Your dream RPG

[SophosTheWise]

Imagine the following:

• You have unlimited financial resources
• Your team is as big as it needs to be for your project and everyone is on board with all your ideas
• Your team is talented and will be able to work out everything based on your suggestions (and based on what's technologically possible)
• There are no people you have to consider - no shareholders, no specific audience, no bosses upstairs

In short: There are no constraints. You can do whatever you want.

Lastly: Since your game will be basically perfect, we can assume that there you could very well create a RTwP-game that's not a clusterfuck. There is no inherently superior system and maybe there could be styles of games that didn't work up until now. Even real time combat could be awesome in the end.

What kind of RPG would you create under these circumstances? What is your dream cRPG? Maybe you already have a concrete idea that you've thought about in the past?

Some input, describe some of the following things: Gameplay loop(s), combat system, non-combat systems, story, style (Isometric, 3rd-Person? First person? Blobber?), art design (realistic, Western, JRPG and so on), people whom you would hire (MCA for story, John Howe for concept art and so on), influences of other games (maybe even a spiritual successor?), game modes (single/multiplayer?), inventory systems, loot, storytelling (environmental, through books, dialogue, cutscenes)

Interested to hear your fantasies. No, not those fantasies, goddamnit.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Arcanum, ToEE or Bloodlines with more polish.

 

[Timeslip]

A turn based RPG which doesn't use a sci-fi or fantasy setting. Really wish someone would make a game where the player leads a team of hard boiled vigilantes against the criminal underworld, drawing more inspiration from the 90's classics than the modern, more streamlined generation of turn based games. Oh well, maybe someone will do it, some day....

 

[LordofSyn]

Imagine the following:

• You have unlimited financial resources
• Your team is as big as it needs to be for your project and everyone is on board with all your ideas
• Your team is talented and will be able to work out everything based on your suggestions (and based on what's technologically possible)
• There are no people you have to consider - no shareholders, no specific audience, no bosses upstairs

In short: There are no constraints. You can do whatever you want.

Lastly: Since your game will be basically perfect, we can assume that there you could very well create a RTwP-game that's not a clusterfuck. There is no inherently superior system and maybe there could be styles of games that didn't work up until now. Even real time combat could be awesome in the end.

What kind of RPG would you create under these circumstances? What is your dream RPG? Maybe you already have a concrete idea that you've thought about in the past?

Some input, describe some of the following things: Gameplay loop(s), combat system, non-combat systems, story, style (Isometric, 3rd-Person? First person? Blobber?), art design (realistic, Western, JRPG and so on), people whom you would hire (MCA for story, John Howe for concept art and so on), influences of other games (maybe even a spiritual successor?), game modes (single/multiplayer?), inventory systems, loot, storytelling (environmental, through books, dialogue, cutscenes)

Interested to hear your fantasies. No, not those fantasies, goddamnit.

I would recommend prefacing this as a video game RPG. I started reading it thinking tabletop RPGs.

Sent from my LGLS996 using Tapatalk

 

[SophosTheWise]

A turn based RPG which doesn't use a sci-fi or fantasy setting. Really wish someone would make a game where the player leads a team of hard boiled vigilantes against the criminal underworld, drawing more inspiration from the 90's classics than the modern, more streamlined generation of turn based games. Oh well, maybe someone will do it, some day....

http://store.steampowered.com/app/545600/Vigilantes/

 

[Timeslip]

A turn based RPG which doesn't use a sci-fi or fantasy setting. Really wish someone would make a game where the player leads a team of hard boiled vigilantes against the criminal underworld, drawing more inspiration from the 90's classics than the modern, more streamlined generation of turn based games. Oh well, maybe someone will do it, some day....

http://store.steampowered.com/app/545600/Vigilantes/

Wow, fancy that

 

[SophosTheWise]

A turn based RPG which doesn't use a sci-fi or fantasy setting. Really wish someone would make a game where the player leads a team of hard boiled vigilantes against the criminal underworld, drawing more inspiration from the 90's classics than the modern, more streamlined generation of turn based games. Oh well, maybe someone will do it, some day....

http://store.steampowered.com/app/545600/Vigilantes/

Wow, fancy that

Oh man, I'm an idiot.

 

[Comte]

All I want is a new gold box style game. Turn based close to table top D&D. Nothing fancy just give me this.

 

[SophosTheWise]

All I want is a new gold box style game. Turn based close to table top D&D. Nothing fancy just give me this.

Same graphics, same everything?

 

[Jimmious]

I want the reactivity and open-ended APPROACH of the true Fallouts (1&2) with a JA2 combat system, blended with a good party management system that will make me feel like I actually control a party going for an adventure and not a squad of optimized fighting machines.
Also a nice touch, but admittedly the most unrealistic, would be actual AI were NPCs would participate in the story, do stuff independently and that would lead into completely different experiences each time

 

[V_K]

Myst with stats and alternative solutions (tied to stats) in a Morrowing-sized gameworld. No combat.

 

[Martyr]

summary: a 2d isometric party based RPG with turn-based combat, dark atmosphere, lots of text, 60% sci-fi, 40% fantasy.

in detail:
• no cutscenes !!!!!!!!!
• graphics shouldn't be more modern than maybe .... Fallout 1/2, Baldur's Gate 1/2 or something like that.
• combat system comparable to the Gold Box games.
• lots and lots of written texts; comparable in amount to Planescape: Torment or Torment: Tides of Numenera. no voice-overs !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• dark atmosphere; setting again similar to T:ToN. I like this mixture of sci-fi and fantasy and I love the idea of the fallen civilizations and the decay of technology.
• story would be written by me and would be similar to Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2 --> protagonist isn't a hero in shining armor, but instead a broken mess.
• singleplayer only, inventory and loot comparable to .... maybe Tyranny. I guess I could come up with a more fitting inventory system, if I thought more about it... but as far as I remember, Tyranny had a decent inventory system?!
• story would be different depending on your choices and the classes and backgrounds that you pick. comparable to Age of Decadence.

 

[Vexxt]

I've always wanted to see an RPG that takes place entirely during the cold-war, and takes every fascinating bit of it and puts it to use. It could follow a single person, or perhaps a few people through a number of "missions" or scenarios that ultimately work to prevent nuclear catastrophe.

This would NOT be open world in the Far Cry sense, but it would have more open areas to explore, plan your attack\escape etc.

One Example:

After completing an intelligence gathering mission on the Eastern side of the Berlin wall, your pre-planned escape route back to Western Germany is cut-off. This particular section would be a huge chunk of a city near the wall where you can figure out a way back across. You have an incredible amount of options - such as befriending Stasi agents but risking capture, posing as a delegate to sneak back across, brute force, etc.

Basically, the game would include the following interesting bits of cold-war history in some fashion -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station - (Discover the source of one of these stations to prevent communications)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand - (The point of the game could be ultimately to disable the "dead-hand" somehow)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lun-class_ekranoplan - (Sabotage development of this plane)


Since most of the cold-war was fought via proxy-warfare, the game could also include missions where you are involved in conflict in Vietnam, North\Sout Korea etc. I feel this would be important since it would allow diverse environments, climates, weapons, tactics etc to keep game play fresh.

As far as combat goes - I would make weapons difficult to master but very satisfying to use. I really like the way weapons handling works in Rising Storm 2 - lots of recoil, sway, etc. If you get a headshot, you have to feel like you earned it - none of this huge hitbox with laser accuracy shit. The game would contain quite a bit of stealth obviously -

Hud would be virtually non-existent. Everything you need to know would be displayed in-game in some fashion. Cut-scenes would also be non-existent - all story telling would be in-game and environmental.

I could expand further - but time is short at the moment. You get the idea!

EDIT: Oh, and we would invest huge amounts of money into crafting believable AI that is fun to fight in combat and avoid in stealth.

Destructible environments would also be included.

 

[Serus]

I can think of a few but let's keep it at least somewhat realistic:

Darklands-like (=relatively low magic, possibly even less than in Darklands, historical setting, some amount of realism and simulation but not to the extreme) with more complexity in how the world is simulated* + Battle Brothers-like turn based combat.

*To create opportunities for more varied and more complex quests and to make the world dynamic not static.


Edit: Add some dungeon-exploring - small or mid sized dungeons but with unique flavour to each and some interesting traps and choices to be made once inside

Edit2: And horses ! I want to see a turn-based CRPG with combat on horses. I know it can be done properly just... never really was.

Edit3: Balance all of the above for perma-death. It would still be a party-based game so even if one survives you can reform a party and keep the progress made as a party but character who died would stay dead - no raising dead as a mechanic (low or no magic as i said)

 

[agentorange]

Unlimited time, resources, and generally everything working in your favor tends to lead to a dull, passionless project. Limits and a certain degree of struggle is what makes a great work. With an unlimited budget and no time constraints you'd never end up releasing anything anyways, as there would, as you see it, always be some minor improvement that could be made.

 

[Egosphere]

Arcanum 2 - but perhaps 70-80 years down the line from the industrial revolution.

 

[Lazing Dirk]

Life, but with quicksaves and dragons

 

[vazha]

1. Turn-based (TOEE-like, hardcore combat with potentially fatal consequences (wounds require lots of time to heal, may incur permanent penalties) & Isometric
2. Setting: IVth Crusade period (Rise and fall of the Latin empire, with Byzantines, Crusaders, Sultanate and Slavs (Bulgaria & Rus) all being major factions with their own storylines, competing for control of Constantinople)
3. No combat magic (witches doing their dark arts & alchemy are fine) & no sci-fi
4. Character classes implementation based on culture you represent (for example, you cannt openly be a Bulgarian inquisitor, or a varangian guard under catholic church's command but you can go rogue as an inquisitor and do missions for slavs, seljuks etc and vice versa, with adequate consequences for you and your faction)
5. Morally grey characters & C&C (for example, do you turn a blind eye to a pedo bishops activities, if he can guarantee the safety & food for the whole district during a siege?), lots of double-crossing
6. Equipment and character doll like in Siege of Avalon, overall atmosphere much like in The Inquisitor / Prelude to Darkness, Show & not tell approach to the story, good dialogue (last time when I enjoyed dialogue in rpg game was... in GOT rpg)
7. No Fed ex quests, no crafting (on your own - bringing some prized materials to a blacksmith now and then is fine, but yo u dont set out in wilderness with the explicit goal of collecting 42 wolf pelts), no puzzles, no saving the world, no co-op, no cheevos.

I rest my case.

 

[felipepepe]

A third-person turn-based sci-fi RPG that's short but highly replayable, where every single NPC has a name & inventory, and every single action has a consequence.

I mean something extreme, like wounds being permanent and healing options extremely limited - so if you got hit by a bullet in the leg you now must pay for super-expensive treatment, amputate & buy a shitty implant or just limp the entire game. I wouldn't mind if one playthrough only lasted 30 mins to 1 hour, as you would have to replay it multiple times and would unlock new things every time.

 

[Cael]

I don't want anything new, shiny or the like. I would like a blend of Fallout 2 and Fallout Tactics.

From FOT, Junction City map would be a great base, and Quincy would be an indication of the very basic kind of non-linear optional quests you can get. Also the variety of possible races for your party and full party control in combat and inventory filtering/control.
From FO2, the dialogues, the characters, RT/TB gameplay, organic recruiting of party members (don't start with a party).

Make it bigger in the sense of more population, more quests, denser overworld map (i.e., more places to explore). Expand and refine the levelling, perk system, traits, etc. Mix up FOT style missions with side quests, with an overarching plot that drives the story forward. Heck, if someone would remake the FOT storyline with added/expanded RPG elements, I would be happy. You start off beating up raiders and after a patrol, you are sent to Brahmin Woods to retake the village. Once you killed off the last of the raiders and talk to the chief guy, the map changes to a Brahmin Wood populated by tribals and you can talk to them like in FO2 (or any other RPG). The usual side (fedex?) quests and RPG shenanigans follows. After a few days, the chief gets abducted, cuing you for the Freeport mission. And so on and so forth. Both Junction City and Quincy are pregnant with post-mission RPG style side quests and NPC conversations and the like. Heck, you might even go on a side quest to make things better/worse for the ghouls in Quincy, for example.

Tidy up the story, give more heads up/foreshadowing about things to come, basically deepen the FOT story. Also play around with the parameters. Instead of the longest range gun being 50, make it 100, for example, and tweak the different ranges so that there is a significant difference between a SMG and a rifle. As it is, the difference between a rifle and a SMG is 3 steps (AK47 vs tommy gun)...

 

[Reinhardt]

Battle Brothers but with

unlimited financial resources

 

[vazha]

Battle Brothers but with

unlimited financial resources

Why would you want that? Also, its quite easy to cheat/mod it into BB, no?

 

[Shaewaroz]

A game like Grimoire™, except good.

 

[Piotrovitz]

...

Loving Tactics, I remember how I wished they would make FO3 on FOT engine - the whole toolset was basically there and all it would take was to hire bunch of good writers to put all the pieces together. It just pisses me off that everything was at Interplay's fingertips and they fucked it up. I blame it at early 2000s trend of moving everything to 3d - they probably thought that new game on same 2d engine would flop.

What I'd love to see is modern version of Wizardry 8 :' (

 

[Reinhardt]

Battle Brothers but with

unlimited financial resources

Why would you want that? Also, its quite easy to cheat/mod it into BB, no?

Resources for development.