Decline Shit in RPGs that piss you off

[Uncle Skull]

Uninspired, generic fantasy D&D/LoTR rip off settings with boring old familiar races, boring old familiar monsters, boring old familiar rules, and without any humor or innovation.
Elves in general.

 

[gaussgunner]

My problem with this is that this takes away your own agency, casting you as a pawn into a pre-made plot you must follow if you want to get anywhere. I understand, of course, the limitations of a computer RPG, but even with these limitations, your game doesn't need to be "plot oriented". Your quest design doesn't need to be about where you want the story to go next and which choices the PC get to make (out of a list), but it could be about "what can the PC do at this point?".

Ideally I think it's about running around doing whatever you want (within the mechanics of the simulation*) to alter the game state. NPCs adjust their plans based on game state, and a story emerges from your interactions with them. However, that's not the 90-hour cinematic interpersonal drama experience we've come to expect, more like a 10-hour orgy of turn-based violence punctuated by exploration, trade, and a bit of curt dialogue. And such a game would never reach a satisfying conclusion. It could easily end up in limbo. At best you'd get confirmation of "winning" upon completion of "main quests", but other interesting outcomes would go unrecognized by the game script.

*Non-autistic high level simulation, that is. I'm speaking in the context of RPGs and other video games which are meant to be FUN.

Prestigious post, Alex. I agree that scripted choices are artificial and it would be preferable for games to gate content and create conflict more believably and organically, like a flesh-and-blood GM can. We're not there yet, of course, and procedural content is nowhere near sophisticated enough to feel inspired when you play it. I also would like to leave the road of heavily scripted decisions ... right now, though, it appears that this is the only way they can have meaning and impact on the narrative.

Agreed. Less is more.

Computer RPGs have their limitations. They remove the DM's subjectivity and the tedium of PnP rules-and-numbers combat, but they can't tell stories worth a shit. Procedural content breaks narrative, and there's no such thing as procedural narrative generation. AIs can handle combat and navigation but they can't hold a meaningful conversation, so all NPC interactions must be scripted. I don't see that changing. Ever. I've given it a lot of thought. Even if it were possible to bestow true AI upon NPCs, they would just act out petty soap operas, masturbate, kill themselves, or hack out of the simulation and exterminate all humans in real life. While scripting in most CRPGs is horrendous, the solution is to refine it, not to replace it with automated monstrosities.

In a nutshell: CRPG = game engine, scripts, characters, items, maps, encounter design, and combat AI. That's the medium. Pretty much anything else is "creative" fuckery.

 

[laclongquan]

Tiny font! Fucking TINY FONT!

 

[ilitarist]

Computer RPGs have their limitations. They remove the DM's subjectivity and the tedium of PnP rules-and-numbers combat, but they can't tell stories worth a shit. Procedural content breaks narrative, and there's no such thing as procedural narrative generation. AIs can handle combat and navigation but they can't hold a meaningful conversation, so all NPC interactions must be scripted. I don't see that changing. Ever. I've given it a lot of thought. Even if it were possible to bestow true AI upon NPCs, they would just act out petty soap operas, masturbate, kill themselves, or hack out of the simulation and exterminate all humans in real life. While scripting in most CRPGs is horrendous, the solution is to refine it, not to replace it with automated monstrosities.

In a nutshell: CRPG = game engine, scripts, characters, items, maps, encounter design, and combat AI. That's the medium. Pretty much anything else is "creative" fuckery.

And that's why role-playing videogames should concentrate first on gameplay - character customization, progression, encounters. Then you can work on the usual videogame stuff: graphics, music, atmosphere.

Sadly this usually means RPGs are complex games. You need a lot of effort to make people feel it's worth the investment. Dark Souls games have good tight gameplay but people get into them because of graphics, atmosphere and fame. Final Fantasy games have complex combat system (up until, you know, 10 years ago) yet people start playing those as interactive movies. And most other RPGs aren't even that good mechanically - yet it almost doesn't matter. So it's understandable how rarely you see mechanically complex, balanced and interesting games - people won't notice unless it's MMO or they'll be glued by graphics/story for 50 hours.

There's similar problem with RTS and 4X games - you have to play for dozens of hours to understand if there's any real strategy there. But those at least have multiplayer to fuel your interest. With RPGs you often get to the end and realize that all those gameplay mechanics were unbalanced, there are clear right choices in equipment and character progression. Whole game was just a tutorial without any interesting problems to solve. Mass Effect 1-3 was like that but it was cinematic so people didn't care. Same with Elder Scrolls, Fallout games (yes, including New Vegas), Divinity Original Sin, Witcher 2-3... SAD!

 

[agentorange]

Roadblocking progression in order to lengthen the game or provide a "cinematic" experience. In Fallout 1 you could wander straight from Vault 13 to the mutant base or the master's cathedral and destroy them both (with enough luck + saving and reloading). The game is set up in a way that if you follow the main quest you will guided through the world at a natural pace and eventually reach these locations at a more fitting level, however it is not necessary to follow this intended path. Many RPGs however force you to follow it, by say locking off a location with a key that you can only get by going through a number of quests (even though your character should be able to bypass said lock with a high lockpicking skill). I've seen people criticize Fallout 1 or other RPGs that can be beaten extremely quickly, but being able to finish a game quickly is a point of virtue as it means there is relatively little heavy scripting that forces a certain course of action. Fallout 2 already began to fail with the Arroyo stuff, and although the Enclave being on an oil rig made sense and made having to find stuff for the boat somewhat acceptable there should have been other options that allow you to bypass doing a bunch of quests to get the ship going (if you have science you could pilot it yourself, or maybe allow you take a vertibird to the rig). Fallout 3 went even worse by having the whole vault introduction, having to find your dad before you initiate the enclave stuff, having to get captured by the enclave in a story quest before you can even access their base etc. If you make an open world then make it be actually OPEN.

Encounter design is what makes or breaks a game for me. I can't stand fighting against the same few enemies again and again and again.
Also I'm a bit of hoarder, who picks up everything he finds, so encumberance naturally infuriates me.
And most kind of minigames. They are usually just annoying and stupid.

Argggh, encumbrance! Forgot that one. That and equipment degradation have become mainstays which rarely add any enjoyment, and usually just add busywork.
If done right both gave their place, but most devs can't be arsed to do them properly.

Yeah that is my problem with encumbrance. It could be interesting and add another layer of challenging depth to the game if done realistically, forcing you to really consider what you bring with you when leaving base, however in a game like Elder Scrolls you get an encumbrance limit but are still able to carry around multiple full sets of armor, a couple 2h swords, a couple dozen alchemical ingredients, etc. At the point where you are allowing us to carry that much crap around why set some arbitrary limit to it.

 

[ilitarist]

This gating is fine for games with save/load I think. Allowing player to just stumble on the end-game content is bad design unless the game provides tools for you to foresee problems, escape from them and suffer the reprecussions.

If you can just walk into a wrong neighbourhood and learn about it through being oneshotted you have to save/load till you understand the designer's intent. It's fine in Dark Souls because you learn you shouldn't go there just as your character learns. Otherwise you're playing as an incredibly lucky hero who just managed to not go into a dangerous places. That irritated me about Gothic/Risen which practically requires you to explore and kill all the weaklings to become strong enough yet you can easily be instakilled if you take the wrong turn. Gothic 1 was better about it as it was more or less clear who's stronger than starting character, but still later you have to learn if you strong enough through trial and error.

 

[Commissar Draco]

1) Random leveled loot
2) RtWP
3) Level scaling
4) BSB setting aka elves, magic and shit.
5) Biowerian style Choices and no Consequences
6) 3D Graphics when hand painted maps would so much better.

 

[Villagkouras]

Fucking crafting.

 

[Grauken]

Level scaling
Major content-cuts due to C&C (I hate replaying games to see it all), I do like minor C&C with different approaches in areas, not whole areas cut
Binary choices, saint or utter monster choices are retarded
Plot that throws my uber-level PCs into jail
When I run around with millions of gold coins and nothing worthwhile to buy, economics in RPGs rarely work after the initial phase is over
Ludicrous adventure-style puzzles

There's a lot of stuff I hate when it's implemented terribly, but can work if done well (e.g. crafting, random loot)

 

[gaussgunner]

Yeah that is my problem with encumbrance. It could be interesting and add another layer of challenging depth to the game if done realistically, forcing you to really consider what you bring with you when leaving base, however in a game like Elder Scrolls you get an encumbrance limit but are still able to carry around multiple full sets of armor, a couple 2h swords, a couple dozen alchemical ingredients, etc. At the point where you are allowing us to carry that much crap around why set some arbitrary limit to it.

I'm fine with weight limits. Inventory tetris isn't at all realistic anyway. You have 2 or 3 weapons close at hand, frequently used gear on your belt and in pockets, and you dump all the other shit in your pack. Weight is usually the limiting factor.

What I fucking hate is when a game lets me sprint effortlessly while carrying 249.9 pounds, then I pick up a feather, that makes 250 pounds, now I can barely walk and the game is yelling YOU ARE CARRYING TOO MUCH WEIGHT!!!
(A) The penalty should fade in gradually,
(B) It should only affect combat, and
(C) Only equipped items should count. You can't fight with 100 pounds on your back. You drop your pack when combat starts.

 

[Zer0wing]

Restrictions. The most basic ones - why can't I murder everybody? Or anybody game designer doesn't want dead?

What is the last RPG which let's you kill anybody, including children? My take is Deus Ex: Invisible War, even though it's not an RPG really. But it had lolis in school uniform and weird physics which let players do obnoxious stuff with dead children. No male kids in IW, though.

Before IW, even blizzard games had killiable children - Warcraft 3 as an example.

 

[Zombra]

Inventory just needs to make up its mind in each game. If I can only carry one suit of armor, that's fine; but if I can carry 10 suits of armor, might as well let me carry 1000. When a game starts off telling me I should loot everything in unrealistic amounts, it's dickweed to arbitrarily make me stop later. Figure out the behavior you want from your players and condition them to it from the beginning.

 

[TripJack]

EVERYTHING

 

[Rali56]

Trash mobs, fetch quests, and companions that have no logical reason to follow you.

 

[Lurker King]

There are many good choices, but fluffy character building and fluffy combat system are tied in the first place.

 

[Lurker King]

Not getting to make characters myself

That's exactly right. Fuck 'The Witcher' in the ass, man.

 

[Hrymr]

Slow leveling. I want to see my numbers going up, otherwise I wouldn't be playing RPG.
Also not being able to increase the stats after character creation (like in AoD) or being able to, but very rarely (+1 to one stat every four levels in DnD).

 

[Gerrard]

Irrelevance of the passage of time.

"Meet me tomorrow at midnight near the southern gate."
"'kay"

<TWO MONTHS LATER>

 

[gaussgunner]

"Come back at midnight"

<MEDITATE FOR 14 HOURS>

"Ok, carry on."

Fuck that.

 

[Commissar Draco]

Yeah that is my problem with encumbrance. It could be interesting and add another layer of challenging depth to the game if done realistically, forcing you to really consider what you bring with you when leaving base, however in a game like Elder Scrolls you get an encumbrance limit but are still able to carry around multiple full sets of armor, a couple 2h swords, a couple dozen alchemical ingredients, etc. At the point where you are allowing us to carry that much crap around why set some arbitrary limit to it.

I'm fine with weight limits. Inventory tetris isn't at all realistic anyway. You have 2 or 3 weapons close at hand, frequently used gear on your belt and in pockets, and you dump all the other shit in your pack. Weight is usually the limiting factor.

What I fucking hate is when a game lets me sprint effortlessly while carrying 249.9 pounds, then I pick up a feather, that makes 250 pounds, now I can barely walk and the game is yelling YOU ARE CARRYING TOO MUCH WEIGHT!!!
(A) The penalty should fade in gradually,
(B) It should only affect combat, and
(C) Only equipped items should count. You can't fight with 100 pounds on your back. You drop your pack when combat starts.

Where are my slaves porters/pack mules? Makes no sense in medieval* like setting game to travel without at least one unless you RP a vagrant like char.

*Give me bag of holding/pocket plane/Highwayman trunkarcus in other setting but otherwise any weight limit is just makes me type godmode after the fight to not make me waste my time I could use RPG by traveling to merchant ten times.

Irrelevance of the passage of time.

"Meet me tomorrow at midnight near the southern gate."
"'kay"

<TWO MONTHS LATER>

PC: I came to town looking for work.

NPC: Well had problem with Basilisk but decided to go bother City Guard Captain... He slew beast two days ago.

PC:

NPC: took only 100 orens too... Buy better horse not this fancy silver sword next time stranger.


Obviusly Don't care about simulation elements in my RP game obviously... unless they are relevent for setting and story reasons... Like radiation poisoning in Fallout's which limited exploration on lower levels.

 

[Carrion]

"Come back at midnight"

<MEDITATE FOR 14 HOURS>

"Ok, carry on."

Fuck that.

"Come back later" is a subtle way of the game telling you that you could be doing some side quests for a while. I don't mind it at all. What is infuriating, though, is when a character tells you to come back at midnight, and the game automatically fast-forwards to midnight without asking for permission. The same goes for cutscene paralysis, teleporting and the other instances where the game takes control away from you for no reason. It's especially annoying when you've got a journal full of quests that you plan to do in a certain order to minimize travel etc., and suddenly you find yourself on the other side of the continent just because the writers decided that's how it should go.

Restrictions. The most basic ones - why can't I murder everybody? Or anybody game designer doesn't want dead?

Children will probably remain off-limits for the foreseeable future outside some fucked-up indie titles, and the best you can expect is something like New Vegas: every adult is fair game, and children try their best to not give you a reason to murder them.

But yeah, you should never run into a situation where you'd actually want to kill a character only to find out that he or she is inexplicably wearing plot armor. Preferably everyone should be killable, but if that's not the case, the invulnerable NPCs should at least do their best to stay out of your way.

 

[Zombra]

"Come back later" is a subtle way of the game telling you that you could be doing some side quests for a while. I don't mind it at all.

Well, that's not so subtle.

But I do appreciate it when RPGs put the brakes on the MQ. Caius Cosades' famous "Go learn your way around" quest is a nice example.

 

[SkeleTony]

Little doubt I am repeating (a few)points here others have made but...

RPGs that effectively do away with carrying capacity and inventory restrictions. -Seriously kids if your silly elf can carry around 10 broadswards, 8 backpacks full of crap, wealth that would make Bill Gates say "Wow! That is a lot of money!" etc. then this is no RPG at all.

Females = Males with boobs. - Women are physically different than men. Smaller frames, different cross-section/skeletal structure, etc. etc. If women are to be depicted as being just as physically strong as men then they need to have physical bodies that warrant such.

Race/species has no gameplay effect (sci-fi and fantasy mostly) - I am not interested in cosmetic fluff. Make ogres bigger and stronger than humans or do not include them as PCs.

Not understanding the difference between Size/Strength and Stamina/fitness/health - Many of my favorite RPGs make this error which seems to have started with GURPS (3rd ed. and earlier). It makes no sense to say that ogres have greater capacity to lift shit and deal damage in melee (because of their size) but then give them stamina corresponding to their larger size. In games like Natuk this lead to the 'Buff Mages' problem as I called it.

Actually, the above should have fallen under this one: Dumbed down overlap in the definition of attributes. - So instead of having Dexterity and Agility the game just has "Dexterity" which covers everything falling under both of these or instead of having Size/Strength and Stamina the game just has "Strength" which is nonsensically defined as covering all of this. Intelligence = willpower. etc.

Party-based RPGs with severe restrictions on party size - typically this results in 4 PC parties of characters who are all alike (everyone can cast spells, do some thieving, fight, shoot arrows etc.). Boring.

Level scaling.

Pre-generated PCs - No I am not interested in the awesome novel you have been working on. I do not want to read your story in a RPG. Keep that non-interactive shit away from me.

Anime/Manga/Jap-faggotry. - This one is ironic since the very first game graphics I ever did were for a 'Final Fantasy-like' console styled RPG called Realm of Arcanum (does not exist anywhere on the net anymore and cannot be found so don't bother looking for it just to laugh at my graphics)

Unlimited ammo - I love Might and Magic 7 and a few others that use this shtick but this bothers me for numerous reasons.

Way too simple/dumbed down magic/psionics. -Examples are fantasy games with two types of magic that work exactly the same (i.e. "Priest spells" and "Mage spells"). Take a lesson from RuneQuest kids and put a little effort into this.


EDIT: Forgot about Hit Points that increase with experience - This is just stupid. Jagged Alliance proved this was unnecessary and lazy design. Hit points should be based on physical size and increasing attributes should be a rare if ever occurrence.

Also D&D game mechanics used in CRPGs.

 

[Haplo]

1. Random loot
2. Full level scaling
3. Equipment tiers and logarithmic growth of equipment stats
4. Disconnection between attributes, skills and feats
5. Stats/feats with little impact on gameplay
6. Meaningless character progression / lack of sense of development
7. Arbitrary bonuses/maluses for being higher/lower level then the content you're facing (deal 10 damage / receive 50 at level 3, but deal 100 and receive 5 at level 6, while fighting the same enemy). Instead you should miss less and be missed more often and/or soak more due to better armor.
8. Master of everything builds, lack of meaningful character diversification (either by class or skillset). Note Skyrim was much better at it then Oblivion or Morrowind, despite not having "classes". Fallout 4 was better at it then F3. Not that any of them is an excellent example of a cRPG execution .

 

[laclongquan]

why not carry a general label "I hate game" when you'all are at it?