Bosom Buddies
When looking forward to The Old Republic, I have a much more positive attitude toward companion characters than some I’ve encountered. I’ve heard the first strike complaints: We won’t have unique companions, it’ll take away from group questing, we’re forced to use them, etc. Valid depending on your point of view and pending seeing it in action, of course, but I can’t help but be intrigued.
Companions have always been a huge part of the BioWare storytelling experience, and I’m glad the company is making sure this continues in TOR. As IGN wrote:
“While traveling the galaxy, your Companion Characters will provide commentary, information on plots and directions to points of interest– all from their own unique perspectives. Companion Characters may act as your conscience, and try to influence your decisions. In turn, you will influence them, and change how they develop as the story progresses. Based on your choices, some Companions will become your closest friends, others may become your lovers, and a few may even become your enemies!”
This is nothing new if you’ve played a BioWare game — ever since Baldur’s Gate II, I’ve adored having companions for exactly these qualities. It’s one thing to explore the world on your own, but another to have part of the world travel with you, giving you alternative perspectives and pulling you to do both good and bad acts. Having a companion flip out because you killed an innocent or develop a romance with you are just two ways that they serve the purpose of helping you form a connection to the game itself.
And what I’ve always found odd is that somewhere along the line, MMORPGs gave in to pressure to devalue the NPCs in favor of the players, sort of assuming that the players would pick up the weight of cooperative storytelling. As a result, while single-player RPGs have incredibly strong and memorable NPCs, well, how many MMO NPCs do you recall with the same fondness? Personally, I can’t get that count up to five; MMO NPCs are so non-memorable that they usually might as well just be cardboard placeholders.
Sure, I hope that BioWare doesn’t make it so comfortable to solo play that we never have any incentive or reason to group, and I’d always want fellow players to be much more desirable than companions if there’s a choice between the two. But I’m quite excited to encounter eight classes’ worth of companions, especially if they’re up to the standards that BioWare has in its other games.
- Posted in: Star Wars: The Old Republic
I totally agree with you. I love the companions in Bioware games. My only complaint about them is when I have 10 to choose from but only get to use 2 or 3. I really wish we could have more characters in our active party and actually use the entire cast available to us.
I’m hoping that SWTOR will inject more story into the MMO market. Quests are getting annoying. I want epic journeys just like in my single player games.
I am in the same camp. I really look forward to TOR and there isn’t a lot that can dissuade me from it. Why? Because I’ve seen the quality of games that Bioware makes. I love my MMOs, but outside of UO, they don’t ever feel as full and vivid as single-player RPGs do. Even WoW, as much as I love it, gets pretty dreary after a while and the world has never exactly been dynamic or engaging.
If TOR can get a great SPRPG feel into an MMO, I am there. I don’t see what all the fuss is about. There isn’t anything in today’s most popular MMOs that isn’t shared with people either. I don’t see the big deal.
The problem I have with companions is that they are tied to non-story mechanics, and it’s hard to enjoy a story when you also need to weight your choices via the mechanical aspects of character progression.
You are thinking in one sense “My character is a disinterested Jedi Knight, and acts to others in that way.” But you are also thinking, maybe not consciously, that “I need to be good to get enough light side points to get a miniquest, or purchase T3 Jedi healing.”
That gamification makes companions limited for me.I think I’d love them if they had no impact on gameplay whatsoever, because then you could let your personality out with no worries about gimping yourself.
I can’t wait to see how they help with crafting and add to the game experience. I love them in Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age Origins. I think people are just afraid they will be a glorified hunters pet or mindless zombie following you around until you hit the “brains” button. I think they will add to the feeling of a world alive.
“others may become your lovers”
Noooo! What will Miho, my Japanese body pillow & wife think??
I admire Bioware games greatly. It took me a while to realise that, unlike most, I did’t actually enjoy playing them very much.
Their highly plot driven nature is something that I really don’t get on with, and acquiring and interacting with the party of NPC companions is tightly tied into that. I don’t actually want to be the leading character in a movie, making lots of moral choices.
It turns out I just want to slob about exploring a big intricate world with intricate backstory embedded in every part of it ready to be investigated, whilst engaging in ludicrous amounts of slayage, doing random things for random NPC people, as I develop my one character through lots of fiddly options, all of at my own pace.
And yes, my favourite quality of life feature is the ability to turn of XP gain. I’m weird.
But all that says is that I’m not one of TOR’s target audience, and therefore absolutely the worst person to ask as to whether Bioware’s sort of thing — at which they are very good — can work in a MMORPG for people who are
I enjoyed Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 but really those are the only BioWare games I liked. And in retrospect I think it’s because at the time I didn’t have a real point of comparison. Even then I wasn’t really that interested in the companions. It was my character I was really involved with; the storylines of the others were of secondary interest.
Once I became accustomed to having complete control of my character in MMOs, the directed storytelling of BioWare’s games began to seem extremely restrictive, even claustrophobic. Shifting that mechanic into an MMO just seems plain weird to me.
I’m glad I have next to no interest in or affection for Star Wars. It makes it very easy to skip SW:toR altogether. If they’d gone for a fantasy setting for their MMO I’d almost certainly have tried it and regretted it.
I gotta say Scotty in Rift (Guardian side) is pretty darn memorable as far as modern NPC’s go. Just walking through the scholar’s camp and hearing about everyone picking on him, then walking through his quests, was quite enjoyable. Then, we get a note in the mail from him awkwardly stating his thanks and that we may be meeting up again… Its fun and it adds to immersion that, to me, is sorely missing.
So true, Scotty in Rift is awsome. Also later when you stand beside him he actually thanks you for the help even if it´s 10 lvl ago you helped him. He is very fun and the quest line is so funny.
Oh definitely, Scotty is a GREAT example of a memorable NPC, and the fact that he sent me a letter in the mail thanking me afterward made it that much better.
I laughed when I found Scotty’s broken pocket watch in Scarwood. The dude’s been everywhere!
…and he’s been gambling. What’s this guy up to anyway? And what are the admission standards for the college?