New RPGs vs Old RPGs

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I've become quite fond of Vampire: the Requiem - the timelines in the original version, Masquerade tied it too closely to the concept of some massive vampire apocalypse happening around the turn of the century (and considering I started playing that in '97, you can see where that would be a tad limiting). Requiem also cleans up the problem of vampires and history (sure, they "live" indefinitely, but in the new version, when they go into torpor every century or so, they have dreams so vivid that on awakening, they can't tell the difference between the dreams and memories), and simplifies the clan structures enormously (while utterly eliminating the concept of the Tremere! Yay!). It even has a Flaw I was able to use to create an Aspie vampire - Behavior Blind (a 2-dot Flaw, but I took it for the roleplaying possibilities, not the power increase). In play, I've given him a whole new affliction - if I think of something amusing to say that might get the character in trouble if he were to say it, I have to roll Intelligence + Self-Control, needing 8 successes. Failure means he said it out loud.

Like I said, real RPGs need the four Ps - Paper, Pencils, Pizza, and geeky People.

I hate the whole graphics versus gameplay argument. I would much rather play a better looking version of a good game than a crap looking version of the same game.

Why does everybody assume good graphics automatically imply bad gameplay? If you really don't care about graphics, download NetHack and play it. It's an RPG made entirely out of ASCII. It's a great game, but it gets a bit annoying have to keep asking help what the green G that you are about to get eaten by is called.

Graphics help immersion, immersion helps me enjoy the game more. That is the reason I played so much of Oblivion, even though I think it definitely not the best in terms of gameplay - the game makes you feel like you are some incredibly powerful being wondering into the hostile yet pretty wilderness. Mass Effect plays out like an interactive movie. It's like an alternate reality, something I can't get from NetHack.

Good graphics don't necessarily imply bad gameplay. But there are basically three qualities a game can have:

- Gameplay
- Graphics
- Length

Old games could achieve all three (for their time - obviously their graphics look bad by modern standards), because it was so much quicker to create art and tech assets for them. Now games can only pick two out of three.

Most modern games try to achieve good gameplay and graphics by sacrificing length. That's fine by me, because frankly I don't have much time for games now anyway. Morrowind/Oblivion are an exception. They have great graphics and length, but end up with unbalanced gameplay and a bland, lifeless world.

The Witcher is good, better than any modern RPG for years.

I'm not much into modern computer games but I still have my old DOS computer. I just love Master Of Orion 2 - nothing better on a cold wet day than to play a space game for 12 hours plus ! !!

I'm usually not like this, but I got FREAKISHLY addicted to Oblivion last year, like...really, really, really badly. Then once I finished up almost every quest I could possibly do on that game (3 months later), I put it down and forgot about its existence. I'm still a bit attached to my character on that game though, and the personality I formed around her X.x;; ANYWAYS-

The Fire Emblem series is amazing. It was first made in 1989, so its really old, but its just a really good series. (Roy and Marth of SSBM come from this series!)
My favorites are the first English translated one, Fire Emblem 7, and the Gamecube one, Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance.
The 2nd GBA one Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones, and the Wii version, Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, in my opinion, were okay. Radiant Dawn is an extremely good sequal to PathoRadiance, but a horrible game by itself.

But anybody with the Nintendo systems should check these games out!

I finally completed Final Fantasy VI. Then I sat for half an hour watching the ending. People who play old RPG's must have had a lot of time on their hands.

I'm about to get the Dark Heresy rulebook.

Now I just need to find some people willing to play a pen 'n paper RPG.

I played Dungeons and Dragons with my friend once but we never finished the game.

The original FFIV is still better than that lame DS remake.

I'm actually very addicted to Nethack lately. I often play it with the traditional ASCII, but these days there are versions with pretty tiles or even 3-D graphics and mouse support that you can download.

ADOM > Nethack

I do like ADOM. Heck, I even sent Thomas Biskup a postcard, and offered him some suggestions that actually made it into the game. The background mutation feature really annoys me though. I like being able to take my time in a game and do everything there is to do, and every time I would try to do all the cool fun things, I would end up a puddle of chaos. It was very frustrating to me. Until he throws in a quest or item that can not just cure mutations, but make you completely immune to them, I don't know if I'll bother playing it again. Arbitrary time-limits and me just don't get along. I eventually switched back to Nethack and Crawl, neither of which I've ever managed to beat yet. I've gotten much closer to beating those two than ADOM though.

I can't judge on that but I think the extra content will be interesting to see (not that I played the original FFIV, but I'm interested in getting it after playing FFVI).

Balder's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn. It's not multilayer, but it's full of oldschool goodness. Even for its age, the atmophire is great. I can still remember the music in the Copper Coronet Inn...

RPGs are too hard for me. DX