When I started The Outer Worlds 2, I figured I’d find a likable, interesting batch of companions. Writing strong characters is just what Obsidian does best, regardless of genre or franchise. What I didn’t expect was seeing it set a new standard for relationships in RPGs and outshining my former favorite, Baldur’s Gate 3, by fixing some of the biggest shortcomings in both that game and the genre on the whole. You can’t kiss your Outer Worlds friends, and they don’t turn into wild animals when aroused. But the process of getting to know them takes more thoughtful effort, and the result is a satisfying and less predictable influence over how the story plays out.
Baldur’s Gate 3‘s approval system always stood out to me as an odd mix of “being a considerate friend” and “making people happy by performing actions that have absolutely nothing to do with said people.” Watching you do nice or mean things and hearing you say what they want might fit in with their personalities and worldviews, sure, but that’s hardly the basis for moving a friendship into more intimate territory. Maybe it’s just me, but if I see you escort an old lady across the road or save a kid from an evil druid, I’m still not gonna start rolling out my deepest, darkest secrets to you.
However, because you were mean to a goblin or said all your homies hate Selune, or some other combination of things, that’s exactly what Baldur’s Gate 3‘s companions start to do. At that point, relationships settle into a routine of saying the right thing during a handful of major events to get the outcome you want, as the power of friendship gradually diminishes your companion’s sense of self-determination. And memory, evidently. Your past conduct and the nature of your relationship have almost no influence over how these major events unfold, as long as you get lucky with the dice. I get that it’s a D&D game, and dice rolls are just part of that. But if I was a little shit to Astarion during Act 1, he shouldn’t be so quick to forgive me in the second act without more friction. And he definitely shouldn’t be relying on my opinion about the ethics of mass murder later on.
Letting you shape major events in someone else’s life with a single choice is hardly a Larian-exclusive issue. It’s a long-standing problem in RPGs and dating sims, which is why Obsidian deserves recognition for trying to make something better in The Outer Worlds 2.
You’ve got your big, obviously important dialogue moments during Outer Worlds 2‘s companion quests and some main story missions as well. So many of the choices your companions remember are separate from those pressing matters looming over their lives, though. These include telling Niles he should celebrate a small victory, for example, instead of letting him deny himself the pleasure. Or hearing Inez reminisce about an old man she cared for on her home planet. And not calling Tristan a stupid bastard when you first meet him and he’s being a stupid bastard. You have to think about the pattern of your relationship and how best to understand your companions for who they are, not just what you want them to be. It’s more like a real relationship, in other words, and the shape of that pattern ends up influencing more than just how their personal quests end.
Your allies are mature enough not to fall for Hallmark card platitudes, too, and they don’t change their outlooks after you remind them to live, laugh, and love. Take Inez, for example, the Auntie’s Choice combat medic expelled from the corporation and desperate to find a way back in. You can tell her at one point that she should recognize her own self-worth, and she scoffs at your ignorance of how life works for people like her. During one crucial confrontation where Niles wants to give in to his thirst for vengeance, if you try dissuading him with your Speech skill and a reminder of some trite lesson learned earlier in the game, he gets furious with you for being so shallow and is less likely to agree with your stance later on too, with potentially ruinous results.
One of the best examples of the game expecting you to meet your allies where they’re at happens with Tristan, your Protectorate ally. Tristan’s an ass. He’s goofy and likable, yes, but he’s also still a judgmental, narrow-minded dick who’s completely unwilling to challenge the views baked into him from youth, even after being faced with incontrovertible proof that they’re A) wrong and B) actively hurting him. It’s very easy to mock the Protectorate and show a total lack of empathy for why Tristan thinks the way he does.
At one point during his companion mission, the two of you encounter a “mentally refreshed” (Protectorate speak for brainwashed) person Tristan labels a traitor he needs to execute with his righteous mallet. You can persuade him not to. But if you’ve spent the last several hours making snide jokes and undermining his loyalty to the Protectorate? Forget it. Brainwashed guy gets the hammer, Tristan goes further down the road that ends in the worst version of himself, and it’s… well, not entirely your fault, actually.
You don’t decide your companion’s lives for them independently. The capacity for good and evil, destruction and rebirth is there from the start with all of them, and you’re just an influence — sometimes not even an effective one, depending on how you behaved earlier and how earnestly you make your case. Most companions have a multitude of ending variations that your actions and theirs build towards over the entirety of the game. It’s not solely your job to shape their lives at crucial moments, nor should it be. No healthy friendship functions that way.
Not every companion gets the same level of attention, admittedly. Marisol, the group’s grandma-slash-trained assassin, was a bit too quick to give up her homicidal tendencies just because I said “maybe don’t kill so many people, sweetie” a total of one time. Still, Outer Worlds 2 plants the seed of a better, more natural way to handle character relationships in RPGs.