Mike Laidlaw says Dragon Age 4 is not in production

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Anyone who has followed the series since Origins, in 2009, and was eagerly waiting for the next Dragon Age chapter after Inquisition, released in 2014, got a cold shower in April 2017. On Twitter, Mike Laidlaw, creative director of the series at BioWare, replied to a fan who lamented the lack of news about Dragon Age 4.

According to the reply, the game was not in production at that moment. Laidlaw left the door ajar, though: he said that if the project ever happened, there were things he wanted to do. For fans, the message was clear: no new Dragon Age anytime soon.

The timing helps explain the answer. BioWare had just released Mass Effect: Andromeda, in March 2017, and much of the studio was involved with Anthem, the online shooter that would come next.

What came next

The series has one of the longest behind-the-scenes stories we have followed here. It is now known that a project did exist: “Joplin”, started in 2015 under Laidlaw’s direction, narrative-focused and set in Tevinter. It was cancelled in October 2017, when the studio’s resources were diverted to other projects, and Laidlaw left BioWare afterward.

Development restarted in 2018 under the codename “Morrison”, and a teaser appeared at The Game Awards that December, featuring Solas, the Dread Wolf. After many team changes and dropping the multiplayer plans, the game was announced as Dragon Age: Dreadwolf in 2022, renamed Dragon Age: The Veilguard in June 2024 and released on October 31, 2024 for PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. Critics were generally positive, but EA said player numbers came in at nearly half of what it expected, and BioWare announced a restructuring in January 2025. From Laidlaw’s answer to the release, it was seven and a half years of waiting.