Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

The RPG Scrollbars: Richard Cobbett's weekly RPG column

ERYFKRAD

Barbarian
Patron
Joined
Sep 25, 2012
Messages
28,237
Strap Yourselves In Serpent in the Staglands Shadorwun: Hong Kong Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
This bloke seems competent. What's he doing at RPS?
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
On radio in games: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/11/30/game-radio/

Grand Theft Auto 3 really brought the radio experience to the masses, not just as a vector for its licensed music, but for the awesome Chatterbox station and ability to weave the passive audio experience in with the action. Most of the callers were unrelated to anything going on, but every now and again there’d be something like Toni Cipriani calling in about his mother, and giving us a perspective we otherwise wouldn’t have seen, as well as painting a picture of the wider city politics and entertainment and pressure groups and other elements that made Liberty City feel like a real place (circa 2001, of course) rather than just a lot of boxes where bad people shot other bad people in the cock while listening to the Scarface soundtrack. It was even used as the audio equivalent of gang signs, with each of the game’s factions having a preferred musical flavour.

It’s no wonder that later games doubled-down on this element with more stations, more chat, and more tie-ins to the main game, like news reports about your recent activities to create the illusion that the city gave a damn, even though the sandbox itself obviously didn’t. The same trick was later used by Saints Row, Watch Dogs, many a sandbox, though increasingly feeling odder that nobody ever seems to think the maniac running naked through the streets with a rocket launcher warrants a mention between Music Sounds Better With You and Everything She Wants.

In RPGs though, radio tends to be even more grounded than that – sometimes a vector for music, as with Fallout, but more often focused on world-building – specifically, the illusion of a bigger, more active world. Fallout 3 for instance used Three Dog’s announcements to spread word about the Capital Wasteland, while Fallout 4 uses it for both that and to create the illusion that the shopkeepers in Diamond City and its surrounds are actively marketing their wares instead of just sitting around and hoping that a confused 200 year old in a Vault suit drops by and liberates them of their Fusion Cores. Other things too of course, like tapping into military broadcasts, listening to episodes of a The Shadow type radio serial, and constantly re-establishing the vibe of Fallout as being rooted in the 1950s even when you’re out in the desert fighting giant scorpions with laser guns. People often call out sound as one of the most important parts of horror. Accurately, too! It’s just often forgotten, or at least not as well discussed, that it’s equally important for just about any setting.

At the same time, radio inherently feels different to many narrative techniques in that it’s not only passive, but deliberately background. You can have it on while doing something else, like fighting for your life against bandits, without being distracted by video. You can switch it off and not feel like you’re missing anything, which you can’t always do when staring at a dry looking book of lore or getting important messages from whatever your Mission Control is. It’s important, but it doesn’t feel important. You can listen intently or ignore it or switch it off, but still enjoy its benefits.

One of my favourite examples of this is, inevitably, from Vampire: Bloodlines. The opening does a great job of setting the basic World of Darkness ambience, and one of the most important parts of that is that when you first appear in your shitty little vampire apartment, the radio is playing the sultry and spooky Deb of Night – a perfect little encapsulation of the game’s dark, self-confident sleaze, off-beat sensibility, lies and monsters just slightly under the surface – and much like the GTA example, a call from one of the game’s secondary characters and hints that Deb herself may be Kindred and helping cover things up. Not least because her final caller straight-up nails much of the plot, only to be quickly shut down and the conversation moved on.

As a game mechanic though, I don’t think anyone’s done radio better than Dead State(from former Troika designer Brian Mitsoda). There’s no music element at all, or at least none that we get to hear. Instead, he’s the voice of the outside world in the survival/RPG mix, with each in-game day unlocking a new broadcast where the DJ tries to keep his sanity through music, to pass on information to the outside world, to talk with his handful of remaining listeners as they call in, and to show the effect of prolonged survival in impossible odds. He has about 50 broadcasts before leaving the station, going from moments of optimism to deep frustration and aggression, often mitigated or sparked by what happens off the air, like having a huge rant about how humanity deserves its current fate, then getting a call from one of his regulars just checking on how he is and hoping he hasn’t given up – leading to his next update being quieter, slightly more hopeful, and promising to cut down the swearing.

Wasteland 2 occasionally ventured into similar territory, though I don’t think it quite went far enough – like a lot of the game, the good stuff like the impossible choice between Ag Center and Highpool, two crucial towns under simultaneous siege that you have to pick between – was too front-loaded. Even when you get to California, there’s nothing quite like the horrific early game scene of saving one town at the same time that the other is on the radio in your ear, begging and pleading for help that absolutely isn’t going to arrive because of your alternate choice, until finally giving up all hope and just going quiet. Likewise, it never makes the most of being in contact with your home base via radio, reinforcing your status as Wasteland lawbringers backed (supposedly) by an organisation instead of just random do-gooders.

Its radio mechanics are definitely worth stealing though, as they’re crazily effective when they work. In many ways, it’s proof that radio is the logical next step that games ripping off System Shock’s audio logs never bothered making the jump to – a form of feedback that can be passive or active, doesn’t distract from the action, and offers a solid reason why you can’t interject or argue or do anything except accept the world’s perception of your latest choice regardless of your original intent.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Richard Cobbett RPGOTY Awards: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/12/14/rpg-awards-2015/

The RPG Scrollbars: The Scrolls of Honour – 2015
Richard Cobbett on December 14th, 2015 at 1:00 pm.

scrolls.jpg


As the dragons finally return to their nests to hibernate and the ghosts don their chains to help remind misers of the meaning of the season, we approach the end of another year. As is tradition, that is time for we at the guild-house to award both quests and questers the ceremonial Scrolls of Honour™. (Chorus of affordable angels)

Scribed upon only the finest vellum in ink taken from a particularly recalcitrant octopus from the Abyssal Depths, they are a testament to skill and imagination and occasional disappointments that mean exactly nothing whatsoever except that I have a column and so I can hand out whatever made-up crap takes my fancy. Lo! We begin!


The Scroll of Strength: The Witcher III
wh1.jpg


My favourite game of the year? I think so, yes. It’s amazing to think that in just two sequels, CD Projekt Red has gone from being the company responsible for the ambitious but often frustratingly flawed and (initially) barely coherent The Witcher to the absolute top-tier of AAA developers. The Witcher III is proof positive that it’s totally been earned, and then some. Certainly, this one needs no Enhanced Edition.

To be sure, it has its downsides, including a less than satisfying combat scaling curve and far too much reliance on the words “Use your Witcher Senses to…”, but I don’t want to get bogged down in that. Witcher III is the kind of labour of love that we rarely see in the AAA space, where every single person involved seemed to bring both their A-Game and a deep passion for making the best Witcher experience possible. It’s not just a question of the graphics and technology, but its sense of humanity and compassion – a game that will give both an abusive husband and an unfairly condemned young man an equal chance to tell their stories, and show that both deserve at least some measure of sympathy for their personal tragedies. Forgiveness? Perhaps not.

Geralt in particular is a triumph, with everything from the writing to the animation of his eyes underscoring how much he isn’t the stoic, cynical observer he likes to portray himself as, and the quests confident enough to show him as everything from a badass warrior to an old sot drunk-dialing wizards while in drag. The expansion, Hearts of Stone, goes so far as to spend a whole quest mocking him for being dull, in a way that’s only possible when there’s no chance of the audience agreeing.

Over the course of the series, The Witcher has been a masterclass in game evolution, in everything from game mechanics, to how well its female characters have gone from being an industry joke courtesy of the sex cards in the first games to some of the best written around. CD Projekt has said that The Witcher 3 is the end of Geralt’s story, though of late they’ve been murmuring about doing more after the second planned expansion, especially since Cyberpunk isn’t likely for a couple of years still. My bet would be on a standalone Ciri game to see if she can carry a whole sequel, and I’d totally play that. I hope they do shelve Geralt now though. She has so much potential for stories, even after her destiny is concluded, but Geralt? I just don’t think anything can happen to him now that would be bigger than already has, and I like to imagine him getting the retirement his heroics have secretly earned him.

I could rant on for hours about how much I loved The Witcher III, which is all the more impressive because nothing makes you never want to see a game again like having tomainline it for review purposes. But I won’t. I’ll just once again be grateful that it recovered from its wonky start to become something truly special.

Needless to say, I really, really can’t wait for Cyberpunk 2077.

The Scroll of Charisma: Undertale
under3.jpg


I’d never heard even of Undertale before it came out. Had missed the Kickstarter, don’t use Tumblr. The first I heard about it was someone on Twitter saying it was worth checking out. I checked it out, and while it’s not quite my favourite game of the year, it’s certainly both up there, and the best surprise in ages.

It’s hard to encapsulate exactly why, at least without spoiling it, but at heart it’s like playing a game of Pass The Parcel where you’re always holding the box as the music stops. Every layer just builds the excitement and usually comes with a bit of candy. The way it tracks your progress between games, and calls you out on doing something like killing a friend to see what happens, then reloading so that it never did. The characters, who start out as one-note jokes and obstacles, only to be fleshed out as you play to the point that even goofy stuff like Sans the pun-loving skeleton’s laziness start to have sinister undertones. The sheer wealth of hidden gags and responses to actions and clever alternative solutions to puzzles. The… oh, but spoilers! So many potential spoilers! Few games have the comfort to undersell themselves this much, so that their secrets can surprise and shine when players stumble across them naturally.

There’s so much to like, but at heart, what sells Undertale is its deep and genuine warmth. It’s a game full of monsters that doesn’t really believe in them, not just offering the options to do things like take pacifist routes because people like no-kill paths in games, but to deconstruct how RPGs work and how we approach them. It’s a game that looks simple, but has been incredibly well and thoughtfully designed, to the point that enemy attacks typically represent their personalities rather than just being random mini-games. It’s a game designed not around gold and glory, but family and love, to the point that if this wasn’t one of my favourite games on its own merits, it would have become one just by watching people Let’s Play it on YouTube and listening to themlaugh and laugh and laugh. Oh, Sans and Papyrus. I want more merch, immediately.

Also, being nice about Undertale really annoys people who deserve to be annoyed. I’ll accept that some fans have been a touch douchey about it, but if you’re midway through typing something like ‘memetale’, go stick your head in a bucket of stagnant water. I’m thrilled that it’s been as successful as it has, and had an absolute blast both playing it and generally feeling part of something special both in and outside it. If it was just a funny, parody RPG, it’d already be a winner, but that’s just the start. There’s so much more to it, and anyone who argues can – as they say – get dunked on.

The Scroll of Valour: Kickstarter Developers
27divorisinee.jpg


Consider this one a shared achievement, and to some extent going back into last year. But I think it’s worth taking a moment to generally applaud the developers who have brought back both old franchises and classic styles over the last year or so. While some may have hit the spot better than others, just about everything from Wasteland 2to Divinity: Original Sin to Serpent in the Staglands to Lords of Xulima to Pillars of Eternity have been at least solid, and typically excellent. This year also saw many returning for a second push, with Divinity: Original Sin getting a huge Enhanced Edition to polish it up and add a ton of new content like full voiceover and rewritten quests that don’t outright tell you what to do, but at least don’t expect you to be psychic.

Not every genre has been so fortunate, with my beloved adventure games in particular having generally done a less than great job of recreating that feeling of being 13 and booting up Day of the Tentacle for the first time, so it’s worth appreciating just how successful RPGs have been. Now. That being said, I do have to counter this to some extent by adding that as fun as the nostalgic trips have been, it is time to start seeing some more new ideas of the kind that made games like Baldur’s Gate and Ultima VII so explosively innovative and exciting back in the day. There’s a whole sack of ideas to steal from, from survival sims to Roguelikes to just generally listening to the guy who says “Isn’t it a bit boring to just get a quest, do the thing, and then go back?”

The cool thing is that the next wave of games does look to be getting more ambitious, with particular stand-outs so far including Divinity: Less Original Sin trying to borrow from tabletop and make party members more than just sacks of equipment and stats, and Numenara’s Crisis system where every battle is an interesting encounter. Fingers crossed that the nostalgia trip is about to become the next step forwards.

The Scroll of Histories: Serpent in the Staglands
whatisgoingon.jpg


There’s been a few RPGs for the more hardcore adventurer this year, including Lords of Xulima and Age of Decadence. This year’s pick though goes to Serpent in the Staglands, an excellent and brutal outing, in which you’re a fallen god travelling through a world more inspired by the likes of Darklands than traditional fantasy CRPGs. It’s not the prettiest game around, and it will stomp your face into a small puddle if you try to play it without not simply reading the rules but sublimating them into a liquid and drinking them in one shot. But, three diamond-tipped axes later, when you finally break into it, it’s a lovely bit of design and a very satisfying quest. Just don’t look up the speed-run on YouTube, because that’s not a way to feel good about yourself.

The Scroll of Failure: Raven’s Cry

Raven’s Cry wasn’t so much a game release as a pile of poo dropped from the TopWare anus, and everyone involved should have had their noses rubbed into it as a warning. Lord Walker of Bath covered the reasons back at the start of the year, and while to the developers credit they have been back and fixed it (though I’ve not played the updated version to see how well, because my list of better things to do with my time includes biting my toenails off, wielding one in each hand and having tiny sword-fights), the sheer scale of its original failure warrants a stamp of NEVER FORGET right on its forehead. On the plus side, The Witcher started off little better, so maybe in a couple of sequels, these will be some of the best RPGs around. Y’know. Maybe.

The Scroll of Banishment: Cyberspace
shad2.jpg


This year, being collected by Shadowrun: Returns for continuing a proud 30 year history of Cyberspace just plain sucking. Stop putting it into games. That includes you, OtherSide when you make System Shock 3, and you, CD Projekt, for Cyberpunk 2077. Cyberspace was a shit idea in the 80s when people wanted to make computers look like they were from the future, and now we’re in that future, it’s just embarrassing for everyone. Just give hackers an iPhone, or if they refuse on moral grounds, Android. But decking into the virtual holomatrix to shoot ICE and crypto-surf the information hyper-highway while wearing a whole cow’s worth of leather? Enough!

Wearing sunglasses indoors continues to be acceptable, if you can pull it off.

The Scroll of Vitality: The Old Republic / Final Fantasy XIV
swars1.jpg


I’m calling this one a draw, because… well, because I can. First, The Old Republic. I know, I know, I’d not thought about it in ages either. However, it wouldn’t be fair to not be grateful that BioWare has finally done what everyone wanted them to do in the first place, and make it possible to (more or less) just play through the class stories without having to endure one of the most tedious MMOs out there. The Imperial Agent story is the one everyone recommends, and with good reason. I’d also like to highlight the Smuggler, though, because it’s both really well written and wonderfully funny.

Taking the other half is Final Fantasy XIV, which only goes from strength to strength while still being able to justify a subscription fee. Its Gold Saucer addition earlier this year is one of the single coolest things ever added to an MMO, and Heavensward has given the main campaign a real shot in the arm. They’re currently doing a free login campaign for former subscribers that offers four days of free play until the end of the month. Sadly, everyone involved with the payment and account management systems has yet to be taken out and shot repeatedly in the face, as justice demands.

The Scroll of Sadness: Fallout 4
fallout_blam.jpg


Don’t mistake this for “Fallout 4 is a bad game”, because it’s clearly not that. But, of all the RPGs I was looking forward to this year, this was the one that most landed with both a thump and sad farty sound. And yes, I really was looking forward to it. A lot. Not only do I love the series, New Vegas more than Fallout 3, admittedly, I was really in the mood for a big sprawling RPG that wasn’t fantasy. It didn’t deliver for me.

It’s cliche to say “I really wish Bethesda had done the world and Obsidian had done the writing”, but… yeah. I really wish Bethesda had done the world and Obsidian had done the writing. I soon lost all interest in the quests that were just glorified ways of setting up not particularly good fighting in bombed out buildings, couldn’t get into the boring and poorly implemented story, and while I’ve kept meaning to go back and find the cool stuff that I know is there, somehow every time I load it up I just end up staring for a while and quitting. Most of the fun I had with it was the time spend idly imagining playing as someone like Nick Valentine or Piper, with a reason to go poking around the deep corners of the wasteland. Seriously, what could be cooler than being a slightly dickish journalist finding awesome stories in the dark future? The success of the RPS diaries show that, even if I couldn’t get into the fiction enough to do the RP thing while playing, there was potential there. Certainly more than the concussed hunt for Shaun and battle for part of the Wasteland that’s doing pretty well on its own.

Basically, after clocking up literally hundreds of hours with the previous two, this one lasted me… eleven. Mostly in a couple of sittings desperately trying to find the fun on my mini-map, but only finding cheap-ass supermutants with long-range rocket launchers. That earns one Scroll, both devoted to and awarded with sighs.

The Scroll of Goatse: Eye Of The Beholder III
dwm_3.jpg


23RD GLORIOUS UNOPPOSED YEAR!

But hey, there’s 12 more months until next time…
 

Neanderthal

Arcane
Joined
Jul 7, 2015
Messages
3,626
Location
Granbretan
Aye he's better than the usual RPS twatneck, gotta say though whats wi the slagging off o first Witchers birds? Triss playing as Yen saved Geralts arse half a dozen times, planned the alliance that would see Salamandra defeated and Adda's scheming revealed and most o otehr lasses were similarly self motivated and able. Nudie cards were just a bonus if you ask me, and wanking jokes on some of em were hilarious like that peasant girls whose choking the chicken, the whore weighing the coin purse or Triss' blatant pussy shots.
 

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
I like that he mentions SitS. It needs to be mentioned more often by mainstream marketing.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Hey hey, Cobbett's not that good. :P Crooked Bee can tell you of a few of his howlers. He's a useful guy, though.
 

ERYFKRAD

Barbarian
Patron
Joined
Sep 25, 2012
Messages
28,237
Strap Yourselves In Serpent in the Staglands Shadorwun: Hong Kong Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Hey hey, Cobbett's not that good. :P Crooked Bee can tell you of a few of his howlers. He's a useful guy, though.
In comparison to the rest of the dotards at RPS, however...
It's like putting our shittiest reviewer in charge of reviews at RPGWatch.
 

Crooked Bee

(no longer) a wide-wandering bee
Patron
Joined
Jan 27, 2010
Messages
15,048
Location
In quarantine
Codex 2013 Codex 2014 PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire MCA Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
Witcher 3 as GOTY? Eww. Nice of him to mention SitS though.

On a more serious note, Cobbett is better than most other game journalists, yes. Lots of howlers, too, as Infinitron mentioned, and his taste can be very mainstream especially when it comes to game design, but at least he's really (and in this industry, fairly uniquely) knowledgeable about RPG and adventure game history and he's often got his priorities right. As far as other RPS journalists go, Adam Smith is alright as well. The rest are downright terrible.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Read until the end. :)

The RPG Scrollbars: The RPGs Of 2016

The holidays are now over, and it’s time to get back to what matters – saving a million accident-prone fantasy realms from their own past mistakes, evil gods on the rampage, and all that pesky loot that they clearly don’t have anything better to do with than stick it in barrels at the bottom of dungeons. This is why so many of them have no choice but to have bandit-driven economies. Shameful. Someone should Do Something There.

Here’s some of the most exciting RPGs due in 2016. I suspect a couple may not actually make it to final release this year, but never mind – ’tis the season to be generous. In no particular order, then, some of the ones I’m looking forward to…


The Witcher III: Blood And Wine
2016_witcher.jpg


On the one hand, yes, this one’s just an expansion pack. That said, it’s both an expansion to one of 2015’s most beloved games, and a far more involved one than the already superb Hearts of Stone. It’ll be good to get out of Temeria to take a trip to the land of Toussaint, where 20 new hours of adventure awaits. Officially, that’s all that’s been promised, with The Witcher III being called the end of Geralt’s story, but of late there’s been mutterings about more Witcher goodness to come – especially since it’s going to be, uh, a long wait for Cyberpunk 2077. (My bet? At some point this year we’ll see the announcement of a Ciri focused expansion, both to take advantage of how much of her story hasn’t been told in the games, and to test the waters for a full-on game set after the events of Witcher III, much like Geralt began the first game all those years ago.)

Final Fantasy IX
2016_vivi.jpg


Yes, that’s the right numeral. Right at the end of 2015, Square let slip that probably the least played but most underappreciated Playstation Final Fantasy game would be making its way to us, presumably without the garbage graphical overhaul that makes Final Fantasy VI such an abomination unto all things good and holy. I say ‘probably’ because I confess, it’s one that I’ve not played either in its original form or any downloadable form, but I certainly plan to when it makes its appearance.

Shroud of the Avatar
2016_shroud.jpg


Part MMO, part single-player game, and present Early Access construction site. I’ve not looked at it for about a year myself, preferring to let Lord British and friends call me when it’s ready and trust that unlike Pagan and Ascension, that’s actually true, but… well… if you’ve been reading this column, you know how much I love Ultima. I desperately want this one to repair its tainted name, even if it can’t officially use it.

YIIK: A Post Modern RPG
2016_yiik.jpg


I played a demo of this one ages ago; an RPG in which… if I got the measure of it… Bill Bryson visits Earthbound to write his new travel book, only to end up saving the world so that he can be rude about minor inconveniences for comic effect. Yes. That sounds about right. Anyway, Undertale may currently be synonymous with ‘modern Earthbound’, but YIIK wants a slice of that butterscotch pie too. With its very different graphical style and approach to the genre, hopefully it’ll get it. The demo was promising, though I suspect it’s going to get hit with a few glares from humourless onlookers who can’t handle other people liking a game that they don’t.

South Park: The Fractured But Whole
2016_sp.jpg


Honestly, was never a fan of South Park, so I was really surprised to enjoy its first RPG outing as much as I did. I’m assuming this one will be similar, only with superheroes and more jokes. If so, hurrah for that. Even if I have absolutely no idea what the title refers to. How does one fracture a butthole? Sounds like a goatse level stretch to me. But anyway. Even if I’m sorry Obsidian isn’t working on this one, looking forward to seeing another RPG that knows exactly how silly it wants to be and has decided that the answer is very, very silly indeed.

Mass Effect Andromeda
2016_andromeda.jpg


Both EA and BioWare have been very hush-hush on this sequel, but honestly they have me at “Mass Effect”. Despite That Ending and an increasing push towards not great shooty-shooty action, the characters and world design and writing made the original trilogy one of my favourite RPG series, and I can’t wait to get back to that universe even if it won’t be in the company of Shepard, Garrus, Tali and the rest of the gang.

Camelot Unchained
2016_camelot.jpg


I’ve got a real soft spot for Dark Age of Camelot, despite the generally abysmal handling of the UK version by GOA. It wasn’t my first MMO, but it was one of the first that landed at a time when I had both time and a good enough internet connection to really dig in and enjoy splashing around Albion and Midgard and somehow never getting around to even visiting The Other One. Much of what it did was later refined by World of Warcraft, with The Elder Scrolls Online having more of it in its blood than the actual Elder Scrolls games. More’s the pity, but that’s not DAOC’s fault. Camelot Unchained plans to push the Realm vs. Realm action to the forefront and make it the core of the game instead of just an important slice, with player driven economies and backgrounds again borrowing from Arthurian, Celtic and Viking myths.

Dark Souls 3
2016_ds3.jpg


Part III of my ongoing mission to get more than a few rooms into these games. I’m not holding out much hope, but I am quite looking forward to trying. I think that’s the definition of insanity in some quarters, but I desperately want to see these games as so many people I follow on Twitter do, instead of a big brick wall that just wants to break my sword in half. Maybe I should stop attacking the walls. But I don’t trust them! Like everything in these games, they plot my demise. Depressingly efficiently.

The Technomancer
2016_technomancer.jpg


I don’t have huuuuge expectations for this new game from Spiders, mostly due to having played previous RPGs from Spiders. However, while they’re not exactly the best RPGs you’ll find even in the average bargain bin, they have been improving over the years and generally interesting enough in their quirkiness that I don’t regret my time with them. I don’t predict greatness for this one, but I’m open to being surprised.

Torment: Tides of Numenera
2016_numen.jpg


Honestly, I know next to nothing about this one, and that’s no accident. I went into Planescape Torment completely cold back in the day, and I think that has a lot to do with how much I ended up being sucked into its crazy world. I’d like the same thing to happen here. The few snippets I have somehow picked up through osmosis however have all tingled very pleasantly, particularly the scripted combat system where every encounter is a bit of an adventure, a puzzle, a collection of cool ways to use skills and find paths that don’t rely entirely on shooty-shooty-bang-bang solutions. Aside from that, I intend to try and keep up my ignorance until it’s finished.

Steve Jackson’s Sorcery!
2016_sorcery.jpg


Or, to be more accurate, Inkle Studios’ Steve Jackson’s Sorcery! Just as 80 Days finally made the jump from iOS to real computers, so to is Sorcery getting ready to make it to our shores. It’s been an amazing ride so far, going from a relatively simple Choose Your Own Adventure that apes the books to some seriously clever design involving time loops and stepping into the past, and going from a linear path to a basically open world where you can take your time to defeat the evil villain’s lieutanants and repair what went wrong, or simply storm forwards and let everything go to Hell. They’re really cool games, and deserve the wider audience that the PC should give them.

Underworld Ascendant
2016_asc.jpg


Both an Underworld and a System Shock successor? Sirs and madames, with these sequels, you are spoiling us. This one’s looking good, with my favourite bit being how much focus the pitch puts on the dungeon as a living ecosystem instead of just a lot of corridors. Underground societies, long-lost tombs, weaponising the environment… all music to my ears. Early videos do however show far too much focus on spiders. Spiders are bad. Please replace them with kittens. Cute kittens. That just want to play.

World of Warcraft: Legion
2016_legion.jpg


The next World of Warcraft expansion. It’s going to sell more than most games can even dream of, even if Blizzard has firmly moved away from trying to reignite its once-success in favour of just focusing on fans and long-term players. New features this year include the Demon Hunter with added focus on mobility, fancy upgradeable weapons, and a new location to sally forth into and beat things up. It’s playable in Alpha already, with few real surprises but lots of nice touches, especially to previously underbaked systems like Transmogrification, and a controversial change to PvP that wants to even the playing field and put the combat focus on skill rather than stats.

Divinity: Original Sin 2
2016_divinity.jpg


Divinity: Original Sin was easily one of my favourite Kickstarted RPGs, and between that, seeing how much Larian has gone to town on improving it, and getting a chance to play a sliver of the upcoming Divinity: Less Original Sin, I’m really looking forward to seeing this one. It’s largely pinning its hopes on evolving from two-players to a full party of competing interests, which I don’t have much doubt will be cool with the right people. For me though, lacking a suitable group to play with, its success hinges on how well it can convey the same feeling in a single-player game. Can not knowing which party members to trust lead to interesting encounters instead of just random knives in the back? I hope so, because it’s definitely a cool idea, from a Larian Studios that finally has the rock-solid RPGs foundations its always needed to let its cool ideas flourish.

Grimoire: Heralds of the Winged Exemplar
2016_grim.jpg


Hahahaha, sure. Just in time to celebrate the year of Linux on desktop.

Now, of course that’s not everything that’s coming over the next twelve months, and few genres know how to slip with style like an RPG. Don’t be too surprised if some of the games marked for the end of the year, like Mass Effect Andromeda, end up being saved for the space-year 2017. Luckily, there’ll be plenty of RPGs big and small to fill the gaps, and hopefully some big surprises for good measure. I’m also very much looking forward to seeing the progress of many of the games that are going to take a little longer, from the next wave of Kickstarted RPGs like The Bard’s Tale IV to the two different projects aiming to pick up where City of Heroes left off. Hopefully we’ll even hear something about Everquest Next. Stranger things have happened.

Could do without so many sandbox crafting games though.

Crafting in general really. Heroes. Don’t. CRAFT.
 

Rahdulan

Omnibus
Patron
Joined
Oct 26, 2012
Messages
5,104
I just wish someone would give Spiders enough money to make the game they want because I seriously like every RPG they made, but it's clear they're held back by logistics of game making. They have their heart and mind in the right place even with how cutthroat this industry is. Not to mention I'll never say no to more mid-sized RPG projects so it doesn't all boil down to AAA safe bets and one-man army magnum opus deals.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/01/18/fallout-4-dragon-age-seasons/


The RPG Scrollbars: Time And Seasons In RPGs
Richard Cobbett on January 18th, 2016 at 1:00 pm.

rpgtime_1.jpg


The times change, and we change with the times. Or in the case of RPGs, not. I’ve always felt this a bit of a shame, especially in games like World of Warcraft, where your character is officially hanging around long enough to see the leaves fall off the trees and the snow to cover up the capital cities. That’s why I was quite keen on both Fallout 4 taking the time to redecorate Diamond City a little for at least Halloween and Christmas, and last week, to see a mod take the next step and give the Commonwealtha makeover for all seasons in a way that nobody’s really tried since Lords of Midnight 3 way back in the 90s. Whole minutes of fun with the system clock there!

But then as now, it’s hard not to start wondering how time could be given its due as more than the fire in which bad movies turn out to be even worse than they initially seemed. Maybe it could be our friend too, and in so many interesting ways.


rpgtime_2.jpg


It’s obviously not that developers can’t factor this kind of stuff into their games. Like a lot of ‘wouldn’t it be cool’ features, there are good reasons not to do it. In the case of something like World of Warcraft for instance, covering most of the world in snow for a quarter of the year would render all the zones looking very samey, as well as detract from areas that draw from the various moods and palettes that they offer. No longer would the snowy road up to Ironforge offer its trademark slide from cold ice to hot metal, for instance, or the various forests be half as fun to explore in autumn.

Still, the simple fact that so few games actually do cool things with time means that it doesn’t necessarily take much to stand out. Rockstar’s Bully for instance offered a special Halloween event full of pranks and costumes and a Christmas equivalent shortly afterwards, and the Halloween section is one of the most memorable slices of the whole game. Similarly, while I’d argue that Blizzard really should shake things up a bit more each year, I remember the first time I did their Christmas content – going to get presents from Greatfather Winter, etc – and it was hard not to feel the warm fuzzies about that, even playing on a laptop that could barely run the damn game and looking out a rainy Yorkshire evening instead of a snowy winter wonderland.

rpgtime_3.jpg


Thinking back, it tends to be the gimmicks more than the core game functions that work the best. The problem with anything critical relying on time is that it’s easy for it to be more of a gotcha than an additional slice of realism. A big timer adds pressure that’s usually not welcome, especially in a game that wants you to take time to explore the fun stuff instead of just focus on the finale. I’m a big fan of Inkle Studios’ 80 Days for instance, a game full of wonderful bits of story (many of which aren’t apparent or even available early on), but there’s always the pressure of seeing how many days you’ve wasted on triviality like having fun instead of barrelling across the world faster than you can comb Fogg’s moustache. I do think that the speed of that game and how easy it is to finish largely counter this problem, that you can win the game and then go back and play however you want without feeling the pressure. It can lead to a very disappointing first run though, at a time when one run is all many games get.

And so it often tends to be. Very few people liked Fallout’s two time limits (the water chip, and then the second one that nobody talks about), which is why Fallout 2 opted to just fake it and pretend that things were desperate without actually dropping the boot. Pathologic is intimidating enough without knowing that every day you waste screaming “What the fuck is going on?!“is likely to screw you over before you find out. Quest For Glory II is so much less pleasurable to explore when you know you’re on a timer for every day that passes, and every few days brings another game-ending menace.

I don’t think many people are fans of outright time limits. I know I’m not.

rpgtime_4.jpg


Even so, when I look back on some of my favourite moments, several do involve the passing of time and the ability to do stuff with that. Consortium for instance, the closest to a modern day successor to The Last Express that I’ve found (sequel Kickstarter coming soon, and I’ve got my fingers crossed for it) does some fantastic stuff with it, like a murder mystery that has to be complete by a certain point, but doesn’t simply drop the boot if you fail. It’s like playing through a slightly clunky SF version of 24, where disasters are always happening and piling on each other, and you’re right in the middle just trying to keep up. On a smaller scale, I also like games that force you to choose at least some options under pressure, like the Telltale games, or Alpha Protocol, which did exactly the same thing… only had choices matter.

And I like the sense of a world outside the confines of my screen, even if most games that do that tend to limit themselves to one big moment to knock over-confident players off their stride, and then immediately lose interest. The start of Deus Ex: Human Revolution for instance, where taking too long pissing about the Sarif offices leads to the hostages being killed before you get there. Mass Effect 2, where wasting too much time before rescuing the captured crew leads to them being mulched in front of your face. Star Control 2, where the enemy Ur-Quan turns out to be in the middle of a civil war which resolves during your fight. Spoiler: This is not great news.

Even so, the simple fact that these kinds of moments are so memorable is often a testament to the moments themselves, but also a reminder of how rare they are. The simple fact that an NPC isn’t full of shit when they warn that the world’s about to end is such a strange concept that it actually counts as a plot twist. The fact that the evil overlord is doing something instead of waiting to be beaten can still be revolutionary, and is hard to object to. At least, once or twice in a game, when it doesn’t mean the end of the world. Only Japanese games have traditionally thrown themselves fully into this side of things though, from the ticking clocks in games like Recettear and Way of the Samurai to the way that visual novels force you to make decisions and then live with them, on the grounds that the point is to keep coming back to find other options and outcomes instead of simply ‘winning’ the game, as most Western games focus on.

rpgtime_5.jpg


Despite the dramatic potential of this though, I’ve often actively preferred the moments that go the other way – being nice, adding to the warmth and friendliness of a world instead of making it more dangerous and cranking up the tension. I mentioned Quest for Glory 2 earlier on, and now I’ll mention it again – little things like the poet Omar occasionally visiting the inn at night, or having a singer there in the evening if you return at the appropriate time. Another great one that’s not really an ‘RPG moment’ as such, but I think I’ll mention anyway, is that you can spend hours and hours in Dead Rising 2 – with a real-time clock – not fighting zombies or hunting for your daughter’s desperately needed medicine or uncovering a conspiracy… but just hanging out in the zombie shelter playing strip poker. And why not? The end of the world is nigh.

Relationships in particular heavily benefit from accepting a progression of time in both design and presentation. I know that Dragon Age 2 isn’t exactly a popular game (and before anyone says it, no I did not review it for PC Gamer) but I’ll defend it in one way – I adore how Bioware used its span to develop not just the relationships between your character and the NPCs, but to give them all lives around the edges. Varric looking after Merill. Anders’ slow descent into madness. Aveline… honestly, just Aveline, going from looking like she was going to be one of Bioware’s dullest characters to really coming into her own, especially in partnership with pirate-queen Isabella. Rarely has a single game handled that journey so well, where the lines being spat around remain constant despite the sentiment shifting dramatically.

Aveline: You didn’t come to my solstice dinner party.
Isabela: Look at you! Dinner parties, cooking… do you have a lace apron yet, or should I get one for you?
Aveline: Don’t change the subject. I sent you an invitation, and you didn’t show up.
Isabela: I thought it would be… I mean, I don’t know. I just don’t do family gatherings. Besides, one day you and Donnic will have children, and I’ll be the last person you want around them. Imagine all the awkward questions you’d have to answer. “Mother, what’s a Slattern?”
Aveline: I’ll just point at you and say, “That’s a slattern.”


That and the other examples in the game make for the kind of character relationship that typically can only be done by stories with multiple games to play with. An individual, running story rarely allows for the characters to do much except follow on behind the hero. A few I can think of have done one or two time-shifts to reorder the board, like I-War 2 and Fable 2, but that tends to be for a time-skip between a prologue and the main game rather than something that can play with the pieces while the game is running and we’re in a position to enjoy it and explore the changes at will.

(Semi-related, I remember being very impressed with what might just be an accidental success with the Tales of Monkey Island series. One episode introduces pirate hunter Morgan LeFlay, one of the more successful new characters, as hero Guybrush Threepwood’s biggest fan. The gap between episodes meant that by the time they were bickering like old friends in the next chapter, it felt like they actually knew each other and had the necessary history, despite her being a brand new character to the series who’d had barely a few minutes of screentime until that point.)

rpgtime_6.jpg


There is, in short, so much more that could be done with time, for drama, for emotion, for structure, or as struck me when playing New Vegas, for keeping a game alive. Imagine for instance that you start playing it in January, but there are signs up for a big Caravan tournament due to take place in March. Or in something like Skyrim, that a carnival is coming to Whiterun town in December. That’s real time, just automatically slipped into the game when the time comes and then removed once it’s over – a focused reason to keep coming back to the game for specific moments. Individual plotlines evolving based on player decisions while playing through things, such as the foundation of a new city that you could see coming together month by month. Or if the Skyrim Civil War had actually been a long, extended campaign that felt like being part of a movement, an army, for the duration, instead of just a quest chain. Mods likeHolidays of Skyrim baked into the experience, like so many other possibilities.

I know I’d be much keener on Season Passes for that kind of game if they were going to actually feel like a ‘season’ – not just a big dollup of DLC here and there, but a commitment to keeping the world alive for a year after release with small tweaks here and new bits of content there. Better yet, just make that part of the deal when you buy the game. After all, the player who’s still in a game is far more likely to buy stuff.

But, ah, that kind of thing at least is going to have to wait for the next generation of open-world RPGs. Simply playing with time and factoring it in more? That’s a baton that pretty much any RPG could pick up and twirl in interesting ways. Hopefully at least a few will give it a shot, because it really is odd how arguably the most persuasive of all natural laws gets left on the sidelines, even in cases where it can shine.

And at the very, very least… I’d really like to see some more snow in winter.

It’s not like the real world’s been serving it up this year.
 

Neanderthal

Arcane
Joined
Jul 7, 2015
Messages
3,626
Location
Granbretan
Talk about the shittiest example you can use? DA2 has no fucking logic, companions stick around and do nothing over ten years just because the plot fucking tells them to, its about as unnatural a progression as you can get. Aveline and Isabella, fucking idiot slave weaklings who can't do shit wi'out protagonist, and only stick around to fill out his roster of squeeing retards, these are supposed to be good examples of a passing time frame?

For fucks sake why dint man mention King of Dragons Pass, where seasons and time play a fucking vital role in almost every feature? Alright its not an RPG , but the systems could be nicked right outta it if any dev had ambition anymore. Or why not mention time limits for companion and other quests in BG2, one o few games that has time limits yet you don't hear much complaining about it? Why not mention the old wargames where winter is a natural end to the campaign season?

Looks like the poor bastard is catching RPS syndrome, first symptom being verbal diarrhea.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/02/01/what-hearthstone-gets-right-about-roleplay/

The RPG Scrollbars: Roles We Take, Roles We Choose
Richard Cobbett on February 1st, 2016 at 2:00 pm.

roles1.jpg


Not for the first time, I’ve spent quite a while recently pondering the nature of roles – more specifically, mechanical role versus narrative role. When we think of RPGs, what we’re usually thinking of is the latter. You play the role of the Hero, but in a universe that’s typically designed to let you define that however you like. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but there’s a key difference between that and stepping into the shoes of someone more specific. Geralt in The Witcher 3 for instance is – spoiler alert – a Witcher. Every encounter revolves around that, every system involves it, every decision has, whether it’s by your choice or Geralt bringing it up, a mercenary element that reinforces that asking for money in exchange for your services is expected and not, as is often the case, the first step towards douchery and getting the Evil ending.

I’ve also been playing a lot of Hearthstone. The two things are linked.


hsheader.jpg


The more I play Hearthstone, the more I admire it. The League of Explorers expansion really re-ignited my somewhat flagging enthusiasm with its humour and constant clever gimmicks, and it’s now something of an evening ritual to lie in bed at night with my iPad, unleashing Zoolock heck on enemies with one of my cats by my side. Over the last month or so, when I’ve been looking into the nature of roles for a project I’m working on and how it affects quest design and similar, it’s also been something of an inspiration. I’m not saying this is a new revelation or anything, it’s baked into the core design and was (justifiably) heavily praised at launch, but Heathstone really is a perfect little example of mechanical role-play in action. Even though it’s not an RPG.

Just to clarify though, what I mean is that each character doesn’t simply have thematically appropriate cards for their class, or a little wallpapering, but encourages you to get into the mindset of their roles. A Warlock for instance is all about sacrifice; playing fast and loose with your health pool, making deals with demons for their services, and wherever possible, finding ways to get out of your payments. Take the Doomguard. It demands two randomly picked cards from your hand, and in most circumstances you want to avoid paying that. You’re encouraged to go Full Weasel on it, either by summoning it with an empty hand so that there’s nothing to take, or bringing it into play some other way, such as with a Voidcaller.

It’s a better recreation of the character mindset than any actual RPG with a Warlock option, which typically treats it as just ‘summon some demons, throw some shit.’ In a similar vein, Rogues are encouraged to literally keep their cards close to their pneumatic chest (it is Valeera after all), with tactics built around sudden bursts of damage and sabotage, while Mages rely on an interlocking set of secrets and spells, and Warriors tank the battlefield. All of the characters’ skills, cards and personalities play into it. At least until someone spoils it by fielding an all-Murloc army. Spoilsports.

roles2.jpg


Keeping this in mind throws a very different light on so many RPGs and the rare feeling of actually BEING somebody in a game. Ultima for instance puts you into the narrative role of the Avatar, paragon of the eight virtues, defeater of yadda yadda, but the running joke of the series is that what you actually do with that authority is treat Britannia like your own personal playground. Only in Ultima IV are you forced not to, with Ultima VII being largely an exercise in how many ways you can bend an open world over your knee and spank it until its bottom is red-raw. Conversely, the Quest for Glory games give you that all important wiggle-room for stealing the occasional thing or making a selfish decision, but at heart are routed in the fact that you are a Hero and it’s your responsibility to live up to that. They’re more linear in design, and notably, designers Lori and Corey Cole spank back hard if you try to do something unbefitting of your role, but everything from the nature of the quests to the skills at your disposal (good for helping people, bad for kicking arse) reinforce that heroic aspect.

It doesn’t help that most RPGs, rightly or wrongly, don’t have much in the way of balls when it comes to restricting the player character in any way. Compare, say, Baldur’s Gate 2 with Dragon Age 2 – partly because it’s a good comparison, partly because it wouldn’t be a good week if I didn’t annoy someone on the Codex. I’m thinking in terms of magic specifically. Baldur’s Gate 2 largely takes place in the city of Amn, and one of the cardinal rules there is ‘no magic without a license’. Dragon Age 2 takes place in a city controlled by Templars, whose job it is to keep mages under control, and not without some reason. Magic isn’t just whizzy-whizzy-bang-bang, but linked to demonic possession and all kinds of other health hazards.

roles5.jpg


Despite this, being a mage – an illegal, ‘apostate’ mage at that – doesn’t mean a damn thing. The guards will completely overlook fireballs in the street, you solving your problems with lightning bolts and all kinds of other stuff like that, even before you get to a point where you’re important enough to turn a blind eye. It’s a continuation of one of Dragon Age’s fundamental lore issues, that magic is meant to be rare and special and dangerous, but fuck that because players want to be/fight mages.

The trouble is that in not giving magic users at least some sense of threat or actual sense of being under the thumb, who cares? Baldur’s Gate 2 meanwhile made being a spellcaster a problem. Break out the elements and some very tough wizards would show up to impolitely request you not do that, with your three options being a) apologise and stop, b) buy a damn license, or c) prove yourself too powerful for them to stop. The latter especially is one of the most satisfying things you can do in that game. Even before that though, that tiny mechanical demand to keep the metaphorical magic wand holstered made a big difference to both mages and the setting.

roles3.jpg


One of the games I’m really looking forward to at the moment is Divinity: Original Sin 2: Not Quite Such An Original Sin, and one of the big reasons is that it wants to nail this sense of character through both restriction and opportunity. The demo town I played a few months ago is quite a fun place for humans, not so much for dwarves. If you’ve got a dwarf in your party, they’re barred at the front gate and have to find their own way in even if it means actively splitting the party. Especially, in fact, with each character having their own opportunities to find information, characters who won’t talk to anyone else, clever scope for sabotage, and reinforcements of their differences. It’s not that difficult to get the Dwarf into town for instance, but soon enough they’ll find an encounter like a banquet taking place in the middle of town. Most characters can just walk on through and eat, but they trigger the guards if they try to stick their beard into human business. It’s more restrictive an experience than the average RPG, yes, but in a way that boosts it rather than detracting. Each character then has their own contacts, their own histories, their own specialities – a wise elf for instance might be able to help heal the witness to a crime, the dwarf might have reason to cut their throat.

(The catch, especially these days, is what elements a game opts to acknowledge. Racism against elves isn’t usually going to be a problem in something like Dragon Age because, well, elves don’t exist. Likewise, you can say whatever you want about the Orlesians without anyone taking offence. Racism and sexism though are more complicated issues, because both competing arguments have a point – that these things exist and it’s both unrealistic and intellectually dishonest to pretend otherwise, and that yes they do, but they get in the way of the fantasy. The usual compromise is that a few characters will be racist or sexist, but it’s okay because they’re the baddies, like Caesar’s Legion over in Fallout: New Vegas. And even they’re willing to make an exception for a female Courier, if only because they’re visibly a walking Act of God.)

roles6.jpg


Well, there’s a guy with a life-expectancy measured in femtoseconds.

For Divinity though, it’s not the bad attitudes specifically, but the fact that they’re used to expand on the game instead of simply lock out content, particularly if you’re controlling a full party in single-player mode. The Dwarf banned from the town isn’t at a disadvantage, because in finding their own way in, they unlock things that only they can access – and no doubt a later location will flip things round and inconvenience the rest of the party. Original Sin 2 also doesn’t just stop there, but embraces the idea that the party might be working against each other at times with features like being able to reverse-pickpocket a forbidden item into another character’s stash, report them to the guards, and have them taken to prison for a while. I have no idea how this complexity is going to come through in the single-player game instead of with a group of friends, but I’m keen to see it. Certainly, it’s the biggest upcoming game I can think of that looks like it’s going to reward playing your character, not just your class, as is the norm.

roles4.jpg


What I find the best ones often do… no, let me pull that back. What I find my favouriteones often do is find the middle ground here. They’re games like Vampire: Bloodlinesthat define fundamental rules and systems, but then provide the wiggle room within that to evolve your own character and feel like you’re playing with your own creation. You will always be X, Y and Z. You always have to A, B and C. But within that, the systems are geared towards giving you an experience that you don’t get from simply playing the designated Hero – something that goes from raw mechanics, like drinking blood or upholding the Masquerade, to quests designed to say something about the world and your place in it rather than simply throw buckets of XP around the place, to specific things that only that game can really do, like Heather Poe’s horrible story and your interactive role as a (usually) inadvertent abuser of both her and your powers. Planescape Torment also stands out as a game that has it both ways, by giving The Nameless One a fixed past and even destiny, but providing vast amounts of flexibility over how he feels about that and how he chooses to conduct himself.

roles7.jpg


The two sides have to work together, but when they do, they produce not just memorable experiences, but memorable experiences that feel like your own, which is something you can’t get so easily from a mere shooter or an adventure where youknow everyone else is having the same basic experience. RPGs excel at making ityours. They just do better if you meet them half-way and let them lay down some rules and expectations that go beyond combat balance and spell lists.

Just as long as the other guy doesn’t have ****ing Thoughtsteal.

Hands off my bloody demons, priest boy.

partly because it wouldn’t be a good week if I didn’t annoy someone on the Codex.

:nocountryforshitposters:
 

Neanderthal

Arcane
Joined
Jul 7, 2015
Messages
3,626
Location
Granbretan
Not a good week then, articles mainly right, though i'd a gon into Exile from KotOR II as being an interestin experiment in a fixed versus blank slate character.

Funny how he brings up racism an sexism as being "problematic," yet murder an thievin that we routinely engage in in RPGs is fine, i've killed thousans o blokes an other species in games an robbed any shit nailed down or not an thats okey dokey. Ha like playin owt in a game makes anybody sexist, racist, a thief or a fuckin murderer, what shit, only nutters can't distinguish reality.
 

vonAchdorf

Arcane
Joined
Sep 20, 2014
Messages
13,465
Rogues are encouraged to literally keep their cards close to their pneumatic chest (it is Valeera after all)

Did an RPS commenter already complain about Mr. Cobbett's sexist writing?
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/02/08/rpgs-travel/

The RPG Scrollbars: To Distant Shores
Richard Cobbett on February 8th, 2016 at 1:00 pm.


shor1.jpg


I’m on the road at the moment – not literally, that would make typing very dangerous – so unsurprisingly I’ve been pondering travel. Also regretting taking too long to see The Martian, and again being stunned by what Americans consider chocolate. But I can’t think of even a tenuous connection between those and RPGs, so travel it is – and in particular, the rare joy that comes of not simply going somewhere new, but feeling that sense of distance behind you and a whole new horizon lying ahead.


shores2.jpg


When it comes to travel, I often point to Leisure Suit Larry 2, though no, it’s not an RPG. It’s not a good game in terms of design, but it’s one I have a soft spot for. A big reason for that is that it felt epic. You start in Los Angeles, and from there you go aboard a cruise ship, to a beautiful holiday island full of nude beaches and KGB assassins, escape from there to go flying to safety, then realise it’s actually not that safe after all and end up parachuting down onto the tropical Nontoonyt Island… all in an era of floppy disks. Lucasarts’ Zak McKracken pulled off something similar, with an adventure spanning the entire world and also a trip to Mars, in an era where most adventures could barely handle an island or two, a small town, or some other nicely limited space.

In both cases, the sense of scale is largely a feint. Count up the number of rooms (screens) and it’s not that impressive. This is Leisure Suit Larry 2. and this Zak McKracken, perhaps with an occasional missing bit here or there that I didn’t spot on a cursory glance.

If so though, not many.

However, both managed to make their voyages effective with a few simple adventure gaming tricks – each area locked off and only accessible by physically travelling there somehow, via plane or boat or whatever, distinct differences in style to make it feel like you’ve arrived somewhere new, and presenting a world where other options are theoretically available, if not actually open during the game proper. Larry 2 for instance forces you to bail out of the plane even though you’re actually heading somewhere else, while Zak gives you a choice of destinations with every trip that may or may not be of any use.

shores3.jpg


Their big advantage over RPGs though is that going in, the expectation is that they’re going to be pretty small, in terms of screen count or scope. RPGs meanwhile love to boast huge maps and 50 hour experiences and whatever, to the point that scale, perceived or otherwise, is less a selling point than a core feature. The core design is typically built on forward momentum – your power increasing as you push through increasingly tough terrain that demands it, and which goes on for what often feels like forever. That can lead to great satisfaction in terms of exploring the map and finding cool things, but it’s still rare to get that raw sense of being on a new shore, where everything may or may not actually be different, but at least might.

I don’t think any game has achieved that effect quite as well as Final Fantasy VII, in which you have a pretty much endless linear adventure throughout the first disc that ultimately leaves you with the keys to your own airship and a whole world to go “Oh, so that’s what the OTHER discs were for…” at. But I can think of quite a few examples that have had the same oomph for me. The uninterrupted ride from the mage tower in the forest to Camelot itself, past an entire world of bandits and other tough enemies. In World of Warcraft, the first time I took a ship to Menethil Harbour, going from a sunny day near Stormwind into the torrential rain of a brand new map, and stepping through the Dark Portal for the first time, into the broken Outland and immediately facing its full wrath.

In this awesome hat.

shores9.jpg


It’s not simply about being somewhere new. The journey is crucial – it has to feel like one. That’s why I like Warcraft’s ships, which take you out to sea before cutting away to the new zone, and then bring you in a little way on the other side for good measure. Final Fantasy XIV also does it well. You spend most of your initial levelling in your home country – The Sand One, The Grass One or The Water One, before the story has you become an ambassador to your side and you’re allowed to go further afield via airship, complete with lots of dramatic cut-scenes and epic music. There’s no question that after doing this, you won’t just save shoe-leather and warp everywhere using magic. What matters is that your character’s first trip into the unknown feels impressive, and that you as the player can share in a degree of that excitement.

That’s a very scripted experience though, and I don’t mean to rule out the fun of going somewhere on a whim. It’s often hard to wander in RPGs because of levelled content – in short, sure, you can have a friend teleport you to the gates of the Dark One’s Fortress O’Evil at Level 1, but it’s going to be a short visit. Rarely is there any actual point in directly ignoring the levelling structure and going somewhere before you’re ready, even though that sort of off-the-cuff adventure can be pretty good fun.

I was very sad when World of Warcraft dropped its class-specific quests for instance, because running as an underlevelled Druid to pick up new forms was one of the few quests in that game that I can outright call an Adventure. A dangerous trek through foreign, hostile realms in search of power and knowledge? Well, huzzah! Sign me up and don’t subsequently dumb things down like you slipped lead paint in their gruel. I liked the concept of the Warlock quests too.

The last true example of something like this working was in Star Trek Online. It isn’t a game that caught my interest much, but I’ll always remember firing it up the first time just to see if I could fly to Deep Space Nine, past a lot of mobs that were kinda coughing and going “Are you SURE you want to be heading out this way?” Yes! I replied, just about successfully evading them, and being thrilled to discover that not only could I make it to my favourite Star Trek series’ home station, I could beam across and explore a surprisingly well done version of it on the inside. I had no idea that they’d built it in the game, and had expected to find some handwaved excuse for why it wasn’t there. I was practically giddy to see what they’d done. Then I decided to push my luck and try Risa, and – yes! It was exactly as boring as it always was on the show!

sto_7.jpg


These moments aren’t just cool on their own terms, though that shouldn’t be discounted. As said, RPGs love space – endless square-miles of terrain, hundreds of dungeons, mountain ranges, great oceans, whatever takes the designer’s fancy. Of the time spent within them though, little has quite as much power as your first glimpse – of emerging from the tutorial with eyes blinking in the sun, looking around, and answering that first, all-important question – “So, what now?”

These ‘distant shores’ moments are echoes of that moment. They might literally be that, or a new city, or a new planet in a space game, a new time-zone in a time-travelling spree, or whatever else. They combine that sense of wonder with a sense of achievement. The first time you looked out at the world, it was its creators’ work. This time, it’s your home, and you approach this new corner of it not as some mere penniless noob covered in rags and wielding a rusty pig-sticker, but a granite-eyed veteran of adventure and war that it will come to respect.

Besides, even heroes need a holiday now and again.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
As you should: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/02/15/star-control-ii-retrospective/

The RPG Scrollbars: Praise The Ur-Quan Masters
Richard Cobbett on February 15th, 2016 at 1:02 pm.

starcon_1.jpg


There aren’t enough SF RPGs, and of those, there aren’t enough that prioritise what I want from them – the feel of being in an impossible universe full of infinite possibilities, not simply being in a futuristic showroom with a lot of tech manuals. It’s why I loved Mass Effect so much, why I got on so well with Anachronox despite hating basically ever actual mechanic it merely thought it understood from JRPGs, and why the likes of Eve and Elite Dangerous just aren’t my mug of Romulan Ale.

And then of course, there’s Star Control II. I’ve been playing it for a couple of reasons of late, partly for work and partly because it’s one of the few games that will run on the Macbook Air I’ve been travelling with over the last week, and…

…it really is a wonderful game universe, isn’t it?


starcon_4.jpg


I know that a lot of purists would prefer more attention go to Starflight, Star Control’s predecessor, and the game that’s not had the spotlight as much in recent years due to the fan-remake Star Control II. Fair enough. Starflight was a fascinating, pioneering game too, with a truly amazing plot twist light-years beyond anything that anyone could have expected back in 1986. Star Control was the game I played first though, and the one that stuck – a sprawling, wonderfully written adventure campaign on one side, a fantastic Spacewar upgrade featuring a whole armada of ships to duel with on the other.

The Spathi Eluder, armed with a rear-mounted cannon to dish out pain while still escaping. The Mycon Podship, crawling around space at slug-speed, but with a homing missile to respect. The inertialess UFOs of the Ariloulaee’lay, capable of confusing any opponent and harnessing the power of random luck for last minute escapes.

In the campaign, you only got to field what you’d persuaded people to give you. In Super Melee, all bets were off, as the great powers of the universe jousted and blasted away for hours and hours of shared-keyboard awesomeness. Star Control 2 was amazing. Such a shame they never made a third one. It didn’t happen.

starcon_2.jpg


Yes, you can agree to save the universe, but only if the new order is called The Empire of Me. I love this game. It’s full of great moments like that, such as setting yourself up as an alien god and changing your new peoples’ language just to screw with them, or travelling with an evil megalomaniac psychic who looks like Krang from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, but with all its points thrown into the Dominate discipline, avoiding the need for a stupid robot body. It’s an entire galaxy to explore, with few barriers to get in your way and a ton of freedom in how you go about saving Earth, what ships you acquire, and how much of a dick you are to enemies and allies alike.

You can’t see me rubbing my hands together, but they’re rubbing. They are rubbing. Star Control 2 was the game I wanted to play since being disappointed by EGA Trekand captivated by Psi-5 Trading Company. Semi-related: gawd, I feel old.

It’s not just the game-y parts of the game that I’ve been replaying it for though, but the fantastic writing and universe design. Star Control has some of the most memorable aliens ever put in a game, and still some of the best written. It helps that most of them don’t actually do very much, consolidating most of their personality and quirks into one or two really big conversation tree driven dialogues. This inherently makes it easier for much of the odder stuff to be delivered in way that avoids dragging the jokes out too far, as with a race of pranksters or the sexy blue Syreen with their Penetrator spaceships.

In most cases, you meet the aliens, they say their piece and then you move on, so the designers don’t have to find ways to extend a nugget of personality into lots of individual quest designs and encounters or, worse, risk them becoming too human, as might occur if you were constantly hanging out with them. It means meetings can be infodump heavy, but that’s okay. They’re islands of plot that break up the much more solitary floating through space just often enough, and which find a perfect balance between being funny and silly, and presenting well thought out species by any SF standards. It’s no surprise that the universe was more inspired by the likes of Larry Niven than Star Trek. Not that they could resist a couple of Star Trek style aliens in there. Cough cough.

starcon_3.jpg


(Yes, that’s the genuine top response when meeting the Syreen.)

In particular, something I always forget after not playing Star Control II for a while is how fascinating its villains are. On the face of it, the titular Ur-Quan are your fairly stock ‘evil’ race. They’ve enslaved Earth, along with most of the other civilised species in the galaxy (your character escaping this fate due to being at the other end of the galaxy at the time, and returning in a powerful Precursor ship). Those who refuse to serve them are obliterated. They look like giant centipedes, in vivid green and black colour schemes to represent their two factions. They must be destroyed! At once!

And yes, yes, they must. But part of Star Control II is slowly learning that the Ur-Quan aren’t actually as bad as they seem. For starters, if they conquer you, you get a free choice of being returned to your homeworld and serving them as slaves, or becoming battle thralls who fight on their behalf. The former deal is sweetened by the fact that the slave shield that keeps you there also keeps the rest of the galaxy out, with the Ur-Quan quick to warn everybody that there are far worse threats than them out there. They’re also, generally, reasonable. Go against them and you face the consequences, but they accept ignorance as a defence, as well as being willing to take the time to explain what they’re doing and why they see it as a good thing.

They can even be generous overlords at times, with even the commander of Earth’s slave starbase outright saying that they’ll probably reward you for helping them gather essential radioactives to power the place. Things don’t always go so well for their slaves though (just ask the cowardly Spathi, though even they got three warnings not to be cowardly custard pots before being threatened with a many-booted centipede stomping their faces for insubordination), and they have some intensely dickish moments like destroying planets’ cultures for little better reason than because they can. Still, things could definitely be worse! And they’re certainly more interesting than the Reapers and their Inception Horns™.

starcon_6.jpg


As with games like Ultima – yep, Richard mentioned Ultima, take a shot – I love this attention to detail. “Evil” is usually a boring start point for any character or fictional race, largely because it’s hard to write as anything other than ultimately self-destructive. The Ur-Quan don’t simply own the galaxy because they have the best toys, though that was how they conquered it, they own the galaxy because they’re smart enough to at least make the status quo tolerable.

Even the more genocidal faction, the Kohr-Ah, have both reasons and justifications for wanting to purge the galaxy, including their belief that anyone they kill has a chance of being reborn as Ur-Quan, and a desperate belief to prevent the rise of anything like their former masters, the psychic Dnyarri. The two sides even have the perspective to accept that they might be wrong, with Star Control 2 taking place during the “Second Doctrinal Conflict” – the time when both factions fight to determine which of them has the moral superiority to reshape the galaxy.

This is a game from 1992, and it does a better and more thoughtful galactic scale threat than Mass Effect, even if we ignore That Ending. Indeed, it does galactic threat better than basically any SF RPG that came after. You can take that as a slight on those games, sure, but it’s far more fitting to appreciate just how brilliant Star Control 2 was. It didn’t hurt that it also came from a time where games would put their foot down. Take too long to finish it and the Second Doctrinal Conflict will end, beginning an outright curb-stomping of the entire galaxy. But even that’s not necessarily Game Over if you know what you’re doing, as seen in this Minimalist playthrough. Bit of a shame the ending doesn’t really acknowledge that accomplishment, but hey, it beats a Fallout style “Game Over” any day.

starcon_5.jpg


The main problem with Ur-Quan Masters, original or remake, is that it’s one of those games that pretends to be a lot more freeform than it actually is. You get a good amount of freedom, but there are key plot points that you have to hit in a particular order and what they are can often be vague. Get ‘em wrong, or simply run out of resources due to distractions or failed battles, and the whole game putters to a disappointing stop. It’s also worth snagging the space maps rather than simply zooming off into space and trying to wing it. Here’s an even handier online version, complete with search, though it does contain spoilers too.

Alternatively, if you just want to see the funny dialogue, try this video Let’s Play, or this text based version. Other player mods include a HD version that, sorry, I find much uglier than the original, and a full music remix that slots right into the Ur-Quan Masters version of the game.

It’s worth taking a look in some form though, because it really does still deserve it. Fingers crossed Stardock’s upcoming Star Control reboot will handle it better than the third game that, as hitherto mentioned, never bloody happened, especially as the GalCiv series is one of the few that’s managed to carry the games’ sense of humour and wit into space over the years. Especially against players who are totally asking for it.That’s absolutely the StarCon spirit, albeit in a very different kind of game.

And, y’know, that reboot isn’t the only game coming out that still carries a torch for this series. But more on that another week. For now, go play it, and find out why its fans are so rabidly insistent that you do. There’s no point buying the GOG version instead of the approved Ur-Quan Masters remake (Star Control 1 doesn’t offer anything essential any more), though if you want to step back further, they do have both Starflights.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Self-Ejected

Bubbles

I'm forever blowing
Joined
Aug 7, 2013
Messages
7,817
And, y’know, that reboot isn’t the only game coming out that still carries a torch for this series. But more on that another week.

And again with his hints about Project Daedalus. I wonder what he's being so coy about.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Richard Cobbett makes a point many Codexers will agree with: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/02/29/rpgs-crafting-pc-games/

The RPG Scrollbars: Heroes. Don’t. Craft.
Richard Cobbett on February 29th, 2016 at 1:00 pm.

craft_1.jpg


Few game mechanics right now make me ‘urrrrrrrrrrgh’ quite like crafting. Bloody, bloody crafting. I hate crafting. I hate that just about every game I pick up can’t wait to introduce its crafting system to me, with its long shopping lists of finnicky items to find, and about as much care for being believable as all those shotguns and medikits Lara Croft used to find littering ancient tombs. Crafting is the worst, and unlike something like the escort missions of old, it manages to be the worst regardless of how much it actually ends up wasting your time.


As ever when I complain, I’m not talking about literally every crafting system ever. It’s not something that interests me in any game, but I have more tolerance for it if it’s a fundemental cornerstone of the game, like a Minecraft. What irks, irritates and gets under my skin is crafting as a Feature That Games Like This Just Have, where every potentially interesting part of the process is stripped away in favour of time-wasting, out-of-character piffle.

I liked the old Elder Scrolls spellcrafting system for instance, because it gave you, the player, the chance to meddle with magic at a very primal level – to create ridiculous spells that stuck two fingers up at balance, no matter how hard the algorithms running the show tried to make them work. Oh, but that was far too interesting, wasn’t it? Come Skyrim and that was the kind of power you had to break open modding tools for, or simply sit back and play with boring Enchantment Lego.

craft_2.jpg


I do understand why crafting is in games, obviously. MMOs need a player economy, exploration and loot needs to drop more than just whatever the local equivalent of gold is to keep it interesting, and players do generally like the ability to customise gear and so on. I just don’t think it generally works very well, with most games being a pure case of following recipes to get a specific thing, and then typically customising it in other much more useful ways, like gem sockets. On top of that, the levels the game can offer, the likelihood of a player staying on top of it, and its relative importance to the rest of single-player experiences that don’t focus on it pretty much guarantee it being left little more than a bloody nuisance at best.

Ironically, crafting would often be better if it did demand more focus, like in The Witcher III – a game that sets up the player character as an alchemist and dirty fighter willing to use any chemical advantage in a fight, only to render the whole system completely irrelevant unless you’re playing on one of the harder difficulty levels. Or the average MMO, where it’s not until the endgame that it’s usually worth bothering to make anything, leaving the majority of the grind to get to that point entirely pointless. What the hell is the point of sitting there churning out a billion useless weapons that nobody, not even the NPCs, actually want? Is this fun? On what planet?

And then there’s the recipe system in survival games, which I think have enough crossover to be mentioned here. I’m willing to accept the mental leap that somehow a completely untrained person can repair an AK-47 by hitting it with a rock, or construct their own firearm by laying out a few bits of wire and metal and not have the MacGuyvered death-trap blow up in their face. What tends to bother me is that despite the simplification, it’s rarely a particularly intuitive process. Instead you need wikis to lay out the various ‘recipes’ for you, with the game either not willing to say what it wants, or acting like a great big tease. Either give me something like Garry’s Mod and reward experimentation, or just tell me how to create a pointy stick.

(This, along with needing time to eat and sleep, is one of the reasons why I don’t bother with Early Access survival games any more. There’s leaving things to be discovered, and then there’s just being a dick. Don’t make me leave the game and find where someone has apparently pulled that information from the deepest resources of their ass, or expect me to sit there trying combinations like a human version of thatSETI@Home program that everyone was briefly obsessed by a few years ago.)

craft_3.jpg


Far more often though, the result is that crafting sits in what I like to think of as The Unsatisfying Valley, where you don’t actually need to do it, and the game will never actually challenge you to the point where you really feel like it might be a good idea, but at the same time the existence of the feature hangs over the entire thing like the Sword of Damocles. Better fill these bags up with ore, just in case. Better grind the skill, just in case. You never know when you might actually need it, except for the fact that you never actually bloody will. And that’s just the problem at its most generic.

One of my biggest problems with crafting is that the systems never really trust you. Not really. They know you’ll have read the wiki or whatever, so typically the bits and pieces you need will be scattered to the four winds just to make things difficult, or anti-fun features will be added just to make damn sure you work at it. It’s not an RPG, but these things don’t get much more obnoxious than the Combo weapons in Dead Rising 2. If you haven’t played it, basically you get to find weapons around a zombie filled mall and then combine them to create super-powerful, zombie-busting murder machines. Spiked gloves! Wheelchairs with lawnmowers on the front! Everything a budding psychopath could want, turning the zombie apocalypse into a field of splashing bubble-wrap.

Oh, except that if you don’t first get the ‘Combo Card’ that tells you how to get your Wolverine on, they all become rubbish. No heavy attacks, bad XP gain. Grrr. Even though Dead Rising is the absolute last series that should suddenly start thinking of balance, it completely kills the sense of having invented some great and wonderful murder weapon. That’s fun. Being reminded that it’s a carefully engineered option placed in the world for you to find… not so much.

Likewise, if I’m going to make my own sword in an RPG, let me actually do that thing properly instead of simply telling me what I’m going to get. Make it meaningful. Make it a memorable moment. Let me choose my style of blade, the curve of it, the runes on its surface, the style of the hilt and pommel, the style of leather on the strap. Then have the courage to let it be my blade for the duration; my Excalibur, my Glamdring, my Orcbonker 3000… something to look back on as fondly as any character or moment.

craft_4.jpg


Knights of the Old Republic did that really well. The scene in which you craft your lightsaber is almost exactly how I wish everyone else did it. First, it’s a one-time, special thing. You’re making your own sword, which is something your character would be doing in game. The whole decision process of making and later upgrading it is rooted in both the world’s fiction and your own personal tastes. Colour of crystal. Single or twinblade? The whole game has been leading to this point, making it feel special, and while afterwards you can pick up about as many lightsabers as bits of vendor trash, I suspect that most players did what the game gently indicated they should – keep upgrading that one weapon, not because it’s special in the grand scheme of things, but because it’s theirs. It certainly beats what happens in most RPGs; out-levelling about ten Swords of Legends and throwing them to NPCs for chump change. What’s that you’ve got there? Excalibur, fabled blade of the One True King? Two gold, mate.

Maybe the economy would be better if heroes put some more money back into the system, like actually paying trained blacksmiths to do the crafting for them? At some point I genuinely expect to get to the bottom of some dungeon somewhere… probably Divinity: Original Sin 2… only to find a blacksmith standing there over some dragon’s carcass and saying “How do you bloody like it when someone does your job for you, eh?” And it’ll be fair enough, really.

Not only should blacksmiths be able to craft better gear than my guy, who’s just taken a few experimental whacks at an anvil, they’re probably able to order moon-rocks and whatever at trade prices instead of having to scour the entire countryside in the hope of stumbling across some that aren’t too badly guarded by fire-ogres.

craft_5.jpg


That hunt for resources would be a lot more relaxing too if you could do in games what you can in real life – find someone in the know and politely ask them where you might find some blofindo mushrooms or silverleaf instead of having to go to a wiki or just assume that they’re out there, somewhere. Sometimes it’s fun to explore the forest and simply see what you find, but again, when crafting is basically optional 99.9% of the time, having to pixelbitch through an entire map in search of what’s been presented as common as a daisy doesn’t help build my desire to keep it up when I’m done.

That said, something which will never, ever be fun in the average game that makes you glug down health-potions like mixers at an awkward office party should ever, ever require the player to do any of that crap just to make something as simple as health potions for questing purposes. Looking at you, Dragon Age: Origins. The only thing that ever, ever does is cause frustration while the player has yet to find the inevitable loophole that lets them make a thousand of them, and then stop the game in its tracks for a few hours while said loophole is abused for fear of not finding another one like it later on. On the other hand, Origins did demonstrate how the words ‘hero’ and ‘craft’ can frolic together – you as the hero going out in the wilds to retrieve things like dragon hide for actual craftsmen to make awesome armour and stuff out of.

I far prefer this kind of wrapping around crafting. It’s not functionally that different, but it feels like a very different transaction. I’m reminded of the cancelled World of Darkness MMO, which had very similar views. You’re a powerful vampire. You don’tstitch shirts. Instead the plan was that you’d recruit, by force if necessary, a network of human contacts to do all that fiddly stuff for you, and simply place an order with them. (Being a vampire, that’s probably the kind of order with ‘NOW!’ tacked on the end.)

Sigh. It might have been a terrible game, but I still wish we’d seen it.

craft_6.jpg


In general, what I’d like to accept is that most games where you’re not specifically building things, like Fallout 4’s settlements (which I think work, even if that whole side of the game is hilariously at odds with what your character would be doing in that situation), you’re really paying and working for customisation. Crafting should be far more than that, with the ability to actually create things and put some imagination and even game-breaking moxie into them – a personal stamp on the world, an exploration of the rules, the chance to actually make things. If all you’re doing is giving people random items in exchange for basic unrelated options then that is what we call ‘currency’ and that is as far from ‘crafting’ as Bognor Regis is from the moon.

But I don’t hold out a lot of hope for that. The success of Minecraft and Fallout 4 and so many other games means that a game without crafting is like a new shooter without eSports potential. It’s expected, even when it adds nothing of real note to the experience and ultimately gets in the way of what could be a fun experience in its own right. The illusion of control and responsibility and discovery, because that’s way the hell easier than actually offering it. I miss making my own spells though.

I wince every time I think of a great combination of items that the latest game doesn’t care to recognise. And I growl every time I have to waste my heroic time picking flowers instead of being down in a dungeon. It’d be one thing if more RPGs cast you as a florist, but that doesn’t tend to happen. No. They’re games about being heroes. And in books and films and the myths of old, there’s a bit of a recurring theme on display.

Say it with me, people. Heroes. Don’t. Craft.

Well. At least unless they’re really going to commit.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom