Most important part of an RPG

[Deleted Member 10432]

Good story and dialogue. If they were so unimportant, why are they so rare?

 

[Wyrmlord]

Good story and dialogue. If they were so unimportant, why are they so rare?

That line of reasoning totally makes sense.

 

[Black_Willow]

Combat - it has to be turn and party based. Without it there's no RPG, only LARPing simulator. Thats why chess = ultimate RPG.

 

[Durwyn]

Good story and dialogue. If they were so unimportant, why are they so rare?

Good story and dialogues != bestseller game != cash

Bloom and shiny GFX == bestseller game == cash

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

I pondered a while which of these things is the MOST important for a RPG to be good.

Actually I'm tempted to agree with skyway and say it's important to have the right mixture of all of them, but since Jarlfrank wanted us to pick one...
I'd say story and dialogue (which should also include Characters).
The next important thing would be combat.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Thats why chess = ultimate RPG.

nonsense

 

[JarlFrank]

Of course the best of all cases is a game that does EVERYTHING right. Yet that's difficult to achieve, so this poll is about which of the individual features you like the most.

So, what game do you think does achieve everything in this list? I think Wiz8 would be the closest to such perfection.

Wiz8 comes close in the combat, exploration and character development sections. Dialog and story... well, the dialogue was surely interesting yet there wasn't much of it and I would've preferred a multiple choice system a la Arcanum or Fallout. Yet I do agree that Wizardry 8 does a lot of things right and is a good example of a near-perfect RPG.

Arcanum is my personal favourite and does everything right, except for the combat. Great character development system, good story, amazing gameworld, interesting lore, good dialogue and C&C.

Also, I do think that Baldur's Gate 2 does many of the things in my list right [in before OH GOD CRUCIFY THAT FAGGOT]. There was nothing wrong with the standard D&D character development, the combat is one of the best RTWP combat systems I've seen, mage battles are fun, there is some choice and consequence, many areas in the game are interesting [underdark, underwater city] and you have a good story and dialogue.

My ideal RPG would be Arcanum with good turnbased combat similar to JA2 or ToEE and a less empty world [for an industrialized nation, there were quite few cities around].

 

[Black_Willow]

Thats why chess = ultimate RPG.

nonsense

So you prefer Oblivion, right?

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

So you prefer Oblivion, right?

Do you want to lecture me on chess or on Oblivion?

 

[Black_Willow]

So you prefer Oblivion, right?

Do you want to lecture me on chess or on Oblivion?

You really didn't get my "chess" joke, did you?
I was making fun of old timers, for whom turn-and-party-based-combat = RPG.

 

[Darth Roxor]

The only good things Arcanum had were character development (although while interesting it was also screwed, since apparently magick users have a LOT easier time than anything else) and some side quests. Rest was mediocre. Can't comment on the C&C, because I played through it only once, and I pretty much had to force myself to finish it.

 

[Helton]

Pick one and do it great. Good game. Pick two, great game. I absolutely love Fallout, Arcanum, Morrowind and PST and each for different reasons.

 

[Fyz]

Picked combat.
Even if the story is great the game bores me if the combat is unchallenging, dull, repetitive. Or simply acts as a filler. Good examples for this are Arcanum, PST, Witcher and MoTB. I don't really mind if the games has little combat, but poorly designed encounters/a boring combat system just for the sake of adding game hours really annoys me. If the area design is ugly aswell it makes it even worse.
On the other hand if the game has a great combat system I don't really care if it has a cliche story or not.
In the end I'd rather play story based games, but when some poor combat is added it really ruins the whole experience for me.

 

[Ardanis]

<s>Combat - Diablo 2 is the best RPG evar.</s>

Writing, aka story and dialogs. As long as it's pleasing to read the rest can be forgiven. But C&C eith a handful of sand won't hurt either.

 

[Hamster]

Very hard choice. It's a tough competetion between combat and story/dialoue with exploraton on the 3rd place. Problem is , i don't really think any feature can make a game entirely on it's own, it must be a combination of at least two of them. But if i must choose one i will go with story/dialogue.

 

[Imbecile]

Given my love of Morrowind I can only assume that exploration and Character development are the most important to me, cause it sucks at everything else.

Edit: To play devils advocate: Surely Story and Dialogue cant be that important to that many people here as they are not key to the RPG genre. The obvious choices are C&C, Character Development and Exploration. If you didn't favour these you wouldn't be mostly playing RPGs.

Cue what is an RPG? fistfight!

 

[Ebonsword]

Great thread.

I will have to say combat, though I am torn between combat and char development ( I like tons of options when levelling up). However combat really is the meat and potatoes of an rpg.

You could have everything done really well but crappy combat, and the game will suck. The reason and goldox games are legends is their tactical combat. Same with realms of arkania. ToEE had fantastic combat too that made the gamea hit with rpg fans despite horrendus bugs and crappy story and dialogue.

I totally agree with the above.

Which scares me because look who wrote it. :shock:

I've played numerous games with lame story but great combat and thoroughly enjoyed them. I have yet to enjoy a game with great story and crappy combat (including PS:T and Arcanum).

 

[Thrasher]

I'm with Sheek on this.

Great RPGs balance all these aspects.

 

[Morkar Left]

Hard to decide.I don´t think that a single aspect of a game makes me enjoy it if the rest is boring. Like mentioned above it´s a good mix of all of the elements or at least two of them that are outstanding if the rest is missing. And one of this at least two elements has to be the lore/gameworld/exploration aspect. So I took the lore/gameworld/exploration for the poll.

 

[Jaime Lannister]

The first 4 tied. My perfect RPG would have ToEE's combat and character development, Planescape's story and world, but with Arcanum levels of choice and consequence.

EDIT: I voted combat with some reservations, since if a game is combat-heavy and the combat is good the other things matter less. However, since all RPGs have a lot of combat, it had better be good. Fallout 1 is the only RPG I can think of where almost all the combat is optional, and it still had above-average combat.

 

[The Ninth Circle]

It's a toss up between character development (I'd tie story and dialog into this option) and lore, world and exploration. Without these, the world seems stagnate and meaningless. If the world seems stale, then the consequences to your actions hardly seem to have an impact given that you simply wouldn't care about the world or characters around you. If the NPCs seem like nothing more than quest givers, you'd never think about your actions. Story and dialog is the means to the character development end and I believe they should be a single option. Combat to me is secondary which is why Arcanum didn't bother me at all. I'd prefer there be no forced combat at all. I never understood the need for combat to be such a focus.

 

[Silellak]

Bloom.

 

[Jaime Lannister]

I'd prefer there be no forced combat at all. I never understood the need for combat to be such a focus.

It shouldn't be forced, but it should be good since it's the most common option.

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

I picked character developement, but it's equally important to see the result of that developement in action. The most important thing about RPG's for me is probably powergaming, since usually if that's not fun in the game it gets boring fast.

 

[Spec]

The problem is this poll only caters to the story-fags, C&C-fags and "squad tactics"-fags. Yes, these people do make up most the Codex but none of them define RPGs.

How come there isn't an option for dungeoneering which is what RPGs are fundamentally about? Completing quests which test you on a mixture of using different party skills (traps, lock picking, stealth), solving puzzles, exploration/clue hunting and combat is what I like about RPGs. RPG = balanced variety of different types of gameplay, in an interesting environment, usually with a fantasy or sci-fi theme to it.

Combat on it's own isn't an RPG, it a strategy/action game
Solving puzzles on it's own isn't an RPG, it's an adventure game
Exploration on it's own isn't an RPG, it's Morrowind
Story on it's own isn't an RPG, it's a visual novel
Studying 'Lore' on it's own isn't an RPG, it's nerdy, derivative fan-fiction
Character optimization on it's own isn't an RPG, it's spreadsheet masturbation
Different/conflicting paths on it's own doesn't make an RPG, it's an interactive fiction game
'Sandboxiness' on it's own isn't an RPG, it makes a boring simulator, not even a game

Once separate them then you don't have a proper RPG.

This. The poll needs a sh17 b0n3rz option.

The whole point of a well done RPG is that it blends several of the above in ways so their relevant to each other over the course of the game. The most important part of making a good RPG is understanding that integration is the most important part, rather than some primacy of one aspect.