EA played a major part in the poor performance of their last 3 games
Let’s not act like BioWare are entirely blameless, a lot of the staff that made their games iconic left and they’ve been making crap for 3 games straight.
As to my last point: dragon age origins for me is up there with BG3 in terms of great RPGs, I absolutely adored the art style, the way the characters interacted and the world created. I launched into dragon age veilguard when it came out as a huge fan of the series and it was honestly one of the most jarring games I’ve ever played, it was like the people at the studio hated everything the series had been and went out of their way to annoy old fans. There’s innovation and then there’s self mutilation. BioWare as we knew it was gone long before EA shut it down
Every form of journalistic media had the same title in their reviews of DA:Veilguard.
“A return to form.”
They had to buy their way into every media outlet to make the game look like it was Origin but better, instead of actually creating a game that was true to its name.
The game actually made me enjoy the other Dragon Age installments less.
Yeah i didnt even bother with veilguard because it looked the furthest yet from DA:O, which they started moving away from with DA2 imo, trying to make it more like ME. Tragic too, because I agree BG3's success seems like a huge indication that they'd be hugely successful actually returning to form with DA:O style gameplay.
Tragic loss for gaming imo, but nothing lives forever
True enough, but stuff like Pullars of Eternity and the old-school Baldur's games are similar enough because they ran turn-based underneath the realyime feel. Imo BG3 makes me feel like it's an "if you build it, they will come" situation
What killed it for me was the complete keep removal and no real choice carryover from previous games. That's like the hallmark of bioware games and they completely done away with it.
IMO 2s combat system was very solid and had they simply made a game with an Origins level story and used that combat system, they would've been golden.
Inquisition in particular was not the same gameplay wise
People point out pretty obnoxious pronoun scene
But the main issue with DAV vs dao or da2.. was how you could react treat the world/party members.. in the most recent game it was completely sanitised
Whats funny is that EA/Bioware every installment moved closer to action gameplay and further from slower more deliberate combat.. because they believed that it wouldn't sell
But then bg3 comes along with modernised but similar combat to DAO.. but also gave you the personal choice to do whatever you want (that old Dragon age, mass effect had) and makes huge amounts of $$ and wins awards and huge acclaim
That’s exactly why we shouldn’t be sad BioWare is closing down. There wasn’t an original cell left in that body. It became what everything we love in this world will become when corporate greed gets its fingers in there, a husk of itself driven by people who don’t even enjoy the games that made them who they are.
"Return to form" doesn't mean going back to the same systems, it just means going back to a previously higher standard of quality than they had been at recently.
Which is true for Bioware as Anthem sucked and DA:V was definitely made to a level more like their old stuff. Before Anthem was Andromeda. I liked that a lot more than DA:V, but it did ship pretty rough.
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u/GrimJimmy94 8h ago
As to my last point: dragon age origins for me is up there with BG3 in terms of great RPGs, I absolutely adored the art style, the way the characters interacted and the world created. I launched into dragon age veilguard when it came out as a huge fan of the series and it was honestly one of the most jarring games I’ve ever played, it was like the people at the studio hated everything the series had been and went out of their way to annoy old fans. There’s innovation and then there’s self mutilation. BioWare as we knew it was gone long before EA shut it down