Kingmaker - Companion Romances

I actually fail to see what ugly looking woman has got to do with SJW. If you mean to say they made them ugly on purpose, I think that would be a bad business decision? Maybe less stereotype could be regarded as SJW, but that's no reason to make them unattractive.

Now that you mention it, when did they look good? If you don't account for portraits like in the Infinity games, I don't remember them ever looking especially attractive to me? Maybe the problem is that new games leave too little to the imagination.

EDIT: Morrigan in DA:O was pretty hot though…I suppose there are other examples if you go outside RPG territory?

Female characters in past games are criticised for sexualizion, "male gaze", objectification etc by SJW. If the female NPC is straight male romanceable, the chance for this criticisms is now gone up so to avoid this, some developers have gone out of they way to make them look ugly. This is an off the cuff theory of mine and may be I am wrong about this but I think it has merit if you take the views of developers into account.

Attractiveness is a subjective thing and we evaluate it based on the tech available to the game. So take DAI, they had plenty of attractive looking female models (Morrigna, Vivienne, Leliana etc) in the game yet the female you can romance looks "ugly" compared to them. This could all be in my head however, lot of other people have similar opinion on this...
 
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Don't care either but if you want samples of what not to do just look at BioWare.

mass-effect-andromeda-ugly-females.jpg

Or go play Dragon Age 2 again.

ehe4m0l4isny.png



Anyway the romance in this game is similar to Baldur's Gate 2.
 
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Well yeah, the characters in ME:A are pretty ugly. But aren't the males as well? I'm not saying there couldn't be an agenda, I'm just sceptical of it this case. On other stuff like the casting for the Witcher TV show I can agree, but I've just not experienced it as a problem in RPG's.
 
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Personally don't want sex scenes in my games at all. Won't boycott or launch a social media bitchfes... um... campaign against it. Just don't need or want it.

I DO appreciate well written companion scripts or a relationship factor that can be influenced by action or dialogue.

Detest relationship branches that are essentially late night bar pickup dialogues where 3 sentences in they announce their agenda, their sexual preference, and their willingness to sleep with you. *cough* Beamdog *cough* EA *cough*

Saying all that, I like attractive characters in my games. I don't want terribly hideous character models every time I look at my screen. I want to look at nice faces. Doesn't have to be some oversexed 15 year olds dream but nice overall.
 
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Maybe they can add a setting.
"If beautiful people offend you, or if you feel insecure about your mirror, or can't imagine why other people would prefer to see attractive models over plain, or if you have a social agenda for other reasons… click here"

Then all the models change to plain multi sexual gender inspecific romance options.

Just word the options less offensively of course. Make them feel like they are acknowledged, righteous, correct, and truly the setting should be default to further the progress of our species! Blah blah.
 
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Maybe they can add a setting.
"If beautiful people offend you, or if you feel insecure about your mirror, or can't imagine why other people would prefer to see attractive models over plain, or if you have a social agenda for other reasons… click here"

Then all the models change to plain multi sexual gender inspecific romance options.

Just word the options it less offensively of course. Make them feel like they are acknowledged, righteous, correct, and truly the setting should be default to further the progress of our species!

This is not far fetched as it sounds. People go out of their way to mod games to suit their preference in terms of looks so I don't see why can't dev supply multiple models for NPCs? You can select ugly, average, sexy looks for your NPCs :lol:
 
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Spontaneous thought : What, if NPCs - party group members - would romance among themselves ?
Key word : "Bantering".
 
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Spontaneous thought : What, if NPCs - party group members - would romance among themselves ?
Key word : "Bantering".

Yeah, I actually got that vibe from PoE2 when I recruited Xoti and got the impression Eder was flirting with her. Was kind of disappointed that wasn't the case.
 
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They actually can romance each other. Companions in PoE2 have dynamic relationships.

 
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They actually can romance each other. Companions in PoE2 have dynamic relationships.


Damn, that's awesome. I stand corrected. I'm not that far into the game but thought I just misunderstood the relations system at first when I thought they were flirting.
 
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There are 8 known dynamic relationships that progress throughout the game. They trigger based on companions reputation towards each other.

- Eder & Xoti romance
- Maia & Xoti romance
- Eder & Iselmyr romance
- Pallegina & Xoti rivalry
- Pallegina & Tekehu Friendship
- Aloth & Tekehu rivalry
- Maia & Tekehu mutual understanding
- Serafen & Xoti friendship
 
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Spontaneous thought : What, if NPCs - party group members - would romance among themselves ?
Key word : "Bantering".

In Kingmaker, Octavia and Regongar that can end up together (well get back together I guess).

DAI has a Dorian and Iron Bull romance (requires having both in the party for it to happen). DA2 had some stuff between Isabella and Fenris if you didn't romance either from what I remember…and in DAO, if you play Darkspawn Chronicle (DLC where the warden dies and you play as the Darkspawns), Alistair ended up with Leliana.

Silver Coin posted the Deadfire ones. Although, only Maia+Xoti really goes anywhere in term of romance.

It's not exactly a new feature either, way back in BG1 you had a married couple (Jaheria and Khalid), Coran can start a relationship with Safana and there is also the Skie/Eldoth stuff.
 
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How long is the main campaign of Kingmaker supposed to be? Are we talking Sword Coast Legends short 30 hours or what?
 
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Well at a glance this looks good.
Hope the writing will not disappoint.
 
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How long is the main campaign of Kingmaker supposed to be? Are we talking Sword Coast Legends short 30 hours or what?
No clue as it was never officially answered but I'd say 50 hrs or more depending on how you play. I even searched google for an answer and couldn't find one in the previews.

You might want to ask @purpleblob.
 
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