A friend of mine "edits writing," she's a severe dyslexic - I do find it a bit silly when people start quoting their hobbies and occupations as some kind of weight to their posts. Anyway I'm not trying to argue with anyone what I really wanted to say was that @ImBarryScott has an awesome name, and now for the penny test.
Since the thread is going off topic anyway... I'd prefer it if there were some romance restrictions - not as narrow as they were in BG2, but still there. I'd prefer if the romanceable NPCs were either straight or gay, (maybe one of them could be bi) - let's not duplicate DA2 mistakes, shall we? Why do I prefer the above? Because it makes the game more interesting. It makes me want to play it multiple times, with many different PCs, different parties and different approach to encountered problems. It ensures that every playthrough is different, and I don't grow bored. It makes the NPCs feel like people, rather than puppets. The argument that 'everyone should have access to the content' is unconvincing for me. Remember the strongholds in BG2? You could only have one at a time. If you were a warrior you couldn't manage the thieves' guild. If you were a ranger, you could only be a protector of Umar Hills. And this was great. So was the fact that some quests were only available if you had a appropriate reputation and/or alignment. It made me feel that it mattered what and who I were - as opposed to DA2, where I did everything there was to do in one and a half playthrough and lost motivation and interest in the game.
If - IF - there are NPCs who go for both genders, I'd like the romances to be vastly different depending on my PCs gender, rather than give us the exact same dialogs with pronounces switched; I want it to be acknowledged that I'm a guy/a gal, and it is or isn't conventional for us to hook up. I'd be okay (hell, I'd be delighted!) if one of NPCs had an option of conventional romance with female PC, and an option of a romance with a male PC that would largely (at least at the start) revolved over the issue of 'damn, I'm straight, but I could totally go gay for you.' If this wouldn't make PC feel special, I don't know what would. (I once roleplayed such situation in reverse - my PC was a ladies man until he met Nathaniel. Heaps of fun were had).
There. That's my off topic tangent. To go back to topic - yes, I'd rather like to know which of my PCs should recruit which new NPC to enable the romance. But if I don't get that info... well, I guess I'll just have to play the game over and over to find out, won't I?
@Brude I see your point, but they still look like principally similar things to me. If I want a reputation of 20 it gets troublesome for me if I also want guys like Edwin (and supposedly Dorn) in my party. There are ways around it, but the main message seems to be that all content isn't completely compatible with all preferences/playstyles.
Fair enough -- but to me, they look vastly different.
Race locks me into a decision I make at character creation.
Rep is more fluid, as is how I reform my party. I can reverse those decisions in game, but I can't do anything about missing out on romance dialogues.
That is my one and only beef with it. Players are forced, often in ignorance, to trade multi class and racial bonuses for extra dialogue and they're stuck with that choice for the entire playthrough.
I don't know what Bioware was thinking. People on this board are super fans, but did they really expect average players to run through the game three times as a male human/half elf just to see all this content? If they didn't expect that, then why did they include four different options? And why make them inaccessible to the majority of race/class combos?
I must be the only person who doesn't really give a single crap about romanceable options. Trying to woo my party members is not why I play. I'm here to kick arse.
What were they thinking? I'd hazard a guess that they saw it as optional content and nothing more. They didn't expect people to want dating simulators. You have to remember that when these games were made romance options weren't this big central feature that they are now.
I mean, look at the Bioware forums, there are romance threads left, right and centre. They even have their on subsections! I don't think anyone foresaw their popularity back then.
And in regards to not making them available to every race and gender? I will echo Syntia13's post on the matter. And think back to how games of that era were designed. I mean, look at Daggerfall and Morrowind as opposed to Oblivion and Skyrim for example. Nowadays rpgs seem like they don't want people to try different builds, paths and characters, but to get all of the games content in one single playthrough.
I can't find the post in that massive Bioware forum archive, but one of the developers, forget if it was David Gaider or Mark Darrah, wrote about the unreasonably big focus on romance options among players. It went something like:
"Sometimes it seems like players think the goal of the game is to romance anyone. Or everyone."
But then I am an anomaly in that romances have never really been the deal maker or breaker it seems to be for some people.
More on topic, I really fail to see how it is imperative that we get to know before hand wether or not a gnome can romance Dorn. And if it is, then I demand to know in detail what loot we'll find in the new dungeons. I'm sorry, but if your prime focus when choosing what race to play is wether or not s/he can romance someone, then you might aswell just play a pure dating simulator instead of Baldur's Gate.
Brother, I edit writing for a living. I'm doing it right now in another tab. Do not presume to correct me. There is more than one definition to the word. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/need
I'm a smart arse in my spare time. There is more than one definition of the word.
Well if ImBarryScott hadn't used Google to define words, there might have been no need for PugPug to point on an actual dictionary.
Comments
I'd prefer it if there were some romance restrictions - not as narrow as they were in BG2, but still there.
I'd prefer if the romanceable NPCs were either straight or gay, (maybe one of them could be bi) - let's not duplicate DA2 mistakes, shall we?
Why do I prefer the above? Because it makes the game more interesting. It makes me want to play it multiple times, with many different PCs, different parties and different approach to encountered problems.
It ensures that every playthrough is different, and I don't grow bored. It makes the NPCs feel like people, rather than puppets.
The argument that 'everyone should have access to the content' is unconvincing for me. Remember the strongholds in BG2? You could only have one at a time. If you were a warrior you couldn't manage the thieves' guild. If you were a ranger, you could only be a protector of Umar Hills. And this was great. So was the fact that some quests were only available if you had a appropriate reputation and/or alignment.
It made me feel that it mattered what and who I were - as opposed to DA2, where I did everything there was to do in one and a half playthrough and lost motivation and interest in the game.
If - IF - there are NPCs who go for both genders, I'd like the romances to be vastly different depending on my PCs gender, rather than give us the exact same dialogs with pronounces switched; I want it to be acknowledged that I'm a guy/a gal, and it is or isn't conventional for us to hook up. I'd be okay (hell, I'd be delighted!) if one of NPCs had an option of conventional romance with female PC, and an option of a romance with a male PC that would largely (at least at the start) revolved over the issue of 'damn, I'm straight, but I could totally go gay for you.' If this wouldn't make PC feel special, I don't know what would.
(I once roleplayed such situation in reverse - my PC was a ladies man until he met Nathaniel. Heaps of fun were had).
There. That's my off topic tangent.
To go back to topic - yes, I'd rather like to know which of my PCs should recruit which new NPC to enable the romance. But if I don't get that info... well, I guess I'll just have to play the game over and over to find out, won't I?
Race locks me into a decision I make at character creation.
Rep is more fluid, as is how I reform my party. I can reverse those decisions in game, but I can't do anything about missing out on romance dialogues.
That is my one and only beef with it. Players are forced, often in ignorance, to trade multi class and racial bonuses for extra dialogue and they're stuck with that choice for the entire playthrough.
I don't know what Bioware was thinking. People on this board are super fans, but did they really expect average players to run through the game three times as a male human/half elf just to see all this content? If they didn't expect that, then why did they include four different options? And why make them inaccessible to the majority of race/class combos?
I mean, look at the Bioware forums, there are romance threads left, right and centre. They even have their on subsections! I don't think anyone foresaw their popularity back then.
And in regards to not making them available to every race and gender? I will echo Syntia13's post on the matter. And think back to how games of that era were designed. I mean, look at Daggerfall and Morrowind as opposed to Oblivion and Skyrim for example. Nowadays rpgs seem like they don't want people to try different builds, paths and characters, but to get all of the games content in one single playthrough.
I can't find the post in that massive Bioware forum archive, but one of the developers, forget if it was David Gaider or Mark Darrah, wrote about the unreasonably big focus on romance options among players. It went something like:
"Sometimes it seems like players think the goal of the game is to romance anyone. Or everyone."
But then I am an anomaly in that romances have never really been the deal maker or breaker it seems to be for some people.
More on topic, I really fail to see how it is imperative that we get to know before hand wether or not a gnome can romance Dorn. And if it is, then I demand to know in detail what loot we'll find in the new dungeons. I'm sorry, but if your prime focus when choosing what race to play is wether or not s/he can romance someone, then you might aswell just play a pure dating simulator instead of Baldur's Gate.