I've been playing computer games since the days of Daggerfall (yes I'm that old - sigh) and I don't think in all those years any other game character has had as much impact as Astarion. Most game NPC companions are just fun with a few quests, or eye candy, or basically pack mules. Astarion actually touches my heart in a way I never expected a pixel character to ever manage. Like another poster said earlier, he's probably the only reason I'm still playing this game instead of moving on to others.
Neil and the writing team did a superlative job - well, until last battle and the end anyway and I'm honestly unconvinced that the same writer wrote the end scenes.
But thats why his unascended ending on the docks is such a kick in the teeth, you can't make us care about characters then pull the rug out from under like that. It not only disrespects the character, but it disrespects their entire narrative throughout the game and the players who become fond of him.
I'm going the bride path this time out, simply because the so called 'good route' is the worst ending for a character I care about that I could imagine and the total lack of anything remotely resembling a proper wrap up ending just makes it 100 times worse.
I also believe, with a few other posters here, that Larian has a downer on his character. Every patch breaks something integral to his romance as if we are not supposed to get together with him. Much as I like kissing Astarion I would prefer it to be on the mouth not him kissing my forehead sigh. His actual romance scenes often cut dialogue short now and we get the infamoous 'continue' when they played perfectly pre patch 3. And apparently we can't see him naked in sex scenes without strategically placed candles or the camera deciding that the ceiling looks lovely at this time of year? So sex with a bear is OK but not with Astarion? Really Larian? - grow up!
One thing that really annoys me is the lack of any reference to previous games and vampire lore from them. Even the cut withers end dialogues still waffle on about Astarion and Tav searching through old tomes to find a cure for Spawn Astarion. If Jaheira is alive all they have to do is ask her, she is a cured vampire herself from BG2. Continuity with previous games (and the lore they created) is a least something they should give a passing nod to. Game went to the trouble of putting Astarions age and apparent length of time as a vampire sufficiently far under the point of no return time span to make a cure possible. It just doesn't make sense that if shes alive she wouldn't tell Tav or if she's dead that one of her kids dooesn't find her notes on it and pass them on. I mean in real life if you know something that can make a friends life easier you'd tell them right?
Be believable Larian, plot holes for the sake of angst and poignancy with nothing to back them up make zero sense, something that happens a lot in this game towards the end and not just to Astarion.
I agree with nearly everything said by the OP and many of the suggestion they make, and comments from other posters, are things that I believe almost every Astarion fan has either thought or posted about before.
