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So that one boss I was stuck on? I have beaten it! And all because I got bored of playing Bejeweled! And it didn't even take that long! (I'd like to say nobody died, but then I'd be lying).
I said I'd talk about it behind a cut, so here we are: I'm pretty sure anyone who follows me who's already played DA:O knows which boss I'm talking about.
The Broodmother.
As I said previously, it is a genuinely disturbing and distressing section of the game. I knew this coming in, which is why the Deep Roads freaked me out from the get-go, but I didn't know what to expect.
I mean, the first mentions of the Deep Roads come early on in the games and me, with standard fantasy epic brain on, was imagining cavernous ravines, not the Mines of Moria (should've known better, right?) So OK, I knew there wasn't a Balrog down there (epic shit would've been epic but a rip-off if there had been). But...I knew there was the Broodmother, but I didn't know specifics.
So I'm trotting along, and nothing's really happening and then...I get to this one bit, and there's what the overhead text describes as "fleshy sacks".
EW.
I mean, I can stick most things, but womb levels? No chance. One reason I can't do the Labyrinth of Amala in Nocturne is its womb-levelness and the noises the doors make when you open them. But I digress.
You see one fleshy sack (you can even take stuff from some of them, which EWWWWWWWW), then you start seeing more. Then they're almost everywhere you turn, although thankfully not on the floor. And then you hear Hespith, and she's telling you a thing. You hear her long before you see her, and basically you follow her voice till you get to her. And she's repeating the same thing, over and over.
(TV Tropes says she's speaking in a Creepy Monotone. I disagree. I'd say more she's speaking as someone who's stopped feeling emotions, and I say this from having personal experience of that).
Then you talk to her, and find out that she came down here with Braska et al. and my mind boggles at how she managed to survive BUT. If you pick up Ruck's mother's quest (to find Ruck), you get foreshadowing from him, about how he eats dead Darkspawn just to survive, and it makes them unable to see him. It also tainted him irrevocably, and now he's completely bat-shit crazy. And so is Hespith.
That doesn't mean she isn't telling the truth, though. She is. She tells you what the Darkspawn do. They carry off their victims, and they eat the men. The women, they take away and rape, repeatedly. They force them to eat the other people - in this case, the other dwarves, and eventually the women become transformed, and they become Broodmothers. Depending on what race they are (dwarf, human, elf, or qunari) depends on what Darkspawn they give birth to (I may get this in the wrong order for the first two, but: genlock, hurlock, shriek, and ogre respectively). And that's basically what they're there for: as Darkspawn breeding factories.
I did all this section in one run, right up to following Hespith's voice yet again, and running into the Broodmother herself (heavily implied, but I don't know if it's ever confirmed, to be Laryn).
I didn't know what was coming and, to put it lightly, I was horrified.
Not because it was badly written. It could've been. They could've thrown it in for cheap flavour. I don't think it was badly written. I actually thought it was well done. I don't know what I'll think come the end of this section (because I literally saved after the fight, as I didn't have a lot of time to do anything else). But, so far, I think it was well written, and really fucking freaky.
I failed the first time I fought the Broodmother, as already documented, and swiftly gave up. I then spent the rest of the afternoon playing Bejeweled, but I couldn't get any of it out of my head. Playing a Match 3 game was the wrong choice - it gave me too much space to think about it. I've also been heavily premenstrual for fuck knows how long, so I also spent all those hours not only thinking about it, and failing to process it, but also nearly crying. I kind of managed to disconnect from it (by, primarily, approaching the entire thing as a That One Boss), but even typing it out now has brought back the horrible feelings I had the first time.
I wish I could say I hope I never have to do it again, but I'm already plotting a female character playthrough (I know her origin and her name, and her dog's name). And I know about The Mother in Awakening (well, I know she exists). Not looking forward to that, either (I know I don't have to play Awakenings, but I damn well paid for the thing, so I might as well).
On a lighter note, using Dog as the tank WORKS! Wynne died first, swiftly followed by Alistair, and I think my PC only survived by not doing a lot to contribute. Dog survived because did you know he's AWESOME?! and obviously I was controlling him, so that was cool.
I am victorious, and now I can play at night again. Maybe.
I said I'd talk about it behind a cut, so here we are: I'm pretty sure anyone who follows me who's already played DA:O knows which boss I'm talking about.
The Broodmother.
As I said previously, it is a genuinely disturbing and distressing section of the game. I knew this coming in, which is why the Deep Roads freaked me out from the get-go, but I didn't know what to expect.
I mean, the first mentions of the Deep Roads come early on in the games and me, with standard fantasy epic brain on, was imagining cavernous ravines, not the Mines of Moria (should've known better, right?) So OK, I knew there wasn't a Balrog down there (epic shit would've been epic but a rip-off if there had been). But...I knew there was the Broodmother, but I didn't know specifics.
So I'm trotting along, and nothing's really happening and then...I get to this one bit, and there's what the overhead text describes as "fleshy sacks".
EW.
I mean, I can stick most things, but womb levels? No chance. One reason I can't do the Labyrinth of Amala in Nocturne is its womb-levelness and the noises the doors make when you open them. But I digress.
You see one fleshy sack (you can even take stuff from some of them, which EWWWWWWWW), then you start seeing more. Then they're almost everywhere you turn, although thankfully not on the floor. And then you hear Hespith, and she's telling you a thing. You hear her long before you see her, and basically you follow her voice till you get to her. And she's repeating the same thing, over and over.
(TV Tropes says she's speaking in a Creepy Monotone. I disagree. I'd say more she's speaking as someone who's stopped feeling emotions, and I say this from having personal experience of that).
Then you talk to her, and find out that she came down here with Braska et al. and my mind boggles at how she managed to survive BUT. If you pick up Ruck's mother's quest (to find Ruck), you get foreshadowing from him, about how he eats dead Darkspawn just to survive, and it makes them unable to see him. It also tainted him irrevocably, and now he's completely bat-shit crazy. And so is Hespith.
That doesn't mean she isn't telling the truth, though. She is. She tells you what the Darkspawn do. They carry off their victims, and they eat the men. The women, they take away and rape, repeatedly. They force them to eat the other people - in this case, the other dwarves, and eventually the women become transformed, and they become Broodmothers. Depending on what race they are (dwarf, human, elf, or qunari) depends on what Darkspawn they give birth to (I may get this in the wrong order for the first two, but: genlock, hurlock, shriek, and ogre respectively). And that's basically what they're there for: as Darkspawn breeding factories.
I did all this section in one run, right up to following Hespith's voice yet again, and running into the Broodmother herself (heavily implied, but I don't know if it's ever confirmed, to be Laryn).
I didn't know what was coming and, to put it lightly, I was horrified.
Not because it was badly written. It could've been. They could've thrown it in for cheap flavour. I don't think it was badly written. I actually thought it was well done. I don't know what I'll think come the end of this section (because I literally saved after the fight, as I didn't have a lot of time to do anything else). But, so far, I think it was well written, and really fucking freaky.
I failed the first time I fought the Broodmother, as already documented, and swiftly gave up. I then spent the rest of the afternoon playing Bejeweled, but I couldn't get any of it out of my head. Playing a Match 3 game was the wrong choice - it gave me too much space to think about it. I've also been heavily premenstrual for fuck knows how long, so I also spent all those hours not only thinking about it, and failing to process it, but also nearly crying. I kind of managed to disconnect from it (by, primarily, approaching the entire thing as a That One Boss), but even typing it out now has brought back the horrible feelings I had the first time.
I wish I could say I hope I never have to do it again, but I'm already plotting a female character playthrough (I know her origin and her name, and her dog's name). And I know about The Mother in Awakening (well, I know she exists). Not looking forward to that, either (I know I don't have to play Awakenings, but I damn well paid for the thing, so I might as well).
On a lighter note, using Dog as the tank WORKS! Wynne died first, swiftly followed by Alistair, and I think my PC only survived by not doing a lot to contribute. Dog survived because did you know he's AWESOME?! and obviously I was controlling him, so that was cool.
I am victorious, and now I can play at night again. Maybe.
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