A good RPG cannot be short

[Grunker]

Blackguards is pretty short, best RPG of its decade

 

[ilitarist]

Blackguards is pretty short, best RPG of its decade

Keep hearing very polarizing things about this game.

Some of the criticism is "my 80% hit missed three times in a row!" which makes me think this game is disliked by imbeciles. Maybe it's a good sign.

 

[Roguey]

Blackguards is pretty short, best RPG of its decade

https://howlongtobeat.com/game.php?id=14481 even the fastest is 28.

 

[Grunker]

^ My playthrough was 32 hours, I consider that to be a short RPG. For comparison, my Dragonfall playthrough took 40, and I believe that game was part of sparking the discussion?

Blackguards is pretty short, best RPG of its decade

Keep hearing very polarizing things about this game.

Some of the criticism is "my 80% hit missed three times in a row!" which makes me think this game is disliked by imbeciles. Maybe it's a good sign.

I admit to being somewhat hyperbolic when I say it's the best of the decade because I believe the Codex cannot into judging stuff by how well it lives up to its vision rather than on how well it lives up to arbitrary Codex ideals, and Blackguards is an extremely focused, very well-executed vision.

But it is a fantastic game, it just doesn't have a lot of the bells and whistles the Codex believes must be part of something that calls itself an RPG.

 

[Roguey]

^ My playthrough was 32 hours, I consider that to be a short RPG.

Even Blaine says 30 is fine.

To me "short" is sub-20 like Alpha Protocol, Dead Man's Switch, Dungeon Siege III, South Park. 20-~35 like Deus Ex, Mask of the Betrayer, Knights of the Chalice are medium-length.

 

[ga♥]

Vampire Bloodlines was breddy short. I don't know how long it took me, but I feel like it was around 20.

 

[Grunker]

^ My playthrough was 32 hours, I consider that to be a short RPG.

Even Blaine says 30 is fine.

To me "short" is sub-20 like Alpha Protocol, Dead Man's Switch, Dungeon Siege III, South Park. 20-~35 like Deus Ex, Mask of the Betrayer, Knights of the Chalice are medium-length.

My playthrough of AP was 32 hours and it wasn't particularly completionist

 

[CryptRat]

You're looking for a particular form of complexity in an RPG (more than just level design), big party creation, enough skills and spells and then also enough areas, situations, enemies to play with them or it's pointless, so you can't have a real good & complex RPG with big party and all without significantly longer playthroughs than some other genre classics like Prince of persia, Another World, Megaman...

 

[fantadomat]

Anything beneath 20 hours is a short one. And most games given as example of short and good are above 20 and 30 hours.

 

[CptMace]

As VOD explained, this is pointless.

I challenge you to name a single good rpg that happens to be long.

Mind that for any game you'll come up with, I'll contest that it's either good, long or an rpg to begin with.
Mind that I won't give any semblance of definition of a long rpg, and whatever names you come up with will help me shape this definition on the get-go by process of elimination.
Mind that if you somehow pull out a name that I can't dismiss without looking like an utter retard, I'll deem you faggy for going for it anyway. This may or may not occur if you pull that name out in literally two minutes.

 

[Black Angel]

I don't know anything about the games being short means they're good or not, but I see no one has asked the right question here, so I'll claim the honor with pleasure.

Ehem...

"What's an RPG?"

 

[ilitarist]

As VOD explained, this is pointless.

I challenge you to name a single good rpg that happens to be long.

Baldur's Gate 2.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Biofail shovelware, not even turn-based, has romances, the very incarnation of decline how the fuck is that "good"? also can be speed run in 30min, does this sound like a long game or what?

 

[Werdna's Revenge]

Too many gamers have been trained into thinking long=good. Blaine is just another popalmole loving sheep in this regard. I guess if you're a Biowarian storyfag you want those long drawn out romances nothing less than 50 hours will do, but the pure gameplay fast paced old school dungeon crawlers can be fast and very satisfying. I want more short RPGs and less filler crap.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Hmmm, alow me to take a look on my russian LP series:

Fallout - almost 7 hours for everything. If you read the dialogues and include some routine I've done offscreen, mb 9 hours in total.

Fallout 1.5 - around 12 hours for everything. If you read the dialogues etc, mb 14-15 in total.

Fallout 2 - around 20 hours for everything (and that's RP mod so that's a lot of extra grinding to do). 25 hours in total.


Boy, what a fucking piece of shit series. It just sucks Todd Howard's sweaty balls. Thank God this cancer died and no one sane remembers it.

 

[CptMace]

Too many gamers have been trained into thinking long=good.

Let's be as fair as possible here. The original statement wasn't that an rpg has to be long to be any good. It was that it can't be any good if it happened to be short.
Which imo is not the same thing. If we consider a medium range in terms of length, that is.
It's actually interesting to discuss this topic, and some have tried to flesh the question out a bit. But it ultimately went back to binary reflexions and absolute affirmations.

 

[Jimmious]

Size doesn't matter guys, it's how you use it that matters

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

But is there really a causal link between game length and quality of content? other than exactly in the other direction (i.e. the longer a game is the more likely it contains large sections of filler content suckitude).
I'd argue it's significantly easier to create a game with 10 hours of top notch quality, polished content than to create one with 50 hours.
If most "good" games are of 30-60 h length it's because most games are of that length, naturally the good ones among them will also be of that length. Implying it's the length that's decisive for the quality of the content (longer = better content, short= content must suck) is a fallacy.

 

[Werdna's Revenge]

Too many gamers have been trained into thinking long=good.

Let's be as fair as possible here. The original statement wasn't that an rpg has to be long to be any good. It was that it can't be any good if it happened to be short.
Which imo is not the same thing. If we consider a medium range in terms of length, that is.
It's actually interesting to discuss this topic, and some have tried to flesh the question out a bit. But it ultimately went back to binary reflexions and absolute affirmations.

Hmm, I suppose you are right maybe I should amend that to be "Too many gamers have been trained into thinking short=bad". Indeed, when a AAA $70 title is a mere 15 hours I get why people feel ripped off if that 15 hours wsn't orgasmic bliss. But I've played too many titles with way too much padding to drive up that playtime. I also don't buy the latest AAA priced games anymore though.

 

[Sinatar]

I just finished playing through the entire Might & Magic series (starting with 2) last month. Outside of Might & Magic VI (which is enormous) the longest playthrough was Might & Magic II at 29 hours and 33 minutes.

You should try actually timing your playthroughs instead of using your vague perception of how long it took. I played all these games on stream, I have exact times for all of them and I got as close to 100%ing them as I could without using a guide, this include mapping every square in the world and every dungeon as well as beating every dungeon and all the optional super bosses. The might & magic games are not as long as you remember. World of Xeen in it's totality (which is 2 full priced games combined) came out to 29 hours, 57 minutes. That's about 10 - 12 hours for 4 and 5 each and then a few hours for the World of Xeen post game stuff (most of which was spent in the optional dungeon of death).

EDIT: I just double checked and Might & Magic VII altogether came out to 34 hours, so that and VI exceeded your 30 hour barrier.

I don't buy this for a hot second. None of these people have any agenda to draw the game out or portray it as being longer than it is:

Unfortunately these are very old games, so there isn't much data for them and all of it is anecdotal, but being random people on the Internet their credibility is as good as yours.

I just finished playing through the entire Might & Magic series (starting with 2) last month. Outside of Might & Magic VI (which is enormous) the longest playthrough was Might & Magic II at 29 hours and 33 minutes.

You should try actually timing your playthroughs instead of using your vague perception of how long it took. I played all these games on stream, I have exact times for all of them and I got as close to 100%ing them as I could without using a guide, this include mapping every square in the world and every dungeon as well as beating every dungeon and all the optional super bosses. The might & magic games are not as long as you remember. World of Xeen in it's totality (which is 2 full priced games combined) came out to 29 hours, 57 minutes. That's about 10 - 12 hours for 4 and 5 each and then a few hours for the World of Xeen post game stuff (most of which was spent in the optional dungeon of death).

EDIT: I just double checked and Might & Magic VII altogether came out to 34 hours, so that and VI exceeded your 30 hour barrier.

It is clear that you lie mate,all MM games that i have played are above 30 maybe even 40 hours on first playtrough. I have played MM6 at least 20 times and can finish it in around 10 hours,that doesn't mean that the game is 10 hours.

Maybe you two yahoos missed the part in my post where I said I streamed all these playthroughs. IE there is video evidence of my playthroughs. I'm not looking to self promote my stream here, but the videos aren't hard to find.

 

[fantadomat]

As VOD explained, this is pointless.

I challenge you to name a single good rpg that happens to be long.

Mind that for any game you'll come up with, I'll contest that it's either good, long or an rpg to begin with.
Mind that I won't give any semblance of definition of a long rpg, and whatever names you come up with will help me shape this definition on the get-go by process of elimination.
Mind that if you somehow pull out a name that I can't dismiss without looking like an utter retard, I'll deem you faggy for going for it anyway. This may or may not occur if you pull that name out in literally two minutes.

Lets be clear i am talking about first time kind of length,many games could be beaten in a lot less hours if have played it 20 times.
Fallout 2 is at least 30 hours no matter what some speedruners here are claiming,i am currently playing it and i am around 20hours and halfway.
Both BG games hit the 30 hour mark with all the exploration and dicking around,i personally can easily wast up to 10 hours pickpocketing all the npcs.
All the Piranha Bytes hit at least 20 hours mark,most of them around 40 hours.
Arcanum is.....long and good.
All the MM games are at least 30 hours adventure.
Eschalon book games are around 20 hours.
Spiredweb games are at least 40 hours each.
Both Kotor games are above 20 hours.
NWN games are the same.
Vampire,the game is between 20 and 30 hours.
Underrail.
All the bioware rpgs are long,even the ME games.
And here i will even give you a bone on the good front.......Oblivion is long rpg ,

The greatest argument here is that the people defending short games are deluded in thinking that 20/30 hours games are short!. You can't make great world,tell its story trough encounters and events,make good C&C system,memorable npcs,good exploration,solid and satisfying progression and good side content without making a long rpg.

 

[fantadomat]

Too many gamers have been trained into thinking long=good.

Let's be as fair as possible here. The original statement wasn't that an rpg has to be long to be any good. It was that it can't be any good if it happened to be short.
Which imo is not the same thing. If we consider a medium range in terms of length, that is.
It's actually interesting to discuss this topic, and some have tried to flesh the question out a bit. But it ultimately went back to binary reflexions and absolute affirmations.

Hmm, I suppose you are right maybe I should amend that to be "Too many gamers have been trained into thinking short=bad". Indeed, when a AAA $70 title is a mere 15 hours I get why people feel ripped off if that 15 hours wsn't orgasmic bliss. But I've played too many titles with way too much padding to drive up that playtime. I also don't buy the latest AAA priced games anymore though.

I am not saying that short games are bad or there should be some money/hour ratio. Just that short doesn't make good rpg. Also i too feel that some games are too slow and i hate grind.

 

[Diggfinger]

As I say to the ladies: "my cock is short but long enough do get the job done in a satisfactory way".

Exactly the same goes for good RPGs:
- I'd rather have 20-40hours quality gameplay, rather than 80-120hours filler/grinding content because developers needed to add "100hours plus" to the box

obviously, one doesnt exclude the other. Good games (Fallout/Arcanum/Dark Souls) can be "short if you know what to do"-ish but we so filled with optional content that you have fun exploring additional stuff to get new story/item/skills etc.

Btw. Josh Sawyer also commented on this that Icewind Dale II was too long, due to the trope that RPGs "must by definition take 100+ hours to complete".
I find that wrong.

 

[Werdna's Revenge]

Too many gamers have been trained into thinking long=good.

Let's be as fair as possible here. The original statement wasn't that an rpg has to be long to be any good. It was that it can't be any good if it happened to be short.
Which imo is not the same thing. If we consider a medium range in terms of length, that is.
It's actually interesting to discuss this topic, and some have tried to flesh the question out a bit. But it ultimately went back to binary reflexions and absolute affirmations.

Hmm, I suppose you are right maybe I should amend that to be "Too many gamers have been trained into thinking short=bad". Indeed, when a AAA $70 title is a mere 15 hours I get why people feel ripped off if that 15 hours wsn't orgasmic bliss. But I've played too many titles with way too much padding to drive up that playtime. I also don't buy the latest AAA priced games anymore though.

I am not saying that short games are bad or there should be some money/hour ratio. Just that short doesn't make good rpg.

You also think Spellforce is a good game, so you obviously have no taste.

 

[CptMace]

Lets be clear i am talking about first time kind of length

You're disagreeing with blaine on the definition then. He specifically said he considers AOD's length to be the sum of all playthroughs required to see every scene of the game. Unless what you meant was that we'd have to consider blind playthroughs, and not single playthroughs, of course.

As for fallout, I can only talk for myself. I only talked about the first game, and I claimed, and still do, that a regular [main quest + side quests] playthrough takes around 20 hours. Which is corroborated by others here and How Long To Beat.