Dragon Age 2: I done finished it
I wish I had insightful things to say because I feel there are insightful things to say, but mostly I'm left going Hmmm.
It was all right. It was sorta weird. In a "good idea, weird execution" kind of way. I guess that's it really. I get the perfect storm of personalities and coincidences thing; we just accidentally assassinated Archduke Ferdinand and all. But the game sort of made me feel like the Templars' position was psychopathic and the only way they had of balancing it out was playing the "tragically driven to blood magic!" card every time a mage came up. It got repetitive and felt frustrating and manipulative instead of complex. Which is a shame because I think the set up could be complex. If Meredith had had good answers for my accusations, for instance. Honestly I also thought the Qunari were not handled well - again I struggled to find redeeming features in their philosophy. They felt like noble savage stereotypes with dialogue designed to sound deep but actually mostly being a bunch of circular conversations with unfamiliar nouns thrown in.
I heard some folks were upset that it wasn't as wide-ranging as DA:O. That didn't really bother me because I think I could have been happy with a game that focused on building up a single location and the epic coming through the passage of time and the personal character journey from indentured servant to king of the hill. So I was sort of annoyed that at the end, you have to flee and no one knows what's up with you - I think that's a better ending if you've just achieved the awesome thing not if you just started the revolution. Couldn't I have been like, leading the Mage Armies or something? Plus, dudes, wtf happened to Bethany! There was no picture of her in the epilogue like the others; I hope she's okay.
On the other hand, there was a lot of fun stuff in this too. The characters were great, and I honestly felt so absolutely furious and betrayed by Anders' Chantry stunt that I sat there for about five minutes desperately looking for reasons why I could spare him and couldn't. So I killed him. And I was 100% totally and completely pro-mage. But as far as I could tell, in addition to murdering a church of innocent folks and destroying the last chance at preventing a bloodbath, he succeeded at nothing except giving Meredith and future templars a freaking defense for her insanity. All he did was make a group anyone with a shred of objectivity would feel sympathy for, and make them look like a group of terrorists who bomb churches. I would have started the revolution anyway, but now it is, and always will be, tainted and ugly. And yeah, on a personal level, I was so genuinely hurt - like as me, the player, sat there - that I'd done nothing but unconditionally support him, and he coldly manipulated me into an act of murder, and a stupid act of murder at that. I'm not sure a game has ever made me feel that immersively furious with a character, which I suppose, is a fairly impressive achievement.
AND THEN HILARIOUSLY, right afterwards, I went up to chat to Sebastian and he was all, "Did Anders ever tell you what he wanted in the Chantry?" because they didn't update their ambient dialogue for the final bit. NO SEBASTIAN, I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HE COULD POSSIBLY HAVE DONE. *facepalm*
And then I killed Fenris, who was my love interest, but Varric STILL said at the end that all my companions went their separate ways, EXCEPT FOR FENRIS. So...I guess I'm dragging his corpse around the Free Marches?
...yay?
It was all right. It was sorta weird. In a "good idea, weird execution" kind of way. I guess that's it really. I get the perfect storm of personalities and coincidences thing; we just accidentally assassinated Archduke Ferdinand and all. But the game sort of made me feel like the Templars' position was psychopathic and the only way they had of balancing it out was playing the "tragically driven to blood magic!" card every time a mage came up. It got repetitive and felt frustrating and manipulative instead of complex. Which is a shame because I think the set up could be complex. If Meredith had had good answers for my accusations, for instance. Honestly I also thought the Qunari were not handled well - again I struggled to find redeeming features in their philosophy. They felt like noble savage stereotypes with dialogue designed to sound deep but actually mostly being a bunch of circular conversations with unfamiliar nouns thrown in.
I heard some folks were upset that it wasn't as wide-ranging as DA:O. That didn't really bother me because I think I could have been happy with a game that focused on building up a single location and the epic coming through the passage of time and the personal character journey from indentured servant to king of the hill. So I was sort of annoyed that at the end, you have to flee and no one knows what's up with you - I think that's a better ending if you've just achieved the awesome thing not if you just started the revolution. Couldn't I have been like, leading the Mage Armies or something? Plus, dudes, wtf happened to Bethany! There was no picture of her in the epilogue like the others; I hope she's okay.
On the other hand, there was a lot of fun stuff in this too. The characters were great, and I honestly felt so absolutely furious and betrayed by Anders' Chantry stunt that I sat there for about five minutes desperately looking for reasons why I could spare him and couldn't. So I killed him. And I was 100% totally and completely pro-mage. But as far as I could tell, in addition to murdering a church of innocent folks and destroying the last chance at preventing a bloodbath, he succeeded at nothing except giving Meredith and future templars a freaking defense for her insanity. All he did was make a group anyone with a shred of objectivity would feel sympathy for, and make them look like a group of terrorists who bomb churches. I would have started the revolution anyway, but now it is, and always will be, tainted and ugly. And yeah, on a personal level, I was so genuinely hurt - like as me, the player, sat there - that I'd done nothing but unconditionally support him, and he coldly manipulated me into an act of murder, and a stupid act of murder at that. I'm not sure a game has ever made me feel that immersively furious with a character, which I suppose, is a fairly impressive achievement.
AND THEN HILARIOUSLY, right afterwards, I went up to chat to Sebastian and he was all, "Did Anders ever tell you what he wanted in the Chantry?" because they didn't update their ambient dialogue for the final bit. NO SEBASTIAN, I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HE COULD POSSIBLY HAVE DONE. *facepalm*
And then I killed Fenris, who was my love interest, but Varric STILL said at the end that all my companions went their separate ways, EXCEPT FOR FENRIS. So...I guess I'm dragging his corpse around the Free Marches?
...yay?