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Order these games by how bad their writing is

ilitarist

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This. PST is legendary for its writing not because the writing is at a high literary level - no, it isn't -, but because the wordsmiths made most lines of text want you to keep going for more. PST is intriguing and involving. Even some random character on the street feels like he might give you some more information about this alien world, information you're craving for.

This is what the vast majority of dialogue heavy RPGs fail to accomplish. Divinity Original Sin had me go through a duality of emotions, none of which are positive: boredom and cringe (at the belgian humor).

Yep. When I checked out Planescape a little while ago I cringed a little because of putting very specific answers in the mouth of the hero (in a very first dialogue if you ask Morte to read tattoo on your back you inevitable say "No wonder it hurts, I have a bloody novel back there" or something and it completely takes you out of the character because you have no choice in the matter, adding a simple "Go on" option would make a dialogue much better) but in general the writing gets you by the balls instantly. Even though I know the story - those NPCs are a joy to talk to.

Nothing like that with Age of Decadence, of course, with its walls of text, forced exposition and inconsistent characters switching between barebones dialogue and exposition mode with player reactions could be safely replaced with Oblivion-style choices. No other game does that and that seems to click with some people.

We should keep in mind that in 1999's Baldur's Gate, things were not very different in that particular departament. But we should also keep in mind the hypocritical tendency that PoE's shortcomings are either excused with the IE games, or when convenient, handily explained away with comparisons of how "established" the D&D setting was, and how easy it was for Bioware

There's something to that. D&D setting is more or less vanilla fantasy setting with everything thrown in. Baldur's Gate 1 has very simplistic dialogue and binary choices between being holy guardian of all good and evil villain mad with power. PoE says its world is nuanced and proves it by throwing history books and socio-economic analysis into the mouth of NPCs. When you go fight a dragon it's like a writer is almost ashamed of having a cliche dragon in the game, Adra one is presented as some Lovecraftian horror for most of the game and other dragons have less talk about them than Ruatan system of education. They present their writing as much more important part of the game. Even worse with Age of Decadence and one of the reasons I don't like that game: you're told straight that the game has a very unique and realistic setting and that you can complete game without fighting. Then you have dialogues without any real choices, typos and erroneous scripts, inconsistent characters and all that jazz. They raise the bar intentionally much higher than any other game and suffer for it. Tyranny was similar to AoD in terms of world and handled similar problems much better even though its prose is still on a level of a cheap fantasy novel.
 

AwesomeButton

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There's something to that. D&D setting is more or less vanilla fantasy setting with everything thrown in. Baldur's Gate 1 has very simplistic dialogue and binary choices between being holy guardian of all good and evil villain mad with power. PoE says its world is nuanced and proves it by throwing history books and socio-economic analysis into the mouth of NPCs. When you go fight a dragon it's like a writer is almost ashamed of having a cliche dragon in the game, Adra one is presented as some Lovecraftian horror for most of the game and other dragons have less talk about them than Ruatan system of education. They present their writing as much more important part of the game. Even worse with Age of Decadence and one of the reasons I don't like that game: you're told straight that the game has a very unique and realistic setting and that you can complete game without fighting. Then you have dialogues without any real choices, typos and erroneous scripts, inconsistent characters and all that jazz. They raise the bar intentionally much higher than any other game and suffer for it. Tyranny was similar to AoD in terms of world and handled similar problems much better even though its prose is still on a level of a cheap fantasy novel.
It could be just my reading of PoE that is at fault, but it really did feel too self-aware at times, forcing itself to look "classic, yet unique". AoD's act is much tougher, it has to suggest and tip the player off without giving out too much about how he can pass a quest without fighting - which skills to use, which lines to choose. Sure it doesn't succeed in telegraphing all of this in just the right measure for most if for any players, but that's what Save/Load is for.

The strong side in cases such as AoD's is when the game builds the world through casually dropped bits of information, half-told stories, referenced characters and events, etc. Generally, a relatively educated person is capable of building his version of the world better than anyone else could do it for him, he just needs to be set on the correct scent. The game which does this the best to date is Thief. In the short descriptions in the beginning of each "act" in AoD, I think there is an attempt to do that, though of course it's a lot less natural than if the player could piece together the info just from exploring the locations.
 

ilitarist

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The strong side in cases such as AoD's is when the game builds the world through casually dropped bits of information, half-told stories, referenced characters and events, etc. Generally, a relatively educated person is capable of building his version of the world better than anyone else could do it for him, he just needs to be set on the correct scent. The game which does this the best to date is Thief.

You rarely see such cases in RPG, don't you? Thief is like that, yes, so are many immersive sims like Dishonored or Deus Ex or Prey. Those games love to throw walls of text at you but those are contained in books mostly so it makes sense they are walls of text, and they often work better in-world because people assume you know a lot of stuff when they write about you, and it's not like the usual "please tell me what country are we living in". Fallout 1 had some of that: you'd assume that the game is about future world, not alternative history and you gather bits and pieces about pre-war USA by exploring destroyed bunkers... And also going to the library. Japanese games love to do it, like in the Dark Souls series, but they usually have a linear story with little agency so it's easier to do.
 

Theldaran

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Baldur's Gate's immersion was far better than PoE. Otherwise, the game focused on exploration, a good thing. I don't think the combat system applies much here.

Besides, there's the tremendous fail that a game released 15 years after its source of inspiration doesn't manage to be better than it. That's just lazy.
 

Pizzashoes

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I feel exactly the opposite - outside of dialogues you could have with them, they were completely disconnected from the setting as characters. As with all else in PoE's Eora, the player is merely informed about events, but doesn't get to experience, as he plays, the consequences of the reality in which his character operates.
I meant those two were well integrated into the lore of the world. Their experiences with either betraying their faith or killing a flesh-and-blood god were extremely compelling. And then we find out that this god was just a manifestation of ideals and human souls. That their personal anguish is just small-fries compared to what the masses would feel if they figured out their world was a lie. That part of PoE works well. But you are right, all of that is just background noise. PoE shuttles the main character along this cosmic story as a mere bystander.

Nothing like that with Age of Decadence, of course, with its walls of text, forced exposition and inconsistent characters switching between barebones dialogue and exposition mode with player reactions could be safely replaced with Oblivion-style choices. No other game does that and that seems to click with some people.
For a lot of playthroughs in AoD, the majority of the text is boring, inapplicable, or spouted by some blowhard who was about to die. But when I played last as a loremaster, I forced myself to read everything and some of the lore of the background world was fairly interesting. But most of the time, you can play it well enough by just holding your beer, smashing 1, and only reading the juicy bits.
 

Grunker

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I am intentionally not asking "Which of these has the best writing". Order the following games, but no further additions:

  • Divinity: Original Sin 2
  • Witcher 3
  • Age of Decadence
  • Pillars of Eternity
  • Icewind Dale
  • Kingdom Come: Deliverance
  • Elex
I'm just curious what the Codex thinks on the topic. :)

P.S. I'm saying games, not RPGs mainly because of Witcher 3
:troll:

Witcher 3
Icewind Dale
Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Pillars of Eternity
Age of Decadence
Elex
Divinity: Original Sin 2
 

Grunker

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lol, hold your :salute:, I ordered them backwards AwesomeButton :lol: (i.e. according to how good I thought their writing was).

Here's the actual ranking (i.e. worst writing first):

Divinity: Original Sin 2
Elex
Age of Decadence
Pillars of Eternity
Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Icewind Dale
Witcher 3
 

AwesomeButton

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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
The chance of this happening was why I went for a rating that can be interpreted as ironic ;)

Now I actually understood you. The rating is still valid, I very much agree with this best-to-worst order.
 
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Codex Year of the Donut
lol, hold your :salute:, I ordered them backwards AwesomeButton :lol: (i.e. according to how good I thought their writing was).

Here's the actual ranking (i.e. worst writing first):

Divinity: Original Sin 2
Elex
Age of Decadence
Pillars of Eternity
Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Icewind Dale
Witcher 3
you accidentally put elex in the wrong spot
 

Grunker

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Read the thread to see my opinion. No doubt in my book about IWD being one of the best.

Writing is one thing though. Whenever I play IWD or watch videos of it, my primary thoughts are about how extensive the degeneration of RPG art has been. We went from evocative, simple, awe-inspiring beauty to all-out cartoons, chaos and just a mess.
 

AwesomeButton

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Read the thread to see my opinion. No doubt in my book about IWD being one of the best.

Writing is one thing though. Whenever I play IWD or watch videos of it, my primary thoughts are about how extensive the degeneration of RPG art has been. We went from evocative, simple, awe-inspiring beauty to all-out cartoons, chaos and just a mess.
I read that in your PoE retrospective. I agree of course. The only debate can be had over the reasons why. I'd say one is the increased demand for fantasy art, which has brought in artists of lesser ability, another is the gradual exhaustion of the set of possible "original" things that can be done. The second can raise eyebrows, but I'll explain - if you are aiming for realism, there are only so much variants of a realistic looking medieval setting you can render before it either becomes banal, or stops conforming to realism. Realism becomes a constraint as a style, and in the same way "classic fantasy art" is also a style and also a constraint. People have no choice but to begin inserting variations after some point. I'm just trying to explain, not to excuse though. Nothing can excuse Warcraft 3's style and all it brought with it.
 

Grunker

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Perhaps you are correct, but I know intelligent bros who have never played RPGs that went ape-shit over how awesome Torment is after I introduced it to them, and they still go "meh, kindda boring, prefer WoW art" when I show them IWD's art.

I think the escalation you talk about is the key here. Like how going from a great, simple hamburger to propping it up with three extra paddies and slices of cheese doesn't actually do improve the quality, but videos of restaurants offering still more excessive burgers still get applause because "more is more, right?"

Total tangent, but we had this trend in Denmark of making "luxury burgers" in the 00's, where every café would do their spin on a gourment version which typically implied stuffing slices of a "quality bun" (meaning too heavy to be appropriate for a burger) with huge amounts of avocado, rucola, bean sprouts and all sorts of other ungodly things, making for something more akin to a dry sandwhich than a burger, and the public sentiment was that somehow this abomination was a delightful, quality meal compared to the fast-food (in a derogatory sense) american hamburger.

We see something similar with the card Grizzly Bear from Magic. Due to exposure to fantasy apparantly summoning huge bears with magical summoning rites wasn't enough, it has to be "Runeclaw Bear" now, which are functionally the same but have disco-light fur and magic claws in the art. Anyone can summon a bear out of thin air right, but MAGICAL BEARS man, think of the possibilities!

It's a failure of applying restraint, ultimately.
 

Jimmious

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Icewind Dale (I don't even remember if IWD had writing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67FuWzixduc&list=PLB31EEF976E4A2C67

if that shit doesn't place your mind around a cozy table of fellow nerds, pen & paper in hand, trepidation at the dangers and treasure-seeking to come, you sir, are lacking in imagination
As I explained in a later post, I played IWD a lot of years ago and the only things I remember about it are its combat, the full party creation and the snowy areas
 

AwesomeButton

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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
Perhaps you are correct, but I know intelligent bros who have never played RPGs that went ape-shit over how awesome Torment is after I introduced it to them, and they still go "meh, kindda boring, prefer WoW art" when I show them IWD's art.
This could be a generational problem. Don't they find any charm in the land North of The Wall when they watch GoT? :)
 

AwesomeButton

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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
We see something similar with the card Grizzly Bear from Magic. Due to exposure to fantasy apparantly summoning huge bears with magical summoning rites wasn't enough, it has to be "Runeclaw Bear" now, which are functionally the same but have disco-light fur and magic claws in the art. Anyone can summon a bear out of thin air right, but MAGICAL BEARS man, think of the possibilities!

It's a failure of applying restraint, ultimately.
That's exactly what I've been telling people, and the bear example is both funny and good.

I've used game plots as illustration, or a parody retelling:
In Epic RPG I we have to give the player motivation to play, in order to boost our sales. What do we do? Well, he can save the world, and maybe someone steals his soul! This will especially resonate with late teen social group. Ok...

Epic RPG I is released. Work on Epic RPG II begins...

Well, time to come up with a player motivating plot for Epic RPG II. What do we do? Well, let's have the player save the world and his soul, because... Nah, we already did this in the first game. Hm, that's right. We can up the stakes this time though... I've got it, hear this - this time he will have to save the universe! Now ain't that epic or what? And we keep the save his own soul thing, because that's still important for the focus groups.
 

Grauken

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I always thought of that as the Dragon Ball Z power inflation problem
 

ilitarist

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This is a problem in RPG story itself.

Everyone hates fighting rats in the beginning. But you need a journey. You have to end with fighting kings or demigods and that should feel earned. In theory. Games like Fallout fix it by making the journey relatively short and using sort of realistic setting. You wouldn't be surprised that the guy who had problems beating rats or ants a week ago can now take on criminal gang. Because now he has grenades and shotgun, those things would allow anyone to kill a bunch of people. In fantasy it's usually more pronounced. I think Gothic has a great sense of progression even though it's short and discrete. Also blobbers or other party games where a team find new ways to interact.

But most RPGs screw it up and it's closely connected to screwing up leveling system. You all know about Oblivion and Skyrim. The story demands you to do heroics in the beginning, so in Oblivion your lvl 1 character is as effective as royal guard at fighting assassins, in Skyrim it's not as glaring but still you can fight a fucking dragon relatively soon in the story. I've recently played Nier Automata and there it's glaring how both RPG system and power inflation are in effect. Heroes destroy huge scyscraper-sized enemies in the first 15 minutes, the very same enemies appear much later and are presented as a threat after you became 10x times stronger in game terms.
 

Kyl Von Kull

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
This is something Elex does very well. Your character is the most badass badass in a world full of badasses, but because of elex withdrawal you start the game as weak as a kitten. So your power progression makes sense: it’s just about recovering from withdrawal and getting better equipment.
 

fantadomat

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Same in Risen 2 IIRC, only instead of Elex withdrawal there was alcoholism.
Not really,more of a mid age crisis,after all you were drinking for health.It is clear that alcoholism is a good thing. Getting messed up by giant spider,well have drink and your wounds heal :) .
 

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