The First Templar - Review @ Worthplaying

Dhruin

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The First Templar has been reviewed at Worthplaying, where they weren't particularly impressed. The score is 5.8/10 due to a list of shortcomings. A bit on the RPG elements:
Despite what the box description says, The First Templar is more of an action game than an RPG. Your player is equipped with various attack types, and there's a combo system. Experience is gained after the conclusion of every fight or after the completion of any quest, but it is used as currency to buy more health orbs or learn more combos and defensive moves instead of for character advancement. You can find and assemble different pieces of armor and weapons, but they're merely cosmetic changes as opposed to actual combat benefits. Game progression is split up into levels instead of being one big, seamless experience, and you even find certain items that only last for as long as the level does. Aside from the experience, the only RPG-like mechanic is the presence of side-quests that pop up alongside your main quests in a given level.
With plenty of RPG aspects missing, it's the combat system that proves to be somewhat interesting. It's a bit free-flowing in that you never really lock on to an enemy. The game sort of gravitates you toward an enemy when you attack, almost letting you take care of large mobs by yourself without much trouble. Your defenses are limited to tumbling, but things open up when you're on the ground since you can actually roll around to avoid ground strikes. It's not exactly the deepest hand-to-hand combat system out there, but it is enjoyable on a basic level.
More information.
 
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Secondary objectives are now RPG elements. Wonders where this stops. Kudos to people who started that RPG elements stuff, very successful, spreads everywhere. Study case for video games legend.
 
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Didn't read the whole article, but I feel compelled to correct a couple of things mentioned in the snipet Dhruin posted:

Advancing you health and combat skills IS part of character advancement, is it not? I'm not sure what the author thinks character advancement is, but apparently in his mind it doesn't include gaining additional skills.... which is absurd.

Your defenses are not limited to tumbling. There is a blocking mechanic utilized for every character and is effective.

The game being broken up into chapters is fact, and of course whether that's good or not is personal opinion. I prefer a fully functional "save" mechanic, but barring that, I prefer games to be broken up into chapters. It bugs me that a lot of games I've played recently feature an auto-save that overwrites all the way through the game - you can't go back and play "that one cool part." So at least in my opinion, the chapter thing is a plus, not a negative.
 
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It is part of the advancement system if you want it to be. It is all subjective. It grows even more subjective when one thinks that advancing health and combat skills were wide spread in 1990 shoot'em ups/beat'em ups, destroying further more the concept of RPG elements. So afterwards, it might not be that part of the advancement system as in the end, it is all subjective and better to select the subjective part that suits one's speech.
 
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I'm not making the argument that TFT is an RPG. It's not. My idea of a ROLE-playing game is that character advancement is determined by selecting skills that will direct your character a certain path at the expense of other skills. If you can achieve all skills by the game's end, you haven't really chosen a role have you?

My complaint with this article maybe is the wording, and so as such is trivial. Nonetheless, RPG-ing aside, the wording makes no sense here: "..but it is used as currency to buy more health orbs or learn more combos and defensive moves instead of for character advancement."

Again, that makes no sense, because what he is talking about IS character advancement. Additional health and combat skills are an integral part of character advancement in any game, including RPGs. Sure, you might be able to invest in other skills in an RPG, like knitting, or whatever, but a stronger, more agile, more dangerous character still remains at the core of character advancement.
 
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It makes sense.
Here's how:
The article does not describe the game as a RPG, giving causes for that.

But it follows the trend of defining RPGs as games including certain elements called RPG elements, exclusive to the genre and therefore, suitable to be used as markers of the genre (if the game has these elements in, then it is a RPG)

In this regard, a character advancement system is a socalled RPG element. In an article sustaining the thesis that the First Templar is not a RPG while maintaining the approach of identifying RPGs through socalled RPG elements, it is better to forget that advancing health and skills combat is also a character advancement system.
If not, it adds one RPG element to the game, endangering the conclusion that the game is not a RPG. It would be destructive to the entire effort to build up a point in the article.

Character advancement as a RPG element is all subjective. If it suits best not to see a system of progression as it exists in the First Templar as character advancement, as it is the case in the article, well, it is the sensible path to take.

The guy is intelligent enough not to shoot himself a bullet in the foot.
 
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I have a good one thanks to the RPG is all subjective tribe.
 
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do we need to go back in a time machine to recall that the devs/publishers never called this an rpg?
how players or reviews label it surely can't be blamed on the devs. also while i haven't played the game yet when i find it under $20 i most likely will.

from the official site
The First Templar is a co-operative action adventure game, set in a dark and gritty portrayal of the late 13th Century during the Crusades where old friends become enemies, corruption spreads throughout the Church and once noble knights oppress the weak and renounce their oaths.

oh yes and i recognize the jabberwocky's post as fact that i agree with.
 
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RPG genre is all subjective, remember? Devs or not devs telling it is a RPG does not change the fact in all subjectivity, it can be a RPG.

If this game has enough so called RPG elements in it, then it is an RPG.
 
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RPG genre is all subjective, remember? Devs or not devs telling it is a RPG does not change the fact in all subjectivity, it can be a RPG.

If this game has enough so called RPG elements in it, then it is an RPG.

I hear that phrase all the time. People speaking thus are are part of the problem for the rpg genre today. We must purge the infidels my brothers.:bigcry::whip::evil:
 
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Lol @ Couchpotato's smileys.

As Curious mentioned, the devs never claimed TFT was an RPG, so criticizing its so-called poorly done RPG elements is silly. I think the confusion might have been spawned by a certain press release that, if I remember correctly, defined the game as an action-adventure with RPG elements. Again, the statement is true, and clearly designed to promote the game to a broader audience. Nothing wrong with that, until people change the statement in their own minds to mean that the game is supposed to be an RPG.

The RPG-like elements this game has is 1) the setting 2) character advancement 3) loot 4) quests (mainly one large one broken up into smaller ones by chapter).

The reason it's still not an RPG is because none of those elements are developed to the point of qualifying. As mentioned, there is character advancement, but the characters are pre-determined and their roles cannot be altered. While there is loot of sorts, there is no economic system. The story itself is a quest, but the path is completely linear, so no choices.

I haven't quite finished the game - I got sidetracked by Alice: Madness Returns. Though TFT is an admirable achievement for a start up developer, Alice is definitely worth spending more money on than TFT. I'd like to write a review on Alice, but at the rate I'm trudging through it, everyone will have played it already!
 
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This RPG elements story is crazy. Kudos to people who spread it. It is very impressive. Other genres can not evolve out without borrowing from RPG.

A football game. Players on the pitch have different attributes, some are faster, some are stronger, some have good passing, some have good finishing.

Standard procedure to deal with the situation: set up a scale so that the differences are materialized.
Without knowning, while working to tackle a very basic demand in his game, this game designer has included an RPG element.

Now, players grows more at ease as they play more matchs. Designer includes the possibility to distribute points to attributes. Without knowing, he has another RPG element.

This is the crazy story told by the RPG elements tribe. Scorn for other genres.

Character advancement is just an element that can be used in many genres to serve a purpose. Useless to connect it with RPG everytime it appears.

Character advancement is not even needed in RPGing. It happens because characters are often rookies at start, who are bound to progress.

RPGing can feature mature characters who wont progress.
 
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