I think it would take longer than three hours for that, you'd basically need an entirely different game. One closer to the original concept of Dreadwolf.
Imagine if instead of making the choice for Emmrich at the pinnacle point, the game makes notice of key conversation moments during Emmrich's questline, maybe a certain reaction to Manfred, the discussion in the Graveyard/Memorial Gardens, the discussions about Hezenkoss, and after all that Emmrich makes a decision based on how the player acted or reacted.
@@nuhre After 6 playthroughs in an attempt to fully understand each factions stories and all story choices made, mostly, The Mournwatch and Emmrich were my favorite new faction and Comp, but they could've been so much better, a fact about most things in the game.
"Had to be me. Someone else might have gotten it wrong." ~a scientist Salarian Remember, when companions could betray you (or you betray them) because of goals' conflict? A different era...
When learning about Emmrich, I thought "Oh, he'll be like Wynne, a wise person with a unique point of life." And then he turns out to fear death while Wynne knows she'll pass on, and saying she lived a good life and she's content. It's a matter of perspective, it's hard to understand Emmrich's fear in his way. I think what Wynne said this, "People fear, not death, but having life taken from them. Many waste the life given to them, occupying themselves with things that do not matter. When the end comes, they say they did not have time enough to spend with loved ones, to fulfill dreams, to go on adventures they only talked about... But why should you fear death if you are happy with the life you have led, if you can look back on everything and say, 'Yes, I am content. It is enough." Could Emmrich do the same as Wynne did?
Interesting concept to explore: a man that avoided life in the pursue of avoiding death. If only he had some autonomy over his final actions. I'd agree if the player could help or stand against him but not to choose for him. Well, corpo ladder leaders can't stand an employee making his own decisions and it shows. To help him realize how much time he lost for what? To become walking corpse? A mutilated parody of own full potential if only he accepted himself and his mortality? See the cruel paralel that trans-writers made here, probably they didn't even notice.
I’m going to be showing my age but Voldemort is who I think of. He spent his life trying to outrun and cheat death. In the end, he seemed no longer human, yet he died a mundane, almost boring, death. And of his body, the heroes just kinda pushed it away in some corner, unwilling to even acknowledge it.
I love how objective you are and talk of each character fairly, not just insulting the DAV characters, despite them obviously being worse. Excited to hear your new interpretations of the characters.
I did my fair share of insulting already. Now that my anger has simmered down, I just want to show people exactly why I was so mad at Veilguard. The potential is there, buried under layers of nonsense.
Like practically everything about the game, Rook's decision with regards to Emmrich has little consequences regardless of the choice. Let Emmrich become a lich? It's a good thing because then he's a member of the Justice Lich of Thedas, protector against... uh, something. Let Emmrich remain mortal? Then he becomes a daddy to that thing that came out of a Pixar show and if Rook romances him, they are all one big family now, yay. In the end, how Rook decides boils down to whether, if they are in a romance with him, jumping the alien from the Fifth Element or Christopher Lee.
Basically, the real tragedy of Emmrich is not about his fear of death, but about the writers wasting his potential. Not that it should be surprising, but it's still upsetting to see.
What's sucks is that Emmerich is arguably one of the better companions in Veilguard in that he at least has one part where you sympathize with him when Trash refuses to acknowledge what he identifies as. Low bar I know but even then Emmerich comes off as someone taking the worst aspects of Dorian and making that his whole character. Too many Veilguard characters feel too shallow because of the writing. Like Emmerich should've been for Neverra what Dorian was for Tevinter and Neverra should've been a highlight but because this game refuses to take itself seriously Emmerich comes off as a Disney character and doesn't fit in the game.
It is incredible how Veilguard manages to be lacking in everything that it does. The devs were so proud of the companions during the marketing and yet none of them are worth caring about. At least we will always have Origins to go back to.
In Rogue Trader, our dialogues with the companions influenced them slowly but surely, when their conclusions comes, it goes with how ours actions affected them. Here, Bioware's methodology of narration and choices seem to have reached their limits
They have lost their touch. I like influencing the outcome of a companion arc by interacting with them throughout the story. Not by being given a "choose X or Y" choice at the end.
I've always applauded Wynne as a character. She was granted a 2nd chance by the Spirit that saved her, and she used its power to help others, despite the risk of dying again, but she didn't care. She wanted to use the powers endowed to her by the Spirit to help the Wardens and save Thedas, knowing that she'll die. Wynne knows her time will come, but wants to make the world a better place before she leaves it, going as far as sacrificing her life to save her son in the novels. Man, it sucks. We had it so good with Origins, and now every time I think of Dragon Age, my memories of Origins will be tainted by fucking Veilguard... it pisses me off...
Same here. Origins was my game. I had to stop playing through my latest run because I knew Veilguard was the end of the road, and it took all the fight away from me.
Wynne is one of my absolute favorites, to get a bit sappy; my Warden wouldn't have gotten very far without Wynne's healing hands holding the team together in battle, being my warrior was an overclocked blender: all the damage and not much in the way of defence. when I unlocked her she _NEVER_ left my party. and being that she was a constant (along with Alistair) I got to know her very well, shes a woman who has been playing the game of life with a bad hand and a deck stacked against her, but still she plays, each card and move valuable regardless of outcome. loss is just another part of life, it only becomes a weight that holds you back if you try to cling to it. moving on doesn't mean forgetting. she never got the chance to be a mother to her son but through the party you become something of a family to her, the kind of fun aunt/grandma who teases the ever loving F*ck out of you but you know its well meaning to try and keep the spirits up. even through the blight there are sparks of joy.
Beautifully put. Wynne was the glue that kept my party together. She was wiser, not simply because of her years, but because she had lived so much in such a short time. I loved her insight into life and death and everything in between.
These analysis comparisons reinforce my decision to reject Veilguard completely, it is not a Dragon Age game, I reject the lore completely. Bad enough that I can't expunge it from my memory totally. I had a 60hr Inquisition replay in progress, I deleted the saves and started over so I could disable Tresspasser, my plays will end without it at the original ending.
I LOVE your insight into Wynn's character. I believe it was a picture of Anders when you spoke of "leaving a mark on the world"? Which makes me wonder whether Wynn's maturity & sense of self is what allowed her to coexist with a spirit whereas Anders & Justice ended up... Twisted. Did Anders' anger corrupt Justice? Was Justice already twisted by his time as a walking corpse? Maybe both? Emmerich is such a missed opportunity, you are so right. A mage being so afraid of death he is willing to exist as a lich (literally an old English word for "corpse") is a great premise. Imagine seeing a rather good-natured man being twisted into DA's version of Mannimarco (a big bad in Elder Scrolls) by his own fear? Shakespearian. Instead his "arc" is shallow and cartoonish. Sacrificing a pet skeleton? That's the drama? In a DA game? What in the name of DreamWorks... (Flashbacks to stabbing Leliana in the Temple/Killing Iron Bull in Trespasser/Isabella leaving Hawke - literally any other display of consequences of relationships with companions in the trilogy). On another note: a question out of curiosity. Disregarding "Veilguard", what do you make of a theory that the Evanuris were the first to corrupt the Golden City? And Corypheus wasn't lying when he said that the Magisters found it corrupted & empty? Like the Evanuris reached it, got the blight, Solas sealed them away behind the Veil to prevent it spreading, and then Tevinter repeated the thing anyway & brought it to Thedas? [I can't help it I love the idea of the Maker being left ambiguous and not "the elves did it, the Chant is 100% lies"]. None of that "Blight is dreams" BS. The Blight is punishment to however stepped into that forbidden part of the Fade.
My theory is that Wynne didn't corrupt Faith because she didn't have any feelings that went against its purpose. Faith chose Wynne because she knew Wynne wouldn't change. I hated the whole "everything tracks back to the Evanuris". Sure, they could be a major part of the story but I wished they weren't the alpha and the omega. And that still doesn't explain how humans came to be. Titans -> dwarves. Qunari -> dragons. Elves-> spirits. ??? -> humans.
@@nuhre I suppose I didn't explain it enough. What I meant is the Golden City is NOT Arlathan. It is a special part of the Fade - the only one that was always fixed in place. The Evanuris tried to reach it for power or whatever - got blighted and sealed away behind the Veil so they don't bring it down - "destroy the world" as Solas puts it. Tevinter Magisters tried to repeat the thing even though the Veil was in place - succeeded, created the Blight as it is now. The elves didn't "create the blight by killing the titans". Mithal wasn't Andraste (wtf is THAT idea). How can they say "the elves are an allegory to medieval jews" and then pull a "the elves are behind everything" is beyond me 😅 I don't see any need to explain how the races came to be. Certainly not like this. Sometimes mystery is good.
Wait... you're telling me that alongside destroying the continent that the first two games took place on and throwing out the aspect that made the Grey Wardens uniquely suited to fighting the Blight, Veilguard just casually deconfirms the Maker and the Chantry's cosmology? How... literally how does the game get worse the more I hear about it. Like, I know the Chantry is a very blatant expy of the Catholic Church, so it's not technically the most original thing in itself, but by God it's a hellova more distinct than another fantasy setting with a rambunctious pantheon of active and tangibly present dieties.
@@ShiningFingerStudio Yeah, apparently they casually (and heavily) emply that Andraste was just one of Mithal's vessels. And the entire Blight/Darkspawn lore from Origins (or like 90% of it) is retconned. The Blight was created by the elves by making the Titans tranquil. And Solas is all over the place (honestly his power scaling is completely off in Veilguard). It's as if the writers have a vendetta against Andrastianism because it reminds them of something ahem. (I am Jewish so not personal feelings here, but this kind of retconning is just mean + just weird and disrespectful to the writers who created the lore [for Origins in particular] - Andraste's ashes were very much sacred.)
The peak of "medicine" is magic. And flesh crafting is a subcategory of blood magic, which in Veilguard they have established only evil people use. So they shot themselves on the foot.
I'm still shocked that characters like Wynne, Irving and Greagoir are only supposed to be like late forties, early fifties. Like, seriously, the way they wrote them is like they are way older. And I know, medieval age is like, 50 is like old, but the way the devs wrote these characters is more like they are in their seventies. Well, Greagoir is more like in his fifties, but Wynne and Irving are more like seventies and eighties. Damn.
Brilliant essay. The way they portrayed Emrich makes me so cranky. He's a member of the *Mortalitasi* and a member of the Mournwatch FFS! He's a caretaker of the dead, and a necromancer! In what universe would someone like that be so scared of death that they'd essentially murder a friend to become an abomination?! What he did should be the antithesis of what the Mortalitasi stand for! If anything, he should be considered an outcast from his communities and have his status revoked. I mean, if they wanted him to be an "eeeeeevil" necromancer, that's fine - a bit on the nose, but fine - but the execution was terrible. Also, what's with Manfred? In what universe would a death worshipper and Guardian of the Dead enslave a sentient skeleton and turn it into what amounts to a puppy and a beast of burden? It makes no sense. Either Emrich honours and protects the dead, OR he's a power hungry necromancer who considers the dead as nothing more than tools. He can't be both. At first I was disappointed that the option to have Wynn turn up in Tevinter was missing, but now I'm just... relieved. I'm glad they kept their grubby mitts of her. She had what every character in ThE VeiLgUaRd is missing - Dignity.
I feel like the easy solution is the play gets no choice, but his fate is decided based on all of the decisions and interactions had up to that point. Like how Isabela was handled in DA2.
Ironically, the player could still have decided the outcome of Emerich's tale, by influencing his views on death/life. If the player has consistently shown how they accept death as inevitable, and is willing to live with that fact, Emerich may choose loyalty over his fear, confronting and coming to terms with it. Contrast that with a Rook who curses against the loss of friends and allies those "taken" from them and he chooses lichdom. We could then have had two follow up questions, Was it worth it? and The Ship of Theseus; if you change what you are, are you still you? Leading to potential conflict with Emerich and killing him, or him being alienated by the group. For example Taash could have accepted his change despite her crude attitude, whilst Belarra disagrees as she sees it as the loss of the servant, and Nev disagrees over the change, but is otherwise accepting. Harding having seen the folly of overuse of magic in Inquisition could have disagreed on base principle. But that's just me wanting good narrative work, and writing standards.
You are not alone. Most viewers agree with that. Let me influence my companions through my actions, not just by being given one character defining choice and for it to not have any weight later on.
Man this comparison might be the most frustrating. Cause I don't know about you but I actually liked Emmerich but when I step back and look objectively at him can see the difference in their writing between these characters as night and day. I just reached the lich decision and I can not for the life of me see why my opinion matters if he should save or let Manfred stay dead? Maybe if I was romancing him I could see the argument of wanting to spend our last days together or wanting to maybe join him it just feels like I'm taking away his agency.
This is how you write. And is why when people say what's the main flaw in the game I say it's the writing and damn all the other flaws. The writing is key, this is a RPG if you fail at writing you have failed at the whole thing.
@@nuhre Yea I knew it was cooked when David Gaider was like Bioware doesn't respect writers and Mary Kirby got shown the door. I knew what time it was, but I jumped anyway. Damn nostalgia, gotta learn to leave everything I loved when I was younger in the past. The present and future is intent upon the destruction of every franchise I once held dear.
I kinda missed wynne. I honestly wanted to know what happened to her since she was living on borrowed time from when we first meet her. After awakening, in the games we hear nothing about her ever again, she just kind of dies offscreen and is forgotten about, which is disappointing. Emmerich is probably one of the better companions in Veilguard, mainly because he's actually nice. But his whole thing with necromancy and whatnot is...weird. They rewrote how necromancy works so they could have 'nice' necromancers and while the lich thing is kind of cool, I had nothing but questions when learning about it, precious few of which get answered. The 'sacrifice' of manfred also didn't make much sense to me, was just kind of jammed in there, probably for the choice at the end. Especially since, as a spirit, couldn't manfred just leave his body and return to the fade before it is 'killed'? Unless he is bound there like a demon.
One thing the writers seem to have forgotten about Lichhood is that in order to maintain his immortality through undeath it costs the souls of others. Even if you aspire to use only the souls of criminals you are still taking the lives of others to sustain your own. The very act is evil. Wynne was more of a Saint type character, someone a higher power favored and blessed with long sustained life and vigor cause of her caring, nurturing, motherly personality. The spirit took care of her, and when the time came Wynne sacrificed her blessed life to save another. This is inspirational.
Wow a lich not even a revenant or something new and unique to the world of Thedas they literally just looked at D&D to provide an answer. this reminds me of how disappointed i was with the handling of Necromancy in Inquisition because we already had the school of entropy and as a fan of necromancy in general (see Gideon the Ninth by Tamsin Muir for everything Necromantic) i was expecting more depth from the magisters and those who specialized in Necromancy (i thought it could be an extremely powerful combo with Blood magic) but of course what we got was generic and entropy got forgotten which was a shame because it could have provided a really good contrast between a natural part of life and whatever they chose for Necromancy.
It's almost criminal to how "safe" and boring the story for Veilguard is, when it comes to such a rich, dark and most unique IP that is Dragon Age. It hurts having these amazing older stories from 1 through 3 and then just get these baby proofed stories, where there is basically no flavour or nuanced whatsoever
It's so clean. So sanitized. I think that's one of the things I hate the most about it. DA used to be grimdark. It was about seeing the worst happen and having to rise to the challenge. This is just a PG13 slop.
@@nuhre That's the thing, it's clean and sanitised, but also contains THE most problematic characters of any DA game! I mean, there were some controversial characters in previous games - Zevran was an assassin, Anders was a violent revolutionary, Sebastian was a zealot, Isabella was a pirate, Cullen and Ogren were addicts who had questionable histories with loved ones and the people in their care. BUT Those characters acknowledged their faults, and had *nuance* . The problematic companions in Veilguard are weirdly sanitised and made to look 'relatively harmless', like Disney villains. The end result is an uncomfortable feeling of having tea with a wolf in sheep's clothing, but the disguise is never really lifted. It's discordant in a very bizarre and unintentionally disturbing/uncanny way.
I like videos that make me think of something new - so thank you for this video. It made me realize that Iron Bull had a similar problem - he also had a hard life-changing choice, and the Inquisitor had to decide for him. Probably also a wasted potential - he should've made this choice himself. In these cases I think it's better to give player a chance for non-direct influence, like it's done with Leliana and Alistair.
@vasya_pupkin1489 Exactly. Let me shape my companions through how I choose to interact with them and the world throughout the game and, depending on their personalities, let my choices guide them one way or the other. But having a hundred percent control of someone's life choices is so odd. Maybe let me give some advice, but depending on how I've treated said companion during the game, they decide whether to follow it or not.
I don't agree with your assessment of Iron Bull because you making the decision that changes his life is the point. Iron Bull in his conversations is basically waffling on making the decision to commit to the Qun or commit to the Chargers and reject the Qun. He's right on the fence but not willing to make the decision, so he straddles it. With his easygoing nature, he probably figures he's got time to make that final choice or that he'll never be forced to... Until the world does it for him and takes the decision out of his hands entirely. He's basically a cautionary tale in the end because if you're a ruthless Inquisitor, you push him into the Qun and he willingly get re-education to forget the pain of what his waffling cost him or if you are just not wanting to break the bull, he steps up to being the leader the Chargers needed embracing them wholeheartedly.
I also disagree with you about Iron Bull. If you had said Cole, I would have agreed, because it made no sense for the Inquisitor of all people to have the final say when it should have been Cole's decision alone. In fact, it should have been a group discussion between Cole, Solas, and Varric with the Inquisitor as the mediator, and Cole would have decided at the end of the discussion. The Inquisitor having the final decision in Iron Bull's case makes more sense. Iron Bull, having no secure sense of identity, would be looking towards them for direction, because they're the one with the highest authority in that scene. So, whatever the Inquisitor chooses, they'll either reinforce his being the good Qunari agent or the Tal-Vashoth who's able to do whatever and go wherever he wants. Because those are the two identities he is torn between and is unable to fully commit to either until after that scene and that decision.
The biggest crime of Emmrich to me is that at no point does he feel Navarran and neither does the Grand Necropolis, it feels more like an international university completely segregated from the context of where its located rather than a major mausoleum of extreme religious importance to an entire nation. Also the Lich Lords piss me off and are not justified by the narrative in anyway to me, when I think of Dragon Age characters using arcane and dark magic to play with the laws of the life and death to gain immortality I do not think “highly disciplined and principled protectors and servants” in fact you could almost argue one of the major themes of all three games is the exact opposite but who cares! All of southern thedas fell to the blight now lol so now we can write whatever dumb garbage we want weeeeee
You know one of the main offenders for me. They don't have accents. He can tell me he's Navarran all he wants, but I don't hear it. And the way they nerfed the Mortalitasi into whatever the Mourn Watch is...
@ the accents thing drives me nuts too, it was so cool how past games used the accents of their voice actors to further flesh out how a character felt and is a big part of why he doesn’t feel Navarran, Cassandra’s accent was so cool and made her so unique and I will always hear how she would pronounce “Nevarra” and “Antony” in my head. Emmrich is just a guy who wandered over from Tantervale by mistake or someshit xD
Basically it all breaks down to- the writers for Veilguard were doing self-inserts and character development is just a passing thought. The dialogue in this game is so juvenile, I bought EA proplay to play this game- made it about 12-13 hours and just got so bored and disappointed, I just stopped playing due to apathy.
I agree. Giving a character a similar personality or life experience isn't terrible if you know how to write it in a compelling way. But if you sacrifice cohesiveness and established lore to satisfy your vanity, then you are not a good writer.
Excellent analysis and comparison. Veilguard fails in so many ways when it comes to story and character development/growth. It is, for the most part, appearance without substance, and the delivery is usually blunt and lacking nuance, subtlety or, as you said, agency of the character in question. Emmrich is a likable character with a lot of wasted potential in terms of storytelling.
2:05 I feel like any necromancer has a problem with their own mortality. Yes even Dorian. Even with blood magic. Blood mages have to dance on that razor blade
I'll probably faint in shock the day I'll be presented by a necromancer who doesn't want to become a ghost/vampire/bag of enchanted bones to keep on living as a glorified corpse. Btw, Wynne was a great character, like all of Origins' party members
All the companions in Veilguard are just stereotypes from established archetypes. They act like they invented the wheel, but it's all been done before and way better.
It's worth noting that even the whole "choose manfred or lichdom" was incredibly artificial. First the Manfred issue is just a random thing that happens and not an actual trial. If Manfred stayed home and didn't get damaged Emmrich would not need to make this choice at all. Second all this is just the lich leader that tells him "nuh huh you can't be lich if you decide to fix your effectively immortal servitor, because I said so". But why though. The fact that he still cares about something more than himself is more positive than being ready to abandon his closest friend to achieve immortality. Imho that situation should have been just a test, and the "right choice" to pass the test should have been choosing to save his friend over immortality to show he is not a sociopat. From what you say in this video, it's also strange that there is a lich cabal in the necromancer faction and everybody is ok with them when liches embody what the necromancers are sworn to fight. This changes the dynamic and makes it A LOT more mundane, from achieving arcane and forbidden knowledge, possibly betraying his own faction, to just obeying to authority figures until they bestow upon him their gifts and higher status
The whole lich thing is so weird. The fact that it is not a concern after the fact and nothing changes is insane. He just made himself immortal, and not one person is concerned about it?
To be honest, I do think that becoming a Lich should be the ultimate goal of any mage, no matter how difficult it is. I am very glad that in Wrath of the Righteous it is possible, and it gives a huge boost to any full spell caster.
You put more thought into his character than the writers did.
Thank you 💜
Can't wait for the "How I'd rewrite the Veilguard" 3 hour video 🤣
I plan to rewrite the companions first. Then the game itself 🤣
I think it would take longer than three hours for that, you'd basically need an entirely different game. One closer to the original concept of Dreadwolf.
Gonna take more then 3 hours to do that 😂
Imagine if instead of making the choice for Emmrich at the pinnacle point, the game makes notice of key conversation moments during Emmrich's questline, maybe a certain reaction to Manfred, the discussion in the Graveyard/Memorial Gardens, the discussions about Hezenkoss, and after all that Emmrich makes a decision based on how the player acted or reacted.
@Shadowpack95 I love that the entire comment section is absolutely unanimous about this.
@@nuhre After 6 playthroughs in an attempt to fully understand each factions stories and all story choices made, mostly, The Mournwatch and Emmrich were my favorite new faction and Comp, but they could've been so much better, a fact about most things in the game.
"Had to be me. Someone else might have gotten it wrong." ~a scientist Salarian
Remember, when companions could betray you (or you betray them) because of goals' conflict? A different era...
yeah when companions were actually characters with goals and a personality that clashed with other companions. I member
Or when you could kill them?
When learning about Emmrich, I thought "Oh, he'll be like Wynne, a wise person with a unique point of life." And then he turns out to fear death while Wynne knows she'll pass on, and saying she lived a good life and she's content. It's a matter of perspective, it's hard to understand Emmrich's fear in his way. I think what Wynne said this, "People fear, not death, but having life taken from them. Many waste the life given to them, occupying themselves with things that do not matter. When the end comes, they say they did not have time enough to spend with loved ones, to fulfill dreams, to go on adventures they only talked about... But why should you fear death if you are happy with the life you have led, if you can look back on everything and say, 'Yes, I am content. It is enough." Could Emmrich do the same as Wynne did?
Interesting concept to explore: a man that avoided life in the pursue of avoiding death. If only he had some autonomy over his final actions. I'd agree if the player could help or stand against him but not to choose for him. Well, corpo ladder leaders can't stand an employee making his own decisions and it shows.
To help him realize how much time he lost for what? To become walking corpse? A mutilated parody of own full potential if only he accepted himself and his mortality? See the cruel paralel that trans-writers made here, probably they didn't even notice.
I’m going to be showing my age but Voldemort is who I think of. He spent his life trying to outrun and cheat death. In the end, he seemed no longer human, yet he died a mundane, almost boring, death. And of his body, the heroes just kinda pushed it away in some corner, unwilling to even acknowledge it.
I love how objective you are and talk of each character fairly, not just insulting the DAV characters, despite them obviously being worse. Excited to hear your new interpretations of the characters.
I did my fair share of insulting already. Now that my anger has simmered down, I just want to show people exactly why I was so mad at Veilguard. The potential is there, buried under layers of nonsense.
Like practically everything about the game, Rook's decision with regards to Emmrich has little consequences regardless of the choice. Let Emmrich become a lich? It's a good thing because then he's a member of the Justice Lich of Thedas, protector against... uh, something. Let Emmrich remain mortal? Then he becomes a daddy to that thing that came out of a Pixar show and if Rook romances him, they are all one big family now, yay. In the end, how Rook decides boils down to whether, if they are in a romance with him, jumping the alien from the Fifth Element or Christopher Lee.
Basically, the real tragedy of Emmrich is not about his fear of death, but about the writers wasting his potential. Not that it should be surprising, but it's still upsetting to see.
All of them have potential, but they are reduced to a singular personality trait.
What's sucks is that Emmerich is arguably one of the better companions in Veilguard in that he at least has one part where you sympathize with him when Trash refuses to acknowledge what he identifies as.
Low bar I know but even then Emmerich comes off as someone taking the worst aspects of Dorian and making that his whole character. Too many Veilguard characters feel too shallow because of the writing.
Like Emmerich should've been for Neverra what Dorian was for Tevinter and Neverra should've been a highlight but because this game refuses to take itself seriously Emmerich comes off as a Disney character and doesn't fit in the game.
It is incredible how Veilguard manages to be lacking in everything that it does. The devs were so proud of the companions during the marketing and yet none of them are worth caring about. At least we will always have Origins to go back to.
When you are a mediocre writer, you think your mediocre characters are great, and people will go crazy about them. They were delusional.
In Rogue Trader, our dialogues with the companions influenced them slowly but surely, when their conclusions comes, it goes with how ours actions affected them.
Here, Bioware's methodology of narration and choices seem to have reached their limits
They have lost their touch. I like influencing the outcome of a companion arc by interacting with them throughout the story. Not by being given a "choose X or Y" choice at the end.
@@nuhre like we did in Inquisition with Cole
Really loving all of these character studies/comparisons, nuhre!
Thank you! I'm having a lot of fun making them 😊
I've always applauded Wynne as a character. She was granted a 2nd chance by the Spirit that saved her, and she used its power to help others, despite the risk of dying again, but she didn't care. She wanted to use the powers endowed to her by the Spirit to help the Wardens and save Thedas, knowing that she'll die. Wynne knows her time will come, but wants to make the world a better place before she leaves it, going as far as sacrificing her life to save her son in the novels.
Man, it sucks. We had it so good with Origins, and now every time I think of Dragon Age, my memories of Origins will be tainted by fucking Veilguard... it pisses me off...
Same here. Origins was my game. I had to stop playing through my latest run because I knew Veilguard was the end of the road, and it took all the fight away from me.
Wynne is one of my absolute favorites, to get a bit sappy; my Warden wouldn't have gotten very far without Wynne's healing hands holding the team together in battle, being my warrior was an overclocked blender: all the damage and not much in the way of defence. when I unlocked her she _NEVER_ left my party. and being that she was a constant (along with Alistair) I got to know her very well, shes a woman who has been playing the game of life with a bad hand and a deck stacked against her, but still she plays, each card and move valuable regardless of outcome.
loss is just another part of life, it only becomes a weight that holds you back if you try to cling to it. moving on doesn't mean forgetting. she never got the chance to be a mother to her son but through the party you become something of a family to her, the kind of fun aunt/grandma who teases the ever loving F*ck out of you but you know its well meaning to try and keep the spirits up. even through the blight there are sparks of joy.
Beautifully put. Wynne was the glue that kept my party together. She was wiser, not simply because of her years, but because she had lived so much in such a short time. I loved her insight into life and death and everything in between.
These analysis comparisons reinforce my decision to reject Veilguard completely, it is not a Dragon Age game, I reject the lore completely. Bad enough that I can't expunge it from my memory totally. I had a 60hr Inquisition replay in progress, I deleted the saves and started over so I could disable Tresspasser, my plays will end without it at the original ending.
I LOVE your insight into Wynn's character. I believe it was a picture of Anders when you spoke of "leaving a mark on the world"? Which makes me wonder whether Wynn's maturity & sense of self is what allowed her to coexist with a spirit whereas Anders & Justice ended up... Twisted. Did Anders' anger corrupt Justice? Was Justice already twisted by his time as a walking corpse? Maybe both?
Emmerich is such a missed opportunity, you are so right. A mage being so afraid of death he is willing to exist as a lich (literally an old English word for "corpse") is a great premise. Imagine seeing a rather good-natured man being twisted into DA's version of Mannimarco (a big bad in Elder Scrolls) by his own fear? Shakespearian.
Instead his "arc" is shallow and cartoonish. Sacrificing a pet skeleton? That's the drama? In a DA game? What in the name of DreamWorks... (Flashbacks to stabbing Leliana in the Temple/Killing Iron Bull in Trespasser/Isabella leaving Hawke - literally any other display of consequences of relationships with companions in the trilogy).
On another note: a question out of curiosity.
Disregarding "Veilguard", what do you make of a theory that the Evanuris were the first to corrupt the Golden City? And Corypheus wasn't lying when he said that the Magisters found it corrupted & empty? Like the Evanuris reached it, got the blight, Solas sealed them away behind the Veil to prevent it spreading, and then Tevinter repeated the thing anyway & brought it to Thedas? [I can't help it I love the idea of the Maker being left ambiguous and not "the elves did it, the Chant is 100% lies"]. None of that "Blight is dreams" BS. The Blight is punishment to however stepped into that forbidden part of the Fade.
My theory is that Wynne didn't corrupt Faith because she didn't have any feelings that went against its purpose. Faith chose Wynne because she knew Wynne wouldn't change.
I hated the whole "everything tracks back to the Evanuris". Sure, they could be a major part of the story but I wished they weren't the alpha and the omega. And that still doesn't explain how humans came to be. Titans -> dwarves. Qunari -> dragons. Elves-> spirits. ??? -> humans.
@@nuhre I suppose I didn't explain it enough.
What I meant is the Golden City is NOT Arlathan. It is a special part of the Fade - the only one that was always fixed in place.
The Evanuris tried to reach it for power or whatever - got blighted and sealed away behind the Veil so they don't bring it down - "destroy the world" as Solas puts it.
Tevinter Magisters tried to repeat the thing even though the Veil was in place - succeeded, created the Blight as it is now.
The elves didn't "create the blight by killing the titans". Mithal wasn't Andraste (wtf is THAT idea). How can they say "the elves are an allegory to medieval jews" and then pull a "the elves are behind everything" is beyond me 😅
I don't see any need to explain how the races came to be. Certainly not like this. Sometimes mystery is good.
@@nuhre Humans--> the Maker 😱😱😱😱
😂
Wait... you're telling me that alongside destroying the continent that the first two games took place on and throwing out the aspect that made the Grey Wardens uniquely suited to fighting the Blight, Veilguard just casually deconfirms the Maker and the Chantry's cosmology?
How... literally how does the game get worse the more I hear about it. Like, I know the Chantry is a very blatant expy of the Catholic Church, so it's not technically the most original thing in itself, but by God it's a hellova more distinct than another fantasy setting with a rambunctious pantheon of active and tangibly present dieties.
@@ShiningFingerStudio Yeah, apparently they casually (and heavily) emply that Andraste was just one of Mithal's vessels.
And the entire Blight/Darkspawn lore from Origins (or like 90% of it) is retconned. The Blight was created by the elves by making the Titans tranquil. And Solas is all over the place (honestly his power scaling is completely off in Veilguard).
It's as if the writers have a vendetta against Andrastianism because it reminds them of something ahem.
(I am Jewish so not personal feelings here, but this kind of retconning is just mean + just weird and disrespectful to the writers who created the lore [for Origins in particular] - Andraste's ashes were very much sacred.)
I see they emphasized mastering trans surgeries over basic medicine in Thedas. RIP to those who get sick hahaha
The peak of "medicine" is magic. And flesh crafting is a subcategory of blood magic, which in Veilguard they have established only evil people use. So they shot themselves on the foot.
I'm still shocked that characters like Wynne, Irving and Greagoir are only supposed to be like late forties, early fifties. Like, seriously, the way they wrote them is like they are way older.
And I know, medieval age is like, 50 is like old, but the way the devs wrote these characters is more like they are in their seventies. Well, Greagoir is more like in his fifties, but Wynne and Irving are more like seventies and eighties.
Damn.
Brilliant essay.
The way they portrayed Emrich makes me so cranky. He's a member of the *Mortalitasi* and a member of the Mournwatch FFS! He's a caretaker of the dead, and a necromancer! In what universe would someone like that be so scared of death that they'd essentially murder a friend to become an abomination?! What he did should be the antithesis of what the Mortalitasi stand for! If anything, he should be considered an outcast from his communities and have his status revoked.
I mean, if they wanted him to be an "eeeeeevil" necromancer, that's fine - a bit on the nose, but fine - but the execution was terrible.
Also, what's with Manfred? In what universe would a death worshipper and Guardian of the Dead enslave a sentient skeleton and turn it into what amounts to a puppy and a beast of burden? It makes no sense. Either Emrich honours and protects the dead, OR he's a power hungry necromancer who considers the dead as nothing more than tools. He can't be both.
At first I was disappointed that the option to have Wynn turn up in Tevinter was missing, but now I'm just... relieved. I'm glad they kept their grubby mitts of her. She had what every character in ThE VeiLgUaRd is missing - Dignity.
I feel like the easy solution is the play gets no choice, but his fate is decided based on all of the decisions and interactions had up to that point.
Like how Isabela was handled in DA2.
Exactly. The companions should change depending on how the player interacts with them and the world.
Ironically, the player could still have decided the outcome of Emerich's tale, by influencing his views on death/life. If the player has consistently shown how they accept death as inevitable, and is willing to live with that fact, Emerich may choose loyalty over his fear, confronting and coming to terms with it. Contrast that with a Rook who curses against the loss of friends and allies those "taken" from them and he chooses lichdom. We could then have had two follow up questions, Was it worth it? and The Ship of Theseus; if you change what you are, are you still you? Leading to potential conflict with Emerich and killing him, or him being alienated by the group. For example Taash could have accepted his change despite her crude attitude, whilst Belarra disagrees as she sees it as the loss of the servant, and Nev disagrees over the change, but is otherwise accepting. Harding having seen the folly of overuse of magic in Inquisition could have disagreed on base principle.
But that's just me wanting good narrative work, and writing standards.
You are not alone. Most viewers agree with that. Let me influence my companions through my actions, not just by being given one character defining choice and for it to not have any weight later on.
Man this comparison might be the most frustrating. Cause I don't know about you but I actually liked Emmerich but when I step back and look objectively at him can see the difference in their writing between these characters as night and day.
I just reached the lich decision and I can not for the life of me see why my opinion matters if he should save or let Manfred stay dead? Maybe if I was romancing him I could see the argument of wanting to spend our last days together or wanting to maybe join him it just feels like I'm taking away his agency.
"Emmerich on the other hand becomes a narrative casualty to the player center designed philosophy" Sums it up perfectly.
@@magicrealms2824 I try my best
This is how you write. And is why when people say what's the main flaw in the game I say it's the writing and damn all the other flaws. The writing is key, this is a RPG if you fail at writing you have failed at the whole thing.
The writing in Veilguard is abysmal. So much in fact, it seems like a bad joke or a parody.
@@nuhre Yea I knew it was cooked when David Gaider was like Bioware doesn't respect writers and Mary Kirby got shown the door. I knew what time it was, but I jumped anyway. Damn nostalgia, gotta learn to leave everything I loved when I was younger in the past. The present and future is intent upon the destruction of every franchise I once held dear.
I kinda missed wynne. I honestly wanted to know what happened to her since she was living on borrowed time from when we first meet her. After awakening, in the games we hear nothing about her ever again, she just kind of dies offscreen and is forgotten about, which is disappointing.
Emmerich is probably one of the better companions in Veilguard, mainly because he's actually nice. But his whole thing with necromancy and whatnot is...weird. They rewrote how necromancy works so they could have 'nice' necromancers and while the lich thing is kind of cool, I had nothing but questions when learning about it, precious few of which get answered.
The 'sacrifice' of manfred also didn't make much sense to me, was just kind of jammed in there, probably for the choice at the end. Especially since, as a spirit, couldn't manfred just leave his body and return to the fade before it is 'killed'? Unless he is bound there like a demon.
I think you could have the player influence other character's choices. In BG3 you can help or go against your companions wishes.
One thing the writers seem to have forgotten about Lichhood is that in order to maintain his immortality through undeath it costs the souls of others. Even if you aspire to use only the souls of criminals you are still taking the lives of others to sustain your own. The very act is evil.
Wynne was more of a Saint type character, someone a higher power favored and blessed with long sustained life and vigor cause of her caring, nurturing, motherly personality. The spirit took care of her, and when the time came Wynne sacrificed her blessed life to save another. This is inspirational.
Wow a lich not even a revenant or something new and unique to the world of Thedas they literally just looked at D&D to provide an answer. this reminds me of how disappointed i was with the handling of Necromancy in Inquisition because we already had the school of entropy and as a fan of necromancy in general (see Gideon the Ninth by Tamsin Muir for everything Necromantic) i was expecting more depth from the magisters and those who specialized in Necromancy (i thought it could be an extremely powerful combo with Blood magic) but of course what we got was generic and entropy got forgotten which was a shame because it could have provided a really good contrast between a natural part of life and whatever they chose for Necromancy.
GODAMN, I felt the depth of this video
You must be the only person left talking about veilguard lol I had already forgotten it exists
And I will continue to do so 🤣
It's almost criminal to how "safe" and boring the story for Veilguard is, when it comes to such a rich, dark and most unique IP that is Dragon Age.
It hurts having these amazing older stories from 1 through 3 and then just get these baby proofed stories, where there is basically no flavour or nuanced whatsoever
It's so clean. So sanitized. I think that's one of the things I hate the most about it. DA used to be grimdark. It was about seeing the worst happen and having to rise to the challenge. This is just a PG13 slop.
@@nuhre That's the thing, it's clean and sanitised, but also contains THE most problematic characters of any DA game! I mean, there were some controversial characters in previous games - Zevran was an assassin, Anders was a violent revolutionary, Sebastian was a zealot, Isabella was a pirate, Cullen and Ogren were addicts who had questionable histories with loved ones and the people in their care.
BUT Those characters acknowledged their faults, and had *nuance* .
The problematic companions in Veilguard are weirdly sanitised and made to look 'relatively harmless', like Disney villains. The end result is an uncomfortable feeling of having tea with a wolf in sheep's clothing, but the disguise is never really lifted.
It's discordant in a very bizarre and unintentionally disturbing/uncanny way.
Have only played Origins and Awakening so far. So glad to learn Wynn finds her son.
It's a bittersweet reunion but a reunion nonetheless.
@ is it in 2 or 3?
@NicoleM04 it's during the novel "Asunder"
I like videos that make me think of something new - so thank you for this video. It made me realize that Iron Bull had a similar problem - he also had a hard life-changing choice, and the Inquisitor had to decide for him. Probably also a wasted potential - he should've made this choice himself. In these cases I think it's better to give player a chance for non-direct influence, like it's done with Leliana and Alistair.
@vasya_pupkin1489 Exactly. Let me shape my companions through how I choose to interact with them and the world throughout the game and, depending on their personalities, let my choices guide them one way or the other. But having a hundred percent control of someone's life choices is so odd. Maybe let me give some advice, but depending on how I've treated said companion during the game, they decide whether to follow it or not.
I don't agree with your assessment of Iron Bull because you making the decision that changes his life is the point. Iron Bull in his conversations is basically waffling on making the decision to commit to the Qun or commit to the Chargers and reject the Qun. He's right on the fence but not willing to make the decision, so he straddles it. With his easygoing nature, he probably figures he's got time to make that final choice or that he'll never be forced to...
Until the world does it for him and takes the decision out of his hands entirely. He's basically a cautionary tale in the end because if you're a ruthless Inquisitor, you push him into the Qun and he willingly get re-education to forget the pain of what his waffling cost him or if you are just not wanting to break the bull, he steps up to being the leader the Chargers needed embracing them wholeheartedly.
I also disagree with you about Iron Bull. If you had said Cole, I would have agreed, because it made no sense for the Inquisitor of all people to have the final say when it should have been Cole's decision alone. In fact, it should have been a group discussion between Cole, Solas, and Varric with the Inquisitor as the mediator, and Cole would have decided at the end of the discussion.
The Inquisitor having the final decision in Iron Bull's case makes more sense. Iron Bull, having no secure sense of identity, would be looking towards them for direction, because they're the one with the highest authority in that scene. So, whatever the Inquisitor chooses, they'll either reinforce his being the good Qunari agent or the Tal-Vashoth who's able to do whatever and go wherever he wants. Because those are the two identities he is torn between and is unable to fully commit to either until after that scene and that decision.
The biggest crime of Emmrich to me is that at no point does he feel Navarran and neither does the Grand Necropolis, it feels more like an international university completely segregated from the context of where its located rather than a major mausoleum of extreme religious importance to an entire nation. Also the Lich Lords piss me off and are not justified by the narrative in anyway to me, when I think of Dragon Age characters using arcane and dark magic to play with the laws of the life and death to gain immortality I do not think “highly disciplined and principled protectors and servants” in fact you could almost argue one of the major themes of all three games is the exact opposite but who cares! All of southern thedas fell to the blight now lol so now we can write whatever dumb garbage we want weeeeee
You know one of the main offenders for me. They don't have accents. He can tell me he's Navarran all he wants, but I don't hear it. And the way they nerfed the Mortalitasi into whatever the Mourn Watch is...
@ the accents thing drives me nuts too, it was so cool how past games used the accents of their voice actors to further flesh out how a character felt and is a big part of why he doesn’t feel Navarran, Cassandra’s accent was so cool and made her so unique and I will always hear how she would pronounce “Nevarra” and “Antony” in my head. Emmrich is just a guy who wandered over from Tantervale by mistake or someshit xD
Basically it all breaks down to- the writers for Veilguard were doing self-inserts and character development is just a passing thought. The dialogue in this game is so juvenile, I bought EA proplay to play this game- made it about 12-13 hours and just got so bored and disappointed, I just stopped playing due to apathy.
I agree. Giving a character a similar personality or life experience isn't terrible if you know how to write it in a compelling way. But if you sacrifice cohesiveness and established lore to satisfy your vanity, then you are not a good writer.
It must be sad to go to the trouble of doing self inserts only to see how incredibly fucking shallow and one dimensional they really are as people. 😬
Excellent analysis and comparison. Veilguard fails in so many ways when it comes to story and character development/growth. It is, for the most part, appearance without substance, and the delivery is usually blunt and lacking nuance, subtlety or, as you said, agency of the character in question. Emmrich is a likable character with a lot of wasted potential in terms of storytelling.
One of the best written alongside Davrin, but if you compare them to any of the previous companions they are a nothing burger.
2:05 I feel like any necromancer has a problem with their own mortality. Yes even Dorian. Even with blood magic. Blood mages have to dance on that razor blade
I'll probably faint in shock the day I'll be presented by a necromancer who doesn't want to become a ghost/vampire/bag of enchanted bones to keep on living as a glorified corpse.
Btw, Wynne was a great character, like all of Origins' party members
All the companions in Veilguard are just stereotypes from established archetypes. They act like they invented the wheel, but it's all been done before and way better.
@nuhre judging by Tash, they made a triangular wheel and assumed it would work
It's worth noting that even the whole "choose manfred or lichdom" was incredibly artificial. First the Manfred issue is just a random thing that happens and not an actual trial. If Manfred stayed home and didn't get damaged Emmrich would not need to make this choice at all. Second all this is just the lich leader that tells him "nuh huh you can't be lich if you decide to fix your effectively immortal servitor, because I said so". But why though. The fact that he still cares about something more than himself is more positive than being ready to abandon his closest friend to achieve immortality. Imho that situation should have been just a test, and the "right choice" to pass the test should have been choosing to save his friend over immortality to show he is not a sociopat.
From what you say in this video, it's also strange that there is a lich cabal in the necromancer faction and everybody is ok with them when liches embody what the necromancers are sworn to fight.
This changes the dynamic and makes it A LOT more mundane, from achieving arcane and forbidden knowledge, possibly betraying his own faction, to just obeying to authority figures until they bestow upon him their gifts and higher status
The whole lich thing is so weird. The fact that it is not a concern after the fact and nothing changes is insane. He just made himself immortal, and not one person is concerned about it?
dang, yo
To be honest, I do think that becoming a Lich should be the ultimate goal of any mage, no matter how difficult it is. I am very glad that in Wrath of the Righteous it is possible, and it gives a huge boost to any full spell caster.
Girl, I just found your channel and your videos are so on point and well made it's not even funny. Keep it up! I love what you do
Thank you so much!!