Summary
The release ofDragon Age: The Veilguardhas returnedBioWareto the center stage as one of the foremost developers of AAA titles in the gaming scene today. It’s no understatement to say their catalog is filled with classic titles that will be remembered for a long time, fromKnights of the Old RepublictoMass Effect 2. It’s not a perfect library of games, as titles likeAnthemcan attest to. But BioWare has still made an incredibly valuable contribution to RPGs as a genre.
There is a lot more to RPGsbesides their stories, however. A story is nothing without compelling characters to guide it, and those characters can feel as well-defined as putty if there isn’t a good setting to host them and explain how they were shaped in certain ways. But how does one create a good setting? World building and lore are essential to making a game world feel real and lived in. For BioWare games, these are the best titles for where lore and world building are concerned.
BioWare had whetted their appetite for sci-fi worlds withStar Wars:Knights of the Old Republic, and were looking to make a splash with an IP of their own. That title ended up being one of the most iconic and important games of the 2000s,Mass Effect.The trilogy has been revitalized in recent years asa Legendary Editionthat encompasses all three games, renewed and remastered. From the first game,Mass Effectsets the bar so high for RPG storytelling that it can be very hard to compare it to anything else.
The lore is what makes this game so strong. Each alien race has more than just a single trope that defines them. They have histories and unique cultures, they have their own philosophies on space and the cosmos. The advent of the Reapers is so pressing because it’s not just the end of humanity, but the end of a myriad of diverse species, each with their own library’s worth of lore.
It’s easyto look atDragon Age: Originsand see something a little cliche. The dwarves are industrious and rowdy, and like drinking. The elves are lithe and dwell in forests. The humans kind of suck, and are modeled off of High Medieval Western Europe. The major bad guys are literally called ‘dark spawn.’ But upon closer inspection, it becomes clear that the lore ofDragon Ageis deeper and more insightful than many other fantasy worlds.
The Darkspawn are the folly of ancient mages, the Dwarves are a dying people desperately pushing back horrors from below. The elves have lost the mantle of their immortality. The Qunari are unlike any other fantasy race at all. On top of all that, the lore is so expansive that an element which takes center stage in the first game, like the Grey Wardens, can take a back seat in later entries and still feel like an authentic and diagetic part of the world.
The lore of BioWare’sNeverwinter Nightsmight not have been the studio’s own, instead reflecting the expansive history of the Sword Coast and Faerun as best known fromDungeons & Dragons.Yet, BioWare respectfully interpreted this lore into one of thebest CRPGs ever made.
The City of Skilled Hands is brought to life with a faithfulness and level of detail that rivals far more contemporary games, much like Larian’s interpretation of the titular city inBaldur’s Gate 3. And the D&D lore that made Neverwinter so compelling is wonderfully realized in this game.
BeforeMass Effectmade an impact on the gaming industry that would last years, orDragon Ageshowed how modern game design could still produce utterly fantastic RPGs, BioWare took their first foray into the world of unique narratives withJade Empire.
The game tells of the history and legacy of this land and how the many warring kingdoms came together to form the empire. It also explores the philosophy behind the two moral paths in this game and how they clash against one another as two irrefutable absolutes. It makes for some of the most philosophically interesting lore to come out of any RPG, let alone any RPG produced by BioWare. This might be an older title, but its sublimeworldbuilding stands with the best.
One of the many exciting things thatVeilguardbrings to the table is an exciting finale to much of the world’s established lore, especially fromInquisition.WhileOriginsfanswill be excited to fall in love with concepts like the Blight all over again with a renewed perspective, other more obscure lore concepts are finally brought together more cohesively.
Lore such as the relationship between the Old Elven Gods and the Titans is tackled in such an interesting and novel way. Players gain more insight than ever into the Dread Wolf’s rebellion, which is a fantastic thing to watch unfold.
