This Year’s Most Compelling (And Troubled) Video Game Character Helped Me Face My Own Anxiety
Lessons from a necromancer who fears death.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard is a lot of things — a long-awaited sequel that can’t live up to expectations, a tight action RPG with superb combat, and a fittingly complex ending to one of gaming’s most fascinating characters. Nearly two months after release there are parts of Veilguard I love, and ones I wish were better. But what I didn’t expect, was that it would be the single game that resonated with me most on a deeply personal level — entirely because of a single character.
Emmrich Volkarin is one of Veilguard’s main party members, a posh and sarcastic necromancer with a flair for the dramatic. On a surface level he’s one of the most compelling characters in Veilguard, but the more you dig into his personal quest the more you reveal deeply human layers — layers that astonishingly echoed my struggles with anxiety.
Warning: This piece will discuss spoilers for Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
My Struggle
Roughly seven years ago my older brother passed away suddenly, and needless to say I didn’t process it for a long, long time. It’s going to stick with me my entire life, but I didn’t seek the help I needed in the immediate sense — and I regret that wholeheartedly. After years of pushing off dealing with the emotional toll, it all came to a head when I developed an innocuous health issue midway through 2023.
Emmrich is one of the last party members you recruit, and a powerful necromancer.
Things spiraled out of my control instantly, and I developed a severe case of what’s called hypochondriasis, or “health anxiety” — when you agonize over every little thing with your health, thinking every little twinge or thing you feel might be the worst possible scenario. For the first time in my life, I had to really, truly grapple with the idea of mortality, what I’d achieved in my life, and the responsibility I felt to live a full life — the one my brother couldn’t.
I spent months at doctors, hospitals, and therapists, getting every test you can imagine and wracking up debt after debt because of it. It’s been a long process, but with help I’ve finally started to push forward — and that’s when I played The Veilguard.
Philosophy Of A Necromancer
As a necromancer, Emmrich quite literally deals in the currency of life, but he has a surprisingly flippant way of approaching it. Because of the beliefs of Nevarra, life and passing are integral parts of the country’s religion and spirituality, and Necromancers are there to ensure that spirits are given the dues they deserve and a place to exist peacefully.
The idea of leaving a legacy in your wake is represented through Emmrich’s surprisingly adorable skeletal companion, Manfred.
Emmrich’s abundant charm and humor instantly make him one of the most likable characters in Veilguard, whether he’s insisting on the importance of a relic called the “Hand of Glory” or detailing the allowance he gives his skeleton assistant Manfred. There’s so much personality injected into every piece of Emmrich’s story, but he also has the game’s most compelling personal quest.
Like Emmrich, I needed to confront the eventuality that all things end, and I need to focus on the here and now.
Decades ago Emmrich found an inquisitive spirit and housed it in a skeleton, turning it into his assistant Manfred. For years he’s seen Manfred’s curiosity and personality grow, and Emmrich knows there’s potential for his protege to turn into an entirely new being, one that could surpass even himself. Ironically, despite playing with life every day through magic, Emmrich also has a crippling fear of his own mortality.
The more you get to know the character, the more you learn he fears not just his own demise — but the passing of everyone he loves. He desperately doesn’t want life to slip away in any form, but his increasingly old age makes it harder and harder to avoid this.
These questions about mortality are directly interrogated in Emmrich’s personal quests, and seeing him grapple with these questions felt inherently similar to all of the anxiety I’ve experienced over the last two years. Yes, I’m only 33, but the problem with anxiety is that you don’t think rationally — every little health issue made me think it could be the end, and like Emmrich, I needed to confront the eventuality that all things end, and I need to focus on the here and now.
No matter which way you choose, Emmrich’s personal quest plays into his personality and the larger themes of his story.
There’s a beautiful wrinkle that comes up when you reach the big decision of Emmrich’s quest. Like every companion you have to make a major choice for Emmrich, in this case encouraging him to live as a Lich and become immortal but lose Manfred, or embrace his mortality and give Manfred a new lease on life. While these two choices can drastically change Emmrich, they both vitally feel intrinsic to his character, with neither betraying who he truly is. No matter what you choose Emmrich has to lose something, either his protege and friends or his own life, eventually. There are no easy answers.
No matter what you choose Emmrich has to lose something ... There are no easy answers.
Realizing that both choices appealed to Emmrich’s sense of self drove home that idea of accepting my own anxiety, realizing that it’s some kind of ethereal sensation not rooted in reality. The pain of loss never goes away, not really, but there are ways to find meaning through it. I’ll never get my brother back, but in a way, it’s helped shape who I am today — and the determination I feel to truly live life and find meaning through relationships.
When you get trapped in life, it's easy to forget such lessons. But occasionally a story like Veilguard, and a character like Emmrich, can be all you need to center yourself again. That, and a whole lot of personal work and exploration. That, after all, is life.
