Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion The romance with Astarion pulls you over to the "dark side".

Originally Posted by jinetemoranco
1. "Looks like a duck, quacks like a duck" could easily be applied to the much simpler idea that the story about the cycle of abuse is depicting abuse, rather than Larian studying "3D sadistic porn" for these purposes.

Perhaps this idea isn't so simple, or it's not so easy to cram it into the story in a way that makes the player see just that. And if Larian decided to go as simple as showing a cycle of violence, applying the typical techniques of "sadistic 3D porn", without linking to the lines, to the nature of the relationship between the characters, to the behavior of Tav and their attitude to Astarion throughout the game, just making the prelude to sadistic porn their usual kisses, and before that Astarion can charmingly and playfully shrug ("Yes, my treasure? "), and then after this "foreplay" announce with complete seriousness that we are "Lovers Forever", then... This is even worse and even sillier on their part than even if they started positioning their game as a "sex store" where players are offered a choice of companions based on their preferences. Here's Tav's facial expression (I'm using Tav from the petition as an example, if it's unacceptable I'll change the picture to a different Tav)



And the facial expressions of the victims of sadistic 3D porn.











In my subjective opinion, these "ducks" are clearly quacking in unison. The difference between sadistic content and SM content is the victim's facial expressions and body language.

This seems like an extremely crude attempt to FORCE the player to see Astarion as an abuser, to the effect that if you don't want to be a victim, you should FORCE him to give up the ritual, fix it, and suppress it. It's basically emotional abuse as a Valentine's Day gift. Or was it a calculation that the player would cry and "run away in fear" from Astarion, get angry at him, etc.? Well, in my case they only succeeded in the first, and instead of the second and third, I preferred to spend some time to try and figure out what was going on. The motivations of the developers are a matter of debate, one can speculate all sorts of things, and it's possible they may envision the "cycle of violence" in this way, after all, if you search for violence on porn resources, you'll find authors who have exactly the same ideas about it.

Originally Posted by jinetemoranco
In fact the scene with Astarion saying that strikes me as really badly written because he basically looks into the camera and says "This was about the cycle of abuse" which is goofishly blunt and not how a real person would talk. But it's very much there. And again, I repeat that we need to stop feeling like the game is personally trying to victimise us for telling its story.

Astarion after refusing the ritual always says only what the "good hero" would like to hear, he keeps manipulating out of desperation, I like this scene on the contrary, it's exactly how formulaic Astarion would say. I really like SA's acting, it's very subtle to convey his feeling of being depressed, broken, you can see the way he adjusts to Tav. When I played with SA it felt just on an empathic level, it was my most depressing time playing BG3. I just want to play BG3 with Lord Astarion and kiss him, not the rotten herring of sadism they put in his pocket in the name of the "abjuse cycle".

Originally Posted by jinetemoranco
And again, I repeat that we need to stop feeling like the game is personally trying to victimise us for telling its story.

To stop feeling is the same as to stop being yourself. I can't stop feeling, and I don't want that for my favorite character, and that's why I help him ascended. Telling someone to stop feeling won't make them stop feeling. And yes, this sadism seems to include trying to "fix" players who aren't going to "fix" Astarion.

Originally Posted by jinetemoranco
3. Assuming you don't care about the devnotes

I have, I read, I read the whole thread, unfortunately I just can't have time to reply or comment on everything, so I'm only commenting on a few things. I have a pretty heavy work load right now, I may not be able to keep up with the forum, I apologize in advance to anyone I won't be able to reply to.

Originally Posted by jinetemoranco
One of my controversial takes that I don't see brought up often is that the epilogue line where a Tav that doesn't want to be with Ascended Astarion complains about freedom, he specifies that he gives them "pleasure", which, considering that this Tav doesn't want to be there, might be implying sexual abuse. This isn't necessarily what the writers intended though and might just be my reading of the line, but I don't think it's a too out-there reading.
I will say I already saw the crux of Astarion's arc back when I played Early Access, and correctly predicted his evil ending would be him becoming a Vampire Lord (didn't predict Ascension) and turning romanced Tav into a spawn that he would degrade.

What about Tav, who loves Astarion and would never want to leave him? Does that have to involve sexual abuse too? Why? My Tav loves Astarion and all of Astarion's lines and behavior fit perfectly and logically with the roleplay and plot. Except for that sadistic content. If those kisses were only for those Tavs who want to leave, there might be some logic to it (but still no justification for sadistic content in a classic RPG) but they are for all Tavs.

I think Larian should fix those kisses at least for their own sake. What one person saw, ten people will see tomorrow, and after a while Steam will simply change the game's rating and move it from the category of classic RPGs to the category of SV (sadism and violence) games.