RPGs you could not complete

[Hobo Elf]

Wiz8: Same reason as some others ITT, not only are there too many random encounters, but combat can take really long. Especially towards the end I felt that the combat was becoming exponentially sloggier. It just wares you down.

 

[Lord Azlan]

It was only when I got older that I wanted to complete games. It is a bit of a paradox as you would think as I matured my time would become more valuable and I would not waste time trying to complete a game. Maybe as I got older I appreciated my earnings more and wanted to maximise any time and money spent on a game - hence a desire to complete them. I am not really a completist actually. I don't know why developers make it SO HARD to complete a game - just does not make sense. Sometimes I think they do this on purpose so the average gamer can't get on to the end sections as they never had time to do it justice.

There is a bunch of games I could not complete - not that I would not have wanted to - just that the games themselves were pushing all my buttons and making it very hard to do so. These games include:

The Witcher 1 - oh so promising. But that Act 2 where you go round and around and around - it was making me dizzy. Please tell me of a shortcut to Act 3. Please. Why do I have to go ALL THE WAY AROUND - ALL THE TIME.

Dragon Age Origins - oh so promising. But the closer I looked the more it seemed to unravel. The world was a bit peculiar. Your character and party development lacked emotional connection to the story. And that passageway where all side fights seem to take place - how very odd.

Star Wars Knight of the Old Republic - So many places that I can't go but should have been able to. So many places that look the same.

Jade Empire - better than the two above. Maybe I might actually. Go back.

Go figure - I did enjoy and complete Mass Effect 1 and 2. Maybe I like guns better than swords.

The ones I did not complete and would really love to are:

UW2. I completed UW1 and it was wonderful. Way ahead of its time and before Doom took false plaudits for first 3D game. UW2 was very good but maybe too hard for my young brain. I loved the music. I loved the different places you could go. Tell me how to get it and play it again please. This time with THE WEB I should complete it in no time.

FF7 - Yep - I bought the new and updated digital version recently and it was great as I remembered. The only reason why I give console games some respect. Quite a big game actually. I have the hint book. Yes. On my to do list. And I won't fail this time (third attempt to complete actually).

Wasteland - With the development of Wasteland 2 the first game was updated and released. I should have bought W2 at the same time but I didn't. I have downloaded about three different walkthroughs for it on my phone and read them on the bus. Before I go to bed. They are all different. The new version does not run properly on my screen as the right hand edge does not appear - how do I fix that? On my to do list.

 

[Scroo]

Wizardry 8 - As much as I love the character system and basically even the combat, the amount of random encounters in combination with combat taking FOREVER even when using Wizfast burns me out every time I try it

M&M VI - I have no idea. I finished the others (didn't play M&M 1 & 2 yet) but not this. I really don't know why.

Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 - BG 1 bores me after a while. BG 2 - see M&M VI. Funny enough I love IWD 1 & 2 though

Every TES game I played

Also every Ultima game I tried (played would be the wrong word, I usually quit an Ultima game after 30 minutes max, I just can't warm up for them :/)

Albion - yes, this one is especially shameful to me since I LOOOVE Albion but after a while I burn out I definitely will complete it though and I will do so soon.

Those are my most shameful games I guess. I also didn't finish some other games of course but I wouldn't consider them as top class rpgs. Wizards & Warriors for example, which is nice but so flawed it kills my fun. Having to speak to quest npcs and merchants with every single character and not being able to skip dialogue... blech!

 

[Morkar Left]

Too many to mention, but for the codex:

Arcanum - horrible balancing, mostly weapons. Bad world design. Such wasted potential.

ToEE - I knew it's not gonna be a big open world like BG, but I thought a big dungeon crawling with multiple factions you can interact with was waiting for me. It turned out the dungeon was rather small, the factions meaningless and 90% of enemies were bugbears anyway. I actually had the most fun with the game outside of the temple...

Bloodlines - Good ideas but shitty corridor world design and lifeless environment. I remember the entrance of that nightclub where I thought "hey, the doorway is like my favourite club" just to see an empty highschool sports hall with 5 people dancing around. Not even a bar was there...

Troika games just didn't do it for me.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I finished all the good crpgs I played, probably because there's not that much of them.

Some game that I thought can be good so I gave them a lot of chances, but they weren't so I quit:

Arcanum - game was completely broken on release, then I tried it a few times with unofficial patches and it was still completely broken, just without the technical incompetence.
IWD 2 - I did manage to finish the other bland and boring IE game (BG1), but IWD 2 is not only bland and boring, it also turns completely derp around the infamous ice temple.
Elder Scroll games (tried them all apart from the first one) - the hiking simulator gameplay model doesn't do anything for me, these series also feature some of the worst character systems ever conceived.
Might and Magic X - these guys had their hearts in the right place, but the party building and looting in this was just so uninspired and boring. What was the last crpg with a good and satisfying looting? This is a pretty important part of crpgs (just after playing a role obviously) so plz git gud developer guize.
Fallout Tactics - such a good idea, such a bad implementation. Horrible mission design and combat system taken straight out of a single character crpg (in which it wasn't even that good) with almost no additions.
Majority of the so called incline/kickstarter/thisisthenewshit crpgs (Expeditions, Shadowrun, Blackguards etc., I think Grimrock is the only one of these games that I genuinely liked) - they managed to embody "meh" really good.

 

[Lhynn]

Too many to mention, but for the codex:

Arcanum - horrible balancing, mostly weapons. Bad world design. Such wasted potential.

ToEE - I knew it's not gonna be a big open world like BG, but I thought a big dungeon crawling with multiple factions you can interact with was waiting for me. It turned out the dungeon was rather small, the factions meaningless and 90% of enemies were bugbears anyway. I actually had the most fun with the game outside of the temple...

Bloodlines - Good ideas but shitty corridor world design and lifeless environment. I remember the entrance of that nightclub where I thought "hey, the doorway is like my favourite club" just to see an empty highschool sports hall with 5 people dancing around. Not even a bar was there...

Troika games just didn't do it for me.

You are a bad person and a shit poster.

 

[Morkar Left]

Troika fanboys are the worst.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

Holy shit, I was feeling bad for never finishing all of the classics like Goldbox games or Krondor, and so many people never finished Arcanum. Beat the game people, Abyss is one of the reasons, slugging through these goddamn mines was worth it.
My games:
- HoMM 3: I beat 2-3 campaigns, put it away for some time, loose my saves, try to beat game a year later ad infinitum. Hope to finally finish it this year.
- NVN 1: I lost all interest when I got to the retarded lizards at the end. Tried HoTU but put down because I don't enjoy epic DND, and I had enough of NVN. Really liked SotU because of the cozy atmophere but didn't progress far, since DND 3rd edition with 2 characters is boring as shit.
- Nox: Got illusionist, was really unhappy with how he played, but didn't want to start-over. Will try to finish the game as a wizard some time in the future.
- NVN 2 OC: Just too boring
- Nocturne - lost my saves two times, also was discouraged as gaining abilities from demon stones (or whatever they were called) and fusion is cryptic as fuck. I plan to finish it sometime next year.
- Jagged Alliance 2 - started 3 times, got bored after capturing few cities, put away and lost my saves. Finishing it right now, I just have to capture 3rd SAM, Balime and then I can finally strike Meduna.

 

[Decado]

Krondor was pretty hardcore. It got quite difficult at the end, if you weren't cheating.

 

[abnaxus]

Krondor was only hard when you needed to control the party with Patrus, who was completely worthless.

 

[Carrion]

Usually I finish every game I start, but quite recently I've picked up a bad habit of getting too many cheap or free games at the same time (can't resist those gog.com sales) and maybe having three or four ongoing playthroughs where I just jump from game to game depending on the day. Occasionally even a really good game might get abandoned because I happened to be in the mood for some other good game instead and just never found the strength to come back and finish what I started. It's pretty disgusting behavior, really, and I think I've gotten over it already. Still, a few games remain unfinished.

Icewind Dale: Got to Severed Hand, then kind of lost interest because of the extreme linearity and lack of interesting encounters, story, locations or... well, anything. Didn't bother to store the savegame anywhere when I got a new computer, and I'm not sure if I want to start from scratch again.

Betrayal at Krondor: I think I got pretty close to the end but just kept too long a break from playing it (I think I was also playing Gothic at the time, which I did finish) and forgot what I was even supposed to be doing. Just never managed to get back into it. I feel like I should start over and finish it some day, but there's just never enough time.

Daggerfall: The game's great in small doses, but it does get repetitive at some point. I don't think I ever really even expected to finish the main quest, to be honest.

Fallout Tactics: Actually, I never managed to even start it. I've bought the goddamn game twice (with the compilation that includes FO and FO2) and even borrowed it once from a friend, but my interest in it stops before I even get around to installing it.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

I didn't finish Krondor because it gets pushed back in by backlog by other titles and because I was annoyed by characters blabbering about some events from some fantasy book I'm not interested in, not because the game was too hard.

 

[Decado]

Patrus was pretty bad, but the game was hard towards the end. At least, it was hard to my 12 year old self. I should play it again. I think I own it off GOG. . .

 

[abnaxus]

I suppose endgame could be hard if you didn't explore thoroughly enough each chapter for best armour, weapons and spells.

Then again Dragonskin spell you get very early and is very hard to miss, and makes party invulnerable to all damage. Same with Fetters of Rime: it completely neutralizes final spellcasting boss.

Very powerful enemies can be disabled with very basic spells.

 

[TalesfromtheCrypt]

Yeah I thought Krondor became very easy after the first half of so, Patrus constantly dying was more annoying than challenging.

I really like the game bute the.later, linear chapters are pretty weak imho, had to force myself to go through them and almost abandond the game.

 

[Overboard]

So what are the games you could not complete, despite giving them a good try?

Grimoire. [/Cleve]

Spoiler

 

[RandomAccount]

ToEE - I got to the bit where you fight a crickey-that's-insanely-hard end boss who was surrounded by mobile vegetation and also seemed to have unlimited summons of all kinds of nightmare difficulty monsters, plus no-end of extremely violent or debilitating spells and impregnable buffs. I think it was THE end-boss but I couldn't be sure. I can't remember if I bothered killing it in the end. I also played the out-the-box-unpatched-rip-off-bug-infested-monstrosity version which didn't help my completionist morale.

Divine Divinity - Loved the game, got really bored by the plains Imps stage and then found out I had nothing in my store of leart skills needed to defeat the first of the many end-end bosses. Oh well. By the time I was ready to start again, some years later, Microsoft had out-tech'ed the game's ability to work.

Beyond Divinity - Pretty boring, but ok. I played the out-the-box-unpatched-rip-off-bug-infested-monstrosity version and the game shafted my save after exiting the smurff village. Not enthralled enough to ever have another go.

Divinity 2 - Was enjoying it but I had the bug where you couldn't walk up a gradient - too frustrating to bare.

Balder's Gate 2 - I have no idea how far I got, I think I'd done most of the main city and it's underground lairs, but I suddenly lost interest. My companions kept interrupting me by saying "I'm ooorrf to do my own quest, byze" just as I was on my way to an enjoyable quest and I lost all interest in knowing who 'my' posse was and lost interest in 'wanting' to solve companion's quests. Basically, it didn't feel like 'my' party playing 'my' game, as it were.

Balder's Gate 1 - I can't remember why. Didn't get very far.

Wizardry 8 - Disk didn't work/Microsoft out tech'd it.

Morrowwind - I can't remember why. Didn't get very far.

Oblivion - I can't remember why. Didn't get very far.

Sacred Gold - I kept refusing to move on before having cleared all monsters - then realised... oh, dumb me. Got on with it for a good few hours then gave up out of general boredom.

Path of Exile - Couldn't kill the Vaal Oversoul solo (so cheesed it in a team) then realised the game doesn't have an ending, just addiction for the sake of addiction, and quit.

All others have currently escaped my memory for now if there are any others.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

That's weird, I remember ToEE boss to be pathetically weak no matter in what way I summoned her, and I'm not terribly good at 3.X edition DnD.

 

[bozia2012]

DA:O - tedious combat, boring classes, default plot with bland writing. Gave up somewhere after the werewolf dungeon, when I realized I will have to do ~3 more before the next hub. Also - my main was one of those male cis-het just trying to be nice and somehow it ended in buttsecks.

ME - for all the posturing to be mature/serious, the setting/design was just a silly, space opera. I gave up after reaching Citadel, when I saw a bartender cleaning the counter with a cloth.

Non-RPGs? Basically any fpp horror - I love those games, but I'm too wimpy to finish. Tried Amnesia twice, always giving up after meeting the first enemy. DCotE - also tried 2 times, escape from Gilman's cost me too dearly.

Path of Exile - Couldn't kill the Vaal Oversoul solo (so cheesed it in a team) then realised the game doesn't have an ending, just addiction for the sake of addiction, and quit.

They added one more act after VO. The game is basically all about slightly enlarging your epeen by beating all difficulty levels on HC - I don't see any reason playing it on normal. Love the art design.

 

[vivec]

For me, I would make a list of games that I *did* complete. I always find myself immensely reluctant to continue playing game once I have explored most of the mechanics. Then the only real encouragement remaining is a good story. Most games offer a limp wet noodle of a progression in that department after half their lengths. This is bad because after becoming a physical deity in the game, the real motivation to keep on going is the mystery of what is to come. Once that is reduced to "Go and defeat the ancient dragon/ demon/ god/ his cultists", there is no drive in the game except the mindless desire to see it to the end. One would think that since such a situation is almost ubiquitous in most games under the category of RPGs, someone would figure out sooner or later that the progression of the story has to correspond to the mechanics progression thus offering a changing gameplay throughout the length of the game. But it seems that till date most games have missed such an opportunity to come up with a product that engages us from beginning to the end.

For example, I loved the new Blackguards game in terms of its Turn based gameplay. But after I had leveled all my party to the utmost skill levels, I did not find myself motivated enough to play ahead. This particular experience has held true for me almost for all the RPGs I have played. Dragon age, NWN, NWN2, IWDs, Wizardry, Summoner, Diablo, Gothics, TOEE etc I just could not bring myself to finish.

It is quite an exercise for myself, when I consider what games I finished. Torment, for example, had a mediocre mechanics, but the story alone allowed me to pull the dead weight of the game to the end. Same holds true for Deus Ex and the second vampires game. These games had some interesting gameplay elements, but they fizzled out halfway through.

So overall I feel that mechanics alone can not carry a game. You need a good story to take it to the end.

 

[RandomAccount]

That's weird, I remember ToEE boss to be pathetically weak no matter in what way I summoned her, and I'm not terribly good at 3.X edition DnD.

Bizarre

 

[Bester]

Alrighty then, here's what I never managed to finish:

Fallout 1 & 2 - too linear for my tastes
Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 - boring as fuck, not enough magic, fantasy world too uncomprehensible
Planescape - narrative too unimaginative
VtBM - too emo
ToEE - hated the system, not enough turn based
IWD - fights way too straightforward and easy
Arcanum - music too energetic, no crafting

Spoiler

WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON IN THIS THREAD???

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Never could finish Mount and Blade. Apparently, 'swing axe until dead' is not a valid strategy to win it.

 

[Seaking4]

Arcanum. I tried after reading about it on the Codex Top 70. If only I knew ... .

I just couldn't finish that game. My only positive experience was switching the game to real time with pause and laughing at how fucked up it was. Only tried once. Can't see myself trying any time soon though.

In fact, I bought Gothic II around the same time as Arcanum (after reading the Top 70). Haven't started it yet but I've got a bad feeling considering the last recommendation turned out badly. I wish there was a Codex money back guarantee.

Edit: forgot to mention Deus Ex. I just hated the way that aiming worked but I fully intend to finish that game one day.

 

[pakoito]

This thread is 3 pages long. I could make it into 20 with every game I've started.