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BioWare has said that any future character DLC for Dragon Age: Inquisition would need to be on-disc – so it’s not going to release any.
"Because of how deeply enmeshed in the system companion characters are, we can’t just add them on the fly – part of them has to be shipped on the disc," creative director Mike Laidlaw told OXM.
"Which has led to criticism that we’re forcing people to pay for content they already own. It’s not the case, but we’ve decided this time to not go that route. There will be no DLC party members."
On-disc DLC has been a thorny issue for some time, with titles such as BioShock 2, Disney Infinity and Street Fighter X Tekken having received a whipping from online communities after content that was being sold to players was discovered already hiding on the discs they had purchased.
Cliff Bleszinski has previously described on-disc DLC as an ugly truth” that often can’t be avoided due to the nature of developments and the technical requirements of modern games.
Analyst Michael Pachter, however, has described the practise as plain greed” while Respawn community manager Abbie Heppe has said she totally gets” why it’s a thorny issue”, adding that Titanfall made a point of staying clear of such things.
Capcom once claimed that the presence of on-disc DLC in a game like Resident Evil 6 was unavoidable, although it also pledged to re-access its implementation.
