Spoilers for every game Bioware has ever made, just to be careful
I get that Bioware is big on using tropes and archetypes, I really do. I get the "A warrior and a mage join you at the beginning of the game" characters, I get the "crazy warrior who's in it for the thrills" character, I get the "slightly insane genius" character, I get the "obviously evil person who joins you anyway" character, I get the "conflicted but wise old man" character. But the "normal human with a tragic past" archetype confuses me. I could maybe see it being used once or twice, but they use it almost all of their games, and every time, it's the least popular character (except maybe the KotOR series, which are, unsurprisingly, the first two games they used it in). I'm serious, check it out.
Carth in KotOR. Atton in KotOR 2. Sky in Jade Empire. Kaiden in Mass Effect. Jacob in Mass Effect 2. Aveline in DA2.
Just about everyone hates Kaiden and most people dislike Aveline for being, by far, the least interesting character in DA2. Jacob and Sky are just straight-up forgettable. I can't say if Kaiden will continue to be "the boring guy" in ME3, since he's returning, but it's certainly not impossible. The only ones people like are Carth and Atton. Carth was the first, and Atton was just substantially better written than anyone else I've listed.
The BG and NWN series have no one like this, but only because they predate the concept (though you can make argument for a few characters in BG as still being this). DAO has no one like this at all, though, which I admit I like.
I just don't really get why Bioware thinks this character archetype is good enough to put into every game they make. I guess it's probably an easy character to write and put into any setting, but that's all I can think of.
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Not changing this sig until I decide to change this sig.
Started: July 6, 2005