According Dragon Age franchise creative director John Epler, each and every one of The Veilguard‘s upcoming companions will be “canonically pansexual”.
Epler, whose thus-far-16-year career with BioWare saw him serve as as a cinematic designer on every entry up to Dragon Age: Inquisition (and its DLC) before eventually being promoted to his current role, provided this insight into the franchise’s next entry during a recent interview given to Game Rant‘s Christine Miller following the title’s official reveal at the 2024 Summer Game Fest.
Speaking to the topic of just how The Veilguard would handle the franchise’s fan-favorite romance systems, Epler declared that rather than each companion’s sexuality simply being able to be romanced by the player, the individual characters will all be ‘pansexual’ (its current dictionary definition encompassing those who are “sexually or romantically attracted to people regardless of their sex or gender”).
“There’s a difference between playersexual and pansexual,” explained the creative director. “All companions are canonically pansexual.”
In other words, regardless of the player character’s input, each and every companion in The Veilguard are canonically open to ‘romantic encounters’ with any and all individuals.
For a more practical example of this difference, it may help to compare the respective romance systems featured in the previous Dragon Age II and Larian Studios’ recent Baldur‘s Gate 3.
In the former title, all of Hawke’s allies could be romanced regardless of which gender the player chose for the protagonist at the start of the game. However, should the hero have been removed completely from the narrative, some of them may not have chosen to explore a straight or gay romance with them – playersexual.
Meanwhile, in the latter, the player’s allies do not need to be ‘interacted with’ in order to open up their romantic horizons, as they have all (somehow) independently come to develop an attraction to the full spectrum of humanoid existence – pansexual.
Notably, The Veilguard is just the latest video game in recent years to feature ‘pansexual representation’.
In addition to the aforementioned Baldur’s Gate 3, Activision Blizzard’s Overwatch 2 added a confirmed pansexual hero, Lifeweaver, to its diverse and inclusive roster.
Further, though not specified in the game itself, a tie-in novel to Star Wars Jedi: Survivor established that Cal Kestis’ Dathomirian ally Nightsister Merrin was also of the same orientation.
At current, BioWare’s Dragon Age: The Veilguard is on track to hit PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S consoles sometime this Fall.