Following Insider Gaming’s exclusive report on information about Dragon Age Dreadwolf, one user on Reddit has leaked gameplay footage and images of the game’s alpha.
Although the original uploads of the files have since been deleted, reuploads of the footage have been found. You can see some combat gameplay of Dragon Age Dreadwolf and images below:
According to the original poster, the footage was posted in response to our original report. Insider Gaming can confirm that the images and footage are authentic and likely originated from a restricted playtest that took place in the last couple of weeks.
It’s believed that the footage would have been internally recorded and reviewed by Bioware developers, so the fate of the playtester is yet to be determined.
The original post states:
“The recent article by Tom Henderson prompted me to make this post instead of responding to every reply in that thread, I’ll just describe what I saw overall here. I was honestly shocked when we got no gameplay reveal at TGA, as I was sure we’d get something considering the timing this video was shared with me.
Background, a kind playtester shared their recorded gameplay of DA4 that was in early Alpha at that stage. I saw what they recorded before they were shuffled to another project. No, I will not share the video as the individual in question asked me not to. And until I get their permission, it will remain private. I don’t want to get anyone in trouble, so they need to let me know its okay and nothing in the video would get back to them.
Alright, so now to what is in the video. It’s about 20 minutes of gameplay involving one segment/dungeon. The entire gameplay is set within the the Gray Warden fortress HQ of Weisshaupt. That’s what the location text literally says. Now again, the gameplay is alpha so there isn’t a whole lot of detail and there are missing textures for a lot of elements. Basically, buildings and whatnot are all modeled and textured but the skybox itself is very dark and makes it seem as though the entire fortress is underground, although it is clearly not. I suspect the skybox could contain some giant world event, similar to the Breach, they hadn’t finished.
The player character is an Elvish “Knight” Class (the character screen actually says they are a mid-level Grey Warden), they’ve got a sword and a shield. They also have two party members, another knight dude and a female dwarf rogue. I suspect both models are placeholders and they won’t actually look like they do in the final game. Darkspawn are currently attacking Weisshaupt and there are roots all over the place alongside Red Lyrium popping up here and there. Oddly, the darkspawn also apparently are infused with Red Lyrium and have Red Lyrium attacks and some have red eyes. The objective is to fight through the Darkspawn to get to the library, but as you are doing so there is also a big ass dragon attacking from above. Because, you know, it is Dragon Age. And the dragon creates occasional environmental and traversal hazards. It ends once you reach the library, close the gates, and then come face to face with the dragon. It appears you are then supposed to try and chain the dragon up, but it ends before the player completes that. There is no audio and while there are subtitles, they are mostly glitched and frozen so you can’t tell what people are saying during cutscenes or combat.
Okay, so that’s the setup and general overview. Now for the juicy gameplay details:
- Combat is completely in real-time and similar to a hack and slash. I’m told the guiding reference point was the God of War (2018), and that shows.
- Player has their regular combo attack and then their abilities as well as a special bar which generates allowing you to pull off a special move. I don’t really understand the comparison to FF15’s wheel. It’s standard Dragon Age ability wheel.
- There was no party control demonstrated. I think it’s a safe bet to say you will not be able to directly control your party members in the game. That said, you likely will be able to tell them to execute certain abilities. But apparently that was locked off in the Alpha.
- The most immediate thing you noticed is that animation quality has DRASTICALLY improved. Like, for any other AAA title it’s probably not that big a deal. But we’ve never seen animation quality this good in any BioWare game. I didn’t actually play it, but I can tell it probably feels really good to control your character. No more stiff animations, it’s all very fluid and seems also very responsive.
- Jumping has also been retained. So, rejoice if you enjoyed jumping a lot in DAI.
- As the character was a sword and shield dude, he was able to parry attacks from enemies and follow up with counters. It’s hard to tell their exact abilities, they only had two on hotkeys along with a special. But one appears to basically be a drop kick and the other a charged sword attack. I’m not sure exactly what the special attack does.
- The UI is similar to DAI, but this is also Alpha and UI is the last thing finalized in any game. Character has a chest slot, a helmet slot, a primary weapon slot, and a shield (secondary weapon?) slot. For accessories, one amulet slot, one belt slot, and two ring slots.
- Oh and the player character’s hair looked glorious. I mean, it was clipping right through their helmet. But it was flowing and bouncing as they moved. Finally, no more stiff ass hair. Now, let’s hope we have more than just two black hairstyles.
- Enemies were pretty much just variations of darkspawn, except the dragon, but again they seemed to have Red Lyrium powers.”
For more from Insider Gaming, check out the Hogwarts Legacy map leak that shows how big the map will be.
