The Escapist - Where Have All My Heroes Gone?

I have to agree, it certainly is a publishing problem, not a developing one. There's not a lack of good developers around, but a lack of people willing to back those developers with the needed funding.

I think that there's talent, but it seems like the major talent is the same guys who have been in the RPG business for essentially a decade. To a large extent, each game recycles about 80% of the ideas from the last game that they did, with each iteration being shallower and more dumbed down than the last. The RPG genre is truly the only genre that I can think of where the best games ever made are all 5+ years old. The genre has been horribly stagnant and all of the efforts that have been made have gone towards making the games more "accessible", and not better. Other genres, like MMORPGs and FPS, have added gameplay elements and made themselves better. Role-playing games have not done this. We need another explosion of talent and innovation like we had in the late 1990's when Bioware and Black Isle got into the CRPG business. The Witcher is certainly promising in that regard, but it's not enough yet to revitalize the genre.

GhanBuriGhan said:

My only hope is that since the game market keeps growing in the mainstream, that at some point the market in its entirety will be so big, that there will be a point where there is just enough money to be made at the fringes, so that we will see something like an "arthouse" gaming market emerge. Maybe the current surge of indie titiles is a first indication of that happening?

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This makes some sense.

It's like having big company bosses having so much money that they begin spending it on art - and therefore building the stock of museums.


In a different sense, this makes sense in an evolutionary sense, too: If the mainstream is saturated, niches must be sought in order to gain any money at all.

There will be the "spreading of the games", much like with animals, races and plants in biology.

There are really many good developers out there who might need just that little bit of extra time to make a great game. The time they don't have because the publishers don't spend any money on smaller projects.

Alrik Fassbauer said:

It's like having big company bosses having so much money that they begin spending it on art - and therefore building the stock of museums.

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I agree and hope this is what is happening ... but it requires the publishers (let alone the general public) looking at indie games, and games in general, as 'ART'.

txa1265 said:

I agree and hope this is what is happening ... but it requires the publishers (let alone the general public) looking at indie games, and games in general, as 'ART'.

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Not really... just as something they would like to see happen out of other motives than making more money. Since many of them started as gamers or developers, that doesn't seem entirely unrealistic.

GhanBuriGhan said:

My only hope is that since the game market keeps growing in the mainstream, that at some point the market in its entirety will be so big, that there will be a point where there is just enough money to be made at the fringes, so that we will see something like an "arthouse" gaming market emerge. Maybe the current surge of indie titiles is a first indication of that happening?

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I'll help you hope, but I don't think so @ the current surge of indie titles being an indication of that. They're just an indication of a saturated market, not so much of a change in attitude of investors and publishers. The indie titles are, after all, still "outside" the market, not a part of it, like "arthouse" is.

doctor_kaz said:

The RPG genre is truly the only genre that I can think of where the best games ever made are all 5+ years old. The genre has been horribly stagnant....

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The market for cRPGs changed soon after those games were made. Remember all the buzz surrounding Diablo? Baldur's Gate? Morrowind was the tipping point, IMO. The enormous popularity of those games introduced cRPG to an entirely different breed of customer, one more interested in RPG's arcade-game potential than its role-playing potential.

I think the market for good cRPGs is a lot bigger than publishers understand. Instead of only trying to compete for video-game market share, they should be targeting everyone who buys fantasy adventure novels. By now most of them have computers, don't they?

GhanBuriGhan said:

Not really... just as something they would like to see happen out of other motives than making more money. Since many of them started as gamers or developers, that doesn't seem entirely unrealistic.

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Yeah, I should have been more specific ... I was referring to the museum reference. It is all about non-monetary motivation.

Squeek said:

I think the market for good cRPGs is a lot bigger than publishers understand.

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And that is where indie devs come in - they do understand it, imho !

Squeek said:

The market for cRPGs changed soon after those games were made. Remember all the buzz surrounding Diablo? Baldur's Gate? Morrowind was the tipping point, IMO. The enormous popularity of those games introduced cRPG to an entirely different breed of customer, one more interested in RPG's arcade-game potential than its role-playing potential.

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Yeah, the market did change (or did it?). I think that the introduction of the X-Box was the real tipping point. When a cheap console with PC architecture showed up, the days of the PC exclusive hardcore game like System Shock 2 and Baldurs Gate 2 were over instantly. Since then, developers like Bioware and now Irrational have succeeded largely by regurgitating stripped down versions of their old work on new platforms where nobody has seen it yet. I keep wondering how long they can rely on that strategy. Apparently, it's a long time.

Alrik Fassbauer said:

And that is where indie devs come in - they do understand it, imho !

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There needs to be a middle ground between the one or two guy indie developers and the big huge studios. Something Troika-sized that can make great games that can be profitable if they sell 250,000-500,000 copies. One or two guys plugging away at their computers was how games were made 20 years ago. I might be a nostalgic old fart, but I don't think that games were better 20 years ago than they are today. If this is the future of PC RPG's, then I think I might find a new hobby.

Older games were better? No, I really don't think so. All just remeber Fallout and Baldurs Gate and Planescape. But really, there are five to ten really good games from the nineties that everyone constantly quotes.

And then they go on saying that there are no more major AAA RPGs out there. And, I'm sorry to say that, this is just nonsense. For example, just look at Gothic 1 and 2 (even 3, at least when the bugs are removed), The Witcher, Vampire: Bloodlines, Bioshock (and yes, this game is as much an RPG as System Shock 2 was). Neverwinter Nights 1 (the OC lacked, but the second Addon is still one of my all-time favorite RPG) and NWN 2 (especially the Addon), Kotor 1 and 2 (even if 2 lacked, it was still a good game) and more.

If you want a dead genre, then try (Action) Space Sims. The last major releases were Freelancer and Darkstar One. That genre is dead. RPGs are not dead nor worse than they were 10 years ago.

Roi Danton said:

Older games were better? No, I really don't think so. All just remeber Fallout and Baldurs Gate and Planescape. But really, there are five to ten really good games from the nineties that everyone constantly quotes.

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...Ok, top 90's RPG titles
Champions of Krynn
Death Knights of Krynn
The Dark Queen of Krynn
Dark Sun
Fallout 1
Fallout 2
Baldur's Gate 1
Baldur's Gate 2
Planescape: Torment
Ultima VI: The False Prophet
Arena
Daggerfall
Wizardry VI: Bane of the Cosmic Forge
Wizardry VII: Crusaders of the Dark Savant
Betrayal at Krondor
Might and Magic III: Isles of Terra
Might and Magic IV: Clouds of Xeen
Might and Magic V: Darkside of Xeen
Might and Magic VI: The Mandate of Heaven
Might and Magic VII: For Blood and Honor
Quest for Glory IV: Shadows of Darkness
Darklands
Realms of Arkania I
Realms of Arkania II
Realms of Arkania III

Top 00's RPG titles
Arcanum
ToEE
V:tM - Bloodlines (all Troika titles, now gone)
Gothic I
Gothic II
Gothic III
The Witcher
KotOR I
KotOR II
Wizardry 8
Arguably NWN 2 with add-on

Not only are both Troika and Gothic lines now defunct, which makes the numerical balance look even worse, but more importantly simple numerical comparisons aren't sufficient. There's a steep drop-off of quality from, say, Realms of Arkania or Fallout to KotOR or NWN 2.

I don't like cross-period comparisons, but let's be honest, only about half a dozen games so far in this decade can really mix and match with the classics. And that's not a lot, it's barely one per year.

Your list is quite good, but to be honest, there are a few RPGs you mentioned in the 90s which I just wouldn't count to the really good ones, at least in my opinion. For example I never liked Daggerfall or Arena (and if you count them in, you just have to count Morrowind (and maybe even Oblivion) into the 00's list. And my list for the OO'2 would also include NWN Addon 2. So yeah, I am maybe a bit short in the second list but not by that much.

I just don't like the constand crying about how dead rpgs are. Yes, you don't get as much rps as fps or rts, but honestly, this hasn't ever been different since command and conquer and doom. There are enough really good and decent rps on the market, so that everyone should find something.

Although you just have to adept yourself a little bit to. I for once could never imagine playing a decent mouse controled space sim, yet Freelancer and Darkstar One are in my all time favorites.
And it's the same with AAA Rpgs. You just don't sell isometric or even 2d titles these days as good as third or first person ones.
In NWN2, for example, you can use the strategic camera to adjust your view to an almost Baldur's Gate look. So 3D isn't really the big bad like some seem always to think.

Actually, Baldur's Gate 2 was released late in 2000.

Personally, I feel there was a "golden period" around 1996-2001 or so, roughly, but before and after is pretty much the same. I wouldn't say we're in a "down" now, it's just that we got a bit spoiled by the golden period.

I would stretch the Golden Age through 2002, as Divine Divinity, Icewind Dale 2, Morrowind, and Neverwinter Nights all came out that year (I thought that NWN was overrated and mediocre but at least it was a major release and tried to make some advances). Hell I would even throw the first Dungeon Siege in there. Not a great game to me, but it had some quality features (like a great interface, no loading times, and great co-op).