relationships with npc's for example: hate, friend, love

can totally flip the game from good to awsome. i think that relationships would be something that skyrim can highly benefit from.
it could be optional, and i am not suggesting six or nudity.
but good old fashion friendly relationships, more so than oblivion, but not to the point where the game gets an AO rating.
you should be able to choose how far you want to go with a relationship: keep it at friends or something a little more personal.

Too Fable-like for me. And like M'Aiq says:
"People always enjoy a good fable. M'aiq has yet to find one, though. Perhaps one day."

Todd said something about NPCs who are your "friends" acting like it more this time around. For example if you show up at their house randomly, they won't demand you leave for trespassing, but will ask if there's something you need, assuming a dire situation if you show up in the middle of the night.

Huh. I didn't know Fable invented romance and human interaction. Go figure.

Nope, but they're the ones who epically failed in implementing it into a RPG.

How can having a relationship with a NPC make the game totally super awesome and better then without it? Companions are enough, this isn't Fable. And a looooot of people are gonna disagree with this bud, since most commentors on topics like these hate the idea of romance, IF that's what you're suggesting (You need to clarify your topic more.)

Or game breaker.

well there is the radiant quest thing that can make you "assassinate an NPC you spend a lot of time with" and that might mean NPCs you are friends with. but im not sure bliviongate:

I completely agree.


I remember I had one of the members from the KotN follow me around, he came with me everywhere and on all my adventures and helped alot.

But one day an oblivion gate popped up outside the temple and me and him went in.

We got halfway through then one of those fire land-mines popped up in slow motion I swear (lol) and hit him right in the face.

To me it was an epic moment where my pixel friend died after all our adventures :violin:

Lol @ violin.

But seriously, friends, if not done cheesily, can be great and make a game!

I'm more into "relationship" & character development stuff in more linear, story-oriented RPGs (like Bioware stuff), rather than in TES-like open world games. So I didn't miss that stuff in MW, OB, or FO3. Different game style, to me.

I know, right?

The Sims was released in 2000. Fable was released in 2004.

***

I think relationships are important. Fable tended to inject everything with a double dose of humor, so you couldn't take things very seriously. If we look at the way Fable deals with relationships, of course you're not going to want them in the game, however if we look at the way the Sims deals with relationships, perhaps its not looking so bad after all.

Take jobs for example. In the sims, not only does managing your skills help you earn a promotion but your relationship with your co-workers also plays a factor. As you progress up the career chain it becomes the other way around -- however your co-workers will notice if you starting svcking up to your boss so you have to try to please everyone.

All that social interaction causes you to lose control of your Sim and it becomes much harder and challenging to balance advancing skills, along with daily necessities.


Thats just one example i drew from the game. I'm sure we could use more!

I've used Game Maker and I don't remember any relationships.

But Skyrim doesn't need that to be a great game. I play most games to avoid social interaction, real or virtual

Actually it was one of the only sucessful things about Fable.

Dragon age did relationships with your partners infinitely better though in my opinion.

Definitely.

You can already have relationships in Skyrim. It's been confirmed for a while. It's called being friends.

There's no intimate relationship and hey, we already have a topic about Romance and one about Families that are still active. How about we go there instead?

I don't really want romantic relationships in TES (and the Anassi (sp?) thing in MW didn't really count) - but previous TES games have felt a bit lonely, and in that respect it would be good if you could build up friendships with people, so that their reactions to you would change if you spent time with them and helped them out and if interactions were a bit more dynamic on that front I certainly wouldn't complain.

I've posted something relative on a different thread. It would actually contribute better on this one than the other.

update- here is is:

No relationships aren't a game maker it's called dispostion and it's associated with Speechcraft. You have a high dispostion with certain NPC you'll get bonuses but that'll be the end of it.

You make good points. In essence, I agree.

This is something I've brought up a lot, but I think it's one of the most salient issues when discussing immersion in fiction. A lot of people can't be drawn into it unless there are characters that serve as an anchor. A world is as much the people as the places in it, and they're often what you most remember as you walk away. I'm just not sure "Yeah, but this is the Elder Scrolls!" is an excuse, honestly, when world-building is so integral to the setting--politics and factions simply would not exist without the characters behind them.

I can't express the degree to which Julan Kaushibael positively affected my time with Morrowind and, going forward, this is something I would be elated to see the series embrace, or it's going to remain impersonal. I'm not of the opinion it's something that would appeal to a niche, either, considering that companions in BioWare titles often serve as one of their selling points. It's an objective upgrade to have a better cast. All there is to it.

...That said, I'm sure a lot of fans feel it would draw resources away from the meat and potatoes, and I can respect that. But I still agree with the TC that relationships (not in a romantic sense) would dramatically improve the experience. Assuming the TC isn't referring to Fable-style relationships anyway, heh, because I'm not sure those would really add much for any demographic.

Agreed. I think the TES games have been sorely lacking in any real in-depth character interaction, which makes a good game great, or a great game the best (KOTOR!). Sadly, I feel there will be even less in Skyrim based on what we've heard. We'll see.

I corrected that title for you... Seriously, the set up of every Elder Scrolls game today... relationships just won't work and shouldn't be done, you'd either have to go the dragon age route (what considering companions sound like they aren't going to be indepth characters is just extremely unlikely) or the fable route (11 wifes and 3 husbands!!!! woo). Either way the relationships become nothing more then (a word that would likely be censored), it just doesn't work on these kinda games properly.



M'aiq's words are still right today too.



If you think KOTOR is one of the best games, I'd have to massively disagree with you. Personally straight up I think Half-Life 2 is probably the best game to have ever seen the light of day so far and that did not have in-depth character interaction at all. KOTOR was a good game, don't get me wrong, it had a fantastic plot and was well executed, but I don't think it's one of the best, games or even RPGs for that matter. Added to that the "relationships" in KOTOR really were not game makers, it'd have been just as great without them in my honest opinion. This said TES is not in the same position as KOTOR, KOTOR while it had customization had a solid backstory for the character and setting, it is different to the mentality of the, TES series what gives generally very little backstory on your character (other then generally starting in prison of course).

I think there should be more rewards for having characters earn a high disposition with your character. Asking for more favors, telling a little secret about themselves, and giving gifts would all be awesome reasons to make a high speechcraft character instead of POTATO FACE IS PLEASED. The whole relationship thing to improve character depth is a little wrong in my opinion, Vivec, Dagoth Ur, Lucien Lachance, Grey Prince and a bunch other people made me sympathize, hate and overall appreciate their complexity of their personalities despite the fact that i could not go out for ladies night/ romance/ find out about their vampire dad that totally makes them ashamed( o wait :rofl: )