Single must play title of the older PC RPG's

[DaveSimmons]

Planescape: Torment has a lower difficulty than BG2.

In BG2 if you play it as intended (with a normal character and party, not with some edited solo uber-character fighter), the mage battles are more complicated than in NWN with dueling buffs/debuffs, spell sequencers, time stops...

 

[Fenixgoon]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
Nothing beats BG2 + mods and PS:T.

That said, NWN1 had some GREAT community modules like Tales of Arterra, Dreamcatcher and Hex Coda. But, IMO, the OC of NWN1 was garbage by Bioware standards.

I really enjoyed Hordes of the Underdark. It's much more action-oriented than NWN1's original campaign and you level up at a much better pace. NWN1 felt sooooo slow.

 

[Martimus]

NWN was great because of the massive number of player made campaigns, and the easy to use development tools that came with it. The actual original campaign was pretty horrible. The two expansions were better, but by no means great. Even so, I played this game perhaps more than any other due to the great replay value of the thousands of player made campaigns that often were much better than the official campaign. Also, it was cool trying out new classes all the time, as each was bad-ass in its own way.

I haven't played any of the other titles. Mostly because most of those titles were released while I was in College and I had absolutely no time to play video games. (I was either studying or partying, so gaming wasn't really an option)

 

[KlokWyze]

I tried to play BG2 twice, but could never get into it. The gui is strange and I think I tried to play it on hard... didn't ever really understand what was happening or what I was supposed to do. I think I'll check it out, try to get that widescreen mod to work and have the patience to figure out wtf is going on.

I have to throw Ultima 7: The Black Gate & the expansion Serpent's Isle in there because that game(s) is fucking awesome. You really have to have the patience and intelligence to complete these games though because they are pretty damned hard. If you take a break and forget EXACTLY what you've done and we're you're going you could spend like 10 hours back tracking and double checking with NPCs. Big world, lots of humor, good combat, awesome items, decent story. :thumbsup:

 

[s44]

Originally posted by: KlokWyze
I tried to play BG2 twice, but could never get into it. The gui is strange and I think I tried to play it on hard... didn't ever really understand what was happening or what I was supposed to do.

It's pretty straightforward if you have an old-school D&D background. If not, read the game mechanics part of the manual pretty carefully. Also, try playing the tutorial first.

 

[Arglebargle]

Originally posted by: 9mak9
I just wish I can get that damn widescreen mod to work for PS:T but I have failed.

I got it to work on my system, but it did take two seperate tries. The first one included lots of headbanging....

 

[shortylickens]

Originally posted by: s44

Originally posted by: KlokWyze
I tried to play BG2 twice, but could never get into it. The gui is strange and I think I tried to play it on hard... didn't ever really understand what was happening or what I was supposed to do.

It's pretty straightforward if you have an old-school D&D background. If not, read the game mechanics part of the manual pretty carefully. Also, try playing the tutorial first.

I keep telling people to play the tutorial but they never listen.
The GUI is perfect IF you know how to play the game. Everything you need is right there and frankly, I found managing the inventory much easier from a full screen menu rather than the tiny little box they make you use in NWN 1 and 2.
Same with KOTOR. In KOTOR 1 the menu did not enlarge with the game resolution and was an annoying little postage stamp at 1600x1200. In KOTOR 2 they made it scale with the game resolution and at 1600x1200 you could see everything easily.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: Arglebargle

Originally posted by: 9mak9
I just wish I can get that damn widescreen mod to work for PS:T but I have failed.

I got it to work on my system, but it did take two seperate tries. The first one included lots of headbanging....

I got it working in BG2, but never did in Torment.

 

[Gothgar]

Baulders Gate 2....

I must have played through that game a dozen times, actually, more easily

 

[Wardawg1001]

BG2, no question. Honestly I've spent more time on BG1 than BG2, but thats mostly cuz I played it through like 10 times before BG2 even came out, and when it did come out my PC was pretty crap (was pretty taxing just to run BG1 on it). Picked up BG2 finally and its definitely the top of the line best DnD based RPG ever made.

 

[TheVrolok]

Originally posted by: shortylickens
If you think Neverwinter Nights is too complicated I'm pretty sure Baldurs Gate would not sit well with you.

This. BG/BG 2 are generally considered to be the best PC RPGs of all time. Some people will argue PS:T, but I think the overall reviews give the slight edge to BG. I know I personally preferred BG (but PS:T was awesome, too). But like shorty said .. if NWN is too complicated, BG isn't any easier.

 

[PhatoseAlpha]

Thinking back, and taking off the rose colored glasses, I'd have to honestly say skip them all.

Torment's combat is uninspiring, and you can get the good bits by reading a script.
BG1's combat was just as uninspiring, and since it was low level AD&D combat and you're therefore made out of glass, it's frustrating to boot.
BG2 is entirely dependent in the early game on you having played BG1. Without doing so, the intro is a bunch of unimportant strangers you have no reason to care about. Not much for a gripping experience, unless you played BG1. And you really don't want to play BG1.
The fallouts, while I loved them dearly at the time, wasted stupid amounts of time with unnecessary animation. New Reno in Fallout 2 is a perfect example of why 'quick mode' is needed in turn based combat.


They were great in their day, but their day is gone. Put up to modern standards by someone without nostalgia to ease the painful bits....they won't hold up.

 

[TheVrolok]

Originally posted by: PhatoseAlpha
Thinking back, and taking off the rose colored glasses, I'd have to honestly say skip them all.

Torment's combat is uninspiring, and you can get the good bits by reading a script.
BG1's combat was just as uninspiring, and since it was low level AD&D combat and you're therefore made out of glass, it's frustrating to boot.
BG2 is entirely dependent in the early game on you having played BG1. Without doing so, the intro is a bunch of unimportant strangers you have no reason to care about. Not much for a gripping experience, unless you played BG1. And you really don't want to play BG1.
The fallouts, while I loved them dearly at the time, wasted stupid amounts of time with unnecessary animation. New Reno in Fallout 2 is a perfect example of why 'quick mode' is needed in turn based combat.


They were great in their day, but their day is gone. Put up to modern standards by someone without nostalgia to ease the painful bits....they won't hold up.

While I agree that graphically, they can't hold a candle to today's standards; could you please list a current CRPG that even comes close to the depth that PS:T/BG had? It doesn't exist. The Witcher was pretty great I thought, but not BG good.

 

[Via]

Originally posted by: PhatoseAlpha
Thinking back, and taking off the rose colored glasses, I'd have to honestly say skip them all.

Torment's combat is uninspiring, and you can get the good bits by reading a script.
BG1's combat was just as uninspiring, and since it was low level AD&D combat and you're therefore made out of glass, it's frustrating to boot.
BG2 is entirely dependent in the early game on you having played BG1. Without doing so, the intro is a bunch of unimportant strangers you have no reason to care about. Not much for a gripping experience, unless you played BG1. And you really don't want to play BG1.
The fallouts, while I loved them dearly at the time, wasted stupid amounts of time with unnecessary animation. New Reno in Fallout 2 is a perfect example of why 'quick mode' is needed in turn based combat.


They were great in their day, but their day is gone. Put up to modern standards by someone without nostalgia to ease the painful bits....they won't hold up.

Yeah, you're right.

they all suck pretty hard.

 

[you2]

I'm not sure; I tried to play torment a few times but could never get very far; on the other hand I played BG 1 for a couple of days and got bored with it (maybe 1/3 way through). However, I played BG II about a year ago and had a blast; thought it was a lot of fun. Conversely I think morrowind/oblivion suck rotten eggs.

I tend torwards newer games (I guess due to the graphics) but ice wind dal; BG II I thought were quite ok with their crappy graphics; and oblivion which had fairly n ice graphics sucks (mostly due to the story/leveling mechanics which are not balanced at all).

I didn't much like witcher combat; but the game itself was great (not perfect; but very enjoyable none the less).

Oh well I've high hopes for dragon age; king bounty legend princess; risen; mass effect 2; bioshock ii and divine divinity 2 so I can't see myself trying planescape torment (again) any time soon

 

[PhatoseAlpha]

Originally posted by: TheVrolokWhile I agree that graphically, they can't hold a candle to today's standards; could you please list a current CRPG that even comes close to the depth that PS:T/BG had? It doesn't exist. The Witcher was pretty great I thought, but not BG good.

That depth is a huge portion of the gameplay problem with the games.


They're older games based on the AD&D 2.5 rules, which were long in the tooth at the time and were intended to have a DM there to override the rules when they weren't fun.


Consider, for example, a 3rd level mage in these games. He can cast 3 spells per day - that's it. Those spells have to be chosen, when resting, from the limited choices in his spellbook, and after choosing then they cannot be altered except by re-memorizing. Which means that unless you're prescient or have just died and reloaded, you've got to guess what spells will be useful that day. Oh, and to boot, they take a while to cast, and if anybody hits you when you cast them you fail and lose the spell. And that's if you're lucky, because a level 3 mage without exceptional constitution has at most 12 hp, with average 7.5, which means a single sword swipe can kill you. And just to ensure that no one would ever be able to hit you, you can't wear armor and can't dodge while casting.

Mages with less spells then Kreskin, who need esp to decide which spells to have available, who are easy targets, made of glass and hang a giant 'kill me now' sign on themselves whenever they want to use a spell. Is it deep? Sure - I've owned the rulebooks, they're huge, and yes, very deep. But they ain't fun. Cripes, AD&D itself has revised the mage system twice since then because it kind of sucked.


And that's what I'm talking about. The depth is as much a relic of a bygone era as anything, and it's really, really hard to view depth as positive when it's used to make this aggravating. And these games do it a lot.

 

[TheVrolok]

Originally posted by: PhatoseAlpha

Originally posted by: TheVrolokWhile I agree that graphically, they can't hold a candle to today's standards; could you please list a current CRPG that even comes close to the depth that PS:T/BG had? It doesn't exist. The Witcher was pretty great I thought, but not BG good.

That depth is a huge portion of the gameplay problem with the games.


They're older games based on the AD&D 2.5 rules, which were long in the tooth at the time and were intended to have a DM there to override the rules when they weren't fun.


Consider, for example, a 3rd level mage in these games. He can cast 3 spells per day - that's it. Those spells have to be chosen, when resting, from the limited choices in his spellbook, and after choosing then they cannot be altered except by re-memorizing. Which means that unless you're prescient or have just died and reloaded, you've got to guess what spells will be useful that day. Oh, and to boot, they take a while to cast, and if anybody hits you when you cast them you fail and lose the spell. And that's if you're lucky, because a level 3 mage without exceptional constitution has at most 12 hp, with average 7.5, which means a single sword swipe can kill you. And just to ensure that no one would ever be able to hit you, you can't wear armor and can't dodge while casting.

Mages with less spells then Kreskin, who need esp to decide which spells to have available, who are easy targets, made of glass and hang a giant 'kill me now' sign on themselves whenever they want to use a spell. Is it deep? Sure - I've owned the rulebooks, they're huge, and yes, very deep. But they ain't fun. Cripes, AD&D itself has revised the mage system twice since then because it kind of sucked.


And that's what I'm talking about. The depth is as much a relic of a bygone era as anything, and it's really, really hard to view depth as positive when it's used to make this aggravating. And these games do it a lot.

I meant depth in story telling/character development - the elements that constitute the RPG portion of the game. I do agree that the mechanics made it absurdly hard at times, I've done playthroughs as a caster and it's just.. awful at low levels. To be honest, though, I enjoyed the challenge. Video games on the whole are fairly easy and it was nice to play something really hard as a challenge. I think you have a legitimate gripe as far as the trying mechanics go, I still think the game more than makes up for that pitfall and trumps any RPG since.

 

[PhatoseAlpha]

I'd say Witcher at least comes very close. The more fundamental problem is that I'm pretty well convinced that you could get that portion of the game through a mini-novelization and skip the less then thrill gameplay mechanics entirely, so I'd much rather recommend you do that.

 

[StinkyPinky]

I played all those games when they were released. Games like BG2, Fallouts, Deus Ex, and Planescape were some of the greatest games ever made.

Funny thing is, I tried to replay BG2 recently and just couldn't get into it. The same with Planescape.

However I replayed Fallout and Fallout 2 recently and loved it.

 

[Concillian]

I recently started re-playing BG2. Last time I touched it was whenever it came out and I never finished it then.

Two things:
1) it's very, very good excellent quality voice acting and the 2D art holds up well even though it's an old game. It's also difficult if you aren't at least a little into the D&D rules and how magic works in D&D (seem like 90% of the magic is buffs, protections and ways to remove protections rather than actual damage) But you can select difficulty mid-stream, so you can progress if you feel stuck.

2) It's long. Longer than any single player game I've ever played. It does a good job of being able to pause and save most times, so it's really easy to play for only an hour at a time, but it's weeks of solid play to get through the plot. At a few hours a week it'll last months. This can be good or bad depending on perspective.

 

[Concillian]

Originally posted by: PhatoseAlpha

Mages with less spells then Kreskin, who need esp to decide which spells to have available, who are easy targets, made of glass and hang a giant 'kill me now' sign on themselves whenever they want to use a spell. Is it deep? Sure - I've owned the rulebooks, they're huge, and yes, very deep. But they ain't fun. Cripes, AD&D itself has revised the mage system twice since then because it kind of sucked.

I agree with this. The mage system is very tedious. At 3rd level, no. At level 15? Every mage you're up against has a spell trigger that launches every "protection from" spell known to man, elf, and orc the instant combat starts. Mages have a ton of interesting spells, but you spend the first 4 rounds of combat casting breach type spells on their mage so your melee guys can actually hit them with anything less than +5 weapons.

You have a bunch of cool damage spells, but half the people you want to damage are immune. because they have a spell trap or "protection from" up. I ended up having the mage(s) memorizing very few damage spells and mostly protection and buffing spells plus the anti-protection spells to strip the enemy mages.

This part of the AD&D2 combat is really annoying.

 

[AshPhoenix]

Nox and Dungeon Siege.

 

[Fenixgoon]

Originally posted by: Concillian

Originally posted by: PhatoseAlpha

Mages with less spells then Kreskin, who need esp to decide which spells to have available, who are easy targets, made of glass and hang a giant 'kill me now' sign on themselves whenever they want to use a spell. Is it deep? Sure - I've owned the rulebooks, they're huge, and yes, very deep. But they ain't fun. Cripes, AD&D itself has revised the mage system twice since then because it kind of sucked.

I agree with this. The mage system is very tedious. At 3rd level, no. At level 15? Every mage you're up against has a spell trigger that launches every "protection from" spell known to man, elf, and orc the instant combat starts. Mages have a ton of interesting spells, but you spend the first 4 rounds of combat casting breach type spells on their mage so your melee guys can actually hit them with anything less than +5 weapons.

You have a bunch of cool damage spells, but half the people you want to damage are immune. because they have a spell trap or "protection from" up. I ended up having the mage(s) memorizing very few damage spells and mostly protection and buffing spells plus the anti-protection spells to strip the enemy mages.

This part of the AD&D2 combat is really annoying.

i had no problem killing mages in BG2

 

[you2]

Dungeon siege sucked (as did Dungeon siege 2). These games had some potential but were dumb'ed down so a 2 year old could play them (also dungeon siege cursor is annoying at best; thought they fixed that in the second version). The graphics are nice. To top it off after making these games he went on and continue the downward spiral by producing space siege.

Oh well they sold well so it sez a bit about what folks are looking for in a game.

Originally posted by: AshPhoenix
Nox and Dungeon Siege.

 

[Via]

Dungeon Seige was a purdy game, but I essentially felt like I was tagging along with a party of adventurers and staying in the background whenever they fought anything.

Just keep your cursor on the health potion icon and let your party take care of the rest.