One of BioWare’s best games is getting its online multiplayer component sunsetted after remaining online for a surprisingly long 12 years.
Dragon Age: Inquisition co-op multiplayer going offline on April 28
Dragon Age: Inquisition is widely considered to be one of developer BioWare’s best games. Having released in 2014 to critical acclaim, the third mainline installment of the beloved Dragon Age series went on to win Game of the Year at Geoff Keighley’s first ever Game Awards. It was the last title released by BioWare before the studio took a bit of a downturn with 2016’s poorly received Mass Effect Andromeda and 2019’s failed live service game Anthem. It’s a rut BioWare is still attempting to fully climb out of today, even after having released Dragon Age: The Veilguard two years ago to much better reception.
Despite Dragon Age: Inquisition having been released during the early part of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One generation, BioWare also released the game on the prior generation of consoles. The game’s online 4-player co-op dungeon crawling mode, which was separate from the main single player portion of Dragon Age: Inquisition, largely flew under the radar as the single player adventure captured the hearts and minds of fans and was clearly the game’s biggest draw. Still, the multiplayer served as a sufficient side mode when players wanted to take a break from Inquisition‘s 50+ hour main story.
Only PlayStation 3 servers are affected
EA recently updated its official list of defunct online services to include Dragon Age: Inquisition‘s online co-op mode, which is set to be taken offline on April 28, giving fans just a few weeks to revisit the multiplayer experience. The good news for gamers on more recent consoles is that only the PlayStation 3 version of Dragon Age: Inquisition will be affected; the mode will continue to remain live and playable for the foreseeable future on Xbox consoles, PlayStation 4, and PC. Of course, the much larger single player portion of Inquisition will remain untouched on all platforms.
Dragon Age: Inquisition was released during a period when the modern live service model as we know it today was only just beginning to be established. Many single player games during this time released with very small multiplayer components that served as a sort of side dish, very few of which had any staying power or were able to have nearly as much of an impact as the single player components they came attached to. The few exceptions were franchises like Halo, Call of Duty, and Gears of War, which waves of gamers flocked to with the express intent of enjoying their robust multiplayer suites. Dragon Age was never a multiplayer-focused franchise, and so Inquisition‘s online mode never generated a huge amount of buzz. With that said, it’s surprising to see that the mode has survived on PS3 for so long and is only now being taken offline.
2026 has so far been a year of high-profile server closures for EA. Inquisition‘s news comes just a few months after BioWare’s aforementioned Anthem had its servers shut down in January. EA’s Battlefield Hardline, the cops and robbers-flavored multiplayer shooter, is facing server shutdown as well, on June 22.
Looking ahead, BioWare seems to have moved on from Dragon Age: The Veilguard, as no DLC for the 2024 fantasy RPG has been confirmed. Instead, BioWare is currently at work on its next big Mass Effect game, though it’s probably years away from being able to share any new details.
The post EA Is Shutting Down One of the Best BioWare Games Ever appeared first on VICE.
