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The hype was sky-touching, but the end result became entirely disappointing for Dragon Age: The Veilguard. EA is one of those independent gaming publisher companies that rarely suffer from low sales issues. However, the preliminary Q3 report of the company reveals a different fact: two of its highly predicted titles failed to meet expectations in 2024. Dragon Age: The Veilguard is among those.
2024 was a challenging year for most game developers and publishers. However, EA had high expectations for the Dragon Age franchise, tracking its previous success records. Released in October 2024, the performance of the latest Dragon Age game didn’t seem inadequate until the publisher came up with a press release.
Anyway, Dragon Age fans will be upset to know that the game took EA down only in its first three months’ performance, as it neither appealed to veterans nor attracted new players.
The full report of the Q3 fiscal year is due on February 4, but the preliminary glimpses revealed the game has underperformed by 50% from what it was expected to do. EA revealed that it only gathered around 1.5 million players during the quarter but failed to sell even 1.5 million units. This generally doesn’t really sound bad, but EA explains that it is not what the company was expecting. It seems the company was expecting more than 3 million players in this time frame.
This news is disappointing for sure, but it does not end there. Add to this tragedy, The Veilguard is not the only game from EA that underperformed. Another EA Sports game is also on this same list that unexpectedly failed.
EA Sports games have introduced some of the most attractive sports simulation games that Electronic Arts releases annually. However, players have been complaining that these games are depreciating in quality for a while, but unfortunately, EA never cared about that.
The scenario didn’t change after the release of the much-awaited EA Sports FC 25. Players have been complaining about this game from the beginning. While going through the metacritic score it is revealed a 2.6 score from the gamers. After receiving such a disappointing number, EA remained unmoved. Henceforth, the consequences turn out to be drastic.
In the press release, EA CEO Andrew Wilson mentioned, “During Q3, we continued to deliver high-quality games and experiences across our portfolio; however, Dragon Age and EA SPORTS FC 25 underperformed our net bookings expectations.”
After being thrashed in the revenue chain, the publisher company has probably opened their eyes. Therefore, as the next strategy, the CEO explained, “This month, our teams delivered a comprehensive gameplay refresh in addition to our annual Team of the Year update in FC 25; positive player feedback and early results are encouraging.”
Taking player feedback seriously will probably increase the sales and player count of EA Sports FC 25. The same thing is applicable to Dragon Age fans as well.
It’s true that Dragon Age: The Veilguard is one of the highly anticipated fourth entries in the Dragon Age franchise, especially because it is the sequel to the Game of the Year in 2014. Anyway, things that might have caused the failure include a decade gap. Maybe new generation players weren’t any more interested in playing a game with its last installment released ten years ago.
That reason might have worked for the veteran gamers as well. They probably weren’t any more interested in a game they hadn’t played in a decade. Additionally, players might have compared the game with the Inquisition and found the gameplay and combat style less interesting than it. The veteran gamers probably thought this game was designed for the young crowd.
Another thing that might have worked against it was the release of Baldur’s Gate 3, a record-breaking action RPG released in 2023 that surpassed all the achievements made by the Dragon Age series. As soon as the comparison between these two games was put forth, naturally, players weren’t interested in The Veilguard.
The reason behind the low player count can be anything. The results are indeed upsetting, but there’s still hope for the franchise. In 2024, some games performed even worse than these. Let’s take Concord as an example, a game withdrawn from the market within 15 days of its global release.
There are a few more examples of the worst games released in 2024. For instance, take the performance of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League. Its all-time peak on Steam stands at 13,459 at the time of writing. In comparison, Dragon Age: The Veilguard did exceptionally well.
Another factor that probably affected the player count is that the game isn’t available on subscription services like Xbox Game Pass, etc. Instead, players must have an EA Play Pro subscription service to access this game. If it launched on other subscription services, besides the EA one, the player count wouldn’t be the same for sure.
With these multiple factors probably affecting the game’s player count, The Veilguard has done pretty well. Therefore, Dragon Age fans can rest assured about this franchise for now.
