I really don't like Albus

[Neifirst]

I started this game up thinking the main character was the cool chick on the store page pictures but I'm stuck with milquetoast boring typical anime protag guy. How long do I have to put up with him? Is he always in this game? If so I may have to refund > <

[Trolleur_Durden]

Albus is the main character and the boss of the Troubleshooter company you manage in the game, so yeah you will have to bring him with you on missions. However you will also unlock more than ten other characters by progressing through the storyline, including the "cool chick on the store page picture", and all of those characters are fleshed out with their own narrative arcs, so at the end of the day, it's an ensemble cast more than anything else.

[Neifirst]

I see.. that's really weird. When you buy Persona 5 and see Joker on the cover, you expect he's the main character and well, he is. When I see someone else on the cover and that's not the main character you start as well.. it threw me off. I hope the devs consider changing the marketing material pictures to reflect that, it's currently misleading. It's like putting a side character in all the marketing material of Persona 5, it wouldn't make any sense.

[AT]

TS its not Persona-style storywise. In persona, you have strictly defined "main character", which represents player. In TS. your company is "main character". Kinda reminds me Durarara story, when anime constantly changes angles to show situation from PoV of different characters. So, you shouldnt say "Albus" is MC, its more story around your company and its members. How they live before, how they join company, what they do after...

[Lesbian Witch Elf]

Totally understand where you are coming from, I often feel similar with games. Always feel its lame when a game has a boring dude in the lead when they have much more interesting written female characters.

But in this case there is more going with Albus that meets the eye. It does require you to not take what his achetype first appears to be at face value, because it can be easy to miss. As for what you are saying about the marketing being focused on Irene, I think her being front and center is totally fine. Like Albus may be the game's "protag" but Irene more than anybody best represents what the soul of the game is.

[x_equals_speed]

It may feel like a while before she joins up, because the game is absolutely massive. Like you get her 5% of the way into the story and can set her to be your avatar and there'll be plenty of missions in which she's the focus, but 5% of the way into the game can be 5-20 hours in depending on how fast you play.

[Blazing]

She's the mascot, not the MC. It's not unusual, e.g. look at Danganronpa or Bioshock 1.

Besides, in the description on the story page, they do say that Albus is the MC in advance and that the game follows his and his new member's stories.

So I don't really think it's the fault of the marketing aspect, tbh.

[TheGrouch]

I feel you. Albus is the most boring character for sure. Obviously you don't put him on the front page but Irene who looks way flashier.

Unfortunately he doesn't become much more interesting as the game goes on either. Very predictable. Very one-dimensional. Bland. But luckily there is a whole cast of other way more fun characters.

[Lesbian Witch Elf]

Originally posted by TheGrouch91:

I feel you. Albus is the most boring character for sure. Obviously you don't put him on the front page but Irene who looks way flashier.

Unfortunately he doesn't become much more interesting as the game goes on either. Very predictable. Very one-dimensional. Bland. But luckily there is a whole cast of other way more fun characters.

I would agree there are much more interesting members of the cast, but calling him one dimensional is off base. He is much more calculative and clever than he first appears. Also his time at Black Pearl shows he can be an immature brat which goes against the typical nice guy protag vibes he normally gives.

[The nameless Gamer]

Originally posted by TheGrouch91:

I feel you. Albus is the most boring character for sure. Obviously you don't put him on the front page but Irene who looks way flashier.

Unfortunately he doesn't become much more interesting as the game goes on either. Very predictable. Very one-dimensional. Bland. But luckily there is a whole cast of other way more fun characters.

Rather than boring, Albus is more... neglected. We know that he has some ghosts of the past to exorcise and actually didn't become a Troubleshooter out of pure altruism. His motivation is to find out what happened to Alma Nox and his father. But as more and more characters came, his own backstory has been put on hiatus. There's definitely more to him than the generic "goody-two-shoes". It just somehow ended up low on the priority list.

[TheGrouch]

Originally posted by Lesbian Witch Elf:

Originally posted by TheGrouch91:

I feel you. Albus is the most boring character for sure. Obviously you don't put him on the front page but Irene who looks way flashier.

Unfortunately he doesn't become much more interesting as the game goes on either. Very predictable. Very one-dimensional. Bland. But luckily there is a whole cast of other way more fun characters.

I would agree there are much more interesting members of the cast, but calling him one dimensional is off base. He is much more calculative and clever than he first appears. Also his time at Black Pearl shows he can be an immature brat which goes against the typical nice guy protag vibes he normally gives.

He's actually pretty fricking stupid. The stunt he pulled when he got wounded was just the most stereotypical hero-move ever and it almost ended up in disaster if he didn't get lucky.

Outside of that it's just "I must do the right thing, I must protect my teammates" but by doing so he doesn't see the bigger picture. Which makes him extremely unlikable to me. There's 0 conflict in what he's doing and he is very naive and straight forward and you can tell what he is going to do a mile away. Boring.

[Lesbian Witch Elf]

Originally posted by TheGrouch91:

Outside of that it's just "I must do the right thing, I must protect my teammates" but by doing so he doesn't see the bigger picture. Which makes him extremely unlikable to me. There's 0 conflict in what he's doing and he is very naive and straight forward and you can tell what he is going to do a mile away. Boring.

Eh, I would say its the opposite. If anything Albus is too focused on the bigger picture and that leads him to neglect the details. Like its shown more than once he needs to be reminded of the needs of his teammates, and while he gets the broad group dynamics going on his understanding is a bit shallow cause his number one priority is an efficient team.

[x_equals_speed]

I'm with lesbian witch elf. Which is the best sentence I've typed today. I got the impression that Albus is somewhat cynical. A lot of his apparently selfless or generous acts tie directly to his goals, I'm pretty sure at one point they explicitly discuss that his taking on dangerous missions to protect civilians that other companies turn down is less about being the good guy and more about looking to increase his companies rank to access things that are important to him. He seems somewhat prone to pushing his team (and in fairness himself) to burnout in pursuit of his goals and his worries about other people's well being are often couched in terms of how it impacts the efficiency of the team.

I'm not sure that qualifies him as a three dimensional character, but if he is one dimensional I'd make the argument that the dimension is "ambition" rather than "nice guy"

[TheGrouch]

I just don't see that side of him. Sounds like you guys interpret way more into his stupid actions than me. But we will see I suppose.

Nothing has shown that he does all this only to increase the company's security rank. So that just sounds like tinfoil hat speculation to me.

[The nameless Gamer]

Originally posted by TheGrouch91:

I just don't see that side of him. Sounds like you guys interpret way more into his stupid actions than me. But we will see I suppose.

Nothing has shown that he does all this only to increase the company's security rank. So that just sounds like tinfoil hat speculation to me.

The crucial bits to that are actually mentioned in the parts even before the first mission. It's around the time when he's moving from his old place to the Silverlining.

Edit: If we're going to look for one-dimensional characters, why give Irene a pass? Even her "dialogue options" are one-dimensional. I do love Irene as a character, but aside from her being a pint-sized bundle of kick-ass, there's practically nothing else to her.

[x_equals_speed]

It is mentioned early, but I'm pretty sure it comes up again later (in conversation with Giselle?). I don't think it's something that's only alluded to once.

We're talking about Albus because he's the subject of the OP, but it's fair to say that Irene is mostly (though not entirely) oriented around one conflict of individual heroism vs collective effort.

I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing though. Not every character needs to be a nuanced psychological treatise.