Following yesterday’s monumental gameplay reveal of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, BioWare is telling fans more about the series’ fourth RPG and its bustling world – which will not be open.
In an interview with IGN, director Corinne Busche explains how linear players can expect The Veilguard to be – is it like Dragon Age 2, or open world like Inquisition? It’s not really akin to either, but it’s definitely not very similar to the latter. According to Busche, the long-awaited new Dragon Age game instead offers a “mission-based” experience where “everything is hand-touched, hand-crafted, very highly curated.”
She then explains why The Veilguard is set up this way, as BioWare believes “that’s how we get the best narrative experience, the best moment-to-moment experience.” This doesn’t mean that the game is strictly linear without any chance for fans to explore, however. “These levels that we go to do open up, some of them have more exploration than others,” Busche reveals. There are also various  “alternate branching paths, mysteries, secrets, optional content” for players to discover.
Any side quests players encounter may be influenced by “the motivations and the experiences of the companions,” with some missions offering more open areas to explore than others. The director concludes that the world does sort of “open up” at such times but stresses once more that The Veilguard is ultimately “a mission-based, highly curated game.” Not all similarities between Inquisition and the upcoming RPG are lost, though – after all, your Inquisitor may influence the beginning of The Veilguard.