Statistics showed that 33% of players romanced Gale and conclusion was "he is just that attractive!". I think I can challenge that statement. If anything, he is just "that easy", or "easy to please", to get approval rating. Simple politeness will go far with him (and Will, and Shadowheart, even with Lae'sel) and he never objects of accepting a quest.
On the opposite side of the specter is Astarion - the only way to romance him is to be rude, dismissive, and aggressive towards potential quest-givers. Which a) does not make sense (he is a vampire, hiding his nature, who is also well bred and knows how to behave), b) harmful to the play-through, since you simply loose some quests. I can add c) you have to go the evil route, but that can be seeing as a good thing.
May be it is a good thing that one romance you can only get if you are evil (though majority of the players would never see half the cutscene designed by the studio) but system in general ... probably should be looked into. There are no alternative pathways even for the easier romances - you missed a scene because of pressing on with exploring, you are locked out of the further content. Sure, the exact scheme will be figured out eventually, may be even a mod will be created to set the flags right (do hope so), but that locks you on a certain gameplay, and definitely does not feel as "natural way of building up relationships".
May be different weight for different dialogues/actions would help? More emphasis on personal interactions? I am not sure, but right now relationships is anything but natural.
Hmm, while perhaps "easy to please", Gale certainly seem to have a lot of other issues attached to his romance in terms of bugs (like the weave scene not appearing etc). I mean, I am not really on the hype train nor ditch train for either of the three current male companions - but in all honesty... Neither is really a good fit for my ranger lady so my first playthrough was without romance - I did however try romance options with some secondary characters after that.
Gale is way too self-absorbed - and in difference from Wyll (which suffers from the same problem), he is not even the slightest aware of it. I nearly spat my drink out when I talked to Gale on one of my alt-playthroughs where I romanced Wyll and Gale went all on about how Wyll supposedly is narcissistic. :'] Probably one of my favorite moments ever - I am just sad there was no option to call him out on it.
Astarion may be lacking in more ways than one when it comes to ... The entire evil bit, but at least he is much more honest about it. And, in difference from Wyll and Gale, Astarion is much more approachable - he actually opens up and is surprisingly honest with Tav. Gale and Wyll is much less so, especially Gale.
And finally, I agree that the game gotta adjust the way players can miss interactions by accident because they did not camp frequently enough. There must be some way of fixing that before launch. :]
