I agree, the only thing that is relevant to this topic is to see how the sex is addressed in the romances with much more caution than the one used about assassinating innocent people.
OP here. Ironically, it's the actual romances that strike me as out of place in such a story, not sex. That some sort of story-sex exists in the game is not a problem. It's the whole idea of deep relationships in a story that spans the timeframe of a month or two that is mostly fighting and running for your life.
The question of how long it takes the protagonist to go from Candlekeep’s gates to the end of the saga is an interesting one to me. I always feel that it takes at least a year, probably more.
Surely my mage could not have gained so much knowledge and skill with her magic in a month or two.
I agree, the only thing that is relevant to this topic is to see how the sex is addressed in the romances with much more caution than the one used about assassinating innocent people.
OP here. Ironically, it's the actual romances that strike me as out of place in such a story, not sex. That some sort of story-sex exists in the game is not a problem. It's the whole idea of deep relationships in a story that spans the timeframe of a month or two that is mostly fighting and running for your life.
I'm of the opinion that such dire circumstances can actually help bring people closer together, short time-span or not.
You and your teammates literally go to hell and back together. You experience life and death in such rapid succession, the only way to cope is to bond closer to your friends and love-interest. Love doesn't have a required time to foster and grow; it's different for everyone. Sometimes fast, sometimes slow. A month or two can feel incredibly short or long depending on the person, even more so in extraordinary circumstances.
And you don't just spend every waking moment running and fighting; you have to eat, sleep, shop, stop and smell the roses once in a while--if only to catch a breather. Bonding happens in those moments. Even if we, the player, don't always see it, we know it has to happen in the realm of the story because that's how people in real life interact too.
Plus, with the threat of death constantly hovering over you, knowing that each breath you take might be your last, I doubt you'd want to squander what little time you have with someone just because it hasn't been "long enough". Time is irrelevant as far as Death's concerned.
Then there's Siege of Dragonspear which covers an even shorter amount of time and a game in which nearly every man and woman you meet wants to sleep with you within literally hours or days of meeting you. It's actually unnerving and creepy.
Stop being a pussy. People don't need "hours", "days" or any "romance" at all to want to fuck with each others. Specially adventurers.
People don't need "hours", "days" or any "romance" at all to want to fuck with each others. Specially adventurers.
That is a truth, both in RL and in a fiction context. I gave before a reason for it, reproduction instinct, that is a specie's agenda, a Life's agenda, more than an agenda of each single person. I pointed out also the reason why in peril situations that instinct often get stronger. But often in our specie, not in all the mammals, this instinct is also deeply related with the reasons why we fall in love with someone, with romance. As not always sex is followed by romance, but are very rare the cases when romance is not followed by sex, or at least to the desire of having sex with the person that you have a romance with. The desire of hugging, kissing and caressing a person that you have fall in love with is very natural in us. But sometimes we just want to have sex, with no romance complications. And all this is a specie agenda, that we misunderstood as being a personal agenda. The fact that we can not decide to have or have not sexual desire, or that we can not decide if and with who we fall in love, show how both sex and romance are specie's inducted, imposed to us for a goal, reproduction, specie continuity and survival. And this doesn't mean that sex and romance are not also important for the single person (specie member).
If people would be more aware of this they would also understand themselves better, is amazing how very few people is aware of somehow being puppets in the hands of the specie, under the influence of a specie agenda. But we listen often things like "I was fool, I did that thing only because I did fall in love, other way I would never have done such thing". Being aware of that helps to deal better with sex and romance, as they can have, and they have, also a value for the single person, and being able to discriminate between specie's goals and individual's goals, help us to have more knowledge on our own life. Knowledge is power. Knowledge is often a pre requisite for freedom.
More in topic 2 different approaches can be used dealing with romance in a RPG. The more serious one that Tolkien used in LOTR, where only some romances happen, pre existing ones or beginning in the novel. Or the more easy and common approach used in the majority of movies and books, where the protagonist have both adventure and sex/romance. Easier approach because people want both adventure and sex/romance, or at least want to emotionally live them in a fiction, in RL most of the people would be frightened to live the adventure that they enjoy to live identifying themselves with the protagonist. That is what most of the people want, so is what most of the writers of books and movie plots give. And is also what the original developers chose for those games, thing that at the time was really innovative for a CRPG, even if is an easy recipe to have people happy when dealing with movies and fiction books.
I think romances are fun if they're well-written, used in moderation and not shoehorned into the plot for the sake of it.
I like the way they are handled in the original Baldur's Gate II and Throne of Bhaal, because together the games seem to take place over a long period of time, so developing feelings for companions makes sense. Also there's the danger element of the adventure bringing people closer together and, in the case of Jaheira, she's been with you from the very beginning and you guys grieve together for a loved one and companion.
I say the original BGII because there are only a handful of companions with whom you can form romances. I'm not so keen on the way the enhanced edition and SoD make most of their characters romance-able. You get hit on so much by man, woman and gnome alike, almost as if the PC has the Lynx effect (maybe it's that divine essence, it acts like a pheromone or something)!!! Realistically, not everyone's going to fancy the PC, and SoD was just too short for the romances to feel believable. I just feel like it's a bit overkill.
Rasaad was utter snoozeville (in my opinion, no offence to Rasaad fans), but it was nice to have a male to romance that wasn't Anomen. I only wish they had used Valygar instead... Well... hrrrrrrrm... hellooooo there...
In the Enhanced Edition's defence, my absolute favourite romance would have to be Dorn's same-sex romance. It takes forever but it is so very worth it. Passionate, deep, obsessive, destructive, bloody, unhealthy and humorous... what's not to love?! ("I would take you where you stand." "Er... we are literally in the middle of a battle. No.")
In the Enhanced Edition's defence, my absolute favourite romance would have to be Dorn's same-sex romance. It takes forever but it is so very worth it. Passionate, deep, obsessive, destructive, bloody, unhealthy and humorous... what's not to love?! ("I would take you where you stand." "Er... we are literally in the middle of a battle. No.")
Is it not just as passionate, deep, obsessive, etc. if you romance him as a woman...?
The question of how long it takes the protagonist to go from Candlekeep’s gates to the end of the saga is an interesting one to me. I always feel that it takes at least a year, probably more.
Surely my mage could not have gained so much knowledge and skill with her magic in a month or two.
surely there would be lot more casters stopping time, calling angels and gating demons if the PC could learn it in only a year. that, or the average time to reach maturity and then die of old age is a lot less than 70-80 years.
In the Enhanced Edition's defence, my absolute favourite romance would have to be Dorn's same-sex romance. It takes forever but it is so very worth it. Passionate, deep, obsessive, destructive, bloody, unhealthy and humorous... what's not to love?! ("I would take you where you stand." "Er... we are literally in the middle of a battle. No.")
Is it not just as passionate, deep, obsessive, etc. if you romance him as a woman...?
That's a totally logical question, and my answer is probably, but I've never romanced him as a female so I don't know if his dialogues are the same as with a male. Are they, out of curiosity?
Imo it would be weird if is not so. To add diversity can be good (and I don't want to start here a debate on things that have been so controversial) , to create opposite discrimination to counter a supposed existing one seems to me silly.
Comments
Surely my mage could not have gained so much knowledge and skill with her magic in a month or two.
You and your teammates literally go to hell and back together. You experience life and death in such rapid succession, the only way to cope is to bond closer to your friends and love-interest. Love doesn't have a required time to foster and grow; it's different for everyone. Sometimes fast, sometimes slow. A month or two can feel incredibly short or long depending on the person, even more so in extraordinary circumstances.
And you don't just spend every waking moment running and fighting; you have to eat, sleep, shop, stop and smell the roses once in a while--if only to catch a breather. Bonding happens in those moments. Even if we, the player, don't always see it, we know it has to happen in the realm of the story because that's how people in real life interact too.
Plus, with the threat of death constantly hovering over you, knowing that each breath you take might be your last, I doubt you'd want to squander what little time you have with someone just because it hasn't been "long enough". Time is irrelevant as far as Death's concerned.
That is a truth, both in RL and in a fiction context.
I gave before a reason for it, reproduction instinct, that is a specie's agenda, a Life's agenda, more than an agenda of each single person. I pointed out also the reason why in peril situations that instinct often get stronger. But often in our specie, not in all the mammals, this instinct is also deeply related with the reasons why we fall in love with someone, with romance.
As not always sex is followed by romance, but are very rare the cases when romance is not followed by sex, or at least to the desire of having sex with the person that you have a romance with. The desire of hugging, kissing and caressing a person that you have fall in love with is very natural in us. But sometimes we just want to have sex, with no romance complications.
And all this is a specie agenda, that we misunderstood as being a personal agenda.
The fact that we can not decide to have or have not sexual desire, or that we can not decide if and with who we fall in love, show how both sex and romance are specie's inducted, imposed to us for a goal, reproduction, specie continuity and survival.
And this doesn't mean that sex and romance are not also important for the single person (specie member).
If people would be more aware of this they would also understand themselves better, is amazing how very few people is aware of somehow being puppets in the hands of the specie, under the influence of a specie agenda. But we listen often things like "I was fool, I did that thing only because I did fall in love, other way I would never have done such thing".
Being aware of that helps to deal better with sex and romance, as they can have, and they have, also a value for the single person, and being able to discriminate between specie's goals and individual's goals, help us to have more knowledge on our own life. Knowledge is power. Knowledge is often a pre requisite for freedom.
More in topic 2 different approaches can be used dealing with romance in a RPG.
The more serious one that Tolkien used in LOTR, where only some romances happen, pre existing ones or beginning in the novel.
Or the more easy and common approach used in the majority of movies and books, where the protagonist have both adventure and sex/romance. Easier approach because people want both adventure and sex/romance, or at least want to emotionally live them in a fiction, in RL most of the people would be frightened to live the adventure that they enjoy to live identifying themselves with the protagonist.
That is what most of the people want, so is what most of the writers of books and movie plots give.
And is also what the original developers chose for those games, thing that at the time was really innovative for a CRPG, even if is an easy recipe to have people happy when dealing with movies and fiction books.
I like the way they are handled in the original Baldur's Gate II and Throne of Bhaal, because together the games seem to take place over a long period of time, so developing feelings for companions makes sense. Also there's the danger element of the adventure bringing people closer together and, in the case of Jaheira, she's been with you from the very beginning and you guys grieve together for a loved one and companion.
I say the original BGII because there are only a handful of companions with whom you can form romances. I'm not so keen on the way the enhanced edition and SoD make most of their characters romance-able. You get hit on so much by man, woman and gnome alike, almost as if the PC has the Lynx effect (maybe it's that divine essence, it acts like a pheromone or something)!!! Realistically, not everyone's going to fancy the PC, and SoD was just too short for the romances to feel believable. I just feel like it's a bit overkill.
Rasaad was utter snoozeville (in my opinion, no offence to Rasaad fans), but it was nice to have a male to romance that wasn't Anomen. I only wish they had used Valygar instead...
In the Enhanced Edition's defence, my absolute favourite romance would have to be Dorn's same-sex romance. It takes forever but it is so very worth it. Passionate, deep, obsessive, destructive, bloody, unhealthy and humorous... what's not to love?! ("I would take you where you stand." "Er... we are literally in the middle of a battle. No.")