The decline of dungeons?

[Jezal_k23]

Dungeons are a classic RPG staple that for many people, including me, are essential to the experience of enjoying those kinds of games. People talk about memorable dungeons for years and years following a game's release, as evidenced by this thread I want to start, so my opinion is that they are a key element of a solid RPG.

I've been thinking about dungeons like The Glow or Durlag's Tower which are both, as far as I know, pretty classic examples of excellent dungeons, well designed, fairly challenging by bringing something new to the table in comparison to the rest of their games and absurdly memorable, with solid background story attached to them.

The Glow in particular gave me incredible anxiety the first time I went there just from reaching the location and seeing what I was getting myself into, along with the creepy music. Durlag's Tower gave me a similar feeling as I went deeper and deeper without knowing what awaited me underground. That's the kind of experience I long for.

Now, what dungeons of the same or similar caliber have recent RPGs offered? I find myself hard pressed to think of anything remotely comparable. Vault 11 from NV is a modern example of a dungeon that has received wide acclaim, but others don't jump at me very easily, not to mention NV came out in 2010, so spending 8 years without a memorable dungeon is not good. Admittedly, I didn't play some recent titles like Underrail for example, so I might not be aware of recent great dungeons out there.

Have RPG dungeons declined over time? If so, how did this happen? If not, then what comparable dungeons exist in recent games? What games are those?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

are the dragons doing ok?

 

[Ventidius]

Recent Japanese blobbers have some of the best dungeon design in RPG history. The Elminage series, the Etrian Odyssey series, The Dark Spire, and Dungeon Travelers 2 are all great in this regard, and frankly, even the relatively simpler ones like Stranger of Sword City and the Operation series beat most of the stuff out there. That said, the dungeon design in these games emphasizes challenge and complexity rather than atmosphere, aesthetics, and background story, which is not to say they are entirely lacking in these regards, but it is not where the focus is.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

As long as those *posers* will keep chanting that PST and BG2 are the best CRPG while JRPGs are not *real* rpgs we will have rpgs with shit dungeons and shit gameplay.

 

[Lilura]

You named the two best (Durlag's Tower + The Glow).

Also,

Death God's Vault + The Skein
Dorn's Deep (Upper and Lower)
Catacombs as a whole (the crypts + Dead/Drowned Nations + Warrens of Thought)

They are also pretty atmospheric.

 

[Lujo]

Wasn't impressed with Durlag's Tower. It felt immersion breakingly "meta", more like a fan mod than something you'd expect in an actual game. Not necessarily bad or unchallenging or anything, just a lot more like a "someone playing with the engine/assets" than something you can take seriously.

Funnily enough, Desktop Dungeons has maps which put most dungeons you can find in a non-minimalist RPG's to shame. Not necessarily what you're looking for but still.

 

[aweigh]

Royal Tomb from Elminage: Gothic. Also, 6th Floor of Myrdral Castle in Wizardry Empire 2.

EDIT: Also are you asking for examples of dungeons with Lore Dump attached to them or of dungeons with good design? Sometimes they can intersect but are you judging a dungeon's quality by the game play it provides or by how it complements the plot?

Personally, I find that the lasting relevance of an area (such as a dungeon) is determined by whether or not the game play found therein is enjoyable or surprising enough, and the above two examples are fantastically designed dungeons with the former being as recent as 2013. (Though Wizardry Empire is from 2001, so that one is pretty old).

I'd be hard pressed to think of comparable examples of dungeons from non-dungeon crawlers, though the ones you mention are objectively well designed.

I'm gonna throw out a non-RPG example of a recent-ish Genius Tier dungeon: The "Silent Hill Society" underground from Silent Hill 2.

Deeply unsettling level, unforgettable really, and it does double-time as the game's story-telling centerweight.

 

[octavius]

Durlag's Tower was great because there was a fleshed out (and tragic) backstory to it, unlike all other dungeons in the BG games. It just felt more "personal".

But mechanically (as in providing the best mapping challenge and puzzles) the best dungeon ever was Chaos Strikes Back.

 

[ilitarist]

Modern RPG has become associated with a necessary story. So you get dungeon that has to be filled with diaries, environmental design and so on as well as "realistic" design, as in it should look as if someone lives here. This makes mechanics more difficult to flesh out; some good dungeons have a puzzle behind them but it's hard to suppress disbelief when you imagine that orcs that lived there had to turn gems in a central chamber in a specific way to get to the toilet.

Also in general we see a rise of, so to say, less branching design. In recent games like Fallout New Vegas, Tyranny, Witcher 2-3, Numenera and other "proper" RPGs you have very few dungeons. For the most part you get sent for a single engagement somewhere in a field or in a house. Compare it to Bethesda obsession with dungeons: in Morrowind they took an approach more similar to Witcher 3 - you rarely had to go into dungeons and most of them were just a few rooms. But in Oblivion and especially in Skyrim and Fallout 4 they doubled down on dungeons: every problem in the world is solved by going into some big building and getting something from a body of local leader. Those dungeons have fine design, sometimes several entry points and branches, but they highlight why devs and players don't like them so much: every quest feels very formulaic and the same in length, you spend as much time on destroying an ancient god summon as on looking for a lost knife. Those dungeons often feel as if they aren't a reward on itself but an obstacle on your way to the reward, often randomly generated and underwhelming.

Might & Magic X had an OK dungeon in a center of it all, Elemental Forge. It was constructed to be artificial prison for some elementals and it's also invaded by some other guys so you get a very varied roster of enemies, some ambushes, lots of secret rooms, lots of puzzles. You return there several times, most of them optional. But it lacked a central idea behind it, it was more of a microcosm of a game.

Fallout New Vegas Dead Money is sort of one big dungeon with some strong themes. Everyone likes it and hates to play it.

 

[Jokzore]

are the dragons doing ok?

Considering most of them seem to be missing their front legs these days, I'd say no, no they are not.

 

[SausageInYourFace]

Blobbers, first & third person RPG dungeons are such a fundamentally different experience from isometic/topdown dungeons its hardly comparable. The latter can be good to but the really immersive feel of acutally being in a dungeon, truly exploring and surving a dungeon can imo only be done by the former.

 

[Jokzore]

The combat was a bit silly but I love Grimrock 1 & 2 for their dungeons.

Do Sen's Fortress and Brume Tower count?

 

[V_K]

Seriously, having BG as a reference point is the next-to-last thing I expected in a thread titled "the decline of dungeons". The last thing would be Arcanum.
Of recent games, Grimrocks are an obvious choice. People diss on them for not being as good as DM/CSB, but keep forgetting that they're still miles ahead of most other RT blobbers, including LoL or EotB.
7 Mages has some amazing dungeons with varying environmental mechanics, although spoiled a bit by the fact that you can only encounter two enemy types in a given level.
Unexplored is a really unique gem in that it's a roguelike with procedural level generations, but the algorithms are so good, they produce better levels (and overall designs) then most level designers.

 

[Max Edge]

In Japan there is a lot games with dungeons. Many of them are pretty good, but there is a catch. I suppose you know which one....https://store.steampowered.com/app/407330/Sakura_Dungeon/

 

[ilitarist]

Blobbers, first & third person RPG dungeons are such a fundamentally different experience from isometic/topdown dungeons its hardly comparable. The latter can be good to but the really immersive feel of acutally being in a dungeon, truly exploring and surving a dungeon can imo only be done by the former.

Eh, blobbers are hardly "immersive". Even pretty ones, like Grimrock, are still very abstracted with grid movement system and the fact that most of puzzles would be easily solved by a group of people that can move more than two steps from each other.

 

[Nyast]

For a more recent dungeon experience, you might want to give a try to Vaporum. The entire game is in a big Steampunk tower with amazing lighting and shadowing effects. Its main drawback is that it's pretty linear, but otherwise I can't think of any other recent game with a better dungeon.

 

[Lilura]

EotB

How can Eye of the Beholder not be greater than Grimrock?

Also, Durlag's Tower is up there not just because of its dungeon design but also because of, well, many many things not the least of which is its permeating allegory on the emotion of fear (which is really well done, expressed in more ways than one, and crystalizes in some well-written riddles before the showdown).

 

[V_K]

How can Eye of the Beholder not be greater than Grimrock?

Uninspired puzzles and encounters, plus DnD doesn't work well with blobber combat.

 

[Jezal_k23]

Also are you asking for examples of dungeons with Lore Dump attached to them or of dungeons with good design? Sometimes they can intersect but are you judging a dungeon's quality by the game play it provides or by how it complements the plot?

I guess plot is secondary, so I mean primarily good dungeon design (and how/if it has declined over time). GENERALLY well designed dungeons have memorable plot to go with them, but if that's not the case I'd be ok with it.

Seriously, having BG as a reference point is the next-to-last thing I expected in a thread titled "the decline of dungeons". The last thing would be Arcanum.
Of recent games, Grimrocks are an obvious choice. People diss on them for not being as good as DM/CSB, but keep forgetting that they're still miles ahead of most other RT blobbers, including LoL or EotB.
7 Mages has some amazing dungeons with varying environmental mechanics, although spoiled a bit by the fact that you can only encounter two enemy types in a given level.
Unexplored is a really unique gem in that it's a roguelike with procedural level generations, but the algorithms are so good, they produce better levels (and overall designs) then most level designers.

I don't mean to present BG as having the ultimate dungeons. I'm sure there must be superior dungeons out there, but if so, they're probably from older games, and I wanted to examine WHY this is happening, and what has gone wrong with dungeon design as time passed. Also I agree that Grimrock is a pretty great example of a recent well designed dungeon.

 

[JarlFrank]

The Stygian Abyss.

 

[Elwro]

Demise has a fun dungeon.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Dungeons were better suited to days of PnP and early cRPGs. They are a relatively simple device that works well when everything needs to be simulated by hand or weak hardware.

These days, with today's powerful hardware, you can simulate entire worlds, cities, wilderness, and other complex placed, so while having some dungeons is ok in the same sense as having some caves, forts, and other points of interests, but you don't want to be stuck in an underground corridor 50-100% of the time. At least I don't.

Of course you can still have particular games entirely set in a dungeon (say UU3), but generally speaking, devs should focus on simulating worlds.

 

[Falksi]

I still thrive on pretty much all the dungeons in Zelda 4: A Link To The Past. Some superb design all round.

 

[Ventidius]

I don't mean to present BG as having the ultimate dungeons. I'm sure there must be superior dungeons out there, but if so, they're probably from older games, and I wanted to examine WHY this is happening, and what has gone wrong with dungeon design as time passed. Also I agree that Grimrock is a pretty great example of a recent well designed dungeon.

This is an interesting question to be sure, and part of the answer is already there in your formulation. You mention there are probably many great dungeons in older games - and you are right - yet there are few these days. Of course, I would argue there is an exception in the above-mentioned niche of Japanese dungeon crawlers, but with regards to the Western scene - which is presumably what you have in mind - there has been an objective impoverishment over time in this regard. So why did the oldies have better dungeon design? I would say the answer is to be found in the gradual change that has been going on in terms of the reigning design paradigms. When cRPGs first burst into the scene, they were very much based on old TSR modules that emphasized combat and dungeon crawling, and this was the golden standard for a good RPG for a long time (from the 80s to at least the mid-90s), hence, as the industry developed, so did the craft of quality dungeon and encounter design.

A good example of this is the refinement of the Wizardry formula evident from Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord in 1981 to Wizardry IV and V in 1987 and 1988, respectively. This evolution is also evident in other later games like Dark Heart of Uukrul. The Gold Box games also evolved from their relatively simple origins in PoR, to the increased challenge and complexity of the Krynn series and Pools of Darkness. Of course, the Gold Box games were more focused on tactics than in dungeons, but they also show the point that I am trying to make: the Western cRPG industry held dungeon exploration and combat as the gold standard of quality RPG gameplay, and as devs learned from their previous work and from each other, the pool of skill and experience in these areas of design grew. It could be said that there was a tradition of RPG design that focused on these gameplay elements that was easily accessible to new devs in the industry and that informed and expanded the work of existing devs. Devs had played these dungeons and tactics games and learned from them, which in turn allowed them to craft good content of a similar type.

This is why, when the so-called cRPG Renaissance came around, it was spearheaded by designers and developers who, while definitely out to reinvent the wheel, grew up and had experience with the older paradigm of gameplay-focused RPGs and were thus able to complement the new approach that distinguished this Renaissance (e.g. increased NPC interactions, narrative exposition, reactivity, etc.) with quality encounter and dungeon design inspired by the design principles and techniques of the classics. Not to mention there were even genuine love letters to the old school, like Icewind Dale and TOEE. The problem is that, in the process, and as the new reactivity-based paradigm replaced the old, the link to the old tradition was lost, and with each new batch of games the elements that constitued the core gameplay of RPGs (the tactical and dungeon crawling aspects, the figurative dungeons and dragons) became more and more diluted. To be sure, the tradition was not entirely lost to the world, it was saved by those Japanese devs like Starfish and Exp Inc. that inherited the Wizardry license, learned from the masters, and continued to expand on their work. But in the rest of the industry - including mainstream Japanese RPGs - the drive towards a storytelling focus eventually overwhelmed and extinguished this legacy.

It might well be possible that someday devs will go back to the classics and find inspiration in them for a revival of gameplay-focused RPGs, but the current mindset of the Western RPG industry still seems to be stuck in the Black Isle design paradigm of reactivity and storytelling, so it is probably not gonna happen anytime soon. But who knows, given the egregious decline in the quality of writing that is going on in Obsidian and inXile, they might just take the hint and move in that direction in the future. One can hope.

 

[mondblut]

devs should focus on simulating worlds.

Especially if the world is kind of a dungeon