Games like to reflect on reality and how it maybe represented to you. Games from Bioware give a great example of representing life. The hardships, the friendships and most importantly, Love. Their love representation are very happy and moving, making fan favorite/loveable characters dateable. Most games tried to replicate this just as Bioware did, but somewhat didn't hit the mark that Bioware did. The games that really wanted this to be done was Fallout and Elder Scrolls from today. Hello Wandering Traveler and welcome to this thought blog.
The first thing I'd like to talk about is Elder Scrolls' version of love. The game didn't have marriage as far as I know, until Skyrim. Although, this game seemed like a test of how they would make marriage in future games of either the same title or separate titles since it had little to know reason to love this character you want to marry.
The reason were mostly: because he/she was pretty, because they seemed to be good fit for the player, or because everyone else was didn't notice you. Why couldn't Senpai notice me? Anyways, if you didn't know, this isn't how marriage works. You can earn someone's trust and take care of a person, but that doesn't mean instant marriage. And to add to this, most of the characters didn't have a personality. Most of the time, all you know about them was that you beat them in a fist fight for 200 gold. The characters weren't very alive. They had a role in the game as an NPC, but little to no character development was shown to most of the characters.
Serana, on the other hand, was the only character I could name that had the most character development and was titled the most interesting and most married character in the game. She had a back story, a personality and a reason to like her other than her beauty. She despised her father's actions, she loves and misses her mother, she wishes to be normal and wants to be cured from her vampiric curse. All that was know from beginning to end of the DLC, Dawnguard. You can actually cure her curse, resolve her problems with her father and reunite her with her mother in the Soul Cairn and marry her. Probably the most dynamic character development in the game, by far.
Fallout has done this back in Fallout 2, making the game to be the first game have same sex marriage. Although, it was ignored at the time, because people at the time still thought it was weird thing to think about or do. But the game didn't explore some character development on most characters, leaving the player to rely on looks and attitude.
In Fallout 4's reveal, the game introduced something I'd like to call Buddy development. SInce the people you could hire for a companion had real distinct personalities, you could relate to almost any of them. You could understand the troubles of Nick while you either destroy the wastes with Maccready or rebuild it with Piper.
Fallout explored how knowing your love, making it more of an interactive thing. You can disappoint them and you can impress them. And if you didn't want to love this character and only want to be friends, the game set only one dialogue option as a love interest. Having the character love you in certain way is something very hard to perfect, that seemed only Bioware could accomplish. Although, the dialogue options can be a downer when talking to them, but at least they made love or friendship a major goal for the player.
This is all I have to say, but what do you think about the love interest in both games? Were they sloppy on their delivery? Or were they more dynamic than other games in the past? You can tell me in the comments, but as usual...
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