RPGs that are unanimously praised by people of refined taste that you never could finish.

[Beautiful Clown Painting]

The title says it all. I had the idea of this thread while wondering about "Albion" in its dedicated topic. I'd say that the only games that qualify are those where you couldn't go past the half game mark. I never finished "Wizardry VIII" but got pretty close to the end so I won't cite it (got bored with the endless fights, I should try it again with the Wizfast patch).

Mine are:

"Ultima VII": I started it 7 times and always stopped while exploring Britain. I think that I don't really like the interface and the perspective, I find it hard to properly explore my surroundings. And I tried Exult with super-high definition. I was much more in love with the "Ultima IV" and "Ultima V" one.

"Deus Ex": I started it four times and one time got as far as Hong Kong but I never did get past this city. As much as I adore the two "System Shock", "Deus Ex" doesn't do it for me.

 

[PorkaMorka]

Wizardry 8, for sure. Even with the Wizfast patch I just got very tired of random encounters taking 15 minutes each. I wasn't really doing anything interesting during that 15 minutes either, just repeating a set of standard actions.

 

[Infinitron]

PROTIP: Putting "game names" in "quotes" is "retarded".

 

[Deleted member 7219]

Arcanum (every now and again I install it and force myself to play it as much as I can, hoping it will interest me. But it doesn't. I don't see the point of any of it. I don't blame MCA for not wanting to play it).

Wizardry 8 (fucking hated it, one of the worst games I've ever played).

Ultima VII (awful, awful top down perspective and awful writing)

Deus Ex (terrible voice-acting and combat mechanics).

 

[SCO]

Ban Matt

 

[Morkar Left]

Arcanum; the good points can't rescue the design flaws

Bloodlines; it has very interesting things going on but something is horrible wrong with the city as a location. An absolute atmosphere killer for me, especially when atmosphere and story is basically the main factor to play the game.

Wizardry games; too much grinding and I'm not a fan of pure dungeon crawlers in the first place.

 

[Shadenuat]

Arcanum
Deus Ex
Wizardry 8
Bloodlines

But.. but.. those are best games ever and my favorite RPGs... why won't you play them?!

 

[ChristofferC]

Any Troika game.

 

[joeydohn]

Too many to list but it's mainly due to my laziness.

 

[Excidium]

Plenty. Most cRPGs ever released fail to keep me interested, even if I keep trying. Struggled a whole fucking lot to finish the BG series, and I had to skip all the expansions.

 

[Renegen]

Ban Matt

We are so often in agreement SCO, I was just about to say that. That hate list tramples over every one of my favourite RPGs. (except Ultima)

 

[Roguey]

I can answer for Lesifoere, who apparently left the Codex forever after I linked to her 90,000+ word Knights of the Old Republic fan-fic wherein she shipped femRevan and Canderous Ordo. I've had these images just collecting digital dust for... a year now? Might as well post 'em. Yep, nothing like smearing someone who isn't even around anymore.

 

[Zed]

Bloodlines; it has very interesting things going on but something is horrible wrong with the city as a location. An absolute atmosphere killer for me, especially when atmosphere and story is basically the main factor to play the game.

That's interesting. Personally I felt the city setting added a lot to the game. You got the night clubs, the shady clinics and dark alleyways.
I do think they could have varied it a bit though. Maybe if a part of the game could have taken place in a more rural area, that would have been interesting.

There are tons of games I never finished, but spent a lot of time on. The ones I will probably finish at some point are:
ToEE - although (potentially) a very short game, I had a hard time spending more than a couple of hours on it.
PS: Torment - played a lot, but quickly lose interest after Sigil.

 

[Marsal]

Bloodlines; it has very interesting things going on but something is horrible wrong with the city as a location. An absolute atmosphere killer for me, especially when atmosphere and story is basically the main factor to play the game.

Bro, don't make me hunt you down. Watch some Vampire movies (Underworld trilogy is not that great, but should get you pumped), install Wesp's patch and play it. OBEY!

I don't care about Arcanum and Wizardry (although you should play those, too).

Personally I felt the city setting added a lot to the game. You got the night clubs, the shady clinics and dark alleyways.

This!

Maybe if a part of the game could have taken place in a more rural area, that would have been interesting.

It is varied. You have different "estates" and missions in area around the city. It's varied just enough not to "water down" the urban atmosphere.

 

[20 Eyes]

To those mentioning Arcanum: it's a half finished game and is hardly praised unanimously by people of refined taste, unless you consider a dozen or so storyfags from RPGCodex.net to unanimously speak for people of refined taste.

Please remove it from your lists accordingly.

 

[Roguey]

Arcanum has consistently made the Codex holy trinity every time there's been a vote, it's totes legit.

 

[Marsal]

I can answer for Lesifoere, who apparently left the Codex forever after I linked to her 90,000+ word Knights of the Old Republic fan-fic wherein she shipped femRevan and Canderous Ordo. I've had these images just collecting digital dust for... a year now? Might as well post 'em. Yep, nothing like smearing someone who isn't even around anymore.

You are really fucking creepy, girl. I'd hate to cross you in real life...

To those mentioning Arcanum: it's a half finished game and is hardly praised unanimously by people of refined taste, unless you consider a dozen or so storyfags from RPGCodex.net to unanimously speak for people of refined taste.

Please remove it from your lists accordingly.

If I had 20 fingers, I'd poke you in all of your 20 eyes, you weeaboo faggot. Why do you even frequent the Codex?

 

[Gragt]

None, really. I have my preferences, like anybody else, but I try to go past them. I know I dropped Gothic 2 for a long time (between 6 months and a year, with a computer transition in the middle) and had trouble going back to it because it's not the kind of game I like, but I still finished it because it's good and do not regret it at all. Often I think I'd like to replay it but I'm a bit conflicted about that. I guess I'll first play Gothic 3 and Risen and then see. On the other hand, I played Fallout 3 for roughly 6 hours, saw it was tripe and dropped it without a second thought. I might convince myself to go back to it one day, just to see the full thing, but I'm not sure I'll manage that. Truth be told, I'm quite happy about that weakness.

 

[Shadenuat]

Now we only need someone to mention Torment because it has too many bori- ...

Zed

dammit!

I'll name Ultima myself, there are only two Ultimas I could play when growing up: IX and UO:Online. I also tried but did't finish M&M5. It's hard to get into those games because of all the lore previous games have, and the huge leap in graphics for the series which was much more fluent for people who started with first parts.

 

[ManjuShri]

Fallout 2 and Baldur's Gate 2 are the big ones for me. Zero consistency of quality in Fallout 2 made it so unseemly when coming from the sound vision of the first, atmospherically it was all over the shop, I guess it's for people who prefer gameplay and questing over story, ambiance and and a clear vision of what the goal of the game is. Baldur's Gate 2 was horrendous for me as while the writing wasn't bad, it was far worse in that it was sheer mediocrity; couple that with real time monotonous DnD combat and it just isn't my cup of tea at all.

 

[Admiral jimbob]

I can answer for Lesifoere, who apparently left the Codex forever after I linked to her 90,000+ word Knights of the Old Republic fan-fic wherein she shipped femRevan and Canderous Ordo.

hahaha what, I respected Lesi

Ultima for me. I admit to only having made token efforts to get into the series at various points, but I just can't get into it. The ridiculous Garriot-and-friends LARP-fantasy setting kills any immersion and atmosphere, combat generally comes across as a chore (especially in 7) and everything else seemed to be of middling quality. Need to give 5 a play, though.

 

[MisterStone]

Bros, I have a horrible confession to make here, and I hope that due to the voluntary nature of this confession you will go easy on me. I did not finish Arcanum, in fact I only played it for a few hours. The shitty combat frustrated me. It's also a pretty complex game, so if you're frustrated at the get-go by the shitty combat and somewhat ponderous UI then it's hard to invest the amount of concentration and time necessary to really get into it.

I will try it again someday, I promise. I PROMISE.

 

[Shadenuat]

The shitty combat frustrated me.

Don't play combat character then. There are 2 (maybe 3) creatures you need to kill in Arcanum to finish the game.

 

[Marsal]

The shitty combat frustrated me.

Don't play combat character then. There are 2 (maybe 3) creatures you need to kill in Arcanum to finish the game.

This. Play a thief or a diplomat. Or just play a mage and spam Harm.

 

[sser]

Baldur's Gate 2. I just can't get into the story or environments. I keep telling myself I will finish it one day, but beyond some combat encounters the game just kinda grates on me.

I also could not get into Arcanum, but that's just because steampunk-types of settings don't really do it for me.

I always thought Diablo 2 was a lazy sequel by Blizzard and a game that was quickly outshone by its peers in the field.

I thought the new Deus Ex game was a huge piece of shit with crap gameplay obfuscated by pretty, yellow cinematics.

Dungeon Siege III is the worst game I've played in at least five years, but I still see some notable people praising it.