Neil Thompson on Dragon Age: Inquisition

Neil Thompson chose to enter the fledgling games industry in 1987 when he was offered the opportunity to “draw spaceships for a living” at A&F Software (of Chuckie Egg fame) in Manchester. Since then he has worked for Psygnosis on the Wipe Out series, Bizarre creations on Blur and James Bond 007: Blood Stone, before moving to Edmonton Canada to join Bioware as Artistic Director.

On a rare trip back to the UK, Neil gave a developer session at EGX where he spoke eloquently on the artistic choices he and his team made in the development of Dragon Age: Inquisition. Over and over he stressed the “importance of a broad inspirational palette” because the product will be “deeper and richer because of it”, the lack of which is inexcusable in a world  in which the internet gives us such a great window on the history of human creativity. Neil’s role may be to oversee the art of Bioware’s games, but he is also acutely aware of the importance of the bigger picture that comes from working closely with the other departments. He pointed out that games are made up of storytelling, design, art and engineering and “work best when those four departments work in harmony… [and are] passionate about a shared goal”.

If you’re going to have a castle, why not have it up in the mountains, towering above everything else?

So what is that shared goal? Well, the team are striving to create a vibrant but threatening world that breaks away from the dull palettes that can be prevalent in the genre, just as the scope of fantasy in general has shifted in recent years thanks to the variety injected by writers such as George RR Martin, Joe Abercrombie and Scott Lynch. He wants to create a world that embodies what he terms “epic and aspirational fantasy”, which he sums up by pointing out “if you’re going to have a castle, why not have it up in the mountains, towering above everything else?” Their goal is to make your jaw drop, and from the lush, romantic civilisations of Thedas (including Orlais, which will be explored for the first time in depth in this game), the epic and threatening wilderness and the otherworldly quality of the Fade, the game certainly looks to have a vast range of settings within which to immerse and delight the player, which looks to be a thankful departure from the often criticised restrictive setting of Dragon Age 2.

This diversity translates to the characters too, something which Bioware has always done well. Discussing the concept art, Neil shows how they attempted to convey the personality of the characters, such as Leliana the Spymaster, shrouded in mystery and shadows; Sera, who’s light hearted and whimsical; and Vivienne, whose rich Orlesian qualities evoke 17th century Versailles. Meanwhile stylistic tarot cards developed for class and race selection show the team “broadening the scope of their inspirations” even more, incorporating styles reminiscent of Eastern European folk tales, the Pre-Raphaelite movement, or the nineteenth-century illustrator Edmund Dulac.

I think you can take the art of Dragon Age: Inquisition and talk about it intelligently, and deconstruct it, and look at its sources. It promotes further conversation; it promotes a deeper understanding of the game.

But while paintings offer a static composition, Neil discussed composition as a dynamic element in games that should look interesting from all angles, which is obviously hard in a 3D world where you surrender the use of the camera as a framing device to the player. As a result, the environments should be uncluttered but lived in. For him it’s important above all that the art can stand up on its own as meaningful. Addressing this point he said: “I think you can take the art of Dragon Age: Inquisition and talk about it intelligently, and deconstruct it, and look at its sources. It promotes further conversation; it promotes a deeper understanding of the game.”

We took the opportunity to catch up with Neil Thompson after his talk to ask him about how the art in Dragon Age: Inquisition was developed, how the artists work with the story department and his thoughts on videogames as art.

Ready Up: You’ve got a background working on racing games such as Wipeout and Blur. Has it been easy to jump across to narrative-based games of the kind you make at Bioware?

Neil Thompson: I don’t like to think I was a racing game specialist. I mean I did other games. I did the Bond game at Bizarre and of course I’d played Bioware’s games, so I was familiar with them. If you’re a professional games developer you learn to adapt quickly.

RU: Like many developers you’ve had to move away from the UK to find work. What do you think the state of the UK industry is like now? Is it improving?

Personally I always wanted to work on the biggest games and with a few notable exceptions I think North America is the place to do that.

Neil: It seems to be. I left 4 years ago. I looked around after Bizarre creations closed and the studios that were there just didn’t seem to want to hire someone with my experience, which is fine. I can’t force them to hire me. So when I looked abroad, Bioware approached me – I had a mutual friend who was already working there – and they saw my experience as a positive. That’s what they wanted to grow and progress. That was fantastic for me. I think the British games industry is under something of a rebirth at the moment. I mean there are a number of small independent studios. Those big studios of the nineties have either closed or splintered and all those talented devs are going off and doing independent game development, which is great. Personally I always wanted to work on the biggest games and with a few notable exceptions I think North America is the place to do that.

RU: So what exactly is your role at the studio and on Dragon Age in particular?

Neil: I’m the Director of Art and Animation, so I oversee the development of Art and Animation at Bioware Edmonton across all the franchises. Because Dragon Age is such a big project, everyone is playing a part in developing the game and bringing it to fruition, so I’m working very closely with Matt Goldman, who’s the Art Director, to make this the best experience it can be.

RU: It’s the first game Bioware’s done on the Frostbite engine. How is that going?

Neil: It’s been great. It’s a hugely powerful engine particularly in terms of the lighting side of things and the surface response, so it’s been a joy to work with. And I not only think it’s benefitted the gen 4 versions of the game, which look stunning, I think working within those broader parameters have allowed the gen 3 versions to take a step up as well. It’s a very attractive game, but then I would say that about it!

RU: The environments do look beautiful. How big is the game and how difficult has it been to maintain that quality on such a scale?

Thedas is a world that breeds diversity and richness and we wanted that diversity in the environments; so there’s deserts, there’s bogs, there’s vast mountain peaks.

Neil: They’re pretty big. I don’t think anyone’s measured them physically, so I can’t give you numbers, but it’s a vast game and certainly bigger than anything we’ve made at Bioware before. In terms of how you keep the quality up, it’s relatively easy because as soon as the environment artists got going with Frostbite they started to learn how far they could push things. I mean, we didn’t have to reign them back in, they just went for it! Thedas is a world that breeds diversity and richness and we wanted that diversity in the environments; so there are deserts, there are bogs, there are vast mountain peaks. Because crafting and looting is such an important part of any RPG there are places to go; so you can wander off the narrative path and go for a stroll through wonderful vistas and there’s a reason to go there because there are things to pick up and gather, and there’s threatening wildlife that will attack you if you provoke it. It’s an enjoyable romp.

RU: Which RPGs have you been influenced by the most, both as a studio and yourself personally?

Neil: I don’t think there are any direct influences. This is the game that the Dragon Age team have been wanting to make. At the moment it’s the best Dragon Age game we can make. I think people take their inspiration from a wide field of genres, not just games but books, art, and movies. It all coagulates into that creative experience.

RU: There have been some interesting RPGs recently that have done some different things. For instance Dragon’s Dogma introduced a physical dimension, where you could grapple with enemies. Has that been an influence at all?

Neil: Not directly. I think what’s great is that the industry is now mature enough to support multiple games in a genre. So the more RPGs that are out there that are good and fun and engaging, then the better for all of us really.

RU: Fantasy has been on a bit of resurgence recently with things like George RR Martin’s A  Game of Thrones, and there’s been a movement away from some of its tropes. What’s great is Dragon Age’s world feels fresh even though it has traditional elements, such as fantasy races like dwarves and elves. What role does art play in that process of keeping it fresh?

Neil: I think it’s important. We always start from a narrative perspective. We have a story and then flesh out the characters, but Dragon Age is already an established franchise, so there are foundations from which to work. Really the artwork has to be supportive and promote the narrative that’s been written, and shouldn’t be in opposition to that. It’s a very rich, diverse narrative, so we’re trying to develop a rich, diverse aesthetic.

RU: So the game has a split form of gameplay, where you can switch from a more action oriented third person perspective, to an overhead tactical overlay. Did that pose any problems?

Neil: It was challenging. Attack cam was a system we had to write from scratch on Frostbite, but I think it’s opened up vast avenues of playability within the game because later on in the game if you’re finding the combat from a direct perspective too challenging you can freeze, go into attack cam and play through more tactically.

RU: Do you think it’s possible to play through in one mode or the other?

Neil: I haven’t done it. I believe it is. It would certainly be a challenge to do, I mean it’s a long game. I admire someone who has the discipline to play through it entirely with one and then the other. I think mixing them up is generally the best way.

RU: How do you work with the writing team? Is the writing all locked down first before the art begins, or is there more of a dialogue between the two?

Neil: The broad sweeps of the narrative are outlined first but we will iterate for a long, long time throughout development. it’s very difficult to lock down creativity in that respect, so it is more of an ongoing dialogue. We work relatively closely on the environments, much more closely on the characters, because obviously the writer of a specific character has a good idea of who that character is. So the concept team will work closely with those guys to flesh it out as well as they can.

RU: Are there any times where you have to reign the writing team back because they have too ambition an idea and you think you won’t be able to realise it, or do you just run with anything?

Neil: We try to run with anything [laughs]. I don’t think there’s been a situation where we’ve had to do that. We’ve been able to go pretty vast and pretty epic with this one.

RU: Bioware’s games are all about choice. Will the player’s choices lead to manifest changes in the world?

Neil: Absolutely. There’s the Dragon Age keep, where you can recreate the choices you made in Origins and Dragon Age 2, bring those into Inquisition and start the game in a different state to if you just jumped in to Inquisition. Obviously art plays a part in that, in how the factions are set up in the world based upon the choice you make.

RU: The coolest thing this game promises is the ability to fight lots of dragons, which is something games rarely do right. How is the dragon fighting in Inquisition?

Neil: There are a lot of dragons to fight and the challenge is to keep the combat refreshing and new every time, and I think we’ve struck a good balance. It’s challenging, it’s fun, it’s visually impressive.

RU: The dragons won’t be flying backwards then?

Neil: They will not be flying backwards. I hope not anyway.

RU: You might want to check that. You’ve spoken a lot in the past how you believe videogames can be an art form. Can you elaborate on that and how do you think the new Dragon Age fits in?

As an industry we’re still very young but the leap between the games we started writing from the mid seventies into the eighties and nineties – you look at those now and what we’ve been able to achieve, certainly with this iteration of the hardware, and it’s a different paradigm.

Neil: I think it’s the same with any new medium in that it struggles to gain acceptance by the established order of things. As an industry we’re still very young but the leap between the games we started writing from the mid-seventies into the eighties and nineties – you look at those now and what we’ve been able to achieve, certainly with this iteration of the hardware, and it’s a different paradigm. It seems amazing to me that even though the age of the gamer has started to increase – I mean we have a generation of mature gamers who like me grew up with Space Invaders and the Atari 2600, we’re looking for a more mature and deep experience from our games, just as we would with movies or books or any other creative medium. We’re in a position now where the established arts community should start to recognise that this is not a trivial hobby, you know? Making games is valid and creative. People work very hard to flesh out a really deep and unique experience for people, just like you do when you create any kind of artwork. It’s time to embrace that.

RU: The indie scene has started pushing things in that direction.

Neil: It has and I think in the indie scene, there are no rules. I mean there are no rules to what a computer game is, you can do whatever you like. And the more creative they are, the more people start to take their inspiration from a wider field than just games they’ve played in the past, the better.

RU: So what’s your biggest point of inspiration?

Neil: I don’t know, I try to take mine from a range of things. I’m a big movie fan, I like gaming, I like books, I like traditional art and sculpture, you name it. I think it all plays a part in who you are as a creative individual.

RU: Finally, who is your favourite Dragon Age character?

Neil: [Laughs] I couldn’t answer that last time. I’m going to go out on a limb and say Varric. To you I’m going to say Varric.

RU: I like the fact that you change it every time.

Neil: You know, there are aspects to all of them I like.

RU: It’s Morrigan all the way for me. I’m glad she’s making a reappearance.

Neil: Yeah, everyone likes Morrigan.