RPGWatch - Game of the Year Awards 2018

Never played a single Monster Hunter game @SirJames;. So I basically have no opinion but they always looked like to much focus on combat with little narrative & story.

Past entries also required you to play online on the PSP.

I've only played this one. Apparently it's full of quality of life changes.

Let me ask you this. How often in an RPG are you presented with a list of dialogue options you'd never personally say? There are massive limitations. It's all just scripted. Sometimes a decision will make an impact you can see later, but it's never YOU talking. None of it actually matters at all. You'll still be able to win the game even if you picked with your eyes closed. What's the point? Fact is there's an arch-villan boss behind it all and you have to kill him.

In MHW every monster is a boss. But monsters can't speak, so what dialogue is actually missing? Do you really need to pick from 3 or 4 things to say with NPC hunters to feel the role of a monster hunter or could you just watch the cutscene and go and hunt the monster?

I'm really not sure what's missing. I don't actually believe an RPG has to not require skill. All 3rd person RPGs require skill. Elex or something similar is pretty hard if you can't play action games? Witcher? Risen? You'll die a few times even if your stats are up to the challenge? That's skill?

I mean, back in the day before the internet, before even a modem I was happy to play single-player RPGs on Amiga like Bards Tale, Ishar 3, 8 or so AD&D goldbox games, etc, etc. But D&D was a TABLETOP MULTIPLAYER GAME and as soon as technology caught up I was just as excited as Lord British about the possibilities of online worlds and adventures with a party of real people.

We got Baldurs Gate and Infinity Engine games and I played them to death with other people. But while I hear we're in a "golden age" of new RPGs, thanks to kickstarters, they seem to have forgotten the roots of RPG games is in multiplayer. Pillars and Tyrany, etc, no mulitplayer. Pathfinder? Which up until the release of this game has been a mulitplayer experience for years? No multiplayer!? How many Pathfinder tabletop groups were disappointed by no multiplayer? All of them? Obviously for people who want a social experience, like a game of classic tabletop D&D or Pathfinder, we're in no golden age at all.

DivinityOS is so fucking legit because it doesn't just do multiplayer but it really tried to step up what multiplayer can be with incredibly ambitious ideas like co-op conversations where you can disagree with eachother. Hats off to Larian for being one of the few devs who can impress me. But so can MHW and that takes a lot!

MHW is pretty much what tabletop RPG players imagine while they play.

A good D&D campaign isn't really about spending the whole time talking. It's about the group making decisions that involve talking then going to a dungeon to kill shit. Sure, throw in some flavour NPCs along the way. Like a gnomish challenge hidden in the moutains near Gargath Outpost. Like MHW does with field researchers or native tribes. But in the end D&D is about dungeons and dragons and that means dungeon crawling for loot. That's what RPGs mean to me. Not the filler. It's about combat, progression, discovery! All things MHW has!

Leaving MHW out has left me voting For The King as the best RPG and while it is a tabletop experience with multiplayer, I feel like its more of a roguelike boardgame than an RPG and has much less for a hardcore RPG player to think about than MHW. It's just dice rolling and luck. It doesn't have any dialogue options, either. Great game, though, with three huge updates adding new campaigns with new items and monsters.

SirJames said:

Anyway, Yakuza 0 is on the list and player skill matters there?

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It's a hybrid with many different systems inside it.
In some minigames player skills matter (karaoke), in some character skill upgrades matter (car races), in some "party" skills matter only (service facilities, escortgirls, craft materials and crafting blueprints missions), in some it's roguelike where diceroll matters (phonebooth, chickfights), but in normal brawling you won't go far if you don't improve existing or learn new skills plus forget beating certain hard trashmobs without buffs/pots.

Different gameplay for each content variety aside, it also has a beefy story, numerous sidestories (where your dialogue choices determine the reward) and enormous amount of humor.

So, if it's a hybrid that has *everything*… What it doesn't have?
Cheesy, silly and cringy english dub. Not in. The game comes only with the original (japanese) voiceover and subtitles in different languages including english.

@SirJames

Nope Multiplayer was never my focus, and I enjoy scripted stories & narratives. Take out all that and all you have is a combat simulator like Dark Souls. So are tastes differ.

So I'll enjoy this new golden age of crowdfunding RPGs as they suit my tastes.

@joxer

As I said in the other thread personally loved playng the Yakuza games and they follow the same formula. It's more of a action adventure game with RPG elements.

Yea but I've had to answer that one particular sentence.

On the sentence where in the same post he basically claims MHW is The Witcher 3, I just don't have any more willpower to reason why it's the complete opposite of TW3. Where is dartagnan and his walls of text when you need him? Yea I know, wasting time in Destiny.

I feel I have to chime in here, since Monster Hunter World was mentioned.

As someone who's played multiple Monster Hunter games such as MH:FU, MH:3U, MH:4U, MH:GU, and MH:W, while clocking at least 200 hours on each game (more as the series progressed, with about 700 in Monster Hunter: World), I can probably provide some clarity here.

I would not consider Monster Hunter: World an RPG. There are a lot of common RPG elements missing to consider it an RPG. However, it could be said there are aspects of roleplaying that exist within it.

• It lacks choice and consequence. Any actions you take don't affect anyone outside of your character.
• There isn't a story or narrative, or at least one that's clearly defined as you progress through the game. Your ultimate goal is to understand the "New World" and figure out why monsters are migrating there. Cutscenes are primarily there to help you transition from one monster to the next.
• The game also doesn't have a class/skill based system, where you commit to set of abilities and stick with them throughout the game that uniquely define your character. Instead, this is done through armor and charms, which can be changed/swapped at will (though in previous games this could only be done in town, which in itself what an aspect of commitment).
• Lack of character development. You don't get to know about the upbringings of the people you interact with, or what led them to be there. If you do, it's probably a short one liner like "I came from X to see what the New World was all about". They don't change or experience something such as hardship as you move along.

But it's also important to note that Monster Hunter games were never designed with story, character development, character classes/skills, or choice and consequence in mind. They're purely designed for your character to engage in intense fights, with or without friends, while acquiring skills through armor, charms and decorations (gems, basically).

I've gotten to know a lot of people who claimed Monster Hunter: World to have the best combat of any game they've played, but keep in mind that it probably took a lot of time to come to that conclusion. Tons of people who started the series with World have made this statement, and being the first they've experienced, I could see why they'd say that. There's a deep and complex learning curve to every weapon type, and they might love it for its complexity.

But I also think it's a combat system not everyone is going to think fondly of. I've encountered plenty of individuals who weren't fascinated by the combat system and left them disinterested with the game completely. Even if they were to learn the mechanics of each weapon, who's to say they'd find the game fun? Many people would argue that a combat system doesn't need to be complex to be great.

Don't misunderstand me, though. I find MH:W to be incredibly enjoyable and it's among one of my favorites, but it's a series that was really hard to recommend to new players up until MH:W showed up, and even now the combat system is a massive hurdle for most first timers, where it can take hours to fully comprehend 1 weapon type, and there are 14 of them. That's a pretty steep learning curve.

I have my feet drenched in tons of genres from cRPGs to jRPGs, shooters, adventure games, horror games, etc. The series has always shared aspects of RPGs, but the games are still far away from being true RPGs. They're all an absolute blast to play, but not for a second would I call them RPGs.

It got removed from the 100+ list of games, because we had to make choices. A chance to get the game in the resulting list would have been here.

joxer said:

So, if it's a hybrid that has *everything*… What it doesn't have?

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Well, I thought it didn't have any "RPG shit" to think about. The skills are locked in a way where you just unlock the cheapest ones first. You can decide if you like Rush or Beast or whatever but it's not nearly as engaging as MHW endgame builds.

I still voted for it, but I totally got way more RPG nerd over my MHW builds.

Took me two hours to make this one… https://i.imgur.com/8pihxYU.jpg

@Ragnaris; 700 hours, huh? On PC? You wanna come fight Extreme Behemoth with me today?

1) Yes
2) No
3) Maybe
4) Say Nothing

PS. Do you like my build?

I mean, it doesn't have Wide-range. I feel like not having Wide-Range 5 is just asking for your teammates to die. Everyone seems to make glass cannon builds with negative fire resist then get oneshot by AT Teostra. It's probably the most powerful skill when you're in a full group. Thoughts?

@Ragnaris;

Thanks for the post it reaffirms what I thought about the games.

Well, I wouldn't call it a "true" RPG, either, but ARPGs are allowed on the list.

700 hours play... Pretty sure it's Ragnaris' GOTY, too?

SirJames said:

Well, I wouldn't call it a "true" RPG, either, but ARPGs are allowed on the list.

700 hours play… Pretty sure it's Ragnaris' GOTY, too?

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By everything I read here I don't think it even qualifies as an arpg but as a action game with some loot systems.

Arpg is something like Path of Exile where your character stats, abilities, skills and equipment play a much bigger role than player skill (although game has a few boss fight where player skill takes the lead).

Let's investigate!

Steam says:

Title: MONSTER HUNTER: WORLD
Genre: Action
Developer: CAPCOM Co., Ltd.
Publisher: CAPCOM Co., Ltd.
Release Date: 10 Aug, 2018

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HOWEVER

The users add these tags:

POPULAR USER-DEFINED TAGS FOR THIS PRODUCT: (?)
Action
Hunting
Co-op
Open World
Multiplayer
Third Person
RPG
Adventure
Fantasy
Singleplayer
Action RPG
Character Customization
Difficult
Great Soundtrack
Exploration
Atmospheric
JRPG
Hack and Slash
Replay Value
Souls-like

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Therefore, to many users, it's an RPG, an Action RPG and a JRPG.

Also, you're probably familiar with status effects like Knockdown, stunned, etc from other RPGs but MHW has heaps. Knockback, knockdown, tripped, paralysed, sleep, etc, etc. It's probably got more than 3rd edition Dungeons and Dragons!

SirJames said:

Also, you're probably familiar with status effects like Knockdown, stunned, etc from other RPGs but MHW has heaps. Knockback, knockdown, tripped, paralysed, sleep, etc, etc. It's probably got more than 3rd edition Dungeons and Dragons!

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I doubt it has more. Does it have such funs stuff like negative levels, grappled, eaten?
D&D has entangled, stunned and paralysed. Also helpless
Not to mention D&D has normal and magical diseases and more fun stuff like that

SirJames said:

Let's investigate!

Steam says:



HOWEVER

The users add these tags:

Therefore, to many users, it's an RPG, an Action RPG and a JRPG.

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Does not mean anything. I am sure many FPS games on steam also get RPG tags from users.

It does mean something. It means people see elements of RPGs, ARPGs and JRPGs in the game. I doubt many games have all three of those tags.

Troika, sirtech and all these classic dead developers who ship buggy rubbish that takes years and years of community patching to become good… It doesn't have to be like that. RPGs can be real games too. Capcom has been making games so long they don't know how to make a game that's buggy enough to be the next Arcanum. It's hard to explain how well made it is. As an armchair developer it's taught me a lot about games and I thought I knew it all.

You know you have unlimited stash space? It's so cruisy to play! No annoying RPG stuff like inventory issues. You even make Loadouts (for consumables AND gear) so you can restock and auto-deposit everything with a click or two. There's no wasted time sorting things and making space or walking long distances. All it wants to do is spoil the player.

edit: Recently I was starting to stress out because I'd almost filled my 5 pages of weapons. I was worried there were only 5 and I didn't want to sell them. You know what happened? It rolled over to 6 pages! Fucking awesome!

Meanhile my $50 or so of stash space in Path of Exile is all full of legendaries I might want for future characters and I feel like I want to buy more but I don't want to buy more. Why would I want my Action rpg to have crap like that?

Unlimited stash is the best!

edit2: Furthermore, there's nothing fun about carry weight limits, either, especially when it's tied to an ability score you don't want to raise. RPGs need to lose the weight and be more fun. Don't try to annoy the player for the sake of realism in a fantasy world.

While it's obvious you enjoy the game, James, having stash space and being able to knock down your enemies doesn't make something an RPG even by the loosest of terminologies. An RPG, as considered on this site, needs to be about more than simply killing things.

Oh, and the Sir-Tech you disparage created one of the best blobber RPGs ever made to this day (reviewed by more than random 14 year olds on Steam).

A Dungeon Master can make a campaign that's entirely combat and its still D&D? You can make house rules like unlimited carry weight and its still D&D? Icewind Dale was mostly combat and still D&D. It's entirely up to the DM.

Capcom is DM and this campaign is all about the Elder Dragons who happen not to talk.

And, yes, I know what Sir-tech has made! I guess the super buggy applies better to Troika but Sir-tech died because their games were not good enough to be financially viable to any publisher. Meanwhile, I'm sure ANY publisher would take a bid to have MHW as one of their IPs.

If you doubt my sir-tech credentials I have two words for you. Fairy Ninja.