Turns out Baldur's Gate 3's companions weren't supposed to be such horndogs: "It was a bug"

Gale wearing a wizard's hat and nothing else in Baldur's Gate 3.

(Image credit: Larian Studios)

Though I loved my time with Baldur's Gate 3 (and hope to return to it once a certain other massive RPG is out of the way), I was a little weirded out by how into me all my companions were. I even wrote a prudish article about it, complaining about the RPG's early goings being full of really forward advances from your party members—particularly a very intimate moment with Gale that seems to come out of nowhere, and ended up putting me off his character completely. "I'd just like BG3 a little bit more if it took a cold shower every now and then," I concluded.

Well… it's now had one, metaphorically, and it turns out my misgivings were at least partly justified. Over at TheGamer they're unafraid to engage in hard-hitting investigative journalism, like asking game director Swen Wicke why all these characters want to jump the player's bones so bad, and the answer is "It was a bug".

"The approval thresholds were too low when we shipped. That's why they were so horny in the beginning," explains Swen. "It wasn't supposed to be that way. We've fixed it since, at least for some of them. We're still fixing a few of them."

The intention was for the various flirtatious scenes to trigger once you'd gotten to know that character and earned some good will with them, for a more organic approximation of a real relationship—but instead, they were among some of your very first conversations. Swen calls out Gale as being particularly quick to get out the candles and red wine, which explains my own run-in with him and how out of place that scene felt for some players.

Of course many people, including PC Gamer's resident unrepentant pervert Fraser Brown and most of my Twitter feed, were quite pleased for their party camp to have the vibe of an unsupervised co-ed dorm, so whether this is a welcome fix or not is up for debate. But as one of Faerûn's more bashful inhabitants, I'm looking forward to starting a new, altogether less sexy save once Larian's worked out all the, er, kinks.

Formerly the editor of PC Gamer magazine (and the dearly departed GamesMaster), Robin combines years of experience in games journalism with a lifelong love of PC gaming. First hypnotised by the light of the monitor as he muddled through Simon the Sorcerer on his uncle’s machine, he’s been a devotee ever since, devouring any RPG or strategy game to stumble into his path. Now he's channelling that devotion into filling this lovely website with features, news, reviews, and all of his hottest takes.