KJ

What is the greatest game music track of all time, and why is it Pursuit -- Cornered! from Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney?

I can't say exactly why I've come back to this series again, but I ended up watching some Let's Plays on YouTube recently, and that lead me to pick the games up myself -- maybe because my hand injuries are keeping me from my Dragon Age replay, but I can just about manage to poke at an iPad screen if I don't spend too much time on it. So I played the last two cases of Trials and Tribulations (and now I just want to spend a day doing nothing but writing epic Mia/Diego fic, because of course I do), then moved on to Miles Edgeworth: Investigations, which I've only played once before. I did a top-to-bottom replay a few years back, but if I ever wrote about that here I didn't tag it so I'll never find it again. While I think T&T remains my favorite (I love getting to play as Mia, and the way "Bridge to Turnabout" pulls so many threads together at the end of the trilogy is incredibly satisfying to me), I'm looking forward to spending more time with the newer games, getting to know them and their characters better.

I let Alistair break up with my Warden after the Landsmeet for the first time ever, and I'm not quite sure how I feel about it.

She could have taken the right dialogue option, and I think it would have stuck -- he's hardened, her persuasion is pretty high -- but it felt right, and I guess I just want to see this scenario play out.

Anyway, off to Redcliffe and endgame, for the first time in forever. I wonder if I can stick to my guns and turn down Morrigan, too.

Here he is! Alexander Trevelyan, Alec to his sisters and to close friends, mage formerly of the Ostwick Circle, Herald of Andraste, recently named Inquisitor.

It didn't occur to me when I gave him that style and color of hair that it was going to make him look an awful lot like Anders; fortunately, except for being a mage, he is unlike Anders in almost every other way. Believes in the Chantry and in the system, and like his sister Kendra in another universe is certain that he is Andraste's chosen -- though a bit more humble about it, and not quite as quick to trust the templars or follow every bit of Chantry doctrine (he disbanded the Templar Order rather than taking them on as partners, for example, and is more trusting of Cole than Kendra ever was). He's a bit brusque, and has a ruthless streak, but I'm not sure how that's going to play out yet; I have a theory that he may walk some of the darker paths I haven't yet dared to tread (let the Chargers go, make Cullen take the lyrium, leave Blackwall to his fate, etc.), but we'll see if I stick to it.

Meanwhile the romance with Cassandra is off to a lovely start. I haven't yet gotten it any further than my Lavellan did, but it's early days since we just got to Skyhold. I look forward to seeing the rest.

I haven't even finished my Lavallen game (doing character quests, buildings up enough power to go to the Arbor Wilds) and I'm already hyped up planning for the next one.

( Cutting because I don't want to bore you all with this level of detail. )

As threatened in my January writing goals post, I figured out how to get back into Dragon Age Keep (which involved T digging out the password for his long-unused EA account; it has to be his, because that's the one connected to the PlayStation account we use to log into our PS4, something we found out the hard way the first time we played DA:I because our backstory save didn't load properly, and we lost something like 8 hours of gameplay to go back and start over again), created the upload file for Loral Mahariel's canon, and rolled up a new Inquisitor for the first time since 2016. This is my first Lavellan, and my first male inquisitor; he's an archer named Mahanon (the default name; I didn't think to prepare one and decided it would do), an utter sweetheart who is going to get eaten alive.

Actually that is probably an exaggeration, because he does occasionally stand up for himself, but for the most part he's a kind and gentle soul who wants to help as many people as possible. Since, as I mentioned, I didn't put in much advance work on preparing the character (in part because I wanted to avoid spoilers about anything origin-specific), I was pleased to see that Clan Lavellan is more interested in co-existing with humans than most other Dalish clans, because that fits well with my initial concept for him. It also makes for a nice contrast with the Warden, because Loral was so anti-human and especially anti-Chantry. They may both be Dalish hunters handy with a bow, but personality-wise, they could not be more different. I know we won't see their shared background mentioned much in game -- my first Inquisitor was a dwarf in a world where the Hero of Ferelden was also a dwarf, and the connection was mentioned maybe twice -- but I am personally fascinated by the implications of two of the most famous heroes in the world both being Dalish elves.

It's early days yet -- I finished the mages of Redcliffe quest tonight, and now I'm faffing about in the Fallow Mire and the Hinterlands to get a couple of levels before closing the breach. But I have all the companions except for Cole, and have laid the flirtation groundwork for both Dorian and Cassandra. (My only real plan for this run beyond trying the last PC background was to focus on one of the two male-gated romances; I had assumed it would probably be Dorian, and that's definitely on the table, but Mahanon was quite taken with Cassandra almost immediately, so we'll see what he decides.) And it's already had the desired effect of getting me thinking about writing again -- I have one codex meme drafted, and ideas for others, and I'm paying super-close attention to all the Grey Warden content in preparation for getting back to the "Face the Music" sequel. So it was the right decision, and I'm looking forward to seeing where it all goes.