Bittersweet Eternity. An open letter addressed to Obsidian Entertainment

[namelessthree]

I agree the fisto and the hookers arent romance options but were as i said was some of the ways the game let u express ur sexuality. The romances i said were in the game but not our own was the tragic story of veronica and her lost love, the troubled couple who wanted to free of one of the casinos grasp, the history of boone and his wife, setting up the boomer with a love seen from far away, etc etc. They were other peoples romances that we got to interact with. Thats what i meant romance was in the game and im sure that romance in that form will be in this game.

My point i was trying to make is that games can be incredible games with lots of roleplay oppertunities that dont need romance for our characters and still be a great game that doesnt need or be complete without the need for romance in it. Fonv didnt have any romances in it and it didnt suffer at all from a roleplays point of view from the lack of it. Just because PoE wont have romance options right now does not mean obsidian cant still craft a game that will give us plenty of roleplay options and deep character interaction between npcs and party members.

it can be a great game without romance options and still not feel like somethings missing because of the lack of it AND the bioware examples was there to show what could happen as well or even skyrim with its marriage that feels so damn empty and halfass u wonder why it gets the praises it does in a game.

seriously the marriage option in skyrim is very praised by plenty of people who wanted romance in their game (not counting u in this at all because i dont know ur stance on that which u problemly share my view on it) that i dont even understand how without headroleay outta game makes up for it for most people.

there are plenty of examples of romance going wrong in a game with very few examples of it being done right. While that isnt a good example of not putting it in a game, it is when its a new ip that u are trying to make the best on all fronts and i rather they play on tbeir strengths which they have already shown they can give us deep and fulfilling roleay options without romance and the options to express our sexuality and motives.

 

 

I do share your point of view completely in the Skyrim issue. Basically my point of view is that if something is going to shallow, you might as well not include it. Precisely because I have Obsidian in such a high praise as RPG developers is the same reason I feel it's a shame they are not including romancing roleplay options, because I believe they can do really something really unique and out of the norm with these... and finding something unique that moves the roleplaying forward and helps it mature I think it's a great thing. The game is feature locked and that's not possible? I am fine with that. But I do hope that now that they are not including romance, at least they explain in-game, story-wise, why those options are not possible. Can the the urgency of the situation, or that your character is tainted by something and basically survival instinct comes first, something like that. It would make more sene that way, at least to me. And of course, the game can be awesome and have plenty of roleplaying options either way but probably with more budget and time they would have include them. In the end it comes down to priorities. Mine are in favor of roleplaying. Other people would prefer more combat. That's fine. In the end it's the devs decision and will have to wait and see how this affects the final game when we play it. 

Edited July 7, 2014 by namelessthree

[namelessthree]

no matter how clever your sophistry or enlightened your ideals, you will never convince a tiger to become a vegetarian. am gonna leave for you all to decide if the promancers is the sophist or tiger.

 

 

 

So true, maybe each of us are both of them. To be honest, I am just happy to discuss the issue with some nice people here. Purely under a selfish perspective, I get so much out of it because it shows me different point of views. You always learn something. By the way, all your comments are small jewels. It's very nice to read you.

Edited July 7, 2014 by namelessthree

[nipsen]

 

Writers are odd, sure, but actors...

we dated an actress... once.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

Pretty sure all of us are actors, in one way or another. To misquote some guy.

 

But even if it is reasonable... and very obvious.. to assume that Obsidian folks would feel slighted, and dumped, by how the press falls in love with Bioware and EA's money. How they carry a not very good title on review blitzes and.. embedded journalists.. I mean, that actually happened. Not just the one who got a role in the game, but others who were paid to write positive features ahead of launch, etc. Becomes very difficult to get a critical Mass Effect 3 review printed when a senior writer gushes about the game's motion features the week before launch. Without disclosing that they had a sponsorship agreement with EA at the time. And EA obviously knows that, and are very skilled with exploiting the PR opportunities the current games-media gives them.

 

That Obsidian would be annoyed by how every game they launch gets instantly described as a buggy unfinished mess in every review. Because they mention they have bugs they unfortunately couldn't address themselves. While no other developer on earth gets their games reviewed in the same way. Because they keep their mouths shut about the huge occlusion problem in 90% of the game's scenes. That they lose bonuses for metacritic scores, that were reduced thanks to a set of very curious reviews. When eventually the same publication wrote a "New Vegas makes the original Fallout 3 obsolete" feature about a year later. Etc. 

 

That Obsidian folks would think that they are being punished by press and fans for being honest, rather than serving people a constant stream of bs.

 

And that simplistic design from abstracts that can be summarized on an a4 page makes good sales-pitches. But often bad games. Or that three minute romances makes for striking press, but uncomfortably bad dialogue in the game.

 

And that this is something it's natural people would eventually catch on to. Just like how having a compartmentalized writing team writing bulk in parallel might increase the amount of quests, but make everything disjointed and uninteresting, etc. That larger budgets and shorter development cycles isn't going to "solve" the problem with producing AAA games, but that this razor-slicing concept is not going to cut it for actually making deeper games after all, etc.

 

And that thoughts like this could possibly be something some Obsidian folks, like some of us, feel is somewhat redeemed with the kickstarter success of PoE, for example. And could, perhaps for good reason, think that Bioware got some well-deserved problems with TOR and the ME3 "choose your colour overlay on the picturebook ending" debacle.

 

I think all of those are reasonable things to assume are views that can exist. But that there is a battle going on between Bioware and Obsidian, that's an intertron invention, no?

 

..I mean, if I remember correctly, the entire serialmance thing was an issue on a few hundred pages and fifty thousand threads on Bioware's forums all the way back to Neverwinter Nights. The idea apparently being that every character in every house in the game, as well as the dog, and the druid's animal companions, should have a romance option. Because if dwarves would not throw themselves at elves and humans, it would be racist. In the same way, that romance by default is something every NPC in the world has, and you have to program it to set one to have specific affinity for just the other sex, so programmers are homophobic, etc. And other amazingly entertaining philosophical discussions.

 

It's not a secret that Bioware's community manager folks were more involved in that discussion compared to anything else, including the drm horror. Thanks to - hopefully in large part - because of the amount of traffic this crap generated. So when that interest in serialmancing results in adding token relationships with npcs in the games - that it actually ends up in the design, and is the most talked about feature in the entire game - then that says something about the approach to making the games that the company has. And the approach to taking on board "input" from the fans.

 

And at least that's where I feel slighted. I really don't have a habit of going on a book-forum and writing down 5000 words about why I thought something was intelligent and thought-provoking. I was genuinely shocked when I found out the dune on usenet had huge discussions about how vain Frank Herbert was, for example. That never occurred to me, and it still doesn't whenever I read the books. But it still generated a discussion that lasted for years.

 

So if there is a split here, it is between people who think that vapid crazy **** on the internet should be instantly catered to as quickly as possible. And between those who suspect that doing so is quietly killing off the fanbase. And that's not really bioware or obsidian, but a very outspoken and obvious design philosophy at many major publishing companies and developers at the moment.

 

If anything, that's what makes Obsidian as a company inedible to a lot of people in the gaming press. This could have been a random stupid comment (very likely), but I've actually had people say outright that they dislike Obsidian for not giving them easy **** to sell that fans want. Meaning that they didn't respond to what was buzzing on the forums at the time, etc. That was a real opinion by a relatively well-placed writer.

 

And perhaps that's what makes Obsidian inedible to some publisher folks as well? That they still exist as a studio, in spite of not actively making vapid crap. I mean, things that supposedly sell, that people want to buy.

 

.. just my opinion, obviously.

[Bryy]

 

no matter how clever your sophistry or enlightened your ideals, you will never convince a tiger to become a vegetarian. am gonna leave for you all to decide if the promancers is the sophist or tiger.

 

 

 

So true, maybe each of us are both of them. To be honest, I am just happy to discuss the issue with some nice people here. Purely under a selfish perspective, I get so much out of it because it shows me different point of views. You always learn something. By the way, all your comments are small jewels. It's very nice to read you.

 

You've got your answer ten times over, plus you yourself answered the question on the first page.

 

I don't even.

 

And did you honestly use the "the only reason you are disagreeing with me is because you must not be smart enough to understand my points" excuse?

[prodigydancer]

I guess if the TC diverted his energy and enthusiasm to a more productive venue we could have a nice romance mod. Not for PE perhaps (since it's still in the making) but for some game anyway.

[teknoman2]

in short OP says "why no romance?  "

[Stun]

 

or even skyrim with its marriage that feels so damn empty and halfass u wonder why it gets the praises it does in a game.

seriously the marriage option in skyrim is very praised by plenty of people who wanted romance in their game (not counting u in this at all because i dont know ur stance on that which u problemly share my view on it) that i dont even understand how without headroleay outta game makes up for it for most people.

 

I do share your point of view completely in the Skyrim issue.

 

Then the both of you have missed Bethesda's point completely. Skyrim's marriages are not "romances", nor were they supposed to be, nor are they the result of trying to implement romances but failing to "flesh them out" or whatever.

 

They were pure utility value as designed. They gave the player something he/she could call his own, like a house....or a horse. In Skyrim, a spouse is either the player's personal merchant, or his/her unconditional fighting companion. Or both. The fact that they come complete with a wedding ceremony, a wedding ring, and they live in the player character's house, Is Brilliant. It leaves completely open the option for Larpers to Larp, and the imaginers to fill in the story gaps in their heads. Which is what the elder scrolls games are all about.

 

THAT is why they work in Skyrim, and why they're praised. But you guys aren't asking for that. Nope. You want Love-drama spoon-fed to you by Obsidian writers. And you want it even though Obsidian has a track record of sucking when it comes to writing romances.

[PrimeJunta]

I wouldn't mind if Obs hangs a big NO KISSING sign on their front door. The promancers have Bioware. Surely antimancers deserve a champion as well?

[namelessthree]

I wouldn't mind if Obs hangs a big NO KISSING sign on their front door. The promancers have Bioware. Surely antimancers deserve a champion as well?

 

EA/Bioware don't do romances but ego stroking although I have to admit that your idea would be trolling in the funniest way possible.

Edited July 7, 2014 by namelessthree

[Fearabbit]

I respect the OP's opinion and everything, but I really can't stand it if people call their opinion an "open letter". That just sounds like you think your opinion is more important than those from the rest of us.

Why? Because calling it a "letter" evokes certain social norms - if you get a letter, you have to read it, you have to respond to it, you cannot simply discard it. Someone penned this letter very carefully, you have to respect that. It has an air of importance.

 

So basically, of all the forum posts, this is the one that developers have to respond to, because it's a "letter". It's a rhetorical device, and I really don't like it. You're no better than us, and your opinion isn't even more sophisticated. Get off your high horse and start writing posts and vitriolic rage comments like the rest of us again.

 

P.S. Also the correct use of "open letters" is when you have rallied a couple of people to your cause. An open letter is actually more like a petition, but less "professional". For example, organizations like WWF or PETA could write open letters in the name of all their members and sympathizers.

 

(Yeah that's actually all I have to say about this topic.)

 

(No actually, one more thing: Start using the Edit button!)

Edited July 7, 2014 by Fearabbit

[namelessthree]

 

 

no matter how clever your sophistry or enlightened your ideals, you will never convince a tiger to become a vegetarian. am gonna leave for you all to decide if the promancers is the sophist or tiger.

 

 

 

So true, maybe each of us are both of them. To be honest, I am just happy to discuss the issue with some nice people here. Purely under a selfish perspective, I get so much out of it because it shows me different point of views. You always learn something. By the way, all your comments are small jewels. It's very nice to read you.

 

You've got your answer ten times over, plus you yourself answered the question on the first page.

 

I don't even.

 

And did you honestly use the "the only reason you are disagreeing with me is because you must not be smart enough to understand my points" excuse?

 

 

 

Yes, I believe that I am smarter than everydoby else, in fact my real name is Edwin Odesseiron. I guess that's is why I've stated that we are all probably both tigers and sophists. -Sigh-

 

You are dangerously talking like a dictator. Basically your persecution against every and each of my comments sounds like this: "I don't think this or that has to be discussed because I don't care about it therefore every comment that you make is irrelevant, bothers me and you shouldn't have made it in first place".  

 

No, sorry but if I want to talk about something I am as free as you are of doing so. If, on top of that, I am lucky enough to have some nice people responding me and engaging in dialogue that I find interesting I don't see how that's a problem for you. So please, do yourself a favor. You don't seem very happy with what I have to express. So simply ignore my comments just like I have done with so many of yours. Don't expect to be answered again unless that you start behaving in a reasonable fashion.

[namelessthree]

I respect the OP's opinion and everything, but I really can't stand it if people call their opinion an "open letter". That just sounds like you think your opinion is more important than those from the rest of us.

Why? Because calling it a "letter" evokes certain social norms - if you get a letter, you have to read it, you have to respond to it, you cannot simply discard it. Someone penned this letter very carefully, you have to respect that. It has an air of importance.

 

So basically, of all the forum posts, this is the one that developers have to respond to, because it's a "letter". It's a rhetorical device, and I really don't like it. You're no better than us, and your opinion isn't even more sophisticated. Get off your high horse and start writing posts and vitriolic rage comments like the rest of us again.

 

P.S. Also the correct use of "open letters" is when you have rallied a couple of people to your cause. An open letter is actually more like a petition, but less "professional". For example, organizations like WWF or PETA could write open letters in the name of all their members and sympathizers.

 

(Yeah that's actually all I have to say about this topic.)

 

This is very interesting and, in retrospective, you are probably right about the naming. To be honest, I didn't think about the implications of the naming while I was writing it so don't take it as if I consider my opion more important  than anybody else here because that's not true. That's only an assumption that you made based of the knowledge that you had about the definition of open letter which doesn't imply that I had the same knowledge or even thought about those implications at the moment of writing. I disagree about the raging. I don't think that raging leads somewhere or helps any kind of communication. The rest is very interesting and I thank you wholeheartedly for pointing that out.

[redneckdevil]

 

 

or even skyrim with its marriage that feels so damn empty and halfass u wonder why it gets the praises it does in a game.

seriously the marriage option in skyrim is very praised by plenty of people who wanted romance in their game (not counting u in this at all because i dont know ur stance on that which u problemly share my view on it) that i dont even understand how without headroleay outta game makes up for it for most people.

I do share your point of view completely in the Skyrim issue.

Then the both of you have missed Bethesda's point completely. Skyrim's marriages are not "romances", nor were they supposed to be, nor are they the result of trying to implement romances but failing to "flesh them out" or whatever.

 

They were pure utility value as designed. They gave the player something he/she could call his own, like a house....or a horse. In Skyrim, a spouse is either the player's personal merchant, or his/her unconditional fighting companion. Or both. The fact that they come complete with a wedding ceremony, a wedding ring, and they live in the player character's house, Is Brilliant. It leaves completely open the option for Larpers to Larp, and the imaginers to fill in the story gaps in their heads. Which is what the elder scrolls games are all about.

 

THAT is why they work in Skyrim, and why they're praised. But you guys aren't asking for that. Nope. You want Love-drama spoon-fed to you by Obsidian writers. And you want it even though Obsidian has a track record of sucking when it comes to writing romances.

I did enjoy the house feature in building my own house...but really? This is what i am talking about, not that the marriage was there but the execution of it.

buy a trinket, give a trinket, say ur vows, and then now u are married. Thats it, no winning over, shifting their stance towards u, nada. Buy a trinket and bam u are married )

Thats my issue with skyrim that i will admit thats purely my own beef and i have long gotten over if no one else shares it nor will i put them down for liking the things in skyrim. My main beef with said game is that a majority of the roleplaying is done strictly in ur head and with ur imagination. The gameworld barely reacts to any of ur decisions or roleplay antics with the exception of the guards. It is a very beautiful sandbox world that has very linear questlines. Its almost as if it the very sandbox world they let u run around in wherever u go will deceive u that u actually have any choices or roleplay optiins with the very stories within the game.

it is a game for larpers and im glad tbey can enjoy it and more power to them, that is not the playstyle for me. Ill stick with morrowind that gives me freedom to use my imagination AND respond to my roleplay as wel ingame. Thankfully bethesda caters to different styles with their games and i have found my niche with tes in morrowind while others have found theirs with oblivion and skyrim. They have every right to enjoy those games just as i have a right to not enjoy because it doesnt suit my playstyle.

imho i guess my main beef with skyrim is that fallout 3 offered more roleplay oppertunities that where reconized ingame than skyrim did. Im not to much on relying solely on my imagination to roleplay interacting with the game world.

rant over, in the n

[redneckdevil]

 

 

or even skyrim with its marriage that feels so damn empty and halfass u wonder why it gets the praises it does in a game.

seriously the marriage option in skyrim is very praised by plenty of people who wanted romance in their game (not counting u in this at all because i dont know ur stance on that which u problemly share my view on it) that i dont even understand how without headroleay outta game makes up for it for most people.

I do share your point of view completely in the Skyrim issue.

Then the both of you have missed Bethesda's point completely. Skyrim's marriages are not "romances", nor were they supposed to be, nor are they the result of trying to implement romances but failing to "flesh them out" or whatever.

 

They were pure utility value as designed. They gave the player something he/she could call his own, like a house....or a horse. In Skyrim, a spouse is either the player's personal merchant, or his/her unconditional fighting companion. Or both. The fact that they come complete with a wedding ceremony, a wedding ring, and they live in the player character's house, Is Brilliant. It leaves completely open the option for Larpers to Larp, and the imaginers to fill in the story gaps in their heads. Which is what the elder scrolls games are all about.

 

THAT is why they work in Skyrim, and why they're praised. But you guys aren't asking for that. Nope. You want Love-drama spoon-fed to you by Obsidian writers. And you want it even though Obsidian has a track record of sucking when it comes to writing romances.

I did enjoy the house feature in building my own house...but really? This is what i am talking about, not that the marriage was there but the execution of it.

buy a trinket, give a trinket, say ur vows, and then now u are married. Thats it, no winning over, shifting their stance towards u, nada. Buy a trinket and bam u are married )

Thats my issue with skyrim that i will admit thats purely my own beef and i have long gotten over if no one else shares it nor will i put them down for liking the things in skyrim. My main beef with said game is that a majority of the roleplaying is done strictly in ur head and with ur imagination. The gameworld barely reacts to any of ur decisions or roleplay antics with the exception of the guards. It is a very beautiful sandbox world that has very linear questlines. Its almost as if it the very sandbox world they let u run around in wherever u go will deceive u that u actually have any choices or roleplay optiins with the very stories within the game.

it is a game for larpers and im glad tbey can enjoy it and more power to them, that is not the playstyle for me. Ill stick with morrowind that gives me freedom to use my imagination AND respond to my roleplay as wel ingame. Thankfully bethesda caters to different styles with their games and i have found my niche with tes in morrowind while others have found theirs with oblivion and skyrim. They have every right to enjoy those games just as i have a right to not enjoy because it doesnt suit my playstyle.

imho i guess my main beef with skyrim is that fallout 3 offered more roleplay oppertunities that where reconized ingame than skyrim did. Im not to much on relying solely on my imagination to roleplay interacting with the game world.

rant over, in the end i am merely critizing the execution, not the idea of what bethesda did in skyrim.  yes i agree it was there for utility for larpers but the execution was imho horribly done.  thats why i am saying if u do soemthing, do it right or dont do it at all.

would i be pissed if obsidian did exactly what skyrim did with marriages and whatnot, no just like im not pissed at bethesda for doing it.  i will cringe yes and not use it and i can even be happy for the people who would love it.  it just wouldnt be for me.  my whole stance in this thread is NOT against having romance in the game, but simply because its locked that we shouldnt worry or think that we are missing roleplay oppertunities when obsidian has a history of giving us plenty of roleplay oppertunities that the ingame will reconize.

Edited July 7, 2014 by redneckdevil

[ashtonw]

 

So all this time you were trying to argue about something you haven't even tryied yourself? If you haven't played and tried the BG2/ Torments romances extensively, why trying to arm a case agaisnt them? 

 

 

I'm not. I like well-written romances in my games. Obsidian has never delivered any and I wouldn't trust them to this time around either. I take issue with the idea that not having such a feature will make PoE a shallow hack-and-slash. You do realize that the romances in BG2 were last minute additions and not the centerpiece of the game, right? Which is why female characters got shafted.

[PrimeJunta]

Or, rather, did not get shafted. :ducks:

[redneckdevil]

Lol

[Valmy]

I think this pretty well illustrates my issue with romances.  I really enjoy them but I hate what they do to the gaming community.  Now people seem to think that they are some sort of requirement for a RPG, or at least a deep one and  that is unfortunate.

 

Having said that I guess I am surprised that people consider Annah and Fall-From-Grace were romances in Torment.  I did not feel that they were, at least not as currently understood with BG2 and Bioware.

Edited July 7, 2014 by Valmy

[sorophx]

The first time I read the pitch back when the kickstarter campaign started, I was thrilled at the oportunity of playing one game that will mix together the deep and richness of writing of both the "Baldur's Gate saga" and "Planescape: Torment". I have to admit that I was never very fond of  the "Icewind Dale" series  because while good games, they always felt to me much less alive due to the lack of companions or roleplaying options. Still, the combat in those games were pretty good and that was exactly what Obsidian was aiming to bring back from them, according to the pitch, so everything was good.

 

my definition of "role playing" in a CRPG most definitely differs from yours. but, I've been playing Baldur's Gate II, and one thing that jumped at me right off the bat: it hardly has any role playing. it has 3 types of responses in dialogues (good, neutral, evil), and most of the time the consequences of your actions boil down to the amount of XP you get (or don't get) as reward. 

 

most lines of dialogue will lead to the same result, so they're there only for fluff. it doesn't matter which one you pick, but I guess this is one way of "role playing" a certain character. you pick a dialogue option that corresponds with your character's alignment, and as a "reward" you get an appropriate response from the NPC. and that's all there is to it!

 

apart from that, BG II is exactly the same as IWD - a string of dungeons of varying difficulty and size. it's very much a dungeon crawler. although, I have to admit, some of the dungeons are designed brilliantly. encounters, on the other hand - not so much. in this respect the IWD games are way better.

 

anyway, to drive the point home, while I think you're correct in your belief, that pre-made party characters with back stories, reactions to your actions etc. make the game feel "alive", we are getting those in PoE. so from that point of view it offers as much role playing as BG II does.

 

as for romances, I can prove to you right here that they were done very poorly in BG II (with one exception - Jaheira). so bringing those up doesn't help your case. 

[Death Machine Miyagi]

I'm curious when I see the number of people who think PoE 2 might be better romance-wise than 1.

 

From the opinions we've gotten from Obsidian writers, MCA actively dislikes romances and J.E. Sawyer, while saying nothing outright, comes across as decidedly disinterested in them. This makes me interested to know if Obsidian actually has anyone writing for them who would want to write an in-game romance for any reason other than because that's what's expected of them.

 

And if they don't, isn't it very, very likely that their romances are destined to be pretty bad, even if PoE 2 makes it possible? Pretty much every 'romance' I've seen from Obsidian has been pretty sloppy, half-hearted stuff. 

[Nonek]

On the other hand Mr Avellone writes excellent...unusual...relationships, such as those between the Exile and Kreia, Nameless and Ravel or Deionarra, Cass and the Courier etcetera. Personally i'd be more interested in those kind of deeply disturbing and complicated relationships, rather than the traditional teenage ego stroking of romances.

[Valmy]

On the other hand Mr Avellone writes excellent...unusual...relationships, such as those between the Exile and Kreia, Nameless and Ravel or Deionarra, Cass and the Courier etcetera. Personally i'd be more interested in those kind of deeply disturbing and complicated relationships, rather than the traditional teenage ego stroking of romances.

 

Absolutely.  Avellone is amazing so with him as a lead writer I don't think anybody has cause for concern. 

[Valmy]

I'm curious when I see the number of people who think PoE 2 might be better romance-wise than 1.

 

 

I am curious when I see people thinking there will be a PoE 2.  Shouldn't we play PoE first and see if it lives up to our expectations before discussing the hypothetical sequel.  Plenty of time to do that during the PoE 2 kickstarter campaign anyway.

[Death Machine Miyagi]

 

I'm curious when I see the number of people who think PoE 2 might be better romance-wise than 1.

 

 

I am curious when I see people thinking there will be a PoE 2.  Shouldn't we play PoE first and see if it lives up to our expectations before discussing the hypothetical sequel.  Plenty of time to do that during the PoE 2 kickstarter campaign anyway.

 

I'm pretty sure that if PoE is at all successful, and it seems very likely it will be, Obsidian is going to want to expand on a series they have the exclusive rights to. So yeah, I would be more surprised if there isn't a PoE 2.

[Death Machine Miyagi]

On the other hand Mr Avellone writes excellent...unusual...relationships, such as those between the Exile and Kreia, Nameless and Ravel or Deionarra, Cass and the Courier etcetera. Personally i'd be more interested in those kind of deeply disturbing and complicated relationships, rather than the traditional teenage ego stroking of romances.

 

Absolutely. I'd add TNO and Ravel Puzzlewell into there, which is an example of how a less traditional 'romance' actually can enhance a game. That relationship isn't about teenage ego stroking at all, but about a very bizarre and almost certainly unreciprocated infatuation that results in the entire sad course of events of the game. Ravel isn't a nubile waifu waiting for you select the 'nice' dialogue options so you can get that fade-to-black sex scene, but a millennia-old monstrous hag who has destroyed countless lives merely for her own amusement and yet oddly enough finds in TNO a moment of human longing. Her love for TNO is integral to the story and feels far more tragic than anything else.