Dear Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening,

[nagia]

I did every fucking Vigil's Keep sidequest. Every single one. I earned the fucking Enduring Vigil achievement.

And what is my reward? Why, you still kill Varel? NOT. FUCKING. OKAY.

Why does this fucking series always kill my preferred NPCs?

I am most displeased with you, and I have now startled my dogs while shouting at my television, so I imagine they're displeased with you, too.

...assholes.

Comments

[darkrose]

Did they kill Varel? I just remember that he wasn't mentioned at all in the epilogue, which pissed me off.

[nagia]

Depends on whether you get all the upgrades for the Keep and then on whether you save Amaranthine or the Vigil. This playthrough, I got all the upgrades, and chose to save the Vigil, so during one of the "oh god go kill all the enemies at the gate" segments, I got to see Varel take an ogre to the face.

Rumor has it that you won't see that cinematic if you get the Enduring Vigil and save Amaranthine, but he gets no mention in the slideshow and, even worse, you get a letter from his successor in Golems Of Amgarrak.

[darkrose]

I didn't know that about GoA, and the one time I got to the end, I saved Amaranthine.

BIOWARE, I AM DISAPPOINT.

[nagia]

Hahaha fully agreed. DEAR BIOWARE: SEE ICON.

I honestly didn't know that either until I checked out the wiki. I haven't even bothered downloading GoA. Awakening did not fill me with the happy, and what I played of Witch Hunt filled me with like six kinds of rage, so I've decided not to grab any of the other DLC that isn't set in Origins.

Have you played Leliana's Song? I've been thinking about grabbing it, but with the way Awakenings and Witch Hunt failed to impress, I'm a little leery...

[darkrose]

Have you played Leliana's Song? I've been thinking about grabbing it, but with the way Awakenings and Witch Hunt failed to impress, I'm a little leery...

Don't bother. The only good things for me were the Battledress of the Provocateur armor, and making my dark-skinned Tabris' mother canon.

The story completely retcons everything Leliana tells you in Origins about Marjolaine and all that. In order to avoid having to design new locations for a $7 DLC, they decided that the whole Leliana is framed and tortured thing happened in Ferelden. The voice actress who does Marjolaine is even more grating when you have to listen to her for more than five lines. And in case it wasn't clear from context that Leliana was raped, they pretty much hit you over the head in a gratuitously triggery scene.

On top of all of that, the protagonist is fully-voiced. I like the actress, so that wasn't a problem, but I found that I absolutely hated choosing a response, only to find out that it was a paraphrase of the actual spoken dialogue that in some cases changed the meaning of the response completely. After this DLC, I was even less sanguine about the fully-voiced protagonist in DA2 than I had been.

Throne of Bhaal felt like closure. Awakening didn't, and with the rest of the DLC I wasn't that disappointed when they went back on the "2 years of Origins DLC" thing. It just wasn't that good.

[nagia]

Oh, ugh. On every level. From the gratuitous rape to the voice acting... ugh, ugh, and ugh.

Thanks for the warning. I'll make sure to steer clear.