Mark Plays ‘Dragon Age: Origins’: Hour 37

In the thirty-seventh hour of Dragon Age: Origins, THIS IS A TRICK. ONE TRIP TO THE ALIENAGE, AND EVERYTHING IS AWFUL AND MESSED UP AND SUPER DISTURBING. YOU ALL KNEW THIS WOULD HAPPEN, AND NO ONE WARNED ME. GODDAMN IT. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to play Dragon Age: Origins

Hour Thirty-Seven

Okay, yes, to be fair, you’re not supposed to warn me. That’s the beauty of this. (For you.) I mean, shit, I should have known that once Anora suggested something was afoot in the Alienage, it wouldn’t be a merry romp through a field of marshmallows. Look what game I’m playing. Despite being near the end of the game, the folks who made this game still don’t hold back on utterly destructive and disturbing plots. THIS IS SO FUCKED UP.

I suppose it’s also quite fitting that in the final part of this game, I return to the place where I started. It’s weird being back in the Alienage! I barely remembered how to navigate my way around the place. But before I passed through the gates that had been closed all this time, I did the following:

1. Listened to Alistair and Shale discuss and compare their various cries of pain.
2. Found Bann Alfstanna while trying to find a vendor who sells empty flasks. I NEED THEM TO MAKE LESSER HEALTH POULTICES AHHHHH WHY DOESN’T ANYONE SELL ANY.
3. Got Sighard to agree to speak against Loghain.
4. Pissed off someone named Arl Wulffric or something? Man, he is not having it right now.

And then it was time to FINALLY RETURN TO THE ALIENAGE. oh my god LOOK THERE’S A HOODED COURIER SHIT YES THIS IS GOING TO BE AWESOME.

Wait, why is Shale complaining about the smell?

Why are there flies buzzing everywhere?

What the fuck, why is there a sign saying it’s illegal for elves to carry weapons???

IS THAT A DEAD DOG IN THE STREET?

WHAT THE HELL WHY ARE THERE SICK ELVES EVERYWHERE?

I ended up giving a sovereign to a veteran elf just to make myself feel better. Somehow, in the months that I’d been gone from the Alienage, everything got worse. When I spoke to my cousin, he told me that Arl Howe led a purge of the Alienage specifically to get revenge for Vaughn’s death. On top of that, some strange sickness (apparently caused by the Blight) is running rampant through my old home, which means that my own dad has been sent to quarantine. Oh, I will avenge the fuck out of him if anything bad happened to him!

Then I went outside and now there are two beggars??? Okay, dudes, you’re probably just making shit up to get money, but I have plenty to spare, so here you go.

I found my lovely friend Shianni outside the quarantine office, and things continued to get even weirder. So, everyone assumed I was dead and had a funeral for me. Now, people are being taken away to be quarantined and never coming back. Some of those people aren’t even showing signs of being sick! GREAT. THIS IS GOING TO BE AWFUL, ISN’T IT?

I tried bribing my way into the building, but when that didn’t work, I ended up sneaking in through the Apartments behind it. I found a pool of warm blood next to a broken vase. All the signs discovered indicated that people had been taken away from the homes in a rush, leaving behind the things they cared about. NONE OF IT MADE ANY SENSE. So was the sickness real? Were these people really disappearing for good?

YES. YES, THEY WERE. It’s here that I meet Caladrius, a slaver. HE IS SELLING MY ELVEN BRETHREN INTO SLAVERY. I GIVE ABSOLUTELY NO FUCKS WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU. He tried to negotiate with me. Like, “Haha, take this fake letter that will implicated Loghain, and I’ll take my slaves and money, and also, give me 100 SOVEREIGNS AS WELL.” You know what I told him?

SWORD TO THE BELLY. That asshole was bleeding out, and he asked me to show him mercy, so I told my party to murder him. As far as I’m concerned, that is mercy, dude.

It didn’t take me too long to complete this part of the game, so I thought that this was a little too easy. I even checked to make sure I wasn’t still on Casual or anything. Nope, everything was still Normal! So when I found Ser Otto outside and he asked me to help him find the source of something “evil,” I didn’t expect it to be any worse than the slavery plot.

Hahaha. haha. Ha. HA.

Yeah, right about when he told me we had to go in an orphanage, I knew that nothing ends well in this scenario.

No, what the fuck are you.

But what the hell are you doin–

WHY AM I STILL CHASING AFTER THIS?

After being ambushed by a pack of rabid dogs, things got EVEN WORSE. I mean, seriously:

WHY. WHY WOULD I EVER WILLINGLY CHOOSE TO GO DOWN A HALLWAY THAT LOOKS LIKE THIS? Because I make bad decisions. Almost immediately, I start hearing voices. It sounds like children playing in the distance. And as I moved further into the orphanage, those children started screaming. There were bones spread everywhere, and pools of congealed blood covered the floor. The voices and screaming got louder until –

DEMONS. SHRIEKS. FUCKING ABOMINATIONS. Then there’s that “boss” battle at the end, and I couldn’t find where the actual trap was, so it just looked like this:

WHAT THE FUCK. I COULDN’T SEE SHIT. And when all was said and done, Ser Otto was dead, the “evil” was gone, AND NO ONE FUCKING TOLD ME WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED THERE. Did those demons murder all the orphans? I MEAN, THAT’S WHAT’S IMPLIED, RIGHT? Oh my god, this is the worst. THE WORST.

WHY DOES THIS GAME KEEP DESTROYING ME.

My Character Stats

Strength: 27+6
Dexterity: 30+12
Willpower: 23+2
Magic: 14+2
Cunning: 24+7
Constitution: 27+2

Heroic Stats

Kills: 655
Damage dealt: 156021
Friendly-fire: 0
Greatest damage dealt: 90
Contribution to party damage: 29
Hit rate: 87
Most powerful foe slain: Arl Howe
Injuries: 27

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