Favourite areas in RPGs

[sportforredneck]

Well, Bethesda can do it to Fallout, so I just ass u me d that Springsteen was fair game.

But unlike Fallout, Springsteen's continued existence has been a good thing.

 

[VonVentrue]

Junktown, Necropolis (Fallout) - I love these areas purely for the atmosphere (outstanding music, well thought-out environment).

Dragon Feeding Grounds (Stonekeep) - that's pretty much self-explanatory,it's one of the most cleverly designed areas I have seen and had the pleasure to visit.

Trinsic (Ultima VII) - I have to agree, the ritual murder scene that Avatar arrives at is truly unforgettable.

Vault City (Fallout 2) - I like that area for some unknown reason... Is that because of the music, the social duality?...I find it hard to explain.

Easthaven (Icewind Dale) - the reasons for this choice are almost the same as above (though...maybe it's just my love for small settlements covered with snow?...)

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

All right...here goes...

Fortress of Regrets-This was such an amazing area. The dialogue and options available were astounding. And the part where you can talk to your other incarnations was quite interesting as well, especially the Paranoid Incarnation. The only flaws of this place were the swarms of shadows and the fact that if Vhailor came along you were in for a very tough fight.

Modron Maze-Brilliant satire on dungeon crawling and the like.

Mariposa Military Base-A great endgame area that provided tons of ways to complete it. It's a shame the Assault Paladins wouldn't actually follow you in though.

The Cathedral-Much like Mariposa it was a great area for the endgame. Plus, the Followers actually....followed you.

New Reno-Sure it was silly, didn't fit into the Fallout world, and was way over the top but the options, amount of content, and great role-playing more than made up for it. Plus, an homage to Wasteland can't be all bad.

The Curio Shop-All the items and all the interactions here were just brilliant. It really was one of the most interesting micro-areas in a game.

Dragon's Eye-I think The Walking Dude described it far better than I would have. It really is probably the best part of Icewind Dale, especially since fireball spam isn't a possibility yet. Too bad the rest of the game after that was a bit of a bummer up until Lower Dorn's Deep.

Athkatla-Big, bustling, and full of stuff to do. Probably one of the better representations of a city, that stays "fresh", in a CRPG.

The Underdark-Probably one of the more interesting areas in Shadows of Amn because there were a few options to get through it. Heck, you could even skip it for the most part if you wanted to.

Durlag's Tower-One of the best dungeon crawls around. Interesting enough too. Would have liked more role-playing...but one can't always get what they desire.

Haunted Forest-Yes....an area from Icewind Dale 2. It was easily the most interesting area in the game. Unfortunately the rest of the game was rather sub-par....so sub-par I forgot this area's actual name. But nevertheless it was a very atmospheric and unique area.

Curst-A very interesting place, especially seeing as it really felt like a town full of traitors and backstabbers. And also interesting as it was totally optional for the most part, just like the Underdark.

 

[Zomg]

Curst is fucking terrible. That whole section of PS:T is trash filler, everything between Ravel and the second half of the endgame minus a few interludes. I can only assume the B-team was responsible for it. It's not San Francisco, though.

The Glow really worked on me when I first played FO, but in retrospect it's rather silly, given how meaningless the radiation rules in FO are. I guess in my original runthrough the game had grabbed me so strongly that I was willing to believe that something enigmatic could be going on.

Good:

the high sabbat in Darklands
the tower of flames in ADOM
the old camp in Gothic

 

[GhanBuriGhan]

Hmmm.

The old camp, Gothic I

The Crypts, Arx Fatalis

Sentinel - Daggerfall

 

[Raapys]

Both the Old Camp and the Swamp Camp in Gothic 1 are awesome, along with several other, smaller areas of the game. Also, the Monastery in Gothic 2 is pure beauty, especially along with the music that starts up as you near the bridge.

In fact, I think Piranha Bytes are rather ingenius when it comes to making great and atmospheric locations.

 

[Archaeon]

BG2 - Waukeem's Promenade ... the feeling of emerging from the dungeon into that district for the first time, the fight between Irenicus and the cowled wizards. i find that brilliant

 

[Monolith]

Any non-action location in Bloodlines. And almost the whole rest. Perfect atmosphere - sound, music, art. Superb. Same with Torment and Fallout's Glow.

 

[Callaxes]

Most of my favorites were mentioned except:

Kurast - The 3rd city from Diablo 2 dark swampy atmosphere, the feel of dread, decay and dead sorrounding the city and of course the spooky forrest filled with monsters, just brilliant!

Arreat - I felt verry at home with the barbarian city in Lord of Destruction, the art design was superb. But outside the city - well - this is where the fun beggins, a true battlefield, possibly the only game that evr managed to incorporate a whole fucking battlefield in a game where you control only 1 character. (of course there's the battlefield between humans and orcs in MM7)

Every city from Darklands

Buccaner's Den from Ultima 7

Orssirium and Wayrest (the mansion) from Daggerfall

Everything from Pagan, the only good thing from U8 was it's superb alienish world

The temple of the Mad God from Betrayal at Krondor

The Shadow Temple near the Umar Hills in BG2

Wacther's Keep, Forrest of Mir and Amkethran in Throne of Bhaal

San Mona in Jagged Alliance 2

Everything from Gothic 3

The dwarven mines in MM7

Everything from Wizardry 8

The Alien Brain's layer on Mars in X-Com

Hong Kong and Paris in Deus Ex

The dreams in Oblivion. Overall 2 quests involve you to transcend into your dreams. The dreams often involve strange dungeon without oponents, just puzzles and interesting traps. Try to imagine Xen from HL, just without of the stupid jumping, alot darker and weirder. Also Arkved's Tower which involves... God dammit! I used to be a lore bluff, I should know the name... Vaermina's daedric shrine quest. Now THIS is the best dungeon I've ever seen, nothing can compare to the door leading to dead ends or the giant sized rooms or the upside down rooms. It's demented and impresive, it obviously looks like it was done by someone with experience or storytelling abillities.

There's no particular reason to kill Arkved, unless you just want to fill a Black Soul Gem. Killing him does not seem to get the Dark Brotherhood's attention either, so it's not even good as an easy murder. However, the crumpled piece of paper next to the orb states "I shall lie here in the dark waiting for death", so you could feel the desire to be merciful and kill him.
Arkved's last words are recorded on a second crumpled piece of paper under the desk. It reads: "the horror, the horror." This, in addition to his journal, which suggests that Vaermina's orb allowed him to glimpse into his own mind, and that he was subseqeuntly driven insane by what he saw, is an allusion to Joeseph Conrad's novel, Heart of Darkness.

Barcelona from Lionheart

Everything in UU: Stygiant Abyss

I think that's about it - no wait!


The town of Khorinis in Gothic 2

 

[DemonKing]

And the winner is...

Severed Hand, IWD.

A beautiful and imaginative location with an intriguing backstory and wide variety of encounters and challenging combats.

I rate it above Dragon's Eye as that place didn't make much sense to me ("Ok - we've reached level 4 of the dungeon and suddenly instead of lizardmen and undead we find a peaceful enclave of friendly priests. No need for suspicon here, my friends!").

Easthaven had a wonderful atmosphere too, particularly the ambient sounds and artwork.

 

[kingcomrade]

@Callaxes-
Kurast was my least favorite, the only place I really liked that much was whatever the name of Act 2 was (Loot Golain or something).

There are many games where you play as a single soldier in a battlefield, Dynasty Warriors is the first to come to mind.

 

[Hümmelgümpf]

Quest for Glory series!

Trial by Fire - Wizards Institute of Technocery entering test, Rasier
Wages of War - The Heart of the World
Shadows of Darkness - Thieves Guild, Monastery basement, Dr. Cranium's laboratory

 

[Klaz]

Oh, yeah, forgot the Quest for Glory saga:
QFG1: The Brigand's Fortress
QFG2: All of Shapeir
QFG3: The Laurel and Hardy special encounter
QFG4: Dr. Cranium's house, Dark One Caves and the Thieves Guild
QFG4 1/2: The pirate island
QFG5: The colliseum and the ending

 

[Texas Red]

Oh hell, Bloodlines deserves a mention. Specifially the starting apartment. Whenever I play the game I take my time admiring it. It takes a talented artist to make a simple modern day apartment look so good.

 

[PseudoIntellectual Snob]

Gothic's Swamp Camp. Gothic 2's Monastery, and the Valley of Mines during the second chapter. It kinds of balance itself, as both games' final dungeons are of a what-the-fuck-were-they-thinking kind.

All of Torment's Sigil, or whatever the city is called. Most of the plane hoping areas were somewhat lacking, but the city in itself has no equal yet. It is weird, beautiful, dark, and has more interesting things than any other RPG city in history. At least of the kind i consider interesting, in any case.

Even if not a "true" cRPG, System Shock 2's big ship qualifies. More game developers should learn from it instead of drowning us in the crap they try to pass as an enviroment. The smaller ship felt rushed and devoid of any reason other than to be a foyer to the final fleshy maze, but the sheer coolness of the previous one more than makes up for it.

KOTOR2's starting location, mainly because it tried to be diferent and took some clues from the previous one, even if it fell quite short of the big prize. QUITE.

That island in Ultima VII where everyone was either dead, undead, or a necromancer. Loved it, and damned they be for making it so short and side-questy. The entire game should have been in a longer, bigger, more developed version of that one island.

Moving on: Pagan's island was cool, moody, and interesting, even if that was the only thing the game had going for it. More of an action RPG thingy though, so i do not know if it qualifies.

Anachronox's Anachronox: Quite memorable, even if underused. More of a jRPG/Adventure hybrid thingy, but whatever.

And another from an "untrue" cRPG: The big french house in Deus Ex. Quite a cool atmosphere, up until they utterly ruined it by filling the maze with cyborgs and sending you to kick ass.



That's it. Other than that most really good locations i can think of aren't RPG or pseudo-rpg related, so i'll stop there.

 

[Jasede]

The starting area in Kotor 2 sucks donkey balls. Enormously.

There is NOTHING worse than making a starting area be nothing but 2 to 3 hours of nothing but fighting while running through a huge, lifeless area and picking up items.

Thanks god the game has Kreia.

 

[Relayer71]

fighting while running through a huge, lifeless area and picking up items.

That's the KOTOR series in a nutshell.

All you do is run through lifeless areas and pick up items. So many containers!!!
They should have named the game Containers Of The Old Republic.

Thanks god the game has Kreia.

Agreed. And if it wasn't for the good dialogue and voice acting in both games they would have been completely worthless.

Hope the next installment has a much higher difficulty level, less combat, more roleplaying, is less linear and last but not least: HAS LESS CONTAINERS!!!!!

 

[Jasede]

Plasteel Cylinders. I see them in my nightmares.

 

[Texas Red]

Plasteel Cylinders. I see them in my nightmares.

Did you perchance play the original campaign of Neverwiner Nights?

 

[Zomg]

You know there's this one fucking guy at Bioware that won't shut up about his pet theory on how container opening represents the hero's journey, studied by the well-known genius that he heard about through Star Wars marketing, and emits funtrons from the television screen into the player's eyes.

 

[kingcomrade]

I thought it represented humanity's rape of the environment.

 

[Relayer71]

Plasteel Cylinders. I see them in my nightmares.

Did you perchance play the original campaign of Neverwiner Nights?

Yes, opening treasure chests was the highpoint of my play time with that game.
The dull story/combat/dialogue nearly put me in a coma.

 

[Relayer71]

I thought it represented humanity's rape of the environment.

It represents the player's expectation of current RPGs....

You open one, find nothing of value within but you move to the next hoping there's something better and occasionally you stumble on something that makes you go, "Hmm, nothing great but it's better than nothing" and you just keep opening and opening...

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

I thought it represented humanity's rape of the environment.

It represents the player's expectation of current RPGs....

You open one, find nothing of value within but you move to the next hoping there's something better and occasionally you stumble on something that makes you go, "Hmm, nothing great but it's better than nothing" and you just keep opening and opening...

Brilliance. Sheer brilliance.

 

[Müg]

Sometime's one of them's trapped and blows up.