Dragon Age 4 - Official Teaser Trailer

The official teaser trailer for Dragon Age 4.

The world of Dragon Age needs a new hero - someone who can take on the evil forces threatening Thedas. Get a first look at some of the new locations you'll discover and the factions fighting by your side in the next chapter of Dragon Age.

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More information.

Artwork looks more stylised, still pleased there will be a next iteration.

Six years since last game in series was released and they still have nothing to show. I am aware about information concerning restart of development, but this is ridiculous.

For me, it just confirms my understanding of corporates as entities who are not really interested in core of the business they invested in (in this case game development). Only thing they care about is perception of actual and potential investors, which they monetize and THAT is money they care about. Not money from some weird game, some freaks from depths of the company structure are developing and selling. Bah!

I don't think it's that simple. Serious investors won't give money on the basis of shiny artwork. They want their money back and thus the company has to sell products.

I agree that the big guys like EA, Microsoft etc. (of course) first and foremost care about money, in contrast to devs like Larian and (perhaps) CDPR who are RPG freaks who want to make great games.

Morrandir said:

I agree that the big guys like EA, Microsoft etc. (of course) first and foremost care about money, in contrast to devs like Larian and (perhaps) CDPR who are RPG freaks who want to make great games.

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Why does it appear that Bioware has lost the skill to make great games then? Solely blaming EA for it would not fly, would it?

Microsoft seems to have adopted a very different strategy and try not to control the studios. I wish that pays off.

Given the game is still two years off at best I'm not surprised no game-play was released. Seems they learned a valuable lesson from Mass Effect Andromeda.

Don't over promise and under deliver with fake footage again.

Every developer/publisher is in it for the money don't let anyone fool you. Once you get a few hits you want a bigger piece of the pie. CDPR is no exception to the rule either.

largh said:

Why does it appear that Bioware has lost the skill to make great games then? Solely blaming EA for it would not fly, would it?

Microsoft seems to have adopted a very different strategy and try not to control the studios. I wish that pays off.

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EA did earn Consumerist's "Worst Company of America" award in 2012 and 2013 for a reason

Bioware alone wasn't perfect either, BG and BG2 were huge successes, but the way it was done wasn't by the book, they poured as much as they could then tried to debug it as they could. They describe what keeps BG2 together as "it's held together by gum" (Mark Darrah's own words). Still, they were learning, and most importantly, they had great ideas. Even if some were MP/MMO-oriented, long before EA bought them in 2007.

Some of those ideas were for Dragon Age's second instalment, but EA intervened because Star Wars: The Old Republic was slipping (2009 .. 2011), and that wasn't good for EA sales reports. EA wanted to use Dragon Age 2 to fill the gap, so Mark Darrah and Aaryn Flynn finally agreed to rush the project to get a release in 2011, not that long after Dragon Age: Origin. To do that, they had to shelve the nice ideas they had about the inquisition theme.

Then they had a lot of unexpected work on the Frostbite engine for Dragon Age: Inquisition, but to be fair, Darrah and Flynn were looking for a new engine, and thought EA's Frostbite would suit their needs.

Resources were also pulled at some point, to help Austin's division on their MMO.

Maybe not everything is EA's fault, but they certainly had a significant part in it.

What also shocked me in the video, besides the obvious (nothing concrete), is how the names "BioWare" and "Electronics Art" appear simultaneously, same font, same size.

(*) nothing concrete: I was expecting it of course, they need more time to show anything else, but I mean it's one obvious trait of this video

One thing I always wondered is how BioWare can still be in business as they haven't released any SP hits in a while. Then I remember why here we go just for reference.

1. KOTOR F2P Online is still active with paid expansions and micro-transactions.
2. Online RPG Anthem despite a rocky start turned a profit eventually.
3. Working on an HD upgrade of the Mass Effect Trilogy.
4. Working on DA4 and a new Mass Effect.

That has to be eating a big hole in EA pockets they better deliver.

I just want it released.

I'm not impressed.
Of all the beloved DA characters they decided to use Solas in the trailer. Who is maybe a huge part of the DLC I never bought nor ever will.

Another trailer that doesn't show gameplay not interested… I wish I could put devs/publishers into a movie theatre and have them watch a bunch of movie trailers with no pictures or sounds... that's what a game trailer is when you don't show gameplay.

I'm starting to hate announcements of games that will not be out for another 3 years. There have been a lot of those lately.

It is just pointless. The story is probably not even finished, art direction is not there yet. There is so much that can happen: cancellation, takeover, reboot, etc. Heck they can decide to make it a mmo shooter instead.

Max 1 year in advance is fine.

TheMadGamer said:

Another trailer that doesn't show gameplay not interested… I wish I could put devs/publishers into a movie theatre and have them watch a bunch of movie trailers with no pictures or sounds… that's what a game trailer is when you don't show gameplay.

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Totally agree with this but at the same time, in this case, it doesn't bother me as much because I don't care about what they do like I once did. Bioware hasn't done much that's interested me for a little while so they're just not on my radar much anymore.

Don't get me wrong, I'll still check out the games when they come out and if they're half decent, I'll happily play 'em. I'm just not invested emotionally in what they do now... I've moved onto cheering on other devs.

I am glad that they announced that they are working on this and ME. DA and ME are two of my favorite game series.

Well, the last decent game from this franchise was DA:O, so I am not expecting much here. Hope they prove me wrong!

The direction they chose with their previous entry makes me very pessimistic about this.

It's just like they cannot make interesting characters or story anymore. In Inquisition, I found the characters so shallow and the dialogues so cheesy that I found myself looking around to make sure no-one else was looking at this.

Not to mention that their content is severely lacking. Inquisition's only filler quests in maps were to collect some mosaic tiles and rare wines and shite like that and were pretty much completely empty.

Giovanni1983 said:

The direction they chose with their previous entry makes me very pessimistic about this.

It's just like they cannot make interesting characters or story anymore. In Inquisition, I found the characters so shallow and the dialogues so cheesy that I found myself looking around to make sure no-one else was looking at this.

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It definitely wasn't OG Bioware level, but if people go into Inquisition with no expectations, it's (IMO) a fun game. If cheesy dialogue had an impact on how good the game is, then we'd have far less Gothic fans.

I'm more interested in the new Mass Effect game, and that says something because I'm not even a big fan of that series.

Giovanni1983 said:

It's just like they cannot make interesting characters or story anymore. In Inquisition, I found the characters so shallow and the dialogues so cheesy that I found myself looking around to make sure no-one else was looking at this.

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Seriously? All the writing is this crap?

I'm not in your head, and could have bad tastes, at least I have thousands of books read in past, so some background and not totally naive on writing topic.

Such comment is woo.