Romance: Quality over quantity, V

[Bullvipunk]

I tend to think if they go for a lost ending expansion they will pick one ending as canon and take atory from there, honestly im not sure id want a mid game story expansion, maybe a few more gigs with some.minor characters story lines but thats not really expansion.

Desperatly need more romance options, as title says it is not more li just better quality interactions to make it more immersive.

Again the simple idea is random tx msgs conversations, dont need va for that, use a tx msg to ask for help and they spawn in to help you until your enter scripted story areas or a vehicle.
Ah the whole apartment issue probably annoys me more than anything on li ingame, wana spend quality time with judy at hers or mine but cant, for all the talk about first person being immersive its the characters that make it so to me.

Again rdr2 free roam post epilogue, playing as john marston , you can spend all day doing chores at home and talking to your partner and son, eat meals,sleep its a great system , just dont get ti drunk infront abigail lol. Something like that would be great with li , even if finished story things like this keep you playing

 

[Guest 4412420]

I tend to think if they go for a lost ending expansion they will pick one ending as canon and take atory from there,

Actually, they wouldn't need to pick one ending at all. Just the ones where V survives. The expansion could start with a short prologue with some slight differences depending on the ending and then tie them all together. For example: V gets approached by someone about a possible cure, or they get an email with some coordinates attached and all would lead to the same place.

 

[Tekashi9]

I think it would be better to have more content with current romances than to create more romance options.
I really doubt that CDPR will be able to create another straight woman on a similar level at Panam, she just perfect.
No piercing. No many tattoos. She has nothing cyber on her body.

The Problem that by adding 1 more option and you would have to create 3 more. And it would take a lot of work to create enough content so you wouldn't be so far behind the others.
Or create 1 bisexual man and woman.
or create a customizable romance option with a story already defined with the same tool that you create V. And then you could make the character look like you prefer.

In her concept art she had her hair let down, as well as a lip piercing. Could be an alternate outfit in the future, just sayin'.

And while she has no exterior cybernetic upgrades, she does in fact have leg implants.

All that said though, I agree. It's better for them to improve the existing romances rather than to add new ones. They'll never be on par with the current ones simply because they would always be added on, possibly through an expansion or DLC and not connected the same way the vanilla ones are.

We need to strengthen the content with the current ones, not spend resources on new ones that will have less then the ones we already have. Like the thread title says, it's quality over quantity. There's a huge gap between the final Panam quest and the ending that needs to be filled. It's almost criminal how you finally begin the romance after all that buildup, and she goes to a basic npc who sits in one spot and only has one new piece of dialogue for hours until the final mission.

Post automatically merged: Jan 13, 2021

Great topic. Hopefully someone from CDPr sees it, reads all of it, and steps are taken.

One of the lead devs was asking people what they wanted to see. Said he was spending a lot of time reading feedback. May be worth tweeting this thread to him for those with social media. Don't leave it to chance. CDPR is one of the few devs who actually listen. They added nearly 10 minutes of new romance content for Triss in a Witcher 3 patch for free after fan feedback. Just gotta let them know what we'd like to see. I would, but don't have an account lol. Here's the tweet though -

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1348195569362198529

 

[LordGavus]

I'll throw my thoughts on the pile, even though I'm just repeating others.

I definitely think the romances need to be expanded. It doesnt have to be anything major, but a few little things would make a huge difference.
I'm team Judy but this would be typical for all.

Let Judy move around the apartment, even it its just cycling between that damn window, desk, pc and kitchen.
Let players interact with the furniture, should be able sit on the couch or sleep over.
Let them accompany V on missions. Block them from main mission stuff if needed, but a companion system would be great.

I think these are 3 simple additions that would make a huge difference. And all this stuff appears to be in game already.

I'd love more dialogue and some repeatable missions too, and hopefully this will come with DLC, but the above should be fairly simple to add.

 

[Strangeroous]

CDPR please hear this out! Considering Judy and Panam are the two most popular characters in the game (I made a post asking people they were tied for 1st with Johnny coming in 3rd, along with what I see on reddit and from YouTubers alike) PLEASE! Give us more content with them, Kerry and River.

Panam was HANDS DOWN the best part of the game for me and after I finished her questline in what was probably like 2 hours the rest of my playthrough felt kinda empty. Especially considering that after I finished her short questline, she basically becomes a mannequin with only the same 3 things to say and no way to interact with her. You guys made amazing characters with amazing stories and super fun quests, please give us more of them and less Regina Jones!!!!!

Honestly this post is amazing, thank you for making it so pretty and really explaining everything clearly!

I also finished her questline in no time ... And I also felt empty... I just really hope that they'll "ressurect" them and make some good updates about friends or partners... I already shared my opinion and talked about this so I won't repeat myself ... but it's true what you said....

 

[Sarah_Nie_en]

I think it's realistic that they will add improved relationships and I hope new relationships with a dlc. The story of the basic game plays in a few weeks and V's main goal is to survive. It would fit to the story if they give us more options for dating when V is searching for a cure. I still hope for Takamura and Hanako as love interest, if you choose the Arasaka ending. Mitch would be great options when you play the nomad ending. And for the Path of Glory Vik could be a love interest. I agree, they need to improve the relationships, but at the moment I'm Single due to lack of options and that's frustrating.

 

[TigerOnCatnip]

I don't know why there are romances added to games that are meant to be....doomed. I miss my River. I got so invested in my romance with River that my real self just pretty much got heart-broken when it abruptly died. I mean c'mon. I played with his niece and nephew for fuck's sake AND shared a meal with him and his family. I SAVED HIS OTHER NEPHEW! *huff puff* Doesn't all that account for something? Okay. Butthurt aside, I truly believe that if there are going to be romances in ANY game, that they should also be expanded upon. Kinda like they are with you throughout the rest of the game. A body needs some rough lovins (and not just with the Joytoy of your choice) after a day of maiming and dismemberment. Even something more intimately meaningful at that. Some kisses, hand holding, etc......I was cruising around doing side gigs when I had the thought of how cool it would be to pick something up for my man that he'd appreciate. A gift to show your affection and blahblahblah. I want to sleep in 'our' bed and wake up with him ready to 'start' the day. Definitely more physical interactions would be wonderful to boot. All that aside, I truly hope they add to the romance part(s). I can't even drag a doll to my house and tie him up to the bed. In the meantime, though, I am really enjoying the game otherwise. I am in it every day. This go round I am taking it slower and I STILL have so much to do before I wanna get to endgame.

 

[PoppyRunner]

I don't know why there are romances added to games that are meant to be....doomed. I miss my River. I got so invested in my romance with River that my real self just pretty much got heart-broken when it abruptly died. I mean c'mon. I played with his niece and nephew for fuck's sake AND shared a meal with him and his family. I SAVED HIS OTHER NEPHEW! *huff puff* Doesn't all that account for something? Okay. Butthurt aside, I truly believe that if there are going to be romances in ANY game, that they should also be expanded upon. Kinda like they are with you throughout the rest of the game. A body needs some rough lovins (and not just with the Joytoy of your choice) after a day of maiming and dismemberment. Even something more intimately meaningful at that. Some kisses, hand holding, etc......I was cruising around doing side gigs when I had the thought of how cool it would be to pick something up for my man that he'd appreciate. A gift to show your affection and blahblahblah. I want to sleep in 'our' bed and wake up with him ready to 'start' the day. Definitely more physical interactions would be wonderful to boot. All that aside, I truly hope they add to the romance part(s). I can't even drag a doll to my house and tie him up to the bed. In the meantime, though, I am really enjoying the game otherwise. I am in it every day. This go round I am taking it slower and I STILL have so much to do before I wanna get to endgame.

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I didnt romance river but it was clear that river romance needed more love you def spent more time with panam /judy than him, i dont even know what it does choosing the good ending

 

[ContactFront]

Would pay for DLC to add more of this stuff some of the people here are talking about. No doubt about it.

 

[Strangeroous]

I don't know why there are romances added to games that are meant to be....doomed. I miss my River. I got so invested in my romance with River that my real self just pretty much got heart-broken when it abruptly died. I mean c'mon. I played with his niece and nephew for fuck's sake AND shared a meal with him and his family. I SAVED HIS OTHER NEPHEW! *huff puff* Doesn't all that account for something? Okay. Butthurt aside, I truly believe that if there are going to be romances in ANY game, that they should also be expanded upon. Kinda like they are with you throughout the rest of the game. A body needs some rough lovins (and not just with the Joytoy of your choice) after a day of maiming and dismemberment. Even something more intimately meaningful at that. Some kisses, hand holding, etc......I was cruising around doing side gigs when I had the thought of how cool it would be to pick something up for my man that he'd appreciate. A gift to show your affection and blahblahblah. I want to sleep in 'our' bed and wake up with him ready to 'start' the day. Definitely more physical interactions would be wonderful to boot. All that aside, I truly hope they add to the romance part(s). I can't even drag a doll to my house and tie him up to the bed. In the meantime, though, I am really enjoying the game otherwise. I am in it every day. This go round I am taking it slower and I STILL have so much to do before I wanna get to endgame.

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This is exactly what I think ... I completely agree with you ... I hope they'll improve romances a lot !

 

[Tekashi9]

I didnt romance river but it was clear that river romance needed more love you def spent more time with panam /judy than him, i dont even know what it does choosing the good ending

From what I understand you have to choose the Afterlife ending to stay with both River or Kerry.

 

[Lonewolf0071701]

My charter dated Panam [Awesome character] and after her questline was done it seemed like she is no longer around. I hope that the dev's will add in the option to hangout, go on dates and add booty calls every few hours real time with repeatable missions you could take her on like street racing ect. Maybe officially introduce her to v's inner circle [Mama Wells ,victor and to Misty ect ] at a big party at v's place or at a restaurant. As for friends like Judy, River and Rouge ect maybe just chill have pizza party's ,play pool drinks and darts and just hang outI am just saying things like this make the game worth playing a lot longer I think.

 

[Strangeroous]

My charter dated Panam [Awesome character] and after her questline was done it seemed like she is no longer around. I hope that the dev's will add in the option to hangout, go on dates and add booty calls every few hours real time with repeatable missions you could take her on like street racing ect. Maybe officially introduce her to v's inner circle [Mama Wells ,victor and to Misty ect ] at a big party at v's place or at a restaurant. As for friends like Judy, River and Rouge ect maybe just chill have pizza party's ,play pool drinks and darts and just hang outI am just saying things like this make the game worth playing a lot longer I think.

Yeah ... This is exactly what I want .... I hope that they'll add it to the game... And I also think that they should add an option where you can choose one of your friend (requires good relationship etc.) to help you with your missions like Jackie in the first missions.

 

[LordGavus]

Absolutely. How good would it be to be able to call up your LI or friend and get them to come with you on side gigs.
Honesty they wouldn't even have to help that much. Just would be cool to have more things to do with them.

 

[HeWhoWobbles]

I've already made my feelings on this clear, whilst I agree with much of what is said I still remain whole hearted on what I experienced and sadly that's something for me at least was a one time opportunity and cannot be returned, I do however hold true hope for other content that may prove better for others, I respect many believe what is told to them is of what was intended but that's something everyone should determine for themselves, and for me I remain unconvinced but again, I hold true respect for the actual creative process.

I will say for a game with alternate endings I find it strange that alternate romances isn't treated as equally available, it seems rather counter productive from a narrative stance and if honest I'm unsure if that can be purely based on the writing but rather down to direction, perhaps what I'm trying to say is, this could have been better planned dimensionally speaking.

 

[Trinixy]

My charter dated Panam [Awesome character] and after her questline was done it seemed like she is no longer around. I hope that the dev's will add in the option to hangout, go on dates and add booty calls every few hours real time with repeatable missions you could take her on like street racing ect. Maybe officially introduce her to v's inner circle [Mama Wells ,victor and to Misty ect ] at a big party at v's place or at a restaurant. As for friends like Judy, River and Rouge ect maybe just chill have pizza party's ,play pool drinks and darts and just hang outI am just saying things like this make the game worth playing a lot longer I think.

Absolutely. How good would it be to be able to call up your LI or friend and get them to come with you on side gigs.
Honesty they wouldn't even have to help that much.

Thank you for both posts, make sure to mention them going forward in threads, many people have expressed similar wishes and they find obvious approval right away. However there are counterpoints to be made to them which were voiced on the forum, consider maybe taking them into account. And they serve well to address quality concerns that might appear from their implementation. Here are some of them:

• Taking LI with you on any random quest or gig, drive them in your car or simply have them follow around would at some point reduce them to a basic companion that only becomes as interesting as the repeatable voice lines they would provide during our time in the field, once these are exhausted you run the risk of having them be annoying or overbearing
• A LI on the field with V will quickly become very predictable, and even if that was to the players advantage in terms of planning gameplay, the character would soon see them as nothing more than an NPC that executes its patterns. And an invincible/invisible LI would damage immersion more than the occasional T-pose
• The LI and friends while being options to follow V would at this point only act the same way, borrowing same animations and provide fire support or take the heat of the bullets, making them tactically useless in their diversity and only counting for their voiced lines of dialogue as the real value
• Any repeatable hangout or date runs the risk of being spammed out of charm by the player. The repeatable nature of it would demand that they are diversified by location and type and time to the point where it would take up so much development time to structure each, for every character, that its implementation with quality in mind has to provide insane quantity that would gut anything else in terms of development

So the main concern is the risk of making romance characters more of an NPC than they are currently. Since they are already so well defined and true to life in many ways due to their presentation in the questlines which they drive forward and shape, they would run the risk of having that agency taken away from them if they move too far away from that path. Which is essentially the case currently with them relegated to few line and cemented in one spot. And while for many of us simply seeing them do something more would already be a huge improvement, we can still offer some remedies for future problems.

• The only few ways to maybe make the repeatable dates not fall into a spammable loop would be for each one to change location and dialogue, time gate them, however even that has its limitations. So at some point, you would be submitting yourself to going on a drive, to a spot with your LI and subjecting yourself to something you have already been tru for possibly 20 minutes at a time. I doubt anyone would want to go tru it again and again past a certain point. This is why I can't for the life of me find a way for repeatable content with romances to work without insane quantity of dialogue and variations. I fear it would not contribute to character growth in the long run. There are better solutions. If anyone has a solution for them in terms of growth that would work without insane quantity of variation, please share.
• Dates or similar events with our LI should ideally be triggered by them, through call or text. Giving them again choice of time and place and having them be equally engaged in its execution as we are. Our input should be our choice of dialogue that would push their growth and make the relationship more intimate. Similar to how it was done now up until we started the relationship.
• The casual dates should be 2 or 3 max, and side quests with our LI in between them. That way we push the narrative development of the relationship as well as reward it with intimate moments. All of these triggered by them past a certain point depending on our progress overall.
• If we are to take them with us on a gig, all the characters would ideally need defined tactical advantages in their approach, Judy as a tech hacking support, Panam as a ranged sniper ideally only for missions outside of the city, River maybe for a more stealthy approach which would leave Kerry as a more heavy fire support. These are open to discussion ofc. They should not be available for a while after a gig and there should be a risk of them getting hurt.
• A better way to approach repeatable interactivity would be in my opinion to limit it to the apartment, ideally they would be more active in it doing different things at different times, dialogue would expand based on our interactions or progress in main or our side stories with them. You can have equally as intimate time in the comfort of your home as on a date if the relationship is fulfilling.

 

[Armedain824]

Just to mention this, the one thing about romances in this game, in particular, is the timetable that V supposedly is on to get the biochip issue resolved.
Took me a while to get to grips with that, but then that's another part of what I see as a dissappointment with the main storyline.
As much as we have all those gigs, sidequests, mob bosses and random rabble-rousers to deal with, once you're in ACT 2, the clock is supposedly "ticking" and while you only see it show up occasionally (and the "ugh.. can't deal with it.. fuuu.." is amusing once in a while, I honestly don't think many of us imagine our V being such a wuss about it ) it's supposed to show that while V could have romances, there really isn't TIME for them.

If not in this, then the next incarnation of CP2077 (hoping for a new storyline ala Fallout, of course), more romance options and responses from the people we choose would be more likely because we have TIME to romance them, go out with them, live together, etc.

Currently, though, it's like you're on "borrowed time" and the romance just helps to get you through the few hours you know your "output/input" for...

 

[Lonewolf0071701]

I want v's L.I to have repeatable hang out option, dates and booty calls (every few hours real time) in the game [so not to spam ] Same with just hanging out with friends like Judy and Rivers ect . If nothing else if the devs add this as a paid dlc then sign me up for that dlc ! [hope fully it will be add as life improvements updates ]

 

[Trinixy]

Same with just hanging out with friends like Judy and Rivers ect . If nothing else if the devs add this as a paid dlc

This is another bit that people hope to see happen. Simply more of these interactions with the characters between themselves with V in the middle so to say. First glimpses of this we got with Jackie and Misty and it felt natural and made them feel instantly relatable, seeing as they have bonds and stories between them. However this one came to a really heavy stop with Misty being entirely sidelined to her only side quest, while she was expected to have a more prominent part in V's story. We got bit bit of it again with Rogue and Panam and their issues but never in person unfortunately.

Jackie seems to have been that factor that would follow you and establish connections to these characters along side you. That was taken over by Johnny, but in his case it is just an indirect, one sided relationship with everyone except for Rogue, Kerry and ofc V.

However for the romances and friends, there can be many opportunities to implement this by simply structuring the quests with them to involve some of the other characters, for example:

• Judy can help on quests revolving around River with more forensic braindances
• Panam can have a need to salvage something she discovered underwater giving more ways to involve diving with ofc Judy by your side
• River can be involved in a murder investigation around the badlands that would allow V to get help from Panam
• Panam and the nomads could get in trouble due to stolen Militech equipment having Meredith involved in the investigation, putting V in a position of harsh decision making between the 2 factions
• Kerry can have a concert organized and allow you to choose a person to take with you on it, this is one way to make a date quest for example or simply have a friend join in on the fun
• If Blue Moon was to become a victim of a stalker, lead her to become a member of the Moxes, get Rita and Judy involved, that is what Moxes originally did
• Have Takemura invite us for dinner with a person of our choice or none, he seems to be very passionate about good food and cooking

These are just some suggestions that would go along with gameplay and the choice based structure while involving our LIs with other characters. Such quest design I doubt anyone would have issues with since it wouldn't take away from anyone in terms of gameplay, while it would give us more time with characters we love, and give incentive for others to explore them that might not necessarily be into romances. Am sure the community has way more nice ideas to throw in the mix.

 

[OG_VELI]

I see lots of people wanting a companion system, but I, myself, can't see finding any enjoyment in that. Other than some random dialogue here and there, they would become a random friendly NPC that follows you around and shoots stuff. That strips down the characters to mindless bots that are braindead (AI now) and have nothing to offer but to eat bullets. And it doesn't even make sense when it comes to some of them. Let's take Judy, for example. Why would she go out with you and shoot stuff? That doesn't make any sense in terms of her character. Yes, she can be useful as a hacker of some sort, but then how does that change anything? You don't need companions in this game, no matter how good the AI is.

What we do need is this:

A better way to approach repeatable interactivity would be in my opinion to limit it to the apartment, ideally they would be more active in it doing different things at different times, dialogue would expand based on our interactions or progress in main or our side stories with them. You can have equally as intimate time in the comfort of your home as on a date if the relationship is fulfilling.