The great Baldur's Gate/Fallout-like nomination thread

[Sigourn]

I've had the intention to make this nomination thread for a while already.

The rules are pretty simple. The games nominated in this thread, to be polled at a later date, must fulfill the following conditions:

COMBAT

1. It has to use some form of turns. It can be turn-based, real-time with pause, or anything resembling turns.
2. The combat has to be decided by character stats. Player reflexes should be limited to hitting the Pause button when they they want like to change their strategy or go to the bathroom.
3. You must be able to move around in the battlefield, beyond basic "front row/back row" movement popularized by games like Final Fantasy VI. Moreover, in the case of party-based RPGs, said party must not behave like a blob: every character should be free to move wherever they want, without any imposed limitations.
   
4. It can be either scripted (i.e. happens during certain events) or not (can happen anytime), in a limited space (like a chess board) or not (like in Fallout).
5. It has to happen in an overhead perspective, allowing a clear view of the battleground. Rule of thumb is: if it doesn't look like Fallout or Baldur's Gate, don't nominate it.

ROLEPLAYING

1. You must be able to create your own character or group of characters. This means attributes, skills, feats, pretty much anything, regardless of whether you are assigned a given name or not. What's important is that you are given a degree of freedom when creating your character, regarding your attributes/skills/feats/perks/etc.
2. You must be able to engage in dialogue, scripted or not.
3. You must be presented with dialogue options, whether this happens often or not. "Fake" dialogue options that lead to But thou must! situations do not count; your decisions during dialogue should be able to affect how the game plays out, either in a massive scale (completely changing the game's storyline) or in a very minor way (i.e. unlocking a path through a quest, prompting an enemy to attack you, or having an NPC gift you some gold). It's paramount that dialogue is not on rails and doesn't consist of a simple list of items to check off. Dialogue shouldn't reinforce the status quo either.

Examples of games that fit these criteria:

• Fallout
  
• Fallout 2
• Arcanum
• Baldur's Gate
• Baldur's Gate II
• Icewind Dale
• Icewind Dale II
• Planescape: Torment
• The Age of Decadence
• Underrail

With all that said, nominate away!

-----------------------------------------------

NOMINATED SO FAR

Spoiler

Avadon: The Black Fortress
Avadon 2: The Corruption
Avadon 3: The Warborn
Avernum
Avernum 2
Avernum 3
Avernum 4
Avernum 5
Avernum 6
Dark Sun: Shattered Lands
Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager
Drakensang: The Dark Eye
Drakensang: The River of Time
Expeditions: Conquistador
Expeditions: Viking
Geneforge
Geneforge 2
Geneforge 3
Geneforge 4: Rebellion
Geneforge 5: Overthrow
Neverwinter Nights
Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark
Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker
Neverwinter Nights: Shadows of Undrentide
Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor
Prelude to Darkness
Serpent in the Staglands
Space Rangers 2
Temple of Elemental Evil
UFO Aftermath
UFO Aftershock
UFO Afterlight

 

[laclongquan]

UFO Aftermath (though its gameplay has some really annoying feature, slow research like turtle)
UFO Aftershock (gunporn Post Apocalypse)
UFO Afterlight (Mars)

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Pathfinder: Kingmaker

 

[Grauken]

Not clear whether this thread is to nominate great BG/Fallout-likes, or nominate games that are like them, irrespective of being great (because PoR:RoMD is decidedly not great)

Dark Sun: Shattered Lands (great)
Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager (okay)
Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor (terrible)
Temple of Elemental Evil (great)

 

[Sigourn]

Not clear whether this thread is to nominate great BG/Fallout-likes, or nominate games that are like them, irrespective of being great (because PoR:RoMD is decidedly not great)

Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor
Temple of Elemental Evil

Ideally we would nominate great games, but it's always the usual suspects so I appreciate people nominating more obscure games, less good or bad games (like RoMD).

 

[buffalo bill]

Not clear whether this thread is to nominate great BG/Fallout-likes, or nominate games that are like them, irrespective of being great (because PoR:RoMD is decidedly not great)

Dark Sun: Shattered Lands (great)

I'd say Fallout is a Dark Sun-like.

 

[Grauken]

I like to use TV tropes terminology for cases like this, Dark Sun was the trope maker, Fallout the trope codifier

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

Drakensang: The Dark Eye
Drakensang: The River of Time
Serpent in the Staglands
Avernum 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Geneforge 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Avadon 1, 2, 3
Neverwinter Nights OC, Shadows of the Undrentide, Hordes of the Underdark, Kingmaker, & a gazillion others from the Vault

Off the top of my head.

 

[Avonaeon]

Expeditions: Conquistador
Expeditions: Viking

 

[Serus]

I've had the intention to make this nomination thread for a while already.

The rules are pretty simple. The games nominated in this thread, to be polled at a later date, must fulfill the following conditions:

COMBAT

1. It has to use some form of turns. It can be turn-based, real-time with pause, or anything resembling turns.
2. The combat has to be decided by character stats. Player reflexes should be limited to hitting the Pause button when they they want like to change their strategy or go to the bathroom.
3. You must be able to move around in the battlefield, beyond basic "front row/back row" movement popularized by games like Final Fantasy VI.
4. It can be either scripted (i.e. happens during certain events) or not (can happen anytime), in a limited space (like a chess board) or not (like in Fallout).
5. It has to happen in an overhead perspective, allowing a clear view of the battleground.

ROLEPLAYING

1. You must be able to create your own character or group of characters. This means attributes, skills, feats, pretty much anything, regardless of whether you are assigned a given name or not. What's important is that you are given a degree of freedom when creating your character, regarding your attributes/skills/feats/perks/etc.
2. You must be able to engage in dialogue, scripted or not.
3. You must be presented with dialogue options, whether this happens often or not. "Fake" dialogue options that lead to But thou must! situations do not count; your decisions during dialogue should be able to affect how the game plays out, either in a massive scale (completely changing the game's storyline) or in a very minor way (i.e. unlocking a path through a quest, prompting an enemy to attack you, or having an NPC gift you some gold). It's paramount that dialogue is not on rails and doesn't consist of a simple list of items to check off. Dialogue shouldn't reinforce the status quo either.

Examples of games that fit these criteria:

• Fallout
  
• Fallout 2
• Arcanum
• Baldur's Gate
• Baldur's Gate II
• Icewind Dale
• Icewind Dale II
• Planescape: Torment
• The Age of Decadence
• Underrail

With all that said, nominate away!

-----------------------------------------------

NOMINATED SO FAR

Spoiler

Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor
Temple of Elemental Evil
UFO Aftermath
UFO Aftershock
UFO Afterlight

So basically "Games like those games I liked when I was younger that have very little in common with each other"? That's... a broad category.

 

[udm]

Space Rangers 2.

 

[Martyr]

Prelude to Darkness.

 

[BEvers]

Wizardry 8 meets all the criteria.

 

[Neanderthal]

Pong.

 

[Circuit the Short]

Betrayal at Krondor
Realms of Arkania
Jagged Alliance

And no, RTWP games are not turn based.

 

[Sigourn]

So basically "Games like those games I liked when I was younger that have very little in common with each other"? That's... a broad category.

I would have to disagree. The nominations have been incredibly consistent so far, either because the rules I set were good, or because people disregarded said rules but still understood the type of games I was talking about.

 

[Strange Fellow]

What's the point of doing such a poll if you're going to be so lenient with the criteria as to include Wizardry 8? You might as well call it "best CRPGs ever" and be done with it. And I'm not sure whether you're only looking for nominations I might actually vote for, or just any games that fit the description.

 

[Serus]

So basically "Games like those games I liked when I was younger that have very little in common with each other"? That's... a broad category.

I would have to disagree. The nominations have been incredibly consistent so far, either because the rules I set were good, or because people disregarded said rules but still understood the type of games I was talking about.

There is no "type". It's two different types arbitrarily glued together. Basically, name all games of type 1 + type 2.
Sure, the "rules" might be technically good but that doesn't contradict what I said. Those criteria are mostly arbitrary and they boil down to: "Games like Fallout + games like Baldur's Gate". If you apply the same logic fairly to all CRPGs You will have to make an effort to find any two CRPG titles that don't share many superficial traits. By the simple virtue of belonging to the same general genre. Like your 2 favourites.
Basically, next comes: "Wizardry/The Elder Scrolls-like". You know, why not - both have first person perspective, in both you explore dungeons, both have several other typical crpg elements. Clearly it makes sense to merge them together.

 

[Sigourn]

What's the point of doing such a poll if you're going to be so lenient with the criteria as to include Wizardry 8? You might as well call it "best CRPGs ever" and be done with it. And I'm not sure whether you're only looking for nominations I might actually vote for, or just any games that fit the description.

I'm counting on people's good will when I include games. If you say Wizardry 8 doesn't fit my criteria, then I will remove it.

There is no "type". It's two different types arbitrarily glued together. Basically, name all games of type 1 + type 2.

I'm aware that the games aren't exactly alike. One for instance allows you to control only your character, while other offers full party control. One expects you to interact with the world through a single character (Vault Dweller or Chosen One), the other allows you to interact with the world with any character you'd like.

But still, I'm talking about a broader "type" or "essence", if you will. Games that encapsulate most of the traits of tabletop RPGs:

1. Have tactical combat, regardless of whether it is better executed or not, achieved through a battleground you can move around without any limitations (this is something I should add to the OP: the idea is that there's nothing preventing my party from spreading as far as the battleground allows). And combat that must work through turns or rounds or something akin, that works in a consistent way and based on stats, as opposed to say Morrowind where my attack speed is dictating solely by how quickly I'm willing to spam left click.
   
2. Have your own voice through dialogue choices with consequences, regardless of how deep or common these choices are.

 

[BEvers]

In what way does Wizardry 8 not fit the criteria?

 

[Sigourn]

I'll let you two solve this by yourselves. BEvers and Strange Fellow

I ask: in Wizardry 8, can your party members move freely around the battlefield, or does your party behave like a blob with a limited freedom?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

You might as well call it "best CRPGs ever"

E L E X

 

[Strange Fellow]

In what way does Wizardry 8 not fit the criteria?

I never said it didn't.

I do think most people would agree that including Wiz 8 in a grouping with these criteria is quite a reach:

You must be able to move around in the battlefield, beyond basic "front row/back row" movement popularized by games like Final Fantasy VI. ... It has to happen in an overhead perspective, allowing a clear view of the battleground.

If you want Wiz 8 in on a technicality that's fine by me, but that kills any claim this poll has to representing Fallout/Baldur's Gate-like games.

Fake edit: Looks like Sigourn settled the matter himself.

Have tactical combat, regardless of whether it is better executed or not, achieved through a battleground you can move around without any limitations (this is something I should add to the OP: the idea is that there's nothing preventing my party from spreading as far as the battleground allows).

 

[BEvers]

Moving the goalposts

If you want Wiz 8 in on a technicality that's fine by me, but that kills any claim this poll has to representing Fallout/Baldur's Gate-like games.

So a defining feature of Fallout/Baldur's Gate-like games is that the characters can move as far away from each other during battle as they want? If your party in Fallout was forced to stay within thirty hexes of each other (for example because of hardcoded companion AI), it would no longer be Fallout?

 

[Serus]

What's the point of doing such a poll if you're going to be so lenient with the criteria as to include Wizardry 8? You might as well call it "best CRPGs ever" and be done with it. And I'm not sure whether you're only looking for nominations I might actually vote for, or just any games that fit the description.

I'm counting on people's good will when I include games. If you say Wizardry 8 doesn't fit my criteria, then I will remove it.

There is no "type". It's two different types arbitrarily glued together. Basically, name all games of type 1 + type 2.

I'm aware that the games aren't exactly alike. One for instance allows you to control only your character, while other offers full party control. One expects you to interact with the world through a single character (Vault Dweller or Chosen One), the other allows you to interact with the world with any character you'd like.

But still, I'm talking about a broader "type" or "essence", if you will. Games that encapsulate most of the traits of tabletop RPGs:

1. Have tactical combat, regardless of whether it is better executed or not, achieved through a battleground you can move around without any limitations (this is something I should add to the OP: the idea is that there's nothing preventing my party from spreading as far as the battleground allows). And combat that must work through turns or rounds or something akin, that works in a consistent way and based on stats, as opposed to say Morrowind where my attack speed is dictating solely by how quickly I'm willing to spam left click.
   
2. Have your own voice through dialogue choices with consequences, regardless of how deep or common these choices are.

1. = Any CRPG that doesn't fit into "arpg" or blobber" subgenre then. I fail to see the relevance of a criterion as broad and unspecific as this.
In addition you can have a pnp/tabletop RPG combat systems where you don't track individual precise party members positioning in combat in a systemic way or do it in an abstract way (so more similar to blobbers than to your "type" of games). Which means the criterion "encapsulated tabletop RPGs" doesn't fly because blobbers can "encapsulate" some tabletop systems as well. It only encapsulates the subtype of tabletop RPGs with tactical combat that includes tracking of individual party members positioning in a systemic and precise way. Aka DnD-like stuff but not many more narrative-focused PnPs. And then, Fallout is hardly a CRPG where tactics or positioning is the focus of the game, many blobbers are more tactical than Fallout is.
2. = In my humble estimation the vast majority of all CRPGs ever made. Even some old pure dungeon crawlers have a few conversations and an occasional (minor) choice to make for the player. An even more broad criterion and even less meaningful than the previous one in my opinion.

Be my guest, make a poll about games you like. But I maintain my opinion that you're making a post-facto rationalization to stick those 2 titles together and as far as any possible methodology goes, it doesn't make much sense.