There comes a point in a lot of games where the story winds up with you finding a friend in trouble and you must do your best to help you both survive. It's you and your injured pal versus impossible odds. Will you both live to tell your virtual grand kids about the epic showdown you're about to partake in? Wait a minute... There's nothing more aggravating than being engrossed in a great single player game only to suddenly find yourself babysitting a piss-poor NPC severely lacking any intelligence, artificial or otherwise. Your ability to finish the mission depends on how well programmed he is as his death instantly fails the level and prevents any further progress. And it's always one of about three tired situations - for example your buddy is hurt so you must throw him over your shoulder and carry him to safety but this slows you down to a walk and of course prevents you from using your weapons. Or perhaps your daft mate is opening a locked door or downloading some data and you must protect them from the enemy onslaught for a period of time while he gets the job done. Oh, here's another; you have to cover him from a rooftop with a sniper rifle as he runs below on the ground. Whatever it is, it's often his behaviour not yours that results in level failure. To sweeten the deal the NPC should have very limited health and talk constantly with a really annoying voice so when he or she dies and the mission is aborted you get to listen to the same trite dialog multiple times when you restart. Remember the Max Payne 2 chapter "Dearest of all my friends" where you have to protect Vinnie in the baseball bat boy costume? Ugh. So, so bad.
A Welsh semi-retired television producer and actor known for low end work that astonishingly people actually watched and even garnered some awards. Originally residing in the electrically-challenged Amish areas of Pennsylvania he has written a few books (Hollywood Pants and Hollywood Horrible Hints and Terribly Fake Tips vols 1 & 2) which you can buy on amazon and all great book stores.
After a brief stint in Australia he now finds himself back in the Welsh valleys of his home country noting that it hasn't changed a bit!
