Postcards From Kirkwall - Meta/Analysis + Fic through the eyes of two Hawkes
Here's something I'm blogging about on Tumblr, daily(ish). I'll also post here for archival reasons.
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Popular media rarely resonates with me at a deep level. Far too often I feel like big budget movies and games tap into someone else’s stories and fantasies.
When I first played Dragon Age 2, about a dozen hours in I realized - HOLY SHIT! - someone wrote a (reasonably) big budget game just for me! (My next thought was, “hmmmm, I bet lots of gamers dislike this game…”)
DA2 has its problems and I have a list of things I would've liked to see done better but, by the time my first Hawke began the initial quests in Act 3, I had been sucked into a very real, personal nightmare. I was riveted. I empathized with Hawke’s painfully difficult situation. Any hope of playing a defiant, swoop-in-and-fix-it hollywood-style hero had been snuffed out of that character long before the Chantry went Boom. I projected feelings and motivations into Hawke that felt real. Hawke felt vulnerable and, given that I was unspoiled on how the game ends, I believed anything could happen, good or bad, and Thrask’s death only increased my Hawke’s sense of vulnerability.
I blogged semi-privately about this experience during January-February 2012. Thinking back to that time still fills me with strong emotions that are difficult to describe.
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Since then, I’ve wanted to write about how complex kyriarchical issues are explored in Dragon Age 2’s Kirkwall but I’ve waffled on how to do this. I’ve also wanted to write about how heroism, choice, and dilemmas are portrayed in DA2. And, I’ve wanted to write about how relationships are (and aren’t) portrayed in popular media and how DA2’s take on relationships leaves me tantalized yet wanting something that was written more honestly. Whenever I had ideas on how to tackle any of this, I didn’t have time to write. When I had time to write, I banged my head against the wall.
Well, now I have time and I finally have an idea for how to make all of this work. But, first, why this is hard:
Writing pure meta, analysis, and criticism for Dragon Age 2 is very difficult for three reasons.
1. There is no singular Kirkwall. The game has more script than a player sees during single play through. This isn’t just a difference in which minor quests become available, but in the lines that characters speak. Meredith’s backstory is only revealed when players make a specific choice. Rivaled or rivalmanced Anders is very different from friended or friendmanced Anders. Lots of minor dialogue with NPCs is easy to miss or unavailable based on prior decisions. Hawke’s gender, class, and personality can determine certain lines and options for Hawke, as do having certain party members in the party certain quests. Each play through can feel very different from the next, which means that players don’t necessarily see the same Kirkwall.
2. Kirkwall is the dictionary definition of a CrapSack World with GreyOnGrayMorality. The writers attempted to create an extremely grey world in which the player’s heroic moral agency is reduced because favorable outcomes are not necessarily tied to morally feel-good choices (e.g., sending Feynriel to the Circle opens up the most beneficial path for him). Unlike other similar games, many quests lack a clear cut morally good option or a “third option” that solves everyone’s problems. A number of quests leave Hawke to choose between the better of two troubling options.
3. The game thoroughly deconstructs the high fantasy hero. After playing, we all know that Hawke looses most of his/her home in Kirkwall, most or all of his/her family, and the world has descended into war. No matter what Hawke tries to do, s/he is powerless at stopping the ongoing shit-storm that occurs in Act 2 and Act 3. Whenever we try to view Hawke through the lens of a fantasy hero, we’re going to fail because the story refuses to make sense from a heroic point of view.
I’ve read wonderful meta/analysis on DA2 - meta that has opened my eyes to different ways of seeing DA2’s characters and events - yet I often feel like DA2 meta/analysis is describing a chimera. The subjectivity and relativism in each DA2 play through makes it hard to say objective statements about what happened in Kirkwall and why. This isn’t to say that meta/analysis is useless because, if that was true, I should just delete what I’m typing!
Instead, what I am saying is this: A potentially good way to understand DA2 is by embracing the subjectivity rather than trying to make singular objective statements about who characters are and what goes down. Anyhow, the writerly side of my brain is fascinated by how this chimeric experience was constructed. That drives me to desire analysis.
So, here’s what I’m doing: Postcards From Kirkwall
Out of all the possible Hawkes we can play, I’m going to play two different Hawkes (I’ll introduce you to them in another post) and I’m going to blog their experiences in Kirkwall along with my thoughts, meta, and analysis while RPing them. When appropriate, I’ll blog these experiences side by side in the same post. At other points, I’ll write short fiction (or make art) that explores their points of view. I’m going to post and organize all of this stuff on a blog called Postcards from Kirkwall (postcardsfromkirkwall.tumblr.com) although I’ll probably reblog a good bit of it here on my main blog and tag it #postcardsfromkirkwall.
You can ignore, track, or follow as you wish.
I’m aiming at making one text post per day, and probably one or two screenshot posts with brief comments.
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Side-note: These two Hawkes - Mari Hawke and Emile Hawke - and their parallel Kirkwalls are feeding into two largish fanfic projects: A History of Lies and Precious Things. Those fanfic projects are independent enough from Postcards from Kirkwall that if you are only interested in DA2 meta/analysis, headcanon, Hawke character development/analysis, and the little fic tidbits, you can safely ignore A History of Lies and/or Precious Things.
The Mari Hawke in Postcards is the same Hawke for whom I wrote out half of the 31 Days of Hawke Meme. To me, the meme was fun but it wasn’t hitting on the kinds of character development questions that I wanted to explore. Thus, Postcards from Kirkwall. :)
Crossposted at http://vieralynn.dreamwidth.org/216748.html.