Now let's pretend we're not playing a single player game where your character is The Chosen One - but we're playing a game of DnD, guided through a story by a GM. We all have our own characters, but why should only one of us at the table get to feel special? IMHO, to capture that DnD experience, the companions represent the other players - and to go through this particular story, you can experience the story as your own character or as one of them.
“I want better content for custom characters and companions to be better at being companions” = The Chosen One narrative.
Those are not the same things ad aren’t directly related. Bioware’s solution to adapting team based was creating Hero’s Journey for our PC.
That hasn’t changed in D:OS1&2 or BG3 - it is still Hero’s Journey and Chosen One story, try just added Highlander on top of that - can’t say for sure it will develop same way for BG3 but it sure looks like that.
Here are the problems that I see:
1) Playable Character, be it customisable or predetermined, is still written, designed and characterised by developers.
No matter how much “freedom” players are given, that freedom is always finite, especially in dialogues which are hand made and not systemic. We can judge a “good RPG” protagonists from different angles - how well they hook players to the story, how wide range of expressions do they support, do they support various player playstyles. BG1&2, PoE1&2, Fallout1&2 New Vegas - all those protagonist were written and to some extend defined - some allow for wider choice then others, and offer finer reactivity to choices picked by the player, but there has been writers and designers hand behind those characters developing well. We might get to decide to be compassionate, selfish, cruel and more, but it is writers skill that makes those characters come to life and become memorable.
Then we have pre-determined characters - Shepard, Geralt. They allow for tighter and more focused story, and require completely different kind of writing. They need to communicate their personality and objectives to the player and be likeable, relatable enough to get players on board.
The point is: a good custom character and good pre-made character requires completely different approach.
BG3, just like D:OS2, risk of being pretty shit in both regards - majority of content written for playable characters will be reused by both customs and all of the origins. It doesn’t serve to characterise our PC based on our preferences, nor does it convey personality o pre-made characters. By all accounts Larian’s writing is dry - and it has to be.
2) Similarly, needs of a playable character and companions are similarly different. Good quests for the player are different from good companion quests.
You can have a wide range of narratives - having companions be our equals, or even more powerful (like NPCs in Gothics) is cool! But that idea is not well done in BG3. I do think that the fact that their entire shtick is up before you start the game does hurt them. I can imagine universe in which Astarion would be a compelling companion - but his characterisation is as deep as startup screen “he is evil, vampires spawn with revenge”. As a playable character it is a jump of point for you to fill using bland dialogue choices aimed to provide utility and as little definition as possible. Will his writing as a companion manage to add some depth? So much it doesn’t seem so. No layers to peel, no discoveries to make. Just extra moments reminding you of his elevator pitch. Frankly, that’s BG1 quality of character depth, and introductory quest and custom barks would achieve more or less the same.
