#doesn't talk about their LI unless it's solas and i say that as a solavellan

[spawnofbhaal]

.

[stardustandash]

It is time for me to put together all my thoughts on Veilguard. Be warned there are so many spoilers ahead under the cut

First off I wanna say that I did enjoy the game overall. After 10 years it was a good jump back into the world of Thedas. I think overall it'll serve it's purpose well as a game to bridge the gap from the first three games to the next game/next set of games, but more on that later.

As this will be a list of pros and cons, I'll start with a neutral opinion: If there was no player created character, I wholeheartedly believe that Bellara would be the main character. The conflict of being Dalish and having to fight the gods believed in by your people is incredible, and having her be a scholar who both sees them as gods and is building an understanding of who they actually were as leaders and people is just so good. As well, I firmly believe that the Cyrian and Anaris plotline is the most direct the game gets with hints towards future games and plots, at least outside of the secret ending.

THE CONS

To start simply, the score. I don't understand the choice made to have Hans Zimmer compose the game's music. He is an excellent composer for film, and has created some of my favourite soundtracks (Pirates is so iconic for a reason), but it is clear after playing he does not know how to score for video games. I found there to be a lack of different motifs and tempos throughout the soundtrack, which is made more glaringly obvious when just listening to the soundtrack by itself. As well, it sounds... copied? I love the Horizon Zero Dawn soundtracks, and a lot of the DAV score sounds like a flatter, sadder version of them. As well, I kept hearing bits that sounded like part of the Star Wars score in the Lighthouse and that bothered me immensely.

The Inquisitor. I was very disappointed by the Inquisitor's role in the game. It felt very much like they were only there so that if you're a Solavellan, you would get your happy ending (though is it happy?). I put Ëonwë, my Dorian romancing mage, into my worldstate in hopes that Dorian would appear and they would get to show that they had kept loving each other through the 10 years in the timeline. Instead I heard Dorian call him Amatus once, in the background while wandering the last room before the final battle, and then only got a letter. And AFAIK if you romance someone else all you get is a letter. That the game doesn't even tell you that you have in your codex library. And from what I've heard, even if you play an Inquisitor that wanted to stop Solas at all costs, they still talk about how Solas was their friend and that they are kind to him at the end of the game. I almost wish the Inquisitor wasn't included, as it feels very unnecessary unless you want your Inquisitor and Solas to smooch at the end. Could have just been letters from the south, thanks. I'm also disappointed in that it would have been nice to have the Inquisitor show up with their LI during one of the meetings.

To piggyback on that a little, I wish that the Devs had gone a little further with bringing over what choices you made in the previous 3 games. Instead it feels like the only important thing you did was whether or not you smooched Solas. I wish that you could have said if your Inquisitor drank from the Well or not, and having them bring out Mythal at the end of the game and/or have the talk about finding the last piece of Mythal with Rook. As well, if you're going to include Isabela in the game, we should be able to say whether or not she ran off, stayed with the kirkwall crew, or was turned over to the qunari. I wish we could have gotten a passing line from Varric in the Fade about keeping an appointment with an old friend if Hawke was left in the Fade in DAI. I wish we could have gotten more flavour text in codex entries about who is King or Queen of Ferelden, who became Divine, etc.

And to add even more, I was surprised at the lack of characters from the previous games. It would have been cool to see Josephine working with the Crows towards their goal of once again becoming Antiva's protectors as their advocate and protector among the merchant princes and politicians. I was also so sure that Fenris was going to show up on some kind of Shadow Dragon quest. It would have been so cool to see him in Docktown, maybe also hunting Aelia and lending his aid to take her down. The biggest issue for me was, once again, the lack of Merrill. This girl SHOULD have been the elven & eluvian expert in DAI, and in Veilguard she SHOULD have been among the Veiljumpers as one of the leaders with Bellara as her protege. She can't join you as she can't leave the Veiljumpers, but she would be able to offer insight with elven lore and perhaps offer a team up with the Wardens to help stop the blight. As well, it would go so far with explaining how Bellara can just fix the eluvian in the Lighthouse. I get that she'd sniff out Solas & the Evanuris' bullshit in seconds, but please you can feel her absence in the games so much.

I did mention this in an earlier post, but I absolutely hate that either Davrin or Harding must die, even if you've achieved Hero of the Veilguard status for them. I really hope they patch this, as this is the most off-putting to a replay thing in the whole game. I really wish they'd gone the route of having that character (if hero status is achieved) be permanently injured, and forced to remain in the Lighthouse instead of joining you on the final quest. I feel like it would hurt worse for both player and Rook to have to talk to them and apologize for their choice rather than a few lines of sad dialogue. It would further the theme of regret and facing the consequences of Rook's choices in such a beautiful way.

The whole of act 3 was a pacing nightmare. You're essentially locked in to just doing the main quests, where as the first two acts are, while not slow, encourage you to take your time. The result felt very rushed and disconnected. I wish we could have gotten a chance to go to each of our allied factions (excepting Shadow Dragons for Obvious Reasons) and do a final quest with them to gear them up and get them ready for battle, with the consequence of not doing so being that you lose your named allies during the fight in Minrathous, regardless of whether the companion fighting with them survives or not. It would have been a good way to keep the pacing of the earlier acts while still keeping the urgency needed through act 3. As well as giving us one last moment with each of the factions.

The lack of a denouement was also a big turn off. We just defeated Elgar'nan and Ghilan'nain and repaired the Veil, but at what cost? Minrathous is destroyed, Rook lost two of their dearest friends, the world is going to be looking at them for answers. I wish we could have gotten a small bit, like the party at the end of Inquisition, except instead a funeral for Varric and whichever companion(s) died during act 3. During which you would be able to ask the companions what they intended to do next, maybe talk to the friends Rook made in the various factions. I would have at least taken a Varric narration of "This is what everyone did after the game" over the credits like at the end of Origins or Trespasser.

I also wish there was more intermingling of your allied factions. It would have been neat to see Evka conferring with the Lords of Fortune while Antoine goes to the Crows for alchemical components and discussing ideas for explosives. Or having Viago or Teia visit the Shadow Dragons and slowly go from being hostile towards them to trading tips on how to take down evil Magisters and manipulate politics. Or having Myrna visiting the Lords of Fortune and discussing spirits and death with Rowan. And maybe if you'd levelled up one faction and not another meant that the lower ranked faction was more abrasive with Rook. It's probably a lot to code and do, but it would have made it feel much more pressing to do all the faction work. And create a vision of a more united Thedas going up against the gods.

This one feels more like a bit of a nitpick, but it almost felt like the game was trying to say there were two sources of the blight: the blight that was in the Fade prison(?) that Ghilan'nain and Elgar'nan wanted to unleash on the world, and the Titan's anger blighting lyrium and it seeping into the world through the deep roads. Personally, I like the latter version better as it seems to follow the previous lore established by the games. If I missed something somewhere that connects the two let me know, because to me it seems like there's not really a connection between the two.

The last thing is also just a small, personal gripe, but I wanted red lyrium Meredith to appear somewhere. We got that little tease at the end of the Absolution show and I wanted her to come out swinging as a lesser big bad that Ghilan'ain and Elgar'nan were manipulating. I hold out hope that it'll be part of the next game based on the secret ending.

The PROS

The combat! It's a truth universally acknowledged that combat in Dragon Age just kind of sucks. I've literally played a mage in Inquisition and wrote fics with one hand while just holding down the trigger to fight. I really have to hand it to the dev team, the combat in Veilguard rocks. It's fun, it's dynamic, it's crunchy. A friend asked me to compare it to other games, and what I came up with is that it feels as fast and flashy as Kingdom Hearts 2, while being crunchy and using your companions like God of War ps4. I really liked being able to switch from a distance weapon to close range so quickly and using that to strategize. Though as a mage the dagger and orb was my favourite! A lot of replay value for me is going to be trying out the different classes.

The companions! I liked all the companions for very different reasons. They each felt like they had their own lives and goals. I've seen people complaining about the lack of a dialogue wheel or being able to smooch your LI at any time, but to me these are PROS! I hate that in DAI you can exhaust essentially all dialogue with the companions at the beginning and then only get a few new options as the game progresses. In Veilguard having those replaced by conversations out in the world and makes the relationships feel like they form very organically. All the personal quests were excellent, and I almost wish we got more backstory and build up to all of them because I was so invested.

The environments and level designs were so cool. I used photomode more in DAV than any other game, and most of the pictures are of the environments. I loved going through the maps on quests, with each one uncovering something I'd missed while wandering or opening up new areas of old maps. And all the treasure hidden away was so fun to find. It really encourages the player to explore the world they built.

Rook themself is an excellent player character. They have just the right balance of personality and blank-slate that makes them feel alive while also a reflection of player choice for personality. A big improvement over the Inquisitor's nothing personality and blank-slate backstory that had everyone up in arms about 'canon' when in reality the Inquisitor was only ever what you headcanoned for them.

As well, thank you devs for giving us the option to play dress up with everyone regardless of what armour they were actually wearing!! I'll admit I didn't like the majority of armours or appearances, but at least I never had to sacrifice utility for fashion!

Taash's questline was both a positive and a negative. I feel like I've seen so many people say that their gender discovery and euphoria is "too on the nose" or "cliche" but I am assuming those takes are coming from a younger generation of fans. Listen up kids. As a non-binary person who reached 30 this year, I didn't even hear the term non-binary until I was 20, and it took me a while of self-reflection to realize that's how I felt about myself. And I still haven't told my parents. Having that dinner with Taash's mother was one of the most emotional scenes in the game for me, because I saw myself and my fears reflected, and then later having Shathann show she'd accepted Taash for themself, was incredible. The cons for me in Taash's questline was being forced to choose which culture to embrace, which felt kinda gross. I wish there'd been an option to say "embrace your mother and what parts of the qun reflect you, but open yourself to learning Rivaini culture as well.

To me, Rook and Solas were such excellent mirrors of each other. Having Rook interrupt Solas' ritual in an attempt to stop him and instead release a worse outcome than the ritual would have likely had is an excellent mirror to Solas locking the Evanuris in their original prison but accidentally creating the veil, dooming the elves to mortality and taking spirits and magic away from the world. The way Solas manipulates Rook through their dreams is reflective of how Mythal once manipulated him. I think it's an excellent choice to have Solas essentially step into the role the Evanuris & Mythal played during his time of rebellion while Rook rebels against him and his desires. I feel like a lot of disgruntled Solas fans are missing this beautiful cyclical pattern, when right at the beginning of the game Solas basically says it himself with "They call me the dread wolf, what will they call you when all this is over?". And he's right. The release of the gods and the subsequent fall of Thedas is almost entirely Rook's fault, even as they strive to fix it (yet more mirroring to Solas).

The choices and consequences felt much more clear in DAV, especially when compared to Inquisition. There's a real reaction and lasting in game consequences to which city you choose to defend in act 1. If you don't strengthen your relationship with your allies they die at the end of the game. Heck, even choosing who to bring on missions changes the banter about what's going on significantly or raises companion bond strength. It brings a lot of replay value to the game.

I cannot stress enough how much the Varric plot twist rocks. I unfortunately had it spoiled over on twitter with an untagged post, but even before then I knew something was up - I was leaning towards him being a puppet/spy for Elgar'nan, not the real Varric. The truth hurts so much worse with him having died in the prologue. The way it was written into the dialogues was enough that something felt off, but not enough to clue you in too early. And having him always be alone in the infirmary, never visibly healing made the off feeling grow as you progressed with time through the game. I'd like to believe that there was some sort of ghost or shade of Varric lingering in the Lighthouse to watch over Harding and Rook and see the business with Solas through to the end, and that Solas was simply making Rook see him more than the others with their mental tether to the Fade.

I enjoyed all the allies we made in the different factions. They all felt so real, like if things had shifted just a little any one of them could be one of your companions instead of who we got. My favourites were Antoine and Evka, and I wasn't really interested in playing a Warden, but I'm curious to know what their relationship to a Warden Rook would look like.

NO MORE DREADED WAR TABLE!! I liked going on all the missions and discovering sidequests by wandering different areas. The missives received throughout the game did feel like excellent ways to follow up on the quests after the fact, or show how choices you'd made affected other people or factions.

NITPICKS

These are just little things that dont really fall under the cons category for me. Like they'd be nice but I'm not that fussed.

-The Inquisitor should have been in either the ugly Skyhold pjs or the red dress uniform depending on whether the inquisition was disbanded or not, not the Shadow Dragon uglies.

-There should have been an option for an elf Rook to say they are Andrastian/don't believe in Dalish gods

-Conversely, there should have been at least one character, like Bellara or another Veil Jumper like Strife, who wholeheartedly believed in the elvhen pantheon and had to deal with reconciling their religion with the evil the gods are unleashing

-We should have gotten at least one mission in Southern Thedas to see the extent of the damage the blight was doing, like a help the Inquisitor evacuate Denerim type mission or smth.

-idk if it's the same with the Crows if you choose to save Minrathous, but the Shadow Dragons & their shop should have come back mid-act 2, but been cold to Rook, and charge more for items/pay less for valuables. I forgot they were even a thing and then they were kinda important in act 3 and needed a reminder who everyone was lol.

-Ghilan'nain's final fight shouldn't have been harder than Elgar'nan's.

Thoughts about the Future Plot

I think that BioWare was very good at covering their butts with a lead up to the next game. On the surface it feels like they could just leave it there, and we can all be left to imagine how Thedas deals with the aftermath of the Sixth Blight and the destruction the return of two Elvhen gods wrought. However, they do have that secret ending, and I believe both Bellara and Taash's, and to some extent Harding's, personal quests all tie into the direction the next game is heading. Both Anaris and Taash's fire-breath tablet mention a "Devouring Storm". In fact, the two of them have a banter about it after you complete both their quests. While unclear if the "Devouring Storm" is a person or a force of magic, it was something that caused the qunari to flee across the sea to Thedas, and it was something that Anaris was trying to hide from by gaining a physical body. With the secret ending, it's safe to say that it is either someone or some force that has also been manipulating the major events of Thedas from behind the scenes.

I foresee that the game's setting will move northward to Par Vollen, and that the Forgotten Ones will play some major role. Whether they are part of the Devouring Storm or not remains to be revealed, but judging by Anaris, my guess is that it is something else. I also predict that the waking and curing of the Titans to aid you will play a major role, and that dwarves regaining magic will have large ripple effects across Thedas. I also feel like this "Gathering Storm" may be the odd song that Antoine hears throughout the game, and that the Grey Wardens, now without blight/much less blight to fight off, will shift into something else that can stand against the Storm. At least we know dragon fire will hold it off, and how cool would it be if in the next game we can tame dragons to fight with us, and/or play as a fire breathing qunari?? My biggest hope is that it will feel less like we need to play an elf to get the full experience of the game than it does in DAI or DAV.

Anyways, this ended up being far longer than intended. Hope you enjoyed my word-vomit about Veilguard.

[icharchivist]

That DAI banter be like "Oh wow, sharing secrets with your friends who love and appreciate you regardless sure is fun! Doesn't talking to your friends make dealing with your issues so much easier? Oh hi Solas :)"

KAGSJSHS YEAAAAH IT SURE IS

I think it adds a layer to understand that Cole can read mind and has known both about Blackwall's lies all along and Solas' as well. Cole is just extremely cryptic so unless you know what he's talking about you can only theorize about what he says, but it means that Cole is constantly dropping hints that the people around us are shady and no one gets it. The only person who actually tries to understand Cole... is Solas.

Idk there's just so many layers there especially since for me, it's post break-up for a solavellan route which means it's after Solas cowarded out from revealing his identity and decided to double down on fixing his mess by also destroying his current happiness.

Cole at Blackwall: "your crimes were horrible but what matters is that you attempted to fix it, even if you hid your identity for it!"

Solas in the back, who just threw his current happiness away to hide his identity to fix his crimes, sweating:

Cole, who also literally called Solas out on destroying his own happiness: wait not like that--

This is the funniest of dynamic i adore them