Dragon Age 4 setting all but confirmed by upcoming short story collection

Dragon Age: Tevinter Nights
(Image credit: Tor Books)

Ever since the ending of Dragon Age: Inquisition's final DLC, Trespasser, fans have been guessing which country the next game would take place in. In the final shot of Inquisition's closing storyline, the Inquisitor stabs a knife directly into the Tevinter Imperium on a map. Fans have of course speculated since then that Dragon Age 4 would head to the mage-ruled nation. An upcoming collection of short stories authored by several BioWare writers titled "Dragon Age: Tevinter Nights" lends a lot of extra credence to that theory. 

Each Dragon Age game so far has been closely connected to a particular location. Dragon Age: Origins took place in Ferelden, Dragon Age 2 was famously confined to the city of Kirkwall, and Dragon Age: Inquisition was largely concerned with the Orlesian Empire. Given the ongoing struggle between mages and Templars in the Dragon Age universe, it would make sense for the next conflict to take place in the Tevinter Imperium. While every other nation that Dragon Age games have visited so far heavily polices magic users and their abilities, Tevinter is ruled by mages and often serves as the boogeyman underneath other countries' beds. 

Dragon Age's current lead writer, Patrick Weekes, serves as the editor of the collection of stories, and tweeted out a link to the book's Amazon listing with a clarification that he is not in fact the sole author. Weekes has penned Dragon Age companion novels alone in the past and releasing fiction set in the Dragon Age universe prior to a new game release is far from a first for BioWare.

The Masked Empire, a novel that Weekes did write, was published 7 months prior to Dragon Age: Inquisition and revolved around several characters that later featured in important Inquisition story quests. It would seem to follow, then, that Tevinter Nights is likely the groundwork for stories or characters that will show up in Dragon Age 4. So far, there's no description of the book on its page other than a brief list of Weekes' credits so we can only guess who the characters on the front may be.

The collection of short stories published by Tor Books is set to come out on March 10th, 2020, according to Amazon. 

Lauren Morton
Associate Editor

Lauren has been writing for PC Gamer since she went hunting for the cryptid Dark Souls fashion police in 2017. She accepted her role as Associate Editor in 2021, now serving as self-appointed chief cozy games and farmlife sim enjoyer. Her career originally began in game development and she remains fascinated by how games tick in the modding and speedrunning scenes. She likes long fantasy books, longer RPGs, can't stop playing co-op survival crafting games, and has spent a number of hours she refuses to count building houses in The Sims games for over 20 years.