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[TurianRenegade]

I didn't want to make a thread for this, but I didn't see any other appropriate place to put it.

After having played Dragon Age 2 three separate times (one for each class), I got to thinking about something:

Because the story
is told using a framed narrative, and while some elements of the story
have no room for dispute (like the ordeal with the Qunari and the mage & templar war), and regardless of the choices you make during
the game, who's to say that the story isn't just one big convincing lie? Varric has shown that he's an unreliable narrator on a few occasions by embellishing and exaggerating various points in the story just to check to see if the Seeker was paying attention. I understand that as a Seeker, Cassandra Pentaghast is trained to tell when someone is lying (with the assumption that Seeker is just a fancy Chantry term for interrogator), but she was only able to pick up on the blatantly obvious lies and only doubted about how Hawke faced down the Arishok because she thought it sounded a little too romantic.  She seemed perfectly accepting of everything that Varric had to tell her even though he is a bit of a smooth talker and no proof was ever offered to back up anything he had to say.

Basically it seems to me that anything Hawke ever does in the game doesn't matter as much as it should because it's all about  Varric recapping his version of the events that took place to the Seeker.

[Maria Caliban]

TurianRenegade wrote...

...who's to say that the story isn't just one big convincing lie?

1. We assume Cassandra, Seeker of the Chantry, is not an idiot. She's already done her research on Hawke and several people who can be his companions. She might have gotten *motive* wrong, but basic facts like 'Hawke was a survivor of Lothering who came to Kirkwall, rose in power, found an idol in the Deep Roads, defeated the Arishok, and sheltered the man who blew up the Chantry and then took a side for/against the Templars' is something she knows.

2. That's not what a framed narrative or unreliable narrator is supposed to be about. While we might have issues with aspects of the plot, characters, or themes, we mostly trust the writers aren't so bad at their job, they can only come up with an extended dream sequence.

If you believe both of those things to be untrue then it's possible it's all just one big lie.

[Torax]

Don't worry I'm sure you'll just end up waking from a nap to find out that Origins is in the Bathroom taking a shower.

[Alamar2078]

That is true and gives the authors slightly more creative license to do their own thing if they'd like. I would hope this option isn't used but it is of course there. It's very possible any single event "isn't what we thought we saw".

[TurianRenegade]

As far as the storytelling device is concerned, I only said that based on how Varric is portrayed. It wasn't a knock on the writers or anything like that.

[Maria Caliban]

TurianRenegade wrote...

As far as the storytelling device is concerned, I only said that based on how Varric is portrayed. It wasn't a knock on the writers or anything like that.

Sorry. I didn't mean to imply you were doing so.

[TurianRenegade]

I happened to find this related article after reading the one entitled "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pantsless Rogue: 'Dragon Age II''s Isabela" that was linked to in the official Isabela discussion thread.

The related article was about "Things I Was (Happily) Wrong About in 'Dragon Age II'" and the third thing the author was wrong about is pretty much what I started this thread about.

"Assumption 3: Framing the story as a flashback is hamfisted and won’t work.

Postulate: It’s corny. It’s schlocky. It’s been done. And, here, it’s possibly racially problematic and misogynist as well, given that the default Hawke family is white and default Bethany is pouring out of her dress until Varric is called upon to give an “accurate” account. It seems especially cheap as means by which the game cuts down on the number of settings (a problem made worse by the limited maps) and promotes lazy timeskipping (also made worse by the way no one seems to age). Dramatically ambitious, mayhaps, but it strikes all the wrong notes, and I vaguely hoped for a while it was just a device of the demo and wouldn’t be present in the real game.

The Truth: The racist/sexist undertones may still be present but that is a matter of interpretation for which there has already been plenty of point-counterpoint. Furthermore, not to minimize the issue at all, but after 40-60 hours playing as our own Hawke family, the memory of those romantic exaggerations is long gone in the minds of players and is replaced with a more structural conundrum. In short: my mind, it is blown.

Someone, maybe me, will eventually write a long textual analysis of this game as a subtle exploration of the unreliable narrator. There are at least two occasions where Varric’s accuracy is called into question and countless others that caused me to pause and reflect that—really—the issue of character agency is incredibly complex here. By framing all of this as Varric’s account and by explicitly stating that Varric is a compulsive liar who fabricates things even when it’s not necessary and it’s not likely that he’ll be called out on it, the player is forced to reevaluate their play as in some way all being something produced by Varric’s invention (or possibly Cassandra’s imagination). There is really no way to verify a single detail of Varric’s story, as it all literally takes place within a blackbox, and while it’s clear there is some larger, exterior truth to it all, everything confined within Varric’s account of Hawke’s story is a puppet show played out by the gamer. It’s so meta my ears are bleeding."

Here's a link to that article: http://www.popmatter...n-dragon-age-ii

Makes me kinda glad that I wasn't the only one who considered that idea, even though the author of the article explained the possibility better than I could have.

[Hrodric]

FACT: The whole thing is a dream.

Proof:

[Eva1346]

Hrodric wrote...

FACT: The whole thing is a dream.

Proof:

classIC HRODRIC!!!

[The Angry One]

If it's all a dream, who's going to appear in the shower?
I vote Duncan.

[Torax]

The Angry One wrote...

If it's all a dream, who's going to appear in the shower?
I vote Duncan.

Cailin fused wolf feces.

[Hrodric]

@Eva: I do it for you, honey. ;-)

@TAO: I was hoping we could have Iona be in the shower so let's compromise with Duncan and Iona.

[The Angry One]

Hrodric wrote...

@TAO: I was hoping we could have Iona be in the shower so let's compromise with Duncan and Iona.

Sure why not. They can be scrubbing each other.