Giving RPGs another chance

[boatofcar]

I used to be really into RPGs...Final Fantasy, Dragon Warrior, Chrono Trigger...However, I didn't buy a Playstation, so I quit playing RPGs until I got a PS2 when it came out just to play FFIX. I played it, it was cool, not as good as FF3 or Chrono Trigger, but I figured that this was the way to go. Then I spent 113 hours on Dragon Warrior VII. Not something I'd want to repeat, but it gave me something to do for a summer :)

Then, FFX...I hated it. After thinking really hard about it, I guess I just didn't like how my player spoke all the time. I miss the older games where your player didn't say much...it was like the designers left it up to you how you wanted to feel and react, and didn't just let you watch a FMV sequence where you talked and talked and talked...I guess the best example of this is Chrono Trigger...I don't think my character spoke much, if at all, in the game. When you iinteracted with people, they talked to you, and you yourself got to feel whatever you wanted about it. The game didn't decide how your character would react to things (for the most part). In FFX, I didn't mind all the video, but I hated all the talking my player did.

Anyway, point of all this, I'm giving RPGs another shot. I just got Chrono Cross off ebay, and I hope it can rekindle the feelings I used to get every Christmas when I'd get a new RPG for Chistmas (usually the only game I'd get new every year). Are there any other RPGs I should try where your character doesn't get in the way of how you feel all the time?

My longest post ever, by far. X_x

[GaijinPunch]

If that's what you want, you'll need to go for some 16-bit RPGs. 32-bit stuff introduced the idea of the characters needing to STFU.

I just played FFVII for the first time and it wasn't too bad.

[WiseSalesman]

Chrono Cross does have a mute main character, but don't expect it to be as good as CT. It's good, don't get me wrong, just not AS good.

Other ideas? Let's see....

You know, I honestly don't think I understand what you mean. You say you liked FFIII (one of my favorites as well), but you don't like your characters talking, whcih confuses me. I'm pretty sure all the characters talked...a lot, really....in FFII and FFIX both.

My suggestions? I don't know, I really like Grandia 2, for DC, but the main character is a loud mouth smart-ass at the beginning, so you may not. I honestly haven't played much of the curent generation of RPGs. I really liked Vagrant Story too, although that's not traditional. Maybe look into that one.

[gwaine]

Boat...like your avatar...big Smiths fan here...head up your way quite a bit to see shows at 9:30 and Constitution Hall

[boatofcar]

Chrono Cross does have a mute main character, but don't expect it to be as good as CT. It's good, don't get me wrong, just not AS good.

Other ideas? Let's see....

You know, I honestly don't think I understand what you mean. You say you liked FFIII (one of my favorites as well), but you don't like your characters talking, whcih confuses me. I'm pretty sure all the characters talked...a lot, really....in FFII and FFIX both.


I guess FFIII was the exception, although there wasn't exactly a character that the game said was supposed to be you, exactly...and back in 94 or 95 when that game came out, it was so much cooler than any other RPG I'd ever played, it didn't matter. It wasn't so much that all the players talked either...the dialogue left a lot of things open, and when you were controlling (is this spelled right?) the player, he or she never answered back when talking to someone. I think that is what gets on my nerves more than anything.

gwaine: I almost went to 9:30 to see Belle and Sebastian awhile back...the lead singer got sick and they cancelled the show though.

[WiseSalesman]

Hey, I just remembered! I'm not very far into Lunar: The Silver Star Story Complete, but the main character (who is supposed to be you) hardly says a word! You might want to look into it, it's been a lot of fun so far. I think I paid around $30 on eBay for it, complete with all the "collectors" goodies.

[Kid Fenris]

Try either of the first two Suikoden games, in which the main characters say nothing that isn't dictated by the player. Star Ocean: The Second Story might be a good choice as well, since its plot is decidedly 16-bit in tone. I wouldn't suggest Valkyrie Profile for you, though. It has a very distinct protagonist.

If you look somewhere other than the PlayStation, check out Skies of Arcadia on the Dreamcast, Fallout 1 and 2 on the PC, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic on the Xbox (and PC).

[le geek]

I second that all the Suikodens Rock. They have an old school flavor to them that the later Final Fantasies don't. The first Suikoden has some of the best music I've heard in a game to boot...

Cheers,
Ben

[kainemaxwell]

My first rpgs back in the day were the Dragon Warrior titles. Anyhow I know what you mean, especially with FFX- I want to continue but can't push myself too.

[hezeuschrist]

I think you're missing the point. In FF3(US), all the characters talked and the story was decidedly predetermined, as were all the vocal reactions of the characters. There just wasn't enough technology back in the day to convey the kind of emotions to the player like they can now with the amazing facial expression and voice acting they can with FFX/X-2. Now some of the voicing in X was crap because it was molded to the original japanese mouth movments, but it got much better in X-2... although the story and atmosphere went way downhill.

Sure Tidus was a whiney pussy, but that's the way the creators wanted you to see him. I really suggest you go back and try FFX again and instead focus on Auron, Jecht, and the kickass plot rather than how much of a cunt your main characters is. Who knows, maybe they also wanted Cecil to be a whiney pussy who was Kain's bitch... we'll never know.

Now, that's not to say that you can't have a main character in a current RPG who is the strong silent type like the cookie cutter mold of the 8-bit and 16-bit days. Cloud for example... but he's kind of a whole other story. The protagonist in Chrono Cross is silent, but he looks like a goober and would ultimately be thought of as a big pussy in comparison to other characters in that game and other RPG main heroes. Still an excellent game though.

[Dahne]

If you really want a character that is completely dictated by you, then the Baldur's Gates and Planescape: Torment would be perfect. The main character talks a lot, but EVERYTHING he/she says is decided by you.

[BoOchan]

I'm personally Very, Very picky with RPG's. I like a lot of the ones for SMS, Especally Wonderboy 3 and 4 for SMS, 4 which I can complete in 2 1/2 hours easily. I don't mind Morrowind, etc but I'm not really into 32/128 Bit RPG'S, Way to many Visuals and talking...

[Griking]

All the talking was the reason I couldn't stomach finishing Sukioden III when I bought it a while back. Too much clicking while my character mindlessly gabbed on and on and on about absolutely nothing.

Then again, I'm an old school RPGer who's used to games like the Bard's Tale and Wizardry. Every now and then you'd find a NPC who would say something to fill you in on storyline but you wouldn't get bored listening to a life story.

Even the Ultima games where you needed to speak to everyone wasn't as bad as many of today's games. When the NPCs would talk they would be short, sweet and too the point.

[SpasticFuctard]

I agree with Dahne, the Baldur's Gate games, The Icewind dale games, even Neverwinter Nights (The new Expansion rocks my socks) rock hard, simple text responses which control the outcome of the game. Knights of the Old Republic is in a similar vein, and is awesome AND console based. It was enough for me to buy an Xbox based on it's socks rocking beat. That game was the bomb diggity, and I also look forward to Jade Empie which used the same engine. Bioware rocks RPG, nuff said.

[calthaer]

I want to second or third or whatever the Baldur's Gate / other PC RPG sentiments. These Japanese RPGs are just too...I don't know. Smarmy? It's just like...they're clichéd and tired.

I was just playing Metal Gear Solid for the first time, and while it's not an RPG it uses a lot of the same tired story-telling things. It's like "oh no, I am a nuclear scientist...and so was my father...and my grandfather worked on the MANHATTEN PROJECT oh no teh curses of nuclear disaster run through my DNA!!!!!!1" I was like "come on, man - way to use drama like a sledgehammer." No subtlety, inept foreshadowing, EXTREMELY linear gameplay...

I remember those dumb plot twists in FF8, too - "Oh nos! We are all ORPHANS - AND TEH EVIL QUEEN WAS OUR NANNY!!!!!! THIS STOREY BY JEFFK!!!!!1"

Those PC RPGs - especially Planescape: Torment - are pretty free-form and you don't feel as much like you're on some railroad tracks just making a bunch of stops between the long, non-interactive (and smarmy) cut-scenes. Torment had a lot of talking, but it was meaningful. Your character chose different responses that were NOT just different ways to reach the same story path. A lot of times console RPGs are like "Will you help me or not? Y / N" and then if you say "No" they're like "DON'T BE GHEY! Will you help me or not? Y / N" until you say "yes." That is lame.

Give PC RPGs a shot. Even the ones that are a "joke" like Freedom Force are a lot better than some of the trite stuff that comes out of Japan, IMO.

[WiseSalesman]

Give PC RPGs a shot. Even the ones that are a "joke" like Freedom Force are a lot better than some of the trite stuff that comes out of Japan, IMO.

I find your opinions on this subject to be rather ridiculous. First of all, comparing console RPGs to PC RPGs is difficult to begin with, because while console RPGs are like reading a book/watching a movie, PC RPGs are more like a "choose your own adventure". Secondly, although I absolutely LOVED Freedom Force, the entire thing was trite, linear, and cliched. Hell, Metal Gear Solid had a MUCH better story than any of Tom Clancy's stuff I've read, let alone most of the other schlock that tops the best seller list these days.

[dmhawkmoon]

GET BREATH OF FIRE FIVE... NOW!

BOFV is a barebones yet gripping RPG, and it's tough too. It's a survival RPG, it has an emotional plot, and yet, it's simple. No giant cutscenes or anything like that. No pretty supermodel characters. You're a bunch of ragged people living in a ragged underground mess. It's good stuff and you'll want to finish it even if you get owned a few times.

[WiseSalesman]

Is BOF5 Dragon Quarter? If so, I own it, and hearing that it's difficult makes me REALLY want to give it a shot.

[calthaer]

Freedom Force is trite and clichéd because it is making fun of the conventions it is copying. Japanese RPGs use / abuse the conventions and attempt to be serious.

If you want to watch a movie, fine - but that's not what the original poster wanted. In fact, if I want to watch a movie, I'll watch a movie...but when I play a game, I want to play a game - not have to push a combination of buttons to make my movie go forward, especially when the movie is hackneyed.

Besides, the method of delivery has nothing to do with whether it's smarmy or not...and who was talking about those best-seller books? I wasn't comparing japanese stories to them, I was comparing them to the stories of console RPGs - which, even though they are not as linear, they ARE story-based.

I mean...even some of the translation - like there was this line in Chrono Cross where a guy says to you "YOU CAN ONLY LIVE STRONGLY BECAUSE LIFE IS LIMITED!" I was like "What you say?!" Tom Clancy is no Shakespeare and his stuff is very formulaic, but at least his characters don't go around saying "Somebody set up us the bomb!"

[Spoony Bard]

Is BOF5 Dragon Quarter? If so, I own it, and hearing that it's difficult makes me REALLY want to give it a shot.
Dragon Quarter is my favorite RPG released this year simply because it combines a number of ideas and features that I love.

-The game has a set number of enemies. You win a battle, you'll never fight it again unless you restart the game somehow.
-I liked the idea of a storyline where the characters lived underground but want to reach the surface. I'd have used it myself one day if Capcom hadn't beaten me to it.
-Its a pseudo-dungeon hack. You have sword+1's, randomly occuring treasure chests, but the dungeon's are always setup the same.
-The battle system is one of the most involving and complex that I've ever used. You can chain moves together to form new moves, you can set up trap fields, there is an element of space to it.
-The game gives you a very realistic reason to advance the storyline.
-The game gives you the ability to overcome any boss fight, but punishes you for it at the same time. You have 100% points of dragon to use. Wyrm kills everything. But if you hit 100%, game over. You have to use Wyrm conservatively, because while it kills anything, it isn't without its drawbacks.
-It doesn't punish you for saving, but it removes the element of safety from it. Its Resident Evil style saving; you use items at terminals to make a hard copy of your data.
-Its short enough to play through quickly, but has enough stuff for you to do that you can take a while playing through it.
-It actually gives you a good reason to play through the game after you've cleared it (you get to see a number of new story sequences that flesh out the story more).

Overall, it takes some initial adjustment, but its a great game given the chance.

[Kid Fenris]

I must admit that I find PC RPGs, on the whole, to be somewhat bland and uninvolving. While players have the ability to pick many paths and direct conversations, the results are seldom surprising, unique, or at all effective at holding my interest. Offering choices isn't nearly as important as rewarding them, and from my experience, the PC RPGs capable of building intriguing worlds and telling interesting stories are relatively few. Planescape: Torment is easily my favorite, though I also liked the Fallout titles, Knights of the Old Republic, and Septerra Core (which is halfway a console RPG in structure).

(Edit: And the original Bard's Tale, to go way back.)

Perhaps it goes back to something Eugene Jarvis pointed out in an interview long ago: well-established borders make for the most engrossing games. Console RPGs that flow in a largely straight line have their shortcomings (and, if ineptly made, will lose me faster than the PC equivalent), yet they also have a certain coherency, a directness of expression and immersion that's rare in PC RPGs.

All the same, I wouldn't write off PC RPGs entirely, and you might enjoy them considerably more than console RPGs if you like a lot of paths to tread. Planescape: Torment is a great place to start exploring the genre. It'll run you about ten bucks at most retailers.


I was just playing Metal Gear Solid for the first time, and while it's not an RPG it uses a lot of the same tired story-telling things. It's like "oh no, I am a nuclear scientist...and so was my father...and my grandfather worked on the MANHATTEN PROJECT oh no teh curses of nuclear disaster run through my DNA!!!!!!1" I was like "come on, man - way to use drama like a sledgehammer." No subtlety, inept foreshadowing, EXTREMELY linear gameplay...

What of Revolver Ocelot's dialogue, Miller's little speeches, or Meryl's initial remarks? Nothing on par with Murakami or Chesterton or Gaiman there, but Metal Gear Solid is a bit cleverer than a cursory glance (or its anti-nuclear overtures) implies.


I remember those dumb plot twists in FF8, too - "Oh nos! We are all ORPHANS - AND TEH EVIL QUEEN WAS OUR NANNY!!!!!! THIS STOREY BY JEFFK!!!!!1"



Nah, if JEFFK made an RPG, it'd be TEH CASTAL ADVENTARE (http://www.somethingawful.com/articles.php?a=345).

And for all the halfway warranted flack that Final Fantasy VIII gets on account of its two or three goofy plot twists, it at least had me playing to the end.

[dmhawkmoon]

Its Resident Evil style saving; you use items at terminals to make a hard copy of your data.

Yeah, you only get like 11 permanent saves per game (found as items) or something like that. You can save any time with a save that deletes itself upon reloading, though. So you can actually quit play midgame easier than normal even though you get so few real saves.

[hezeuschrist]

I also find it ridiculous to compare Japanese RPG's to western RPG's. You can't compare Morrowind to Final Fantasy X... they aren't even close to the same type of game. To say you don't enjoy Japanese RPGS's that are designed to be epic movies is fine, but to say that they're trite and bad based on your personal bias is just wrong.

[Kid Fenris]

I also find it ridiculous to compare Japanese RPG's to western RPG's. You can't compare Morrowind to Final Fantasy X... they aren't even close to the same type of game. To say you don't enjoy Japanese RPGS's that are designed to be epic movies is fine, but to say that they're trite and bad based on your personal bias is just wrong.

Easy there. Calthaer's perfectly within his (her?) rights to air an opinion on RPGs, since it's just that: an opinion, and not some official study that anyone could take as fact.

I don't think it's wholly unfair to compare RPG styles, as they use similar gameplay elements. Of course, favoring one over another is an entirely personal matter.

Besides, we're getting away from the issue at hand: helping Boatofcar find old-fashioned RPGs. You could always try the GBA, Boat. Golden Sun and Lufia: The Ruins of Lore make use of the silent-hero model.

[hezeuschrist]

Compare the styles, sure. But to compare individual games would be like comparing Chess to Devil May Cry, or to simply write of the entire genre and say it sucks is like saying you think XXX musician is a no-talent hack because you don't like the music they play.

Just say it's not for you and move on. It's certainly helpful in this thread :roll:

[Ed Oscuro]

I remember those dumb plot twists in FF8, too - "Oh nos! We are all ORPHANS - AND TEH EVIL QUEEN WAS OUR NANNY!!!!!! THIS STOREY BY JEFFK!!!!!1"

Nah, if JEFFK made an RPG, it'd be TEH CASTAL ADVENTARE (http://www.somethingawful.com/articles.php?a=345).

*counting my blessings*

Still, I'm glad that I (along with some other people here) are intelligent enough that you don't look at a game like Metal Gear Solid and say "Masterful blathering!" It really does get silly at times, and knowing the guy behind it (I remember Hideo Kojima once "forecasting" the games he was interested in creating for the year as if he were a weatherman) doesn't really make it go down any easier...

[Kid Fenris]

Still, I'm glad that I (along with some other people here) are intelligent enough that you don't look at a game like Metal Gear Solid and say "Masterful blathering!" It really does get silly at times, and knowing the guy behind it (I remember Hideo Kojima once "forecasting" the games he was interested in creating for the year as if he were a weatherman) doesn't really make it go down any easier...

Can love bloom on the battlefield for Ed?

I'm guessing that it can't.

[calthaer]

Hey for all my criticisms of MGS I'm still playing it - it's not a bad game, I'm more commenting on the storytelling that's going on. I'm sorry, but some of it is just laugh-out-loud funny, it's so ridiculous. At the same time they've really done a good job of updating the Metal Gear gameplay and making it compelling. I'm just waiting for that nerdy "Otaku" doctor to throw off his clothes, dance around in his underwear, and go "YATTA!"

And speaking of gameplay, I think it's entirely appropriate to compare western vs. eastern RPGs, since they're both on the shelves competing for our purchasing dollars and they're both RPGs using a lot of the same mechanics (experience, levels, usually some epic story, professions, battle that is generally turn-based, etc.). The poster is saying that he enjoys games with those sorts of mechanics (Bard's Tale was one of my favorites, too...in fact I think I'm going to go change my avatar back) but doesn't enjoy long-winded and non-interactive cut-scenes. Since that is one of the defining (or annoying, depending on your perspective) aspects of a lot of Japanese RPGs (and their story-telling methods), why not comment on it and compare?

[SpasticFuctard]

that JEFFK RPG is the best ever!

have you a sword in your shorts to bring the kingdom to peace without a fairy gnome?

SF