#any wiggly line can become a tentacle | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

lhs3020b · 8 months

Text

Ending ended

Last night, I finished my Baldur's Gate 3 playthrough.

Some disorganised and incoherent thoughts below the cut, inevitably with SPOILERS...

We ended up freeing the Prince of the Comet - what I was not expecting was that this sent the Emperor straight off to the Netherbrain. It was interesting that there were no persuade options to talk him down from this, particularly as Orpheus's later actions suggest he's not quite as radically anti-ghaik as he claims.

Orpheus, frankly, I ended up with mixed feeling about. Some of his behaviour is understandable given that he'd spent several thousand years trapped inside the Astral Prism, and yes likely wasn't in a great headspace when he got out. Still, I found I didn't really warm to him. He was a long way from pleasant to interact with; perhaps, just perhaps, you can see the seeds for where the Vlaakiths came from, if this is what all gith'yanki rulers have been like. Haughty, high-handed, firm in their view of their own righteousness and also firm in the view that the lesser mortals should die when they're told ... while at the same time being quite willing to be a complete hypocrite if they think it suits them.

I was particularly-irked by his "you should have let my honour guard kill you" line. My good man, we had no idea who these people were when they came pouring out of the portal at our camp in the middle of the night! And at that point, from our viewpoint, the Astral Prism and its occupants were the only things stopping us from getting a face full of wriggly, wiggly tentacles. Lastly, why should we take the hit for gith'yanki internal politics, which really should not be our problem in any way?

So yes, the Prince of the Comet ended up as the Prince of a Noodle-Filled Face. In fairness to him, he did become slightly more pleasant to interact once we destroyed the Netherbrain (thank goodness there was no Synthesis here!), and actually I did try to talk him down from insisting on being killed. However, by that point all the Inspiration was gone and I couldn't make the Persuade check, so oh well. Stabbing it is then.

Presentationally, the endings suffered a bit for me as the city's asset-load-time issues were on full display. For instance, one entire cutscene looked like this:

Floaty floaty bell! It tolls! While levitating! Above a non-existent city!

Anyway, in terms of the endings themselves, it was nice seeing all your allies make their appearance. It's anyone's guess how they got into the Upper City but apparently they did, so fair play to them. And it did feel like the stuff you had done in the game mattered, and you were able to make choices that felt like they were important and would have real consequences, all the way up to the end itself.

Also, Wither's cameo where he was, umm, withering to the Dead Three was unexpectedly-hilarious. (He really did not hold back on their inadequacies.)

I did feel like the characters could have done with more-developed end-sequences. In mine, Astarion just runs off and Wyll says "that's the last we'll see of him". OK, bye then, I guess. Karlach's was a bit longer but again, left a lot hanging. (She and Wyll went back to Avernus; my headcanon, I have decided, is that they had Zariel in the Naughty Corner by the end of the week.)

Shadowheart never appeared in the ending-scenes - in fact I got more from Halsin, who spent most of Act III out cold on a slab in the Bhaalites' temple!

Scratch ... never appeared again after the last trip to camp. (Please, tell me what happened to my dog!) For that matter, nor did Yenna or their cat. I want to think this means they're all safe, but a lot of fireworks were going off during the illithid invasion of the city, and the Netherbrain itself seems to crash in the harbour, and the campsite is right next to it, so it's hard not to worry. (Maybe next time I'll make sure my final camp is near Rivington, just to be on the safe side.)

For that matter, Mizora also sort of just ... disappeared. Her ongoing cope-and-seethe style plan to kill Duke Ravengard apparently went nowhere - or maybe she just realised she was double-booked that Tuesday morning?

Lae'Zel's ending also felt truncated - she just suddenly whistled up an actual dragon and flew off with the rest of the rebel gith'yanki. There's no hint as to what happens next.

It was odd that killing Raphael off apparently had no significant impact, other than his non-presence at the end. And while there's been a lot of talk about Zariel, she never actually appeared either.

Probably the most developed ending was Gale's, and I think that was largely because his was the main romance option my character pursued. Even then, while Gale agreed to turn over the Crown of Karsus to Mystra, we never actually see it happen, so who knows if it ever actually did?

So overall in summary, this has been the best gaming experience I think I have had in about 11 years. The game's depth, breadth of content and characterisation have knocked a lot of recent so-called Triple-A products into a cocked hat. It was a complicated, emotional journey. At the same time, I am left wishing that some aspects of the endings had been expanded, however I am very glad that it didn't end up being a repeat of Mass Effect 3.

#baldurs gate 3 #ending thoughts #LHS witters #LHS plays new games

1 note · View note