The reaction, the making of, and what comes next.
But then, the fourth Dragon Age game project has been extraordinary for BioWare in many ways.
And now here, finally, the game is.
But a month after a release, there’s uncertainty around the game and series.
I don’t know that I’ve seen the reaction to a BioWare game be as divided.
So where does Dragon Age go from here, and how does BioWare feel about it?
For added visibility: some spoilers lie ahead.
Eurogamer: We’re roughly a month after launch now so some of the dust and nerves have settled.
How did you find the launch period as people’s opinions and reviews were rolling in?
Corinne Busche:The biggest thing I was feeling was a sense of curiosity.
We know what we’ve got.
You’re always curious, right.
So for me it’s curiosity.
John Epler:I’d say for me probably relief was definitely at the top of my list.
So the fact that it came out felt amazing.
So seeing other people look at it through that lens was really great.
To Corinne’s other point: curiosity definitely there too.
Did it surprise you at all how divisive reactions to the game were?
Did you expect it?
Busche:Isn’t it interesting?
Did we expect it?
What we know is that these reactions have been a part of the Dragon Age journey with every entry.
It was more-so this time than we were braced for, but we did expect it.
I also think that comes from reinvention.
I find it fascinating - all of the instalments have been significantly different.
It’s inherent to the DNA of the game.
It’s not trying to be all things to all people.
It’s trying to be itself, it’s trying to be the game that it wants to be.
How has the commercial response to the game been?
I’ve seen stories about sales and they seem mixed - inconclusive.
The game seems to be doing okay but struggling to keep pace with Inquisition before it.
Has it been a success from your point of view - how do you measure that?
That they executed at quality: internally we consider that a success.
We’re very happy with the critical reception to the game.
In fact, in a lot of ways, that is the harder path to take.
So yeah, we’re quite proud of the critical reception.
And two, when did you decide not to do an expansion - presumably this was a while ago?
Busche:Oh, yes, yeah, absolutely.
We toy with those ideas of course.
You don’t want your players to miss out on that [by not playing the DLC].
The difference in The Veilguard is the story ends pretty conclusively.
Busche:It is a challenge.
Interesting; I would agree.
What do you say to that?
How far back to these Executors - these beings - go?
But it’s been something that we’ve been talking about for quite some time.
Even to someone as powerful as Solas they are seen as a threat.
They’ve shown up in DAI.
They’ve also shown up - I can’t remember…
So it’s been a thread in the IP for a while.
But yeah, I get the reaction.
John, you’ve been on the project the whole time, I believe?
These are incredibly exciting ideas.
It could be Chantry-themed and this and that."
And we sat there like, “Oh, yeah.”
We just talked ourselves into a terrible idea because we got excited about it.
You mentioned the multiplayer version of Dragon Age 4 there, which was codenamed Morrison, I believe.
I’ve seen this described as a Fantasy Anthem - is there any truth in this?
Busche:What would you recognise?
There are a few mission concepts that survived.
Of course there was some wonderful technology to build off of.
We couldn’t have gotten there in the time we had without that pre-work.
Oh, what, all of them?
Busche:And along those lines, John, the factions were in a similar boat.
Originally, we had a handful of different names for Rook.
There was Shrike - it was all bird names, I don’t remember specifically why.
But Rook was the one who ultimately survived.
Rook as the main character was always kind of where we were going, but different versions of Rook.
Speaking of Varric, when did you know he was going to die?
Epler:That actually came in surprisingly early.
[Corinne gestures to indicate she did too.]
Epler:So we talked about having Solas kill Varric.
“Why do I care about this Varric guy?
He’s been there for 45 minutes.”
It was a great way to continue that.
Epler:The passing of the torch as well - that’s the other thing.
Because there’s so much about the game that feels influenced by Mass Effect 2.
Busche:The answer might surprise you: that it was relatively late.
It’s very difficult to assess a body of work piecemeal or out of order.
My time is up so let’s end with a look to the future.
Which way do you turn?
In some ways there are some parallels in that regard, to say, the Final Fantasy series.
What kind of adventure is this going to be?
Epler:There’s lots of stories I still want to tell in this setting.
I just love the franchise.
