I really hate companions in games. I think they introduce all of the problems of escort missions:

• having to worry about not just your own safety, but the safety of someone else (who probably has terrible AI) which actually makes combat harder, and not in a fun way
• they tend to run off and cause problems like alerting enemies while you’re in stealth
• you have to worry about their pathing getting stuck
• they tend to stand right in your way in narrow corridors

but they’re even worse than escort mission NPCs because:

• you’re expected to have them for a big chunk of the game
• they often just won’t shut up, constantly saying voice lines that ruin the moment or don’t give you a second to think in silence (this isn’t a problem with escort missions because escort missions generally don’t last that long)
• some of them come off like they genuinely do not want to be helping you (Lydia in Skyrim)
• even if you get a companion NPC that’s genuinely helpful and doesn’t get in your way or annoy you, now every time you accomplish something in the game you have to wonder if you would have been able to accomplish it on your own, or if the companion NPC carried you through it