It seems like there's a number of folks on all sides of this discussion who are falling more into the trap of picking each other apart, than having a directed conversation about a topic; the thread hasn't really covered any new ground in the past two pages, and is drifting more into side topics that some folks are mostly just using to pick and poke at one another. I know it's not my place, but I'd like to encourage all sides of the debate to take a step or two and a breath or two, and focus back in on the opinion you want to voice about the topic at hand, and focus less on trying to tear down people who think or feel otherwise.
The original topic title doesn't help, I admit - it's a bit inflammatory ^.^
Pachanj asked about reasons why they should be there, well for me, several reasons:
- It's a chance to explore an element of my character and define who they are and what they're like in this aspect, and to me that's important. - Similarly, it's a chance to see other characters at personal and intimate moments, and there's a strong element of immersion involved in having the sorts of conversations that only really happen in intimate pillow scenarios, actually in those scenarios, rather than after the fact with all our clothes back on, where it feels out of place or stilted. - The immersion element extends to stepping into the place of my character and (ideally) having some influence over how they act and behave in that scenario - and mentally exploring what they experience during it; imagination always plays an important role here, of course, and does the majority of the heavy lifting, but if it's done well, I appreciate the scaffolding of a scene playing out in the process. - Character direction in intimate sequences also opens up the opportunity for more character customisation in intimate ways; having a complete character and being able to describe many more elements of what that looks like; I personally view this as a positive, though for accessibility, of course, defining your character's intimate details and traits should be optional (in the way that some games do this, it's a check box in character creation that, when you click to enable it, then opens up the related menus and options, but has them not visually existing before you select to engage - I'd like that) - Lastly, because I'm an adult woman and it's a bit of naughty fun, and I really feel like games can be better if they're more comfortable with some naughty fun adult activity as a natural part of the world and lives they build and portray.
All this turns on the supposition, however, that the scenes as they are need to be vastly improved in their atmosphere, pacing, tone and shooting/choreography to really be satisfying in this way - but I genuinely want them improved, and I don't want Larian to back off from his or get scared. I want them to do better, now that they've taken the biggest step of deciding to go all in.
