I hope they take a page from some of the more in-depth companion quest mods like Tears of the Fiend or Ruined Tail's Tale. I absolutely adored the level of work put into these and loved the characters and the personality they all seemed to have.

I was also fond of Malevolent and rather enjoyed my dark, sadistic, twisted evil armor, though it made me do horrible things in the beginning.

Oops, i accidentally put in field instead of fiend

To be honest I think that all this character connections will take away the fact that it is an rpg and you play they way you want that's always been the great thing about elder scrolls games.

I hope they take some cues from Fallout 3 on this one.

I had few really strong connections with anyone from MW or OB, but I had quite a few random characters in F3 who I adored/admired/enjoyed. The reverse is also true, the people I disliked in F3 I tended to feel stronger about as well...

Agreed.

If I want to play Mass Effect or Dragon Age I'll go do that...... I don't need strong connections in my games, I don't want to feel hindered in any way whatsoever. I'm looking out for number one .

Yeah, Agro dying was a shock for me too.

And yes, I want to get attached to characters...thats what characters should do anyway. In Oblivion I got atached to Martin a bit...there was something about his plight that made him kind of solid as a character. Theres no narrative without characters, so I doubt Skyrim will be devoid of memorable charcaters. Maybe Esbern will be interesting, a sort of Mister Miyagi kinda guy.

If I were to get one character to get attached to, it would be me saving a lonely orphan and raising him as a my son (He would be so hard to protect, but perhaps I could raise him to be an epic sidekick).

I couldn't give you a name of a TES character I got attached too. I can give you one from every Final Fantasy from 6-10, but as for Bethesda's games or any open RPG for that matter I would have to say Dogmeat. I got him right away and although he never died we went everywhere and did everything. If I had to choose a second one it would be Liberty Prime. Bless his Anti-Communist China slogan spouting robot heart :wub:

A thousand times yes. It was the connections I felt with the characters that made games like Mass Effect 2 for me

Y'know, I never thought too much about the student-mentor relationships when I was doing my first post. Having that fatherly connection to another character helps establish and maintain a strong relationship to them. And - some people might think me strange for this - especially so if the player character serves as the mentor.

Having a companion that is a cross between your companion and a squire would suit a lot of players. I wouldn't mind having an extra hand to burgle homes with me, on my "dungeon" raids. And especially if that companion has his own problems, story, personality, and thoughts on things.


But as far as relationships go, Ruined-Tail was my absolute best friend in Oblivion.



Sometimes I wish text-based dialogue would make its way back into TES. Text-based dialogue has so much more ability to convey so much more story with so very less disk space needed. It was nice to chat with a completely generic person in Balmora for fifteen good minutes, even though they were generic they still had some interesting dialogue.

Yes, I want to get attached to characters in Skyrim. I don't play RPGs just because of action hack and slash, I want to feel emotions. It doesn't feel right to be a hero and fight if you don't care about anyone.


I agree. Conversations like that really make you think...and the drama.

Ruined-Tail is still my Argonian characters' best friend in Oblivion.

I was attached to the bandits at the dungeon across from the sewers in OB... Of course, it was only because my brother told me they were racist against Redguards (lol)...

What about the main quest? pretty swaying.
Ofcourse it makes you feel attached to that character, but it doesn't mean you don't have choice. What you're saying is that they shouldn't have any convincing brain-washing quests/NPCs because of in TES games you have the choice factor? Even with more in-depth characters you still have it.

Haha yes^
I felt particularly bad when at the end of the main quest, both Jauffre and Bauras had wound up dead at the last battle

I loved everyone in the Cheydinhall Dark Brother Sanctuary...it was so difficult to...you know...

While I do want lots and lots of unique characters whom I can build friendships with, there should also be a few normal people. Not everyone is a Speaker for the Hand of Sithis, if you catch my drift. More unique characters is a good idea, but there should be some normal boring people too. There's a lot of different writing styles that could even an average kid off the streat interesting to talk too. There just are so many npc's in games like Oblivion and Morrowind that its near impossible to give each their own personality. The trick is to not have the player run into 3 Mary Sues on one block corner.

Even peoples disposition changing as time goes on would make people feel unique. Having morning people who are happy to see you even when its only 5am in game, or people who are touchy till they had their nap(like me today). Even if they technically all say the same thing, they may give off a different vibe because of how happy or pissy they are feeling at the moment.

I always did. couldnt help it or not. hell I kept the marines alive in halo for poops sake