"Return to form" was mandated to be mentioned in reviews.

[Liquid Shadow Cop]

https://imgur.com/a/AnpsS1z

"The recipient of this review program will agree to mention that Dragon Age: The Veilguard sees a "return to form" at BioWare."

So yes, all the coping about how review writers were just uncreative - NO. They MADE them write that down, even if it hadn't earned it. Epler went on social media pleased as punch in how they "succeeded" in having reviews mention that BioWare is back, disregarding they MADE them write that, inorganic legacy media CANCER.

Other things reviewers weren't allowed to mention:

• Top surgery scars.
  
• "Woke" content.
  
• Any mention of God of War.
  
• Other stuff, just peep the link.

Let it be known they're trying to deceive you, I've already seen people making excuses for these reviews which all regurgitate the exact same thing, how it was all coincidental, you were similarly had.

EDIT: Thank you for the awards and to showcase how willing these unhygienic chuddies are willing to believe literally anything you throw at them.

[Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser]

Forgive me for not taking at face value that any actual legal department or marketing team would draft an NDA with sentence structure and grammar like, "assigned by truth of choice" or "our dictionary of blacklisted which includes," but I'm going to need to see a source for this.

[pr1mus]

"Refrain from stating that the writing in the game is of poor quality. The company has a history of persecution against its female writer staff, and this will not be tolerated."

lmao, no shot, this sounds a bit TOO on the nose.

[Captain Spaulding]

I am by no means a defender of this game, but that needs to be adequately provided a source/verification... if real, this is sketchy as heck and further highlights why its good to never trust reviewers (as somebody here was arguing with me yesterday, saying things like professional reviewers are a better way to measure how good a game is than user scores and so on).

[IRMcG]

Looks like something anybody could have typed up and it's source is (supposedly) one of the 2 reviewers who hated the game, so yeah really believable. Doesn't even read like a professional document.

[riles656]

Is anyone actually surprised that this happens? And do you guys think for a second that this company is the only one that does it? Most companies go the extra mile and straight up bribe people to promote their games. Remember ubisoft and their whole star wars outlaws "promotion" where they paid for peoples plane tickets to disney world and gave them tickets for a few days? Everyone has a price these days. Funny that the form leaked tho.

[Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser]

Originally posted by Pnume:

Originally posted by Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser:

Forgive me for not taking at face value that any actual legal department or marketing team would draft an NDA with sentence structure and grammar like, "assigned by truth of choice" or "our dictionary of blacklisted which includes," but I'm going to need to see a source for this.

You just need to make a google search with Dragon age and return to form to see how often it pops up in reviews. It is creepy.

I'm referring to this claimed "NDA." The thing that is being offered as supposed evidence of precisely that claim, but which contains a typo, and is written in a way that anyone who actually believes what it professes to likely wouldn't phrase it.

"... our dictionary of blacklisted which includes..." Their dictionary of blacklisted what which includes... ? Presumably it should say "terms" there, or "words." But it's just blank. Oops?

Likewise, "... assigned by truth of choice" just sounds like someone making fun of how they imagine someone who acknowledges gender identity would speak about "their truth" or some such.

I don't care how frequently an extremely common turn of phrase shows up in reviews for a game that lots of people were hoping would be what that phrase describes. Go search for Breath of the Wild reviews and the phrase "breath of fresh air" and lo and behold, shock and wonder, common turn of phrase is common. Look for something, and you'll find it. That's how confirmation bias works.

I want to see actual, non-circumstantial, corroborated evidence that this document posted is legitimate. Because if it's fabricated instead, it borders on libelous defamation. And if so, I hope they proactively treat it as such.

[Cass]

Source or it didn't happen.

No, "I saw it on the internet" doesn't count as a source.

[Beta Ray Shill]

Not just 'return to form' repeated across multiple reviews, but 'triumphant return to form' across at least 3.

That's absolutely mental.

If this thread gets deleted (I've a feeling it will), then that'll be all I need to know, as if it wasn't clear already there was some bonkers bias going on. Even their pals in Larian seem to have been held to gunpoint. The Larian publishing director's twitter comment is so stilted and contrived in its praise that there had to have been some 'preliminary discussion' involved before that went out.

If the 'mandate' can be verified as real, this is apocalyptic stuff.

But who needs that? You'd want to be blinkered not to see the pattern in those reviews.

This is mafia-level.

[kiteless 凧無し]

Early access reviews are nothing more than marketing

We give you review code, you play by our rules

Only naive people take any of the reviews seriously

[Beta Ray Shill]

Originally posted by Cass:

Source or it didn't happen.

The source is the written words of the reviews, parroting each other, identically, without ambiguity.

[Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser]

Originally posted by Beta Ray Shill:

Originally posted by Cass:

Source or it didn't happen.

The source is the written words of the reviews, parroting each other, identically, without ambiguity.

Once again, cite the source of the document. Which - again - contains a grammatical error, among other questionable elements.

[STBiLL]

Embarrassing.

[Cass]

Originally posted by Beta Ray Shill:

Originally posted by Cass:

Source or it didn't happen.

The source is the written words of the reviews, parroting each other, identically, without ambiguity.

Once again, "I saw it on the internet" doesn't count.

[Coldhands]

“Return to form” appears 5 times 51 reviews on the metacritic professional review list page.

BioWare hasn’t been in a good spot since Andromeda launched, so if you reviewed and liked Veilguard, and felt like it was BioWare getting back to making the kind of game they’re known for, seems like you might call it a “return to form”.

[Beta Ray Shill]

Originally posted by Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser:

Once again, cite the source of the document. Which - again - contains a grammatical error, among other questionable elements.

I'm saying you don't need proof of that document to note there's something deeply suspect about dozens of game critics parroting the same praise, verbatim. When has that ever happened, exactly?

You could make a case for two reviews having identical language, but even then you'd have to wonder how does it happen, given the comparatively low volume. But dozens?

Haha.

Also, all the other events surrounding this (the ME director distancing themselves from this game's approach with the visuals etc), and the sheer amount of cash EA stands to lose from this, essentially millions.

This is serious business. In no way would I put it beyond these people to do everything and anything to protect their jobs.

Anyway, I'm not really shocked. It was clear for a long time there was a mafia in place within the games industry.