BIG Mods For PC-RPG Traditionalists

Remember the fantastic immersion you felt with games you played that were based on rpg roots (at a table with dice, rolling up a character, forming a party with your friends and adventuring in a difficult, long, open-ended adventure, playing the ROLE of your character WITHOUT any shallow, repetitive twitchy clickfest via fingers & thumbs in the online soup of Action-Mmorpg-First-Person-Shooters) ?

For me it was Baldur's gate 1 & 2, Icewind Dale 1 & 2, Fallout 1 & 2, T.O.E.E.,
after my D&D / Traveller tabletop days.You may have other games, even more traditional, that formed the basis of your rpg wonder.

But oh how shallow, repetitive & dumb things have become.It's as if Doom & Duke Nukem have infiltrated the entire rpg perspective & experience, turning it into a reactive, annoying, FPS-action-mmorpg swamp of shallow stupidity... rife with stress, crashes, idiots and a sports-based mentality of hyperactive competition and repetition.It's as if the pause, concepts, imagination, options, depth, artistry, variance, creativity, thoughtfullness, party-based chemistry/synergy, dialogue, subtlety, beauty and expressiveness have all been taken away by corporate cut & pasters, and multiplayer pea-brains.

For those who get ample enjoyment out of the FPS-Action-Mmorpg realm, this thread is not necessarily for you.But for those, like myself, who dislike Oblivion and the entire FPS perspective / MMORPG experience, which has overwhelmingly dominated the PC-RPG scene lately, I would like to *start* a list of games/mods which hint back to the "good 'ol days", the days where the roots of role-playing were manifested in games.Not exhaustive, or perfect, just a yearning for the classics.

I'll start things off with (only) 4 mods, which might fill the traditionalist void to some extent.Please suggest others, according to your own tastes, experience.I'll try to add more later.But I want them to be large, deep and difficult, with dialogue, pause, artistry and uniqueness.




1) Tortured Hearts 1 (NWN1 Mod).Massive, difficult, 100% non-linear and full of thoughtful depth.

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=modules.Detail&id=3799



2) Tortured Hearts 2 (NWN1 Mod, in BETA).Same as above.

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=modules.Detail&id=5347



3) Runes Of Blood (NWN1 Mod).Large, good storyline, somewhat reminiscent of BG2.

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=modules.detail&id=4038



4) Ultima V Lazarus (Dungeon Siege 1 Mod).

http://lazarus.planetdungeonsiege.gamespy.com/Screenshots.php





(Any and all other mod suggestions are greatly welcome).

Good thread, I'll await developments. Everyone knows what I think of Lazarus, with the U6 Project yet to come!!

Welcome to the Watch, I think you'll fit right in if you prefer classic RPGs.

I used to know a bunch of mods for the old BG games, but I've lost track of it all. I seem to recall an NPC project called Amber that was quite good (some demonic rogue NPC), and the male sorcerer Kelso or something similar. Also I tried various Soulafein mods, where one was really good (he was a mage/warrior multiclass in that mod). He was a bit too emotional though, but good otherwise.

For Baldur's Gate mods (and especially BG2 mods) there's no one who does it better than the Pocket Plane Group. There are plenty of cool Pocket Plane mods, but I give the highest marks to "Keto NPC." It has everything you would want in a BG mod, including outstanding voice acting and even singing (in multiple-part harmonies).

The most valuable RPG mod ever made is probably "Morrowind Comes Alive," IMO. Lots of mods claim to change the whole game experience, but that one really did. It's an incredible mod.

Corwin said:

Good thread, I'll await developments. Everyone knows what I think of Lazarus, with the U6 Project yet to come!!

Click to expand...

What do ya rate Lazarus (out of 10) ? And do you think U6 will use a different game engine this time ?

Cheers.

Maylander said:

Welcome to the Watch, I think you'll fit right in if you prefer classic RPGs.

I used to know a bunch of mods for the old BG games, but I've lost track of it all. I seem to recall an NPC project called Amber that was quite good (some demonic rogue NPC), and the male sorcerer Kelso or something similar. Also I tried various Soulafein mods, where one was really good (he was a mage/warrior multiclass in that mod). He was a bit too emotional though, but good otherwise.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the welcome.I love classic Rpg's, in fact I'm going back in time continuously (well, not back so far as to have to use Dos-Box, which will exclude me from playing some great dinosaurs...)

The BG mods for me weren't enough.I wanted a HUGE total conversion, without bugs, and was never really satisfied.BG3 or it's equivalent, heh heh...

Squeek said:

For Baldur's Gate mods (and especially BG2 mods) there's no one who does it better than the Pocket Plane Group. There are plenty of cool Pocket Plane mods, but I give the highest marks to "Keto NPC." It has everything you would want in a BG mod, including outstanding voice acting and even singing (in multiple-part harmonies).

The most valuable RPG mod ever made is probably "Morrowind Comes Alive," IMO. Lots of mods claim to change the whole game experience, but that one really did. It's an incredible mod.

Click to expand...

Re: the BG mods, is any one really a large standalone game, stable, balanced and immersive, with new characters and story ?

As for Morrowind Comes Alive, does it bring the camera view perspective higher up, more isometric or 3/4 view, or is it still the same (up close 3rd person or zoomed in 1st person) ?

First off, here's the 1.68 patch links for those who have NWN Diamond, and can't manually update.

http://nwn.bioware.com/support/patch.html

http://nwn.bioware.com/support/patch_english_hotu.html


And a little note for those who were let down by NWN's original campaign (cure the plague, ugh).These mods (and the above ones) are standalone new games entirely, which can give the post Baldur's Gate 2 player more enjoyment and challenge.

Also, I recommend you set the difficulty to "Core Rules" for nearly every mod (BG as well for that matter) as it makes things more volatile, challenging and suspenseful.The easy mods (read the user comments ) should be cranked all the way up.


I'd like to see big, stable, refined and difficult Rpg mods for other game engines, but I can't find any (yet).


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5) Tales Of Arterra 1

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=modules.Detail&id=4046



6) Tales Of Arterra 2

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=modules.detail&id=4047


7) AL2 : Crimson Tides Of Tethyr

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=modules.Detail&id=4188

Well, here is at least the Link to Corwins Lazarus Review back at the Dot:

http://www.rpgdot.com/index.php?hsaction=10053&ID=1224

Although it hurts to see the undead form of a once great community-Side ...

I can't really recommend any of the greater BG-Mods, except

BG-Tutu (back in the days not so easy to install but very rewarding - should be easier today)

http://www.pocketplane.net/mambo/index.php?option=content&task=blogcategory&id=143&Itemid=98

The BG 1 NPC Projekt (BG1 Tutu is requiered)

http://www.gibberlings3.net/bg1npc/index.php

IMO the other Mods have all their ups and downs... nice to have, but usually not bugfree and while most of them are fun, they haven't the high quality of the Main Games - I can't count how many times I had to reinstall BG 2 because I installed some Mods that didn't work together

Smaller Mods, that are really cool are

- the NPC-Banter-Pack
- the NPC-Flirt-Pack
if you liked the Dialogues

and good but smaller Quests are integrated by

- unfinished Business
- Quest Pack

All available at Pocketplane.net.

Thanks for posting the link to Corwin's review of the Lazarus mod, Fenris. I had downloaded this some time ago but was too lazy to reinstall Dungeon Siege. I am now inspired to have a shot at it.

OP, since you come from a table top background, you defintely want to check out the Realms of Arkania trilogy, and might want to give MegaTraveller a wirl also. Also Darklands. You seem to be (to quote from txa) LTTP (late to the party) and missed the best the genre has to offer.

Also, you left out PS:T, which is a must if you can tolerate the IE combat, and you won't need dosbox. I would also suggest Prelude to Darkness, but the only version being passed around is very buggy and would be tolerable if it crashed to desktop, but it actually locks your computer up making you have to do a hard restart. Tuegdor and the Alliance with Rome is a must if you like Ultima 7, or even the FO's. It is unconventional and brings a great new perspective to the rpg genre. Since I can't spell I'll link to the game's site http://www.teudogar.com/home.htm

You also are lucky to have a bunch of great games about to be released, such as Age of Decadence (can be compared to FO I guess), Broken Hourglass (can be compared to the BG's by the maker of famous BG mods), Eschalon (an old school romp with some new twists), Ashes: the orginal two-worlds (party based), of course, the spiderweb games, and not an rpg but great nayways UFO:ET which was released today for DD.

Also wizardy 7 and 8 if you like party games.