Huxley.
You.
Know.
You.
Want.
To.
Huxley.
You.
Know.
You.
Want.
To.
OKAY FINE
HERE'S THE NEW LIST
YOU ASKED FOR IT
Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy XII
Earthbound
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Fallout 3
I will fail to make comment on the first three because it's Huxley.
The last two are just unforgivable.
I knew when I wrote my list of terrible RPGs there would be people who agreed with it
Originally Posted by Teddy Roosevelt
Uhmm no thanks. I don't like W RPGS at all.
You should give them a try sometimes, even if you don't normally like them, you're missing out on some GREAT stuff!
Uhmm no thanks. I don't like W RPGS at all.
^ No thanks. They're just not my personal cup of tea. They all have that Matrix or WOW/ Dungeons and Dragons feel.
Planescape and Fallout deviate a little from those templates, but if you read Fantasy/Sci-Fi, they probably don't deviate enough for you.
I don't really like WRPGs either but I really got into The Witcher and Oblivion.
I am disappoint.What is it about WPRG's do you not like?
They all have this WoW and Dungeons and Dragons feel to them. I hate those games.I am disappoint.
I won't comment on WoW because I think it has valid reasons to prove alienating to people. Your comments are interesting and it's similar to some other things I've observed.
I never understood why RPG's with a D&D "feel" to them are unappealing to some. D&D is the origin of role-playing, and still to this day is one of the most flexible RPG systems standing, with a huge variety of settings and types of narratives available for a player to experience and undergo. Even a JRPG series like Dragon Quest, Tales, or Final Fantasy draws heavily from D&D and its various settings, and the major differences in style is more visual than anything. D&D gives profound flexibility in character and world building, and some of the most satisfying and, interestingly enough, original stories I have played were in D&D sessions.
I notice a lot of JRPG fans are turned off by WRPG's. Mayhaps they appear too stat-based, or too dark and cynical, or mayhaps it's the non-linear narrative giving an impression of a lack of resonance or emotional weight or complexity. Maybe it's the relatively formulaic settings. Yes, this is a subgenre known for its staggering reliance on numbers, stats, and variables. It is a genre that tends to use fantasy tropes well-established in fantasy conventions. It is a genre with open-ended narratives.
However, WRPG's have, especially in the late-90's to early 2000's, have provided us with some of the most thoughtful, engaging, and unique stories in gaming and, I would argue in some cases, all of fiction.
Take Planescape: Torment, one of my favorites. This is a game that is at least give or take 70% dialogue and exploration, arguably more of an adventure game than an RPG. The character advancement is surprisingly simple, if very open-ended. This is a game that you can progress not at all underleveled without ever technically entering combat. The Planescape setting is incredibly interesting, with the game's central location of Sigil being quite twisted, with an immensely well-developed cast of characters both magical and macabre.
The story in this game is incredible and doesn't sacrifice anything by being non-linear. In fact, the non-linearity actually serves to reinforce the game's themes. The story is that you play a man who awakes in a mortuary grotesquely covered in scars and tattoos, with no memory of who you are or what your name is. Whenever you die you just wake up just as you were. You must search for your lost memories and your identity. What you find is fascinatingly haunting, as your past incarnations run the gamut and have had some powerful and almost unimaginable effects on the game's world and the people in it.
The characters that can join your party are all extremely detailed, developed, and original, with some truly heartbreaking moments between them and The Nameless One (your main character). The game's incredible writing (one advantage the WRPG has is it is written in my native tongue so there are rarely spotty translations unless it's German or something), haunting atmosphere, and great voice-acting serves to enhance the sheer power of mood this game possesses.
So, if you ever try one WRPG in your life, try Torment. It's a philosophical, metaphysical gaming experience. There is truly nothing like it, and is a game that, unfortunately, JRPG's have yet to include something quite like in their ranks.
hmmm here goes in no order:
Final Fantasy VIII
Vagrant Story
Front Mission 3
Breath of Fire 4
Mass Effect (series, hard to pick one game out of the 3 since they all rely on one another)
I know everyone will bitch about FFVIII (well maybe Locky will agree with me but thats about it) but since it was the RPG what first got me really in to RPG gaming I feel it deserves it's mention on there, plus without VIII I would never have first joined EoFF and met you fine rubes. Plus Triple Triad is amazing.
Honorable mentions:
Remaining FF games
Fallout series (including tactics and 3, though I'm yet to play NV)
Baldurs Gate 2
Never Winter Nights
Diablo 2
Dragon Age Origins
Deus Ex
There's probably some I've forgotten to mention.
F those haters sonn!
We needed you in Neo's thread earlier...
Hey I love FF VIII too !
Not as much as FF IX or FF VI but it's up there.
The biggest issue I had with IX and the main reason VIII went in the list of the top 5 and not IX; is they took the idea from VIII of the card game which was awesome because let's face it Triple Triad was ultimately independent enough to be a card game in it's own right (they missed a marketing ploy by not making it a legit real life card game too imho with decks on sale in stores and so forth would've been something to rival Pokemon Cards even!) and then they smurfed it up. Tetra Master was overly complicated, with the way it worked out the card strength the fact that the cards had randomized attack options (literally I once got an amazingly awesome early game, card in terms of numbers/power with 0 attack arrows :\ smurfing douche of a game) and even how the rules played out. I had believed after a great deal of time reading up online and playing the game that I had a good grasp of it only for some random bulltrout to crop up and destroy my supposed knowledge of the game. It turned a fun minigame in to something of a chore for me. I don't want a minigame to be so complicated it feels like a chore, I want it to be easy and fun to play. That's why VIII's Triple Triad is amazing; simplicity combined with the fact that nothing was definitive; dislike the random rule if you use some basic tactics it is no more. The only minigame I remember coming close to this (aside from those in VII because there's too many to get in to here) was Blitzball, it was a sports sim yes, but it was relatively simple and still had enough depth that you could lose an entire day just playing the minigame without ever feeling like you had to do anything but. That's why my best FFIX file had somewhere like 200 hours on it when my best FFVIII files got close to 500. My best X file is technically still ongoing
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