Same gender romance discussion

[Xilizhra]

I don't know Nadia. Ashara is... ok, I guess. Maybe it's because I did her quest line back at release, but she seems fairly forgettable. Not to mention, Nadia and Ashara are padawan and apprentice to the PC - not exactly the best basis for a relationship, all things considered (see: Vette and Jaesa, above.)

 

BH Spoilers:

 

 

Also, Mako just seems really young. I know Torian's young as well, but Mako just comes off more "little sister". Also, Torian's a seasoned warrior, Mako sees her entire family murdered and joins the BH out revenge and a need of some familiarity. Torain seems to join you more as a choice - he reclaims his honour and would be accepted as a full Mandolorian. Instead, he joins up with the Champion of the Great Hunt because raisons.

The problem comes from the fact that those two are literally the only female companions that the Consular and Inquisitor get, so there's really no choice involved, even if you do find that kind of thing creepy (if it helps, there don't seem to be significant age differences involved).

[Seireeni]

Not Nadia and/or Ashara? I've heard Mako is rather popular for that kind of thing too.

 

Of course, Nadia and Ashara being at the top of my list is probably just because of my preferred classes, but there you have it.

 

Nadia imo isn't really an interesting character, and I've always disliked Ashara, so those two definitely would not be on my list.

 

I've probably mentioned hundred times before that I'd like my sniper to be able to romance Kaliyo. Apart from that, I actually haven't thought about this much. Kira and Mako could be nice. Vector too.

[Tatile]

The problem comes from the fact that those two are literally the only female companions that the Consular and Inquisitor get, so there's really no choice involved, even if you do find that kind of thing creepy (if it helps, there don't seem to be significant age differences involved).

 

It also depends on how it's written, but, given the current attention to detail concerning female companion's motivations (you're the PC?! LOL, lemme jump on your dick), I'm somewhat apprehensive. Perhaps the current writers are trying to provide better quality romances for the SGRA content. Perhaps they're still agonising over how to include stereotypical gender roles to the SGRA content (what, we can't have two men who are strong and independent together? Who will be the woman?! - two wimmenz together in love?!! WHO WILL BE DICK). Perhaps they're pasta'ing together boring side mission text for daily areas that no one will ever read and are lamenting their life choices.

 

We will never know.

[Xilizhra]

It also depends on how it's written, but, given the current attention to detail concerning female companion's motivations (you're the PC?! LOL, lemme jump on your dick), I'm somewhat apprehensive. Perhaps the current writers are trying to provide better quality romances for the SGRA content. Perhaps they're still agonising over how to include stereotypical gender roles to the SGRA content (what, we can't have two men who are strong and independent together? Who will be the woman?! - two wimmenz together in love?!! WHO WILL BE DICK). Perhaps they're pasta'ing together boring side mission text for daily areas that no one will ever read and are lamenting their life choices.

 

We will never know.

Are you saying that I'm not actually missing anything by not romancing any women in-game thus far?

 

Also, I've come to realize that my question, at least for women, is kind of silly: only three classes have more than one female character, so for those other five, the SGR option would be predefined. For the remainder... to be honest, it might be interesting if Jaesa was primarily attracted to women on the light side.

[Tatile]

Are you saying that I'm not actually missing anything by not romancing any women in-game thus far?

 

Also, I've come to realize that my question, at least for women, is kind of silly: only three classes have more than one female character, so for those other five, the SGR option would be predefined. For the remainder... to be honest, it might be interesting if Jaesa was primarily attracted to women on the light side.

 

To be honest, I wouldn't know, most of my characters are female, and my one male character is gay anyway

 

I was being a bit facetious - I'm sure the romances aren't quite that bad, but it doesn't help that every single female (organic) companion is a romance option. But I have heard some people complaining that their personalities seem to get side-lined in favour of the PC being able to play god? I mean, it doesn't make much sense for Kaliyo to get jealous of the Agent romancing her and Temple - she seems to have a fairly polyamorous bent herself.

[copperjack]

To be honest, I wouldn't know, most of my characters are female, and my one male character is gay anyway

 

I was being a bit facetious - I'm sure the romances aren't quite that bad, but it doesn't help that every single female (organic) companion is a romance option. But I have heard some people complaining that their personalities seem to get side-lined in favour of the PC being able to play god? I mean, it doesn't make much sense for Kaliyo to get jealous of the Agent romancing her and Temple - she seems to have a fairly polyamorous bent herself.

 

Could be that Kaliyo's just a bit of a hypocrite - I'm sure there are a lot of people who like dating multiple people but expect those people to be faithful only to them.

 

It's a bit of a hard line to walk between letting players feel like they have control over their game and keeping the characters realistic. It doesn't really make sense to have companions love you no matter what unless you have insane charisma which isn't even relevant in this game, but it also reduces choice a little if you're forced into doing a certain set of things or else they'll reject you. Most of these companions could definitely stand to be a little more on the picky side of things though.

 

As for which ones would be good for SGR, probably Vector, Corso, Kaliyo... Khem Val... Hunter from the Agent storyline could have been kind of interesting if they'd made the flirting go anywhere.

[Tatile]

Hunter

 

So many terrifying possibilities... I can definitely say "yes" to Hunter, but very much in the way that I enjoyed Chapters 2 and 3. I show my love for my characters by doing terrible things to them

 

Also, it would be nice if the companions had personalities. It doesn't make sense for Vette to be "in love" with a racist, mass-murdering monster (unless Stockholm syndrome.) Wouldn't Kaliyo tire of someone who's a devout Imperial - and constantly screwing up her "fun"?

 

Yes, there could be reasons for the above, but the current writing - and lack of progression past "mawwiage! babbies!" - leaves only speculation and fan-fiction. Fan-fiction's inevitable, but I doubt that Bioware deliberately left their stories open-ended and encouraged it.

Edited December 28, 2013 by Tatile

[theStirge]

So, which characters would everyone most want to romance as an SGR, even though that's probably been asked already? Also, if the Cartel Market needs to be used as an alternative for this, which character type would be ideal in that?

 

1. Kira

2. Temple

3. Kira

4. Vette

5. Kira

6. Mako

7. Kira

8. Kaliyo

9. Kira

10. Quinn

11. Kira

12. Talos

13. Kira

14. Akaavi

15. Kira

16. Elara

and of course, 17. Kira.

 

(Can you tell that I really like Kira and that my Sentinel is dying to get in her robes?)

[copperjack]

It could be interesting if they'd made slightly different romance routes depending on your character's behaviour. Like if the Agent is a loyal imperial Kaliyo's just in it for the sex, but if they're more chaotic she wants some kind of long term partnership with them. Or having the more coercive relationship paths restricted to dark side characters, and light side people getting less creepy ones.

 

Jade Empire managed this sort of thing decently with at least one of their romances. This character was basically a good guy, and if the PC took an evil choice at the end of the game he would be shocked and leave them. If however you'd spent all previous conversations in the game convincing him that this sort of action was good and reasonable then he'd stick around and do evil things too. It was a good way to allow the companions their own personalities/moralities while still letting the player have a good deal of control over the story.

[Tatile]

It could be interesting if they'd made slightly different romance routes depending on your character's behaviour. Like if the Agent is a loyal imperial Kaliyo's just in it for the sex, but if they're more chaotic she wants some kind of long term partnership with them. Or having the more coercive relationship paths restricted to dark side characters, and light side people getting less creepy ones.

 

Jade Empire managed this sort of thing decently with at least one of their romances. This character was basically a good guy, and if the PC took an evil choice at the end of the game he would be shocked and leave them. If however you'd spent all previous conversations in the game convincing him that this sort of action was good and reasonable then he'd stick around and do evil things too. It was a good way to allow the companions their own personalities/moralities while still letting the player have a good deal of control over the story.

 

That would be great, but require them to actually support Story Content, which they're not really doing any more :/

 

Why couldn't they have just stuck with "single-player-style game with sort-of multiplayer options" and owned it, rather than trying to be some sort of bizarre MMO-WoW-clone hybrid?

[copperjack]

I like most of the story content we have so far, and it's definitely more than we would have gotten if they'd just made KotOR 3 instead, but the game's going to get really boring once I've done all the class stories. Hopefully by then somebody will realise that the story is really what makes this game stand out from every other MMO out there.

[Xilizhra]

That would be great, but require them to actually support Story Content, which they're not really doing any more :/

 

Why couldn't they have just stuck with "single-player-style game with sort-of multiplayer options" and owned it, rather than trying to be some sort of bizarre MMO-WoW-clone hybrid?

They had to learn a lesson for themselves. However, if creative energy on TOR is already dying, they might be willing to make KOTOR 3 and undo at least some of the damage.

[BumBoi]

I would be happy if they just added a new companion one male (for me ) and a female one same way they added treek through cartel and let them be gay so then its optional for people that don't want it don't have to get them... I sure it would be easy enough to do and im sure a lot!! of people would buy them... ohh and I know this is the wrong place but some new headbands like aayla secura's would be ace...

[Tatile]

They had to learn a lesson for themselves. However, if creative energy on TOR is already dying, they might be willing to make KOTOR 3 and undo at least some of the damage.

 

Like undoing "canon" dude Revan?

[Rabenschwinge]

1. Kira

2. Temple

3. Kira

4. Vette

5. Kira

6. Mako

7. Kira

8. Kaliyo

9. Kira

10. Quinn

11. Kira

12. Talos

13. Kira

14. Akaavi

15. Kira

16. Elara

and of course, 17. Kira.

 

(Can you tell that I really like Kira and that my Sentinel is dying to get in her robes?)

 

Strange, I somehow got the impression there is a recurring character there. ^^ Well, in my case it really is. Ahem, well I hate to make things complicated by naming a non-companion character but I'll have to say "Watcher 2".

[copperjack]

Like undoing "canon" dude Revan?

 

Canon male Revan was really only necessary for the books, which were kind of weird anyway. I wish they had stuck with what Obsidian did for KotOR 2 and let you choose the gender/alignment of Revan and the Exile. It would have only required a few more lines of dialogue and an extra character model each. I suppose that might still leave the issue of race, but that's what hoods and masks are for.

[Tatile]

Canon male Revan was really only necessary for the books, which were kind of weird anyway. I wish they had stuck with what Obsidian did for KotOR 2 and let you choose the gender/alignment of Revan and the Exile. It would have only required a few more lines of dialogue and an extra character model each. I suppose that might still leave the issue of race, but that's what hoods and masks are for.

 

If their character creation wasn't as restrictive as it is, they could have had a very androgynous body, and a modulated voice from the mask, and therefore have avoided any need for going "Revan is dude". But, you know. if you can't tell men and women apart from staring at the chest area, Straight Male Gamers might get scared

[Xilizhra]

Like undoing "canon" dude Revan?

Well, for that, they'd also have to undo Satele Shan. I might be biased because I've never played any KOTOR games, but I kind of like Satele.

 

I would suggest the possibility that Bastila could be impregnated with some kind of altered cellular material from a female Revan's body, but Juhani was the F/F option there, not Bastila.

[Tatile]

Well, for that, they'd also have to undo Satele Shan. I might be biased because I've never played any KOTOR games, but I kind of like Satele.

 

I would suggest the possibility that Bastila could be impregnated with some kind of altered cellular material from a female Revan's body, but Juhani was the F/F option there, not Bastila.

 

I'm sure in 300 years Bastilla and Revan could have become a couple during KOTOR 3 or what-have-you.

 

Or it could have been a non-romantic agreement. Kind of like being a donor parent.

[copperjack]

Well, for that, they'd also have to undo Satele Shan. I might be biased because I've never played any KOTOR games, but I kind of like Satele.

 

I would suggest the possibility that Bastila could be impregnated with some kind of altered cellular material from a female Revan's body, but Juhani was the F/F option there, not Bastila.

 

They could have just made Satele only descended from Bastila. Or played up the speculation around Revan's life more, so nobody really knows what the heck went on.

[Xilizhra]

I'm sure in 300 years Bastilla and Revan could have become a couple during KOTOR 3 or what-have-you.

 

Or it could have been a non-romantic agreement. Kind of like being a donor parent.

Whatever, just dump the Austin team for whatever the next project happens to be. In terms of gender politics, it probably won't be worse.

[Tatile]

Whatever, just dump the Austin team for whatever the next project happens to be. In terms of gender politics, it probably won't be worse.

 

Yeah, I have to be honest, if I see any Austin writer other than Mr. Freed on a project in the future, I won't exactly have my hopes up.

[Xilizhra]

Yeah, I have to be honest, if I see any Austin writer other than Mr. Freed on a project in the future, I won't exactly have my hopes up.

Do you think they will do some new KOTOR game regardless? It might be waiting until after DAI comes out and hopefully does well, but still.

[Tatile]

Do you think they will do some new KOTOR game regardless? It might be waiting until after DAI comes out and hopefully does well, but still.

 

I believe those hopes were largely dashed when SWTOR dropped, however EA does have a rather extended licence, so they might go back to the single-player model. It might depend on how successful DAI is - one hopes that if a KOTOR3 is made, it won't be the Austin crew working on it.

[Xilizhra]

I believe those hopes were largely dashed when SWTOR dropped, however EA does have a rather extended licence, so they might go back to the single-player model. It might depend on how successful DAI is - one hopes that if a KOTOR3 is made, it won't be the Austin crew working on it.

DAI seems to be do-or-die for Bioware, and I really hope they don't overthink everything and screw things up that way.