One other impression I got replaying Act 3 was that there was an air of inevitability about Ciri becoming Empress. I paid close attention to what characters say about her becoming Empress after reloading earlier and not taking Ciri to see the Emperor.
- There's a dialogue on the boat that plays out between Yen and Ciri where Yen suggests that she should see Emhyr and that it wasn't too late yet.
- Again Yen's the one to tell Ciri that the Emperor plans to give her Skellige as you all sail there for Final Preparations.
- Philippa also says it is inevitable that Ciri becomes Empress. Sure, she says a lot of things, but this was after all attempts to resist Emhyr were made.
There's a big effort made to push that idea without the game allow you and/or Ciri to reasonably resist those sentiments. It's like if you choose to no take Ciri to the Emperor, you're both just in denial. So the game itself pushes a certain agenda I feel.
I totally agree, and I remember we were discussing this point some time ago. You get all of these hints that the ending seems predestined and yet on the other hand you see Ciri almost making it seem like her own desires are pulling her in a different direction. I guess we could interpret this in terms of an overarching motif of 'people that want/expect Ciri to do something they, projecting, can't imagine she would do otherwise' versus 'what Ciri actually wants to do if the decision is left up to her'. This conflict could have been further elucidated simply by having instances where people mention what Ciri would do and then have her interject a bit more (assuming she's there) or there could have been a scenario where you talk to her and she mentions how all of these people have their own designs for her but she really wants to do X, which would fit better with the overall feeling of the two "good" endings. On the one hand, she accepts the outcome as a matter of duty and on the other she accepts it as a matter of choice and/or personal freedom. The game itself could have also taken certain choices made during dialogue options or decisions made that would influence the overall feeling of where Ciri's fate lies...of course "time and resources" comes into play here, it might simply have been difficult to do this from a game design standpoint to account for all those variables and to have them actually change dialogue, voice acting, and other potential outcomes in the game.
This should have happened when you talk to Ciri about whether you want to go see the Emperor or not. Really, it's a critical moment and one where both characters should've put all their cards on the table. I just recently replayed that scene where I suggested she shouldn't go and see him and the response was a very quick "yeah I don't want to be part of anyone else's plan, let's not go.". That felt very much like denial of the situation yet again.
Yep. I feel there were several instances in the game with a lot of the characters that warranted more. This is definitely one of the more important ones. Other instances could have been, as you have mentioned recently, more of a family dynamic, and, in general, more 'pivotal' conversations with other characters that would have better defined them, their wishes or feelings, or provided depth to what is otherwise a more shallow, topical examination of their character. Examples of this would be Avallac'h's lab where more notes/books/journals could have been planted to provide more depth on his motives, hinted at the White Frost, provided more exposition on Eredin. Also, on the 'Through Time and Space', there could have been more dialogue between him and Geralt given that Geralt was already skeptical of him. The conversation with Ge'els was a missed opportunity to go into more depth on Eredin or the Aen Elle as a whole, "humanizing" them a bit more, for lack of a better term. There are other instances that just needed a 'little more' there that would have really filled in some gaps...
So based on my impressions I would say if Nilfgaard won the war (which seems canonical), Emhyr will reach out to her eventually. "All roads lead to Rome..."
I too got this impression. Assuming Nilgaard wins the war and Emhyr is still alive, he could just as easily allow Ciri to go do her thing before calling upon her again. His "I don't want to see you ever again" to Geralt could just as easily have been seen as the Emhyr not wanting Geralt/Yen to interfere should he wish to reach out to her again in the future to achieve his ambitions. Your example of comparing him to Tywin is the best comparison I've seen to date in terms of characterization.
