Dragon Age: The Veilguard disappointed fans’ expectations. An insider report mentions several reasons why the RPG was destined to fail.
How did Veilguard perform at release? The international press still received Dragon Age Veilguard positively. The RPG currently has a score of 82 out of 100 possible points on Metacritic. However, unlike the press, fans of the series are dissatisfied with the latest installment. On Metacritic, it only has a score of 3.9/10 points, and on Steam it has only a recommendation rate of 69%.
There are several reasons for this. The decisions would have little impact on the gameplay, and the romances would feel forced. Additionally, there is a lack of the serious, dark tone that characterized the previous installments of the series. Furthermore, there are the boring battles and puzzles.
An insider report from Bloomberg reveals that the debacle surrounding Veilguard had already been apparent early on. Journalist Jason Schreier spoke with about 24 BioWare developers of the RPG and summarizes several reasons for its failure.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard changed direction several times
What are the reasons? After the flops of Anthem and Mass Effect: Andromeda, EA is said to have put pressure on the development team of Dragon Age: The Veilguard. The employees were said to be under immense pressure.
There are several reasons for the subpar rating:
- Failures in marketing
- Poor word of mouth
- 10-year gap to the predecessor
- Inconsistencies in the tone of the game
- Time pressure due to voice actor strikes and layoffs at BioWare
- Switch from single-player to multiplayer and back
The shift in the direction of the game contributed significantly to its failure. Initially, EA wanted to turn Dragon Age into a live-service game to generate continuous revenue.
At this point, the development team had to start from scratch. Executive Producer Mark Darrah revealed on YouTube that he wished “this shift had never happened.” There were supposed to be a variety of missions and action-packed fights that could be played with friends. Important characters were not supposed to be able to die.
But this concept was doomed to fail, Darrah said. After the flop of Anthem, the team switched back to single-player and had to restart development from an early stage without receiving additional time for development.
Due to time pressure and the previous multiplayer foundation, there were supposed to be less impactful decisions and limitations in the story.
Additionally, the change in narrative style was noted. Originally, Dragon Age was supposed to have a snappier tone. After Forspoken, which had a similar tone but flopped, the decision was made to forego cheeky jokes. This is said to have led to inconsistencies in dialogue, as conversations were rewritten later.
What happened next? A few months after the flop, there was a restructuring at BioWare. EA distributed the development team across several projects. Shortly thereafter, the head of BioWare also left the studio.
If it were up to EA, then Dragon Age: Veilguard failed for another reason. According to them, the RPG lacked a “shared world” and additional MMO elements. You can read their argument here: EA believes Dragon Age failed because it was not like their last big flop Anthem.
