Rate Bioware games

skavenhorde said:

You've never played BG II?

You must go buy it now or have your RPG credentials ripped away

Seriously, it's a great game. Taking out a lich has never been so much fun.

The Throne of Bhaal expansion added Watcher's Keep that was great. Now-a-days they could probably get away with just releasing that dungeon as a whole game.

Click to expand...

Yes, and thats only one of the shameful holes in my RPG resume . Thing is, as you can see from my list, that I didn't care too much for BG. To me it was an OK game, and I have fond memories of coop playing it with my wife, but I didn't feel an urge for more. So I never saw a reason to get BG II at the time. Its on my GOG wishlist, though

1. KotOR
2. DA:O
3. BG
4. BG2
5. ME2
6. ME
7. NWN
8. DA2

Frankly, I never understood why the BG games are so highly praised. When I played them, I liked them, but they were IMO largely overshadowed by FO 1+2 and PS:T and I remember being very disappointed by their fake dialogue choices and lack of C&C, at least compared to e.g. FO2. (This comparison is probably the reason why BG does not gain any nostalgia points).

KotOR completely took me by surpise. I hardly read anything about it but I was in a "buying mood" and decided to treat myself so I purchased it (due to the SW setting) not expecting too much. Having no expectations at all, I was pleasantly surprised and it was a very enjoyable experience. But truth be told, the main appeal to me was the SW atmosphere, jedi powers and light sabers.

DA:O I enjoyed very much. (Again I had no expectations as I deliberately avoided to read any previews in order to prevent any hype). To me, the biggest virtue was the fact that they did not use the D&D ruleset. (Although I understand that for others that is a shortcoming). I am familiar with the D&D ruleset but over the years I have come to dislike it, especially the magic system, which I passionately hate. Also, DA:O had more C&C than BG (at least if my memory serves me right), which is the main reason I rank it higher.

I recently played Mass Effect and I had high expectations because it had been praised a lot. I was unimpressed and I found it an OK game but average in many aspects. I like the setting though.

Mass Effect 2 is about "packaging". Though enjoyable as a cinematic experience, but take away the high production value and you are left with an empty shell.

I found NWN to be very bland and boring.

DA2, well, what can I say that hasn't been said before? .

DAO
BG2
BG
ME2
ME
Jade Empire
Kotor
DA2

Sometimes I think Bioware got a bit too much credit for mediocre games due to being in the right niche at the right time. But most of them have some genuine qualities that are well deserved.

Asdraguuhl said:

Frankly, I never understood why the BG games are so highly praised. When I played them, I liked them, but they were IMO largely overshadowed by FO 1+2 and PS:T and I remember being very dissapointed by their fake dialogue choices and lack of C&C, at least compared to e.g. FO2. (This comparison is probably the reason why BG does not gain any nostalgia points).

Click to expand...

I think part of the reason was that they were the first games to take up the AD&D ruleset after the aging SSI gold box series. BG had modern graphics, a story and relatively complex combat. The competition was mostly '3D' dungeon crawlers with no story and 10 year older releases, that wasn't especially hard to beat.

I agree that story and dialogue in the FO games were better but they lacked party based combat which was a big deal among many RPG enthusiasts.

1. Baldur's Gate 2
2. Baldur's gate 1 + Tales of the Sword Coast
3. Dragon age orgins + awakening
4. NWN + both expansions
5. Kotor
6. Mass effect 1
7. Mass Effect 2
8. Jade Empire
9. Dragon age 2
10. MDK2
11. Shattered Steel

Take out Jade Empire and you can rate them in order of release (surprise).

BG1
BG2
NWN (non OC)
KotOR
ME
DA:O
ME2
DA2

The last 4 are a generic homogeneous slop of unoriginality.

Oh well:

1) Dragon Age: Origins
2) Baldur's Gate II
3) Mass Effect 1
4) Kotor 1&2
5) Jade Empire

That's it, I think. I've put both Kotor in the same place because I love'em in the same manner (one day or another I have to replay them, they're one of the few SW games that I enjoy, altough I like the first saga).

Asdraguuhl said:

Frankly, I never understood why the BG games are so highly praised. When I played them, I liked them, but they were IMO largely overshadowed by FO 1+2 and PS:T and I remember being very dissapointed by their fake dialogue choices and lack of C&C, at least compared to e.g. FO2. (This comparison is probably the reason why BG does not gain any nostalgia points).

Click to expand...

I'm the exact opposite when it comes to BG vs FO. I've never understood why so many people put FO 1&2 on such a pedestal. I can only assume it's the setting/story, because it sure as hell wasn't the gameplay.

Not that they (FO 1&2) weren't great, but I thought the Infinity Engine games were a significant improvement.

1. NWN (-OC - this is more for the toolset, modding, and serving options than anything actual gamey that Bio put out).
2. BG2
3. KotOR
4. BG

Haven't played anything else from Bio. Seriously? MDK2 > NWN for some? blech

I can understand why a lack of interest in Bio games after BG, because BG didn't turn me on either at first. I thought it was too clunky and unfocussed. It took IWD for me to take another look at it. BG2 was the perfect meld between IWD and BG IMO - although it was too long. ToB was too actiony (ie. Diablo like) and contrived tho. They should have fleshed it out a lot more.

1. BG 2
2. BG 1
3. Dragon Age
4. NWN
5. ME

I had the most fun with BG 2 and it's the only one I managed to finish. BG 1 got me into RPGs although I can't get myself to play it nowadays (seems awfully uninspired and lacking options - as if Fallout never happened. Mind you, I played Fallout a couple of years later).

Dragon Age was fun for a while but I got tired of the combat and the encounter design when I was about halfway through. Enjoyed some of the locations though, like the village with the rising undead and the possessed child.

Somehow I managed to get a lot of mileage out of NWN, even before I found out about mods and so on. For some reason I kept coming back to it again and again (although I never got further than Luskan). Today I don't consider it a good RPG by any stretch and wouldn't waste half an hour on it, but I don't have as much time as back then now so I guess that I simply got picky (and also have played better games in the meanwhile).

I liked ME initially, the setting worked and the first impression was good. But again, combat made me ditch it pretty quickly.

Haven't played any of their other games and only Jade Empires seems kinda interesting.

JDR13 said:

I'm the exact opposite when it comes to BG vs FO. I've never understood why so many people put FO 1&2 on such a pedestal. I can only assume it's the setting/story, because it sure as hell wasn't the gameplay.

Not that they (FO 1&2) weren't great, but I thought the Infinity Engine games were a significant improvement.

Click to expand...

I assume, if I understand you correctly, that with "gameplay" you mean "combat mechanics". They are very different indeed. But in my case, I do not tend to give high priority to combat mechanics but significantly more to non-combat gameplay aspects (interaction with the world, setting, dialogues, choices, etc.).

The term RPG is indeed very broad with many different elements and it is interesting to see how different people have different priorities where things that are important to some are completely irrelevant to others. In fact, I like this versatility of RPG's since it leads to different variety of games…….and of course to interesting forum topics .

Asdraguuhl said:

I assume, if I understand you correctly, that with "gameplay" you mean "combat mechanics". They are very different indeed. But in my case, I do not tend to give high priority to combat mechanics but significantly more to non-combat gameplay aspects (interaction with the world, setting, dialogs, choices, etc.).

Click to expand...

Not just mechanics, but enemy and NPC ai as well. I know I definitely would have enjoyed those game even more if they had allowed direct control over all the party members like in the IE games.

Things like setting and dialogue are subjective of course. I like D&D and post-apocalyptic equally, and I enjoyed the dialogue in both series'. The FO games had more choices that mattered, but that was always one of the strong points of that series.

JDR13 said:

Not just mechanics, but enemy and NPC ai as well. I know I definitely would have enjoyed those game even more if they had allowed direct control over all the party members like in the IE games.

Click to expand...

I understand your viewpoint perfectly. Ideally, I prefer the party NPC's to act on their own as that would give them more personality but that requires a very well developed AI. And in all honesty, the FO NPC's weren't exactly blessed with excellent combat AI (particularly in the first game), in which case I would also prefer full party control.

I have to admit that I liked the idea in DA:0 of programming NPC actions based on certain events during combat. You can have full party control if you so desire but you could also focus on your character while letting the rest act independently based on your preferred set of tactics. You can say a lot of bad things about DA2 but I thought that this NPC programming element was here better implemented and I used it quite effectively.

1. Baldur's Gate II
2. NWN + Expansions (HotU specially)
3. Dragon Age Origins
4. Baldur's Gate
5. Mass Effect 2
6. Mass Effect
7. Dragon Age 2
8. Jade Empire
9. Kotor

1. Baldur's Gate (+TotSC)
2. Baldur's Gate 2 (+ToB)
3. Dragon Age: Origins (+Awakening)
4. KotOR
5. Mass Effect 2
6. NWN (+SoU +HotU +Thain +Vives - kind of hard to place since longevity was much higher and satisfaction of building/running a PW needs to be factored in.. but I've tried to rank more on playing)
7. Mass Effect
8. MDK2
(9. Dragon Age 2 - suspected position as I've not played it yet)
10. Shattered Steel
(11. Jade Empire)

I consider Bioware one of my all time favorite developers. I love most of their games but somehow never really liked NWN. It's a great game for it tools but at the time I just found it dull. The switch to 3D just made it much less aesthetically pleasing than the BG series. I have never been able to play through it but somehow I wish I could muster the motivation to play through the OC and expansions. Although not a Bioware game I managed to beat NWN2 but found the opening caves of MotB incrediably boring so I never made it further...

stealth said:

Although not a Bioware game I managed to beat NWN2 but found the opening caves of MotB incrediably boring so I never made it further…

Click to expand...

MotB picks up considerably right after the caves and it takes only 1-2 hours to go through them anyway.
Interesting that you managed to finish NWN2, personally I´ve found the first 15 or so hours of the game to be approximately 100x more boring and "gamebreaking" than MotB´s caves .

DeepO said:

MotB picks up considerably right after the caves and it takes only 1-2 hours to go through them anyway.
Interesting that you managed to finish NWN2, personally I´ve found the first 15 or so hours of the game to be approximately 100x more boring and "gamebreaking" than MotB´s caves .

Click to expand...

I actually play through nwn2 twice but couldn't finish motb even once. I didn't like the spirit hunger thing.

anyways...

1.bg2
2.dao
3.nwn
4.bg1
5.kotor

didn't like any of the others and hated da2. Even though bioware didn't make them I would put iwd 1 &2 before bg2 and nwn2 before nwn.

Man, I loved the spirit hunger from MotB. It was a creative and innovative gameplay mechanic.

Bostur hit the nail on the head for why the Baldur's Gate games had some popularity - which was particularly prevalent for my circle of friends: The desire to play a modern adaptation of the AD&D rules and for party based gameplay naturally evolved from the Goldbox series. Amen to that desire.

Anyway...to BioWare and beyond. I never played MDK2 nor Shattered Steel.

1. BG2+Throne of Bhaal
2. Baldur's Gate+Tales of the Sword Coast
3. Dragon Age Origins
4. Knights of the Old Republic
5. NWN OC
6. Mass Effect 2
7. Mass Effect
8. Jade Empire
9. Dragon Age 2

I'll only post what I've played, due to the fact that I'm somewhat picky about Bioware games.

1. Baldur's Gate II
2. Baldur's Gate I
3. Dragon Age: Origins
4. Mass Effect
5. Mass Effect 2

I've never played DA2, NWN, KotOR, MDK2, Shattered Steel, Jade Empire. I knew nothing of Dragon Age: Origins, and only ended up purchasing it by recommendations from friends and word of mouth, but in the end I was glad I did. Right now, ME3 is on my "wait and see" list because I really didn't care for ME2.

1. NWN (expansions and community SP modules).
2. BG II / ToB
3. KotOR
4. DA:O
5. BG / TotSC

I have ME 1 and DA:Awakening, but haven't played them yet...