As co-creator of the Fallout series, director of The Outer Worlds, and a contributor to numerous other games, Tim Cain has a pretty strong idea about what makes a good RPG. In a rundown of features nobody likes, he gives devs a few pointers on what to avoid, and a lot of it comes down to bad NPCs.
"It just gets really tiresome to see them roll out over and over and over," he says, of stereotypically-designed NPCs. "Where sarcasm or judgment is the entire NPC's personality. It's annoying." A frustrating facet of this, he adds, is when you encounter a character like this, but the player can't rebut or react to them.
"It's one of the reasons I like letting the player kill the NPC," he states. "Kill them, they won't bother you any more, and it lets you get rid of some of that pent-up rage that somebody's thrown yet another sarcastic NPC at you."
After that, he goes on to the "dreaded NPC" who suggests they'll follow you. Yes, he means escort missions, and he's definitely got a point on this one. Cain brings up the myriad of ways these are irritating, from the character getting stuck to plot information being dumped on you while you try to guide them around.
"You can't stay with them, you're constantly staying ahead or moving behind," he says. "I see this so much, I find it hard to believe the designer has never seen an escort quest and wasn't annoyed by them. Either they've never played an RPG in their entire life, or they've somehow thought, 'This escort quest will be fun.' They'd be wrong."
Cain gives an antidote to this bugbear: vehicles. Drive them or fly them, make it something you can control, and it'd be more pleasurable. He circles back on NPCs, but for the ones who're just there for an exposition drop. Y'know, where they "talk at you," rather than providing meaningful conversation.
"It's really long, throw in making it unskippable, and you have a lore dump nightmare," he states, outlining that these include expository NPCs and lecture NPCs - anyone you have to sit and listen to, basically. As he says, the solution has existed here for decades: make it all added info through audio-logs or in-game books.
All worthwhile advice, and though I generally agree, I need to make one caveat: All escort storylines are bad, except Resident Evil 4's. Let that be the benchmark. Do you have a section escorting someone? If yes, is your game as good as Resi 4? If not, revisit the first question. Simple.
