Dragon Age: Dreadwolf has been in development for a long time, but it is inching ever closer to launch. To celebrate Dragon Age Day (Dec. 4), BioWare released a brand-new trailer for the game. Like previous Dreadwolf videos, it’s a cinematic trailer, focusing on the setup for the game’s story rather than actual gameplay. However, this time around, it’s a cinematic that will actually be in the game — the first-ever Dragon Age: Dreadwolf in-game footage.
The developer shared the trailer on Instagram as well as the official BioWare blog. It’s also available on the official Dragon Age YouTube channel, and we’ve embedded it below. The whole thing takes less than a minute, and (understandably) contains massive spoilers for Dragon Age: Inquisition:
In the trailer, recurring party member Varric Tethras narrates what we know about Solas, aka The Dread Wolf. The artwork is highly stylized, suggesting that this might be part of the game’s introductory cutscene, or a bit of exposition early on. It’s almost certainly not indicative of the game’s overall art style — although if it is, that would be a pretty big departure from the semi-realistic graphics in the first three games.
The content of the trailer should be familiar to anyone who played Inquisition. Vathric discusses how Solas was a party member at first, then later revealed himself to be the legendary Dread Wolf Fen’Harel: a mythical figure who betrayed the elves — and his fellow gods. Some Dragon Age characters see Fen’Harel as a villain; others see him as a visionary. But either way, he’s working up a potentially world-ending scheme.
Fans who played the Dragon Age: Inquisition Trespasser DLC, however, may pick up on a slight contradiction in Varric’s narration. Toward the end of the trailer, he states:
“[Solas wanted to] destroy the world — and we’re the only ones who can stop him.”
However, Trespasser ended with a pretty convincing argument that Varric and his group might actually not do such a great job at stopping their former colleague. Inquisition’s protagonist stated that Solas knows the party members too well, and that any plan they formulate, he would see coming.
Instead, the protagonist suggested that they might need to recruit new allies to the cause. (In gameplay terms, this would be an excellent excuse to create a whole new protagonist, since every Dragon Age game so far has started with customizing a new avatar.)
BioWare is starting to release information about Dragon Age: Dreadwolf at a steadier clip, so hopefully we’ll see actual gameplay soon — and a release window soon after.
