Latest news with #DragonAge:TheVeilguard
Daily Mirror
18-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mirror
Oblivion Remastered reminds me of when Bethesda were the true RPG masters
If Bethesda wants to be back on top by the time next Elder Scrolls game rolls around, it should take more lessons from Oblivion Remastered than Starfield. Oblivion Remastered demonstrates the kind of inspiring world and storytelling experience any studio worth its RPG weight should be aiming to recapture. For the longest time, the RPG video game arms race was dominated by the two Bs: BioWare and Bethesda. Specialising in creating titles with memorable characters set in incredibly detailed worlds – the kind where you, the player, can make an impact through your own gameplay decisions – it's clear that this style of game, in 2025, has only become harder to make for both studios. As a result, there's a lot less of these 'all-encompassing' style RPG experiences to be found in general, which means when a disappointment of, say, Starfield 's calibre arrives, it's no fun for anyone. Particularly the players and developers who adored the genre-defining experiences of BioWare and Bethesda's heyday. While not a bad game per se, Dragon Age: The Veilguard 's more action-oriented approach caused long-time series fans to wonder why it was even called Dragon Age at all. As for Mass Effect? Time will tell whether BioWare can put lightning back in that bottle. Meanwhile, as for the other big B, I've been dipping in and out of Oblivion Remastered since its release this month. It's showing age in places, true, yet still reminds me of when a Bethesda RPG was something to be savoured. Is it full of jank and barmy voice acting? Yes, but it also nails (as Skyrim also did) the feeling of being transported to another place, a feeling that's further cemented once you gain influence over it through your decisions. Starfield lacked a lot of this texture, by comparison. The difference with Oblivion is that it cuts the clutter. Now, what do I mean by 'clutter'? Part of this is the size of the world, of course. Whereas Starfield was largely sold on the premise of being limitless, what with procedurally generated planets making up a vast solar system that seemed ripe for exploration alongside a few central hubs, Oblivion's Cyrodiil is almost the exact opposite. In a little under 10 minutes, I can run from its capital all the way to the county of Kvatch, where I'm immediately besieged by countless narrative threads to pull on – almost all of them interesting. By nature of being substantially smaller, not only is Oblivion Remastered more manageable, but less intimidating when wanting to become invested in the several stories it presents. Starfield's more procedural approach feels more like a chore. There's an interesting concept at its centre, one involving some sort of ancient prophecy that quickly sees your main mission to hunt down a series of Artefacts as part of Constellation's effort. This narrative throughline quickly gets muddled soon after you've first launched off the starting planet, however, and it isn't helped by the avalanche of continuous load screens as you board, fly, and then exit your shuttle. Oblivion Remastered has absolutely none of these extra trimmings, and therefore very little bloat. You're quickly out there, exploring Cyrodiil at your own pace, meeting all kinds of quirky races and characters. A dying age Funnily enough, where Oblivion Remastered is most like Starfield is in the raft of dungeons I'm encouraged to plunder. Absolutely all of them I've explored so far feel like the same copy-and-paste underground design, only with a slightly different layout and objective. This isn't an issue exclusive to Oblivion, mind you, Skyrim still has a similar sense of repetition. However, it never bothers me too much since you're never forced to spend exorbitant amounts of time in them, meaning it's never too long before you're back out into Cyrodiil's beautiful open scenery – which obviously looks better than ever due to being rebuilt from the ground up in Unreal Engine 5. These are just a few superficial examples, but as someone who is currently playing Oblivion for the first time via this remaster, the benefits are clear: Bethesda RPGs are best when they cut out any noise and make you the centre of this story cleanly and promptly. It's not perfect, and by nature of being essentially a facelift of a 2006 Xbox 360 title, there's a few niggles I have with combat, pacing, and the minigames. Dear lord, the minigames… That said, I hope Bethesda learns what it did great during this era of RPG development so it can use these lessons to inform the next generation of The Elder Scrolls rather than the less nuanced approach of Starfield. In the end, there's a direct line that can be drawn from Oblivion all the way to Starfield. You see it in its insistence on wanting to make the player feel special, combined with plenty of reasons to poke away at the farthest reaches of the map and, most of all, tell a story in a world that reflects the effects of your specific decision-making right back at you. These kinds of wide-scale RPGs are no longer a walk in the park to make, and so it's not too surprising to see both BioWare and Bethesda stumble a fair bit when wanting to still get it right while making the most of what new advancements in technology offer. Oblivion Remastered, warts and all, has far more texture and allure than most other recent video game worlds. As such, I don't think it's wrong to expect a once great RPG studio like Bethesda to try and get back to that.
Business Mayor
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Business Mayor
Why Even User Video Game Scores Can't Be Trusted Any More – How-To Geek
Review bombing skews ratings with irrelevant negativity, harming a game's reputation and affecting future projects. It's hard to trust negative reviews due to review bombing, which only makes it harder to judge a game. Reviews should focus on gameplay, but outside influences often lead to unfairly low scores and mistrust. Review bombing occurs when a group of people works together to flood online review sites with many negative reviews. This is commonly a retaliatory tactic that's used even if the game itself is good. This practice damages the trust in user review systems by skewing a game's overall rating and shaping how people see it, usually for reasons that have nothing to do with a game's overall quality. Review Bombing Has Become Too Common Marcus Mears III / Review Geek The process of review bombing sees a bunch of people, often driven by outside issues, all post bad reviews at the same time. Many use bots or automated tools to make their attack even bigger. This wave of low scores drowns out real criticism and pulls down the game's average rating, which can hurt sales and even affect whether future projects get made. Many games have been hit by review bombing. Big-name games can face backlash over comments made by those involved in production and receive negative reviews that have nothing to do with how the game played or how well it worked. Other games with controversial characters or storylines have also been targeted, like Dragon Age: The Veilguard , showing how easily review systems can be abused because of social or political disagreements. Related Imagine a world where PC game reviews are just reviews. These attacks aren't always about politics. Sometimes, players organize negative review campaigns because they're unhappy with changes to gameplay, feel like the game pushes too many microtransactions, or believe the developers aren't listening to their complaints. For example, Infinity Nikki was recently review-bombed due to a launcher error. A launch error is a bug that would likely have been fixed by reporting it regularly. Players don't need to go to the review section to get attention when developers build games with bug report systems and have X accounts to receive feedback. Many go overboard just because they want others to see that they are angry. These are calls for attention, not a real reflection on the gameplay or quality of the game itself. Review bombing is an overused tactic to show disdain. If anything, the review bombers look like they're just whining when using this technique to complain over a minor issue or the servers going down for a day. Bad Reviews Lose Their Believability Over Time Jorge Aguilar/Activision The growing problem of review bombing has greatly hurt the trustworthiness of negative user reviews for video games. This issue happens when organized groups overwhelm review platforms with large numbers of extremely negative ratings, often for reasons that have nothing to do with the game's actual quality. As a result, it can cause many to distrust negative reviews more than ever. At first, negative reviews might appear to be honest, showing real disappointment from players. However, these get mixed in with many review bombers who want to vent their frustration over something unrelated to the gameplay itself. This makes it very hard to distinguish between real criticism and planned attacks meant to harm a game's reputation. It's gone so far that you can expect negative reviews even if you know the game is good. Related These games occupy a special place in my mind. When Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was released, there was a sudden flood of negative reviews. The game had plenty of issues and a very short campaign. This was expected and warranted because the quality of the game didn't surpass Modern Warfare 2 ; it was more like an expansion pack at full price. When Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 came out, it was a real improvement and did a lot well. However, it faced a similar wave of negativity, where bad reviews at first far outnumbered positive ones, likely because of organized efforts. Even though many of the issues were quickly fixed, players seemed to be focused on bashing a new game in the series for their own personal reasons, not so much on the game's quality. While many people updated their reviews to be more positive, the initial wave of negativity had a lasting effect. This makes you question whether early reviews can be trusted, and reviews matter most when a game first comes out, and there's not much information on them available. Reviews Should Reflect the Game, Not Public Opinion Bioware While it's nice to think reviewers try to stay fair, outside influences often twist how a game's true quality is judged. A review itself is subjective because it's an opinion, so that's okay. What's less than okay is how often reviews lead away from the game itself. Reviews should look at the gameplay, story, visuals, and overall design. However, review bombers often get swayed by the drama around how the game was made or the company's reputation behind it. Sadly, this means the ideal review is often ignored, leading to scores that don't truly show how good or bad a game really is. One big issue is how hard it is to differentiate between professional criticism and public opinion. If people dislike a game's publisher because of issues that aren't directly related to the game itself, like shady business deals or accusations against the developers, such negativity can hurt the reception of a new game. This creates a situation where a well-crafted game gets low scores because people already dislike the company behind it. There are valid reasons not to purchase a game that's embroiled in these sorts of problems, but whether a review score should be reflective of outside drama is another question entirely. Related These action games are hiding some great puzzles. Players' distrust, often fueled by news stories about these controversies, directly shapes how critics see the game. For example, even if a game gets mostly good reviews and has solid gameplay, a title from a company dealing with accusations of ethical issues could still be judged harshly by some players before they even try it, dragging down the final average score. I firmly believe that a publisher should be held to account for unethical and predatory practices. But it's arguably better not to buy the game than to mess with the review system. A lack of sales will kill a great game. Guardians of the Galaxy is a great example of a great game with good reviews that just didn't sell well because of the public's view it had before release. The publisher wasn't trusted, so the game wasn't bought, and the game died—no fake bad reviews needed. Reviews From Individuals Are as Unbelievable as Big Sites Steam The trustworthiness of video game reviews, whether from big review websites or regular players, has become more doubtful over time. Big review sites often give out fairly high scores, often between 7 and 9. This trend makes people worry that issues have been glossed over. I've reviewed and edited reviews of games at professional sites for years. It's not easy to make a real game review, but burning a bridge with a publisher is not smart. I'd say that when it comes to the big review websites, read the review and not the score. Even considering bias or fear of hurting reputation, it's arguable that user review scores can be more untrustworthy than those on big sites. While they seem like they should reflect real player experiences, they can easily be manipulated or influenced by bias. A Minecraft Movie and Five Nights At Freddy's movies are great examples of this. Plenty of regular watchers hated them, but some of that is because they expect Oppenheimer quality from kids' movies. If you go in without the expectation of an adult target audience, you enjoy those movies much more. The growing problem of review bombing has made it much harder to tell the difference between honest criticism and planned, harmful attacks. It makes user reviews less believable and has already hurt the user review system far more than it ever hurt any publishers.
Yahoo
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Ex-BioWare Lead Says The Dragon Age Team Didn't Feel Supported During Veilguard Development
Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Generate Key Takeaways It's no secret that the game that would become Dragon Age: The Veilguard had a troubled development. However, every time a new story comes out about how studio in-fighting and corporate favoritism affected the project, it feels like more of a miracle that the fantasy RPG got out the door looking like a classic BioWare game. Mark Darrah, the former executive producer of the Dragon Age series, has released a new YouTube video in which he discusses how a few events in 2017 fundamentally changed the trajectory of the RPG studio and how, according to him, Dragon Age was thrown under the bus in more ways than one during this time. Darrah's 16-minute video runs down how things shifted at BioWare in the months leading up to Mass Effect: Andromeda's launch in 2017, a period of change that he calls 'the most impactful 12 months' in the studio's history. In late 2016 Darrah, who had been working on Dragon Age, began instead leading the team that would oversee the closing months of the sci-fi RPG's development cycle. He explains that his transfer felt like a blow to the Dragon Age team, which was then working on one of the early iterations of the fantasy series' fourth entry, as Darrah had been a key member of its leadership. However, Darrah thought that by helping ship Andromeda, he could then see the resources dedicated to the game reallocated to help the Dragon Age team develop the fantasy RPG. But unfortunately, that's not what happened. 'My feeling at the time was the Dragon Age team was feeling jerked around,' Darrah says in the video. 'They were feeling like we were getting no support from BioWare or from [publisher] EA, which was basically true.' Darrah says his coming on to help with Andromeda was irregular at the time, as it was the first time the studio had a 'leadership discontinuity,' in which a person in charge of one project that was in active development left it to work on another. Darrah says the short time he spent working on Andromeda didn't ultimately have much of an impact on Dragon Age's development, but it did set a precedent establishing that leadership could be moved around within the company, even if they were in the middle of directing something else. This move contributed to a perception that Dragon Age wasn't a priority within the company. Darrah goes on to explain how the relationship between BioWare and EA changed at this time, as the studio started reporting to a different arm of the publisher. Prior to this, BioWare was 'strangely' reporting to higher-ups in the company's sports section, a group which Darrah described as 'benignly disinterested,' allowing the studio to work more autonomously. Then, when things shifted in 2017, BioWare started reporting to a branch of EA that was 'hyper interested' in the decision-making process. According to Darrah, this change in leadership was likely part of why the studio moved on from Andromeda so quickly, canceling the game's planned DLC and putting the sci-fi series on ice. 'The group that we reported into had very little stake in either the success or the failure of [Mass Effect: Andromeda], and they had a lot more incentive for BioWare to move on to the next thing that they could tie themselves to and show themselves as having influence on the development of,' Darrah said. As BioWare geared up for the next game, the much-maligned looter shooter Anthem, Darrah says he received 'assurances' from EA and BioWare leadership that Dragon Age was important to the company, but not the kinds of developers and resources that would back those statements up. And it was all made a lot more complicated by the return of ex-Mass Effect director Casey Hudson, who rejoined the company as its general manager in 2017. Darrah says he learned about Hudson's return at the same time as the rest of the company, despite being a senior member of BioWare's leadership team. He says he considered the decision to bring Hudson back without consulting him a sign of 'an immense amount of disrespect,' and he sent emails shortly after the announcement that said he expected Hudson would make a call to 'starve' Dragon Age of resources as the studio went all-hands-on-deck on Anthem. Darrah was once again reassured by leadership that Dragon Age was important to the company and that they were committed to him leading the project. 'As we all know, that's not what happened at all,' Darrah says. 'In very short order, in basically exactly the way that I predicted, Anthem was seen as needing greater leadership support, and myself and some other very senior people, and a large percentage of the Dragon Age team, was moved onto Anthem.' This was followed by the scaling down of BioWare's Montreal studio, which saw many staff members moved to other teams across the EA umbrella. Darrah says that the Montreal team had 'basically been lied to' and were told that the Dragon Age team 'didn't want' them. He also claims that he was trying to get the next Dragon Age past a certain development threshold which he hoped might allow him to retain those developers, but EA higher-ups who were local in Montreal wanted those people, and 'proximity is a powerful tool.' 'If you are someone who's been mad at me since 2017 because you feel like I abandoned you in Montreal, know that that's not what happened,' Darrah says. 'Know that I fought with every tool that I knew how to wield to try and keep you, but the organization had no interest in that occurring.' Whatever the circumstances, Darrah says EA wasn't interested in helping the Dragon Age team grow; it wanted Anthem to get off the ground and be a huge live-service hit for the company. Darrah hypothesizes that, at this point, management pivoted the Dragon Age project into the now-scrapped live-service game as a 'rationalization' for removing many members of the team and putting them to work on Anthem. Now that the next Dragon Age was going back to the drawing board, it could be argued that the project didn't need that big of a team in its early production stages. The move also resulted in a longer 'leadership discontinuity,' as Darrah worked on Anthem until the game shipped in 2019. 'I talked a fairly long time ago about how EA buys studios and then consumes them and they start to lose their culture into the overall EA culture,' Darrah said. 'To me, it feels like 2017 is when EA finished digesting BioWare, which they had bought nine years earlier in 2008.' Darrah acknowledges that much of his story might sound like a series of events that affected him personally rather than the studio at large, but a handful of ex-BioWare employees have shared the video on social media and corroborated the events described. Darrah's claims also line up with Kotaku's previous reporting on Anthem's development, in which sources told us about how the loot shooter took up much of the company's resources, further complicating the development of what would eventually become Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Darrah left BioWare in 2020, but returned to consult onThe Veilguard in 2023. After 10 years of tortured development, that game finally launched in 2024 as a single-player, story-driven RPG and was divisive in the ways Dragon Age games often are. In January, BioWare was restructured to be a one-game studio, resulting in layoffs for some of the company's veteran talent. The team that remains is working on Mass Effect 5. 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Forbes
16-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘Dragon Age: The Veilguard' Leads 2025 Gayming Awards Nominations
'Dragon Age: The Veilguard' is the frontrunner at this year's Gayming Awards, but it's an open ... More field. Dragon Age: The Veilguard has claimed a narrow lead in the nomination stakes going into the 2025 Gayming Awards, including a coveted place on an incredibly close Game of the Year list. Still, the show's stars-in-waiting appear to be some truly spectacular indie titles, which have long deserved their time in the limelight. The fifth annual Gayming Awards, which will be broadcast on July 8 via WOW Presents Plus following an exclusive deal announced earlier this year, celebrates excellence in LGBTQ+ video games and queer representation in the industry. The Veilguard is one of six titles nominated for Game of the Year, and it'll duke it out with Dragon's Dogma 2, Life is Strange: Double Exposure, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, The Last of Us Part II Remastered, and the fantastic Fear The Spotlight. It's also shortlisted for the Gayming Magazine Readers' Award and Best LGBTQ+ Character, with lead character Rook earning a nomination. It's also a great year for indies, with the superb Sorry We're Closed and Caravan SandWitch among smaller-studio hopefuls going into the ceremony. Last year, Baldur's Gate 3 unsurprisingly claimed the biggest award of the night, while Thirsty Suitors rightly took home the Authentic Representation and Best LGBTQ Indie Game awards. 'Fear the Spotlight' more than deserves its place on the list. 'Caravan SandWitch' is one of the most underrated games of 2024, and you really should play it. Public voting is now open in four categories, including the Readers' Award, Content Creator of the Year, Geek Entertainment of the Year, and Community Impact Award. Winners of the yet-unannounced Gayming Icon and LGBTQ+ Streamer Rising Star Class of 2025 will be revealed closer to the event, at some point in June.
The Guardian
27-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
These games were indie smash hits – but what happened next?
It is now more or less impossible to put a precise figure on the number of video games released each year. According to data published by the digital store Steam, almost 19,000 titles were released in 2024 – and that's just on one platform. Hundreds more arrived on consoles and smartphones. In some ways this is the positive sign of a vibrant industry, but how on earth does a new project get noticed? When Triple A titles with multimillion dollar marketing budgets are finding it hard to gain attention (disappointing sales have been reported for Dragon Age: The Veilguard, the Final Fantasy VII remakes and EA Sports FC), what chance is there for a small team to break out? And yet it does happen. Last year's surprise hit Balatro has shifted more than 5m copies. Complex medieval strategy title Manor Lords sold 1m copies during its launch weekend. But what awaits a small developer after they achieve success? And what does success even mean in a continuously evolving industry? James Carbutt and Will Todd of Coal Supper are still trying to make sense of it. Their acerbic satire Thank Goodness You're Here!, in which players slap their way through bizarre quotidian scenarios in the fictional humble northern town of Barnsworth, is now an award-winning game. 'It's just not registered as a success in my head at all,' says Carbutt. 'The numbers are going up on screen, and there have been YouTube playthroughs and some erotic fan art. Beyond that, it won't register.' After spending three years working on the project, the pair now find themselves in the confusing glare of the spotlight, fielding questions about what's next. 'It's horrible,' Carbutt jokes. 'But I don't think we feel any sort of second-album syndrome. The space it gives you to be a bit introspective about what you want to do next is the interesting quirk of a successful indie game.' Veteran indie developer Gabe Cuzzillo (Ape Out, Baby Steps) offered them sage wisdom. 'He spoke about how you should focus not just on making something good – because how do you quantify that, it's amorphous?' says Todd. 'Instead we should look at what it is we want to explore and judge success intrinsically, based on whether we explored that thing. The pressure of speed to market doesn't apply to us, because it's never going to be possible to crank something out in six months to chase success anyway. It's more like, in the wake of this being received well, what's the next thing we want to explore? That's something we're interrogating at the moment.' Australian developer Grace Bruxner has also redefined success after leaving behind a trilogy of Frog Detective games: bite-size adventures co-developed with Thomas Bowker that quickly became cult indie hits. 'Success in games has always been a bit of a lie, a bit of an illusion,' she says, pointing to typical markers such as cultural impact, player numbers and financial gain. 'My measure of success is: did I make something I'm proud of, and has it impacted my life and other people's lives in a positive way? And yes, it did, so thumbs up.' Bruxner began working on the series during her final year at university as an experiment, to see whether she could produce a commercial game. After a relatively breezy first outing, the second Frog Detective game demanded that Bruxner and Bowker lock in, and spend most of their time on the project. By the third instalment, the hard work had paid off, though the pressure had begun to take its toll. Throw in the pandemic, as well as mental and physical health issues, and Bruxner was ready to take a break. 'I wasn't grinding super hard, but I also wasn't having a great time,' she says. 'It just was really nice to make that choice to stop.' Sign up to Pushing Buttons Keza MacDonald's weekly look at the world of gaming after newsletter promotion Bruxner still has game ideas swirling in the back of her head, but she wanted to escape the endless production cycle that has swallowed up many of her peers, regardless of mounting exhaustion or burnout. 'It's not universal advice,' she says, 'but if you're a solo dev or a really small team, I don't think there's any shame in leaving it there. Unless you love making games. I'm not sure I love making games. I was quite young when we released the first Frog Detective, so it was like, 'This is my entire identity for life. I don't know how to be a separate person from that.' Three years after the series' swan song, she is on indefinite hiatus, exploring alternative creative paths – such as pottery. 'I can't imagine making games, because of the expectations on me as a creator,' she explains. 'I don't even know where I would go from here.' Bruxner has been surprised by her ability to sustain herself on the modest amount of money provided by Frog Detective. 'If your game continues to have a tail, and you can budget properly and live within your means, it is possible to have a passive income that isn't tied to being a horrible landlord,' she explains. Even so, she knows how taboo it can be to talk plainly about money, especially in creative circles like the indie game scene. 'I have the free time to chill and decide what I want to do, but I assume at some point I'll probably need to have a career again. My biggest question is will this money last forever? Probably not, and then what happens when it runs out? I don't know.' It may seem as though more indies than ever have broken into the spotlight in recent years. But enduring games industry turbulence has made finding financial support for follow-ups and debuts more complicated. 'The elephant in the room is everything that's happened over the past couple of years, with mass layoffs, studio closures and evaporating funding opportunities,' explains AP Thomson, a developer of the forthcoming indie Consume Me with fellow NYU Game Center graduate Jenny Jiao Hsia. 'Before that, there was a pretty major change around the mid-2010s when indie publishers and funders started rising in prominence. Everything we've heard suggests that the same opportunities no longer exist or are incredibly limited.' Consume Me, the duo's coming-of-age scheduling RPG doesn't have a release date but has already been nominated for five gongs at the Independent Games Festival awards. As such, Jiao Hsia and Thomson are already under pressure to decide their next endeavour. 'Multiple people have told us we should be moving forward once it launches,' says Thomson. Even with growing expectations, the pair aren't keen to get ahead of themselves. 'Everything we've heard suggests that now is really not a great time to be pitching, so we're going to focus our energy on the launch and then read the temperature of the room after that,' Thomson adds. 'I'm looking forward to finding enjoyment in making art again, instead of feeling like I have to show up to a job I never applied to,' explains Jiao Hsia. 'The idea of making art for fun, without worrying about making money off it, is something I can't wait to do.'
