Your year in RPGs so far

The endlessly respawning trash mobs i.e. if you pan the camera from front to back more mobs will spawn.
Why bother? The point is find path to avoid them and even rush them, yes the respawn not worth it, then skip them it's more fun.

The large but empty zones with the same three or 4 quests in every zone i.e.
It's pure lie, shame on you.

I'll never ever forget the giant zone, played for fun of adventuring, not RpG ever achiee a that food mood of wild avdenturing. But the point is to play it low level enough so all thrill is here.

Argue with liars is such a waste of time, so pathetic manipulation attempt. I suppose I risk another warn, but too much is too much, it's intolerable.
 
Joined
Oct 14, 2007
Messages
3,258
I haven't got any new RPGs yet this year (though I intend to get Disco Elysium when it comes out & may get Stygian soon). So far I have mainly been playing with mods / user generated campaigns.

For Shadowrun: Hong Kong I just finished the excellent campaigns of The Caldecott Caper and CalFree In Chains. These are the second and third parts of a triology (though you use a different player character in each). It was a great introduction for me to the Shadowrun lore of California. It had great story, well developed characters, and I'd say in many ways surpassed HBS Hong Kong game.. IMO Calfree in Chains was comparable to Dragonfall in quality (maybe not quite as long, but just as enjoyable). Great stuff, highly recommended if you have SRHK. Like SRHK I found combat got a bit too easy even on the highest difficulty setting but if you want a challenge you could try building a character less suited for combat (i.e., a "Face").

Now I just started playing Vox Populi which is actually a port of the "Dead Man's Switch" Shadowrun Returns campaign to the HK engine, but with lots of added features and new runs.

For Temple of Elemental Evil I have been playing the Keep on the Borderlands mod (I also applied the Temple+ mod which adds some additional feats, spells, classes, and bugfixes).. I am not familiar with the D&D module this is based but this is a pretty enjoyable mod. I'm alternating between a save with a lawful leaning good aligned party and a neutral evil party.

I've also been tinkering around with Arcanum a bit… Alternating between a charismatic mage and a gunslinging tech warrior. Some day I need to stick with a build and actually try to finish the game.

(On my Nintendo 3DS) I have been playing Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology. I'm pretty close to the end but I mainly only play it when I'm not at home. Great JRPG.
 
Joined
Apr 9, 2013
Messages
2,316
Location
PA
It's pure lie, shame on you.

Liar? I suggest you haven't played the game.

Here are the repeating quests:
Astrariums
Requisition (i.e. Field Tent)
Geological Survey (Mineral, Iron etc)
Weapon Requisition (i.e. longbow etc)

These are in pretty much every zone.

I completed the game, I'm not sure you did?

There is only one good Dragon Age game, and that is Origins. Although Inquisition is better than Dragon Age 2, I'll give you that :)
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
3,088
Location
Sigil
Each zone is very large and you wrote: "empty zones with the same three or 4 quests". You are just a liar.
 
Joined
Oct 14, 2007
Messages
3,258
Each zone is very large and you wrote: "empty zones with the same three or 4 quests". You are just a liar.

I can only guess English is not your native language. I did not say the zone's are not large.

edit: And just to clarify, when I said empty, I obviously was referring to meaningful content i.e. not trash mobs and fetch quests i.e. Like Dragon Age Origins.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
3,088
Location
Sigil
It's not my bad English that will hide you are a plain pure liar.

To manipulate people you need apply a lot more effort than just throw some non sense lie. You can't hide behind subjectivity and argue it's the point, you push it too far.
 
Joined
Oct 14, 2007
Messages
3,258
Are you denying that those quests are in each of the area zones like Hinterlands, Western Approachs etc?

Anyway, I'm done with this discussion. Don't have time to explain it in a way you would understand.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
3,088
Location
Sigil
edit: And just to clarify, when I said empty, I obviously was referring to meaningful content i.e. not trash mobs and fetch quests i.e. Like Dragon Age Origins.
Ok like DAO that's more honest... or like Avernum 1 I'm playing (played only the first remake) or like any Bethesda RPG.

It's an empty comment, close to 99% of RPG have ton of trash mobs and fetch quests. The problem isn't that. But I won't bother explain you.
 
Joined
Oct 14, 2007
Messages
3,258
I admit there is a problem with DAI, and I can't say I can explain it really. But the point isn't trash combats and fetch quests because most huge very open RPG do the same.

I believe there's three major problems, two can be solved by the player and change hugely a play:
- Expectations from dev previous RPG, in matter of combats design quality and diversity, filling quality, secondary stories building. This is largely a psychological aspect, you can't compare a huge very open RPG to a big RPG with many relatively linear aspects. It involves different constraints for writing, filling density and quality, respawn requirement.
- Game flow, the natural game flow will push most player to auto burn in first zone of the game, I mean past introduction. Many aspects are totally optional but it's up to player to organize himself his game flow so it works to fit better his own fun or current mood. That's a questionable design but the player can solve it himself largely. It's not complicated it's just players aren't used to it. Moreover RPG of previous decade before DAI morphed many RPG players into obsessional completists expecting do everything in one play, and using systematic cleaning approach to achieve it more safely, but in DAI such play will only generate a burnout.
- The dev failed develop well some design/develop skills not useful in their previous blueprint(s) but rather important in very large and very open blueprints. For example, good skills into procedural generation for combats respawn, manage long secondary quests into a very open context, keep a control of new quests flow in a very open context, manage events in such very open context, more.

I also agree that it was a very bad design idea to present task types in precise quests categories. I'll take one example, the pictures quests, they are great quests or great quests parts, they should have been spread and hidden inside longuer secondary quests.

Another example is telescope puzzles should have hide more the repetition. The second part to find an element detected from afar is just quite good, and some can involve tricky exploration. And the first part, the mini game is ok when used few time, it makes sense. But the first part should have been more varied, and the whole should have been more hidden inside longer secondary quests, plus a few pure curiosity points as it is.

But in practice when it bores you need just skip, there's a lot to do, including pure exploration fun, you can as well skip all those repetitive tasks, and even sometimes you could find fun to do one when you are in a good mood, because they aren't bad only by repetition, at least for most of them. It's like making your own longer quest from various elements of the game. Really it can works but you should not have some completist mental troubles, and should be ready to listen your own fun, and should be ready to organize yourself your game flow.
 
Joined
Oct 14, 2007
Messages
3,258
For Shadowrun: Hong Kong I just finished the excellent campaigns of The Caldecott Caper and CalFree In Chains. These are the second and third parts of a triology (though you use a different player character in each). It was a great introduction for me to the Shadowrun lore of California. It had great story, well developed characters, and I'd say in many ways surpassed HBS Hong Kong game.. IMO Calfree in Chains was comparable to Dragonfall in quality (maybe not quite as long, but just as enjoyable). Great stuff, highly recommended if you have SRHK. Like SRHK I found combat got a bit too easy even on the highest difficulty setting but if you want a challenge you could try building a character less suited for combat (i.e., a "Face").
I completely forgot that there were modules for those games. Thanks for the reminder.
 
Joined
Jul 27, 2018
Messages
1,026
Location
France
Since 2011 I have been busy Running a Minecraft server, if there is one thing I love equal to RPG's is the ability to Create and Sandbox games have come a long way..Now that i finally shut it down I have returned to the RPG scene to find so many quality RPG's that have been released and i have a lot to catch up on.. The Only RPG's that drew me away from the MC server were the PB releases, but now I have a whole slew of RPG's cued up to play..

I will generally play a few at a time divvying up time between them, Unless it's a PB game which get my undivided attention.. Right now I am playing..

Pillars of Eternity
Divinity Original Sin
Siege of Dragonspear

On weekend nights My son and I play Outward, what a great co-op game this turned out to be..

On my List to be played are
Greedfall
Pillars of Eternity II
Original Sin II
Pathfinder:Kingmaker
Tyranny
Torment Tides of Numenera
Age of Decadence
Shadowrun Dragonfall

Edit: Adding Disco Elysium (hey it's got to be great, it shares the same name as our Minecraft world Elysium :) )
 
Last edited:
Joined
Jan 9, 2008
Messages
128
I think this is mostly a matter of opinion. I would not describe da:i as you did but that doesn't mean you are incorrect just a matter of greys. I will say that da:i did have an excessive number of time consuming useless (trash?) quests but it did also have a few more interesting quests unique to certain zones (been a long time since i played so i can't really provide examples). Yes I think most of the zones had the annoying find x quests so i would agree with that aspect. Was it a great game - i think there are better esp the last few years but i did enjoy a large chunk of it and I think some of the zones were fairly interesting even if they had respawning 'trash' mobs.
-
It could have been a better game but it was not the worse i've ever tried. As for da-2 - well that game would have been a lot better with more interesting zones but it had more powerful quests (i think). da:eek: I don' tthink was the great game many people think it was - was it better than da:i - i'm not sure - it had a lot of poor zones and fairly poor combat (I think bg-2 or even iwd were better in those regards). da:i had pretty good story telling (this is a little different than the story itself - but it had some really good character development esp for the companions (not user customization but in story telling).
-
Anyway i don't regret playing da:i but i then again i haven't gone back and replayed it.

Are you denying that those quests are in each of the area zones like Hinterlands, Western Approachs etc?

Anyway, I'm done with this discussion. Don't have time to explain it in a way you would understand.
 
Joined
Oct 20, 2006
Messages
7,758
Location
usa - no longer boston
Just finished Pathfinder Kingmaker. Loved it. That was a lot of content! Took me a long time to finish. Picked it up early this year after finishing PoE:2. Playing them back to back gave me pretty much a full year of RPG goodness. I have to say I really liked both of them, but would give the nod to Pathfinder. I liked the look and feel of PoE better, but liked the mechanics, gameplay, and story of Pathfinder better. I'm a sucker for the classic tabletop RPG settings I guess. Not sure what I'm going to play next. Might take an RPG break for a bit. Manipulating my party and inventory for 12+ months has taken a toll! This Disco Elysium game looks pretty cool and different. Might give that a try. Next thing on the release list that looks exciting to me is Wasteland 3. Happy gaming :)
 
Joined
Nov 22, 2014
Messages
261
So, now that I finished The Outer Worlds (TOW), I was wondering whether I would consider it for "RPG of the Year". I have to say, it's a pretty close competition with Greefall (GF).

  • Both games do not quite nail it in terms of loot / equipment, sharing some issues as well as having individual issues in that area.
  • Combat balance is a bit better in TOW.
  • TOW is also slightly ahead in terms of exploration.
  • I loved the humor in TOW, much less of that in GF.
  • Overall, GF has the better voice acting.
  • Story telling and setting (including main as well as side missions) is considerably more coherent in GF.
  • Both games have some interesting choices/consequences for the player.
  • TOW has much more degrees of freedom (which manifests in the potential to kill nearly every NPC, or finishing the game in a 12 minute speedrun).
  • Both games reuse graphical assets alot, but TOW is being more clever about it.

I'm undecided.
 
Joined
May 18, 2012
Messages
2,315
I most likely will go with Greedfall for GOTY for 2019. Outer Worlds will be runner-up. Besides those two I am doing projects (mods, stories) and playing FO4 and Skyrim still.
 
Joined
Jun 4, 2008
Messages
3,959
Location
NH
Let’s see ... I have played more FPS than RPG this year, but here are my RPG:

PC:
- Queen’s Wish
- Fallout 4
- Gothic 2 Gold
- KOTOR 1 & 2
- Partial replays of Fallout 3, Baldur’s Gate 2, Skyrim, Elex, a couple of kickstarter games

Mobile
- NWN EE and all expansions and modules on Samsung Galaxy Tab S4

Nintendo Switch
- Diablo III
- Pillars of Eternity
- Divinity Original Sin 2
- The Witcher 3

Not as bad as I thought :)
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
14,932
Hmm… lets see as I took a six month hiatus from gaming.:(

Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Loved it and it deserves to be called the true Baldur's Gate inspired sequel. Yes I know that's debatable but that's my personal opinion.

Wasteland 2 - Director's Cut - Replayed its not bad but it gets boring halfway through. So I'm hoping part three improves the series. Based on the videos it does.

Neverwinter Nights Enhanced Edition - Still my most favorite RPG due to mods.

Neverwinter Nights 2 - My second best RPG of all time also due to mods.

Atom RPG - Simply the best clone of the orginial Fallout games in years.

GreedFall - One of Spiders best RPGs but still has some of the classic problems.

The Outer Worlds - A good mini-RPG that surprised me.

Dragon Age - Inquisition - Despite the popular opinion of this forum it sucks I still enjoy it and replayed many times. As said already it's much better then Dragon Age 2.

Queen's Wish The Conqueror - Yes Vogel should upgrade his graphics & engine but he at least delivered another decent story based RPG on a small budget.

Mass Effect - Andromeda - Another game that most have a negative opinion of but I enjoyed re-playing it again. It's also the last BioWare game I enjoyed.

Elex - Again game with mixed opinions on this forum but I enjoyed the world due to the mix of technology, and Factions. Can't wait to play the sequel in a few years.
 
Joined
Oct 1, 2010
Messages
36,185
Location
Spudlandia
Atom RPG was already released in December 2018 so I gues it wouldn't qualify as a game of the year anymore :(
I didn't play it yet as I was waiting for the German Fan Translation but it looks amazing.

Here is the games I played so far:

Aeon of Sands (2018): Very interesting looking crawler with a very distinct art style and a dynamic story. I really didn't like the level design and the core gameplay / the fighting though.

Jagged Alliance: Rage! (2018): Another one of the horrible attempts to make money out of the JA license. Don't know if they succeeded with that, but the game is pretty bad.

Elex (2016): Did a great job in mixing Fantasy, Science Fiction and Post Apocalyptic Settings in interestingly designed open world. The combat wasn't amazing, but as long as you didn't use meelee it was fine.
I'd recommend this game.

Grimshade (2019): Very linear RPG with good tactical battles and a rather unique setting. Only first part of a series and ending is very open.
The game is fine but the ending is so open and feels cut off, that I wouldn't really recommend it until it's clear that the story is continued with a sequel.

Pathway (2019): Another attempt to get some of the FTL glory in the rogue-lite genre. Was really looking forward to that one. Unfortunately it failed to deliver. While it has amazing capabilities with it's graphics, they are only used to be shown in small scene pictures. The combat gets repetitive extremely fast and the resource management of the main map didn't work at all. Not sure what they changed with patches. But at least from my experience in may it's not a game I can recommend.

Dead Age (2019): Very basic and somewhat cheap looking rogue-lite. It's the exact opposite of pathway. It's presentation sucks, but it's mechanics and balancing work for the most part. Not the most awesome game, but if you like the genre, I recommend it.

Druidstone (2019): It's not more of an RPG than XCom, so it doesn't really fit that well into this list. Combat is great if you do all optional objectives right away, as the balance will otherwise break. Not very convincing story.
If you like tactical gameplay with some puzzle elements, a bit like "Into the Breach" or "Massive Chalice", this could be for you and it's recommended.

The Bard's Tale Trilogy (2019): The remaster of the original trilogy. I'd say the remaster itself is fine. The feature improvements are good with various options, the graphics are ok, the music/sound is pretty bad though. But what is worst about this game is actually what was taken over from the original game: Horrible combat and equally horrible dungeon design and character development. It opened my eyes about how far RPGs evolved from the 80s to the 90s. If you want to have a look into the original game for historical reason, you might want to take a look. Otherwise I cannot recommend it.

Depth of Extinction (2018): Mixes roguelike elements with tactical gameplay of Xcom (and character development along the newer xcom titles). It's quite unpolished and rough around the edges. However it's core gameplay, the combat is a lot of fun.
Only if you are fine with constantly being reminded that this game is still somewhat in development even though it was released over a year ago, it can be somewhat recommended.

Legends of Amberland (2019): A very simple but nice open world blobber. A bit repetitive at times. If you are ok with a game which is a bit more simple I can recommend it.

Queen's Wish: The Conqueror (2019): Another one of Spiderwebs games. The new feature, the "base building" doesn't work well, and the story seems very constructed. While I prefer the fully open Avernum games and even most Avadon games as this series has a more interesting story, Queen's Wish still offers good writing (not overall story), and solid gameplay (though much easier than previous games). Not Vogel's best work, but I still recommend it.

Made a review (in German) of all these games (except of Queen's wish, which I am still playing). And you can find links on my homepage at http://ndnw.net/GameDB/GameDB.php

But to give a summary of my ratings:

Rating Equals a rating in 100% system of:
Just Bad 0%-54%
Rather Bad 55%-64%
Neutral 65%-69%
Rather Good 70%-74%
Thumbs Up 75%-89%
Gold 90%-100%

Gold Thumbs Up Rather Good Neutral Rather Bad Just Bad
- Elex Grimshade Pathway Aeon of Sands: The Trail Jagged Alliance: Rage!
Dead Age Depth of Extinction The Bard's Tale Trilogy
Druidstone
Legends of Amberland
Queen's Wish


Considering that there is no "Gold" rated game, and the only "Thumbs Up" rated game which is from 2016, I cannot say that 2019 was an awesome RPG gaming year so far.
At least there is some choice in the Rather Good category…
 
Joined
Jun 2, 2012
Messages
4,691
I'm finding it very difficult to get into Pathfinder. I'm somewhere in act 2 - probably middle or late but i have to 'force' myself to play - i just don't find it engaging. Not sure I will finish this one.

I liked DA:I; it had a lot of flaws but was fun.

I also enjoyed ME:A; it had a lot of flaws and the first 10 hours or so i had a lot of complaints and almost quit but after a while it became fun. Like DA:I it has a lot of pointless filler quests but still was more or less enjoyable. I think of the two DA:I is the better game. You said ME:A was the last bio-ware game you enjoyed but given how recent the game is there is always hope they do another game you enjoy....
-
Seems like you still manage to play a lot of games with a 6 month break...

Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Loved it and it deserves to be called the true Baldur's Gate inspired sequel. Yes I know that's debatable but that's my personal opinion.



Dragon Age - Inquisition - Despite the popular opinion of this forum it sucks I still enjoy it and replayed many times. As said already it's much better then Dragon Age 2.


Mass Effect - Andromeda - Another game that most have a negative opinion of but I enjoyed re-playing it again. It's also the last BioWare game I enjoyed.
 
Joined
Oct 20, 2006
Messages
7,758
Location
usa - no longer boston
Seems like you still manage to play a lot of games with a 6 month break…
Well when you have nothing but free time you can finish a lot of games.:biggrin:

Anyway I only played three new games this year so far.
 
Joined
Oct 1, 2010
Messages
36,185
Location
Spudlandia
Back
Top Bottom