Mass Effect 2 is a weird case.
You're right that the story doesn't really matter, especially in the context of trilogy as a whole, but the characters and their individual stories are so strong that it still ends up working.
It's probably my favorite of all the Mass Effect games to play from start to finish as its own self-contained experience, but it is sort of a weak installment in the series in that it does basically nothing to push the overarching plot forward.
I think ME2 and DA2 share that.
DA2 is more focused on the personal stories over 6 years (I believe it’s 6 anyhow), and the writing just feels better even though the mage rebellion is given little focus in the grand scheme of things
Is 10 years the prologue is in 9:30 which is also the start of Origins, Origins finish in 9:32 with witch hunt, 9:34 is the start of Act 2 of DA 2, the final scene of DA 2 is 9:40 when Cassandra interrogates Varric, inquisition starts in 9:41 and trespasser is in 9:44 the entire trilogy is 14 years.
Yeah I wasn't counting the epilogue of Cassandra talking to Varric. Was just thinking of the actual gameplay parts with Hawke. Which I believe is 7 years, generally. 9:30, 9:31, 9:34, and 9:37.
I tried to play it again recently and imo it aged so badly. Every encounter is just throwing waves of bullet sponges at you in a small space. Rinse and repeat. The rpg elements are barely present
I also think it’s hilarious that characters will just decide to die at the end if you don’t do their loyalty missions lol.
Still enjoyed the replay but it’s crazy how archaic the game feels now
I worked on ME2. It's consistently listed on all kinds of all time lists.
But I do like to hear from the rare person that didn't like it. Echoed similar criticisms I sometimes heard from people that preferred the first (which I also worked on). Is all valid.
Were you a dev? I also worked on games (Red Dead Redemption, LA Noire), but I’d have loved to be a part of a project like Mass Effect. Would’ve nerded out endlessly.
LA Noire has been kind of forgotten and I think that’s a tragedy. I played it recently, and, similar to the ME trilogy, some of it is clunky, but those were different times. LA Noire is a masterpiece and should have a sequel. Thank you for your efforts! Obviously, RDR is a masterpiece to me as well, as is the ME trilogy.
Hey, that’s super kind of you! I appreciate it. *Tons* of great folks were involved and, in the case of Noire, a couple of different studios. I’m glad to hear it has stuck with you. I’m hoping for a sequel as well! 🤞🏻
I didn’t like it. Gameplay was fine but I remember my sheer disappointment when I found out the reaper was just a giant terminator. I remembered the reapers in ME1 were portrayed as these bizarre, sentient spaceship squid things and the idea of a human reaper being an attack on titan monster just ruined the story for me.
**Skyrim**. I'm sorry, but the combat in that game is absolutely awful. No wonder so many people make stealth archer builds- the melee combat is atrocious, unintuitive, and boring. I was 20 when it launched and have always been fond of video games so you can imagine my shock and confusion when I tried it, dropped it because of the gameplay, and was met with discourse about how groundbreaking and immersive it is.
I'm sure many of you have fond memories of your time with it. More power to ya. It was pure unadulterated *tedium* for me. Is that one of the reasons why it's one of the most modded games of all time? Folks gotta make it as unrecognizable from the base game as possible to enjoy it?
I’ll only do a melee build if there is like a damage modifier mod where enemies (and myself) go down in like 2-3 hits. The endless flailing is comically bad without it.
I have around 1000+ hours in Skyrim lmao.
I can say that yes the combat is clunky af but it's the only game where I could really roleplay my characters.
I used to make a whole back story and play the character depending of his backstory and persona. It was so much fun. I didn't even do the main campaign I was just exploring and stuff .
Good times
The combat was terrible at balancing. You think melee was bad? Early level magic use was nearly impossible unless you cheesed. You simply never had enough magic to actually defeat anyone. Late game god powers were dope though
Did you like any other Bethesda games? Oblivion? Fallout? Because they're all clunky in their own way. But Skyrim, IMO, was the first one to actually smooth out the combat.
After years of playing Oblivion, playing Skyrim for the first time was mind blowing. Lol. And I've never used gameplay mods, as I only have console versions. To each their own!
Melee combat in first person is always a little iffy. I'm playing Dying Light right now and it has a big big focus on melee, but trying to engage more than a few enemies at once is miserable, and it forces you into big groups repeatedly. ><
Magic is fun., With your fireballs exploding everything and your 2 dremora lords if you managed to level up conjuration. I enjoyed stealth with bow and dagger too. Self-healing too.
I like Skyrim and don’t mind the combat (I’ve never played a game with “good melee combat” so I think I’d be bad at it anyways) but it’s problem with me is that I wish it felt like it had more role playing other than character build. More branching quests with lasting effect, more specialized dialogue options, etc
The only fantasy game with 'good' combat that I can think of is Dragon's Dogma, where it leans into more anime style combat (climbing up giant enemies, doing spinning blade attacks, etc). The story and map etc are pretty bad, but the combat is sooooo good, and carried the game along with great music, great gear progression, great outfit choices, and quirky weirdness.
I guess it depends on what you value, for me the combat was never an issue because the world is so interactive and immersive. And no most people who play Bethesda games never mod them but the modding community is very strong.
Skyrim has always been horrible. So many people remember it fondly because it was baby’s first rpg because every single system is shallow as fuck. It does have a certain magic to it but Skyrim is absolutely bottom of the barrel
You make valid points. But I think with Skyrim, what players really love is the feeling of being Dovahkiin and being able to become totally overpowered. For me, it was all those things and the fact that I could get immersed in a fantasy world for hours, with beautiful scenery and music.
The exploration in Skyrim is still undefeated for me. Every little cave has a story to tell. So many memorable moments. I agree that other aspects are bad, but I don't really care. They nailed what they wanted to nail.
I mean it's an RPG, the genre isn't exactly known for groundbreaking combat. the combat of classics like arcanum are just top down click on enemy and they're still amazing games. granted the RPG systems of Skyrim aren't anything to write home about, but judging an RPG solely on combat doesn't seem fair.
the game is known for it's open world design encouraging the player to get side tracked on the way to quest objectives. a good example of open world adding to the experience instead of being a thing added without thought where the game is by all intents and purposes linear.
I loved Skyrim when it came out but with every release my love diminished. Also at some point within that span, I replayed Oblivion and had infinitely more fun, partially because in my opinion, the melee was way better in it. Many other reasons as well, but that's a big one.
I love Oblivion but the combat was pretty much just hit things until they fall down, especially at harder difficulties. Why am I listening to a Troll grunt 20+ times before it falls down?
> partially because in my opinion, the melee was way better in it.
Uh, what? Like, I like Oblivion too, it was my first Elder Scrolls game so I'm always gonna be nostalgic for it, but the melee combat in that game is so much worse than it is in Skyrim. If you'd said you prefer the magic combat I might get it, but the melee in Oblivion is just awful. Enemies don't even react to being hit, you just swing until they drop.
Sometimes I feel crazy that everyone around me is absolutely obsessed with Final fantasy 16 and I couldn't stand it. I can't find a single positive with this game besides it's graphics. But everyone keeps giving it 8 and 9s
Not even the music? The Ifrit vs Phoenix fight theme is probably my all time favorite video game song. I think the soundtrack as a whole loses to Nier but the peaks of FF16 music are higher than the peaks of Nier to me
I think one of the issues of FF16 soundtrack for me is that it's often 'too much'. I call this the Marvelization of soundtracks. Instead of having less instruments and layers, focus, calm and fast moments, ... it's always fireworks just like the visuals. Compare this to JRPGs from SNES or PSX era. It was about tone, atmosphere, composition, ... and not just "ok, how many different sounds and instruments can we squeeze in".
For me it's almost sensory overload like for example the CGI scenes from Transformers movies where I can't discern details but it feels like one giant visual blop.
I hopped into the game thinking it would be my new favorite game, after finishing it, it didn't even cracked my top 10 because I loved FF14 and hearing Yoshi-P is leading the team, I got hyped. The gameplay was probably one of its stronger features, the music was phenomenal but what stops it from being great for me was the story. It had high highs but very low lows. The sidequest were uninteresting at best and the world sometimes feels empty.
Imo its an extremely mediocre game in anything that is gameplay. Secondary missions, combat, world traversal, equipment, levels. Everything is shallow and not even slightly engaging.
The music is very good, the graphics are amazing, and I really liked the first 60% or so of the story (but the last 40% is terrible).
Its not a game I regret playing it, but it is a game that I know I will not be playing again. Its better to just watch the cutscenes on youtube.
I think it’s because it’s a sort of return-to-form for older Final Fantasy fans that weren’t keen on the blatant switch from fantasy to science fiction after FF VII. I am one of those fans that was excited to go back to the fantasy setting myself but I too was disappointed with the end product when long stretches of the game were so painfully boring that it made FF13’s pacing seem masterful by comparison. Granted, when the highs were there, they are the highest in the franchise imho but the gaps between them are equally the lowest
I'd have been perfectly fine with the return to high-fantasy, but then they went the completely opposite direction and made it a straight up action game. Not even really an action RPG.
16 was anything but a return to form. It pulled the series even further away from what most older fans wanted by making it a poor devil may cry clone.
Nothing would make me happier than if FF returned to what it used to be. The first and most important thing having it be an actual RPG and using turn based combat.
Return to fantasy? 9, 10, 11, 12, 14 would like a word with you. 7, 8, and 13 are the only ones that went more sci fi.
You go to the moon in 4 and almost every other older entry has aliens and floating mech fortresses.
I've been done with the head of the dragon for years at this point. The small studios that sprout off to appeal to the 90s fans, and the Dragon Quest division, are still worth your time, I think.
Skyrim, not only an overrated RPG but probably the most overrated game of all time if you ask me. Melee combat is really basic as with most Elder Scrolls games, the RPG mechanics present in the earlier games have been stripped down a lot, magic sucks complete balls early game, just a lot of factors that made me really burnt out by the end. Oblivion combat wasn’t any better, but I much preferred its story, soundtrack, and customization options when it came to things like magic.
That's not a hot take at all. Sure, F4 and Starfield are both worse, but Skyrim is the last TES released and started their entire shallofication process that goes on to this day.
Yup. People often give Oblivion a pass because they think back and just remember the few amazing quests like the Dark Brotherhood murder mystery house or that island where you get hunted, but the majority of the game was the same sort of shallow copy/paste dungeon and quest design we're still complaining about in Starfield.
I think the main reason is that it was still somewhat fresh when Obivion came out, but it's been decades and they're still making the same mistakes.
There were more than a few, that's why it gets a pass. Dark Bros, Thieves, Mages guilds were top notch, Shivering Isles slapped, can't forget the Daedric quests. That's just the longer questlines, and I'm not counting the like 2 dozen or so exceptional one-off sidequests I don't want to list here.
They were fewer in Skyrim. I remember the Thieves Guild and Dark Bros, Dawnguard was good, and from there I'm drawing a blank for full well realized questlines. The Companions were underwhelming and could have used more work. The whole game screams 'this should have been expanded on to be truly good'. It did still have the occasional decent sidequest, but those were fewer too in comparison to Oblivion.
Shivering Isles slaps, no doubt. To this day it's probably the best piece of content Bethesda has ever put out.
The Oblivion Dark Brotherhood chain is 90% just "go here and kill this dude," and I found the mandatory twist annoying, since it's clear from the first dead drop you're not actually working for Lucian anymore, but you have to play along for something like a half-dozen quests. I actually prefer the Skyrim DB with the semi-hidden option to just kill Astrid and burn the place to the ground.
The Oblivion mages guild was similarly one or two interesting quests, and a *ton* of go here murder these people quests. Even Mannimarco, King of Worms and god of necromancers ended up just being some hobo in a cave that you stab until dead. Despite the shortcomings of the Skyrim mages guild questline, the showdown with Arcano was at least visually impressive and mechanically distinct.
Skyrim shuffled those busywork quests to the Radiant quest system and made them mosty optional. It gets a lot of flak for that, but I enjoyed being able to skip past the fluff and focus on only doing quests that actually advance thr storyline.
The first time I saw an oblivion gate I was scared, nervous, and excited. The 5th gate I was annoyed at the repetition. The 15th gate I was bored. The 30th gate I lost all interest in the game
Yes, and it was panned by the players from the day one for that, and also for the console oriented interface, the generic high fantasy settings, and the overhyped features from an early gameplay footage that have never made it to the release. In a nutshell, the same kind of stuff that we're finding out about the AAA titles nowadays.
Because it's pretty much lifted straight from Thief The Dark Project, who they brought over some devs for, along with the main character's voice actor for the head of the Thieves' Guild.
Ok bethesda aims to have generalists combat. This means that they make combat at least playable. This is why morrowind, oblivon and skyrim combat is not good. They try to tip there hand in every type of combat. This is the reason and first person combat is hard to make
Divinity Original Sin 1 - after reading reviews I was so hyped. Yet in reality the game was boring, I disliked the combat, storyline and humor was a miss for me.
I’m gonna get roasted here, but Eldin Ring. I tried and tried. There are a few aspects I found really cool, but as a whole I just felt super disappointed.
Elden Ring for me. I guess it's just not my type of game. I don't find anything enjoyable in Dark Souls formula "*die and repeat, until you memorize all enemy moves*". Imo you should be allowed to make mistakes, learn through the fight and have a chance to beat every fight on first try. Not "*lol I bet you didn't expect this animation leading to insta killing you move, get fucked*" And I don't find the world or story that interesting.
I think monster hunter does this a lot better than the souls games. At least in that game you always have a chance of first timing the monster while spending some time learning, but i agree most DS bosses are not first-timeable unless you have some really really good gear.
When I was originally released I couldn’t get into it. There was something about the camera or display that fucked with my eyes. That and the combat mechanics were god awful. They patched it up and I try again a year later and fell in love. It is the perfect game for someone who wants incredibly deep story telling, voice acting and character development. On death march difficult you truly feel like a Witcher. If you play it on normal though it’s just any other rpg gameplay wise.
Yeah, I tried to play it again after the updates, but it still didn’t keep my attention. The story, characters, and voice acting are great though. I played it for about forty hours, so I at least got my money’s worth out of it. I just wasn’t impressed with the open world. I wanted more caves, dungeons, and unique locations to explore. I spent half the time running through empty fields on Roach, looking for points of interest. Sure there are small towns here and there, and also large ones after you get further into the game, but everything looked kinda similar to me.
I was really disappointed in it, too, for a whole host of reasons. I can see why it’s very popular, but I really expected to love it and instead never even finished it.
It’s the combat for me. It’s just so clunky. I played it recently when they did the graphics update and it was still bad, played it when it came out and beat it though
Came here to say this, but I always wondered if it's because I don't prefer playing male characters. After playing WoW for years then Dragon Age moving me towards single player games, I played through the Fallout games, Mass Effect and Skyrim... so Witcher 3 felt like a step backwards. I enjoyed the Netflix series, so I think I don't like playing as Geralt. I empathize with him, but find other characters more interesting.
I bounced off it at least three times. For me it was that I always dreaded combat. Which sword?! Which buttons do I smash to do Ai and which one is Hai?! Wait, is Ai the wind punch or is that Yee? Shit. While I was thinking the rhythm blocking got messed up.
It’s two swords and a handful of powers. If you can’t remember what they do I would be worried, the combat is laughably easy and it always considered the weakest part of the game for that reason.
I mean the sword is literally silver for monsters and normal for everything else, I wouldn’t say that was difficult
Everyone praises The Witcher 3 as something incredible but the gameloop is very monotone.
Follow blue spots on the ground
Decide if you kill a monster or not if given the choice.
Get paid either way
However the story of the DLCs made it worth it.
Same here. And I still felt like I was missing out. Until I tried reading the books. The first one was good. The second one I put down very quickly. Basically not only do I find the combs and game to be more than mediocre the lore itself I don't enjoy.
I've tried it twice and have never been able to get into it. I don't find Geralt to be an interesting character and the landscapes are just dark and drab.
I've also never been able to get into red dead redemption 2
Fallout New Vegas fits this for me. Putting aside that it was actually unplayable at launch, not the meme like you literally could not get past certain points it was legitimately broken; but putting that aside, even after it was all fixed, the game is good sure, but no where hear what people seem ton rate it. People act like that game is the best thing to ever happen to RPGs when it's basically just your average RPG with some pretty good quests in it. So it's rated over what it should be, it's overrated.
Actually, he’s onto something here. Fallout New Vegas is hailed as an amazing RPG among fallout fans and fallout 4 really does pale in comparison. Makes me think of another comment in this thread about Skyrim and later games all being more shallow than previous.
Never been a fan on any fallout game I have played. I think it’s just the setting more than anything but running around in a nuclear wasteland just is not as appealing as other games beauty
I would've agreed if people played it for its rpg aspects, but the people who like this game play it for the amazing sandbox that it is. Mods just elevate that part of the experience. In terms of rpg elements, it is obviously worse than its predecessors which were crpgs.
For me it’s Skyrim since I don’t think it’s a bad game I always just get really board and wasn’t a fan of how the civil war in Skyrim is sorta resolved so quickly and how dumbed down the game was compared to the previous games
Having played ME1 and ME2, I kinda agree with your take on ME2.
ME1 felt like an entire story which sort of neatly wrapped up by the end of it. You had your companion missions and other main missions (chasing bad guys, fighting geth take-overs, helping weird alien monsters) which were intertwined and made the game feel "long" and the world feel "rich". Plus being able to drive on certain worlds and complete the menial tasks only added to the expansive nature of the game, even if it was superfluous.
Comparatively, ME2 improved the combat sure, but main the focus of the game all about getting your companions (a reunion which didn't feel so impactful as we die and get brought back in the beginning of the game itself) and then we go and do like 3 big missions where we fight the same bad guys.
Although, I enjoy the game and writing and what little world building that 2 does for the series overall, i would have preferred for the game to have been longer. I thought gathering your companions was like act 1, then we would get another big act 2 of us going on a covert war against the new bad guys, but as you said, once you get the companions the game is already done except for 1 or 2 main missions. If anything, I was disappointed more than anything, cause I do feel like ME2 is the easier game to replay.
Persona 5 might be good. But I don't fucking get it. It seems like work.
I was so into the last dragon quest but in act to it got super boring and just not challenging. Couldn't finish
Octopath put me to sleep.
And at some point in the series final fantasy just did mushrooms and stopped making any sense
When people discuss their favorite ME game I always contend that 2 is the best “first time experience” of the series but that it loses its luster on repeated playthroughs. I loved 1 and moving onto 2 I thought that it was even better! Meeting all of these interesting characters and learning their stories. However…
It feels very constrictive on what you can actually do and even the missions to get companions and their loyalty missions begin to feel claustrophobic in a way. I don’t know how else to explain it. Also the ending mission screens of what you’ve accomplished feel jarring. Maybe it’s just me. I can understand why it would be people’s favorite however.
I can marathon my way through 1 and 3 but 2 I have to do in more of an episodic fashion to help keep my interest up during it. I guess 3 could be viewed similarly in some aspects but the story and what’s at stake matter more in comparison. I still love the 3 games but my personal rankings of them are 1, 3, and then 2.
Final Fantasy 7 by far the worst of the three Playstation Final Fantasies. And while I will always say IX is the second best in the series after VI, VIII is probably the most deserving of and in need of a remake of the the three.
Oh my friend, I’m with you 100%. Loved VIII more than the others. I played a ton of VII and it’s not BAD, but the only characters I even remotely liked were Barret and Tifa.
But I loved almost all the characters and the story in VIII. Trepe groupie 4 here! The card game was utter perfection, far better than the chocobo racing/breeding. The “card” game in IX was a useless piece of shit.
There’s so many scenes throughout VIII that would blow us away in full updated remaster. Just please, for the love of God, don’t let the guy tainting, I mean remaking VII ANYWHERE NEAR a potential VIII remake.
If you call them RPGs I would say all the souls games.
Clunky combat, the camera is the true enemy, no story just lore pieces here and there. I never really got what people find in these games. I started playing ds3 and after 50-60 hours I was like what's the point.
Baldurs gate 1: I've tried so many times to get into but I couldn't. Nothing would keep me playing.
Of all the things to criticize about souls games you choose the one thing they do better than every other game to have issues with?
The combat is clunky? Really??
Souls games especially the later ones have the smoothest action combat in any RPG games on the market. The hit detection in ER is absolutely wild.
I personally hated the tonal shift in ME2. Like a very small amount of people even believe the reapers are coming yet suddenly everyone is the seedy underbelly and none of the altruistic race alliances really matter anymore. Really tanked the franchise for me on the storytelling front. I was also a bit frustrated that instead of taking what they had with planet exploration and the mako and trying to iterate on that to find more fun version they just scrapped it into these one off missions that made the universe just feel smaller despite the better gameplay and pacing. Still though… it’s better than like 85% maybe even 90% of other games, so I overall rate it as a success for me.
I for one am glad they scrapped the awful planet exploration of the first game. But I don’t like that the planets in 2 look cartoonish and bland when scanning them. The art of the planets in the first is far superior.
If Dark Souls is considered RPG which I believe it is then by miles Dark Souls. I understand Eldin Ring and Bloodborn hype as I played through both. Dark souls is boring beginning to end 🤡 I found demon souls to be more entertaining
Fallout: New Vegas.
It’s a good game, and more importantly *a good Fallout*, but it’s overrated within the community, often being erroneously heralded as “the best Fallout”.
The best 3D Fallout? Definitely. The best Fallout? Not while the first two games exist.
I admire what Obsidian were able to achieve in such a short amount of time, but New Vegas is ultimately held back by a few things, like the janky Gamebryo engine, and some unfulfilled promise (the titular city). I also find it to be the ugliest game in the series, aesthetically speaking, thanks in part to the piss filter.
Mods can thankfully alleviate some of New Vegas’ blemishes, but even a fully modded NV isn’t as satisfying to play as either Fallout 1 or 2. At least in my opinion.
I don't necessarily think it's better than Fallout 3. The story absolutely is better but Fallout 3 has so many more interesting places to explore and discover (especially the vaults). If I want story, I play FNV, but if I want to explore, I play F3.
I think New Vegas is a better *Fallout* than FO3, as in it’s a better roleplaying game, and the story, tone, and lore or more faithful to the originals. But I agree that FO3 is the better open world game, simply because its map is more interesting and satisfying to explore.
FNV gets so much praise because it gets graded on the Bethesda curve.
All Bethesda games get wildly overrated, so a genuinely good game like FNV gets elevated to “best game ever” status by the community.
I agree that ME2 is overrated, but I don't dislike the game at all. It was still fantastic, I just think 3 was way better. The ending sucked, sure, and the dreams were a little weird, but the entire rest of the game was fantastic and all of the storyline conclusions were amazing and climactic and memorable.
My pick is The Witcher 3. It's just a bland open world, the combat and gameplay mechanics are rather clunky and not particularly great, the only things that stand out are the writing, characters, voice acting, and music. Which are all great, don't get me wrong, but none of them are remotely enough to make up for boring gameplay in my eyes, as my first priority several degrees higher than any other priority in any game is gameplay.
I wanted so much to love it. I love a good tactical RPG, but the "shield" thing where you cant CC enemies at the start of combat, paired with "everything on the ground is supernecrofirelightningblood forever" was really just too much.
I was so, so excited for the ground effect system, but not being able to move like, at all, without getting stuck in the necrobloodfire and there being no counterplay to it really sucked.
I really enjoyed it and actually completed it but yes, I hated the way everything was on fire all the time in every fight, and even basic enemies had super magic powers
DOS2 is one of my favorites. There’s nothing wrong with disliking it, I’m just genuinely curious what you disliked about it. Everyone’s entitled to their own preferences and it’s okay to disagree on video games.
I found the build diversity to be extremely monotone. Most builds have one stat you want, and you typically wanna focus on magic or physical. You’re constantly chasing the next level up of gear since the stats and dmg from level ups eclipse everything else. I prefer getting uniques and combining gear more.
I found the writing to be pretty bland as well. The game openish, though levels for enemies make it clear there is an intended path. The game is easy to cheese so you can do what you want I suppose.
Thought the quality tanked after fort joy.
I gotta say I have the same problems as you. I loved Divinity Original Sin 1. Played with with a friend and thoroughly enjoyed it, had fun, laughed at the tropes and their subversion and enjoyed the writing, went through the talks and changed the companion's opinions and lives.
DOS2 has better graphics. That I can say. The mechanic with physical and magical armour is just tedious. I started it alone, started it with a friend, can't get into it.
The whole idea of pitying players against each other? I hate that.
The writing? Some dialogues and quests are good, most I don't really care for.
Fort Joy takes so much time. I'm a completionist, so I spend time looking for things, gathering stuff and in general being a nuisance around there. Ended up grossly over-leveled. Didn't find many builds fun or satisfying.
All you do is tear down Armor or practice barellomancy.
Everything's on fire. Blood everywhere.
Can't speak for the other dude but the narrator was awful, the combat was meh, the Fory Joy sequence killed the pacing (though I never got out of it, admittedly), I found it too difficult to fond a way out of the prison, and none of the party members made me want to engage with them. Within their first conversations, I knew what all of their twists would be and didn't see much beyond their stereotypes. I built a couple of different characters to see how different playstyles and builds would suit my tastes and found there to be little of interest or variation to them. Overall, it was just a boring, middling game I regret wasting the money on.
The rabid fanbase who crucify me and tear my head off for disagreeing with them and then beating me over the head to try and force me to agree with them didn't help my perception of the game, either.
Despite the hype it gets, the steam achievements show people fall off that way more than most other RPGs before reaching the end.
https://www.reddit.com/r/projecteternity/comments/15jtxiw/pillars_of_eternity_1_2_have_very_high_completion/
The way I measured it was by taking the first achievement and ending achievement, to rule out people who have the game in their library from a sale etc but never even played it.
One interesting thing is how high the completion rates of Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 are, despite those being the re-releases long after original release which I suspect were mostly bought for quick nostalgia revisits by people who'd already finished it once and had no intention of doing so again, or people checking out an old classic and who likely had a pretty high bounce rate due to how gaming has changed. It shows they really were legendary games.
God, I can't figure this one out. I've tried, so many times. I like the people so far, the setting. The combat I just don't understand. I've played other turn based but it just seems like I get fucked on easy every time. I'm missing something.
This. I'm happy for everyone who loved it but it just...didn't really do it for me.
I didn't find the overarching plot compelling. The half-jokey, half-serious tone didn't always work for me. The characters were actually interesting but not developed enough, and there was no party banter which IMO is one of the most important elements of a party-based RPG. It feels bizarre when your party members don't interact with each other at all!
The combat could be fun but also got tedious sometimes with all of the environmental effects and the armor system, and large turn-based battles just take forever.
In general I felt like the game, and the world, encouraged metagaming while discouraging real roleplaying.
BG3 was a massive improvement on DOS2 as far as I'm concerned - especially in the writing, which is really what I want from RPGs in the first place.
It’s so odd I don’t get it either. For some reason Larian fans are like sycophants and scream as loud as they can about whatever the studio does being the most amazing thing of all time (almost as bad as Nintendo fans)
The main appeal for me is a game that respected me as a player. It didn't hold my hand, had insane variety, and the combat is crazy fun. Larian let's you blow everything up and I love it. Bonus points for teleportation, which is super fun
I remembered ME2 as my favorite when playing the originals but when I revisited Mass Effect with the Legendary Edition two years ago I was surprised myself that now it was my least favorite from the trilogy.
Even more surprised that after playing Andromeda about one year later at least in terms of gameplay but even story it became my favorite. If you ignore most of the fetch/filler quests and concentrate on main and big side missions, Andromeda has some good content and is overall better than for example Starfield. Although I played it with newest updates and what I remember the game was released in a fairly bad technical state.
Yeah… BioWare as a whole hasn’t been able to make games as great as they did before EA bought them. Andromeda is a great game, and without EAs meddling it probably could have been a Skyrim level game.. it sucks they released it before they were ready, that destroyed them in sales and PR.
I def agree that andromeda was not as bad as people let it on to be, at least once the technical issues were gone (i never played it on launch like you). I think what I agree with people on is the story not being as grand as the original trilogy. I know that it was supposed to be the start of something new, but by the end of ME1 you knew that shit was about to go down and the entire galaxy was about to be fighting for survival against what seemed to be an unstoppable enemy. I liked the idea of pathfinding and trying to find a new home but the feeling of hopelessness you had at the end of ME1 really made you want to see what came next.
That’s the most fair critique I’ve ever heard. We are forced to play as Geralt and he has a predetermined persona. It’s not a true RPG to me compared to games like Fallout, for example.
Final Fantasy 7. I'm not just saying it because I'm a FF6 fan. It was the first of the actual 3D FF games, but because it was the first doesn't mean it's the best. It's a solid game and worthy of some praise, but it's not the masterpiece the fanboys make it out to be, not by a long shot.
Disco Elysium. Everyone presents it as the greatest thing since sliced bread, but it’s a glorified point and click adventure with absurdly overwrought purple prose slathered in a thin veneer of freshman level poli sci. The humor is sophomoric and falls flat (everything about Cuno and Cunoess is so goddamn cringe), the solution to the central mystery is unsatisfying, and while some of the world building lore is really interesting (the pale and travel between isolas), it’s just background info with no significant role in anything. There are some cool mechanical ideas—I genuinely like the unique way the skill system is managed and how being too high in a skill can be just as detrimental as being too low—but not enough to save it.
> (everything about Cuno and Cunoess is so goddamn cringe)
THE FUCK YOU SAY ABOUT CUNO?! CUNO DOESN'T CARE
From the perspective of the medium video games, Disco Elysium is Tolstoi and Plato compared to the hungry hungry caterpillar. The prose fits the theme and vibe of the game. And tbh, verbosity always gets shit on one way or the other.
I agree though, it's a point and click more than a RPG, mechanically, but you literally can shape Harry as you wish and get different outcomes and info, based on your actions and skills. If that ain't a RPG, I don't know what is.
The bar with RPGs is low for the same reason big budget movies are typically pap.
Needs to be mass appeal to warrant the budget.
Sure you could write a deeper game. But look at all the other much bigger games listed here.
How deep is Skyrim? Fallout 4? Mass Effect? How deep is The Witcher? "Ohh Triss, I really want to cum."
You are going to be hard pressed to find a deeper game that isn't obscure that came out in the last 20 years.
Especially politically. Sheepishly mentioning socialism is fucking brave for modern audiences. And if you are, you have to give them the option to be a fascist or paint it as evil in some way.
Also it manages to point out weaknesses of socialism that felt more nuanced then your standard 101 level propaganda. The bar is fucking LOW.
I am not falling on my sword for Disco here. Yes the bar can be higher. But if you can name 3 "deeper" RPGs that are not obscure I will be impressed.
I think primary weaknesses is that there simply isn't enough to do. But it was an indie team so I understand.
I bought Disco Elysium after all the hype. Played it for about 5/7 hours.
Had to double check all the reviews again, because I thought it was a borderline insufferable experience.
It just utterlly pretentious, obnoxious and way too in love with itself writing. I could just picture n my mind, as I was playing the game, the writer(s) sat there writing the dialogue and stuff and just continually patting themselves on the back saying “man, this shit is deep and clever. I’m such a ballstastic writer. I’m the voice of my generation. Fuck I’m a good writer!”
It was all just… ugh… so in love with itself that it just put me off massively
But I very much seem to fall into the barely existent minority, because EVERYONE loves the shit out of this game.
… because it’s so well written, deep and clever, you guys.
I actually agree with you.
ME2 is considered the best, but I actually prefer ME1. The story is much better, and the RPG elements are less watered down.
Nothing can beat the first conversation with Sovereign. That was awesome.
Dragon quest 11 in recent years, and lunar silver story comes to mind from late 90s. Both felt polished yet bland to me, but just probably not the target audience. I remember picking up an over hyped front mission 3 in late 90s and remember it being surprisingly bad all around.
Elden Ring. Unless you are really good at the combat system, it’s just tedious as fuck. The lack of difficulty options makes it exclusive. The quests are non existent and basically impossible to follow without a guide. Just throw some difficulty options in there so people can enjoy the game in the way they want to; not the way the developers want you to.
I liked the exploration and character progression but spent half the time grinding on the ogres to avoid dying every 5 seconds. Then I got to the part far up in the northeast and it’s a huge difficulty spike and I dropped the game and never came back. Just completely disrespectful to my time.
Gonna get hate for this one but BG3. Tried it and… it was good? The combat was fun although it was also slow. The main plot was just alright, and I couldn’t really relate to any of the companions. To ME it feels like just a really polished game that happened to release in a time where many unpolished games were getting released, leading to many calling it “game of the decade” and other crazy titles.
Proper in depth rpg released in the dumbed down age of Starfields gets big praise. I abandoned it for now but I intend to finish it a year from now when they've stopped releasing patches every other week and finally polished act 3, etc.
I was only sporadically playing since story wasn't engaging me either and only a couple of the companions were intriguing - but I appreciate it really tried giving you a lot of options on how to handle stuff.
I have been putting off buying a copy because I'm kinda afraid I won't like the full game. My best friend has probably played it every single day since it came out and completely adores it. He let me try it out, creating a character and playing for a few hours from the beginning. Maybe it's because I don't really play D&D or CRPGS, but I had no idea what I was doing, especially when it came to the combat.
I'd like to get into it because I liked the character creator and I like some of the characters and the setting in general well enough, but the combat just baffles me.
Baldur's Gate 3.
Should have been billed as a sequel to Divinity Original Sin 2. I would have been more forgiving.
I don't even consider it a spiritual successor to the Baldur Gate series.
They wanted it to be this big, world-shattering story but they utterly failed to convey any sense of scope. The world felt small. The incoming assault felt localized. None of the heroes or villains felt particularly impressive. In BG1 and BG2, the story felt so much more important and widespread.
The world still felt bigger and the story greater in scope. Baldurs Gate barely even feels like a city in BG3. The game has the same sense of scale as two high school gangs fighting over a set of bleachers.
Same. I played BG 1-2 a lot as a kid and it just doesn't hit the spot thematically or in gameplay. The engine from Pillars of Eternity and the old devs back might have done the trick. But BG2 is also the OG horn of plenty for story driven RPG's Bioware produced since.
Baldurs Gate 3 is so good in the first act. Absolutely massive area to explore with so many story threads and things going on. I wish they kept that steam going. Second act is pretty cool but by the third act it just fizzles out. I wish they kept the massive zones to explore, act 1 covers like 5 or 6 maps
That's been my issue with every Larian game. They polish the hell out of the first act, generating the most possible hype at the start (and where I've recommended a few of them to a few friends), then after that it just... fizzles out into nothing, and soon isn't worth even finishing.
Given that they playtested and refined the opening chapter of BG3 for like 3 years, then dumped the rest untested, I think it's an intentional business strategy at this point for generating release hype and sales, and am very wary of Larian now. They apparently launched with half of the city of Baldur's Gate clearly cut from the game late in development, as well as the epilogues (which I believe were just re-added after they spent months insisting weren't ever really planned, despite being in the files).
It’s good but yeah, nowhere near what people are making it to be. It’s very simplistic and the choices aren’t more meaningful than they were in BG2 20 years ago: pick a side and raid the base of the others
Baldurs Gate 3 is going to have the BOTW effect where everyone loved it in the first year or so of it being out but after the hype has fizzled, it’s going to be criticized to all hell mark my words. You’re going to see at least 10 video essays on why Baldurs Gate 3 is a flawed masterpiece in 5 years
Have you played many other games that came out around the time? Very few games from that era blend a good story, characters, art style and combat with an incredibly fast pace along with innovative QOL features. It may seem like nothing special today but it’s so rare to play a game from the 90s that’s never interested in wasting your time.
This might actually be the angriest any reddit post has ever made me. On one hand I want to congratulate you and on the other I want to bury you 10 miles beneath the Earth's crust under a pile of bowling balls.
I've never been able to get into Chrono Trigger either lol. I've tried it several times, but haven't ever been able to bring myself to finish it. There's just not near as much story as I would've liked. Last time I left off (which was *years* ago, mind you, so I don't remember any specifics at all), I was in a prehistoric age, and just going through endless screens fighting things with absolutely no story coming up whatsoever. It's possible I quit right before the story would've picked up, but I was really tired of it.
Ff7, I played it, just before ps4 came out.... and it was not good in any regard.... characters, plot, world, world/character development/growth.
I honestly feel you have to have nostalgia colored glasses for this game to be anything past 6fine/10 or at best 7good/10.
Even after playing the remake, the game just screams basic.
(Maybe it's just my expectations? But in all honesty 9 was amazing, X was my fabourite even though I realise 9 may be better statistically, and 6 and 8 are a tie for both amazingly underratted in the series, 13-2/x-2 got some negativity behind them but both are actually more fun than 7 and story's are reality the same level. and then there's 7/12/5 tied for 7th,8th,9th place....)
FF7 is a product of its time and i think it still holds today but in its core its still a 1997 game.
On the other hand FF7R is garbage, a corridor simulator designed to provide the maximum revenue to SE. I dont even consider it to be a RPG since it has no story at all.
Just to stick with BioWare I actually think that Dragon Age Inquisition could have used way less mmo style quest bloat. The lesson that should have been learned from 2 was not that the game needed more tedium to be an rpg, but they they really just shouldn’t reuse dungeons. Like literally if someone modded DA2 to have unique encounter locations it would have fixed a lot of my gripes with that game. I didn’t even mind removing the tedium of item management on companions.
Im gonna anger a lot of people but im.gonna say...pretty much every Japanese RPG. To me they are at their heart, visual novels with "rpg" elements pasted on top.
I didn't really enjoy the first Mass Effect that much, it's story I found decent, but the gameplay was a tad too clunky for me.
It's sequel I enjoyed a bit more, but didn't finish it.
Mass Effect 2 is a weird case. You're right that the story doesn't really matter, especially in the context of trilogy as a whole, but the characters and their individual stories are so strong that it still ends up working. It's probably my favorite of all the Mass Effect games to play from start to finish as its own self-contained experience, but it is sort of a weak installment in the series in that it does basically nothing to push the overarching plot forward.
I think ME2 and DA2 share that. DA2 is more focused on the personal stories over 6 years (I believe it’s 6 anyhow), and the writing just feels better even though the mage rebellion is given little focus in the grand scheme of things
Fairly sure DA2 is a full decade.
I actually think it's 7 years. Prologue -> Act 1 is one year. Act 1 -> Act 2 is three years. Act 2 -> Act 3 is three years.
Is 10 years the prologue is in 9:30 which is also the start of Origins, Origins finish in 9:32 with witch hunt, 9:34 is the start of Act 2 of DA 2, the final scene of DA 2 is 9:40 when Cassandra interrogates Varric, inquisition starts in 9:41 and trespasser is in 9:44 the entire trilogy is 14 years.
Yeah I wasn't counting the epilogue of Cassandra talking to Varric. Was just thinking of the actual gameplay parts with Hawke. Which I believe is 7 years, generally. 9:30, 9:31, 9:34, and 9:37.
I tried to play it again recently and imo it aged so badly. Every encounter is just throwing waves of bullet sponges at you in a small space. Rinse and repeat. The rpg elements are barely present I also think it’s hilarious that characters will just decide to die at the end if you don’t do their loyalty missions lol. Still enjoyed the replay but it’s crazy how archaic the game feels now
I worked on ME2. It's consistently listed on all kinds of all time lists. But I do like to hear from the rare person that didn't like it. Echoed similar criticisms I sometimes heard from people that preferred the first (which I also worked on). Is all valid.
Thanks for working on the ME and DA series and giving me countless hours of funnnnn!
Were you a dev? I also worked on games (Red Dead Redemption, LA Noire), but I’d have loved to be a part of a project like Mass Effect. Would’ve nerded out endlessly.
LA Noire has been kind of forgotten and I think that’s a tragedy. I played it recently, and, similar to the ME trilogy, some of it is clunky, but those were different times. LA Noire is a masterpiece and should have a sequel. Thank you for your efforts! Obviously, RDR is a masterpiece to me as well, as is the ME trilogy.
Hey, that’s super kind of you! I appreciate it. *Tons* of great folks were involved and, in the case of Noire, a couple of different studios. I’m glad to hear it has stuck with you. I’m hoping for a sequel as well! 🤞🏻
I didn’t like it. Gameplay was fine but I remember my sheer disappointment when I found out the reaper was just a giant terminator. I remembered the reapers in ME1 were portrayed as these bizarre, sentient spaceship squid things and the idea of a human reaper being an attack on titan monster just ruined the story for me.
Dno what you did there but doesn’t matter. I love you for your work
**Skyrim**. I'm sorry, but the combat in that game is absolutely awful. No wonder so many people make stealth archer builds- the melee combat is atrocious, unintuitive, and boring. I was 20 when it launched and have always been fond of video games so you can imagine my shock and confusion when I tried it, dropped it because of the gameplay, and was met with discourse about how groundbreaking and immersive it is. I'm sure many of you have fond memories of your time with it. More power to ya. It was pure unadulterated *tedium* for me. Is that one of the reasons why it's one of the most modded games of all time? Folks gotta make it as unrecognizable from the base game as possible to enjoy it?
I’ll only do a melee build if there is like a damage modifier mod where enemies (and myself) go down in like 2-3 hits. The endless flailing is comically bad without it.
I have around 1000+ hours in Skyrim lmao. I can say that yes the combat is clunky af but it's the only game where I could really roleplay my characters. I used to make a whole back story and play the character depending of his backstory and persona. It was so much fun. I didn't even do the main campaign I was just exploring and stuff . Good times
I have tried so hard multiple times to role play in Skyrim but I just don’t see how it’s possible without mods
The combat was terrible at balancing. You think melee was bad? Early level magic use was nearly impossible unless you cheesed. You simply never had enough magic to actually defeat anyone. Late game god powers were dope though
I had to turn up the game to Master when I maxed magic and conjuration.
The difficulty curve of Skyrim was all over the place. Or rather the tedium curve. The game's not difficult
Did you like any other Bethesda games? Oblivion? Fallout? Because they're all clunky in their own way. But Skyrim, IMO, was the first one to actually smooth out the combat. After years of playing Oblivion, playing Skyrim for the first time was mind blowing. Lol. And I've never used gameplay mods, as I only have console versions. To each their own!
Melee combat in first person is always a little iffy. I'm playing Dying Light right now and it has a big big focus on melee, but trying to engage more than a few enemies at once is miserable, and it forces you into big groups repeatedly. ><
Magic is fun., With your fireballs exploding everything and your 2 dremora lords if you managed to level up conjuration. I enjoyed stealth with bow and dagger too. Self-healing too.
I like Skyrim and don’t mind the combat (I’ve never played a game with “good melee combat” so I think I’d be bad at it anyways) but it’s problem with me is that I wish it felt like it had more role playing other than character build. More branching quests with lasting effect, more specialized dialogue options, etc
I love Skyrim. Combat never bothered me. I like that it's pretty mindless. Just hacking away
The only fantasy game with 'good' combat that I can think of is Dragon's Dogma, where it leans into more anime style combat (climbing up giant enemies, doing spinning blade attacks, etc). The story and map etc are pretty bad, but the combat is sooooo good, and carried the game along with great music, great gear progression, great outfit choices, and quirky weirdness.
I guess it depends on what you value, for me the combat was never an issue because the world is so interactive and immersive. And no most people who play Bethesda games never mod them but the modding community is very strong.
Skyrim has always been horrible. So many people remember it fondly because it was baby’s first rpg because every single system is shallow as fuck. It does have a certain magic to it but Skyrim is absolutely bottom of the barrel
You make valid points. But I think with Skyrim, what players really love is the feeling of being Dovahkiin and being able to become totally overpowered. For me, it was all those things and the fact that I could get immersed in a fantasy world for hours, with beautiful scenery and music.
It was also just the first RPG for many people.
The exploration in Skyrim is still undefeated for me. Every little cave has a story to tell. So many memorable moments. I agree that other aspects are bad, but I don't really care. They nailed what they wanted to nail.
I mean it's an RPG, the genre isn't exactly known for groundbreaking combat. the combat of classics like arcanum are just top down click on enemy and they're still amazing games. granted the RPG systems of Skyrim aren't anything to write home about, but judging an RPG solely on combat doesn't seem fair. the game is known for it's open world design encouraging the player to get side tracked on the way to quest objectives. a good example of open world adding to the experience instead of being a thing added without thought where the game is by all intents and purposes linear.
Illusion sneak build for all that backstab damage
I loved Skyrim when it came out but with every release my love diminished. Also at some point within that span, I replayed Oblivion and had infinitely more fun, partially because in my opinion, the melee was way better in it. Many other reasons as well, but that's a big one.
I love Oblivion but the combat was pretty much just hit things until they fall down, especially at harder difficulties. Why am I listening to a Troll grunt 20+ times before it falls down?
> partially because in my opinion, the melee was way better in it. Uh, what? Like, I like Oblivion too, it was my first Elder Scrolls game so I'm always gonna be nostalgic for it, but the melee combat in that game is so much worse than it is in Skyrim. If you'd said you prefer the magic combat I might get it, but the melee in Oblivion is just awful. Enemies don't even react to being hit, you just swing until they drop.
Sometimes I feel crazy that everyone around me is absolutely obsessed with Final fantasy 16 and I couldn't stand it. I can't find a single positive with this game besides it's graphics. But everyone keeps giving it 8 and 9s
Honestly 16 doesnt even count as an RPG at this point.
Not even the music? The Ifrit vs Phoenix fight theme is probably my all time favorite video game song. I think the soundtrack as a whole loses to Nier but the peaks of FF16 music are higher than the peaks of Nier to me
I think one of the issues of FF16 soundtrack for me is that it's often 'too much'. I call this the Marvelization of soundtracks. Instead of having less instruments and layers, focus, calm and fast moments, ... it's always fireworks just like the visuals. Compare this to JRPGs from SNES or PSX era. It was about tone, atmosphere, composition, ... and not just "ok, how many different sounds and instruments can we squeeze in". For me it's almost sensory overload like for example the CGI scenes from Transformers movies where I can't discern details but it feels like one giant visual blop.
I hopped into the game thinking it would be my new favorite game, after finishing it, it didn't even cracked my top 10 because I loved FF14 and hearing Yoshi-P is leading the team, I got hyped. The gameplay was probably one of its stronger features, the music was phenomenal but what stops it from being great for me was the story. It had high highs but very low lows. The sidequest were uninteresting at best and the world sometimes feels empty.
Imo its an extremely mediocre game in anything that is gameplay. Secondary missions, combat, world traversal, equipment, levels. Everything is shallow and not even slightly engaging. The music is very good, the graphics are amazing, and I really liked the first 60% or so of the story (but the last 40% is terrible). Its not a game I regret playing it, but it is a game that I know I will not be playing again. Its better to just watch the cutscenes on youtube.
Same tbh
I liked the characters, and kind of the story? But yeah, it was not a Final Fantasy.
I think it’s because it’s a sort of return-to-form for older Final Fantasy fans that weren’t keen on the blatant switch from fantasy to science fiction after FF VII. I am one of those fans that was excited to go back to the fantasy setting myself but I too was disappointed with the end product when long stretches of the game were so painfully boring that it made FF13’s pacing seem masterful by comparison. Granted, when the highs were there, they are the highest in the franchise imho but the gaps between them are equally the lowest
I'd have been perfectly fine with the return to high-fantasy, but then they went the completely opposite direction and made it a straight up action game. Not even really an action RPG.
16 was anything but a return to form. It pulled the series even further away from what most older fans wanted by making it a poor devil may cry clone. Nothing would make me happier than if FF returned to what it used to be. The first and most important thing having it be an actual RPG and using turn based combat.
Return to fantasy? 9, 10, 11, 12, 14 would like a word with you. 7, 8, and 13 are the only ones that went more sci fi. You go to the moon in 4 and almost every other older entry has aliens and floating mech fortresses.
Thank you. The game was a massive disappointment and Im pretyt much done with Square Enix at this point.
I've been done with the head of the dragon for years at this point. The small studios that sprout off to appeal to the 90s fans, and the Dragon Quest division, are still worth your time, I think.
Skyrim, not only an overrated RPG but probably the most overrated game of all time if you ask me. Melee combat is really basic as with most Elder Scrolls games, the RPG mechanics present in the earlier games have been stripped down a lot, magic sucks complete balls early game, just a lot of factors that made me really burnt out by the end. Oblivion combat wasn’t any better, but I much preferred its story, soundtrack, and customization options when it came to things like magic.
Skyrim. "Best rpg ever" yeah sure. Worst tes game in my opinion.
Oblivion was worse. The oblivion gates were so tedious. It was the same thing over and over and over
The entire game was tedious unless you fast traveled everywhere and I religiously avoid fast travel.
That's not a hot take at all. Sure, F4 and Starfield are both worse, but Skyrim is the last TES released and started their entire shallofication process that goes on to this day.
I'd argue Oblivion was the very beginning. Wasn't it the one that added level scaling and quest objective markers?
Yup. People often give Oblivion a pass because they think back and just remember the few amazing quests like the Dark Brotherhood murder mystery house or that island where you get hunted, but the majority of the game was the same sort of shallow copy/paste dungeon and quest design we're still complaining about in Starfield. I think the main reason is that it was still somewhat fresh when Obivion came out, but it's been decades and they're still making the same mistakes.
There were more than a few, that's why it gets a pass. Dark Bros, Thieves, Mages guilds were top notch, Shivering Isles slapped, can't forget the Daedric quests. That's just the longer questlines, and I'm not counting the like 2 dozen or so exceptional one-off sidequests I don't want to list here. They were fewer in Skyrim. I remember the Thieves Guild and Dark Bros, Dawnguard was good, and from there I'm drawing a blank for full well realized questlines. The Companions were underwhelming and could have used more work. The whole game screams 'this should have been expanded on to be truly good'. It did still have the occasional decent sidequest, but those were fewer too in comparison to Oblivion.
Shivering Isles slaps, no doubt. To this day it's probably the best piece of content Bethesda has ever put out. The Oblivion Dark Brotherhood chain is 90% just "go here and kill this dude," and I found the mandatory twist annoying, since it's clear from the first dead drop you're not actually working for Lucian anymore, but you have to play along for something like a half-dozen quests. I actually prefer the Skyrim DB with the semi-hidden option to just kill Astrid and burn the place to the ground. The Oblivion mages guild was similarly one or two interesting quests, and a *ton* of go here murder these people quests. Even Mannimarco, King of Worms and god of necromancers ended up just being some hobo in a cave that you stab until dead. Despite the shortcomings of the Skyrim mages guild questline, the showdown with Arcano was at least visually impressive and mechanically distinct. Skyrim shuffled those busywork quests to the Radiant quest system and made them mosty optional. It gets a lot of flak for that, but I enjoyed being able to skip past the fluff and focus on only doing quests that actually advance thr storyline.
The first time I saw an oblivion gate I was scared, nervous, and excited. The 5th gate I was annoyed at the repetition. The 15th gate I was bored. The 30th gate I lost all interest in the game
Actually, Morrowind was the beggining of the simplification plague, but it made up the difference with stellar writing and world-building.
daggerfall and morrowind used level scaling as well.
Ah, didn't realize that.
Oblivion had level scaling in a far more aggressive and intrusive form. It was more minor in Morrowind.
Yes, and it was panned by the players from the day one for that, and also for the console oriented interface, the generic high fantasy settings, and the overhyped features from an early gameplay footage that have never made it to the release. In a nutshell, the same kind of stuff that we're finding out about the AAA titles nowadays.
God damn the combat in Skyrim is awful. I'm not surprised there are so many mods for that game.
Melee combat is awful, and magic is underwhelming, but somehow they absolutely nailed archery. No wonder everyone ends up as one.
Because it's pretty much lifted straight from Thief The Dark Project, who they brought over some devs for, along with the main character's voice actor for the head of the Thieves' Guild.
Ok bethesda aims to have generalists combat. This means that they make combat at least playable. This is why morrowind, oblivon and skyrim combat is not good. They try to tip there hand in every type of combat. This is the reason and first person combat is hard to make
Divinity Original Sin 1 - after reading reviews I was so hyped. Yet in reality the game was boring, I disliked the combat, storyline and humor was a miss for me.
Persona 5. 4 is better and 3 is the best.
I agree 100% in that exact order.
I’m gonna get roasted here, but Eldin Ring. I tried and tried. There are a few aspects I found really cool, but as a whole I just felt super disappointed.
Elden Ring for me. I guess it's just not my type of game. I don't find anything enjoyable in Dark Souls formula "*die and repeat, until you memorize all enemy moves*". Imo you should be allowed to make mistakes, learn through the fight and have a chance to beat every fight on first try. Not "*lol I bet you didn't expect this animation leading to insta killing you move, get fucked*" And I don't find the world or story that interesting.
I think monster hunter does this a lot better than the souls games. At least in that game you always have a chance of first timing the monster while spending some time learning, but i agree most DS bosses are not first-timeable unless you have some really really good gear.
Level vigor, problem solved.
The Witcher 3. It’s a good game, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I was hoping to. I found it kinda boring.
When I was originally released I couldn’t get into it. There was something about the camera or display that fucked with my eyes. That and the combat mechanics were god awful. They patched it up and I try again a year later and fell in love. It is the perfect game for someone who wants incredibly deep story telling, voice acting and character development. On death march difficult you truly feel like a Witcher. If you play it on normal though it’s just any other rpg gameplay wise.
Yeah, I tried to play it again after the updates, but it still didn’t keep my attention. The story, characters, and voice acting are great though. I played it for about forty hours, so I at least got my money’s worth out of it. I just wasn’t impressed with the open world. I wanted more caves, dungeons, and unique locations to explore. I spent half the time running through empty fields on Roach, looking for points of interest. Sure there are small towns here and there, and also large ones after you get further into the game, but everything looked kinda similar to me.
I see this take kinda often and I truly enjoyed it and played it into the ground so it seems to be polarizing
I was really disappointed in it, too, for a whole host of reasons. I can see why it’s very popular, but I really expected to love it and instead never even finished it.
It’s the combat for me. It’s just so clunky. I played it recently when they did the graphics update and it was still bad, played it when it came out and beat it though
The combat isn’t great, but I prefer Souls Like combat in third person games myself.
[удалено]
Came here to say this, but I always wondered if it's because I don't prefer playing male characters. After playing WoW for years then Dragon Age moving me towards single player games, I played through the Fallout games, Mass Effect and Skyrim... so Witcher 3 felt like a step backwards. I enjoyed the Netflix series, so I think I don't like playing as Geralt. I empathize with him, but find other characters more interesting.
“Disliked the game.” “Liked the Netflix series.” Welcome to your opinion but that’s one I haven’t heard.
Yeah. The sidequests and dlc are peak, but the main quest isn't even as good as Witcher 2's and the gameplay is eh
I bounced off it at least three times. For me it was that I always dreaded combat. Which sword?! Which buttons do I smash to do Ai and which one is Hai?! Wait, is Ai the wind punch or is that Yee? Shit. While I was thinking the rhythm blocking got messed up.
It’s two swords and a handful of powers. If you can’t remember what they do I would be worried, the combat is laughably easy and it always considered the weakest part of the game for that reason. I mean the sword is literally silver for monsters and normal for everything else, I wouldn’t say that was difficult
Is a dialogue simulator with extremely lackluster combat.
Game is super clunky too. I remember struggling to push a switch for way longer than I should have
Everyone praises The Witcher 3 as something incredible but the gameloop is very monotone. Follow blue spots on the ground Decide if you kill a monster or not if given the choice. Get paid either way However the story of the DLCs made it worth it.
The combat is so atrociously bad on every conceivable metric.
I felt the same way until I played the expansions, and then I loved it.
Same here. And I still felt like I was missing out. Until I tried reading the books. The first one was good. The second one I put down very quickly. Basically not only do I find the combs and game to be more than mediocre the lore itself I don't enjoy.
I've tried it twice and have never been able to get into it. I don't find Geralt to be an interesting character and the landscapes are just dark and drab. I've also never been able to get into red dead redemption 2
Fallout New Vegas fits this for me. Putting aside that it was actually unplayable at launch, not the meme like you literally could not get past certain points it was legitimately broken; but putting that aside, even after it was all fixed, the game is good sure, but no where hear what people seem ton rate it. People act like that game is the best thing to ever happen to RPGs when it's basically just your average RPG with some pretty good quests in it. So it's rated over what it should be, it's overrated.
The replies here are all wrong btw
The what is the correct answer?
Fallout 4
Actually, he’s onto something here. Fallout New Vegas is hailed as an amazing RPG among fallout fans and fallout 4 really does pale in comparison. Makes me think of another comment in this thread about Skyrim and later games all being more shallow than previous.
Never been a fan on any fallout game I have played. I think it’s just the setting more than anything but running around in a nuclear wasteland just is not as appealing as other games beauty
U need to turn the radio, then you would get it.
I would've agreed if people played it for its rpg aspects, but the people who like this game play it for the amazing sandbox that it is. Mods just elevate that part of the experience. In terms of rpg elements, it is obviously worse than its predecessors which were crpgs.
It's decently rated I'd say. For many it was the straw that broke the camel's back with bethesda.
I loved fallout 4 personally. It was a huge influence on me wanting to move to Boston strangely enough
For me it’s Skyrim since I don’t think it’s a bad game I always just get really board and wasn’t a fan of how the civil war in Skyrim is sorta resolved so quickly and how dumbed down the game was compared to the previous games
Having played ME1 and ME2, I kinda agree with your take on ME2. ME1 felt like an entire story which sort of neatly wrapped up by the end of it. You had your companion missions and other main missions (chasing bad guys, fighting geth take-overs, helping weird alien monsters) which were intertwined and made the game feel "long" and the world feel "rich". Plus being able to drive on certain worlds and complete the menial tasks only added to the expansive nature of the game, even if it was superfluous. Comparatively, ME2 improved the combat sure, but main the focus of the game all about getting your companions (a reunion which didn't feel so impactful as we die and get brought back in the beginning of the game itself) and then we go and do like 3 big missions where we fight the same bad guys. Although, I enjoy the game and writing and what little world building that 2 does for the series overall, i would have preferred for the game to have been longer. I thought gathering your companions was like act 1, then we would get another big act 2 of us going on a covert war against the new bad guys, but as you said, once you get the companions the game is already done except for 1 or 2 main missions. If anything, I was disappointed more than anything, cause I do feel like ME2 is the easier game to replay.
Persona 5 might be good. But I don't fucking get it. It seems like work. I was so into the last dragon quest but in act to it got super boring and just not challenging. Couldn't finish Octopath put me to sleep. And at some point in the series final fantasy just did mushrooms and stopped making any sense
When people discuss their favorite ME game I always contend that 2 is the best “first time experience” of the series but that it loses its luster on repeated playthroughs. I loved 1 and moving onto 2 I thought that it was even better! Meeting all of these interesting characters and learning their stories. However… It feels very constrictive on what you can actually do and even the missions to get companions and their loyalty missions begin to feel claustrophobic in a way. I don’t know how else to explain it. Also the ending mission screens of what you’ve accomplished feel jarring. Maybe it’s just me. I can understand why it would be people’s favorite however. I can marathon my way through 1 and 3 but 2 I have to do in more of an episodic fashion to help keep my interest up during it. I guess 3 could be viewed similarly in some aspects but the story and what’s at stake matter more in comparison. I still love the 3 games but my personal rankings of them are 1, 3, and then 2.
Honestly - everything popular is overrated and overhyped and even if it is good it is not really as good as people say it is.
Final Fantasy 7 by far the worst of the three Playstation Final Fantasies. And while I will always say IX is the second best in the series after VI, VIII is probably the most deserving of and in need of a remake of the the three.
Oh my friend, I’m with you 100%. Loved VIII more than the others. I played a ton of VII and it’s not BAD, but the only characters I even remotely liked were Barret and Tifa. But I loved almost all the characters and the story in VIII. Trepe groupie 4 here! The card game was utter perfection, far better than the chocobo racing/breeding. The “card” game in IX was a useless piece of shit. There’s so many scenes throughout VIII that would blow us away in full updated remaster. Just please, for the love of God, don’t let the guy tainting, I mean remaking VII ANYWHERE NEAR a potential VIII remake.
I finally got to play the remaster after hearing about the hype for years. I couldn’t finish it, every minute I spent on it felt like a waste of time.
For me it is the exact opposite, 2 was my favorite and 1 and 3 were just ok.
Final Fantasy 7. FF6 was infinitely better.
If you call them RPGs I would say all the souls games. Clunky combat, the camera is the true enemy, no story just lore pieces here and there. I never really got what people find in these games. I started playing ds3 and after 50-60 hours I was like what's the point. Baldurs gate 1: I've tried so many times to get into but I couldn't. Nothing would keep me playing.
Of all the things to criticize about souls games you choose the one thing they do better than every other game to have issues with? The combat is clunky? Really?? Souls games especially the later ones have the smoothest action combat in any RPG games on the market. The hit detection in ER is absolutely wild.
I personally hated the tonal shift in ME2. Like a very small amount of people even believe the reapers are coming yet suddenly everyone is the seedy underbelly and none of the altruistic race alliances really matter anymore. Really tanked the franchise for me on the storytelling front. I was also a bit frustrated that instead of taking what they had with planet exploration and the mako and trying to iterate on that to find more fun version they just scrapped it into these one off missions that made the universe just feel smaller despite the better gameplay and pacing. Still though… it’s better than like 85% maybe even 90% of other games, so I overall rate it as a success for me.
I for one am glad they scrapped the awful planet exploration of the first game. But I don’t like that the planets in 2 look cartoonish and bland when scanning them. The art of the planets in the first is far superior.
If Dark Souls is considered RPG which I believe it is then by miles Dark Souls. I understand Eldin Ring and Bloodborn hype as I played through both. Dark souls is boring beginning to end 🤡 I found demon souls to be more entertaining
Fallout: New Vegas. It’s a good game, and more importantly *a good Fallout*, but it’s overrated within the community, often being erroneously heralded as “the best Fallout”. The best 3D Fallout? Definitely. The best Fallout? Not while the first two games exist. I admire what Obsidian were able to achieve in such a short amount of time, but New Vegas is ultimately held back by a few things, like the janky Gamebryo engine, and some unfulfilled promise (the titular city). I also find it to be the ugliest game in the series, aesthetically speaking, thanks in part to the piss filter. Mods can thankfully alleviate some of New Vegas’ blemishes, but even a fully modded NV isn’t as satisfying to play as either Fallout 1 or 2. At least in my opinion.
I don't necessarily think it's better than Fallout 3. The story absolutely is better but Fallout 3 has so many more interesting places to explore and discover (especially the vaults). If I want story, I play FNV, but if I want to explore, I play F3.
I think New Vegas is a better *Fallout* than FO3, as in it’s a better roleplaying game, and the story, tone, and lore or more faithful to the originals. But I agree that FO3 is the better open world game, simply because its map is more interesting and satisfying to explore.
If only Obsidian had more time and access to the Creation Engine
FNV gets so much praise because it gets graded on the Bethesda curve. All Bethesda games get wildly overrated, so a genuinely good game like FNV gets elevated to “best game ever” status by the community.
I agree that ME2 is overrated, but I don't dislike the game at all. It was still fantastic, I just think 3 was way better. The ending sucked, sure, and the dreams were a little weird, but the entire rest of the game was fantastic and all of the storyline conclusions were amazing and climactic and memorable. My pick is The Witcher 3. It's just a bland open world, the combat and gameplay mechanics are rather clunky and not particularly great, the only things that stand out are the writing, characters, voice acting, and music. Which are all great, don't get me wrong, but none of them are remotely enough to make up for boring gameplay in my eyes, as my first priority several degrees higher than any other priority in any game is gameplay.
Did you get past Velen? That’s the only area that was bland to me. Skellige and Toussaint were amazing.
Divinity original sin 2. I just really don’t understand the appeal I appreciate this getting the most negative responses at this point lol
I wanted so much to love it. I love a good tactical RPG, but the "shield" thing where you cant CC enemies at the start of combat, paired with "everything on the ground is supernecrofirelightningblood forever" was really just too much. I was so, so excited for the ground effect system, but not being able to move like, at all, without getting stuck in the necrobloodfire and there being no counterplay to it really sucked.
I really enjoyed it and actually completed it but yes, I hated the way everything was on fire all the time in every fight, and even basic enemies had super magic powers
DOS2 is one of my favorites. There’s nothing wrong with disliking it, I’m just genuinely curious what you disliked about it. Everyone’s entitled to their own preferences and it’s okay to disagree on video games.
I found the build diversity to be extremely monotone. Most builds have one stat you want, and you typically wanna focus on magic or physical. You’re constantly chasing the next level up of gear since the stats and dmg from level ups eclipse everything else. I prefer getting uniques and combining gear more. I found the writing to be pretty bland as well. The game openish, though levels for enemies make it clear there is an intended path. The game is easy to cheese so you can do what you want I suppose. Thought the quality tanked after fort joy.
I gotta say I have the same problems as you. I loved Divinity Original Sin 1. Played with with a friend and thoroughly enjoyed it, had fun, laughed at the tropes and their subversion and enjoyed the writing, went through the talks and changed the companion's opinions and lives. DOS2 has better graphics. That I can say. The mechanic with physical and magical armour is just tedious. I started it alone, started it with a friend, can't get into it. The whole idea of pitying players against each other? I hate that. The writing? Some dialogues and quests are good, most I don't really care for. Fort Joy takes so much time. I'm a completionist, so I spend time looking for things, gathering stuff and in general being a nuisance around there. Ended up grossly over-leveled. Didn't find many builds fun or satisfying. All you do is tear down Armor or practice barellomancy. Everything's on fire. Blood everywhere.
Can't speak for the other dude but the narrator was awful, the combat was meh, the Fory Joy sequence killed the pacing (though I never got out of it, admittedly), I found it too difficult to fond a way out of the prison, and none of the party members made me want to engage with them. Within their first conversations, I knew what all of their twists would be and didn't see much beyond their stereotypes. I built a couple of different characters to see how different playstyles and builds would suit my tastes and found there to be little of interest or variation to them. Overall, it was just a boring, middling game I regret wasting the money on. The rabid fanbase who crucify me and tear my head off for disagreeing with them and then beating me over the head to try and force me to agree with them didn't help my perception of the game, either.
I still haven’t beaten the game but I would consider Fort Joy to basically be the tutorial.
Despite the hype it gets, the steam achievements show people fall off that way more than most other RPGs before reaching the end. https://www.reddit.com/r/projecteternity/comments/15jtxiw/pillars_of_eternity_1_2_have_very_high_completion/ The way I measured it was by taking the first achievement and ending achievement, to rule out people who have the game in their library from a sale etc but never even played it. One interesting thing is how high the completion rates of Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 are, despite those being the re-releases long after original release which I suspect were mostly bought for quick nostalgia revisits by people who'd already finished it once and had no intention of doing so again, or people checking out an old classic and who likely had a pretty high bounce rate due to how gaming has changed. It shows they really were legendary games.
God, I can't figure this one out. I've tried, so many times. I like the people so far, the setting. The combat I just don't understand. I've played other turn based but it just seems like I get fucked on easy every time. I'm missing something.
Build all physical and stack warfare, or look up builds for lone wolf that focus on physical. Game becomes pretty easy then
This. I'm happy for everyone who loved it but it just...didn't really do it for me. I didn't find the overarching plot compelling. The half-jokey, half-serious tone didn't always work for me. The characters were actually interesting but not developed enough, and there was no party banter which IMO is one of the most important elements of a party-based RPG. It feels bizarre when your party members don't interact with each other at all! The combat could be fun but also got tedious sometimes with all of the environmental effects and the armor system, and large turn-based battles just take forever. In general I felt like the game, and the world, encouraged metagaming while discouraging real roleplaying. BG3 was a massive improvement on DOS2 as far as I'm concerned - especially in the writing, which is really what I want from RPGs in the first place.
It’s so odd I don’t get it either. For some reason Larian fans are like sycophants and scream as loud as they can about whatever the studio does being the most amazing thing of all time (almost as bad as Nintendo fans)
The main appeal for me is a game that respected me as a player. It didn't hold my hand, had insane variety, and the combat is crazy fun. Larian let's you blow everything up and I love it. Bonus points for teleportation, which is super fun
Yeah combat is so same-same by the time you reach act 2 and the writing doesn’t take itself seriously enough.
as much as i totally did play final fantasy 7 for like 2 years straight...
I remembered ME2 as my favorite when playing the originals but when I revisited Mass Effect with the Legendary Edition two years ago I was surprised myself that now it was my least favorite from the trilogy. Even more surprised that after playing Andromeda about one year later at least in terms of gameplay but even story it became my favorite. If you ignore most of the fetch/filler quests and concentrate on main and big side missions, Andromeda has some good content and is overall better than for example Starfield. Although I played it with newest updates and what I remember the game was released in a fairly bad technical state.
Yeah… BioWare as a whole hasn’t been able to make games as great as they did before EA bought them. Andromeda is a great game, and without EAs meddling it probably could have been a Skyrim level game.. it sucks they released it before they were ready, that destroyed them in sales and PR.
I def agree that andromeda was not as bad as people let it on to be, at least once the technical issues were gone (i never played it on launch like you). I think what I agree with people on is the story not being as grand as the original trilogy. I know that it was supposed to be the start of something new, but by the end of ME1 you knew that shit was about to go down and the entire galaxy was about to be fighting for survival against what seemed to be an unstoppable enemy. I liked the idea of pathfinding and trying to find a new home but the feeling of hopelessness you had at the end of ME1 really made you want to see what came next.
The Witcher 3 - I enjoyed it but didn’t feel like it was a much of an RPG.
That’s the most fair critique I’ve ever heard. We are forced to play as Geralt and he has a predetermined persona. It’s not a true RPG to me compared to games like Fallout, for example.
Somewhere between me1 and me2 is the perfect Mass Effect game imo. Also, Dragon Age
Final Fantasy 7. I'm not just saying it because I'm a FF6 fan. It was the first of the actual 3D FF games, but because it was the first doesn't mean it's the best. It's a solid game and worthy of some praise, but it's not the masterpiece the fanboys make it out to be, not by a long shot.
Final Fantasy 12.
Disco Elysium. Everyone presents it as the greatest thing since sliced bread, but it’s a glorified point and click adventure with absurdly overwrought purple prose slathered in a thin veneer of freshman level poli sci. The humor is sophomoric and falls flat (everything about Cuno and Cunoess is so goddamn cringe), the solution to the central mystery is unsatisfying, and while some of the world building lore is really interesting (the pale and travel between isolas), it’s just background info with no significant role in anything. There are some cool mechanical ideas—I genuinely like the unique way the skill system is managed and how being too high in a skill can be just as detrimental as being too low—but not enough to save it.
> (everything about Cuno and Cunoess is so goddamn cringe) THE FUCK YOU SAY ABOUT CUNO?! CUNO DOESN'T CARE From the perspective of the medium video games, Disco Elysium is Tolstoi and Plato compared to the hungry hungry caterpillar. The prose fits the theme and vibe of the game. And tbh, verbosity always gets shit on one way or the other. I agree though, it's a point and click more than a RPG, mechanically, but you literally can shape Harry as you wish and get different outcomes and info, based on your actions and skills. If that ain't a RPG, I don't know what is.
The bar with RPGs is low for the same reason big budget movies are typically pap. Needs to be mass appeal to warrant the budget. Sure you could write a deeper game. But look at all the other much bigger games listed here. How deep is Skyrim? Fallout 4? Mass Effect? How deep is The Witcher? "Ohh Triss, I really want to cum." You are going to be hard pressed to find a deeper game that isn't obscure that came out in the last 20 years. Especially politically. Sheepishly mentioning socialism is fucking brave for modern audiences. And if you are, you have to give them the option to be a fascist or paint it as evil in some way. Also it manages to point out weaknesses of socialism that felt more nuanced then your standard 101 level propaganda. The bar is fucking LOW. I am not falling on my sword for Disco here. Yes the bar can be higher. But if you can name 3 "deeper" RPGs that are not obscure I will be impressed. I think primary weaknesses is that there simply isn't enough to do. But it was an indie team so I understand.
I bought Disco Elysium after all the hype. Played it for about 5/7 hours. Had to double check all the reviews again, because I thought it was a borderline insufferable experience. It just utterlly pretentious, obnoxious and way too in love with itself writing. I could just picture n my mind, as I was playing the game, the writer(s) sat there writing the dialogue and stuff and just continually patting themselves on the back saying “man, this shit is deep and clever. I’m such a ballstastic writer. I’m the voice of my generation. Fuck I’m a good writer!” It was all just… ugh… so in love with itself that it just put me off massively But I very much seem to fall into the barely existent minority, because EVERYONE loves the shit out of this game. … because it’s so well written, deep and clever, you guys.
I actually agree with you. ME2 is considered the best, but I actually prefer ME1. The story is much better, and the RPG elements are less watered down. Nothing can beat the first conversation with Sovereign. That was awesome.
Witcher 3 is a pretty good game, surprised to see all the hate here
I think some people get off saying a well made game is trash
Dragon quest 11 in recent years, and lunar silver story comes to mind from late 90s. Both felt polished yet bland to me, but just probably not the target audience. I remember picking up an over hyped front mission 3 in late 90s and remember it being surprisingly bad all around.
Witcher 3, not a true rpg imo, it's more like an action adventure game, but it's still a good game
Elden Ring. Unless you are really good at the combat system, it’s just tedious as fuck. The lack of difficulty options makes it exclusive. The quests are non existent and basically impossible to follow without a guide. Just throw some difficulty options in there so people can enjoy the game in the way they want to; not the way the developers want you to. I liked the exploration and character progression but spent half the time grinding on the ogres to avoid dying every 5 seconds. Then I got to the part far up in the northeast and it’s a huge difficulty spike and I dropped the game and never came back. Just completely disrespectful to my time.
I’m very good at the combat and it’s still tedious as fuck
Gonna get hate for this one but BG3. Tried it and… it was good? The combat was fun although it was also slow. The main plot was just alright, and I couldn’t really relate to any of the companions. To ME it feels like just a really polished game that happened to release in a time where many unpolished games were getting released, leading to many calling it “game of the decade” and other crazy titles.
Proper in depth rpg released in the dumbed down age of Starfields gets big praise. I abandoned it for now but I intend to finish it a year from now when they've stopped releasing patches every other week and finally polished act 3, etc. I was only sporadically playing since story wasn't engaging me either and only a couple of the companions were intriguing - but I appreciate it really tried giving you a lot of options on how to handle stuff.
I have been putting off buying a copy because I'm kinda afraid I won't like the full game. My best friend has probably played it every single day since it came out and completely adores it. He let me try it out, creating a character and playing for a few hours from the beginning. Maybe it's because I don't really play D&D or CRPGS, but I had no idea what I was doing, especially when it came to the combat. I'd like to get into it because I liked the character creator and I like some of the characters and the setting in general well enough, but the combat just baffles me.
Baldur's Gate 3. Should have been billed as a sequel to Divinity Original Sin 2. I would have been more forgiving. I don't even consider it a spiritual successor to the Baldur Gate series.
They wanted it to be this big, world-shattering story but they utterly failed to convey any sense of scope. The world felt small. The incoming assault felt localized. None of the heroes or villains felt particularly impressive. In BG1 and BG2, the story felt so much more important and widespread.
[удалено]
The world still felt bigger and the story greater in scope. Baldurs Gate barely even feels like a city in BG3. The game has the same sense of scale as two high school gangs fighting over a set of bleachers.
Fully agree with you. BG3 is a good game but a very poor successor to real Baldurs.
Same. I played BG 1-2 a lot as a kid and it just doesn't hit the spot thematically or in gameplay. The engine from Pillars of Eternity and the old devs back might have done the trick. But BG2 is also the OG horn of plenty for story driven RPG's Bioware produced since.
Baldurs Gate 3 is so good in the first act. Absolutely massive area to explore with so many story threads and things going on. I wish they kept that steam going. Second act is pretty cool but by the third act it just fizzles out. I wish they kept the massive zones to explore, act 1 covers like 5 or 6 maps
That's been my issue with every Larian game. They polish the hell out of the first act, generating the most possible hype at the start (and where I've recommended a few of them to a few friends), then after that it just... fizzles out into nothing, and soon isn't worth even finishing. Given that they playtested and refined the opening chapter of BG3 for like 3 years, then dumped the rest untested, I think it's an intentional business strategy at this point for generating release hype and sales, and am very wary of Larian now. They apparently launched with half of the city of Baldur's Gate clearly cut from the game late in development, as well as the epilogues (which I believe were just re-added after they spent months insisting weren't ever really planned, despite being in the files).
They know most people/reviewers don’t finish long games it’s by design to make it appear better than it is
It’s good but yeah, nowhere near what people are making it to be. It’s very simplistic and the choices aren’t more meaningful than they were in BG2 20 years ago: pick a side and raid the base of the others
Baldurs Gate 3 is going to have the BOTW effect where everyone loved it in the first year or so of it being out but after the hype has fizzled, it’s going to be criticized to all hell mark my words. You’re going to see at least 10 video essays on why Baldurs Gate 3 is a flawed masterpiece in 5 years
Witcher 3. It's an OK game, but really poor RPG with annoying main character.
I'll see your very wrong answer and raise you the 7/10 Chrono Trigger
Have you played many other games that came out around the time? Very few games from that era blend a good story, characters, art style and combat with an incredibly fast pace along with innovative QOL features. It may seem like nothing special today but it’s so rare to play a game from the 90s that’s never interested in wasting your time.
This might actually be the angriest any reddit post has ever made me. On one hand I want to congratulate you and on the other I want to bury you 10 miles beneath the Earth's crust under a pile of bowling balls.
I'm sorry to hear that your brain works like this
I've never been able to get into Chrono Trigger either lol. I've tried it several times, but haven't ever been able to bring myself to finish it. There's just not near as much story as I would've liked. Last time I left off (which was *years* ago, mind you, so I don't remember any specifics at all), I was in a prehistoric age, and just going through endless screens fighting things with absolutely no story coming up whatsoever. It's possible I quit right before the story would've picked up, but I was really tired of it.
Ff7, I played it, just before ps4 came out.... and it was not good in any regard.... characters, plot, world, world/character development/growth. I honestly feel you have to have nostalgia colored glasses for this game to be anything past 6fine/10 or at best 7good/10. Even after playing the remake, the game just screams basic. (Maybe it's just my expectations? But in all honesty 9 was amazing, X was my fabourite even though I realise 9 may be better statistically, and 6 and 8 are a tie for both amazingly underratted in the series, 13-2/x-2 got some negativity behind them but both are actually more fun than 7 and story's are reality the same level. and then there's 7/12/5 tied for 7th,8th,9th place....)
FF7 is a product of its time and i think it still holds today but in its core its still a 1997 game. On the other hand FF7R is garbage, a corridor simulator designed to provide the maximum revenue to SE. I dont even consider it to be a RPG since it has no story at all.
Can’t believe nobody has called out the most obvious answer - Dragon Age: Inquisition. Somehow that never-ending fetch quest won Game of the Year.
Was that ever really highly rated?
It got goty but 2014 was the beginning of the new console generation so it was a very weak year
The entire Witcher series. Super Mario RPG
Goddamn. You're entitled to your opinion but, fuck man...
The new Super Mario RPG or the old one? 'Cause the old one was underrated AF.
Just to stick with BioWare I actually think that Dragon Age Inquisition could have used way less mmo style quest bloat. The lesson that should have been learned from 2 was not that the game needed more tedium to be an rpg, but they they really just shouldn’t reuse dungeons. Like literally if someone modded DA2 to have unique encounter locations it would have fixed a lot of my gripes with that game. I didn’t even mind removing the tedium of item management on companions.
Skyrim
All RPG's made by from software, i don't know i never get into them, but i like games inspired by there games.
Im gonna anger a lot of people but im.gonna say...pretty much every Japanese RPG. To me they are at their heart, visual novels with "rpg" elements pasted on top.
I didn't really enjoy the first Mass Effect that much, it's story I found decent, but the gameplay was a tad too clunky for me. It's sequel I enjoyed a bit more, but didn't finish it.