The following review contains significant spoilers. Avoid reading if you wish to experience the game for some reason

''If this is all just the maker winding us up, I hope there's a damn good punch line coming.''
Except it does not. The makers of The Veilguard messed it up big time up to a point where we are left to scratch the leftovers to find something meaningful remaining.

Gotta admit that I've never been a massive DA fan so I can't share the community's collective heartbreak equally. Even though Inquisition bored the ♥♥♥♥ out of me I get why people is so upset as I always was the ME guy I now have my share of worry though they already ♥♥♥♥♥♥ it up once (the chilling fact that Andromeda was far more true to its nature than DAV is). I wonder what parts of this game are the recyled stuff from the rebooted pitches.

Veilguard apparently was left to suffer when it got rebooted (at least) twice and its initial title changed from Dreadwolf to Veilguard. Developers pointed out the game not being about Solas as the reason for the name change. Except, it begins with Solas, ends with Solas and is absolutely about ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ Solas. Bioware not only did lose a way cooler title but they lost a lifetime opportunity to craft Solas into being far more complex and unique character. Two elven gods hungry for power? Holy ♥♥♥♥. How poignant is that! But the game still is about Solas you ♥♥♥ Bioware. If not why are we going through 6 of Solas biggest regrets and somehow each one of them has their own seperate achievements? The game should have focused on Solas far more as he's only the true redeemable character out of the whole cast and when the redemption comes it's barely fullfilling as he has almost no screentime besides your banters with him in the Fade and some of his flashbacks. It's also a massive missed opportunity in which Solas could convince/coerce Rook into destroying the veil.

And since it's impossible to discuss the Veilguard within the limitations of steam review's character limits please allow me to go over why DAV sucks colossally with bulletpoints:

a) Bioware pulled a Sixth Sense on Varric and I hated it. Should have guessed it, bastard took a lot of naps.

b) Failed a chance to unite HoF and the Warden with the Inquisitor and Rook. Make no mistake, DAV is absolutely the final game in this quadrilogy.

b) The Inquisitor casually sends you a letter to let you know the south has fallen to the Blight. Words cannot describe how messed up that is (given all the experience of both former protagonists), but I was like, ‘yeah, whatever.’ If Bioware does not care enough to extend the story to the south and show how they are holding up, conveying it only through missives (which I discovered much later on), then why should I care?

c) The secret ending (which requires you to collect three symbols foreshadowing the ending, the stupidest idea ever) is such ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ that it must have been made as an effort to distinguish this saga from the upcoming one. Again, words cannot describe how messed up it is. Secret society-type organizations/factions work better in games like Deus Ex for a reason. Reducing Loghain, a master strategist and arguably still the best antagonist in the franchise, to merely being ‘whispered’ is absurd.

d) Companions grow on you, but in and out of gameplay, none of them make a real difference. Oftentimes—besides perhaps the early game—I was strong enough to breeze through enemies by stacking up burning ailments. Companions were ultimately just there to occasionally ‘detonate’ matched skills. To be fair, DAV loses the sweet spot of DAO in mixing up real-time action and strategy, presenting itself more as a generic action-adventure game where most of the enemies have similar attack patterns and you don’t even need to think about exploiting their weaknesses.

e) Companions are also awfully polite, and even Emmrich doesn’t shine enough. There are no real pushbacks, and the dialogue wheel feel like a callback to FO4, making you shake with PTSD. The way the dialogue options are presented often feels like a cover-up for poorly written content. Highlighting each option with obvious indicators and refusing to let you play a morally ambiguous character or be a straight-up jerk is distasteful. You are supportive, understanding, hilarious... Yeah, everyone likes that type of person, right? I wish I had a friend like that, but I am also playing a quasi-blank slate character, so why can’t I fantasize about being a jerk?

f) Banters are often scripted scenes (such as the one with Taash and Emmrich) in which they tried to recreate ME2 but ultimately failed, especially because you can’t engage in nuanced conversations. Taash’s whole schtick is about being torn between two cultures and gender identity, which is a philosophy in and of itself. I like angst characters, and Taash is a My Chemical Romance level of angst, but they are underdeveloped and underdelivered. It’s not solely about using modern terms in a pseudo-medieval setting either (although I did get the impression that was a mission statement). It’s how Bioware cues to it every single time. Not giving Taash a solid reason to antagonize people naturally portrays them as hypocritical. Bioware should have known better. I do use a language where pronouns are irrelevant, and even in English, it’s possible (though it may come off as unnatural) to dodge pronouns and just use names. Ffs.

g) I do like the art direction in the game, and it does look fancy (I often felt like I was playing Fable), but it’s not the best fit for a franchise known for its gritty and mature tone. This tonal shift does not serve the game well and seems like a desperate attempt to distinguish the game from its predecessors. Yeah, this is a soft reboot after all.
PS: There are a few F-bombs you could count on one hand and not even partial nudity in an M-rated game.

h) The forced companion death is debatable, but Bioware is known for doing that, so I’ll give it a pass. I liked Davrin (and my favorite female counterpart was Neve, who was also my romance interest) as he was calm, sound-minded, and a grounded character among a bunch of nutjobs, and I let him sacrifice himself. Ngl, it didn’t strike me as powerful, but Harding and Davrin were indeed the best options for that role (if I’m not mistaken, Davrin’s writer should be also Gallus').

i) They tried to recreate the suicide mission but didn’t change the formula at all. Instead of assigning roles to companions at the beginning of the two final mission, perhaps we should have done that in a multilayered endgame questline with real payoffs. Perhaps we should have gone solo (or at best with one companion) and assigned all the others to specific roles. It’s quite easy to figure out things in DAV, as once again, it boils down to whether your companions are loyal or not.

j) Gearing is quite boring and feels like a remnant of an old pitch. Hunting chests for duplicates to increase rarity is not intuitive, but overall, I didn’t mind the exploration. In a way, it’s better than DAI’s MMO wannabe aspects.

k) Old companions are in positions of power, but we barely know how or why. You can give a title to Dorian, but I couldn’t say why, other than the fact he was once a cool character. Inquisitor’s inclusion is excellent but far limited.

i) Do yourself a favor and consider this a one-and-done type of game. There’s no NG+, no high degree of freedom, and the pacing is all over the place, with Bioware cramming all the companion and faction quests into the late-mid and late game. Going over all of them again would be a pain, especially knowing how limited your choices are.

I could go on and on, but what's the point, really? DA has become a franchise with four distinct games. Just when you think it’s finally found its footing, it ends up upsetting some of its fans. Sure, that happens with franchises that survived long enough, but to this degree? It feels like a borderline insult.

★★★☆☆

Life is strange indeed. And disappointing at times.

I’ll avoid heavy spoilers in this section although it's hard to do so, here goes nothing:

First, I opted for the “Bay” ending. I believe it serves as a more cohesive story conclusion for the themes this game is meant to explore. However, the fact that Deck9 chose to canonize both endings was a bold move and A CHOICE. I’ve only seen how things progress through the first two chapters with this ending, but even at that stage, I'd buy that Deck9 may not have been able to do it justice. It’s not that I couldn’t believe Max and Chloe might part ways; in fact, considering they primarily bonded over shared childhood arnd trauma, a parting of ways could become inevitable,and not necessarily antagonistic. Still, exploring the intricacies of such a tangled relationship would demand serious narrative skill, and I’m not convinced Deck9 could deliver that. But I’ll remove myself out of that discussion, as it’s the least of the issues with the game's overall narrative.

The first two chapters are brilliantly done (which is interesting to see that Enix let people play those two early, sneaky ain't it). You can freely explore the campus and shift between two timelines: the living and the dead. The living timeline exudes warmth with vibrant tones, lively upbeat music, and an overall sense of vitality. In contrast, the dead timeline is cold, distant, and carries a subtle yet oppressive weight. Although some of the artistic nuance of the original LIS gets lost here, Deck9 succeeds in crafting a strong contrast between these two realities. The puzzles are a notable improvement (tho not groundbreaking) as you snoop around and reveal information by using both timelines' versions of the characters and figure out how the levels do change, and I appreciated the slow-burn murder mystery. Sifting through characters’ lives, motivations, and secrets at that stage of the game felt genuinely engaging, and the cast seemed likable enough.

Caledon didn’t feel much larger than Blackwell (or other parts of Arcadia Bay), but the seamless exploration made it feel as a step up. I expected to experience a blend of True Colors and the original LIS—and for a while, it worked beautifully until it didn't and fell apart badly. The plot, being a LIS story, inevitably became convoluted, but it did so in the worst possible way, with little redeeming about it. The pacing, strong initially, becomes increasingly erratic, speeding up while simultaneously bogged down by questionable subplots without a resolution. Even the achievements become sparse as you progress—most of the side activities, explorable areas, and missable achievements are crammed into the first two chapters, with the third trailing off, and by Chapter 5, you’re on more a linear path. Even the ingame social media, text messages and your own journal becomes obsolete and underused. Did they rush things? Perhaps, but whatever the reason, it leaves a deeply unsatisfying experience. Compared to heavy hitting finale of LIS and Before the Storm, Double Exposure (DE) is just bland. Though Max gets to have a moment of resolve.

DE hints at something larger, which is fine, but it handles it in a shallow, Marvel-esque way, with a “Max Caulfield will return” message. In reality, though, DE is hardly a spin-off. Cool. I just wish they had realized how lacking the major antagonist is. They fall nowhere near Jefferson’s dark, 'twisted artistry' in the first LIS Instead, DE’s big reveal seems to be that some people are just deeply unpleasant ♥♥♥♥♥, a fact that requires real writing skill to make meaningful. To create an antagonist with moral high ground despite their questionable actions is no small feat, and Deck9 falls short there. I remember people criticized the first game’s ending, but it was meant to either come full circle or shatter it completely. Here, there’s no closure, and the final choice is rendered moot since it only sets up the next game—possibly along with your romance interests.

In short, DE begins as a slow-burn mystery, more mature more grounded and then descends into absolute madness, with no fullfilling payoff. The game does a disservice to both its cast and even to Max herself, arguably one of the most down-to-earth, genuinely selfless protagonists—a character the antagonist should, in theory, have provided a meaningful contrast to. Instead deepening the story, bringing out themes of the real power is the personality we get a simply poorly executed, exaggerated and arbitrarily integrated superhero wannabe mess. So they can drag it out more.

[HEAVY SPOILERS]

The parallels to the original LIS are present, with Rachel and Chloe mirrored by Maya and Safi. Max’s abandonment of Chloe at her lowest parallels Chloe’s eventual reconciliation with her, and I can see a similar dynamic with Safi, who bonds with Max while still haunted by her past. Safi’s self-centered, god-complex nature only surfaces when she finally asks Max to join her twisted cause at the very end and 'til that point she seems like a laidback sarcastic type of gal. She vanishes off-screen for a significant part of the playtime, and though she seems somewhat privileged, her motivations seem underexplored. Compared to Chloe, whose pain feels grounded and relatable, Safi’s motivations and actions don’t add up. Her struggles are vague and unconvincing, with little to justify her extreme behavior beyond being labeled as “pure evil.” Even the psychological damage wrought by her distant, overprotective mother—and the estrangement of her father to her by her own mother—is handled superficially. Chloe was fatherless yet anchored by her supportive mother, fair. But who did she had as a friend? Frank? On the other end, Safi, had Moses, a calm and selfless friend who was close to her even before Max. So why does Safi take this path? Instead of a profound exploration, we’re left wondering if a gunshot to Safi’s head wouldn’t have made a more fitting, sobering end to the game—a reminder that not everyone is meant to be saved. Sigh...

The case of Alderman. He seems intriguing and daring at first but then vanishes (literally). How does this work? Why do Max and Moses remember him? Will we ever get answers? Who knows? What’s clear is that without him, the game loses nothing—and that is baffling because the game gets rid of him when it doesn't need him. Then why have him, to detract people off from what?

Then there’s Amanda, one of the few sane, likable characters. She asks to take a break because of what transpired, a convenient excuse to wrap up the game. How silly.

Maya, meant to parallel Rachel, is another miss. Unlike the original, DE isn’t centered around Maya the way LIS revolved around Rachel; she’s just another side plot leading to Lucas’ exposure, trying to justify Safi’s anger.

The lack of depth in Safi’s backstory, combined with the absence of a serious tragedy, is stark. She attempts a point-blank shot at her mother, and the game barely pauses there, everyone moves on and seemingly be ok with it? A solo Safi game could have been interesting—her shape-shifting would create some sort of tension, allowing us to explore her fractured relationship with her mother while Safi would discover her manipulative nature. Then she meets Max, we get this in which there could be an option for Safi to either redeem herself or descend into the storm, showing how a seemingly modest (compared to time manipulation I mean) power can carry massive destructive potential. But instead, we get this—a story where Safi faces no real pushback from anyone and slaps back to your face in any attempt to help her.

Max was vocal at how her own powers nearly (or actually did) destroyed a town and messed up her life. Safi ain't a Magneto and she's just a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ dork who refuses to listen and thinks ''We have power, they don't so I'll work this out just fine'' and tries to scout and recruit people? To those 60% who backed up Safi. WTF?

★★½☆☆☆