Dragon Age The Veilguard is a massive new world full of thoughtful stories, epic battles, and beautiful visuals to accompany them. This round of companions is among the most interesting, thoughtful, and downright charismatic, and adventuring with them made for an unforgettable journey.

CGMagazine - Dayna Eileen - 10 / 10

From style to story and everything in between, Dragon Age: The Veilguard is everything I wanted from this entry in the Dragon Age universe.

COGconnected - Mark Steighner - 90 / 100

Polished and confident, Dragon Age: The Veilguard feels like a return to form for the developer. Dragon Age: The Veilguard gives us a beautiful world to experience, interesting allies to explore it with, and action that grows increasingly more nuanced throughout.

Checkpoint Gaming - Luke Mitchell - 10 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a triumphant return to form for one of gaming's most loved developers. It's an epic and grandiose RPG adventure, interwoven with intimate, powerful stories about its cast of endearing and quirky companions. It has a truly stunning world to explore, with hidden secrets, alluring side quests and a literal treasure trove of lore to comb through. Its tight, in-depth combat systems and breadth of accessibility options deliver a highly personalised experience. But beyond the adventure itself, it's another shining testament to diversity and inclusivity, polished to near perfection in its presentation. Put simply, Dragon Age: The Veilguard is Dragon Age at its most captivating, a truly generational adventure that is as heartfelt as it is thrilling.

Cinelinx - Becky O'Brien - 5 / 5

After ten long years, the world of Dragon Age is back in the best way possible. Longtime fans of the Dragon Age series will find so much to love in Dragon Age: The Veilguard as this is the best visit to the land of Thedas yet. An easy contender for Game of The Year, highly recommended for playing as soon as possible.

Dexerto - Ethan Dean - 4 / 5

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a stellar achievement that ends a decade-long dry spell. It tells one of the best stories in the series fuelled by some of its most memorable characters. It’s not a flawless journey but the minor imperfections don’t detract from one of 2024’s best RPGs.

Digital Trends - Tomas Franzese - 3.5 / 5

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a return to form for this once-lauded RPG studio that should satiate Dragon Age fans quite well after a decade-long wait. But returning to form and perfecting form are not the same thing. BioWare has plenty of room to regrow as it gets back on track making the kinds of games RPG fans want them to create.

Digitec Magazine - Philipp Rüegg - German - 4 / 5

With “Dragon Age: The Veilguard”, Bioware delivers a gripping action role-playing game that is aimed at the masses but doesn't forget its roots.

DualShockers - Callum Marshall - 8.5 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a compelling new entry in the series, taking the franchise in a new direction with more RPG-lite ideals. This decision will alienate Die Hard fans but will undoubtedly win favor with new fans willing to embrace the series.

GRYOnline.pl - Anna Garas - Polish - 7 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is the best game BioWare has made since Mass Effect 3. It is crafted much better in terms of story and gameplay than DA: Inquisition (I find this game mediorce at best), and is superior to Andromeda in every way. But the things that used to dazzle me right now are „only” good. There's more to accomplish in the genre than that.

Game Rant - Joshua Duckworth - 10 / 10

After 100 hours and 3 playthroughs of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, I feel justified in my ten-year wait and satisfied by the results.

Gamepressure - Krzysztof Lewandowski - 6 / 10

This isn’t the end of Dragon Age that I was expecting - in this respect, the game must be rated low. However, as an action RPG with flair and a beautiful fairy-tale world, it turns out to be decent, and sometimes even more than that.

Gamer Guides - Tom Hopkins - 92 / 100

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a phenomenal return to form for BioWare. The story is well-paced and the cast of characters are the trademark BioWare staple of fully-realised, but it’s in the newly action-oriented combat where things truly shine.

GamingTrend - Ron Burke - 85 / 100

The writing can be overwrought, written by committee, and occasionally forced, but it's also a major step forward for a team that needs the win. Dragon Age: The Veilguard brings us compelling characters, excellent combat, and a world worth saving.

Guardian - Malindy Hetfeld - 3 / 5

There is lots to do in this huge and beautiful fantasy world, but inconsistent writing and muted combat dull its blade

IGN - Leana Hafer - 9 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard refreshes and reinvigorates a storied series that stumbled through its middle years, and leaves no doubt that it deserves its place in the RPG pantheon. The next Mass Effect is going to have a very tough act to follow, which is not something I ever imagined I'd be saying before I got swept away on this adventure.

Push Square - Robert Ramsey - 8 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard isn't quite BioWare back to its absolute best, but it is the most cohesive and emotionally engaging RPG that the studio has delivered since Mass Effect 3. Its shift to crunchy action combat is an improvement over Inquisition's middle-of-the-road approach, and although the game feels a little light on meaningful player choice, the storytelling pulls no punches when it actually matters. This is a gorgeous and gripping adventure, backed by a cast of endearing heroes and deliciously devious villains.

Quest Daily - Julian Price - 9.5 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a fantasy epic that showcases the best voice acting and overall polish of any game I’ve played this year.

SECTOR.sk - Táňa Matúšová - Slovak - 7 / 10

The latest chapter in the Dragon Age saga successfully combines the best of semi-open-world gameplay with a balanced and engaging combat system. While Dragon Age: The Veilguard falls short of previous installments in areas like side quests, story choices, and dialogue depth, it excels in combat quality, world design, and audiovisual presentation, delivering some of the most epic battles in the series. This game is a roller-coaster experience; at its peak, it entertained and amazed me, yet at times, its lack of depth dampened my enthusiasm.

Stevivor - Hamish Lindsay - 8.5 / 10

Dragon Age The Veilguard is the epitome of 'better than the sum of its. It’s been so long since I experienced this level of joy in a long-form RPG; I have a compulsion to keep playing and finish one more quest.

TechRaptor - Erren Van Duine - 9.5 / 10

Dragon Age: The Veilguard delivers an incredible experience built on fluid combat, deep lore and characters, and player choice. All of this is wrapped up in a polished package that is a must play for Dragon Age fans and RPG fans alike.

TheGamer - Stacey Henley - 4 / 5

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a Dragon Age game like no other, and that alone will put some people off. But it brings with it the traditions of excellent character writing, strong world building through narrative quests, and offers the most exciting combat the series has ever seen. There is a stronger version of The Veilguard in here, one with more Solas and companion quests that find a more natural ending, but the one we’ve got is still a worthy successor to Dragon Age: Inquisition, and is a much needed return to form for BioWare.

VGC - Jordan Middler - 3 / 5

Dragon Age: The Veilguard feels like BioWare playing it too safe. While it nails what it does best, like the excellent cast and interpersonal relationships, from a gameplay perspective it feels out of date.

XboxEra - Jesse Norris - 10 / 10

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[–] Defaced@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago (2 children)

No idea why there are so many people who want this game to fail. Bioware has realistically made two bad games, Andromeda and Anthem, and for me Andromeda has the best gameplay in the entire series, not necessarily the best story and anthem is just not great. It's crazy the amount of bioware hate that exists that's completely unwarranted.

[–] BenFranklinsDick@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Dragon Age 2 is a bad game

[–] ThunderWhiskers@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago

DA2 has several bad qualities. I personally would not generalize it as a bad game. I am willing to concede that this is an unpopular opinion, however.

[–] TwoBeeSan@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I agree. Gameplay from 2 to origins is shameful.

It's story is another matter. Have come around on that in recent years.

[–] shani66@ani.social 2 points 6 days ago

I feel like the story has good ideas but ultimately fails, personally. I like the idea of struggling against inevitable tragedy, but when the cause of such tragedy was against always immediately in arms reach of you and caused by a single person it falls flat.

[–] Defaced@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

You have your opinion but it's definitely in the vocal minority.

[–] BenFranklinsDick@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

What? You're in the minority here. DA2 is known as one of the most notoriously bad sequels ever made.

It was obviously made under extreme time constraints, as well as by a different team due to EA meddling.

It is a blatantly unfinished game that had good ideas that didn't get enough time in the oven.

[–] Defaced@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Age_II lots of good information in the wiki page, of which none of your claims are accurate except for maybe the polarizing views on reused assets but that's literally by design, not crunch. It sold more than origins and sold over a million copies in two weeks, that's pretty damn good. Nice rage baiting though.

[–] ryven@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 week ago

Wow knowing the asset reuse was by design makes me feel way less charitable towards DA2. (I don't know if I'd go as far as the other commenter and say it's "a bad game," but I didn't like it.)

[–] Shadywack@lemmy.world 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

It depends on how you frame it. I don't see it as "hate" as I don't hate Bioware, but objectively speaking, the work speaks for itself. Hyperbole such as disaster, catastrophe, etc are embellishments, but to say the game isn't bad or just so-so isn't a scathing criticism.

Anthem was treated the way it was due to ME3 and the narrative choices, for better or worse. People wanted to tell off Casey Hudson, and the game suffered unfairly. Granted it wasn't a good game, it wasn't as terrible as it was made out to be either.

Now on Andromeda, however, it was fairly criticized. The gameplay was fun and engaging, but the narrative and storytelling were given their fair treatment. That stuff was just bad, and the developer responses didn't help either. The pathetic rants amounted to "I put mah heart and souuuulll into it", and just because people worked really hard on something, doesn't mean it was a good thing. People worked really hard in the sewers of London to get rid of fatbergs, but in the end all they achieved was moving shit around, and that's more dignified than the trash we got in Andromeda's writing and character animations.

Looking at the current marketing situation and the "Bioware hate" as you refer to it, I really think there's more EA hate at this point. EA is blatantly manipulating the review scores by means of review embargos and selectively cherry picking only favorable review outlets, and in some cases we are even spotting reused catchphrases that indicate signs of coaching by EA to say positive things about the game. They do this in light of the consumer sentiment about preorders "Not touching this or preordering, I want reviews first" is a common sentiment amongst their video comments telling their marketing engagement experts to use dirty tricks like review manipulation.

I'd honestly love for Veilguard to be fantastic, but the layoffs and staff turnover tell me they didn't value their developers, didn't value the product, and don't value the art or anything really beyond making some flashy flim-flam with marketable gimmicks. The reviews I've read mention that the characters in the game must definitely know what Tiktok is, due to the cringy dialogue, and that's a review that gave it a favorable score.

Just wait until the objective reviews hit and this game is widely panned. That will draw the line between "hate" and "oh, this is actually shitty", and make things especially clear.

[–] Defaced@lemmy.world 0 points 6 days ago (1 children)

There have been more positive reviews so far than negative, and not a single post has shown any proof that EA is manipulating reviews and cherry picking. The only thing we've seen is one guy at fextralife throwing out conspiracy theories about how EA hates him, another guy who's apparently a racist and sexist asshat, and that's pretty much it. Mortismal has even stated he wasn't paid off or anything by EA and would be fined and his account deleted if he was and didn't disclose that fact, which he didn't.

Bioware has made two bad games, Andromeda and Anthem, two. One is objectively not that bad, the other is a game in a genre they've never dipped their toes into, and the biggest issue is that those two releases were back to back, so that apparently means they've gone to shit now and everything else they've created means nothing. It's really sad how petty and ridiculous some people are over bioware. As for the EA hate that's been around forever, but God forbid someone say something positive about a bioware game.

Do you have proof that EA is forcing reviewers to use catchphrases as you've said? I get it, we all have our hate boners, we all have our pet peeves, but damn son....the conspiracy theories and review embargo nonsense is just stupid at this point. Like you said let's just wait for the objective reviews but how about we simply don't write the game off because bioware apparently murdered our puppies.

[–] Shadywack@lemmy.world 1 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

This sure seems to indicate coaching on catchphrases. As for conspiracy theories, this isn't a conspiracy, it's pretty obvious. IGN, Gamespot, Kotaku, and Polygon have a long history of rating games higher based on their budget and publisher influence. Standard review outlets are inconsistent, and since 2010 have been the butt of many jokes. This seven year old video from Dunkey albeit, satire, rather well breaks down the inconsistency between review outlet staff even highlighting their own subjective contradictions from individual reviewers (look at the bit about the Sonic game in this one).

When you look at the first wave of reviews given by those issued pre-release review copies, the trend speaks for itself.

[Edit] Mass media manipulation never happens, no, never, there are no American soldiers in Baghdad

[–] Defaced@lemmy.world -1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

You know, I was honestly going to give you some credit for trying, but then you edited your post and decided to turn the conversation political. Your entire argument has lost all credibility, these are video games, please try not to take them so seriously, have a nice day.

[–] Shadywack@lemmy.world 2 points 6 days ago

Lol, how is that political? It's a "water makes wet" kind of thing. I'm sorry you have such fragile feelings about Bioware and don't like the narrative. If it's any consolation, it's not even the same people who made the prior games. Whether the game's a massive success or financial failure, EA's just going to fire them all anyway. That's cool though, we'll see how it looks on the Steam reviews this weekend. If past experience is any indicator, whenever a publisher resorts to funny business, it's because they have to. Nobody was needed in the defense of BG, MDK2, BG2, NWN, Kotor, Jade Empire, ME, ME2, DA:O, DA2, SW:TOR, DA:I, etc.

I don't even really care about the studio anymore to be honest, after the layoffs and turnover, we have no idea whether this crew delivered or not, and judging from the review oddities, it paints a bleak picture. Let them sink or swim based on what EA allowed them to do, then through no true fault of their own, face a studio closure because of the obtuse fuckwads in EA corporate. Either way, the future sucks for the gaming studio called Bioware, in name only.