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Press Junketeer  Posts: 403 Joined: 15 Jul 2008     | |
Gone Gonzo  Posts: 2174 Joined: 14 Nov 2007     | We need to start getting some fucking artistry into games, that's what we need to do. Instead of having a generic good ending and a generic bad ending, why not start showing more shades of grey? Why not have your character try to do the good thing at the end of the game, yet in doing so causing even more harm. Or rather than having your evil character mwa-ha-ha off into the sunset, why not show him becoming psychologically fractured from being so evil and corrupted. Instead of making good and evil endings the polar opposite of each other, why not introduce themes and motifs that recur in both? Why not have evil kings, trapped princesses and crusading knights with some actual depth and motivation? Is it really that difficult? Also, more stats do not mean more freedom! Stats were good for pen and paper RPGs where the only thing to keep the game going was your stats sheet and your imagination. This, however, is meant to be the 'next generation'. Everything is presented in Hi-Definition, Surround Sound, Anti-Aliased, High Quality Texture 350,000 fucking colour splendour. Why are we still clinging to a system that was never meant to be anything more than a guideline to stop our D&D imaginations running away with us? |
Gone Gonzo  Posts: 3587 Joined: 6 Aug 2008   |
Say it with me F-A-B-L-E-2, said they were going for stuff like that, including heaps of grey decisions, like kill an evil kid or let him grow up to kill etc (more gray) could be good. |
Press Junketeer Posts: 403 Joined: 15 Jul 2008 | Jeffers, while I have not beat it as I'm waiting for my "Enhanced" up date, the Witcher presents more grays then being good or bad, since your character really is almost true neutral. It's a great game, as well, but I would most certainly wait for the enhanced edition this September. They are releasing an almost expansion sized patch in terms of efforts for this title at no cost for those of us that have puchased it. I have respect for CDProjekt and their support. Plus, you all should love them for "good old games" or http://www.gog.com/en/intro Yes, DRM free versions of old PC classics guaranteed to work in XP and Vista. Enjoy. |
On the Record  Posts: 5977 Joined: 7 Feb 2008    | Random Encounters DEFINATELY NEED to die, I love JRPG's as much as I do good WRPG's but that is something they just can't seem to get rid of and REALLY need to. I do agree with Breedbate on the fact that your Writers should create your world and that it should have an intruiging and deep mythology surrounding it. That's something more game companies need to get on. IMO the PERFECT RPG at the moment is Knights of the Old Republic, it perfectly captures what an RPG should be for me. Not saying it can't be improved, but for its time? KOTOR did everything right. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 2174 Joined: 14 Nov 2007 |
HA! I'll believe that when I see it. |
Beat Writer  Posts: 151 Joined: 14 Aug 2008  | I think the big problem of RPGs is the ammount of time you spend in menu screens, if item equipping was simpler to understand (ie oblivion WTF do all those symbols mean?) a simple magic, defense, and strength system like kingdom hearts would help a bunch to the more complicated RPGs. |
Gone Gonzo  Posts: 3086 Joined: 13 Jul 2008     |
no what? |
Gone Gonzo  Posts: 1781 Joined: 1 May 2008     |
You WHAT?!?!?!? Don't get me wrong, massive fan of TES games here, but "every god damn opportunity imaginable"? Where was the opportunity to join the Mythic Dawn? Where was the opportunity to throw the amulet into a river? Where was the opportunity to sit back and let Kvatch burn? Why couldn't you kill Martin before his Big Finale? And most importantly, WHY COULDN'T YOU ATTACK DAGON?! As for Morrowind- Where was the opportunity to join Dagoth Ur? Why couldn't you lead a load of your guild members to war or glory against a hoard of invaders? I'm not saying these DIDN'T end up in the game, but it was through the users writing mods, not the writers at Beth who made the games what they could have been [/rant] |
Infamous Scribbler  Posts: 526 Joined: 21 Jan 2008   |
Yeah, the first one had about as much depth as Diablo, so It's barely worthy of being called an RPG. Molyneux talked that one up to heaven and back as well, so I'm not touching the thing till someone I know buys a copy first. To make RPGs better you simply need to look at Fallout, Torment and Bloodlines and figure out what it was that made them the best RPGs ever made. A strong, novel quality story with characters that feel like real people and the highest quality of voice acting to match. Freedom to accomplish your goals in nearly any manner you see fit, even if some of the tasks are required. This means alternate quest paths, which Bethesda seems to be allergic to. Viable paths through the game that result in minimal or no combat. Giving the social, stealth and knowledge paradigms as much weight as combat skill. Shades of grey morality. Strange new worlds and civilizations. And above all else, Choices that have very real, serious, and sometimes unintended consequences. Come to think of it, Deus Ex fits all of these except for the voice acting, doesn't it? |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3587 Joined: 6 Aug 2008 | To ReepNeep. they actually made peter Molyneaux stay quiet until they already put the stuff into the game because he over hyped the last one and they didn't want to go through that again. He's only been allowed to reveal details rather recently. |
Press Junketeer Posts: 403 Joined: 15 Jul 2008 | *sniff* I guess no one read my recommendation of The Witcher. Seriously, it's good and gives primarily gray choices. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3587 Joined: 6 Aug 2008 |
Yeh but i heard that it goes over board on length, 50+ hours is good but some people don't have that conviction/don't care enough to bother. |
Infamous Scribbler Posts: 526 Joined: 21 Jan 2008 | I got halfway through The Witcher before hearing about the enhanced edition. I decided to wait until it came out so I could start over. The characters are well developed, the world is interesting and unconvetnional, and the questwriting is fantastic. Its a very good one from an RP point of view, but I was kind of turned off by the simplistic combat mechanics. |
Press Junketeer  Posts: 367 Joined: 11 Oct 2007     |
You beat me to the point with one post. Aye, here it is... consequences. The big problem with RPG's today is that it is very hard to get immersed in anything when nothing you do can have any bigger consequence than a moment of annoyance as you run from the spawn point to try to kill your enemy again. You're never in danger of actually losing anything... just getting slightly delayed on the way to your goal. Now I agree that having a game where you can have serious setbacks or even lose your beloved character is difficult to pull off as it is almost guaranteed to piss the players off something fierce and thus make them hate the game. Playing this card is like going for the lot in Hearts/Black Lady: if you're going to do it, you have to get everything right, or you're screwed while everyone else laughs at you. But yes... consequences... that's what I dearly want in an RPG game. The second thing I want in an RPG is persistence outside the character. If I drop a thing on the ground, it shall stay there... forever, or until someone picks it up. Burn down a house and it shall remain burned down. Kill the mayor and a new one that is different from the old one will be appointed. And conversely: build a house in a place and I shall be able to move into it when it's done. Persistence and consequences... what I do leaves a lasting impression. /S |
Press Junketeer Posts: 403 Joined: 15 Jul 2008 |
Well beggars can't be choosers, now can they? Trust me, it keeps you engaged. I too stopped half way, not because of length or it sucks,... but rather for the Enhanced edition rolling out. |
Anonymous Source Posts: 3 Joined: 15 Aug 2008 | Well, first one has to look at the really good games. For me, Baldurs Gate II shines as the best RPG ever made, but thats ofcourse just my observation. If I am to enjoy an RPG, it needs a great story which is masterfuly told, it needs villains you can believe, ie: not cackling, skullmask wearing necromancers, but villains with motivations you can understand, and also a faint glimmer of "good" so they can be precieved as 'human' aswell. If you from some twisted point of view can understand the villain, then you ahve made a good villain. Second, you need good companions with depth to their character, believable motivations and fears etc. Baldurs Gate I & II did that very well. Quests for your companions is also very nice, aslong as they are not overdone, and take the focus away from the main story. Third, i want dilemmas. This is where i enjoyed the Witcher; the choices you had to make, and didnt get to see the result of the choices before much later. It adds alot of excitement to the gameplay when you cannot allways predict the consequences of your actions Fourth; a somewhat original story. The Evil which has been released and must once again be sealed for the tenth or so time is only fun for so many games. How about making a game when there is no moral at the end? And with, as others have pointed out, more than just a good or evil ending. And what of your companions? What of the world? If you play as a mercenarie, perhaps you wont give a damn about that town you encountered way back in the game, but saves another. Or where you have to choose who gets to live and who must die? Or play a thief. Or make an assassin RPG where you dont have to be a nice or totally badass assassin, but things in between aswell. And for the love of God, a game where you -dont- have to save the whole world? How about just a city? Or just your own guild in the city? Fifth; Put some clothes on those female NPC's. Please. If i want to see hot, lightly dressed women i can do so in real Life, i dont need an RPG for that. Thats my cents anyway |
Infamous Scribbler Posts: 526 Joined: 21 Jan 2008 |
Out of curiosity, have you ever played Torment? It fits #4 almost perfectly and you seem to enjoy Infinity engine games and at least be able to stomach D&D 2nd rules. Not to give out too much, but the Quest is to save yourself. Torment specifically went out if it's way to break convention and it's my favorite RPG because of it. Its also very dialog heavy which I really enjoy in such games.
The Chainmail Bikini bothers me too. If she wants some armor to wear to the beach, maybe. That shit shouldn't fly in the Spine of the World. |
Press Junketeer Posts: 403 Joined: 15 Jul 2008 |
You know if you honestly see a female warrior actually sporting that, you know she wears it because she is so good, she's not gonna get hit. or, in the D&D world, it could be a Glamour. XD |
Anonymous Source Posts: 3 Joined: 15 Aug 2008 | No, I have never played Torment. I stopped buying new RPG games after the disaster of Neverwinter Nights 2, though Im sure Torment is much older than that. Point was that i havent looked for new (or old) RPG's lately :P Becoming picky I guess. And yeah, i think the Infinity engine has so far been superior to any other when it comes to singleplayer games. I still start a new BG II game once in a while after having downloaded new mods from Pocket Plane. I didnt mind the 2nd rules either, sorta gave a more 'advanced' feeling to whole thing, pluss it didnt ruin the fun like being able to calculate everything in neverwinter nights. For what things to avoid in new RPG's, I will offer theese two lists: general evil cliches: |
Paperboy  Posts: 30 Joined: 14 Aug 2008   | Give me any other game that gives you as many choices as Elder Scrolls. Until then, I dub Elder Scrolls one of the better (not best) RPGs. I liked Fable's combat system, and overall the story was stellar. (Especially the part where you went to jail, loved that) but where it failed, in my belief, was character depth and the consequences department. Yes, guards chased you after you get so evil, but by that point you can easily slaughter them with your Sword of Aeons, or some such. I'd honestly half to say that Drakengard was the best RPG, even if it really wasn't designed that way. Awesome story, pretty characters, bunch of choices (though I don't think there were a whole lot of consequences...), and radical combat (of course who DOESNT want to fly on a dragon and incinerate EVERYONE?). Yes, the character saves the world, but really each storyline ended up with me feeling emotionally saddened, or saying 'WTF!?!?' and furiously trying to kill whatever hell spawn opposed me. There's even one where you die, I believe. Really, you guys are just repeating yourselves now. Burning down houses would be awesome though. Arson FTW. |
Gone Gonzo  Posts: 1267 Joined: 11 Jan 2008  | In all seriousness I think it's prime time we stopped all this levelling up nonesense. Fighting should be more involving, as others have pointed out, and perhaps more tactical. Even tactical RPGs tend to be quite dumb these days. Perhaps a good choice for those who want a more story/ talking heads orientated RPG and for those wanting more action, fighting based ala Planescape Torment. Less RPGs. There's just too many of them. Ironically, I have more loathing for the big RPG manufacterers ie Square-Enix and Bioware than the smaller developers who usually try to incorporate something fresh and new. |
Copy Clerk  Posts: 104 Joined: 4 Apr 2008  |
Morrowind was pretty good, Daggerfall was good, Arena was meh, Oblivion blew ass. |
Paperboy  Posts: 32 Joined: 29 Jul 2008 |
Planescape: Torment. |
Gone Gonzo  Posts: 4582 Joined: 22 Jun 2008     | First off, NO MORE FUCKING CLICHED CHARACTERS. Anyways KOTOR in my opinion did everything that it could at its time. The characters were fucking awesome. If you don't think so just get back to space marines 9000 and leave the smart people alone. The main character was pure genius, Plus he didn't talk which was good.(Call if archaic if you like but then I don't want some guy doing both bad, good and neutral choices because then it just sounds the same but with different words.) The plot twists were great overall the game was bottled awesome and it makes me wonder why the hell are bioware messing with a system thats been proven to work. |
On the Record  Posts: 6114 Joined: 25 Jan 2008   | Why is it that a good topic like this always ends up with banter about how good X Y and Z game was? We KNOW they were good games... This topic is about how to make the NEW games good like the old ones. Come on fellas, lets take those memories of great games, and figure out WHY they were great so we can force (at gunpoint if necessary) game companies to put those FUN parts back in. There, I've done penance for all the times I totally derailed other threads in nostalgic gibberygoo. Now when does Ziggy say we leap out of this one? |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 4582 Joined: 22 Jun 2008 |
We describe great games and how they work. If you imitate said great game then your game should be great right? You hammer out the flaws and wahla great game. |
Muckraker Posts: 300 Joined: 1 Jul 2008 |
Yep. Why can't we make RPGs really good anymore? Well, developers have to pay the piper. They have to make money. And the sad reality is that most of the market today is not in a frenzy over slamming down $60 for a game that touts itself as a 'rich, complex story full of original characters'. Most people are willing to accept crap like Neverwinter Nights 2. The game literally forced you to walk away and leave unattended the corpses of several extremely powerful mages who were in the middle of a ritual that would have turned them into undead shadows when you killed them. I nearly ripped my monitor from my desk and threw it across the room as, sure enough, the shades of your antagonists rose up more powerful than ever before. But most people don't care. Neverwinter Nights 2 did have shiny graphics, though. The Witcher, for all its emphasis on plot, also gave you shiny graphics - at the fatal cost of painful load times that left the entire game feeling disjointed. Oblivion was completely lacklustre and nowhere near as filling as Morrowind, but can any of you say that it didn't look like a three-course feast of RPG goodness? The gaming demographic is more about visuals than text, now, and unless that trend's a pendulum, then things can only go downhill. Edit: I know I sound like a Negative Nancy, but honestly, nothing has come out to really excite me in over 5 years. Half a decade. Not a terribly long time in my life, but in terms of gaming, that's quite a stretch. Double edit: whoever linked GOG, that stuff looks like a fucking godsend. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 2174 Joined: 14 Nov 2007 |
Voila, you have a game that's derivative. Innovation and imitation are not the best bed buddies. |
Press Junketeer Posts: 403 Joined: 15 Jul 2008 |
A) They have fixed most of that and are fixing it more this September B) Welcome! Wish I could get into those old games like you guys do. I'll put it in the easiest terms: They are just too hard for me :( |
Beat Writer  Posts: 182 Joined: 7 Aug 2008    | i think that "arr pee gees" are most liked because of their "freedom-feeling" that i feel rpgs are supossed to give you, although you can allways feel as you can see these limitations that you get, for example; in oblivion you cant go to other provinces or in final fantasy its incredibly linear. there is one simple answer to this ; add as much freedom as possible or at least make the limitations less clear |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 4582 Joined: 22 Jun 2008 |
Sure but once somethings polished to a mirror shine then someones going to have to innovate. Thats why we don't play in 2D anymore. |
Muckraker Posts: 300 Joined: 1 Jul 2008 |
No. Not at all the answer. Otherwise, GTA would be the definition of a phenomenal FPS. |
Press Junketeer  Posts: 469 Joined: 24 Jul 2008 |
ummmmmmmm.....are you retarded. I agree there are more stats than necisary but: attack/defense power, weight, value for items, not in that order. Also, either have the game be linear with side quests that really wouldn't effect your reputation in a negative way. Or positive if you're a bad guy. So elder scrolls, the sidequest where you go kill 5 vampires can stay, The fighter guild's quests can stay. However the assassin's quests..............that really shouldn't work into the main quest, it could be made to but it shouldn't be expected non-linear, have the side quests effect the main story line. If I take back the farm of 2 warriors who lost it to goblins, they should've helped me save bruma from the deadra. The assassin quests, one of the speaker's or whatever should come help you in the final quest and you should be able to have them assassinate people. AND LESS INVINCIBLES. I don't expect you to be able to kill everyone, but in elder scrolls there were invincible guards, no. I want the count to be invincible if I kill his heir and his heir to be invincible if I kill him, or however far the chain goes until no one can possibly take the job. I want characters only necisary for side quests that aren't guild quests to be killable. |
Muckraker Posts: 300 Joined: 1 Jul 2008 |
Agreed. Given that you could actually kill the GODS in Morrowind? Can't believe they reneged on that. Seriously, as long as you say 'You have severed the threads of fate by killing this character!' or something, just as an F.Y.I. to reload, I love being able to KFE. |
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It might be sad, but I cannot get into the classic RPGs you all rave about. They aren't bad games, but the barrier to entry to someone who started RPGs in the PS2 era and has played, now, SNES thru current... It's DAMNED hard for me to get into them because I think they are archaic dinosaurs in terms of mechanics. The stories might be damned well awesome, but they mechanics are so ancient that it feels like I need to read a guide to play the game, which is bad game design in today's standards.
If you want to keep the same vein, that's fine, just use modern systems like Mass Effect's dialogue system, as an example. It acually feels like a real conversation instead of "Read a dozen options and choose one", which I love to read books, but I don't like reading all those outcomes.
Most of these older titles, I feel, are more like modern strategy RPGs. Sorry old PC gamers, but I like the way the modern RPG is evolving and I'm hoping Dragon Age is a blend of the great stories of the past and modern mechanics of gameplay.