Dragon Age: The Veilguard Review - Homecoming

After thinking about it for a while, Dragon Age skipping out on an entry for so long might have been the best decision EA could have made. It’s not unlike all these '90s movie sequels we're seeing coming back around after several decades – although less extreme in the case of this particular series as it’s only been ten years since Dragon Age: Inquisition.

I bring up this comparison because, at its core, Bioware as a developer had somewhat tapered off, and Dragon Age was dormant for some time following three successive releases starting in 2009. Instead of hashing out whatever they could after the third game, the team took their time in preparing something for the current generation.

The result is now here with Dragon Age: The Veilguard, a fully featured single-player continuation of the Dragon Age world. After ten years of waiting, is it all worth it? Can Bioware restore some of the faith that waned away from fans of the studio?

After playing through The Veilguard, I’ve never been more sure that the answer to that question is a resounding “yes”.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard pulls on the tried and true Bioware formula by putting you in the shoes of a character known as Rook – and as such, everything that character does over the course of the story matters.

From dialogue, to quests, and character interactions – it’s all woven into the ultimate outcome of the story. So much so, that I was almost taken aback by how quickly the game gets you right into the thick of it.

The Veilguard kicks off by putting Rook into immediate action (quite literally after the character creator), by way of having to confront a man known as Solas, the Dread Wolf. Solas has one goal: to tear down the Veil that separates the world, Thedas, from the realm of demons. It’s a grand scheme he wants to enact in order to restore his people. Surely it can’t go wrong… until it does.

Thanks to Rook and associates, Solas’ ritual is disrupted, releasing two ancient and powerful gods, Elgar’naan and Ghilan’nain, and imminent destruction upon the world. With everything thrown into chaos, it’ll be up to Rook and their companions to put a stop to them in a world that is fraught with plenty of established strife and conflict.

The Veilguard’s story is one that weaves through both the over-arching narrative, and one that relies so much on interactions with different companions, locations, and factions. All of these elements are important as they eventually lead to the story’s conclusion.

For the most part, I found it largely enjoyable. There’s a lot of love in getting to know the different companions that Rook recruits. There’s also a feeling similar to the recent Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves movie that inspires a lot of whimsy, but not without variety in their backgrounds.

There’s also a lot of depth in the lore, and in each of the different locations Rook explores and the different people they meet. The writers of The Veilguard did well to make everything feel well-worn within the world, and a lot of that is pieced together in both side quests and companion quests.

It’s worth noting that a lot of the optional quests are worth doing in that respect, and you will miss a lot by just rushing through the main story. When Bioware said that everything you do circles back to the finale, they weren’t kidding. That said, I did think the way The Veilguard wraps up is a little anti-climactic. There’s a lot of big things that go on within the story, what with the elder gods and the impending doom upon the world, but the way all of it comes together leaves a little to be desired when so much of it is framed with high stakes and appropriate drama before that point.

Mileage may vary of course, but the journey along the way was something I felt was the strongest part, as well as all the choices you make while doing so through dialogue and other decisions. There are some choices that have immense consequences beyond the immediate action, so those are worth taking into consideration because they will have long-lasting impacts in some cases.

All of this circles back to Rook and their companions. Rook, the player-created character is a fully fleshed-out and voiced protagonist – one whose appearance, lineage, and class can be completely customized at the start of the game.

They can be an elf, a qunari, human, or dwarf. From there, it’s a selection of their faction and accompanying backstory. For example, I went with the Antivan Crows, who are both assassins and protectors.

Classes in The Veiguard are split into three choices, each of which carries two different weapons. These are Warrior, Mage, and Rogue, which are all self-explanatory. During my playthrough, I went with Mage for the range abilities with spellcasting, but also because I was able to then specialize through the Skills with a blade as a secondary weapon for close combat.

The Veilguard lets you re-spec whenever you want too, so there’s a lot of freedom in playstyle throughout.

Your class will largely influence how you approach combat in The Veilguard, but at its core, each one will include a light attack, heavy attack, along with jumping and dodging – all of which can be strung together in action gameplay mapped to the face buttons on a controller.

There’s also an Ability Wheel, which pauses the action so you can pick out both your own individual actions and targets, as well as your companions. It’s an intuitive system that lets you swap in and out of real-time combat seamlessly while giving you more control. I found myself using it a lot when it came to parsing out some of the more challenging enemies, such as the boss encounters. That said, I would have liked to see a bit more variety in the enemies overall. It's one of the few areas of The Veilguard I found somewhat lacking.

Further combat customization can be found in the Skill tree, in which Rook can tool their playstyle to one specialization. Skill Points are earned throughout The Veilguard through quests, as well as through normal combat. It’s a basic setup, but being able to re-spec whenever you want helps keep gameplay fresh.

Rook’s companions can also earn Skill Points, and this is important because there’s a lot of time that can be dedicated to increasing their bonds, as well as catering them to different combat whims as they all come equipped with different abilities.

For example, there’s Lace Harding, who is handy with a bow and the ability to stagger enemies. There’s also Darvin, a strong attacker who uses his griffon companion as backup. Another interesting character is Lucanis Dellamorte, an assassin who makes use of dual daggers, but someone who can also put buffs on the party.

Each of the seven companions are unique, and their individual stories make them worth spending time with - you can even influence romantic options with them, in true Bioware tradition. Of course, you can choose to ignore them entirely, but you may not like the eventual consequences.

All of this is wrapped up together in what is no doubt a stunning presentation. The Veilguard looks gorgeous throughout with plenty of visual flair, a dense world, and unique art direction accompanied by an electric soundtrack.

There’s something to be said about the amount of visual variety and fidelity in The Veilguard, and it really helps to tell a world-spanning story.

That said, I did encounter some performance issues in several locations. Quite randomly, there were framerate drops without much of anything going on, so hopefully that’s something that can be fixed in a patch later down the line. I also encountered some bugged out enemies, but it was nothing that was game-breaking.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is no doubt an achievement. And again, the ten-year wait has been a blessing because it allowed the folks at Bioware to come back with something strong, satisfying, and fully polished.

Because that’s what The Veilguard is – a polished game, one with a compelling story and characters with much of the design decisions not dissimilar to that of Mass Effect 2. It's a polished game that, I think most importantly, doesn't require any previous knowledge of the series, but if you are a fan, it doesn't shy away from catering to you too.

TechRaptor reviewed Dragon Age: The Veilguard on PC with a code provided by the publisher over the course of 46 hours of gameplay. All screenshots were taken during the process of review.