#I don't think it was handled well

[skateboardtotheheart]

there is just something about the difference between edwin's love interests and having the cat king's reaction to edwin in hell being "i'll be waiting when he gets back" vs charles "no version of this where i don't come get you" rowland convincing a powerful trans-dimensional being to open a door to hell just so he could get him back

i am insane

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Peeped the horrors

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[the-crooked-library]

"Louis and Armand were still in love in Dubai!!" "Louis and Armand never loved each other!!" - no. it's worse. they were on the precipice of something good, but Armand couldn't recognize that, so he ruined everything they had, right when Louis had actually come to love him. the love was there for a fleeting moment and it was ruined irreversibly, never to return, even after decades they'd spent together out of desperation and spite. it's worse and that's the point

[sunderwight]

Thinking about the weird camaraderie that exists between demons but not angels in GO.

Have we ever seen two angels who are actually friends? Or even friendly to one another? We have met angels with a capacity to be friendly in general, but I think the closest we've come to two angels actually getting along would be Gabriel making a point to laugh at Sandalphon's terrible "can't have a war without War" line in S1.

Most scenes between the angels actually seem to have an undercurrent of absolute hostility. Teeth-clenched teamwork. No wonder it took them so long to notice that Aziraphale wasn't on the same page as the rest of them! The rest of them are barely on the same page as one another, either! When Gabriel goes against the majority vote, no one bats an eye at demoting him and wiping his memory. Michael and Uriel immediately begin vying for his job. The only times we've seen angels team up is when they're working together to bully someone else, like when they're trying to intimidate Aziraphale in S1 or going to the aftermath of the bookshop raid in S2.

Saraqael's overall neutrality towards Muriel is the closest we get to two angels in Heaven getting along, and it's more a lack of hostility than any kind of friendliness. At least until Gabriel loses his memories and Muriel shows up to spy on Aziraphale, and Aziraphale decides to be kind to both of them.

Demons, on the other hand, actually seem to form alliances and even friendships among one another. Hastur and Ligur are awful, but Hastur seems genuinely distraught over Ligur's death, not just fearful of suffering the same fate. Shax and Furfur conspire together and even though the 1940's investigation into Crowley's fraternizing doesn't work out for Furfur, it's not due to any double-crossing on Shax's part. Unlike the angels, who stick almost exclusively to making threats until the Metatron decides to try dangling a carrot at the end of the season, demons actually offer rewards to other demons when trying to work together. Beelzebub offers Crowley a promotion if he can bring them Gabriel, Furfur offers to back Shax up politically if she goes for the Duke position opening, and Crowley successfully stalls Hastur in S1 by pretending everything was a test and he's going to be put in charge of a legion as a reward for passing. They're still not great at socializing, but they're significantly ahead of the angels.

Of course, it's a fact that demons are awful to one another (Eric's treatment is really bad, they throw that random demon into holy water just to test it, "it'd be a funny world if demons went around trusting one another", etc) but they still seem more capable of forming friendships than the angels do.

I think that's because Hell cramps and crowds everyone together to try and increase their suffering and hostility, whereas Heaven isolates angels to decrease the odds of questioning or rebellion. Hell's methods are unpleasant, but it still ends up putting demons together, and some of those demons inevitably forge alliances and make friendships. Because as Crowley and Beelzebub demonstrate, demons are still social creatures with the capacity for love and affection, even if it's strongly discouraged and buried under nine million layers of trauma and a cultural mandate against kindness.

Angels are the same, but isolation makes is harder to form connections than overcrowding. Muriel and Jimbriel are both so eager to make friends, but Muriel's spent the past millennia shut in an empty office, and Gabriel has been distanced from his peers both through his position and also through Heaven's culture of fear and surveillance. He only breaks away from it when he finds something that's stronger than "choosing sides" (stronger than the fear of being rejected by Heaven and Falling, in fact strong enough that Falling seems worth it if he gets to be with someone he loves). Both Muriel and Gabriel are only able to start forming connections when they're away from Heaven.

I just think it's interesting that demons, despite being supposedly devoid of love, have an advantage in forming relationships compared to angels. Angels are supposed to love, but have far fewer opportunities to actually do so. Demons aren't supposed to love, but they make connections anyway.

[a2zillustration]

A little rooftop conversation

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[[ All Croissant Adventures (chronological, desktop) ]]

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[queerofthedagger]

i love fingon so much just. he's so good and so reckless and he loves so fiercely it makes him do the most stupid shit, and in turn no one ever quite puts him first. I'm going to eat glass

[buddiesmutslut]

I know I've said it before, but I think this upcoming episode is going to be so interesting, even if we don't get Queer Eddie OR BT Bones (neither of which I'm fully convinced are going to happen on Thursday), & it's really for this one interesting phrase that Ryan & Oliver have both used.

They have both mentioned "rose-colored glasses" when it comes to Tommy & Shannon, and I would argue that they each have to reckon with these relationships before we can have any movement towards Buddie.

Eddie thinks that Shannon was the love of his life, that he failed her and has to carry that guilt with him for the rest of his life. I believe that Eddie placing Shannon on a pedestal is partially what's stopping him from realizing his queerness (along with the catholic guilt and repression, but a lot of that is also tied up in Shannon & their failed marriage.)

Buck's convinced that his big feelings last season were all about Tommy, and I'm not saying that some of them weren't, but I don't think it'd be too far of a stretch to say that he figures that he's in this relationship now and that obviously everything is fine now. He figured out this part of himself and he's dating a man and that means everything is Fine and he absolutely does not need to do any further digging or searching or learning, despite the fact that he and Tommy don't really seem to like each other all that much, nor do they seem to be all that compatible.

Buck has to reckon with the fact that realizing his bisexuality and immediately jumping into a relationship with a man that he wasn't even sure he wanted (his speech at the coffee date) might not be the solution to all the problems he's had, and Eddie has to deal with the fact that Shannon was not perfect, that what she did was not the same as what he did, that she's responsible for her own actions and that this romanticized vision he has clung to of their lives is not real and is not consistent with the actual relationship that they had.

There's a Divorce Arc this episode - which I'm begging does something with Eddie - and an uncomfortable truth learned about Tommy's past; it's not completely out of left field to assume that the Rose-Colored Glasses come off this episode.

And the fact that it's happening for them BOTH, at the same time? In the relationships that I think are the biggest obstacles to them realizing/accepting their feelings for each other???

I'm never fully convinced they're actually going to go there with these 2, but it will be SO interesting to see how this episode plays out, regardless.

[onesnoopyaday]

Snoopy #14

15/10/2024

[kirby-the-gorb]

[olasketches]

guys I won't lie.. I am not in the slightest prepared to see sukuna die... I always knew it's inevitable but I don't think any amount of signs and d flags can ease up the utter heartbreak I'm going to experience once it happens... I love sukuna. I love this silly, messy guy so so so much and I am absolutely NOT ready for what's to come... not all.

[thousandyearphantombunker]

"We want more morally grey/flawed female characters"

You bitches can't handle APPLE WHITE!

like people keep saying "you couldn't even handle rose quartz" but this is even more pathetic to me. How can y'all make this kid into a monster?

[terukotime]

You say you don’t like the killer reveal, why? I actually think dev made some great choices and I’d love to talk to you about your perspective.

i don't want to get too deep into it because, like i mentioned in my previous post, i don't want my criticism to come off as negativity towards the series or discourage anyone involved in the production of the show because it's honestly not a huge deal. like, it in no way ruins the show or makes it less enjoyable for me. and i don't think the choice of who the culprit is is a bad one at all, i'm mostly unsatisfied with the way the chapter handles it.

[spoilers beneath the cut, obvi lol. and please remember this is just my opinion. me having and expressing my opinion is not hate towards the series. i'm nervous enough as it is posting just this and not a bigger essay on all my thoughts because i really don't want to have this be misconstrued, nor do i want any criticism i have to give, regardless of how innocent and respectful my intentions, to make drdtdev or anyone who works on the series feel bad.]

i think Ace being the killer DOES make sense. i have no qualms with him being the blackened, in theory. do i think he could've made for a great survivor, or have really interesting growth throughout the coming chapters? yeah! i would have loved for Ace to be kept around for much longer. but him being the killer this chapter isn’t inherently bad. it's now clear that there's a specific direction Ace's character was meant to go in this story and i think that's fine.

my problem is with what *didn't* happen with Ace's character up to this point.

the chapter hasn't concluded yet so there's still a chance for my thoughts to change, though i don't think it'll make much of a difference. but i'm still waiting to see if it can stick the landing. and even if it doesn't, that's okay. i've already accepted it, i'm just still disappointed by it all the same.

Ace, honestly, hasn't played much of an active role in the story. he's been a source of conflict and comedic relief, and that's okay, not every character has to be as important as Xander or David...but he hasn't really gotten to *do* anything. this series is very character-driven, and thus is very focused on the relationships between other characters. Ace has only had one notable relationship (outside of his feud with Nico, but i'm not really including that as a "relationship" for obvious reasons), and that was with Levi. and that didn't even stay positive for very long. and we also know now that Levi didn't even care about him to begin with because he doesn't care about people in general.

not only did Ace never really get to establish any other relationships, no one ever LIKED him. of course a good portion of the fandom likes him, but in the actual story, no one cares about him. no one will miss him. his death is honestly kind of meaningless character-wise. does it serve as a lesson to some of the other characters? sure. but he's going to be dying here with no one ever liking or caring about him.

Min's story wasn't just a cautionary tale. people did like her, people did care about her. she was friends with a lot of characters, she got to have an impact in the daily lives of others. we got to know her better, the things she liked, her deeper thoughts and opinions on things. she got to do stuff, and we got to learn about her. her death meant more to the characters beyond just being the first culprit. she died as a person, not just as a character.

most of the stuff we know about Ace is surface level or things confirmed in Q&As. he doesn't get to contribute much aside from the aforementioned conflict/comedic relief. i understand where the show is going with that idea, and why him not being liked by anyone is a specific part of what led him to murder, but that's not really what irks me. it's that Ace never got to really be a *person.* he's essentially a plot device, serving the greater "good person" theme going on this chapter, and filling in the smaller roles in the story when needed, like an antagonist in a scene or delivering a gag. yes, his admittance to killing Arei and eventual post-trial trauma dump will give him a bit more humanity and character...but that's not really enough.

we only get to see Ace how the other members of the cast see Ace: his loud, combative, aggressive side. the side that makes people think he's nothing more than an angry meathead who can't do anything right. we never got to see much of his other sides, of a much more somber, melancholic Ace. receiving even a hint of the Ace we see in his confession of guilt beforehand would have given him the depth we needed before this point.

to explain what i mean: imagine how unsatisfying it would have been if we never got to actually see Arei's breakdown in the playground. if Teruko had left before it happened, and we only get to learn what happened from a flashback from David's perspective. we already feel the weight and tragedy of Arei's death when her body is discovered because we knew beforehand why she behaved the way she did, how she never even liked being the way she is, and wishing she could be a good person like Eden. if we didn't get to see that happen beforehand, Arei's death would feel very flat and detached. her character growth would've happened entirely retroactively.

that's how i feel with Ace. it's not like he didn’t get enough spotlight this chapter, he certainly did. but every scene he was in really didn't really add anything new to him. the only thing that "progressed" with him was his hatred and paranoia. we just see him descend with no uplifting moments, no emotional hook to make us feel anything for him. the closest we get is the scene where he's arguing with Nico and Veronika at lunch, ranting about how poorly everyone thinks of him and that they all assume that he's for some reason happy to be the way he is. but it's really the barest of scrapes towards the deeper layers of his character.

a big problem is that there were a lot of chances for his character to actively be *explored*, but instead, the narrative perspective of him stays completely stagnant. the time we get with him this chapter doesn't give him any greater focus. and sure, you could say that that might be a big giveaway to him being the culprit, but i think if the time between character spotlight is distributed evenly, that would be easily circumvented. there was a lot more time that could've been spent building Ace's character beyond his animosity and self-loathing tendencies. we could have had someone actually attempting to bond with him, even if it doesn't turn out well. even if all the characters distrust each other to varying degrees, there's still a lot of characters that like each other or have unique bonds with each other that make them stand out and feel worth remembering, because those bonds contribute something to their characters. but with Ace? he truly gets the short end of the stick, because this isn't just the characters neglecting him, it's the story itself. if Ace got to have a moment like Arei, maybe someone to confide in, even if he wasn't really friends with them or liked them at all, him being vulnerable just once and having a moment with someone else would have rooted him in more as a person who fell victim to what the killing game wanted from him and not just a fictional character fulfilling the purpose required of them in the story.

honestly, it's a bit of a slap in the face, the way the show goes about it. because in hindsight, Ace's whole character is *meant* to be wasted potential. after all, his related phrase on Mai's bio page is "a girl who had a bright future".

he was set up to have the potential to change, the potential to add more to the story, the potential to show us more than what we were given. and i think the show kind of knows that and specifically perpetuates that. the scene where Teruko tells Levi to give up on trying to apologize to Ace almost reads as the show itself telling you to give up on Ace. that, why should we care about him? he's not going to amount to what we want from him. there's no use in investing our feelings in him.

whether or not any of that actually was intentionally doesn't matter, unfortunately, because rewatching so many scenes having this new context really makes it all seem like Despair Time doesn't want you to care about Ace. that Ace is meant to be a waste, that that's the core of his character. him being the epitome of wasted potential could have been great, actually, if they chose to use even a slight bit of that potential to build him up more before his inevitable demise. instead we watch him eat shit throughout the entire show thus far only for him to get royally fucked at the very end in the worst way possible. Ace's theme of wasted potential is only wasted potential because nothing is ever done with him. not actively, anyways. whatever his post-trial confessional is like won't really give us what we needed from the start. Ace didn't just deserve better in his life. he deserves better as a fictional character. he deserved to be a person and not *just* a character. he deserved to have deeper, emotional character moments outside of the trial, long before his murder confession and rapidly approaching demise. he deserved to be 3-dimensional.

again, this is all just my personal opinion, and there's still a chance the show can stick the landing and make Ace as the culprit feel a lot more natural and deserved. i'm not really confident in that happening, but drdt is full of surprises as well as a lot of great writing. that being said, even though i believe they kinda fumbled the bag with Ace here, i don't hate this turn of events. although he's a big favorite of mine, i still wanted Eden to be innocent over him, because she's also a great character and her killing Arei would not only be pretty huge character assassination, but would also make Arei's death meaningless. and i also think there were other characters who could have been better candidates as the chapter 2 killer (not just Hu, i think Levi, Arturo, and maybe even J also could've made for compelling culprits with the right reasons).

i'm content with this. i'm heartbroken he's going so early and i wish the execution of his guilt had been a lot better, but overall it's not terrible. he just deserved so much more in many different ways.

[trappedinafantasy37]

There is a trend that I've noticed amongst fandom spaces around games, and it isn't a trend that is unique to Baldur's Gate. I have seen it happen in my other fandom spaces like Fallout, Cyberpunk, Dragon Age, etc. But people have a habit of having very strong opinions about companions/characters that they do not know.

It is comical to watch the abject lies people create about companions and use them as justification to dislike said companion because they know they don't have a valid reason to do so. This isn't unique to Minthara, this happens to ALL companions (ironically, the funniest and most egregious lies I've ever heard actually aren't even about Minthara). It's just glaringly obvious when it comes to Minthara as she is the least recruited and most killed companion in the game and is thus the least known. So the lies and mischaracterizations pop up more often, and there is an abundance of them. And it gets exhausting having to constantly fight these lies all the time. Especially when so few people actually know her and thus there are few who are able to defend her.

I remember there was a poll a few months ago that overwhelming voted Minthara as the least loyal and most likely companion to cheat on you. To me, that just screams that the people who voted for her in that poll have never had a conversation with her outside the goblin camp. Minthara is the most loyal companion. That is not an opinion of mine. That is a fact. That is canon to the game. She is canonically your most loyal companion. And it's not that she's the least likely to cheat. She never will. Again, not an opinion. That is canon to the game. But this is information people don't know, because they've never spent a single moment getting to know her. This is a lie being spread about her that will be used as justification to dislike her and to justify not recruiting her or justify killing her.

I have also seen people admit that their opinions about her is formed solely on social media posts from YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, Reddit, or Tumblr because they just can't stomach having her in their party. As ironic as this is going to sound, but your opinion about a character should never be based on social media alone. The people who do this are missing out on the context of that post and often fail to use it in comparison with the rest of the character (especially since there is a high risk of a social media post containing misinformation or just straight up lies). People will take this one snippet of a character, and use it as if that it is all that character is. Posts on social media, including mine, are meant to be supplementary to your experience of a companion, not the sole foundation.

When it comes to these social media posts, no two people are going to have the exact same interpretation, which may cause confusion for an outsider looking in. Even amongst us Minthara enjoyers, we do not always agree, and that is to be expected. We are all different people who have lived different lives and thus have different experiences informing our interpretations. Even amongst my mutuals we do not always agree, and that's normal. But at least we have taken the time to get to know her and come to our own conclusions and can understand how someone else came to a different one. My posts, or anyone else's, should not be your sole source of information about Minthara or any other characters. You still do need to form your own opinion and that can only be done by actually spending the time to get to know them.

Recently, one of my old posts in which I talked about the relationship with Minthara and Karlach has exploded again. And I see the tags that people are attaching to it. The game has been out for 10 months now. And it makes me sad that people still have the wrong opinion about Minthara. It makes me sad just how little people actually know about her. It makes me sad that people are only now going to go recruit her for the first time, even though the knock out exploit has been here for months. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that my post has changed the way people see Minthara and encouraged them to want to get to know her. But it breaks my heart that I have to use another companion to convince people to get to know Minthara, because to them, Minthara alone just isn't good enough. They have already made up their mind about her, even though they don't even know her.

People are allowed to have whatever opinions that they want. But don't get online and share those opinions about a character you don't even know to people who do. It's like highschool level petty nonsense where people would rather believe and spread rumors about a person, rather than getting to know the person themselves and forming their own opinion. And, no, I don't care if your opinion is a positive one because even positive opinions can be inaccurate and wrong if you don't know the character. Again, this isn't just about Minthara but all characters and companions. And I'm only scratching at the surface level here. This essay would be significantly longer if I actually took the time to talk about how implicit bias, racism, homophobia, and sexism have all had a negative impact on fandom perception of Minthara and the other companions.

I will never tell anyone to do anything with their game they don't want to do, I will only encourage people to try new things. If you truly do not want to recruit Minthara or interact with her, that's fine. It's your game, your world, your rules, your vision.

But, I will say this. If the only conversation that you have ever had with Minthara is the one in the goblin camp, shut the fuck up about her. This cruel, heartless, evil person that floats around is a twisted version of Minthara that only exists on social media and was created by people who do not know her. This bastardized version is nothing like the version that actually exists in the game. And you would know that if you ever spent a single second of your time getting to know her.

[myfairkatiecat]

hey as someone who struggles with lashing out at people when I'm upset, I'd like to remind everyone that saying that it's out of character for someone to lash out/get really upset/struggle with anger sometimes when the rest of the time they're a super kind and thoughtful person is just as bad as only remembering that one specific characteristic about them and completely forgetting that they're super kind and thoughtful person!

[iamacolor]

this is such a small exchange and yet it's absolutely heartbreaking to see this little boy being proud of how he reacted to something he never should've endured - but it's also interesting to see her immediately go talk to the child once she noticed the state he was in, no matter how much she criticised her parents for taking care of such children when she was growing up, she was brought up to notice the signs most people ignore and to lend a hand to those in need

[alongtidesoflight]

so here's my honest thoughts on dragon age: the veilguard, after ~40 hours of playing. i finished the main quest after having finished all companion quests and major faction quests. just to clear up what content i saw, i played as an elven transmasc rook who is a member of the lords of fortune. he romanced lucanis (although after finishing the game i'm now leaning towards taash). i don't know what's happening in playthroughs that have a different race, gender identity, romance or faction going on.

full spoilers ahead, i mean it. don't read further if you want to avoid them. i don't want complaining about it in my asks.

oh and also, if you're worried because of a few negative reviews online i can comfort you by saying don't give a fuck about a certain big name youtuber who is very much tied to bethesda franchises giving this a negative review. i'll explain why.

i'm starting off with the things i liked

the game looks really pretty. i was worried it wouldn't feel like thedas anymore (with them trying to "focus on northern thedas only" i thought they'd make a clear cut in environmental design. they do and they don't. it's complicated. i'll elaborate on it when talking about the negative stuff). anyway it does. minrathous feels like kirkwall. treviso enchanted me like the winter palace did. the hossberg wetlands reminded me of the hinterlands and a couple other inquisition maps. arlathan looked like... arlathan. the crossroads were different, but familiar. overall i like the way it looks and feels. it's thedas, with a twist. it's a good one, and gives everything a solid but unique feel.

combat is top tier. if you're a hardcore dragon age player you WILL miss the tactical aspect of it for a bit, but i promise you, once you're used to the way the combat works, you will be lapping that shit up. and once you get to ability combos you'll mourn the control you used to have over your companions in battle a bit less

the MAIN quest and its story. i expected worse, way worse. and for a while the game even had me tricked (harr harr you'll get it in a second) it is Really That Much Worse. but holy shit was it good. i walked away satisfied ngl.

your choices have SOLID weight. there's consequences, good AND bad. i got minrathous blighted, ruled over by venatori, and the leader of the shadow dragons ultimately died because of my decisions. i made those at the beginning and throughout the game. he died at the end. DAVRIN died because i didn't expect what i was saying to have that much weight. i thought i was in the clear. he had hero status. well turns out, your choices can still get your companions killed even if you do everything right. i fucking love him. he shouldn't have made that sacrifice just because i told him to do everything it takes once.

the inquisitor, morrigan and dorian being there, surprisingly. there's also negatives to this though, see below.

speaking of companions dying and the inquisitor playing a bigger role: the final quest feels like me2's suicide mission. i was blown away by it and the fact that i got to see the results of all my efforts playing out in front of me.

bioware are NOT trying to redeem solas. they love him as a character yes, but i wasn't forced to see any good in him. he betrays you. he fucked my rook over twice. he fucked him over right back, for good this time (the veil wasn't torn down, i anchored it by binding him to it, he's doomed to uphold it). but solas really lives up to his name as the trickster elven god. rip to all the people who grew really attached to him over the years.

varric died. if you like him that's probably as hard reading it as it was watching it. varric died and the game lies about it until the very end. when the realisation hits, it hurts. but in the very best way.

the amount of care they put into gender expression and trans identities this time around. (i'll add onto this with negative points as well too).

rook feels very much ingrained in the world of thedas. he doesn't ask questions that expose the player to lore through dialogue as if he's stepped foot into thedas for the first time. those conversations feel very solid and good. i hope other faction players got as much joy out of this as i did.

and the things i didn't like and boy there's a lot unfortunately

the music. let's just get that out of the way holy shit. it doesn't feel like it belongs in this universe. it gets so incredibly sci-fi-y at times you'd think it's taken straight from mass effect andromeda. there's not a single song unique to veilguard that i really enjoyed. it broke my immersion, real bad. hearing a busker play the tavern songs from inquisition on a lute right after i killed some venatori with wobbly bass songs playing in the background is just odd. weird tonal shift. don't like it. it's made for people who like flashy light-weight cinema.

tevinter nights is required reading. the podcasts are required listening exercises. the game is so fast paced, especially at the start, that there's no time to introduce you to characters and how much weight their names carry in-game. i would not have known who half these people are if i hadn't skimmed over tevinter nights. i'd care even less about them than i already did. there is no time to get properly attached to them. people will act as if you're talking to a legend personified and you'll be thinking man goddamn which chapter of tevinter night were they in again and what did they do???

there's a weird mismatch with the animations. you'll have beautifully fluid ones, like emmrich casting spells. and then you'll have rook's face animating in the most unnatural manner that's sorta reminiscent of mass effect andromeda's "my face is tired" addison, when their emotions SHOULD be landing with the player rn instead.

i'm not vibing with the art style. sometimes it works. most of the time it doesn't. at points i felt like i was watching tangled.

that also brings me to some of the dialogue. same issue. i am watching frozen. i am watching tangled. someone on the writer's team really likes the adorkable trope. bellara is its victim.

for all the talk about identity, bioware sure doesn't like theirs. the grey warden armor got a redesign again and it just makes them look like a generic army. i hate it lol

in general, i don't like the armor design. the wardrobe/appearances system is fine, but it's just not helping if all the armors are just... kinda bland or downight bad looking? and don't get me started on the lords of fortune armor. that is orientalism personified.

the world states should have been carried over, full stop. i know they said they didn't because they want to separate what happens in the north from what happens in the south, which... i could have lived with that. but the inquisitor sends you letters that keep you up to date on... the south of thedas. you learn that there's a blight again, that people are standing strong but it's difficult, denerim's fallen, the rulers are taking care of it, orlais is fighting and they're successful for a while, etc etc. what's good bioware. i thought we don't care about the south this time around. why are you feeding me so much boring generic information. if you're not gonna show any of it and just write letters, then carrying the world state over should not have been an issue. i have a game dev background. those few lines of code would not have broken your budget or pushed your engine's limits. fuck right off.

this gripe of mine carries over to all the cameos. as a lord of fortune you have to deal with isabela a lot. it's fun. i missed her. you get to go drinking with her and taash and bellara! also my hawke romanced her. she's not mentioned once. they had the opportunity to put a sentence or two about her in there with not a lot of effort, trust me.

when varric dies, all she has is a single line about it. for gold, for fortune, for varric. she only says it if you interact with her on your way to the final push. that's not mandatory.

morrigan is there. kieran isn't. the old god soul that mythal and then solas absorbed? who cares at this point, the gods are dead now and solas is locked away for eternity. i suppose? why is morrigan there. she feels unneeded. i wish they'd just left her down south, at least that way i wouldn't have had to witness her god awful redesign.

dorian at least feels as if he belongs in this story. the shadow dragons are a crucial part to protecting minrathous. he's also weirdly underutilised. isabela and morrigan had more lines than him in my playthrough.

on the topic of romance: bro that was underwhelming. no, genuinely. you know when romance picked up a bit? after the point of no return. i heard maybe two lines of companion banter about it before that. maybe i missed something which i honestly doubt, but romance did not play much of a role in lucanis's storyline. i saved his grandmother as he wished me to (and if you read tevinter nights you know she was rather abusive and their relationship not the healthiest) and told him to focus on his family. a reunified family my rook wasn't even introduced to as a partner at the end of all that.

really, do not buy this game if you're only in it for the romances. others might be better, lucanis's basically gave me nothing. except for an outing (the second coffee date i had with him, it was getting repetitive) all of it played out once i committed to the final quest. the sex scene was a fade to black. annoyingly right after davrin died. if you're looking for well paced and good spice, pick up something else. the sweet talk and the final goodbye were nice though.

for all the good the ever-presence of gender identity does, it is brought up in such a disruptive manner too. it doesn't even play out naturally if you CHOOSE the lines that are meant to be said. hearing the words trans and non-binary in this setting doesn't feel right, and i'm saying this as a trans guy. i think it could have been handled more gracefully. the amount of times my rook went "i'm a MAN" as if he's about to start drumming on his chest and roaring any second now got super nerve-grating. "i'm so glad you're into me... the me who is trans. remember?" just. tell me one trans person who'd talk like that to a person they've grown close with and are trying to romance. this game doesn't handle sexuality well, so all this hey my body might not look like the way you're expecting it to look talk amounts to nothing anyway. i feel about this the way i feel about krem: this is partial exposition to trans experiences... packaged up for cis consumption. the ONLY exception to that is interacting with taash. holy shit was all of that heartwarming and bro did it feel good and natural to talk to them about theirs and rook's gender.

rivain and nevarra are new locations added by veilguard. they're also incredibly underwhelming, small and constricted maps. rivain is a coastline with a few ruins. the hall of valor is a partial ruin nestled into a cave on a beach, with a fighting pit. isabela is there in her skimpy outfit commentating your pit fights. that's it. i'm sorry if you were looking for a bustling pirate cove or whatever. you're not gonna get it. the nevarran crypts btw are a long ass dungeon crawl. that's it.

speaking of maps. i thought people were being dramatic when they said you're gonna be fighting the same enemies on them again and again. i thought they were figure of speeching it. they're not. you WILL fight the same amount of enemies. in the same spot. every time you reload the map. best to stay on a map and clear out the enemies and do as much questing on that map as you can before leaving, because you WILL have to do it all over again once you return.

the three choices i made for my inquisitor didn't matter lol she didn't have to face solas and therefore couldn't stop him at any cost as she had sworn (maybe because my rook tricked solas into binding himself to the veil, there was also an option to fight him. would she have stepped in? who knows). blackwall wasn't mentioned. and either her using a small amount of her forces in the final fight was the reason the civilians of minrathous fared so well..... or it just didn't matter. ultimately i think she had very little impact on anything