Dragon Age: The Veilguard Hands-On - A Cure for Tiresome Open Worlds

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a massive game and step forward for the series. Its design is thoughtful, the moment to moment gameplay exhilarating, and full of spectacle around every corner. For many, this will not only be a return to form for BioWare but a level up. 

Before going further, check out the above video to see much of what I’m discussing here in-motion and a bunch of other features like the character creator, views of the class skill trees, the companion skill trees, and a whole lot more. 

Instead of describing combat to you, we have a few videos showing off different levels of Veilguard’s gameplay. We have one focused on the Warrior class showing early combat, one on the Mage class showing a more intermediate look at combat, and then we have a video on Rogue combat that shows what a well-crafted higher character can do. 

In all, there’s about an hour’s worth of footage to take in if you want to see what Veilguard is all about. 

As I write this, I am keeping in mind my interview with Game Director Corinne Busche. In that interview, we discuss the design philosophy behind how they handle player choice and just how much it permeates the entire game. BioWare’s approach really shows up in every aspect of the game. 

I encourage you to read that interview as a companion piece to this, as it talks a lot more about important player choices, dialogue choices, and relationships with companions. The amount of effectual choices you can make is truly impressive. 

Just as the choices you make in the story and the relationships you’ll make in the game are vast and varied, so too are the options for you to play the game just as you want. Your toolbox when it comes to combat is humongous.     

Veilguard’s Skill Trees Encourage Experimentation 

The skill trees for the various classes have a staggering amount of variety and nuance to them.  Each tree has a few defined paths to specializations, which in themselves are great, but there’s a lot of things on the margins for you to take in as well. 

One thing to note is that Veilguard has a level cap of 50, and while I haven’t counted them, there’s definitely well over 100 nodes in the skill tree to make your build. So, there’s a lot of freedom to do what you want with a build. 

What it also means is that the trees were designed with the knowledge that you won’t be able to fill out even most of it, so they are filled with a bunch of strategic decisions to build something unique to your playstyle. 

In just the Warrior alone, you can build something around parrying, around shield throwing, around two handed weapons, a lifestealing build, and man so much more. I wish I had studied the trees a little closer as there’s so much there. 

In fact, the developers said at the preview event I attended that the finetuning of the trees has been a big focus of Veilguard’s development with the hope that people can outsmart the developers. 

For example, they mentioned that someone playtesting the game was able to make a shield-throwing Warrior build that could more or less one shot bosses. That of course needed to be tuned down some, but they’re excited at the prospect of what people will be able to do. 

Even with my limited time messing with it, I can already see that a popular post in Dragon Age communities and social media  will be showing off crazy builds and the combos you can pull off. 

The best part of the skill tree is the fact you can redo it whenever you want. There is no limit on respeccing what you want, so you can fine tune between encounters if you want or just change something completely. 

Gear is More than Just Numbers 

Adding a layer on top of that is the gear you’ll equip. There are a lot of different status effects and attributes that can affect the damage you do. Focus on breaking down shields, barriers, holding people in place, staggering – there are stats for all of that. 

The gear isn’t simply just a “bigger number is better” approach, either. Pieces of armor or a weapon can be dramatically different from one another, and I can foresee a possibility where you find something so sick you change your build to make use of its stats and abilities. 

Runes are another piece of gear you get access to that add a lot of versatility. You can equip up to three and each come with some sort of active ability and stat boost. 

For example, one might just give you a straight 10% bonus to cold damage and then have an active ability that increases your ability damage by 20% for a certain time period. 

Each of the three runic abilities will be available to you in combat, too. You can cycle through their use as another active ability to use. 

Companions are Key to an Optimum Build, Too 

One final wrinkle to consider when trying to make the most optimum build you can are your companions. Like your player character, companions have fairly expansive skill trees and even gear to equip. 

Whenever you venture out with your two companions, you can equip them with three abilities each. Each companion has five different abilities to choose from, each of which have their own upgrade path. 

Obviously, the skill trees are no where as huge as the player character’s, but you can change up what sort of effectiveness an ability has pretty significantly. 

For example, in that screenshot above Davrin has the ability Death From Above. That’s something he can call down from the sky to cause a small explosion, damage, and stagger some enemies. 

In one upgrade path, you can go full bore and try to make Death from Above the most devastating AoE attack you can. In the other, it will buff your companions and yourself in various ways at the same time becoming a pseudo-support ability.  

Some abilities go from causing huge types of certain kinds of damage to trying to control the field more, like slowing or freezing enemies in place. Or maybe you’re wanting someone to heal, to keep enemies at a distance, or just try to blow up as much as you can. 

Those are all viable options that you can use to complement your playstyle. With a Mage or even a Rogue focusing on the bow, some companions may be more helpful in controlling the field by allowing you to keep your distance and stay in range. Or maybe they can group enemies up while another companion sticks them in place for you to deliver some powerful blow. 

There’s a lot of choices you can make in not only the party make up but the individual choices for your companions, which can empower you’re preferred playstyle a great amount.

Synergy is the word the developers use with your companions, and there is certainly a lot to be found. Not only in just the straight utility of the abilities, but there are some abilities companions or player characters can use simultaneously for a big bonus in damage. 

The amount of player choice you have in how you want to play is truly astonishing and like nothing I’ve seen in an action RPG of this type before. It’s not only the choices you can make but just how obviously effective they are. It’s not simple stat increases here and there but huge shake ups that dramatically effect how you can play the game. 

Like I said before, BioWare told us at the preview event that they can’t wait to see how players outsmart the development team with the incredible tools they’re putting in our hands. 

Veilguard Isn’t Open World But Still Feels Huge 

I don’t know about you, but the open world formula has been pretty tiresome in so many games for so long. Too often great ideas and great games are bogged down by open world bloat and “activities” littered on a map just for something to do.  

Dragon Age: The Veilguard gives you the best of both worlds in terms of having plenty of exploration with hand-crafted gameplay experiences. At no time in my near 7 hours of playing the game did it feel claustrophobic or that I wasn’t immersed in some massive well-realized world. 

Veilguard is mission-based, so you’ll gather up some companions and venture out to complete some quest, or more than one, in a specific area of the game. 

Shedding the weight of designing an effective open world lets Veilguard really shine. Each of the missions I completed were full of awesome spectacle, a cool set piece, or some exquisite arena in which to fight a boss. 

Those epic crescendo moments saved for big climaxes in games feel like they’re around every corner in Veilguard. I was constantly delighted and taken aback by the amazing imagery and emotion these hugely dramatic moments constantly portrayed. 

The best moments of so many games are not remembered from how you got from point a to point b but what you actually did when you got there. Those fine-tuned gameplay sequences that really show a game at its best. 

More or less, that’s basically what Veilguard is. The prologue kicks you off in what the developers wanted to feel like was the final mission of a game, a big story concluding moment to set the stage. From that point on, Veilguard never really lets go. 

Obviously, I can’t imagine the whole game is as crazy cool at that rate it was in my preview. The snippets of gameplay the chose to show were put there for a reason, after all. Regardless, I think there’s a lot to look forward to.

I don’t want you to think that Veilguard is just high-octane action all the time, as BioWare has a reputation for crafting some good stories – particularly in telling stories about the companions you gather along the way. 

Those intimate character moments are still there. Between missions you’ll be at your base of operations, The Lighthouse, where everyone can kind of chill and collect their thoughts. You’ll have the opportunity to talk with and learn a ton more about the companions and the world at large there. 

Each of them are well-realized with well-defined personalities, beliefs, desires, goals, and everything else that goes into a great character. It is learning who these folks are that we really get to start putting the rest of the world-threatening plot into perspective. 

The Crossroads Will Satisfy Your Exploration Urges 

The Lighthouse is a sanctuary within the Veil for your party to hangout, but you’ll quickly get access to another part of the Veil for travel: The Crossroads. 

The Crossroads is a place in-between in the Veil that allows for quick travel all around the world. It is an expansive set of ruins, structures, dungeons, and more just waiting to be discovered. 

You can engage with The Crossroads as much or as little as you want. Once you’ve made y our way to the major fast travel point to get you to somewhere in the world, you don’t have to do much in The Crossroads. 

However, there is a lot of story and sidequesting to be done there. It’s full of open world puzzling, random events, and quests to stumble upon. For example, in one I stumbled into an old memory of Solas’ past, getting to experience it firsthand while delving a dungeon. 

Dragon Age: The Veilguard Preview | Final Thoughts 

Dragon Age: The Veilguard feels like Baldur’s Gate 3’s cousin. I know how insane that sentence sounds, particularly with BioWare’s history in the Baldur’s Gate series. 

Both are RPGs with incredible tools for player agency with actual game changing consequences. Both focus heavily on deep connective stories with companions and party members. Both let you get as crazy as you want with their respective combat systems. 

In short, both in terms of design philosophy and quality, I think Dragon Age: The Veilguard is to action RPGs what Baldur’s Gate 3 is to CRPGs. 

Might be a little early to say that, as there’s a whole lot of the game I didn’t see, but I don’t think I’ve walked away feeling better about the quality of a game than with Veilguard. 

---

Dragon Age: The Veilguard was previewed at an event with close to 7 hours of hands-on gameplay.