Narrative choices

 This is just going to be a rant about narrative choices with little to no actual thought put into it. I am just going to make that clear. I find it silly that the idea of, "oh we have to give fake choices because having meaningful choices would be too costly/ ruin the gameplay experience" you can have little narrative moments/ parts of the world where the player choices change how the world is being affected at the end of the day.

Saving the Blacksmith's wife from the goblins doesn't have to be some kind of big story/ narrative moment, it could be some small narrative moment, some small story telling detail, it's not the big arching plots players care about; time after time from youtubers and other people I hear people talk about the moments on their journey and not these fake choices I see companies push for the story.

Not every single moment in a game needs to be some grand narrative to push the story forward in a way of "feeling" as if your choice matters. Hell you could have the fake choices give small narrative moments! Maybe have it where the player trying to run away from the train the player gets hurt instead of going on regardless and just giving more cutscene to see.

Hell; the choice of doing the narrative side quest of the characters that follow you on your journey being more meaningful/ impactful carries greater weight in Tales of Xillia 2 than your fricking fake choices. The smaller side narrative adventures will always hold true to making a meaningful and fulfilling story and not these stupid moments of "oh no matter what I did, it doesn't matter" kind of thing.

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