Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback "Romance" Toggle Option

I know there's a lot of back and forth about the romance in this game between those both for and against it, but for myself I'm far more interested in the story itself rather than any potential romances. Rather than be forced into situations that make many of us uncomfortable, it would be nice if there were an additional option that allowed us to turn off any dialogue options and cut scenes that relate to romance or it's potential thereof. This way everyone gets what they want and we can all enjoy the game the way we want to. Those who wish to partake in the various options available can be free to go as far as they want, while those of us who do not can just focus on the parts we bought the game for.

It's kind of like suggesting there should be a battle toggle for those of us who bought this game for anything other than combat. Mods may be able to help you, but I think the developers including a Romance toggle sounds ludicrous. I agree the paths that determine whether or not companions are coming onto Tav need much more attention.

Most other games handle this by making all romantic paths and options be distinctly and firmly player-initiated, and non-present if the player does not make the first move; this is done not from a poor writing or fantasy fulfilment angle, but specifically as a tool to provide exactly what you're asking for - the ability for players to engage with or not engage with content that may be unappealing or uncomfortable to them, while still making it a natural and smoothly present element for those who are interested in it, knowing that the latter will be the majority to *some* degree. There's a reason it's been a standard tool used in RPGs across this genre and others for decades.

Larian either don't know, or don't care about this, and haven't availed themselves of it... and the result is that there is no clear player-first initiation of any romance, and no pathways that pursue positive relations with your companions without diving headlong into full romance and physical intimacy... The fact that they released a game where you cannot have positive relations with your companions without jumping in the sack with them, and cannot turn them down without basically being the worst kind of arsehole to them, regardless of the character you're playing... That is the most ludicrous thing here, I feel. Friendly companions and trusted commrades should be the *Default* outcome of positive relations with your allies and companions, with romantic attachment being something specifically moved towards outside of that... instead we've got a game where the former isn't really even possible, or so it seems in many cases.

Thats because for Larian having sex is one of their primary marketing methods to create hype and to distract from the companions being rather shallow. So of course having sex and the way to it is the default companion interaction.
From Larians point of view just being friends with a companion is a failure state. Better luck next time.

My husband decided to stop playing because of how pushy all the companions were about wanting to jump his Tav so quickly. He doesn't care for romancing in games and was so uncomfortable with it, it completely put him off playing BG3. Having a little comment in the beginning/end of the dialogue option in brackets like [Initiates Romance] and [Locks Romance] seems like such an easy thing they could've done like how they let us know what skill check is being used (Wisdom for example) or if it's an Illithid power option.

A Romance toggle option seems like too much to implement/would cause a lot of issues, but how hard would it have been for them to make it clear which choices lead to romance when they were already adding the Illithid power ones. I don't like comparing games and studios but I'm 99% sure Bioware did this for DA Inquisition. Larian really should've let Romance be a Player-initiated thing, especially with how rude the Rejection options are. I wouldn't need to reject every single follower if that was the case and feel bad about it every time.

This was actually where the conversation over at https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=906245#Post906245 started, and folk are welcome to discuss there.

I’m just going to lock this thread to cut down on duplicate discussion and saving us having to retread the same ground again.

Edit: Actually I’ve reconsidered. Perhaps it is good to have a thread where we can specifically discuss opting out of romance altogether, either by means of a toggle or by some other game-related mechanism (eg making all romances player initiated via clear dialogue options). As long as we stick to that here, rather than venturing into romance more generally which is best covered elsewhere, I’ll leave this open for now.

I recall an Astarion scene where he's hypothesizing over whose blood would taste best and you can indicate your preference of which companion interested your MC.

It would do a world of good if each companion subtly sounded out MC's preferences before taking the bold step of propositioning them.

Probably not hard at all since there is a mod that does this, with the help of script extender. It's been a blessing to have it to avoid unwanted flirting, etc.

I would be totally fine if they had made it where romance was player initiated. That's the most natural way to do it, and it basically does the same thing as a toggle option. You avoid saying or doing anything that might make the NPC think you're coming on to them and you never have to worry about it.

However, they've already created the scripts to have the characters act the way they do, and I would imagine it's probably easier to just create a toggle that turns off anything they've marked as "romance" rather than completely redo all the dialogue to make it all player initiated rather than coming from the NPC's. Only they really know that, though.

"Romance toggles" should be within the game world. Not with MODS.
The problem here is the Larian style toggles are not really toggles. Everything is forcibly pushed without having OPTIONS to go a friendship route for example. That would be a good "toggle". Or a clean NO, and keep it at that for romances without it meaning I HATE YOU.

I prefer everything about BG2's romance and friendship system. Its simple and effective and works within the world. Its really good icing on the cake and fleshes out the lore and world. In BG3 ITS the cake and more...sticks out like...

Yep please just let us toggle of this stuff.