Do you like to see some "weird" companions?

[sodaTwo]

Not weird for weird sake. But for the love of (insert your flying spaghetti monster of choice here) please do not pull any punches, this might be the one chance to make a truly full flavored companions.

[stiltskin]

how about a milk carton as a pet and maybe broken umbrella?

[motorizer]

Companions that are not what they seem are always exciting to me. They need not try to murder you suddenly without warning, but an unexpected revelation of a hidden agenda is nice.

 

It would be interesting to find out a companion had been scheming behind your back or working as a double agent or something, possibly under duress...as long as there is a way to give him a second chance, not enough companions for an out and out traitor

 

like Yoshimo but with a way to save him

[AGX-17]

Yeah, and if they're considered weird for their world, it should be something noted by NPCs you interact with. Weird player character options wouldn't hurt, either.

[Starwars]

I don't care too much about them being weird "outwardly" so to speak. I think some will have weird quirks and that's fine with me. But what I really want it just interesting and fleshed out companions that match some of the depth in games like MotB or Torment.

Small little things that's been revealed so far like Forton being into mind-expanding drugs, or the character recently described as a Cipher detective. Those already sound like potentially really interesting angles to me,

 

It's already been confirmed that PE will be less absurd (or bizarre, forgot the choice of words) than PE, but will aim for the same depth.

[MantisDreaming]

Indulge me.

 

"Weird" and "normal" for that matter are pretty ambiguous words.

They both draw on and are limited by your personal frame of reference which is subjective.

 

When someone says: "Don't be weird for the sake of being weird," what does that mean to you? And why is it necessarily a bad thing?

 

It seems that to say something is weird for the sake of being weird implies that you understand the nature (what makes it weird, why it is weird) of the thing you are calling weird which, I think, would make the thing in question not so weird! So if it isn't weird, its "weirdness" ceases to be the issue. It does not compute.

 

Trying too hard to be weird maybe? (zebra in scuba gear) Pretentiously post modern? (Soup can art) Mayhap... mayhap.

 

All that said: I think everyone is weird to a degree, so sure, weird companions GO!

[Gromnir]

weird is fine. when developers stop at weird, it is bad. far too often the obsidian writers work to make their companions weird w/o developing the Character. fall-from-grace is memorable as a reflective/chaste succubus, but not 'cause of what she says or does. don't even get us started on vhailor shortcomings. morte, on the other hand, is a fully developed character with a history that we learn incrementally. morte story is, perhaps, not as important as tno, but morte story enhances tno significantly. we feels great sympathy for morte when we learn the full scope of his relationship with tno. we see tno's character different than we would w/o morte. kreia is also a fantastic companion. is almost as if we get to have ravel puzzlewell as a companion. has the final (if not main) antagonist be a companion? that alone is noteworthy, yes?

 

make weird is ok as long as you develop.

 

HA! good Fun!

[AGX-17]

Indulge me.

 

"Weird" and "normal" for that matter are pretty ambiguous words.

They both draw on and are limited by your personal frame of reference which is subjective.

 

When someone says: "Don't be weird for the sake of being weird," what does that mean to you? And why is it necessarily a bad thing?

 

It seems that to say something is weird for the sake of being weird implies that you understand the nature (what makes it weird, why it is weird) of the thing you are calling weird which, I think, would make the thing in question not so weird! So if it isn't weird, its "weirdness" ceases to be the issue. It does not compute.

 

Trying too hard to be weird maybe? (zebra in scuba gear) Pretentiously post modern? (Soup can art) Mayhap... mayhap.

 

All that said: I think everyone is weird to a degree, so sure, weird companions GO!

 

I thought the point of the thread is the idea of them being "unusual" in an exceptional way. Not weird like "oh that Gilmdorp, he sure has one odd sense of humor! *laughtrack*" or "oh i'm so emo weep weep i'm going to write poetry about being emo and cut myself *cut, cut*"but more like "townsfolk and important NPCs being outwardly troubled by their presence."

 

Also... I don't see how it's possible to have a pretentiously postmodern companion in a pre-modernistic world.

Edited October 20, 2012 by AGX-17

[MantisDreaming]

 

Also... I don't see how it's possible to have a pretentiously postmodern companion in a pre-modernistic world.

 

A leap in thought, at that stage in the rant I was addressing possible definitions (I might concede on) of what people meant when regarding something a weird for sake of weird.

[rjshae]

When I walk into a pub with a wise cracking, floating skull for a companion, I want the locals to throw a net over it, douse it in vodka, and toss it in the fire. It's the only way to be sure.

[Xantomas]

Indulge me.

 

"Weird" and "normal" for that matter are pretty ambiguous words.

They both draw on and are limited by your personal frame of reference which is subjective.

 

When someone says: "Don't be weird for the sake of being weird," what does that mean to you? And why is it necessarily a bad thing?

 

It seems that to say something is weird for the sake of being weird implies that you understand the nature (what makes it weird, why it is weird) of the thing you are calling weird which, I think, would make the thing in question not so weird! So if it isn't weird, its "weirdness" ceases to be the issue. It does not compute.

 

Trying too hard to be weird maybe? (zebra in scuba gear) Pretentiously post modern? (Soup can art) Mayhap... mayhap.

 

All that said: I think everyone is weird to a degree, so sure, weird companions GO!

 

I thought the point of the thread is the idea of them being "unusual" in an exceptional way. Not weird like "oh that Gilmdorp, he sure has one odd sense of humor! *laughtrack*" or "oh i'm so emo weep weep i'm going to write poetry about being emo and cut myself *cut, cut*"but more like "townsfolk and important NPCs being outwardly troubled by their presence."

 

Also... I don't see how it's possible to have a pretentiously postmodern companion in a pre-modernistic world.

 

An NPC's race or appearance is pretty meaningless alone in an isometric RPG. You are never going to see it's face outside of a character portrait. There is no closeup voice acted dialogue here. The Gith cleric in NWN2 was very exotic in all ways and the fans mostly hated her guts. Minsc in BG2 was just a plain old human ranger and he's one of the most remembered and loved NPC's in RPG history. It's the writing and personality that makes for good or bad companion characters. Making it some odd or scary exotic being isn't important. Morte from PS:T is a very memorable character mostly because of his story and personality, not just because he was a floating skull.

Edited October 20, 2012 by Xantomas

[harhar!]

Pst was nice and full of weird dudes, I like it.

[eselle28]

I enjoy odd characters, but I wouldn't want as many as show up in Torment, since the planes were by their nature pretty odd. I think there's also a bit of difference between a game taking place in a universe most people already find quite familiar and one that's introducing a completely new setting. In the former, odd races and backgrounds can seem refreshing. In the latter, I think there's more groundwork to do in introducing players to the game's most common races. So I wouldn't mind one or perhaps two oddballs in the group of companions, but I wouldn't want them to be so common that there's no room left for a elven companion or an orlan one, who could give players some insight on the major cultures they'll be encountering in the game.

[aphotic]

I would like every single one of my companions to be unique, quirky, significant, or otherwise distinguishable from my own character. I would like my companions to have significant opinons or even effects on the plot. Such variation avoids staleness and adds great narrative opportunity.

 

I know it's not well-liked in general (I enjoyed it for the simplest fact that we were, for once, not saving the world in a BioWare game), but Dragon Age II did this extremely well with one character in particular:

Anders

 

Edited October 20, 2012 by aphotic

[^Rayne^]

I would love to have some odd clockwork/robot like creation like Nordom or sort of a Wall-E sort of character, possibly even a race that was engineered and somehow was able to become a vessel for the souls of certain sentient animals. Having to collect unique items to upgrade this character especially with the mechanics they use for players to craft would make it possible for players to do the upgrades. Personally I loved T3-M4 in Kotor 1 & 2 and I would love to have one of the characters be something like this.

[bronzepoem]

When I walk into a pub with a wise cracking, floating skull for a companion, I want the locals to throw a net over it, douse it in vodka, and toss it in the fire. It's the only way to be sure.

Haha, really an interesting scene!Why not?

 

As I said in another topic, I wish I can awaken a elder race suvivor in the bottom of mega dungeon. Then bring him back to today's society. He may do many Improper things and my role will be the "firefighter". I'm sure that will be a funny story

[BasaltineBadger]

I'm for the special companion. The world feel more mysterious when your companions can be something your PC cannot.

[LordCrash]

That's one of the reasons I never got that warm with PST. I like humans, even in fantasy, that's the point. They can be weird, but characterwise or lookwise. And maybe there could be a single companion being even more weird than that, from some other (non-classic fantasy) race. But that's enough for me.

Edited October 21, 2012 by LordCrash

[AGX-17]

An NPC's race or appearance is pretty meaningless alone in an isometric RPG. You are never going to see it's face outside of a character portrait. There is no closeup voice acted dialogue here. The Gith cleric in NWN2 was very exotic in all ways and the fans mostly hated her guts. Minsc in BG2 was just a plain old human ranger and he's one of the most remembered and loved NPC's in RPG history. It's the writing and personality that makes for good or bad companion characters. Making it some odd or scary exotic being isn't important. Morte from PS:T is a very memorable character mostly because of his story and personality, not just because he was a floating skull.

 

But in PST, a floating skull isn't actually that odd. You're equating "well-written" or "well-developed" with "weird." That logic makes any well-written character "weird."

 

A character's appearance matters in the world of the RPG. This is an imaginary world from the start, and we're imagining that these imaginary companions are interacting with other imaginary NPCs, and for these imaginary individuals, their appearance is highly relevant. If you can't be bothered to imagine this world is "real" in some way, why bother in the first place? That's the territory of the powergamer and the minmaxer. Why not just propose an elimination of graphics altogether and make P:E a random number conflict generator?

Edited October 21, 2012 by AGX-17

[MantisDreaming]

Xantomas said:

An NPC's race or appearance is pretty meaningless alone in an isometric RPG.

&

It's the writing and personality that makes for good or bad companion characters.

 

Yo AGX , I don't think Xantomas is saying that we should do away with graphics. Just that the in-game representation of the character, art-style, "weirdness" if you like, is not enough alone to make a character truly interesting. Imagine if his dialogue writing was phoned-in or flat. He follows you for the entire game and is a floating, wise cracking skull. Honestly, on paper that sounds like it could get annoying. Instead well crafted writing made him interesting, funny and down right endearing at times.

 

And just because he's suppose to be a normal occurrence in Sigil and the planes that doesn't make him any less strange to the player interacting and controlling him.

[AgentOrange]

I'd rather have KotOR 2 style companions. P:T companions were weird, but it was a logical weirdness considering the setting. In most cases though the "lol weird xD" style is just used as a crutch by ****ty writers.

Edited October 21, 2012 by AgentOrange