I'm perfectly aware of Hollywood and bestselling book formulas, but I don't think this applies to niche things like PF:K. You are on a niche forum where deviance is not only celebrated but expected, otherwise we wouldn't get our RPGs ever. If everyone followed the formulas, we would only get the most popular genres atm, which are definitely not what we want, so I think that argument fails. If you are arguing that they should stick to tried and true things if they aren't sure of what they are doing, then I agree. I much more prefer them write traditional fairy-tale-like companions than trying to be deep like PoE1 and DF and failing, but I don't think Owlcat have failed at what they are trying to do with the companions, at least up to now, I have to play more to see where all of this is going to go. Most people failing to recognize what a character is about is not the writer's fault, at least if it's true that most people hate Valerie. Maybe they should've given her a better build, or at least not equip her with a tower shield, so she makes a better mechanical impression at first, but that's a bit different. Owlcat may have falsely assumed most people playing PF:K would be familiar with at least D&D 3E and would know that a tower shield at level 1 is not the best idea.
As for Valerie's character, what I'm saying isn't her arc, this is extrapolated from literally the first dialogue with her after the bandits attack Oleg's. If there is anything people should take away from this conversation is not to take a character at their word and that there may be hidden currents. This is the same with the Viconia thread, where some people trust her unconditionally without realizing she might be lying about everything or she might not be telling the whole truth, and also not taking into account her blatant approval of evil acts when determining whether she is evil or not. I do agree Valerie isn't very "relatable" with the whole "I'm too beautiful for this world" thing, but I don't hold relatability of a character in high regard or as a very important quality. I.e. people should change their criteria so they can appreciate more stuff. (Good) Taste is cultivated, not inborn.
I was on another thread the other day re. PF:K and I mused that, while objectively speaking the game is
horrifically PC, for some reason it doesn't bother me as much as in some other similarly-infested games (which might even have
less ostensible PC cult nonsense in them).
And I think that's because the writing in PF:K is actually ... well, dare I say it, actually
quite good, with the degeneracy of the characters woven into the story in actually quite a thoughtful way, or at the very least a way that makes sense in context, doesn't pull me out of immersion.
I further mused that this might be the difference between something being written by someone who's a
genuine pervert, versus something written by someone who's only doing their quota of corporate box-ticking for the day. Or to put it even more succinctly: the difference between writing driven by enthusiasm and writing driven by fear.
Another way of looking at it is that the PC aspects of PF:K don't come across as
preachy. The characters just are who they are, it doesn't feel like they're there
specifically to teach us heathens a lesson or finger-wag at us. It feels like someone just wants to tell their stories.
