Everything You Need to Know About Dragon Age: The Veilguard

Since it was announced back in the summer that we’d have a new Dragon Age game this year, we have been eagerly awaiting Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Now, it’s nearly here.

Get ready for an immersive RPG experience, with Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Corrupt ancient gods are free and causing havoc in Thedas, and you need to be Dragon Age’s newest hero. We’re taking a closer look at the gameplay and PC specifications required to play this epic new fantasy adventure.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard

Dragon Age: The Veilguard was developed by BioWare and published by Electronic Arts. It is the latest in the Dragon Age franchise, the ninth title in the series. Set in the world of Thedas, you play as the rising hero Rook in the fight to stop the corrupt ancient gods who are trying to destroy the world. With a team of seven companions, you will become the Veilguard and protect the land from these destructive forces.

Save a Battered World

Thedas is a vibrant world to explore, filled with rugged wilderness, labyrinths, and cities – all with a healthy dollop of conflict and secret magics. With all the havoc the gods are creating, nations are at war and factions are splintering. This is the backdrop to a dramatic single-player campaign, rich with lore, diverse environments, and fearsome beasts to fight.

Your hero, Rook, is highly customisable. You can choose from four different races and three combat classes to best suit your playstyle. Their appearance and backstory are entirely up to you too! As you progress through the story, you’ll level up and gain new abilities. There are even powerful items you can discover along the way that will enhance your combat style. In battle, you must combine your own fast-paced attacks and parries with the companion ability wheel to properly exploit any monster’s weaknesses.

Dragon Age™: The Veilguard game still from Steam

The companions are vital in your quest to save Thedas. There are seven of them, each with their own unique backstories and rich lives. You can befriend each of them, deepening your relationships and even falling in love. The choices you make with your companions will impact their development and which abilities they’ll unlock – making each playthrough a new experience. Your companions are:

Harding: The Scout
Neve: The Detective
Emmrich: The Necromancer
Taash: The Dragon Hunter
Davrin: The Warden
Bellara: The Veil Jumper
and Lucanis: The Mage Killer

Accessibility Features

There are a number of accessibility features available on Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Fully detailed on a Steam announcement, these include combat and difficulty settings, a customisable UI and HUD, audio aids, visual aids, and even adjustments to alleviate motion sickness. We love to see it!

Accessibility in Gaming: Are Our Favourite Games Really Accessible?

Accessibility is a hot topic in gaming, with more and more games offering these features. But can we really call the hobby accessible?

Simon’s Thoughts on Dragon Age: Veilguard

Now I know Veilguard has been a hot topic in the culture war, but I’m going to try and steer as far away from that as I can. I’ve yet to finish the game – in fact, I’m only around 30 hours in, which is near the halfway mark. But I’m going to examine what I like and dislike about this latest addition to the Dragon Age series so far.

Simon’s Gaming Specs

I battled the Elven Gods on my custom gaming PC with the following specs:

Component	Details
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 5600X
GPU	AMD Radeon RX 6800
RAM	32GB DDR4 3600MHz
Storage	NVMe and SATA storage

Previous Reviews

Dive into Azeroth in World of Warcraft: The War Within

The Excellent – Combat

Cutting straight to the chase, the combat system in Dragon Age: Veilguard is fantastic. It’s fluid to play with and does so much heavy lifting for the game. For example, take a battle with a group of Venatori. That generally consists of one or more casters, a pair of melee fighters, and, on occasion, a heavy armed with a shield. On my rogue, this is how I’d handle the fight:

I’d dash in, perform a quick combo on the melee, follow it up with a special ability that applies a status effect to them.

Then, I’d do a quick combo with my team to exploit that status, resulting in a detonation which will generally take out the melee and stagger the heavy.

As this is happening, I close the distance to the caster, heavy charge attack, and finish them off with another hard-hitting ability, leaving just the heavy.

Finally, I’d carefully approach the heavy, bait them into an attack I can parry, moving into a riposte, stunning them, giving me plenty of room to hit them with my last ability to finish the fight.

All of this happens in seconds and is super easy to pull off. Combat is done through a handful of buttons, a light attack, heavy attack, ranged, dodge, parry, and movement, which blend perfectly together. Everything comes with satisfying feedback. Moves feel weighty when performed, whilst also being quick and flashy. Plus, enemy attacks are well telegraphed, with yellow warnings for attacks you can parry, and red for stuff you need to dodge.

Combat in Dragon Age: Veilguard — Getting ready for a parry

The Good – Art and Audio

Another high point for Dragon Age: Veilguard is how much work the visual and audio artists have obviously put into the game. The art is beautiful and while different, still tries to keep it tied into the Dragon Age universe. I mean, they have Varric monologuing over animatics with the same art style as seen in Dragon Age 2, which in my opinion is just perfect.

The locations you explore are visually distinct. Treviso has a very renaissance Italy vibe to it, lots of grand buildings surrounded by canals. Arlathan Forest on the other hand, heavily features a return to nature style, where an ancient Elven city has slowly been reclaimed by the forest. Then there’s my favourite location, the Grand Necropolis in Nevara. If you love the macabre then this is the place for you, skulls and bone motifs everywhere.

The market in Treviso — The central market in Treviso

In addition to amazing art, Dragon Age: Veilguard boasts a superb soundtrack. Is that any surprise when it’s been composed by the legendary Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe! These tracks set the mood for any given scene. What’s more, they can quickly switch up when it’s required, such as when you move from exploring to being thrust into battle. The music will go from low key to frantic in time with the change of pace.

The Disappointing – Animation

Now while the animation during fights is top notch, everything else is middling to downright bad. For example, this is yet another game where the protagonist can’t swim, instead if you jump into water, you throw up your hands and sink whilst some ripples and bubbles are added to the water. Then you respawn. Additionally, whilst you may be able to sprint around every locale without stopping for breath, you can’t jump for peanuts. I’m not talking about jumping over a canyon here, I’m on about not being able to jump small gaps without almost missing and having to climb up, taking all the flow out of exploration.

Then there’s the character animation when interacting with one another. When I say that the most expressive and interesting character to look at during a scene is Manfred, you’re doing something wrong. He’s a skeleton with goggles on! Everyone is just so wooden, there are hardly any expressions on their faces. BioWare was doing this so much better in Mass Effect 2, a game from 2010! Then there’s the lip syncing. Oh, the lip syncing is bad! Just flappy lips in front of a set of pearly white top teeth that does not match the words being spoken.

Manfred the skeleton — Behold Manfred, the best character in the game

The Bad – Writing

Now Dragon Age as a setting has been around for a long while now – fifteen years, in fact. It’s had a bunch of games, many novels, comics, and even an animated film all set in the Dragon Age universe. Yet, quite often, the game feels like it is only playing lip service to its own lore.

In terms of the timeline, it’s only been around twenty years since Dragon Age: Origins, but the technology level has changed drastically. The world is now full of what I can only call Magitech. Take for example a magical artifact like an Eluvian. They’re everywhere now even more so than they were in Inquisition. These mirrors were a major plot point of the Dalish Elf story in Origins, so seeing them become mundane is jarring, not to mention that fixing one is relatively simple, with some technobabble and hand waving worthy of an episode of Star Trek.

Elven magitech — Somehow these things are now everywhere

Now, the crimes committed against the lore of the universe are nothing compared to dialogue. Almost every character is written like a modern twenty something cosplaying a character in a fantasy setting. A character might be explaining how the world is doomed because of the party’s actions, and then Rook or a party member will chime in with a “lol so random” retort. The immersion is broken.

The Annoying – Characters

Again, I’m not touching on the sensitive topics that are raging over Veilguard, but I do want to mention that some of the characters are just awful. It’s something where the most likeable character is Manfred who, if you remember, is a skeleton with goggles for eyes.

Manfred with Emmrich and Harding — Best character Manfred blessing the party with his presence

This is again a case of bad writing. The voice actors are giving it their all, but what they have to work with just isn’t great. Some are passable like Varric, who feels like he always has. But he is injured early on in the game, so you have limited interactions with him.

Then there are the ones who just aren’t likeable, with the one I dislike the most being Taash. Again, I’m only 30-hours in, so they’re just stepping into their identity struggle. The character feels like the bad traits of Anders, have been mixed with the bad traits of Sera, ending up with a petulant child of a character. They are very snappy towards Rook when you first meet, especially after you make a simple observation about their garb. And they don’t break this image, when you see them pouting like a toddler, when told they need to go and help save the world a few minutes later.

Conclusion

In short, would I recommend Dragon Age: Veilguard? That’s a tough one, but I’m going to say yes, if you can overlook its flaws like I can. The overall story is passable and does line up with previous titles. There are even some moments that really shine, like the visit to the Dwarven Thaig, which perfectly captures the feel of the Deep Roads as seen in Dragon Age: Origins.

Also, I really can’t emphasise how much I love the combat system, it’s like BioWare have hand-picked little pieces from other titles to create something phenomenal. You’ve got limited potions from dark souls, melee like the Batman Arkham series, companion synergy as seen in Mass Effect 3. It all works so well to make something that I feel could influence other games going forward.

The art style and music are excellent, making it a feast for the senses. The Siege of Weisshaupt is a standout moment, seeing Ghilan’nain staring at you from the clouds as her pet Archdemon flies towards you is both terrifying, and beautiful at the same time. Meanwhile, the music that plays throughout the Siege just builds tension magnificently, where you actually feel relieved to end up in the boss battle at the end.

The art team can certainly deliver when it’s called for

These factors carry some serious weight for me, overshadowing the disappointments I’m getting from other areas. Unfortunately, you might not be able to overlook them! Hopefully I’ve been able to make a case where you’re willing to give the game a chance without paying attention to what is going on around it.

Is Dragon Age: The Veilguard Multiplayer?

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a singleplayer campaign, with no multiplayer modes supported. With the stunning visuals and immersive story-telling, we reckon it would be great fodder for livestreaming!

Overclockers UK's Ultimate Collection of Streaming Guides

If your streaming set-up is in need of some TLC, check out our comprehensive collection of guides.

What Platform is Dragon Age: The Veilguard Available On?

Dragon Age: The Veilguard will be available to play on PC, PlayStation5, and Xbox Series X/S from October 31^st 2024.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard Official Specifications

Does your gaming PC have what it takes to unite the veilguard? Here are the official specifications for Dragon Age: The Veilguard:

Component	Minimum Specs	Recommended Specs
Operating System	Windows 11 / 10 64-bit	Windows 11 / 10 64-bit
Processor	Intel Core i5-8400 AMD Ryzen 3 3300X AMD CPUs on Windows 11 require AGESA V2 1.2.0.7	Intel Core i9-9900K AMD Ryzen 7 3700X AMD CPUs on Windows 11 require AGESA V2 1.2.0.7
Memory	16GB RAM	16GB RAM
Graphics	NVIDIA GTX 970 / 1650 AMD Radeon R9 290X	NVIDIA RTX 2070 AMD Radeon RX 5700XT
DirectX	Version 12	Version 12
Storage	100GB available space	100GB available space
Additional Notes	SSD preferred but HDD supported	SSD required

🎮 Is Your PC Ready? The Ultimate Guide to Dragon Age: The Veilguard Specs 🐲🖥️

Our “Is Your PC Ready? Series” is back! Briony has all the details you need on the PC hardware requirements to play Dragon Age: The Veilguard.

Best PCs to Play Dragon Age: The Veilguard

Dragon Age: The Veilguard was built in an optimised game engine, meaning it can be played on older hardware. However, if you fully want to enjoy this game as a cinematic masterpiece, you may need a little more oomph from your gaming PC. At Overclockers UK, we have plenty of gaming PCs and laptops that pack the performance where you need it. We’ve picked out a few here that we think would be perfect for playing Dragon Age: The Veilguard, but you can browse our entire collections with just the click of a button.

Shop Gaming PCs

Shop Gaming Laptops