Former Dragon Age developers did not like EA Games CEO's statement

Dragon Age: The Veilguard was one of the major failures of EA Games in 2024, with a game that displeased in many aspects, especially in the story.

With the failure of the game, EA Games ended up admitting that the work had not reached its goal, with profits well below expectations. Obviously after that, the CEO of EA Games tried to find a reason why Dragon Age: The Veilguard went wrong, and he brought the worst possible response that gaming industry fans could give.

The CEO of EA, Andrew Wilson, recently expressed some bizarre criticisms of Dragon Age: The Veilguard during a quarterly financial call. He suggested that the game struggled because it didn't have any active service component.

I'm not sure if any amount of live service elements could have saved this game from the poor writing, pacing, and lackluster companions. It seems like some former Dragon Age developers agree with this sentiment that live service is not the right play.

"Look, I'm not a fancy CEO guy," says former Dragon Age creative director, Mike Laidlaw (via Eurogamer). "But if someone told me, 'the key to success of this single-player IP is to make it purely a multiplayer game. No, not a spin-off: fundamentally changing the DNA of what people loved about the main game.' I'd probably, like, quit that job or something."

I want to emphasize that I don't think it's fair to say that the plan was to make The Veilguard a purely multiplayer game; instead, it would be a singleplayer game with live service features. And to tell everyone that you'd probably "quit that job or something" a week after BioWare veterans confirmed that EA also fired them is a bit tone-deaf. But the point about changing the DNA of a game just to cater to what some bigwigs think is the largest possible consumer market available is not the right mentality to make a great game that is truly enjoyable.

David Gaider, another BioWare veteran, also offered his opinions on what EA should focus on next, and it's not live service. "My advice to EA (not that they care): you have an IP that many people deeply, deeply love," says Gaider. "At its peak, it sold well enough to make you happy, right? Look at what it did best at the point it sold most. Follow Larian's example and invest in that. The audience is still there. And waiting."

Gaider also points out that internal projections for The Veilguard may have been too high. Therefore, EA's statement that it underperformed may be more indicative of unrealistic metrics than the game itself.

"Let's be clear: you don't have those numbers," says Gaider. "No one outside of EA does, and we only know what they tell us—though the fact that they've said little, actually says a lot. For a series return after 10 years, they wanted numbers they could boast about. Whatever they were, they didn't get them. Does that make Veilguard a failure? Depends on your metric." Overall, the future of Dragon Age doesn't look very bright now, and despite calls that the idea of Dragon Age can survive through the creative endeavors of its fans, players shouldn't have to rely on fan-made creations to enjoy a much-loved and established series like Dragon Age.