YouTuber Neon Knight, who claims to have played over 7 hours of Dragon Age: The Veilguard described the game as a “thin coat of paint.”

A screenshot from Dragon Age: The Veilguard (2024), BioWare

In a recent upload to YouTube, Neon Knight said, “So, with Dragon Age: The Veilguard there’ve been a lot of attempts, in my opinion, to convince the general public that this game is something that it really isn’t, to convince you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears, what you’ve been seeing in trailers and previews, and believe that the Dragon Age DNA in Veilguard, specifically its gameplay, is anything more than a very thin coat of paint.”

He continued, “And as someone who played the game for about 7 hours a few weeks ago, well I guess my thesis statement here is that it isn’t. A thin coat of paint is more or less exactly what Veilguard has to offer long-time fans, and serious, level-headed discussion about this game is completely hampered by what seems to be an almost universal refusal to just say that out loud.”

From there he shared that the game will be compared to God of War 2018. He said the game’s “combat and exploration is full blown, or at least 85% God of War 2018 worship. This new Dragon Age is all about the action, building up a rage meter to release an ultimate, getting your perfect parries in, shield throws, talismans that activate special abilities, plenty of pots to break and chests to open. You get it, point is, somebody really like God of War 2018 and said, ‘Why don’t we just do that, and be done with it.’”

Next, he noted the game will also be compared to the Guardians of the Galaxy video game regarding its tone. He said, “This is the point of the video where some of you recoil in horror and maybe projectile vomit, but it’s also the point where at least some of you are probably thinking, ‘Hey, those are two not not bad at all games, you could do much worse in terms of comparison.’ And, yeah, if you’re thinking that I completely agree.”

However, he noted these two games are not what Dragon Age fans are expecting a Dragon Age game to be compared to, “There is no denying that the Dragon Age fanbase of just six months ago would’ve torn that imaginary person apart for merely suggesting such a thing. Yet, ultimately, that’s the type of game BioWare have made here.”

A screenshot from Dragon Age: The Veilguard (2024), BioWare

He went on to claim that BioWare “tried to make a very palatable game here that could appeal to everyone instead of directly targeting their own fanbase and hopefully breaking out from there, the ideal approach in my opinion.”

“Veilguard, as a quippy action adventure, is trying pretty hard at times and has its moments, it’s just not that a quip filled action game is not what most Dragon Age fans were asking for,” he added.

A screenshot from Dragon Age: The Veilguard (2024), BioWare

Next, Neon Knight shared that he was “incredibly disappointed when I found out that Veilguard allows you to import a grand total of wait for it… 0 choices from Origins, 0 choices from Dragon Age 2, and just 3 from Inquisition, the game that Veilguard is a direct sequel to.”

As for the choices from Inquisition, he shared that the only things that carry over are who your Inquisitor romanced, whether you choose to disband the Inquisition, and whether you chose to stop Solas.

He opined, “BioWare are doing this very strange with Veilguard. On one hand, it’s a direct sequel with a bunch of returning character in prominent roles. Yet, on the other, it’s a borderline soft reboot trying to minimize every direct tie to the past in an attempt to avoid scaring off non-Dragon Age fans.”

He says these decisions take what made Dragon Age stand out and “reducing it to a shell of itself.”

A screenshot from Dragon Age: The Veilguard (2024), BioWare

Later in the video, he described Veilguard as a “very linear game, or at least it feels that way 99% of the time.”

He added, “Sure, from the Lighthouse base of operations you can decide what mission you want to do, I don’t blieve things are all forced in a specific order, but ultimately once you’re doing a mission, which is what you’re going to be doing most of the time, you’re being funneled down a set path with little offshoots here and there to find some gear or an optional enemy, maybe.”

A screenshot from Dragon Age: The Veilguard (2024), BioWare

What do you make of Neon Knight’s description of Dragon Age: The Veilguard after playing the game for 7 hours?