Dragon Age Dragon Age: The Veilguard Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Rev]

Don't even touch the sequels, tho, they're both terrible.

DA2 is miles better than DAI.

I agree that Inquisition is even worse, but DA II is still awful.

 

[Wilian]

At least DA2 got us memes.

 

[Alienman]

Be honest with me: was Origins actually good? I (please be merciful) actually enjoyed Mass Effect 1 and 2 upon their release (I'm kinda scared to revisit them), but passed on DAO to have my opinions on Bioware obliterated by the back-to-back jokes that were Dragon Age II and Mass Effect 3.

DA:O is probably the last good BioWare rpg, it's also probably the one with the higher reactivity they've ever done (then again, BioWare games never featured much reactivity, not even BG2 which is without a doubt the best game they've made).
It has too many trash mob in some sections (the Deep Roads above all), the monster/enemy variety is very limited and design encounter is meh as well, allowing you to use the same tactics in pretty much every fight and win easily, but aside from that I think it's a pretty good game.
Don't even touch the sequels, tho, they're both terrible.

I liked Deep Roads. It actually felt like they place they were talking about in the city. Expansive with tunnels that goes on and on forever crawling with beasts all over the place. I really enjoyed that dungeon crawling section.

 

[Rev]

I liked Deep Roads. It actually felt like they place they were talking about in the city. Expansive with tunnels that goes on and on forever crawling with beasts all over the place. I really enjoyed that dungeon crawling section.

I wouldn't have disliked the Deep Roads so much, if it wasn't just the same trash mobs over and over again. But since it was just legion of the same monsters and nothing else to do, it became boring very quickly.

 

[Roguey]

I liked Deep Roads. It actually felt like they place they were talking about in the city. Expansive with tunnels that goes on and on forever crawling with beasts all over the place. I really enjoyed that dungeon crawling section.

I feel like they could have made this point without putting you into a 5 hour dungeon where you kill nearly 500 enemies.

 

[Alienman]

That area just clicked with me. Hearing about it throughout the story, and then finally going there and seeing how god damn huge and perilous it was. Thought it felt pretty epic and is one of the best parts with the game in my opinion. It also had this aura of mystery and dread.

 

[vivec]

Be honest with me: was Origins actually good? I (please be merciful) actually enjoyed Mass Effect 1 and 2 upon their release (I'm kinda scared to revisit them), but passed on DAO to have my opinions on Bioware obliterated by the back-to-back jokes that were Dragon Age II and Mass Effect 3.

Let me give you a straight one. Yes, Origins is good for the starters and almost until 50-70% in. After that, you will catch up how it is utter crap. What is wrong with it? It's the encounter design that starts to become glaringly obvious as a cut-paste job. Then the enemy variety hits you as lacking and finally you realize that you have been using MMO tactics all the way through by having a tank control the aggro and the mage to debuff the enemies and the rogue to DPS.

 

[Lagole Gon]

Deep Roads would be a bit less painful without the dorf gang dungeon just before it. Everything has to be a dungeon in this game.
A haunted house? It's actually a mini dungeon made from several houses.
A cult in a sleepy village? There's a big dungeon underneath it, more populous than the village itself.

 

[BrotherFrank]

Be honest with me: was Origins actually good? I (please be merciful) actually enjoyed Mass Effect 1 and 2 upon their release (I'm kinda scared to revisit them), but passed on DAO to have my opinions on Bioware obliterated by the back-to-back jokes that were Dragon Age II and Mass Effect 3.

This topic was bought up in shoutbox earlier and people who commented seemed pretty divided as to whether DA:O was good or not.

Personally I will stand by DA:O being a really decent rpg (i even liked the deep roads so backing up alienman on this..im dead serious, its the circle mage tower fade section that i hated even though it had less thrash mobs and you could blitz it in about 30 mins) , and out of the all the recent bioware games, it's the one with the biggest modding community by far which adds to its value imo. It ain't quite neverwinter nights level (especially in terms of player created campaigns, or at least i've yet to play one) but it's definitely got the biggest mod scene out of any bioware game post nwn.

 

[Roguey]

Deep Roads would be a bit less painful without the dorf gang dungeon just before it. Everything has to be a dungeon in this game.
A haunted house? It's actually a mini dungeon made from several houses.
A cult in a sleepy village? There's a big dungeon underneath it, more populous than the village itself.

The Infinity Engine is only good for combat crawling and conversation.

 

[RepHope]

The Deep Roads were tedious, but I felt like they did a good job at conveying how massive they were built up to be, as well as showing you how utterly fucked the Dwarves are.

It’s the Fade that’s truly awful. Bioware has never done a good job at making the Fade feel mysterious and interesting. Every single time you go there you know before hand that you’re going into the Fade, and even if you didn’t that ugly ass green filter gives it away. Demons are just retarded mooks instead of the tempters they’re made out to be. Every Fade map is ugly and boring instead of wondrous and terrifying like a Dream/Spirit world should be. They didn’t even put the Black City in DAI or at least I couldn’t fucking see it.

The only time I’ve liked the Fade was in the Mage Origin. It was quick and they at least tried to have an intelligent demon.

 

[Delterius]

Be honest with me: was Origins actually good? I (please be merciful) actually enjoyed Mass Effect 1 and 2 upon their release (I'm kinda scared to revisit them), but passed on DAO to have my opinions on Bioware obliterated by the back-to-back jokes that were Dragon Age II and Mass Effect 3.

RPG Codex Game of the Year 2009

• A generic but well designed, well thought-through world;
• A generic threat that's merely a background; the game is more about you dealing with different factions than about you stopping the Blight;
• Very detailed character system with some flaws;
• Tactical combat wasted on filler encounters;
• Standard party members setup with all the banter and drama you can expect, but this time you can kill a lot more party members, which is a must-have feature in a Bioware game;
• Truly excellent quest choices and options sandwiched between a linear and not overly interesting beginning and an anticlimatic ending.

 

[BrotherFrank]

They didn’t even put the Black City in DAI or at least I couldn’t fucking see it.

Aaah yeah, the black city floating in the distance, always out of reach yet promising all sorts of untold mysteries was the only good thing about the fade, and pretty much the only piece of lore that might tempt me to revisit the setting. Well let's be real, bioware would probably fuck that up too, you'd get inside and there would be some mysterious god child offering u 3 choices and it will be me3 ending all over again. I guess maybe some things are just best left unexplained.

 

[Falksi]

Deep Roads? Did you chaps play on Nightmare? I thought some of the encounters on Nightmare felt anything but copy-paste. Some very well designed & thought out. Didn't drag for me either, felt like I was genuinely going stupidly deep underground, and may not return.

Be honest with me: was Origins actually good? I (please be merciful) actually enjoyed Mass Effect 1 and 2 upon their release (I'm kinda scared to revisit them), but passed on DAO to have my opinions on Bioware obliterated by the back-to-back jokes that were Dragon Age II and Mass Effect 3.

Origins is fucking briliant.

Like anything you can pick flaws with it. They're largely irrelevant though because, as an overall experience, DA:O is just fucking lush.

Great characters; great banter; I personally loved the combat and thought it was a superb evolution of previous games to both appease hardcore RPGers & open it up to casuals in the process; wonderfully fucking absorbing music; choices & dialogue options which were both significant and drew you in, with the illusion of choice being very well hidden amongst actual choice; great lore etc.

Buy it, play it, thrive on it. I personally found it a bit boring for 15 or so hours, and the first playthrough around a 7/10. But my subsequent playthrough's on harder levels with different choices were each 9/10 several times over.

A genuine sequel, which took DA:O's foundations, alien-ized the world slightly, modded the combat slightly, and gave us more of what Origins did would be the best thing Bioware could do.

 

[Delterius]

Deep Roads? Did you chaps play on Nightmare?

that depends

how many mages did you bring along

 

[Falksi]

Deep Roads? Did you chaps play on Nightmare?

that depends

how many mages did you bring along

Tried various combos on several playthroughs. Yeah latter ones got boring when I knew how to cake-walk them, but that's just coz I knew the patterns. Every game's gonna reach that point inevitably. Doesn't make it a badly designed game.

 

[Delterius]

Deep Roads? Did you chaps play on Nightmare?

that depends

how many mages did you bring along

Tried various combos on several playthroughs. Yeah latter ones got boring when I knew how to cake-walk them, but that's just coz I knew the patterns. Every game's gonna reach that point inevitably. Doesn't make it a badly designed game.

No I mean, mages are really overpowered.

Its an old meme in DA:O. If someone complains X fight is too hard, they often don't have any mages with them.

 

[Xeon]

I beat it on Nightmare with Wynn/Alister/Whoever appropriate for more dialogue/quest. I think the only must have companion is Wynn, she is the only healer iirc unless you are one, she is also missable.

I did add breakable chests for of the mods so I don't have to rely on thief that much.

 

[Lagole Gon]

Deep Roads would be a bit less painful without the dorf gang dungeon just before it. Everything has to be a dungeon in this game.
A haunted house? It's actually a mini dungeon made from several houses.
A cult in a sleepy village? There's a big dungeon underneath it, more populous than the village itself.

The Infinity Engine is only good for combat crawling and conversation.

Oh, I have another one. During the mage origin part, you have to kill spiders in a pantry or whatever. And the pantry is a big cave dungeon. And it's not underground, it's somewhere in the tower.

Wizard did it!

 

[Space Satan]

BG2
Freaking hard enemy party. Solution - Wizard
Dragon: Soluition - Wizard
Huge mob of low-level enemies: Solution - Wizard
Final Boss: Solution - Wizard
Vampires: Solution - Wizard
Enemy Wizards: Solution - Wizard

 

[Mark Richard]

That area just clicked with me. Hearing about it throughout the story, and then finally going there and seeing how god damn huge and perilous it was. Thought it felt pretty epic and is one of the best parts with the game in my opinion. It also had this aura of mystery and dread.

The history of the dwarves was more interesting to me. Here's a people who've been fighting for their very existence while their culture has stagnated and their traditions have throttled their chances of survival. They're more interested in reclaiming symbolic relics than targeting Darkspawn nests, or producing historians to preserve their former glory rather than scientists to preserve their future (and cure the infertility problem). Forging alliances and trade routes with the surface is vital, yet dwarves who venture outside are considered outcasts. This portrayal of the dwarves isn't new, but in an RPG we're finally given the opportunity to push them in the right direction. #bhelenforking

The moment the Darkspawn are driven below, the surface world congratulates itself when all they've really done is put newspaper over a puddle of piss. Only Dwarf Wardens even have the option of asking the human king/queen to support the dwarves with an army.

 

[Falksi]

BG2
Freaking hard enemy party. Solution - Wizard
Dragon: Soluition - Wizard
Huge mob of low-level enemies: Solution - Wizard
Final Boss: Solution - Wizard
Vampires: Solution - Wizard
Enemy Wizards: Solution - Wizard

Another reason PoE is da best.

 

[Storyfag]

Deep Roads would be a bit less painful without the dorf gang dungeon just before it. Everything has to be a dungeon in this game.
A haunted house? It's actually a mini dungeon made from several houses.
A cult in a sleepy village? There's a big dungeon underneath it, more populous than the village itself.

The Infinity Engine is only good for combat crawling and conversation.

Oh, I have another one. During the mage origin part, you have to kill spiders in a pantry or whatever. And the pantry is a big cave dungeon. And it's not underground, it's somewhere in the tower.

Wizard did it!

The tower, of all places, is implied to be huge. But the game is indeed crammed full of dungeons too big for their environs.

 

[Delterius]

A cult in a sleepy village? There's a big dungeon underneath it, more populous than the village itself.

I don't think that one is a thing, though.

 

[Theldaran]

I'm sure that if Inquisition had released in 2015, Twitcher 3 would have shat all over it, prompting the accelerated demise of Bioware that we may see with DA4... it would have been another Andromeda case.

But history was forgiving.