Dragon Age: The Veilguard creative director thinks there'll come a point in the games industry "where we can't make graphics better," so the focus will be on giving players "freedom" instead
Sep. 6, 2024“To me that’s the most interesting challenge,” John Epler says
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Dragon Age: The Veilguardcreative director John Epler has given his thoughts on what he reckons the games industry will look like in 25 years, and he thinks there’ll come a point where developers' focus will be on giving players freedom.
Speaking to Eurogamer, theBioWareveteran says that while there’s a “temptation to say it’s going to be a technological shift,” but when it comes down to it, “at a certain point, we come to the place where we can’t make graphics better.” Could we reach that point in the next 25 years? Of course, we can’t know that for sure at this point, but Epler suggests that priorities will be different in the future.
“Ultimately, it’s going to be about finding that balance between player freedom and authored content,” he says. “To me, that’s the most interesting challenge. How do you manage to allow players freedom in your world, freedom in this space?
“25 years from now, I’m hoping technology resources will make it easier to build content in ways that allow for branching but also still have that feeling of hand-touched-ness that you lose a little bit when you get to procedural content,” he adds.
It’s a little mind-boggling to imagine what the games industry could look like so far. I mean, looking solely at Dragon Age as an example, it’s had four main installments since the RPG series began in 2009 if we count the upcoming release of Dragon Age: The Veilguard. That’s four games in 15 years, so based on rough math that you definitely shouldn’t take seriously, that suggests we could even be up to Dragon Age 10 in 25 years' time. Wouldn’t that be something?
For now, though, all Dragon Age fans are focused on The Veilguard, which will finally be upon us on October 31, with aneat feature that seems perfect for people-pleasers.
For more games like Dragon Age, be sure to check out our roundup of thebest RPGs.
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I’m one of GamesRadar+’s news writers, who works alongside the rest of the news team to deliver cool gaming stories that we love. After spending more hours than I can count filling The University of Sheffield’s student newspaper with Pokemon and indie game content, and picking up a degree in Journalism Studies, I started my career at GAMINGbible where I worked as a journalist for over a year and a half. I then became TechRadar Gaming’s news writer, where I sourced stories and wrote about all sorts of intriguing topics. In my spare time, you’re sure to find me on my Nintendo Switch or PS5 playing through story-driven RPGs like Xenoblade Chronicles and Persona 5 Royal, nuzlocking old Pokemon games, or going for a Victory Royale in Fortnite.
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