes.

 

[The people of Duckburg]

A while back someone posted what seemed to be a quote from the writer, director or whatever, saying that the pushup thing was supposed to be a humiliation ritual for getting someone's pronouns wrong. Was that a real quote from whichever dev it was?

 

[damager]

I'm mean shouldn't that asshole take care of that grey beard shining through his skin before he cuts off his dick?

WTF bro

 

[Odoryuk]

Can anyone explain the pushups thing to me? I'm seeing it everywhere now

When you write something that Codex absolutely hates, you do 10 push ups.
To think more about your mistakes.

But who is this Codex guy?

 

[shimadamada]

 

[Larianshill]

But who is this Codex guy?

This guy.