Dragon Age: THE VEILGUARD

Dug up this post from 3 years ago. One of the newer developers working on The Veilguard was commenting while playing Origins for the first time and implied that grimdark or dark fantasy isn't fun, and that they don't want to make games like that anymore. Explains why this game looks like it was made by the Tumblr generation.

https://old.reddit.com/r/dragonage/comments/l4ofuq/spoilers_all_jon_renish_da4_technical_director/

The lead writer also says that the Blood Mage class isn't in The Veilguard because it's too "nasty" and "evil" for a hero character to use.

https://archive.is/no17b
https://www.gamesradar.com/games/dr...ts-arent-where-bioware-want-the-hero-to-walk/
 
Jon Renish, the dev that is "the Tumblr generation" according to you, is in his 50s and doesn't have Tumblr. Furthermore, he was fired last year. But hey, love the generational denigration! Really builds a better world for all of us /s
 
That's too bad (and an odd choice) about the Blood Mage.

Would've been an interesting playthrough if the world interacted with you differently and new story possibilities opened up based on the player being a Blood Mage.

Sorta like how Origins changed based on what race and class you were (at least in the early game).
 
I need to play this game… it might be good, or it might just completely piss me off because of the DEI crap.

I’m not going to lie, the universe of Dragon Age genuinely excites me. Honestly, much more than Dark Souls or Elden Ring even. I’d go so far as to say it’s maybe my favourite’ universe’ of any series.

I’m just hoping to be surprised here. I’m keeping an open mind because I really want to love this game.
 
Hershy said:
I need to play this game… it might be good, or it might just completely piss me off because of the DEI crap.

I’m not going to lie, the universe of Dragon Age genuinely excites me. Honestly, much more than Dark Souls or Elden Ring even. I’d go so far as to say it’s maybe my favourite’ universe’ of any series.

I’m just hoping to be surprised here. I’m keeping an open mind because I really want to love this game.
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The last Dragon Age was a fluke. It was a crunch time completion that worked and the game was pretty damn good. I know they have some good writers on board now... The problem with the title has been all the management change ups with old Bioware employees milking the position before moving on and accomplishing nothing. The change up there led to most projects being scrambled multiple times. I hope this is good, and I don't think DEI is gonna have any place that would harm the title since Bioware games tend to allow damn near anything with relationships in game. If they stick to the formula of the last game, it will be good (I still play it, it's an epic game with great visuals). if they try to depart too much, it will be trash. Bioware as a studio needs a hit, or they should just be absorbed into EA and the studio closed. It's not been the same since they were bought. Though I did like Andromeda, it was pretty good for a crunch time failure that was whipped together in a couple months out of nothing. Liked the combat and a number of other elements. Hope the next ME title is good... but it's gonna depend on this one.
 
M76 said:
DA was always very story oriented. I mean the first game automatically took screenshots of your character at key story moments during cutscenes. It doesn't get more story heavy than that.

I'm one of the very few people who liked both the first and second games. In spite of how different they were. Origins was an RPG / strategy game, where the most important thing was the build and squad composition, not to mention the squad command system through which you could even design basic behavior scripts for your squad members. For example attack enemy with the highest health, or automatically take health potion if health falls bellow a certain threshold. It was a really neat game, that I felt was dragged down by the unnecessarily boring and meandering storyline. It's expansion Awakening was where that formula really shined with better companions and a more tightly written and interesting story.

DA2 turned this all on its head and went for the A-RPG route, the squad management is still there, but is almost irrelevant. However the story IMO is far superior to Origins, this time compensating for what was lost on the RPG / strategy side.

DA:I while my initial impression of it were positive, in hindsight it is the worst of the bunch by a wide margin. And I'm pretty sure it is the first DEI influenced AAA game, we just didn't know what DEI was at the time therefore it did not even occur to us that characters were made ugly deliberately. Or why there were so many unnatural cringe moments. But DEI aside it is the worst on the gameplay side as well, playing as an MMO despite being a single player RPG, with tons of grind and fetchquests, and repeating whack a mole minigames across multiple areas. And the most awful combat system, that is bad even as an A-RPG. I was bamboozled by the environment graphics and the size of the maps, that's why I didn't realize sooner that DA:I is not a good game.

This post was NOT written by an AI.
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And that is why I haven't played it, despite having had a copy for a number of years. To be fair I have DA Origins as well, but never got around to it. Not really into these types of RPGs honestly, and the the sheer length of DA: I was enough to put me off when I read about lots of bad side quests. The amount of very long games I can play is very limited, so I never got around to it as there are frequently more interesting games for me.

If this upcoming game cuts out fetch quest/MMO style quests and has a passable story I may give it a try.
 
Flogger23m said:
And that is why I haven't played it, despite having had a copy for a number of years. To be fair I have DA Origins as well, but never got around to it. Not really into these types of RPGs honestly, and the the sheer length of DA: I was enough to put me off when I read about lots of bad side quests. The amount of very long games I can play is very limited, so I never got around to it as there are frequently more interesting games for me.

If this upcoming game cuts out fetch quest/MMO style quests and has a passable story I may give it a try.
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Yeah the howlongtobeat site has been very helpful for those of us who have limited time to allocate to games. If I see something with 50+ hours campaign I'd have to really want to play it.
 
Furious_Styles said:
Yeah the howlongtobeat site has been very helpful for those of us who have limited time to allocate to games. If I see something with 50+ hours campaign I'd have to really want to play it.
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Exactly. I also find shorter games to be funner even with the same or lower quality, largely because there is less BS in them and they are focused on the fun things (what games are supposed to be for). I also find shorter games (20-30 hours) that are good feel like they are longer than their hour count. For example Metro Exodus is apparently 24 or so hours without DLC, maybe 30+ for those that take time and explore. But if I hadn't looked that up I would have thought it was closer to 40-44 hours if I went off of memory. It certainly felt like more happened in that game than many 60+ hours games I played.
 
Per my Steam and Origin accounts, I put more than 100 hours each into both Origins and DA3. I regret nothing and had a blast with both. The version of Dragon Age 2 I played on Steam is listed as "Retired," so it's saying I only played for 14 hours. I know it was much shorter, but I'd suspect I probably put at least 35 into that one, too. I'm totally fine with long haul games as long as they're compelling and I still get something out of exploration and completing tasks. There's something to be said for a linear straight-ahead story title, too. Naught Dog is terrific at that sort of game. I find that I dislike games that don't know what they are. The kinds that lack urgency, get tedious, or simply waste my time in order to rack up playtime #'s.
 
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Flogger23m said:
Exactly. I also find shorter games to be funner even with the same or lower quality, largely because there is less BS in them and they are focused on the fun things (what games are supposed to be for). I also find shorter games (20-30 hours) that are good feel like they are longer than their hour count. For example Metro Exodus is apparently 24 or so hours without DLC, maybe 30+ for those that take time and explore. But if I hadn't looked that up I would have thought it was closer to 40-44 hours if I went off of memory. It certainly felt like more happened in that game than many 60+ hours games I played.
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I don't think the hour count in of itself is indicative of anything. It's how those hours are spent. I find that if a game feels longer than it is that's a negative. It means you are not having fun.
Generally if a game is less than 20 hours to beat I feel ripped off, no matter how good it is. Just as quantity can't make up for lack of quality it doesn't work the other way either. Quality does not make up for lack of content.
 
Domingo said:
The kinds that lack urgency, get tedious, or simply waste my time in order to rack up playtime #'s.
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So basically DA:I
It is the only game where I lost track of the main story due to the grind so much that I totally forgot what I was doing.
 
M76 said:
So basically DA:I
It is the only game where I lost track of the main story due to the grind so much that I totally forgot what I was doing.
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I, oddly, liked that one. At least once I realized it was smart to get the hell out of the first zone ASAP instead of trying to complete everything first. At that point, it was like a totally different game. There were definitely some MMO grindy elements, but if I feel like I'm getting something from that process I'm okay with it. Kinda like Fallout and TES. Attention to detail and lore can go a long way to making "work" portions of a game fun.
 
M76 said:
I don't think the hour count in of itself is indicative of anything. It's how those hours are spent. I find that if a game feels longer than it is that's a negative. It means you are not having fun.
Generally if a game is less than 20 hours to beat I feel ripped off, no matter how good it is. Just as quantity can't make up for lack of quality it doesn't work the other way either. Quality does not make up for lack of content.
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Of course. Generally few games can get past the ~36 hour mark before becoming longer than necessary. There certainly are a number of games that do it but they are in the minority. To me I would put it around 12-15 hours as being "too short". But it kind of depends. A 15 hour game that gives you multiple approaches and has open enough gameplay means I will replay some missions again. With most really long, and especially open world games, I will never play them again regardless of how much gameplay variety it may offer. Too much filler and repetition in the first play through. Those parts are hard to sit through as is, and replaying them again is even more boring the second go around when you just want to get to the good parts.

One of the things I liked about the older Assassin's Creed games is you could replay the story missions at anytime, so you could relive those good parts of the game without doing 30-40 hours of side quests, traversal, or upgrading/buying stuff. RDR2 also offers this.
 
Flogger23m said:
Of course. Generally few games can get past the ~36 hour mark before becoming longer than necessary. There certainly are a number of games that do it but they are in the minority. To me I would put it around 12-15 hours as being "too short". But it kind of depends. A 15 hour game that gives you multiple approaches and has open enough gameplay means I will replay some missions again. With most really long, and especially open world games, I will never play them again regardless of how much gameplay variety it may offer. Too much filler and repetition in the first play through. Those parts are hard to sit through as is, and replaying them again is even more boring the second go around when you just want to get to the good parts.

One of the things I liked about the older Assassin's Creed games is you could replay the story missions at anytime, so you could relive those good parts of the game without doing 30-40 hours of side quests, traversal, or upgrading/buying stuff. RDR2 also offers this.
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That's kind of strange to me. I usually never play linear games more than once, no matter how good they are. It is just too tedious to go through the same motions again, even if there are some different choices along the line, it is just not worth doing the entire game again to make a different choice 5 -10 hours in. This is why I liked the feature in Detroit Become Human that allowed you to go back to any story branch point and try different choices without having to re-play the entire game.

In a good open world RPG however it is easy to switch things up enough so that a new game doesn't feel stale. A different character, different build, or different approach can offer a completely fresh experience. In a good game "filler" is not supposed to be something to just get out of the way. Doing side stuff should be it's own reward, and sometimes it's more fun than doing the main story. I mean in basically all Bethesda games since Oblivion side content > main quest.

However there is one game that is utterly ruined replayability wise by side content and that is Marvel's Midnight Suns. It is a strategy game, but the missions are interconnected by these struggle sessions in RPG format where you explore around your HQ and talk to companions. Which was tedious on the first try already. But the strategy part of the game is solid enough and I'd happily have done more playthroughs if there was an option to just give me the strategy maps and nothing else, no filler.
 
M76 said:
That's kind of strange to me. I usually never play linear games more than once, no matter how good they are.
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Shorter doesn't equal linear. Take Splinter Cell Chaos Theory as an example. The missions generally give you a few gameplay approaches and different things to try. Replaying a mission is quick and easy and you get to experience all of the great aspects of that game immediately. It is around a 15 or so hour game at most. I've played each mission a few times, so if I go by hour count, it isn't too far off from something like a 40 hour long game for me.

M76 said:
This is why I liked the feature in Detroit Become Human that allowed you to go back to any story branch point and try different choices without having to re-play the entire game.
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It got lower reviews, but I think it was the best interactive story/movie game I played. I liked Heavy Rain except for the glaring plot holes.

M76 said:
In a good open world RPG however it is easy to switch things up enough so that a new game doesn't feel stale. A different character, different build, or different approach can offer a completely fresh experience. In a good game "filler" is not supposed to be something to just get out of the way. Doing side stuff should be it's own reward, and sometimes it's more fun than doing the main story.
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And that is the problem I find with longer games. Almost none of them have no filler. Even games like Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk had some. Cyberpunk thankfully was not that bad, but it still had a bit of filler like bad inventory management and at parts I had to collect and sell the same repeating weapons to get enough credits to buy something.
 
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Flogger23m said:
Shorter doesn't equal linear. Take Splinter Cell Chaos Theory as an example. The missions generally give you a few gameplay approaches and different things to try. Replaying a mission is quick and easy and you get to experience all of the great aspects of that game immediately. It is around a 15 or so hour game at most. I've played each mission a few times, so if I go by hour count, it isn't too far off from something like a 40 hour long game for me.
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I love Chaos Theory, but it is not an open world game. The missions are on separate maps, some of which have a semi-open layout, that's it. What you are describing is an immersive sim ie. giving multiple approaches to solving problems. An immersive sim can still be both open world or linear, neither is a prerequisite. I don't think there is a single open world game out there that is 12-15 hours, unless we count speedrunning the main quest. Hence why I assumed you are talking about linear games.
Flogger23m said:
It got lower reviews, but I think it was the best interactive story/movie game I played. I liked Heavy Rain except for the glaring plot holes.
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I liked Beyond Two Souls more, but I can no longer go back to replay it without having an overwhelming feeling of discomfort, and not due to anything in the game. It is ruined forever.
Flogger23m said:
And that is the problem I find with longer games. Almost none of them have no filler. Even games like Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk had some. Cyberpunk thankfully was not that bad, but it still had a bit of filler like bad inventory management and at parts I had to collect and sell the same repeating weapons to get enough credits to buy something.
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Inventory management and in game economics are not filler, they are core game mechanics. If done well, they are part of the fun, and in CP2077 they are done well, at least post 2.1 which I played recently. IDK about the Witcher 3, I could never get into that game.
 
M76 said:
I love Chaos Theory, but it is not an open world game.
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I was referring to game length not game design, maybe I was not clear. I don't mind open world games, if they add to the game. I would say maybe 7 out of 10 open world games I play would be better without being open world. Ghost of Tsushima is an example of a recent game I played that didn't know how to use an open world. Example: Run 800 meters to get a quest, spend 2 minutes talking to someone, and then have the objective marker update and require you to run another 350 meters elsewhere.

M76 said:
The missions are on separate maps, some of which have a semi-open layout, that's it.
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As a general rule, that is superior to open world games. I prefer mission based games. People seem to think games have to be extremely linear like Call of Duty campaigns or some massive sprawling map with the same 6 repeating activities over and over again. Chaos Theory is an excellent example of a mission based game that is not linear yet doesn't make you spend more time collecting sticks or holding down the W key for three minutes.

M76 said:
Inventory management and in game economics are not filler, they are core game mechanics. If done well, they are part of the fun, and in CP2077 they are done well, at least post 2.1 which I played recently. IDK about the Witcher 3, I could never get into that game.
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Part in bold is key. In most games it really is not fun and feels dated. In most games it is designed to be filler, to take up more time in the absence of good gameplay. In Cyberpunk, it got tedious at times but there are far worse games. But it is one of the few things I did not like about Cyberpunk. Witcher 3 is similar, but maybe a bit worse.

Some games are designed around it, like post apocalyptic games that make a more nuanced or logical reason for scarcity or need of scraping every cent/resource.
 
Flogger23m said:
I was referring to game length not game design, maybe I was not clear. I don't mind open world games, if they add to the game. I would say maybe 7 out of 10 open world games I play would be better without being open world. Ghost of Tsushima is an example of a recent game I played that didn't know how to use an open world. Example: Run 800 meters to get a quest, spend 2 minutes talking to someone, and then have the objective marker update and require you to run another 350 meters elsewhere.
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This is a wildly unpopular opinion but I think the best use of open world was in AC:Odyssey and Ghost Recon Breakpoint. Those games came out after each other and had a mode without mission markers. When you picked up a new mission you didn't get a marker pop up on the map or interface. Instead what you got was a description of the job and the location. So you needed to do some investigation / scouting to find the actual target area, which didn't just make the games infinitely more immersive, but helped exploration as well. Since instead of blindly following a marker, without thought, you have to actually look at the game world / scenery and read it. Making it easier to bump into unrelated locations.

But it must not have been that popular (new things that change conventions rarely are) since they sadly dropped this from later open world games. IDK why since it was optional anyway. Guess it was too much effort, and UBI is really into churning out low effort games nowadays.
Flogger23m said:
As a general rule, that is superior to open world games. I prefer mission based games. People seem to think games have to be extremely linear like Call of Duty campaigns or some massive sprawling map with the same 6 repeating activities over and over again. Chaos Theory is an excellent example of a mission based game that is not linear yet doesn't make you spend more time collecting sticks or holding down the W key for three minutes.
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I have one general rule: There are no general rules :D Making blanket statements is a recipe for disaster. Completely linear games can be great too, just as semi-linear mission based games, just as completely seamless open world games.
But when push comes to shove I prefer open world games because they offer more replay value. Linear games are 10-15 hours and done, some semi open games maybe 20-30, times 2-3 if they are extremely good. Open world can be anything from 30 to 150 hours with even more replay value.

As I've mentioned I love Chaos Theory, but it is a 7 hour game.
Flogger23m said:
Part in bold is key. In most games it really is not fun and feels dated. In most games it is designed to be filler,
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No, it doesn't turn into filler just because you don't like it, it is still a core game mechanic. You can't have an RPG with no inventory or looting. I mean you can, but only to its detriment I despised AC:Valhalla for that.
Flogger23m said:
to take up more time in the absence of good gameplay. In Cyberpunk, it got tedious at times but there are far worse games. But it is one of the few things I did not like about Cyberpunk. Witcher 3 is similar, but maybe a bit worse.

Some games are designed around it, like post apocalyptic games that make a more nuanced or logical reason for scarcity or need of scraping every cent/resource.
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I just can't imagine what do you mean absence of good gameplay in Cyberpunk. The only balance issue I can complain about is that looting brings in disproportionately more money than the jobs themselves. But I think this issue plagues almost all open world games I have played. Starfield and other Bethesda RPGs are far more tedious in this. Of course no system is perfect but CP2077 is in the top tier. I bet this game will have 100 times worse, because Inqusition sure did.
 
M76 said:
This is a wildly unpopular opinion but I think the best use of open world was in AC:Odyssey
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To me that is a good example of a boring open world game. Poor pacing, in gameplay and leveling as well as story. There were many areas that were useless for the game and were essentially just places to run through and watch NPCs repeat animations. I'm not sure how they could make ancient Greece feel so boring, but they did. Lots of bland side missions and a mostly dead, empty world. Generally that is my problem with Ubisoft games. They have a massive army of artists but no direction.

M76 said:
I have one general rule: There are no general rules :D Making blanket statements is a recipe for disaster. Completely linear games can be great too, just as semi-linear mission based games, just as completely seamless open world games.
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I only say as a general rule because making a convincing open world is much harder. Most of the open world games I play don't use them right and end up just making you hold W for an extra 5 minutes between tasks. EX) Spending 5 minutes running to a quest location, spend 3 minutes talking to someone, spend 5 more minutes running to another location, fight someone for 2 minutes. 10 minutes running, 7 minutes gameplay/story.

M76 said:
But when push comes to shove I prefer open world games because they offer more replay value. Linear games are 10-15 hours and done, some semi open games maybe 20-30, times 2-3 if they are extremely good. Open world can be anything from 30 to 150 hours with even more replay value.
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Generally open world games aren't that replayable, IMO. Largely because they offer a lot of lesser content that is essentially rehashed setups. Like Far Cry 6 outposts. Yeah you can attach an outpost slightly differently, but the difference in gameplay is not really worth replaying it. I'd rather replay something with more interest than replaying outpost #68, or stacking rocks task #37.

M76 said:
As I've mentioned I love Chaos Theory, but it is a 7 hour game.
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Generally the average gamer takes around 14 hours to finish it on their first try.

M76 said:
No, it doesn't turn into filler just because you don't like it, it is still a core game mechanic.
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Not really. A core game mechanic can still be filler. If a game is poorly designed it may have you spending more time doing boring, menial and otherwise uninteresting tasks that get in the way of doing something actually fun. That is my definition of filler content; boring tasks that amount to nothing fun or interesting that waste time.

Example, lets say I buy a street racing game. I want to race cars, that is why I bought the game. But they design it so that a core mechanic is running around stealing gas cans from stores, houses, boats, for some idiotic reason. To drive to a racing point, you use up half of your gas. So to have enough gas for the race, you need to get out of your car again and start running around finding gas cans at your destination. Fueling up your care would be a core mechanic, but it would be filler content to expand play time doing menial and boring things. You'd spend more time walking holding E to pick up gas cans than racing in a car. And this is how most open world or long hour games are designed.

M76 said:
You can't have an RPG with no inventory or looting. I mean you can, but only to its detriment I despised AC:Valhalla for that.
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Mass Effect 2 comes to mind, but that is an action RPG and the reason why it is fun. Assassin's Creed are stealth or action adventure games, not RPGs with the exception of Odyssey and the upcoming Shadows. Valhalla had a much better weapon upgrading. It focuses less on leveling and resource gathering. I would instead worry more about obtaining and actually using the different weapon types. And using the weapons against enemies is where the fun in such a game comes from.

M76 said:
The only balance issue I can complain about is that looting brings in disproportionately more money than the jobs themselves. But I think this issue plagues almost all open world games I have played.
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That is what I am referring to. Looting should be for finding new item types and nothing else unless it is specifically a game designed around a post apocalyptic setting. In Cyberpunk the jobs did not give enough money, so typically you would get into a 2 minute shoot out and then spend 5 minutes carrying stuff to a drop off box to sell them. This is becoming very common in games. Combat time is less than item collecting time. And in most modern games item collecting is necessary otherwise you will be unable to level your character or buy upgrades, leaving you under powered or using the same limited selection of equipment (lack of variety, repetitive). I'm not really sure why most game developers think running up to corpses and holding E should take up more game time than shooting or sword fighting. It irritates me to no end. It isn't fun nor challenging. To me, that is lazy game design. If you're spending more time collecting junk, or "filler content" as I call it, than doing something fun and interesting that means the game has design problems.
 
Flogger23m said:
To me that is a good example of a boring open world game. Poor pacing, in gameplay and leveling as well as story. There were many areas that were useless for the game and were essentially just places to run through and watch NPCs repeat animations. I'm not sure how they could make ancient Greece feel so boring, but they did. Lots of bland side missions and a mostly dead, empty world. Generally that is my problem with Ubisoft games. They have a massive army of artists but no direction.
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I don't think Odyssey is the pinnacle of open world games, nor is breakpoint, I just loved that feature of no hand holding exploration.
Flogger23m said:
I only say as a general rule because making a convincing open world is much harder. Most of the open world games I play don't use them right and end up just making you hold W for an extra 5 minutes between tasks. EX) Spending 5 minutes running to a quest location, spend 3 minutes talking to someone, spend 5 more minutes running to another location, fight someone for 2 minutes. 10 minutes running, 7 minutes gameplay/story.
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That's more of an MMORPG problem. This is why DA:I played and felt like an MMORPG. This is not an open world specific thing either, as this problem was also prominent in Metro Exodus.
Flogger23m said:
Generally open world games aren't that replayable, IMO. Largely because they offer a lot of lesser content that is essentially rehashed setups. Like Far Cry 6 outposts. Yeah you can attach an outpost slightly differently, but the difference in gameplay is not really worth replaying it. I'd rather replay something with more interest than replaying outpost #68, or stacking rocks task #37.
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Not all open world games offer replay value, but that's down to the quality of the individual game, not the open world nature. As a counter point, I will not replay a linear game even if it is the best game ever. At least not until I forgotten about it enough so it can be a semi-fresh experience again. I think I played Chaos Theory three times, with at least 5 years in between runs. I replayed Cyberpunk 2077 3 times in a month.
Flogger23m said:
Generally the average gamer takes around 14 hours to finish it on their first try.
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IDK, I was going off of my latest playthrough of it, maybe it took slightly more time the first time around, but not twice the time.
Flogger23m said:
Not really. A core game mechanic can still be filler. If a game is poorly designed it may have you spending more time doing boring, menial and otherwise uninteresting tasks that get in the way of doing something actually fun. That is my definition of filler content; boring tasks that amount to nothing fun or interesting that waste time.
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So then it is not filler, just poor game design. Bad inventory management is not filler it is bad game design, like in Mass Effect 1, or DeusEx Human Revolution.
That said one person's boring might be another person's fun. I find minecraft trash, but millions think it is the bestest ever.
Flogger23m said:
Example, lets say I buy a street racing game. I want to race cars, that is why I bought the game. But they design it so that a core mechanic is running around stealing gas cans from stores, houses, boats, for some idiotic reason. To drive to a racing point, you use up half of your gas. So to have enough gas for the race, you need to get out of your car again and start running around finding gas cans at your destination. Fueling up your care would be a core mechanic, but it would be filler content to expand play time doing menial and boring things. You'd spend more time walking holding E to pick up gas cans than racing in a car. And this is how most open world or long hour games are designed.
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Are you kidding me? Of course you describe a worst case scenario, but I'd actually love a game like that. A racing game where you don't just hop into cars and race with no care in the world, but actually have to take care of the car. This is the heart of every race for money, upgrade car type of game since street rod.

I actually find it a shame that they eventually ditched the whole fuel mechanic from Starfield. if it is done well it would not be annoying, it would elevate the game.
Flogger23m said:
Mass Effect 2 comes to mind, but that is an action RPG and the reason why it is fun.
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ME2 is barely an RPG, it almost has no RPG mechanics. I loved that game too, but that wouldn't work as an open world RPG either.
Flogger23m said:
Assassin's Creed are stealth or action adventure games, not RPGs with the exception of Odyssey and the upcoming Shadows. Valhalla had a much better weapon upgrading. It focuses less on leveling and resource gathering. I would instead worry more about obtaining and actually using the different weapon types. And using the weapons against enemies is where the fun in such a game comes from.
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As I've said one person's fun is another's nightmare. I think the weapon / armor upgrading mechanic in Valhalla is utter trash, all the fighting of random mobs is completely pointless since there is no loot. No, to upgrade weapons you are forced to go to predetermined locations, repeat the same song and dance dozens of times, no intrigue, no exploration, no fun. Just a mechanic repetition of a gameplay loop with no variety. Odyssey might not be perfect, but compared to Valhalla it was a masterpiece.
Flogger23m said:
That is what I am referring to. Looting should be for finding new item types and nothing else unless it is specifically a game designed around a post apocalyptic setting. In Cyberpunk the jobs did not give enough money, so typically you would get into a 2 minute shoot out and then spend 5 minutes carrying stuff to a drop off box to sell them. This is becoming very common in games. Combat time is less than item collecting time. And in most modern games item collecting is necessary otherwise you will be unable to level your character or buy upgrades, leaving you under powered or using the same limited selection of equipment (lack of variety, repetitive). I'm not really sure why most game developers think running up to corpses and holding E should take up more game time than shooting or sword fighting. It irritates me to no end. It isn't fun nor challenging. To me, that is lazy game design. If you're spending more time collecting junk, or "filler content" as I call it, than doing something fun and interesting that means the game has design problems.
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If there was no looting getting into random fights in the game would be pointless, no worse, it would be detrimental because you loose health, you waste ammo, if a game has that mechanic then your equipment deteriorates. And then there is not even loot at the end of it to recoup your losses. If that was the case the logical choice would just be to run past or avoid as many fights as humanly possible. It would turn CP2077 into GTA (something which some people already accused it of being).


I think you just don't like open world RPGs, as looting is a core mechanic there, and if it is removed it lessens the whole experience. The only thing I'd change in CP2077 is make the payouts significantly more for jobs, so it feels like it is actually worth doing instead of it just being the excuse to loot a location. But looting must remain so random encounters have their own reward, and there is the fun of the anticipation whether you get a good item or not.
 
M76 said:
This is not an open world specific thing either, as this problem was also prominent in Metro Exodus.
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Not in my experience. The locations and missions tended to be longer than the traversal time, and basically all of the missions were story missions so they had relevance to the plot. Metro Exodus is a good example of how you can cut out junk missions and activities while still having something that isn't a completely linear hallway shooter.

M76 said:
So then it is not filler, just poor game design. Bad inventory management is not filler it is bad game design, like in Mass Effect 1, or DeusEx Human Revolution.
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Filler is an aspect of bad game design. Though "filler" is typically designed to pad game length and make it artificially longer. Largely due to the absence of good gameplay or the desire to hit some minimum hour time. Often times it may be done with good intentions, but it just a lack of vision or money/time. Again it is largely menial, boring tasks. There are a lot of games I play that I think more fondly of, then I re-watch gameplay and remember how the good parts are only half the game. The rest of it is forgettable and a time waster that should not have been in the game.

ME1's inventory management was terrible, but it did not take up much time so I wouldn't call that filler. It is just crap. Deus Ex Human Revolution had one of the better inventory management systems I've seen in a game. Of course it isn't realistic, but it did attempt to take size/shape into account rather than just weight. Overall it was not much of a problem for me in both play throughs I spent little time managing it. Sometimes I would toss some ammo but seldom ran out of it anyways.

M76 said:
That said one person's boring might be another person's fun. I find minecraft trash, but millions think it is the bestest ever.
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The difference is Minecraft is excellent at what it does. It is an excellent sandbox game. If I play an FPS game, I want good shooting gameplay and that is what I want to be doing. Not running up to corpses after a 2 minute fighting to collect ammo for 5 minutes, or some other lame side activities that for some reason take up more game time.

M76 said:
Are you kidding me? Of course you describe a worst case scenario, but I'd actually love a game like that.
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I doubt you would, unless those gameplay features were fully designed. I am describing how it works in a typical, modern game. You typically run around and mindlessly hold E to collect something. I am going to again reference Ghost of Tsushima, as you spend more time collecting "Resources" (actual in game name) than sword fighting in some missions. Replace "Resources" with gas cans, and I doubt holding the E button will be any more interesting.

M76 said:
I actually find it a shame that they eventually ditched the whole fuel mechanic from Starfield. if it is done well it would not be annoying, it would elevate the game.
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Well it was present in how much distance you can travel.

M76 said:
ME2 is barely an RPG, it almost has no RPG mechanics. I loved that game too, but that wouldn't work as an open world RPG either.
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Mass Effect has always been more role playing in the story decisions and character tonality (aggressive or compassionate etc.) you choose, and not so much about stats. That is what made those games good, because the role playing things that were present mattered. And why it is an action RPG series, with a strong emphasis on action.

M76 said:
As I've said one person's fun is another's nightmare. I think the weapon / armor upgrading mechanic in Valhalla is utter trash, all the fighting of random mobs is completely pointless since there is no loot.
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It would have been better if there were no upgrades. Upgrading should bring new gameplay changes, rather than magically doing 2% more damage or something which is lazy design. For a sword/melee fighting game that is harder to do. I too disliked having to upgrade my flail to magically make it do more damage, that should not have been in the game at all. Upgrading the weapon slots makes sense as that can add some new gameplay options, but the rest? Unnecessary and pointless.

Gathering loot is boring, repetitive, and menial. In a game about sword fighting/melee that should not be a core activity. If I wanted to play a game where collecting junk off the ground was a core mechanic I would play a game centered on that. That is where a garbage man/janitor type game can have some appeal I suppose. I would not play it, because collecting stuff off the ground or out of bins is not exactly interesting for me in the slightest. What I am interested in is fighting people with swords, flails and axes in semi historical settings.

M76 said:
No, to upgrade weapons you are forced to go to predetermined locations, repeat the same song and dance dozens of times, no intrigue, no exploration, no fun. Just a mechanic repetition of a gameplay loop with no variety.
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And that is what I refer to as filler.

M76 said:
If there was no looting getting into random fights in the game would be pointless, no worse, it would be detrimental because you loose health, you waste ammo, if a game has that mechanic then your equipment deteriorates.
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The point is to have fun. You play a shooter game to fight people with guns, or a sword fighting game to fight them with swords. Use some tactics, try something new, and enjoy the feat of taking down the enemies successfully. The "loot loop" is typically designed as a quick dopamine release in the absence of good naturally rewarding gameplay. For ammunition replinishment the game has to be designed better. More money given from mission completition so you can buy it (less time + a place where you can get upgrades/new weapons), or if a mission/level based game, appropriate amounts given at the start of the mission or having resupply areas/mechanics. Example, in Ghost Recon Warfighter, partway through a number of missions a helicopter will land and allow you to resupply. But between those missions you're going to need to watch your ammunition so you don't burn through it all.

M76 said:
If that was the case the logical choice would just be to run past or avoid as many fights as humanly possible.
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And that is why in games with a heavy "loot loop" I often avoid fights. It is pointless to spend 2 minutes fighting and 5 minutes holding E to collect things. If the end result is the same, I will just avoid the fight. The reward (fun gameplay) isn't worth the trouble (boring gameplay taking up more time). Again, I will reference Ghost of Tsushima because I think it is the perfect example of many underdeveloped open world features and dull filler activities. There are random fights that can be started by running into random enemies while travelling around the world. I started just running past them because if I wanted to use equipment like fire arrows I would need to loot every corpse to get more ammo back for the side/main missions. And the looting would take longer than the fighting.

M76 said:
I think you just don't like open world RPGs, as looting is a core mechanic there, and if it is removed it lessens the whole experience.
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It depends on the game. Fallout games it worked given the setting, even if it got absurdly tedious in FO4 which is also a problem with Starfield.
 
according to a tweet from BioWare, Dragon Age: The Veilguard won't require the EA app to launch on Steam...

https://x.com/dragonage/status/1816511768044163410

Veilguard.png
 
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'Anthem with dragons'...that's how BioWare described the newest Dragon Age game early in its development...but it seems they learned from the mistakes of Anthem (I still think Anthem was underrated and had the framework of a really good game)...

Creative Director John Epler: "We’re a studio that has always been built around digging deep on storytelling and roleplaying. I'm proud of a lot of things on Anthem – I was on that project for a year and a half...but at the end of the day, we were building a game focused on something we were not necessarily as proficient at...for me and the team, the biggest lesson was to know what you're good at and then double down on it...don’t spread yourselves too thin...don't try to do a bunch of different things you don’t have the expertise to do...a lot of the people on this team came here to build a story-focused, singleplayer RPG"
 
hu76 said:
damn long time
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Sarcasm?

I’m surprised that EA has moved so quickly with the announcements. Even this past Spring I wasn’t expecting to see a new Dragon Age in 2024.

It’s not uncommon to wait ten months after the announcement of a release date. Roughly two months is cake.
 
Hershy said:
Sarcasm?

I’m surprised that EA has moved so quickly with the announcements. Even this past Spring I wasn’t expecting to see a new Dragon Age in 2024.

It’s not uncommon to wait ten months after the announcement of a release date. Roughly two months is cake.
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It's been in active development since 2018. A cadence of marketing and announcements is not unusual up to 6 months out from the intended release date. They're building up hype for preorders.
 
I wonder how much Sweet Baby Inc they will show and how the Dragon Age fans will react.

15 minutes I hope they show some gameplay the last reveal that made a big impact on me was way back to Battlefield 1.
 
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I have such low expectations for this… but I have such high regard for the Dragon Age universe… I’m just hoping for a shocker.

And of course it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. In the end, it only matters what I think. LOL.

I’ve loved every game in the series so far.
 
Trailer might have show a few seconds of Gameplay basically all cinematics. Preorder are up though but they didn't really show gameplay game doesn't look woke but there is the Gameplay video from back in June which is the Intro if the gameplay is like Dragons Dogma 2 I really don't want it.
 
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Comixbooks said:
Trailer might have show a few seconds of Gameplay basically all cinematics. Preorder are up though but they didn't really show gameplay game doesn't look woke but there is the Gameplay video from back in June which is the Intro if the gameplay is like Dragons Dogma 2 I really don't want it.
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The game has never been woke, however it has always allowed romance with any character or sex and some feel that is woke. They do it so people won't complain they can't romance a character. I am looking forward to it, but I wish it would go back to the combat style in the first game. They keep making it more and more arcade like.
 
The Combat looks non tactical just Spam fighting trying their best with the Frostbite engine. Plus you have the transparent skill wheel window which takes up the whole screen while fighting breaks immersion.
The colors are saturated to hell it looks just like Dragon Age Inquisition with a new coat a paint the story looks just like Inquisition.
I need to see more gameplay otherwise I suspect the reviews with be Mostly Negative.
 
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Just so everyone knows… being the major Dragon Age fanatic that I am… I will unofficially be moderating this thread going forward.

So listen up!

No negativity. Perhaps you think this series has gone woke. Perhaps you don’t trust EA. Maybe you’re just pissed off in general and like to take out your anger by visiting gaming forums and dog piling on people like Comixbooks.

Then you shall be moderated!
 
Hershy said:
Just so everyone knows… being the major Dragon Age fanatic that I am… I will unofficially be moderating this thread going forward.

So listen up!

No negativity. Perhaps you think this series has gone woke. Perhaps you don’t trust EA. Maybe you’re just pissed off in general and like to take out your anger by visiting gaming forums and dog piling on people like Comixbooks.

Then you shall be moderated!
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I think you took a wrong turn at Albuquerque, your destination is below. Please leave your [H]Card at the door.

https://forums.anandtech.com/
 
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