I had to think about this; if a companion in BW bugs me, I just don't take them with me as squaddies, so they don't leave much of an impact. Also, even though some of them I may not like as characters, I admire their writing, or what the creators were trying to do. 'Great character, just not my cup of tea'. Leliana is a prime example of this. Good attempt at making a religious, sweet, feminine character who could fight tooth and nail for what she believed in. Just not my thing. Same for ME1's Ashley.
This habit of leaving character that don't click with me back at base explains why I don't particularly dislike ME2's Jacob. I admired the attempt at making an ordinary soldier character, but he just didn't grab me, so I always left him behind. From the sound of it, I'm glad this is the one character in all of BW games I played whose romance I never bothered to complete.
I'd have liked them to tone ME2's Jack way the hell down, but ME3 Jack makes up for it...
The point where it all breaks down is DA2, IMO. I actually love that game and played it through a stupid number of times, but I love it for what I felt they were trying to achieve, not for what their insane deadlines forced them to shit out. I thought it was a great idea to have a hero who's not saving the world, just trying to get ahead in it. But then they used it as an excuse to copy paste the entire game's locations twenty times. Gah, I can run those dungeons blindfold by now. I loved what they were obviously trying to do with the characters, but too many of their storylines were nothing but a hot mess. Prize goes to Merril. She's a great character in concept, a great VA, a great squaddie to take along once you mod her skill line so she's actually useful in a fight, not just to drop lovely little one liners. But her 'story' (I use quotes in utter contempt here) feels like an EA exec greenstamped a few preliminary paragraphs dribbled out by a harried writer and passed it to the devs without once engaging his or her brain. It's nonsense from start to finish, stuffed with plotholes, contrivances, 180s in characterisation, and nonsensical decisions.
Aveline and Varric show that the writers and the game was initially committed to great, diverse, original, strong characters and story arcs. You can feel it during Chapter 1 for every character - even Anders and Fenris have moments where they show different facets to their character. But either the writers don't bother to even the tone in the following chapters, or they just throw a storyline out and run away before the fridge moment sets in. Anders is a prime example. I would have preferred if they'd kept Awakening's Anders, honestly, but I give them props for taking big chances with the character and -
- turning him into a terrorist. That character arc makes sense - I don't like it, but it makes sense, especially if you rival him, and you get a better feel for how his conflict between healer and no-holds-barred-freedom-bent-possessed-lunatic is tearing him apart. However, the target for his piss-and-dragonspit bomb is THE CHANTRY? Why not an orphanage, or a retirement home, or a kitten refuge??
"Don't you see this will make it worse for all mages?" my Hawke very reasonably points out against a backdrop of smoking ruins (while Meredith stands around like a ninny for no conceivable reason).
"We were all dead anyway, now or later, what does it matter," answers Anders.
"Well then why didn't you put the bomb beneath the Gallows, in the tunnels that you know so well? You'd have attacked the templars directly, possibly taken out their loony-tunes Knight Commander as a huge fat bonus, and any mage who survived would have been pitied rather than lynched, or at least would have had a better chance of making it out of Kirkwall since the templars were destroyed. Woudln't that have been a more logical target? Since mages survival and freedom has suddenly dropped to the bottom of your to-do list anyway."
"Oh, damn, you're right!" exclaims Anders. "Why didn't you say anything back when you saw me plant the mysterious payload in the chantry, rather than accept my evasive and ominous explanations?"
"I tried to," growls Hawke, "but I didn't have that conversation option. I went twenty times around the Chantry trying to find what any first-grade chemistry student would know is a bomb, but it must have been behind one of the painted-on doors. Even telling Cullen about it can't get it found for some daft reason. At least if you'd planted the bomb beneath the Gallows, I would have assumed you were aiming something at the templars and not asked as many questions. In addition, you'd have had a better story reason not to tell me, even if I'm totally pro-mage and anti-chantry, since it would have possibly endangered my sibling as well. That attack is something I could potentially forgive you for, not for blowing up a whole churchful of people whose only crime was to try to make peace instead of stabbing templars in the throat."
"Damn you, writers!" exclaims Anders, and then Sebastian mans up and plugs him with an arrow instead of whining at Hawke to do it or stamping off in a huff.
No wait, that didn't actually happen, did it...
