What is it about old school RPG's?

[Feidb]

I like the old school games "jus' cuause". Yup, it's hard to define.

I like the sense of adventure and discovery. Yeah, the newer games may have that, but sometimes they just don't seem to be doing it right.

I actually prefer the crappy old 2D graphics to the 3D. The 2D seems to have brighter colors, isn't all pointy looking, and doesn't blur and stutter and skip like some do if your video card isn't up to snuff.

One thing I hate is 3rd person. I'm a 1st person guy. Yeah, Eschalon is 3rd person, but there is none of that **#^&^$*# AI to deal with, pathfinding, characters wandering off, etc.

I also like turn based. Yeah, I'm 56 and my reflexes are not what they once were. However, I wasn't much faster 20 years ago when I started playing computer games like Phantasie, Bard's Tale, and the original gold box D&D games.

Games I thought would have a lot of potential were Baldur's Gate, Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights, etc. However, despite all the D&D ties, those games just plain suck. Why? That **#&&$ 3rd person isometric view, the crappy AI, and in the case of Dungeon Siege, a rigid linear game.

Sure, Eschalon is 3rd person, but in this case it's tolerable because it is not too complicated. Yes, I wish it were 1st person, but it has so many other things I like that I can overlook that.

I loved the Elder Scrolls series but Oblivion is just too slick. I don't like that the monsters level up with you so you have the same challenge everytime you fight. I also don't like the narrow variety of monsters. I am about halfway through it and keep putting it aside. One day maybe I'll finish it.

My favorite D&D computer games of all time are the Might & Magic series. They had it all. Party play, crappy but gorgeous 2D graphics, first person, turn based.

I'm not just hankering for the good old days either. I like technology, I appreciate it. However, when so much is put into the technology and little is put into the story, or the spirit of the game, I just lose interest.

What I'd like to see in Eschalon: Book II? A bigger world, more freedom on the maps to cover the whole area instead of just specific paths. A larger variety of monsters. Explanations of each spell. A fly spell. Party based. And of course, first person. However, I can live with the 3rd person as long as things don't get too fancy.

[Nepharis]

*bump*

I mope around pining for a repeat of my first Escape Velocity experience. Or my awe at Deus Ex. I guess a lot of it is nostalgia.

QFT. Two greatest games ever made, hands down (with Portal coming in at a distant but significant third ). EV was a 2D, top-down mix between space shooter, trading game, and general awesomeness. Simple but shiny graphics, great story, and open ended with so many different paths to take... you could join the meanie 'Federation, help the Rebellion cause, get caught up in a battle between neighboring independents (I always sided with Lethe.. never sure why *shrugs*), or just run around hunting pirates. There's a very good chance I've played that game for a thousand hours; in fact I played it last week when I was "back home". I loved it because it engaged my imagination, and let me take control of the game. Sadly, it was and still is only playable on Macintosh OS 9, but it's memory lives on (and actually I think there's a full-conversion mod for EV:Nova that recreates the original).

Deus Ex is the pinnacle of first person RPG gaming. Great story, great game mechanics, technically linear story but your actions dictate deviations in the narrative. I will forever hate the Xbox for killing the franchise: Deus Ex 2 was released (simultaneously?) for Xbox and PC, and as a result of consoles (esp. the xbox) sucking horrific balls for FPS games, the game was completely gimped. It was a flop, and thankfully quickly faded into oblivion, leaving only a sore memory to blemish the incredible achievement that was the original Deus Ex.

I play games (and, specifically RPGs) for the same reason I read fiction, and that's to immerse my imagination in a new reality. This is what the classic crpg's did. Along with Escape Velocity, the other game that was central to my childhood was Exile III: Ruined World. The graphics were nothing special.. top-down 2D turn-based rpg (Eschalon draws a lot on this type of game), but the world... The world was *enormous*, there were large cities and towns and remote outposts and countless NPCs you could talk to; you could spend days (real time, no joke) just exploring the world, hunting down ancient artifacts, I suppose there was the main quests as well. The other big games I loved were Fallout 1 & 2; again, just all around great immersion fantasy. If it drags you in, it's good.

For me, that's what the crpg's were all about, was immersion. At least for me (and I'm sure there are plenty of others who do/did this), when you build a party, one of those characters is *you*. It's the whole idea of an avatar.. you aren't just leading around a bunch of random dudes, you are *in the game*, and image yourself projected into that fantasy world. Games, and particularly crpg's, are the ideal for providing this immersive world, moreso than books, and much moreso than television, obviously. Uh, yeah... it looks like I've gone on quite a rant here. Maybe I'll edit this later to actually have a point.


Cheers,
~nepharis

[GSV3MiaC]

I don't mind all the sexy new technology, I just wish they'd apply some more of it to the actual GAMEPLAY, and less to the sound, graphics, etc. I mean 'physics engines' for Krisake .. who cares if the bodies bounce realistically (well someone must, but not me).

These days all I see is stuttering / tearing video frames, I get stuck in walls (as do the attacking monsters), and the whole thing degenerates into a clickfest, or co-ordination test platform game, or whatever. Please leave most of your brain at the door...

1st person was fun, at first (Eye of the Beholder 1, iirc, at least for me), but ultimately I think we might have been better off with 3rd person turn based, where there is more tactics and strategy and less 'how fast can I click'.

[Cal]

Obviously these people never played some of the earlier Wizardries.

Ahhh...the memories. Starting out, tiptoeing down the first corridor, get into a single fight, win it (...barely...) then sprinting back down the corridor to Gilgamesh's Tavern praying you don't get another random encounter!

Those damn Scruffy Men...Vorpal Bunnies...Murphy's Ghost...

Why oldstyle games? For me, great memories such as I've just described. I read a lot, sci-fi and fantasy...playing those games allowed me to be part of a story. I was the one swinging the swords or casting the spells or picking the locks on the chests.

[Maelstrom]

Obviously these people never played some of the earlier Wizardries.

Ahhh...the memories. Starting out, tiptoeing down the first corridor, get into a single fight, win it (...barely...) then sprinting back down the corridor to Gilgamesh's Tavern praying you don't get another random encounter!

Those damn Scruffy Men...Vorpal Bunnies...Murphy's Ghost...

Or kicking in that first door, taking out the humanoids (orcs) without taking any damage and going to the second and getting decimated by those Scruffy Men or slimes before crying "Mommy!" and heading back to Gilgamesh's. Wiz I was $50 and for a 5th grader in the 80's that was a ton of cash! I saved my allowance for half a summer to buy that game and played it many times before I got KOD (Knight of Diamonds).

Did you ever get the Marasuma blade? Dang that thing did some damage! I only had one party find that thing in all the times I played the game. The funniest one was the Blade Cuisinart! My best friend and I couldn't stop laughing after finding that one for the first time!!

[txa1265]

old school RPG's that there is such a big fan base

Everyone else has described why we like them ... but there is a problem with your initial reasoning.

Because there *isn't* such a big fan base.

Why else would these games be developed by hard-working indies with no backing rather than large studios? Imagine that a large dev could buy the ToEE engine and set a dozen folks on it to churn out a 100+ story-based game that would make us all weep with joy ... but they don't. Why? Because there is no money in it.

The entire market for these games isn't even big enough to be rounding error for a game like Halo 3 ...

[Cal]

Did you ever get the Marasuma blade? Dang that thing did some damage! I only had one party find that thing in all the times I played the game. The funniest one was the Blade Cuisinart! My best friend and I couldn't stop laughing after finding that one for the first time!!

Muramasa Blade...and yep, I did.

My all-time favourite weapon, tho', was from a game called Dragon Wars. By the same people that did Bard's Tale 1-3, I think. Anyway, it was called the Gatling Bow. Equip it with the Magic Quiver, and you got a result like "monster his 137 times for 5467 damage".

[realmzmaster]

Memories! These are the games most of us grew up with. You could play the hero or the leader of the party. You were responsible for keeping your characters alive and mapping out the terrain. There you are deep in the dungeons your party hanging on by a thread after defeating the group of slimes.

Your party is in desperate need of healing. Your cleric is out of healing spells. Your cleric is in need of healing. You have to make a mad dash to the inn. The inn was usually the save point in the game. You had to find a healer, but the healer was back in the town with the inn. You sat on the edge of your seat hoping aganist hope that no other group of monsters block your way. Sometimes you made it, a lot of times you did not. Now with a half dead party you had to find a way to beat a group of fresh monsters.

If you made it back to the inn and the healer, you could not wait to do it again! Some of the CRPGs had puzzles. NeverWinter Nights 2 (one of the better newer CRPGs) had Nine Hells as one of the games. Some of the Might & Magic CRPGs had card games. The games tested your brain power not just your reflexes.

I remember playing Alternate Reality: City(one of the first CRPG's with a pseudo 3D perspective and weather effects). There was heavy rain. I had just had an encounter I was poisoned and all my supplies were stolen. I have only a same gem left. My hit points and attributes were dropping. I was running around trying to find the healer, when the dreaded words came up: Encounter! out of the rain spring in front of me a ninja!

I thought I was doomed! Luckily I was not surprised. ( if I had been surprised, the ninja would get the first action.) I was given my list of choices. My mind started clicking as I went down the choices.

Attack (pure suicide in my condition) Run away (not fast enough) Bribe (with what? I had only the gem. I needed that to trade with the healer) Greetings (not likely) Bluff (???)

After weighing the choices, I bluffed. It worked! The ninja left me alone. I stumbled into the healer. Unforunately, the healer wanted gold. I had to find a place to sell the gem!
There was a store next to the healer. The store was still open (yes in Alternate Reality shop keepers had store hours!) I sold the gem and crawled back to the healer. I do mean crawl. You speed decreased as you weaken. I was finally patched up. I had to find an inn with my remaining money to restore my stats. The healer save me, but could not restore all my stats. I walk down the street until I found the inn and rented a room.

This is why I like old school CRPGs. I remember this as if it was yesterday. With the newer CRPGs I really do not remember events like this. Eschalon brought back some of those memories.

[Jude]

What Nepharis said.

Jude