"But Dragon's Dogma does have one major unique mechanic that deserves a close examination. It's, um. . .well, do you remember Neopets? It's kind of like that but with slavery. As part of the introductory missions, you have to generate a primary NPC sidekick in the same way you made yourself: class, race, appearance, favorite Spice Girl, etc. But for adventuring purposes, you can also enlist two additional sidekicks who are the main sidekicks of other players elsewhere in the world. You go into a little connecting universe where a sampling of available hired hands swan about trying to catch your eye, you go over to the ones you like, look at their equipment, check their teeth, bob their scrotums, and if you're happy, take them adventuring with you. When you're finished with them, you give them a little present and send them back to their owner with a fond slap on the bum. You even have to rate them like you're filling in the timesheet for the temp agency. It creates motivation to make sure that your sidekick has the best equipment and skills and looks good in tights so they'll be more likely to get hired by other players, acquire experience, bring you back presents, and...wait a minute! Am I pimping?!
Once that thought occurred to me, I just couldn't shake it off. It didn't help that I deliberately designed my sidekick to juxtapose my protagonist, making him a long-haired, blond, petite young white boy with rosy cheeks and pouty lips, or the way he'd come back from his temp jobs timidly asking if he'd done a good job and clutching a really, really nice present that haunted me as I tried to picture what kind of service had earned it. No, it's all right, says the game. They're not actually intelligent, free willed human beings. They're pawns, a sort of magical slave race who look a lot like humans but actually don't have minds of their own. Oh, even better. Now we're pimping the mentally sub-normal!"
Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw's review of Dragon's Dogma.
