Community RPG Codex Top 70 PC RPGs (Now with User Reviews!)

[Crooked Bee]

I find it funny how many people on other forums get hung up over the rankings ("Fallout 1 over Fallout 2!?" "But PS:T isn't the best RPG ever!" "WTF BG2 is only #4??" "Arcanum in Top 10??"), instead of just using this list as a guideline on what RPGs are worth giving a look.

Perhaps next time we should order our "Top X RPGs" list alphabetically or chronologically.

 

[tuluse]

I find it funny how many people on other forums get hung up over the rankings ("Fallout 1 over Fallout 2!?" "But PS:T isn't the best RPG ever!" "WTF BG2 is only #4??" "Arcanum in Top 10??"), instead of just using this list as a guideline on what RPGs are worth giving a look.

Perhaps next time we should order our "Top X RPGs" list alphabetically or chronologically.

Where would the fun in that be?

 

[Crooked Bee]

I don't find reading those kind of posts particularly fun, but if others do then I'm okay with that.

I just realized felipe's book's going to be chronological, which is a good thing.

 

[tuluse]

I don't find reading those kind of posts particularly fun, but if others do then I'm okay with that.

I just realized felipe's book's going to be chronological, which is a good thing.

I think making the list was fun, an rating games on scale was part of it.

If we just wanted a long list there are better voting systems to use.

 

[felipepepe]

I just realized felipe's book's going to be chronological, which is a good thing.

Yup. Not only you get a sense of the evolution of the genre, but it also solves all this drama, where people just give a quick look at the ranking, then find something they don't like and proceed to ignore the list.

 

[HiddenX]

tuluse
they are discussing the ranking or why some game is not on the list, there are not discussing the mini-reviews - that would be much more interesting - at least for me.

 

[Gozma]

The problem with a value-neutral chronological listing is that you have to define RPG. The thing with this good-ness vote that I like is that it pretty much skates right past that cul-de-sac by "defining" RPG implicitly.

 

[Crooked Bee]

The problem with a value-neutral chronological listing is that you have to define RPG. The thing with this good-ness vote that I like is that it pretty much skates right past that cul-de-sac by "defining" RPG implicitly.

Theoretically, I agree. In practice, however, felipepepe's chronological list will just include whatever. Problem solved.

 

[Zeriel]

My only problem with the list as-is is that it necessarily favors games that are well-known over games that are qualitatively better. Is Deus Ex really a better RPG than Betrayal at Krondor? When legitimately great games are at the top it is a nice surprise, but overall the very top reads more like "okay games that everyone has played".

Agree with Crooked Bee that it is fantastic as a "what should I play" list, though.

 

[:Flash:]

So if I planned on going through as many of these games as I can what order should I do it in? Should I go from first to last, vice versa or go from oldest to newest (or vice versa again I guess)?

Order them in how much they appeal to you after reading the reviews.

 

[tuluse]

tuluse
they are discussing the ranking or why some game is not on the list, there are not discussing the mini-reviews - that would be much more interesting - at least for me.

Yeah, but I doubt those people would have interesting things to say about the reviews anyways.

My only problem with the list as-is is that it necessarily favors games that are well-known over games that are qualitatively better. Is Deus Ex really a better RPG than Betrayal at Krondor? When legitimately great games are at the top it is a nice surprise, but overall the very top reads more like "okay games that everyone has played".

Agree with Crooked Bee that it is fantastic as a "what should I play" list, though.

I think most people think Deus Ex is legitimately great.

 

[Broseph]

My only problem with the list as-is is that it necessarily favors games that are well-known over games that are qualitatively better. Is Deus Ex really a better RPG than Betrayal at Krondor? When legitimately great games are at the top it is a nice surprise, but overall the very top reads more like "okay games that everyone has played".

Agree with Crooked Bee that it is fantastic as a "what should I play" list, though.

This list was created to solve that problem. It didn't completely succeed, but that's not really possible seeing as all best RPGs lists boil down to a popularity contest anyway.

Looking at the average number of points distributed is a pretty good indication of how well-liked a game is, as well. Wizardry 8 received less votes than Deus Ex and MOTB, but it ranked higher because its fans are more fond of it.

 

[Gozma]

The Roguelike Studies department needs to update its "classic style Roguelike everyone should go to first" from ADOM to Crawl.

 

[Monty]

I think some people on other forums haven't really understood the nuances of the voting system. Like that discussion on RPGWatch on why Skyrim is not in the top 70 and how this supposedly shows 'nostalgia' bias. They forget that with 25 points to distribute people are voting for their top 10/20 games. Mediocre games like Skyrim might be in a number of gamers' top 70 lists but very few top 10 lists.

Something like Arcanum, which some people describe as a broken mess, has a loyal group of supporters who allocated points to it. Other groups favoured Wizardry, or the gold box games, or Witcher, Gothic. Something like Skyrim simply had no/few supporters who loved aspects of it enough to rate it very highly.

So while some moan about order and omissions, the reality is it's a very interesting list where every game has something which made it appeal strongly to someone. Which is great for the mini-reviews.

Those who focus too much on the ranking (or DArtagnan at the Watch with his Skyrim obsession) need to realise that this was not a curated top 70 list but the result of voting for a small number of games. No system of voting would ever please everyone and I think this is the best I've seen in terms of an overall selection.

 

[HiddenX]

DArtagnan - don't speak this name in my presence...

 

[Crooked Bee]

So far the thread on Obsidian forums has been less interesting (or positive) than the one on Bioware forums... ITZ must be nigh or something.

(Though to be fair, the Obsidian thread is very recent.)

 

[Roguey]

Did you even play it?

Why would I play a jrpg-wannabe with bad gameplay?

 

[tuluse]

So far the thread on Obsidian forums has been less interesting (or positive) than the one on Bioware forums... ITZ must be nigh or something.

(Though to be fair, the Obsidian thread is very recent.)

Neogaf had the best discussion from the threads I've kept on eye on.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Just had a look at the Gaf thread - yeah, it wasn't half bad. Too bad it seems to have died already..

 

[tuluse]

An interesting difference between the codex and other sites. A lot of people complaining that certain games are too buggy to on the list or as high as they are. We seem to be completely indifferent to bugginess.

 

[HiddenX]

Some of the best CRPGs were buggy on release. Non-game-breaking-bugs, gfx and sound are irrelevant for rating a CRPG.

 

[Rake]

An interesting difference between the codex and other sites. A lot of people complaining that certain games are too buggy to on the list or as high as they are. We seem to be completely indifferent to bugginess.

People in Obsidian's forums of all places have no right to complain about bugginess though...

 

[Delterius]

An interesting difference between the codex and other sites. A lot of people complaining that certain games are too buggy to on the list or as high as they are. We seem to be completely indifferent to bugginess.

We are 'indifferent' to all bugginess, that's the difference. Most everyone else likes to give a pass for certain all time favourites, like Skyrim.

 

[Ninjerk]

http://www.nma-fallout.com/showthread.php?201443-The-Codex-beat-us-to-it

Akratus

They're having RPG definition discussion

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Sort of stupid they left out action rpg's like the Diablo series.

Since when Jagged alliance 2 is a cRPG ?!