sha-lyuzar

[sha-lyuzar]

assertion: veilguard is a cowardly and politically regressive game

socialist-flavored haterade below the cut :)

i have tried to see what others saw in veilguard. i've gone thru many of the positive posts and read lots of veilguard "defenses" (too many of which come with snide commentary and bad faith assumptions about those who critique the game, which i honestly find tragic. do y'all not critique the things you love? ive been bitching abt dragon age since i first played origins lmao. step up your game, vg fans! /joking)

anyway! i have been pondering 2 arguments in particular:

1) veilguard is politically important for having trans representation

2) veilguard's plot was likely changed in response to real-world politics

the second point is important, imo. art is not made in a vacuum. it is created by people living under systems that influence and shape their experiences. with any piece of media, we should consider the environment in which it was created, ask ourselves what it is trying to say, and consider what it might not have meant to say.

da:i and trespasser set up several plot threads that had the potential to change thedas on a massive scale. the elven uprising, the cure for tranquility, the possibility of the veil coming down. veilguard chose to ignore all but the last, and even that was only used to set up a much simpler story about the forces of Good versus Evil.

because it is quite a simple, straightforward story, isn't it? there's no options in-game to challenge or even question the power the crows hold over antiva. they're your allies, so for all intents and purposes they're Good Guys! there's no elves in the game who argue that maybe solas has the right idea - better to risk it all for the chance at something better than to accept the continued enslavement and oppression of their people. there's no dalish who are unwilling to accept that the entities they have worshipped as gods for hundreds of years are both 1) not actually gods and 2) super evil.

the lack of differing in-game perspectives is a problem with far-reaching consequences, imo. veilguard does not encourage the player to be curious about what it sets in front of rook. it does not ask you, as previous games did, what you think about the world - you are expected to accept what you're told by the narrative at face value. it does not ask you whether you agree with the ideas expressed by your companions - why would you want to argue with them, anyway? it does not offer you the choice to do things a different way - the game, in fact, goes out of its way to repeatedly tell you what you should be doing. altogether, the range of acceptable opinion veilguard allows the player to express within the framework of the game is remarkably narrow compared to other dragon age titles.

"stop!" i hear you cry. "get to the point!"

you're right, voice in the walls. the point is, da4 was primed to tell a story that dealt with complex political questions. when is revolutionary change justified? who gets to make that decision? who should get to make that decision? how do you go about building a better world? what sacrifices are acceptable in that pursuit? how do you respond if your efforts fail?

now dont get me wrong, i think bioware would have handled these questions clumsily at best, and id likely not love the answers they might propose. this is the studio that refuses to allow a single positive opinion on post-da2 anders to be expressed by in-game npcs, after all.

but! they didnt even try!! they walked away from all of that, hand-waved the systemic injustices set up over the course of 3 games, and instead told a story in which the diagetic message is that the role of a hero is to protect the status quo.

again, the story veilguard chose to tell deliberately places rook as an enforcer of the existing system. they don't even have the option to really question it! it's treated as an implicit truth about the world veilguard presents: things are best the way they are, and if you think otherwise you're dangerous and objectively wrong.

so how do i imagine real-world politics shaping this story?

we live in a world that is threatened by irreversible, catastrophic climate change. the richest country on the planet is bankrolling the genocide of a dehumanized population of mostly children. millions of people go hungry every day while a small number of (mostly white and western) ultra-wealthy assholes own 4+ homes and a private jet to fly them back and forth. far-right ideologies are gaining in power and popularity around the globe, many of them backed by the aforementioned richest country on the planet.

if im considering how world events might have changed the trajectory of veilguard's storyline, i see cowardice. bioware abandoned established plot threads that would have necessarily brought up questions of revolutionary, world-altering change. why did they make this choice? we can only assume. recall, though, how stridently bioware avoids any positive mention of anders, and consider that to ask players if revolutionary change is necessary in thedas implicitly raises the question: what about here?

as a nonbinary socialist, i couldnt give 2 fucks about the trans rep in this game. it feels like a dei training at the department of defense: here's your pronoun pin, now go kill some muslims qunari! hooray for representation!

(because listen, im sorry, bioware gets no points from me for trans rep when they double-down on the islamophobia at the same time)

in a time of heightened political crisis, bioware took a beloved ip known for its inclusion of socio-political themes and used it to tell a story that says the world is fine the way it is. have a little feel-good escapism and don't think about the bad shit.

to quote disco elysium: god is in his heaven. everything is normal on earth.

[sha-lyuzar]

You guys wanna look at my balls? For the class?

[sha-lyuzar]

Dragon Age Origins All companions

[sha-lyuzar]

Every quest-related note found on the ground in Veilguard is like:

"Attention, fellow evildoers! Please remember to lock the CONSPICUOUS HATCH on top of the ROOF that we use in our EVIL PLANS.

All the worst,

Evilus Venatorius"

[sha-lyuzar]

[sha-lyuzar]

like i just. i just need to lay this out. becuz i need to go to bed but i will not be able to stop thinking about this otherwise. okay. so

the tranquil we see in inquisition

Avexis. who was a major player in the events of dawn of the seeker. helped save the day alongside cassandra. was honored by the divine. she's tranquil now. she's minaeve's assistant and we see her around haven but we can't speak to her

overheard dialogue between her and giselle reveals that she has been so horribly abused while tranquil that she wouldn't chose to be cured becuz she doesn't think she could handle dealing with her trauma with all her emotions intact

cassandra, who knew avexis, who tells you the story of saving the divine and mourns how she is celebrated while the mages were forgotton, has absolutely fuck all to say about any of this. if she even knows avexis is in haven

you don't know avexis's significance if you haven't watched dawn of the seeker. we don't see avexis again following in your heart shall burn

Helisma Derrington. becomes your lead of creature research upon your arrival to skyhold. presumably one of minaeve's assistants prior as she is given the position by minaeve if minaeve lives

(minaeve is the only character afaik that you can talk to about the tranquil at any kind of length and who appears to give any kind of shit about them)

you can have conversation with helisma, which i think is great, and she even gives you war table missions if you talk with her enough. it's been too long since i've played and i couldn't find a full video, but you can get SOME of her perspective on being tranquil. it isn't much. her memory doesn't appear to be very good

Clemence. you have one (1) conversation with him which is his recruitment, and that's only if you check out the mages in redcliffe and then bother to talk to ppl after your convo with alexius. his conversation is interesting but brief. i don't know if anyone has taken a fly cam for close ups on everyone wearing robes in redcliffe, but for the average player, he's the only tranquil we know to be there. we do not see him again

Maddox. a tranquil from kirkwall. he was made tranquil for passing love letters. samson was kicked out of the templars for passing them for him. the only thing cullen has to say about it is that meredith made mages tranquil for even lesser "offenses"; he doesn't appear overly bothered by this

you only get to see maddox if you side with the mages. he dies. he kills himself ostensibly to aid samson. he remains loyal to samson to the end. this is arguably the best evidence we have of a tranquil exercising autonomy

(EDIT: forgot to mention Pharamond. you only learn about him by finding an obscure note in a certain cave in the western approach. it doesn't really tell you what he was doing there and you have to intuit that he's an ex-tranquil. you don't know the significance of this unless you've read asunder)

~

the tranquil are all killed. not all of them obviously, but a lot. the majority. so many are killed that their murderers have trouble finding more to kill. they are killed by the venatori. their skulls are used to make the ocularum that allow you to find the shards. tranquil skulls specifically are needed to make them. we don't know how they find this out

a tranquil must be killed within proximity to shards for the oculara to work. no one knows where that proximity is until the tranquil is killed and the oculara is able to be made. if the oculara doesn't work, they move to a different location and try again. the tranquil must be killed exactly as a demon possesses them. if their death is off even by mere minutes, it won't work. they have to do it again

(take into account how many ocularum there are. take into account that tranquil were among the largest populations in the circles and that the majority of them were killed. remember how many ocularum there are. take into account the failures during discovery and the failures during attempts to make them. estimate a number. remember that so many tranquil were killed, the venatori struggled to find more to kill. double the number)

you only find out what happened to the tranquil, this knowledge about the ocularum, if you enter the shack near the docks in redcliffe. it requires the deft hands fine tools perk. nothing is said about them otherwise

your companions have various dialogue about this. cassandra says she'd wondered what happened to them and that she should have looked harder to find them. solas says he'd wondered what happened, he says their deaths are a waste. vivienne says she'd assumed they were with the rebels and that she shouldn't have. cole says they couldn't call for help, that if he'd heard them he'd have saved them, that he'll avenge them

once you leave, no one says anything more. you can't say anything more. you don't even get a war table mission about it. if this happens prior to promise of destruction you can't bring it up in your post-quest convo with cass. you can't bring it up when you later discuss releasing the truth of the cure with her

the ocularum stay up. you can continue to use them. nothing is mentioned about whether they are ever taken down

people didn't care about the tranquil, if they even noticed they were gone. the people who cared about them didn't look hard enough for them, or they decided someone else must have. no one mentions them to you when you're herald, when you're inquisitor; you aren't given the option to look for them

the loyal templars didn't protect them. the seekers didn't protect them. the rebel mages didn't protect them. no other mage group protected them. minaeve is the only person we know of that makes an effort to protect as many as she can

we never get to talk to any tranquil character about this. we can't tell them about the ocularum. we can't tell them about the cure

the tranquil suffer the worst cruelties the circles have to offer. and then they die. they are killed en masse. off-screen. and they are never mentioned again

no one cares about them. you aren't allowed to care about them. the bioware writers sure as fuck don't care about them

[sha-lyuzar]

Project Joplin save me.

Project Joplin.

Save me Project Joplin.

[sha-lyuzar]

NO WAY NO WAY HE CAME TO SEE US OFF AAAAAHDJJSJSKS

[sha-lyuzar]

Tarquin dragon age the man you are

[sha-lyuzar]

I'm so confused because i just to the Divine's Manor and Strife is just... there? Like, i saw him being stabbed repeatedly and now He's standing here unscathed??

Made it to the final quest at 3:00am, and am forcing myself to go to sleep, even though i wanted to be in bed 3 hours ago. For some reason, despite having all factions maxed out, all companions as heroes of the veilguard and assigning Emmrich to the wards, Strife still got hit, and i'm not sure what i did wrong.

[sha-lyuzar]

Neve Gallus the woman you are

[sha-lyuzar]

I know it would have been a nightmare for the devs to juggle two different player characters but I still wish these two could have been recruited at the same time tbh. I needed to see what kind of headaches they would have brought to the Ferelden nobility and to each other :/

[sha-lyuzar]

A lot of the pro-veilguard arguments I see include a very specific way of viewing what “dark fantasy” is which misses the entire point as to why there are criticisms about the overall tone of the game.

Dark fantasy is not just “how much murder rape bigotry and overall suffering can we put in a story for the sake of doing so”.

It’s about having events and themes based off of the darker parts of reality and then, as the player, being able to do something about it. The general appeal is the catharsis. It’s about seeing these stories reflected through an interactive story in a meaningful, respectful, purposeful way.

Is dragon age the poster child for handling its complicated, real-life-inspired politics well? No. But veilguard was somehow worse. The bar was in hell and it still tripped flat on its face.

Veilguard’s lackadaisical, chronically ironic “well THAT just happened”, neutered writing and theme is not a good argument as to why this is a good dragon age game, and you can’t blame the dark fantasy genre for it.

[sha-lyuzar]

I forgot I drew these ages ago! Reposting them because I can: The Three Divines.

[sha-lyuzar]

my contribution to the "neve in suits" agenda

[sha-lyuzar]

Made it to the final quest at 3:00am, and am forcing myself to go to sleep, even though i wanted to be in bed 3 hours ago. For some reason, despite having all factions maxed out, all companions as heroes of the veilguard and assigning Emmrich to the wards, Strife still got hit, and i'm not sure what i did wrong.

[sha-lyuzar]

Anderfels in the lore: an arid steppe nearly devoid of life. This is not arable land due to having weathered multiple Blights. The only livable areas are coasts and the banksmof the Lattenfluss. The dust storms are frequent and brutal, and summers scorch what ever humidity is present. There's a giant statue of Andraste in the Anderfels, so giant it makes the Minrathous spires look merely ok.

Roaring and roiling dust storms on the horizon. Endless plains that put the fear of the unfathomable in anybody who didn't grow up there. Nothing beautiful grows there, only the dullest, hardiest grasses.

And where do we go? Swamp. At night. Filled with pretty, blue flowers and gators. And high rock formations so most of the time as the game guides you to the map, you're staring at rocks anyway.

I get that 'rocks make it more interesting visually' but listen. You have no fucking idea how much time i spent dicking around in the Steppe in both Pathologic games just so I could take in the existential dread of isolation, just the gently rolling steppe disappearing into the mist. The liminal space of it all. Friendly and incredibly hostile at the same time, inviting and subtly terrifying. Meant only for people who were adapted to it, and yet calling you to join it... in the most fucked up 'come die here and let me grow healing herbs from your corpse' kind of way.

Now add a looming dust storm to that if you think you're unable to blow the player's mind with the promise of the dread and dead endless.

Swamps. Really.