Star Wars: the Old Republic Companion Series

- Additional DLC style in the vein of Treek

- Takes place at or after a certain point in the story / certain companion relationship level

 

Benefits:

- Extended companion story; focusing on the companion's history, their time spent away from the protagonist during KOEE/KOET, and most importantly their relationship with the protagonist.

- Special attention to extending romantic storylines, exploring the character's relationship with protagonist.

- Extended general dialogue options and interactions

- Additional equipment or Cartel items

- Additional customization options

 

Potential Benefits:

- Possibility of unlocking additional minor companions (similar to the Star Fortress companions)

 

Additional Details:

- The Companion Series could be just that - releasing in staggered formation with new main story content - and offering additional purchasing opportunities for non-essential gameplay for subscribers.

- Periodic releases with new content for a single character or a group of characters could provide hype for the game, giving older players a reason to refocus on storylines that seem to taper off in later gameplay.

I'd love to see the companions given more content time. So far the game has invested so much time into creating great content that bring out the companions to give each one a great, well developed character and I'd love to see that continue like this.

I made a suggestion like this years ago and I still like the idea. I'm all for it.

 

However, I wouldn't want more companions to come out of it. I prefer companions to have more story and adding minor companions would be less satisfying if they didn't have their own stories. Given the seeming shortage of people to devote to working on SWTOR, I would think that more companions would create more writing work that wouldn't see much progress.

On the contrary, I think SWTOR needs to significantly scale back the number of companions in-game.

 

If they want to give us interesting companion stories, fine; I don't want "Here's Stat Stick #50"

I have suggested something similar to this as a way for BW to add same-sex romanceable companions into the early game. Create some companions that can join your character as early as level 10 on the fleet station that have their own story and cutscenes that unlock as one's story progresses. Similar to Treek. This would also be a way to introduce a male romanceable Force user (Arcann and Scourge are both very late game, one is class specific, and neither have much development to their romance). It would be really cool if they made these characters from species we do not get as companions, such as Miraluka and Mirialan.

I have suggested something similar to this as a way for BW to add same-sex romanceable companions into the early game. Create some companions that can join your character as early as level 10 on the fleet station that have their own story and cutscenes that unlock as one's story progresses. Similar to Treek. This would also be a way to introduce a male romanceable Force user (Arcann and Scourge are both very late game, one is class specific, and neither have much development to their romance). It would be really cool if they made these characters from species we do not get as companions, such as Miraluka and Mirialan.

 

Agreed with you and the earlier poster - it doesn't need to be more companions, just more content. Perhaps with a better companion interface.

It would also be nice if we got daily interactions with companions too. Something like that interacting with that guy who runs your pirate crew on Rishi or delivering alliance crates to Oggy and Sana-Rae or C2's comfort mission.

 

Maybe you can find companion gifts they especially like and deliver it through the daily mission and get a much higher return on influence than if you give it the normal way. That would be a nice alternative to the commander's compendium and 50 hours of clicking companion gifts.

I'm not saying I disagree, but how much work would these take, and how much would it detract from what the are (supposedly) doing?

I'm not saying I disagree, but how much work would these take, and how much would it detract from what the are (supposedly) doing?

 

TL;DR Depends on how it is implemented. It could range from months to years of effort with some or all of the team having to chip in.

 

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Regarding time spent, it depends on the amount of content and type. For example, new emails from the companions will likely take less time from the writers than a whole scene. Going by the original poster's initial request, it could take as much time as an expansion if as much content is included. (We have a lot of companions these days). Incidentally, it could also involve as much variety in content as any other expansion since the main goal is to focus on the companions' story rather than exclude any game play style.

 

More than likely it could pull some of every part of the team to spend time working on it, especially for diverse content, but certain kinds of content weigh more heavily on certain members of the team. For example,story heavy missions will lean on writers and new items and scenes may lean on artists. New mechanics, however, will need programmers and designers. Even though some time can be saved by reusing existing assets and mechanics someone on the team still has to put it all together and hook it up to work. Not to mention the fact that there is the need for voice actors who are external to the team and may not be available.

 

In terms of trade offs, it's hard to predict what it could detract from or how while on the outside. Just the same, everything implemented has come at the cost of something else that could have been or may have got something of a start. That just seems to be the nature of MMO development, so I feel it has no choice but to be a trade off. On the flip side, all development needs to be organized, so it's not likely it would be shoved to the top of the to-do list even if someone decided this needs to be in game. It could still be years before work started on it even if they decide to put it in the backlog today.