Most Important RPG

After doing some more thinking I guess it has to be Zork!

I would say Ultima. U4 basically is copied down by most JRPGs, basically creating an entire genre of RPG by itself. It's also the first really persistent, inhabited world I can recall; while other games had NPCs; U4 really HAD NPCs. Up until U7 at least, that fact persisted. To this day, I can't think of many games with as fleshed out and vibrant a world as U6. I doubt there are; while other games have 'worlds' with NPCs; they are far more barren and lifeless than Pong.

Coming close is Wizardry 1. Like Ultima, Wizardry basically created an entire sub-genre of RPGs. Bard's Tale, Might and Magic, etc... came after, and all shared the same basic Wizardry design. I actually prefer this style myself; though I will admit that the U4-7 style lends itself more easily to a persistent world design.

Truth be told, I'm not an Ultima fan, but to me that has to be the most genre-defining RPG ever. Sad that EA got ahold of it.

Sadly, both are long dead; the market filled with gimmicks, vast empty landscapes, and bad design. Every time I buy a new RPG, I get filled with disappointment and toss it into the heap of games I'll never touch again. That's why I'm writing my own. So I can be disappointed by THAT, and toss it in a heap of games I'll never touch again.

With a heavy heart I'd have to say Diablo, because it showed developers that they could dispense with plot, complexity and dialogue in favour of mindless but strangely compelling clickfests, spawning more clones than anything else, sucking life and investment out of the more thoughtful ends of the rpg spectrum...

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You know, I'd forgotten what a radical departure Diablo was. But come to think of it, I was around in those ancient times and I saw it myself.

Nowadays, especially around here, Diablo is all but synonymous with derivative, because when it comes to the c-word**, Diablo goes before it all the time. But when Diablo was nearing release, it absolutely represented something unique and innovative to me.

And I hated the thought of it. Yes, I was one of the original Diablo haters, and this is back before the game even came out. Some here, no doubt, had yet to be born. I remember how derisively I told my little brother it was a "point and click RPG". I remember saying that again and again, which is odd now because that doesn't even seem like a criticism, let alone the scathingly negative summation I intended at the time.

It was all so different. Controlling a single character, a quasi 3-D, isometric viewpoint, JRPG-style mana and health (but in globes instead of lines), randomized dungeons, randmoized monsters, randomized items. Maybe most of the elements already existed, but no game had even come close to assembling all these together.

And the mouse! Why do you think I called it "point and click"? Back in those days, most (all?) games actually said on the box "Mouse Optional", and damnit they meant it! I didn't use a mouse to play games, and I played lot of games. Mice were for working in Windows. That's how different Diablo was; it came out at a time when the vast majority of games didn't even require a mouse.

I guess I'd forgotten that. I of course came to love Diablo and Diablo II even more. But after WoW, while I my reverence for Blizzard as gamesmiths never dimmed, I might have lost sight of the fact that they once were innovators.

**clone. Get your mind out of the gutter, sicko.

Planescape: ?Torrent?

Well I know P2P are important but even so…

Yeesh said:

And the mouse! Why do you think I called it "point and click"? Back in those days, most (all?) games actually said on the box "Mouse Optional", and damnit they meant it!

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Depends on the genre. In adventure games, the mouse wasn't optional at that time, if I remember correctly.

They weren't called "point & click interfaces" for no reason.

Alrik Fassbauer said:

Depends on the genre. In adventure games, the mouse wasn't optional at that time, if I remember correctly.

They weren't called "point & click interfaces" for no reason.

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Interesting point, what first games used mouse, what first games didn't had good controls without a mouse, what first games required a mouse.

The second point is a bit objective, for example at Doom time there have been some war flame on newsgroups to know what controls was best, keyboard only or mouse only. Yep that makes smile but that show how late keyboards still stick in DOS players mind.

For first games with a required mouse you'll perhaps have to check Atari games and if not then Mac games (but first mac games are late stuff).

azraelck said:

I would say Ultima. U4 basically is copied down by most JRPGs, basically creating an entire genre of RPG by itself. It's also the first really persistent, inhabited world I can recall; while other games had NPCs; U4 really HAD NPCs. Up until U7 at least, that fact persisted.

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I didn't play any but only tried Ultima III a little but from what I read I doubt it's any Ultima that has been the direct influence of most JRPG. Some Ultima has certainly been the influence for Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest but that's much more Final Fantasy 2 that is the major influence for JPRG not Ultima. Final Fantasy 2 setup the strong story, strong characters, and deep NPC at the price of a global linearity. That's FF2 the major influence to JPRG, not Ultima approach which is an indirect influence.

About the persistent world and inhabited world, I already read it for Ultima 3 so it couldn't be for the 4 too. Additionally it wasn't the first with the persistence approach. Also Ultima 1&2 had already done a step forward with the world approach. Ha well that's my 2 cents but well all of that is much more evolution than revolution. The Ultima series setup a whole genre and eventually Ultima III bring more points similar to more modern RPG but all Ultima bring some new points like the IV and other.

I still think all of these 'name the best' things are idiotic - even more so than 'top XX lists'.

New thread for Mike! "Top 6.3 Reasons Why 'Name the Best' Lists are Teh SuXXorz"

Dasale said:

I didn't play any but only tried Ultima III a little but from what I read I doubt it's any Ultima that has been the direct influence of most JRPG. Some Ultima has certainly been the influence for Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest but that's much more Final Fantasy 2 that is the major influence for JPRG not Ultima. Final Fantasy 2 setup the strong story, strong characters, and deep NPC at the price of a global linearity. That's FF2 the major influence to JPRG, not Ultima approach which is an indirect influence.

About the persistent world and inhabited world, I already read it for Ultima 3 so it couldn't be for the 4 too. Additionally it wasn't the first with the persistence approach. Also Ultima 1&2 had already done a step forward with the world approach. Ha well that's my 2 cents but well all of that is much more evolution than revolution. The Ultima series setup a whole genre and eventually Ultima III bring more points similar to more modern RPG but all Ultima bring some new points like the IV and other.

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Final Fantasy, Dragon Warrior/Quest, Phantasy Star, and quite a few more took the same top-down approach to exploration; with a separate battle screen. Granted, I think U4 (or maybe 3, it has been years) went with a more tactical approach to combat, which the JRPGs never did.

Even though they generally suck, a few jRPGs have caught my fancy. DW1, and the Phantasy Star series, and Tales of Symphonia.

Though we obviously have differing tastes; you've never actually played any Ultimas beyond a little in 3; and my hours in FF2 disgusted me to think I paid a whole $5 for renting that thing. I never found a 'deep plot', 'strong NPCs', or characters that didn't remind me of the cardboard box I brought it home in. I guess Ultima 6 and Might and Magic III: Isles of Terra spoiled me. And MM3 is pretty much a dungeon crawl; though a much more fleshed out one than early Wizardries and Bard's Tale.

Pretty much all RPGs went and tried to create a 'world', however U4 actually succeeded. Heck, I picked up Morrowind, and found it to be nothing but emptiness; barren and devoid of life. That wouldn't be so bad in a small, linear dungeon crawl like Bard's Tale; but in such a massive game world? Never. Vastly different from U4-7. It reminded me more of some of the MMORPGs I've tried; with fewer NPCs and no other PCs to interact with. In fact, with some work it'd probably been a good MMO.

Go actually play Ultima 4. It's freeware now, I think. You can run it in DOSBox. There's a lot more in that game than meets the eye; with mechanics that no other games even try to include. Since the Ultima series was so successful, until EA got ahold of it and ruined it like everything else they get, those mechanics works quite well.

Lol I wonder why you want lead that to a console vs pc rpg "war"... that's ridiculous. Anyway, blah blah, the influence is certainly more the Ultima series or Ultima III than Ultima IV. And the console CRPG get influenced by FF2 not by Ultima 4.

dteowner said:

New thread for Mike! "Top 6.3 Reasons Why 'Name the Best' Lists are Teh SuXXorz"

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Hehe ... I have no problems with the 'top 10 RPG's' as done here, because if you notice there is little dissention. But as soon as you tell someone taht Final Fantasy VII is better than Gothic 2 you are in for Battle Royale And the 'this is better than *everything*' sort of absolutes always cause trouble.

I wonder why you think you can read my mind, and understand my intentions You can't, just like you can't grasp the fact that Ultima inspired early JRPGs. I'd argue, but since your only refute is to claim I'm starting a flame war, I'll leave it.

azraelck said:

I wonder why you think you can read my mind, and understand my intentions You can't, just like you can't grasp the fact that Ultima inspired early JRPGs. I'd argue, but since your only refute is to claim I'm starting a flame war, I'll leave it.

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Isn't that fairly well documented by the Japanese designers themselves?

I guess the "most important" games should be the ones that proved a certain style of game (or subgenre) would be viable economically and thus shaped what CRPGS are today. I don't know in all cases what these games were. Diablo for the action RPG, I guess, Arena for the open world sandbox RPG, BG for the modern RT/isometric RPG, Ultima Underworld for the RPG/FPS hybrid?

txa1265 said:

I still think all of these 'name the best' things are idiotic - even more so than 'top XX lists'.

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Simple lists are generally pretty idiotic, it's the discussions on why things make the list that have some merit, and this thread's discussion on what's actually important and what we each mean by important I've found quite interesting.

Dasale said:

About the persistent world and inhabited world, I already read it for Ultima 3 so it couldn't be for the 4 too. Additionally it wasn't the first with the persistence approach. Also Ultima 1&2 had already done a step forward with the world approach. Ha well that's my 2 cents but well all of that is much more evolution than revolution. The Ultima series setup a whole genre and eventually Ultima III bring more points similar to more modern RPG but all Ultima bring some new points like the IV and other.

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The difference between U3 and U4 was that in U4, each NPC had their own schedule. You couldn't go into the armor shop at 3 AM and expect someone to be there. I could be wrong, but I thought U4 was the first to actually utilize that concept. If I am, it would seem to be the first that was a massive success.

azraelck said:

I wonder why you think you can read my mind, and understand my intentions You can't, just like you can't grasp the fact that Ultima inspired early JRPGs. I'd argue, but since your only refute is to claim I'm starting a flame war, I'll leave it.

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I agree with that Ultima series inspired Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest but not Ultima IV like you stated.

And for later JRPG it's mainly Final Fantasy 2 special approach on many points that have been copied, points you won't find in Ultima series like a deep linear story, intensive random fighting, and many other important points.

blatantninja said:

The difference between U3 and U4 was that in U4, each NPC had their own schedule. You couldn't go into the armor shop at 3 AM and expect someone to be there. I could be wrong, but I thought U4 was the first to actually utilize that concept. If I am, it would seem to be the first that was a massive success.

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Since the 3 the success was already massive for its time.

That's that, merchants closed at night? Was there really, apart that, a living of NPC? For me it's Ultima VII that firstly really did this job and unlike previous in the series, people was going to sleep, diner, eat, some working. Is really the 4 had that?

Anyway on this point, quite difficult to implement, this series hasn't influenced much other RPG (until some more recent WRPG) and certainly not JRPG. I think there's a confusion about how good or innovative is a game and how influential it could be.

GhanBuriGhan said:

I guess the "most important" games should be the ones that proved a certain style of game (or subgenre) would be viable economically and thus shaped what CRPGS are today. I don't know in all cases what these games were. Diablo for the action RPG, I guess, Arena for the open world sandbox RPG, BG for the modern RT/isometric RPG, Ultima Underworld for the RPG/FPS hybrid?

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You are probably right it's mainly a matter of money, but I'm not sure it's this primary motivation that bring us The Witcher or Gothic 1&2+NOTR.

Also few remarks:

• RPG/FPS hybrids, it's less UU than System Shock and later Deus Ex.
• For Sandbox what games the Elder Scroll series influence apart itself? I don't see any clear example. Gothic series is a quite different approach and G3 is just a history about RPG going more and more fat and too much ambition at the start letting no time for a required polishing.
• For Diablo, I think it's mixed with Dungeon Siege that it influence but DS influence quite many Action RPG beside Diablo.
• For modern isometric RPG, I don't see how it's a today RPG genre. perhaps you think Full 3D third person view like Neverwinter Night 2?

Today the main evolution in WRPG seems to be:

• More and more story at depends of puzzling and game challenge.
• Full 3D with a preference for first person view but that last point seems still not concluded, Neverwinter Night 2 is one of the rare counter example.
• Real time at depends of turn based.
• Action at depends of strategical or tactical.