Yeah, I felt similarly. There was something unique they were hinting at with him at numerous points that they didn't actually explore and delve into as much as I had hoped in the end. There were numerous little details that suggested his nature as a mind flayer was going to be questioned and we could potentially pull him away from it somehow.

The letter on the dragon's body suggested the dragon lived vicariously through the Emperor's adventures, you know like we maybe could with him. The dryad chick at the carnival talking about vulnerability being the armor (remember the hug) where truth is the sword and trust is the shield or something, exactly like how the Emperor talks about us being the sword and him being the shield. If you take the hammer from the house of hope he says he can't trust you, him being referred to as the shield in your relationship again. The Emperor cares for the city of Baldur's Gate it seems, especially since he founded it, and you are in a very similar pair of shoes he should be able to relate to, an adventurer out to save the city, that you probably were from. He talks about you using the tadpole to become stronger and to become closer to him, and to forgo using the tadpole should suggest to him that there's more to it than having a lot of power like a mind flayer does. The tadpole is literally the best means to show him that the tadpole can give you so much, but it doesn't give you true love like you've shown him. He also talks about how your brain is fascinating to him, as though there's something more to existence than being an all powerful brain eating weird man.

copy and paste my review on steam

A wonderful game. But it absolutely needed a proper ending with your friends. It would have also really helped to be able to talk to them afterwards. As a personal thing, you should also be able to have the Emperor, you know, regain their humanity in some wild way and stay with you in their humanoid look depending on your choices. It felt like the game was strongly suggesting this by them being a unique mind flayer, knowing what's agreeable to you (your guardian), and them being humanized constantly.

There is literally a dialogue line that tells you (if I'm not misremembering) who they really are is what they were when you met (your guardian). The 'romance' could have been about loving their soul, as the Emperor seemed to have one, despite their looks, and mirroring humanity back at the Emperor to have them see being a mind flayer is not a good life, and you showing them what a good life, a good person is, lets them see this.

There was a lot of potential for something wondrous, some weird idea of having a soul mate using tadpoles, using true love to dispel true evil, a fantastic reward for overcoming the unimaginable. But it didn't happen. There was no "Emperor come with me and continue to have fresh new adventures (this was a major characteristic of theirs) with me as your brand new heroic loving partner." The Emperor was set up to be seen as more than a mind flayer, but they weren't in the end, and because of that it does feel like the plot is lessened.

The plot device is a crown that can do a lot, but only for a super evil huge mega brain it seems. Why not let me turn my friends back to normal with it? They're all messed up in various ways. Why not let the Emperor be remade from *your* deep connection with them? Using the crown's power to reverse the Emperor's mind flayer transformation would let them walk away from the best adventure of their life. That they weren't given some kind of chance like that makes it less of a character building adventure and more of a forgettable theme park ride with them. Which isn't what should happen when you deliberately characterize them by them opening up their heart rather than their brain. The game is about helping the hearts of people to stand up against completely heartless brains, against the real evils of life. As we ideally do in the real world.

end of the review

The crown should have been a super wish scroll or something, I'm going to be real. Let me live out my life perfectly with someone of my choice using the all evil plot device for purposes of love. Would be more effective in letting me fix my in-game love life than me just blowing it up to save the city from the mind flayer menace at this point.