About the companions, I honestly don't get all the vitriol. Are they perfect? Not in the least, but they are not as bad as some people claim here either. For example, I personally detest Camelia (for obvious reasons) and I decided to stop her in her personal quest even if that meant losing her as a companion, but that doesn't mean I consider her a bad character that damages the game. Quite the contrary, because she's certainly something you don't expect in a CRPG. And this is true for many other companions in the game. And let's be honest, the likes of Viconia (and I love her btw) Jaheira and even Minsc were not such great characters from a literary standing point, yet most of us remember them fondly.
It would have been no problem if there was a variety of likeable and unlikable personalities, but in WotR all companions fall into either "detestable" or "annoying" categories. No single character I would have liked to have as a friend if they were living in real life. Regarding the older characters in BG2, I've never looked at those characters in terms of writing, they always existed as combat companions because every single quest in BG2 had to be solved by hitting someone on the head. But I cannot say that all of them were not likeable, but Mincs for me was actually annoying, never liked that hamster nonsense.
I apologise if you already said it and I missed it, but I'd be interested in knowing what you think of BG3's companions from a likeability perspective.
