Games recommended for Beginners/Newbies to the RPG genre ?

If anyone would consider at all to respond… What hidden gem have I missed? Any recommendations are more than welcome.

Quite hard to say as the games you mention to like and dislike don't seem to follow any logical pattern.

You didn't mention Divinity: OS2 yet. So maybe that's worth a look. Great game and my only real recommendation here.

If you want to go more "indie", there is also Balrum, Book of Eschalon and Antharion. Age of Decadence might also be worth checking out.
None of them I'd completely recommend though (especially not for beginners/newbies)
 
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If the beginner/newcomer is a child (and if he/she has access to a PS3 console) I can recommend the first Ni No Kuni. It has cartoonish aesthetics, isn't that hard to play (or finish), and it doesn't has "adult" scenes, if you know what I mean. The game is, indeed, very accessible.
 
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I don't know if you've tried any of the earlier Final Fantasy games, but for the money they are totally worth it. I see you've played many of the later ones, but the strongest in the series are the early ones.

Have you tried any of the Legend of Heroes games? Trails in the Sky and Trails of Cold Steel are two different series, somewhat related, and if you enjoyed the FF games that you played you might really dig these.

In any case, good luck in finding something that is both satisfying and enjoyable!
 
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So my daughter is in Kindergarten right now, and they're already suggesting Power Point and Youtube projects, online educational games, and they're even starting to teach coding at early elementary school level. For her 6th birthday, I just set her up with a nice older Lenovo laptop (it's built like a brick, it's reliable) and well whatever. I'm going on a tangent here. I put on a few games on it that I thought she might be able to play. One of them was the original Dungeon Siege. For the advanced user, since the game sort of plays itself, it might not be very interesting. But for someone new to the RPG genre, it might be a really easy transition. No crazy skill trees, you fight back when something attacks you automatically, some cool places to explore, and you can play it with others. Anyways, she's enjoying it. "Daddy! I killed the bear in the cave and got the magic armor!"
 
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For dungeon crawlers I could recommend the Heroes of Monkey Tavern. It's a short game - I beat it in about 4 or 5 hours I think - and it has some well designed levels and secrets. And it is very simple to play - the game auto-levels characters, for example, so you don't need to learn about builds and skill points or spell selections etc. I enjoyed it for what it was.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/492500/Heroes_of_the_Monkey_Tavern/
 
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What hidden gem have I missed? Any recommendations are more than welcome.
You haven't mentioned MMORPGs? They can take up a lot of free time. Warframe? Path of Exile? Diablo 3? GTA online? Elilte Dangerous? World of Warcraft?

Could play MOBAS? HON, DOTA2, LOL?

Could join the Battle Royale craze and play Fortnite or PUBG?

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, similar to ToME. Dungeonmans was pretty fun too.

Dominions 4 or 5. Has a lot of depth and different factions to try. I played crazy amounts Dominions.

Nioh is similar to soulsborn. Great gameplay, worse exploration, but won't last you that long before becoming boring.

Dragons Dogma has good gameplay. Then you can wait for Monster Hunter World.

Could play Deadcells and get into the roguelites?

Co-op games? Vermintide2? Terraria, For The King?

ToEE mod Keep on the borderlands?

There's a few ideas, anyway :)
 
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Next - play Valkyria Chronicles on PC.
After that go for The Witcher games (if the first one does't grab you, try other two as all are different).
Sell consoles on ebay.
 
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@Craigorn; - probably should have started a new topic given that you're no beginner/n00b.

Honestly, though, I can't make heads or tails of your likes/dislikes list. For instance, you seem to hate Dragon Age: Inquisition even more than the second game but you don't even give a hint why. Was it the crafting system? Something about the story? Perhaps you didn't enjoy <ahem> riding the bull? Without the reasons why you like/dislike games, we have to try and guess from the list. Don't like Shadowruns and XComs but do like DA:O and Baldur's Gate? I'm stumped.

I guess I'll just shotgun it: like Joxer just said, the Witcher games are great. Valkyria Chronicles is fun, though the story is like a children's version of World War 2, which is pretty bazar. If you liked System Shock then you might like Prey or the Dishonored games. Saints Row The Third was fun, though only somewhat an RPG. Drakensang: River of Time was all right. Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen was plenty fun.
 
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Well if you are going to play games like witcher; why not wasteland 2. It is turn base so you can take your time and has decent writing. I would recommend D:OS (divinity original sin) but the writing in wasteland 2 is much better.
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Personally VC ( Valkyria Chronicles ) is an excellent game and not super hard. The only issue is if the person is really young the subject matter is not the best. While all the games mentioned have lots of violence et all it is mostly make believe but VC has a touch with reality.
 
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Guys, thanks a lot. Could not respond earlier, so that's why I quoted your comments below. You definitely gave me some fresh ideas of games that I am going to try in the near future.


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You didn't mention Divinity: OS2 yet. So maybe that's worth a look. Great game and my only real recommendation here.

If you want to go more "indie", there is also Balrum, Book of Eschalon and Antharion. Age of Decadence might also be worth checking out.
None of them I'd completely recommend though (especially not for beginners/newbies)

I've played most of the Larian games (incl.D:OS2). One of my favorite dev studios.
I've also played Book of Eschalon 1/2 and AoD. I tried Balrum and Book of Eschalon 3, but did not like them that much.

I just checked on Antharion, it definitely caught my interested. Thanks for the recommendation.


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If the beginner/newcomer is a child (and if he/she has access to a PS3 console) I can recommend the first Ni No Kuni. It has cartoonish aesthetics, isn't that hard to play (or finish), and it doesn't has "adult" scenes, if you know what I mean. The game is, indeed, very accessible.

hehe, I am not a child, maybe because English is not my native language, I'm used to express my thoughts in a simplistic way :)
My elder son just turned 11, and he is starting to appreciate the PS3 legacy that I've left to him. We do some couch coop sessions on Rayman, Little Big Planet.
But the first Ni No Kuni is a good suggestion for him :)
To be honest, I played it at release, but gave up due to the repetitive grinding required.


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I don't know if you've tried any of the earlier Final Fantasy games, but for the money they are totally worth it. I see you've played many of the later ones, but the strongest in the series are the early ones.

Have you tried any of the Legend of Heroes games? Trails in the Sky and Trails of Cold Steel are two different series, somewhat related, and if you enjoyed the FF games that you played you might really dig these.

I've been considering to play the coming remake of FF7 + the HD version of FF8. The original FF7 is from the PS1 era, which makes me hesitant.

Legend of Heroes is something that's gone under my radar. Will definitely check it out, thanks.


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So my daughter is in Kindergarten right now, and they're already suggesting Power Point and Youtube projects, online educational games, and they're even starting to teach coding at early elementary school level. For her 6th birthday, I just set her up with a nice older Lenovo laptop (it's built like a brick, it's reliable) and well whatever. I'm going on a tangent here. I put on a few games on it that I thought she might be able to play. One of them was the original Dungeon Siege. For the advanced user, since the game sort of plays itself, it might not be very interesting. But for someone new to the RPG genre, it might be a really easy transition. No crazy skill trees, you fight back when something attacks you automatically, some cool places to explore, and you can play it with others. Anyways, she's enjoying it. "Daddy! I killed the bear in the cave and got the magic armor!"

Yep, time to start preparing your daughter for the heavy hitters (the infinity engine games and the fallouts :) )
I've played the first Dungeon Siege, had a blast, thanks for the recommendation.


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For dungeon crawlers I could recommend the Heroes of Monkey Tavern. /[/url]

Thanks! Never heard of it, the gameplay looks similar to Grimrock, MM10, The Quest. Will definitely check it out.


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You haven't mentioned MMORPGs? They can take up a lot of free time. Warframe? Path of Exile? Diablo 3? GTA online? Elilte Dangerous? World of Warcraft?

Could play MOBAS? HON, DOTA2, LOL?

Could join the Battle Royale craze and play Fortnite or PUBG?

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, similar to ToME. Dungeonmans was pretty fun too.

Dominions 4 or 5. Has a lot of depth and different factions to try. I played crazy amounts Dominions.

Nioh is similar to soulsborn. Great gameplay, worse exploration, but won't last you that long before becoming boring.

Dragons Dogma has good gameplay. Then you can wait for Monster Hunter World.

Could play Deadcells and get into the roguelites?

Co-op games? Vermintide2? Terraria, For The King?

ToEE mod Keep on the borderlands?

There's a few ideas, anyway :)

Thank you, Sir!
MMORPGs - I've played all mentioned above. Not so actively anymore. I even have a Diablo 3 Season 13 character, but I am not very persistent.

MOBAs - I have 1000+ hours on DOTA2, got banned for 6 months last year, and gave up on the genre as a whole :)

Battle Royale is not my kind of thing.

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, For the King and ToEE mod will be definitely checked, thanks for the suggestions.

Dominions - I am not in those types of strategy games, so I will pass.

Nioh - yep, played that and liked it so much.

Dragon's Dogma in theory had all components needed (I even bought it day1 for the ps3), but could not keep me interested for long.


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Next - play Valkyria Chronicles on PC.
After that go for The Witcher games (if the first one does't grab you, try other two as all are different).
Sell consoles on ebay.

I have done Valkyria Chronicles on PS3. Cannot recommend it enough to anyone who hasn't played it yet.
Finished all three witchers too, with the second one being my favorite.
And about consoles, I tend to disagree. Games like Demon's Souls and Bloodborne alone justify having a console (or two :)).


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@Craigorn; - probably should have started a new topic given that you're no beginner/n00b.

Honestly, though, I can't make heads or tails of your likes/dislikes list. For instance, you seem to hate Dragon Age: Inquisition even more than the second game but you don't even give a hint why. Was it the crafting system? Something about the story? Perhaps you didn't enjoy <ahem> riding the bull? Without the reasons why you like/dislike games, we have to try and guess from the list. Don't like Shadowruns and XComs but do like DA:O and Baldur's Gate? I'm stumped.

I guess I'll just shotgun it: like Joxer just said, the Witcher games are great. Valkyria Chronicles is fun, though the story is like a children's version of World War 2, which is pretty bazar. If you liked System Shock then you might like Prey or the Dishonored games. Saints Row The Third was fun, though only somewhat an RPG. Drakensang: River of Time was all right. Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen was plenty fun.

I tried to search through the forum, and find an existing topic with a meaning close enough to the one of my post. Sorry for not opening a new one.

I know I have not provided any guidance of what type of gaming experience I am fond of, but to be honest, different role-playing games appeal to me equally with their different qualities.
The shotgun approach that you took is the kind of feedback I was looking for.

On your question regarding DA:I - I didn't like the theme park MMO structure of the world with high percent of quests being quite generic and non-engaging.
Shadowrun - only played Dragonfall, and I must say it has a brutally good setting. The main plot is also far from the cliche. I did not finish it, as I did not enjoy the combat. But, this is one of the games that I still have not given up on.
XCOM games - I am really not in these team squad strategy type of games (battle brothers is an exception, if it can be categorized here at all). But I have heard and read a lot of good feedback on war of the chosen.
From your suggestions, I may give Prey a try. I am hesitant when it comes to Arcane and their types of games. I've only enjoyed Dark Messiah. Tried Arx Fatalis and Dishonored, but could not get invested enough in order to continue.


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Well if you are going to play games like witcher; why not wasteland 2. It is turn base so you can take your time and has decent writing. I would recommend D:OS (divinity original sin) but the writing in wasteland 2 is much better.
-
Personally VC ( Valkyria Chronicles ) is an excellent game and not super hard. The only issue is if the person is really young the subject matter is not the best. While all the games mentioned have lots of violence et all it is mostly make believe but VC has a touch with reality.

Thank “you”. Wasteland 2 is another one I may give a try again, especially that you mentioned its writing being better than the writing in D:OS (something that I could not notice from the first 3-4 maps).
VC I played and enjoyed enormously, as shared above.
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SIM's Medieval comes from a very different direction - but I believe it would be a good "beginner's entry", too.

The only drawback of this game would be, that while it gives a "Newbie" a good entry into the RPG genre, he or she will NEVER see such an hich amount of SOCIAL tasks EVER in ANY RPG again ...

RPGs are - to this day - still almost exclusively combat-focused, manly games, so to say. Except the occational bard or trapper, maybe.

The only exception to that could be PS:T with its ... uneasy setting. No good for real beginners.
 
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