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How should a noob approach blobbers?

System

Educated
Joined
Jan 13, 2012
Messages
38
I don't see anyone recommending Arcana on SNES. It is very simple and short game, kinda tough but not unfairly, it is not inaccessible like some other more popular blobbers. If you can get over some strange graphic style decisions it is pretty rewarding entry level turn based blobber. It prompted me to play older Wizardries, which made me curl up in the corner and go back to the loving embrace of M&M.
 

DraQ

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Ultima Underworld and System Shock are some of my favourite games, but I wouldn't call them blobbers. Blobbers are tile based.
Are you mentally broken?
:hmmm:
The term blobber comes from "blob with arms and legs" referring to the representation of *party*. There is no such thing as non-party based blobber, so neither UUW, nor System Shock (nor any other FPS) is a blobber.
OTOH Wizardry 8 *IS* a blobber, tiles have fuck-all to do with it.
 

V_K

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Ultima Underworld and System Shock are some of my favourite games, but I wouldn't call them blobbers. Blobbers are tile based.
Are you mentally broken?
:hmmm:
The term blobber comes from "blob with arms and legs" referring to the representation of *party*. There is no such thing as non-party based blobber, so neither UUW, nor System Shock (nor any other FPS) is a blobber.
OTOH Wizardry 8 *IS* a blobber, tiles have fuck-all to do with it.
What he probably meant is that single-character tile-based games like Anvil of Dawn or Legacy: Realm of Terror can be classified as blobber-ish, since aside from the party composition they play very much like Dungeon Master. However putting single-character continuous-movement games like UUW or SS2 in that pile would be stretching it too far.
 

DraQ

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Ultima Underworld and System Shock are some of my favourite games, but I wouldn't call them blobbers. Blobbers are tile based.
Are you mentally broken?
:hmmm:
The term blobber comes from "blob with arms and legs" referring to the representation of *party*. There is no such thing as non-party based blobber, so neither UUW, nor System Shock (nor any other FPS) is a blobber.
OTOH Wizardry 8 *IS* a blobber, tiles have fuck-all to do with it.
What he probably meant is that single-character tile-based games like Anvil of Dawn or Legacy: Realm of Terror can be classified as blobber-ish, since aside from the party composition they play very much like Dungeon Master. However putting single-character continuous-movement games like UUW or SS2 in that pile would be stretching it too far.
Disagreed. Tile-based + FPP but without party blob is typically either a proto-FPS (portions of Alcatraz and Platoon worked that way) or an early (action) RPG, depending on whether it has RPG elements.
 

Snorkack

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Shadorwun: Hong Kong
Paper Sorcerer is probably the best blobber for getting familiar with this subgenre of the last few years.
If diving right into old games is no problem for you, Might & Magic World of Xeen is probably the way to go.
Even although everyone's talking about it, forget Grimoire for now. I think this is a game only connoiseurs can fully appreciate, especially in its current state.
 

Parabalus

Arcane
Joined
Mar 23, 2015
Messages
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Might and Magic 6-8 are as popamole as blobbers get, you can't really fuck up anything in them. Wizardry 8 seems a natural next step after them, maybe M&M:X.

The older Wizardry and M&M games mostly require mental fortitude, it takes a very specific mindset to enjoy them. Try them only after you've confirmed you enjoy the newer ones.
 

Zombra

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I'll try Wizardry at some point, but first I want to finish something more friendly, because even though it seems like a great series, it also seems like it requires a level of knowledge that I don't have at the moment.
Just to say, when Wizardry 1 came out, we were all noobs. Lack of experience is not a valid reason not to try it.
 

DraQ

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What V_K said.

OTOH Wizardry 8 *IS* a blobber, tiles have fuck-all to do with it.

Have you played, and completed, other blobbers than Wiz 8?
And how exactly is that relevant?

I was just wondering.
I have played LoL (not finished, but got as far as Scotia's castle, might replay at some point) and Thunderscape (stopped at the very beginning due to technical problems).
Have Wiz6-8 playthrough on my backlog, same with MM8.
Won't bother with EoB and DM.
Won't bother with earlier Wizardries with possible (but unlikely) exception of W4.
Might bother with some other blobbers provided they are not too primitive and aren't RT.

Have played some tile-based crawler-shooters with no RPG elements back in the day.
 

Iznaliu

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Even then:
  • Insane mentally impaired, iron-clad mountain of muscle with a huge sword is less devastating among fellow mentally impaired, iron-clad mountains of muscle than among frail dudes and dudettes in bathrobes.
  • You can always supplement your party with RPCs and you can switch classes, if not of your party members then RPCs, to scratch your itches.
...so it shouldn't be that crippling.

Even still, your party won't be able to make headway as it keeps being hit by spells.
 

Zombra

An iron rock in the river of blood and evil
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Even still, your party won't be able to make headway as it keeps being hit by spells.
Stop this foolishness. Your argument is disingenuous. Creating a magicless party in W8 would take a deliberately destructive effort on the part of any new player.
 

Gregz

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I really like the idea of blobbers.

I've read a lot about them for the past few months and I'm always excited to try one. I've read twice the Wizardry IV Let's Play that Crooked Bee made and it's definitely one of the best things I've read in a long time.

The problem is, as it happens with classic roguelikes, the blobbers I've tried so far (Elminage Original and SMT: Strange Journey) don't seem very "noob-friendly", so after about 10 hours into each one I gave up because I realized that the problem wasn't the difficulty, but the fact that I had a shitty/non balanced party.

Stranger of Sword City is modern and pretty accessible, it's also a great game.

Google 'best party' + *name of any game in this thread* if you're worried about starting out gimped.
 

pippin

Guest
Paper Sorcerer: it's not hard, but on the other hand it's also kind of plain imo. The game telegraphs everything. This includes the secrets. Starting with this game could wire your brain to accept the fact that secrets are telegraphed, when even Grimrock didn't do that. For some weird reason I felt it was closer to 16 bit era rpgs than Wiz4. But then again no game is like Wiz4.

Stranger of Sword City: this game is great actually. It's forgiving in the sense that your character won't die, so you can do whatever you want with it within reason. All your party members will be incapacitated and you have to wait for them to recover, but other than that it's ok. It will also introduce you to the Wizardry inspired concept of class/job changing, which is kinda intuitive; spend x levels in one class, unlock a skill, then move on to other (better) classes. This is the game which will prepare you to the greatest and most difficult choice in gaming, ever: Samurai or Knight/Lord?
 

makchanka

Arbiter
Joined
Jun 21, 2017
Messages
244
try wiz8 or M&M 7 if you want an easy introduction to blobbers for a modern gamer, though they're not nearly as good as grid-based blobbers. If you don't want to screw up your idea of what blobbers are for a somewhat harder introduction, M&M 4-5 and Wiz 7 are better. You can ignore literally everything made in Japan. It's all garbage.

Start with the classics and you'll appreciate what more modern games improve on.

Stranger of Sword City is modern and pretty accessible, it's also a great game.

Stories in blobbers are largely white noise, but SoSC is actually grating. The plot reads like it was written by middle schoolers trying to write a drama. It's bad. If the gameplay were good enough it wouldn't matter -because who the fuck plays blobbers for the story-, but it just isn't. It is, however, probably the best recent Japanese blobber to come out. That's not saying much though.

Anyway, if OP is adamant about playing that anime crap, the way to avoid screwing up SoSC is to plan out what you want in terms of party development, then make duplicate characters in case you fuck up multiclassing and a few alternates that follow different developmental paths in case your plan was shit to begin with. It's pretty hard to fuck up though. It's not the most complicated game.
 

pippin

Guest
When it comes to certain people's opinions about japanese blobbers, just keep in mind that sage advice: the Jew fears the Samurai.
 

DraQ

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Even still, your party won't be able to make headway as it keeps being hit by spells.
Umm... No?
You can pick-up bard and get free magic screen AND soul shield, supplement that with certain overenthusiastic ranger, develop said ranger in spellcasting department and you eventually get an element shield as well.

Stop this foolishness. Your argument is disingenuous. Creating a magicless party in W8 would take a deliberately destructive effort on the part of any new player.
Besides, this. Only two classes in Wizardry 8 are magicless - rogue and fighter (and even they can use trinkets, scrolls, *tix, potions and bombs). Using only two classes in a game where you make a party of six is pushing it (same with making smaller party).
 

hackncrazy

Savant
Joined
Jun 9, 2015
Messages
415
Oh, since no one answered about an specific point:

Dying a lot is normal in these games? I remember that in SJ and Elminage I died A LOT on each dungeon before I figured out how to kill the enemies, what's the best course to follow etc.

Also, running back to the save point every time you get a good drop is considered cheating in some way?
 

V_K

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Dying a lot is normal in these games?
Varies from game to game really. The 1980s ones (and the Japanese that are modelled after them) are a lot more brutal than the 1990s ones. I'd say loosing some characters regularly is par for the course, while a TPK shouldn't really happen every 2 steps.
 

anvi

Prophet
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Don't bother with Wizardry imo. Get Eye of the Beholder 2. It is the perfect introduction to blobbers, there is no better. Just make sure you grind a bit and go back to old areas to exlore them thoroughly and kill everything when it respawns. It is the only way I know of to survive the late stages of the game if you get that far.

The best way to play them is with MMORPG tactics. Build a tank to take damage, in a blobber you probably need 2 to fill the front row. It can be a warrior or a pally or whatever, and on simpler games I usually go with 1 tank and a rogue that survives thanks to agility rather than armor. Then the back row you need at least 1 healer in each party, and at least 1 spell caster to blast shit.

Tanks need armor class above everything, agi to avoid attacks. Some games you will need some str on them so they can do some damage, but usually it is best to just build them to survive and let the others do the damage. Mages and priests build them to have mana and do damage. After EOTB2, play the third one, and maybe the first if you really want to. After that try Lands of Lore, the first one at least.

Also unpopular opinion around these parts, but I think the Might & Magic games suck and you should avoid them. Although the recent one is an exception (Might & Magic X: Legacy). The older ones had better worlds, but the new one is the only one that has decent combat, and that should be the whole point of games like this.

Also Wiz 8 is technically cool but boring to play imho. I haven't played the others. Also Legend of Grimrock 1 and 2 are worth trying but they are noob versions of blobbers. The first one is worth playing mostly for the puzzles, and the second one is worth playing only if you get a mod called Magic of Grimrock. Don't play them until you get good though, they can be quite hard. Dumbed down, but hard. Magic of Grimrock is not dumbed down though, that is one of the best blob experiences available.
 

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