That’s not true but even if it were, it’s terrible writing. And as I described subverts any possibility of you bonding with these people. Who in the fucking world would invite a vampire to the place they sleep? After they were effectively kidnapped by aliens? No one.
Anyway you’re distracting from the point because your assertion is absurd. We were cool with stop motion graphics in the 80’s if you used it today, the audience would think ‘oh this scene isn’t supposed to be serious.’ You’re not addressing any of the narrative conflict, you’re just saying “well that’s how it’s always been. Yeah that’s how it was on DOS. You have no point.
It's absolutely true, name me one companion in DnD games (Baldur's Gate 1+2, Neverwinter Nights, etc.) where this wasn't the case and a companion turned out to be something entirely else than they appeared to be late into the game. Even with Yoshimo it was hinted at a LOT by other companions, it was basically right in your face that this guy is working for the big bad.
'Terrible writing' depends a matter of what function the writing serves. It's not a book, not a film, it's a computer RPG. An interactive experience of a specific kind where your decisions about whom you want to experience the story with and what person they are should be informed ones and not let keep players guessing about that foundation for too long.
As for who would invite a vampire to the place they sleep: Turns out a lot of players didn't kill him outright and even let him feed on them. People are strange, aren't they?
Of course, you're free to create your own RPG with lots of companions to choose from, in which, only late in the third act, suddenly all companions make face-heel turns and reveal their *gasp* true colours about who and what exactly they were all along, and joke's on the player if they haven't figured it out before that. By all means, make that kind of game, sounds interesting, just hard to implement in a way that doesn't make players feel dumb and betrayed for not realizing something the game actively withheld from them. I believe you can do this sort of thing in strictly linear storytelling, but not in interactive ones where players choose whom to take along - because then players will always feel "punished" as if they made the "wrong" decision when in fact they had no way of knowing.
