Incline How to properly enjoy an RPG

[Gibson]

got 2 cents to spare:
- i always play a role, right now i'm a sneaky trap-laying mofo that you really shouldn't trust in Underrail and i try to stick with it. and I don't mind learning about the game (no walkthroughs tho, that's for male feminists) before going in so i can be good at my role. If I hadn't looked for a build example or a breakdown of stats for Underrail and learn about skills and feats before going in, the amount of shit i'd be eating would be overwhelming. I still eat a lot of shit, but now it's like with a napkin and cutlery.
- I save-scumm in a way - after every finished fight i hit that quicksave button like it owes me money, but other than that not really that often and I NEVER reload after text choices, i always stick with text choices no matter what. Also I've played every rpg ever with only one (quick)save file, always! that way choices really matter - made a bad choice? well man up and git gud or eat shit.

 

[underground nymph]

Probably not a breaking news, but I found out that all kind of Iron man modes (you name it) without opportunity to save scum is the most rewarding experience you could have from playing not only RPG, but I guess anything actually. At least it perfectly works with tactical and strategy games.
Yet it’s certainly not a way to enjoy something you’re not perfectly familiar with.

 

[Beggar]

Really hard to enjoy an RPG these days. Everywhere you see references to the classical games which absolutely kills the immersion, makes it feel like it's a meme game.
Other thing, and the most annoying of all: bugs and save incompatibility. You sink 30h into the game while it is still being patched (and will be for a very long time) and after it's in great shape, you just can't force yourself doing this once more. The first experience is stuck into the mind and things you are doing now feels so wrong.

Is it even possible to enjoy any modern RPG? I'm not sure about that anymore

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

Play it the way you want.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Play CoD instead.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

I really don't have the patience to essentially grind the same encounter/s over and over again because the boss at the end kicks my ass multiple times.

 

[Stavrophore]

How to get the most out of it and immerse yourself imo.



Don't seek tips

Use your wit and intelligence to overcome obstacles.

Don't metagame

Obsessing over perfect builds can ruin the fun. Flawed builds are cool. However it turns out makes it special. Picked the wrong feat by accident or made a bad call? Don't worry, it might prove useful after all.

Don't save-scum

Obvioiusly, ruins muh immersion. Stick with what you get.

Increase difficulty

The greater the challenge, the more rewarding gameplay will be.

Be spontaneous, not completionist

Don't try to visit every location. Don't try to complete every quest. Leave something for other play-through. I'm not advocating role-playing strictly speaking. But tend to do stuff which makes sense. Clearing five dungeons in a row doesn't.

Don't binge on dialogue options (by eXalted)

Don't exhaust all conversation options if you don't find them interesting. And yes, there could be a quest hidden there, who cares?

Keep cycling savegame slots

Try to save less often. Certainly don't spam the quicksave button. Continuity of experience is key to immersion.

Live with your consequences.

Failed a skill roll? Attacked someone by accident? Jammed a chest? Try this experiment and don't reload. That liberates you from OCD and made my runs much more memorable and distinctive e.g. that time when I was caught stealing, that time when I drank the wrong potion etc.

Role playing

Obviously a subject which can be widely interpreted however just making consistent dialogue choices works.

Play it like it was meant to be played (by Wayward Son)

Sure, you COULD look up that dungeon map or use screenshots to take notes, but the game was built around the lack of easily accessible internet and/or screenshots, so this can ruin the gameplay. Ultimas are a good example of this, they were built around you taking good, concise but accurate notes or you were up Shit Creek without a paddle.

Spontaneity is king

This is where all the fun and good gaming memories stem from.








Do you have any suggestions? I wish more games would encourage such behavior.

The problem is that im autist and i always try to go for best efficiency/min max. Same for story elements i always pick options where i can get most shekels, so im probably chaotic neutral xD

 

[Starwars]

-If a game is on the horizon, decide early on if you're gonna spend the cash on it or not and then don't follow all the retarded pre-release discussions, the previews, the streamers and let's players. Go in as blind as you can without a bunch of pre-conceived notions about what it will be or knowing how entire chunks of the game will look and play. Risk the money.

-Don't look for help on builds or whatever beforehand on your first playthrough. Dive in, do your own thing, create your own character.

-Play a game because you want to enjoy playing the game and don't go in just so you can participate in dumb discussions online.

 

[Lacrymas]

Nah, don't buy anything at release, wait at least a year for not only a price reduction, but also probably a "complete edition" with as many bugs squashed as possible. Really, though, if you have to go through elaborate rituals to enjoy a game, maybe it just isn't very good. I do agree with going in blind for a first playthrough, but not spoiling anything beforehand seems obvious.

 

[thesecret1]

I find the best phase of any RPG is the hobo phase, when you have a broken stick as a weapon and a burlap sack for armor. Where every coin you find is exciting because it means you may save up for something to wear and when every battle is full of excitement since you're weak as hell. Later on, I usually get ahead of the difficulty curve and things are no longer so exciting - have more money than I can spend, armour and weapon are good enough to plow through the next 10 hours without changing (but I'll change them for something more efficient anyway along the way since the game tends to throw powerful shit at me at every turn)... And so I like to put on the hardest difficulty every time (sometimes going as far as getting mods that raise the difficulty, especially in terms of in game economy) so as to hopefully prolong the hobo phase for more enjoyment.

 

[Starwars]

Nah, don't buy anything at release, wait at least a year for not only a price reduction, but also probably a "complete edition" with as many bugs squashed as possible. Really, though, if you have to go through elaborate rituals to enjoy a game, maybe it just isn't very good. I do agree with going in blind for a first playthrough, but not spoiling anything beforehand seems obvious.

I don't think it's obvious at all in this day and age to be honest, but I agree that it should be. Just look how many retarded let's play videos and youtuber discussion you see posted on the Codex of all places.

And I see the sense in not pre-ordering of course and waiting for bugfixes and and all that. At the same time, if you're somehow excited by a game before it is released, it's fun to dive in right away. I was excited enough about a game like Disco Elysium that I could kinda get that feeling of being a kid on Christmas when I started the game up. I had no idea if I would like the game or not, didn't know anything about it at all except for some very basic things they revealed way back when (which drew me to the game). And that excitment affects the experience of playing the game a lot. If I waited a year to play it, I would still find it a great game of course but that excitment wouldn't be there in the same way. And that's a fun thing to have in a game every once in a while.

 

[Swigen]

I recommend buying a good graphics card to derive maximum enjoyment from graphically intense rpgs like Disco Elysium, ATOM and probably Das Geisterturm.

 

[Wayward Son]

I always like to wait and hear opinions from other people with similar tastes to decide if I want to ge ta game

 

[Dramart]

Just follow your heart, and you'll never be wrong.

 

[Lacrymas]

Sounds like the perfect recipe to get your heart trodden on ;p

 

[fantadomat]

Just follow your heart, and you'll never be wrong.

Ahh the mystical power of love.

 

[Silverfish]

Strength build. No exceptions.

 

[Wayward Son]

Sounds like the perfect recipe to get your heart trodden on ;p

Eh, wouldn’t be the first nor the last.

 

[Ysaye]

Just follow your heart, and you'll never be wrong.

Ahh the mystical power of love.

What's the heart got to do with love? The heart is a muscle, you are following the path of might if you are following your heart. Having said that, you should just follow your mind...if that's even possible to do......

 

[smaug]

Roll or create chars over and over again. But don’t actually play the game, on the off chance it might be shit.

 

[Comte]

Best way to enjoy rpgs is to play some golden age classic in a window then load up your internet browser to fap when your bored of killing millions of creatures and hunting for the macguffin. This way you can switch back and forth.

 

[nyjsu]

If the game is mostly about combat then meta-gaming and min-maxing is definitely part of the experience, I can't see how is it fun to pick a non-optimal choice in a game like Underrail, ToEE or whatever. In more N A R R A T I V E™ games your tips are true though.

 

[eXalted]

Don't listen to Codex and just play them.

 

[Quillon]

Something I realized recently is that I play characters with consistent behavior but I don't roleplay/larp which I think is why I don't like the new approach of prominent RPG devs' focus on player expression rather than tangible C&C.

 

[RoksCQ]

How to get the most out of it and immerse yourself imo.



Don't seek tips

Use your wit and intelligence to overcome obstacles.

Don't metagame

Obsessing over perfect builds can ruin the fun. Flawed builds are cool. However it turns out makes it special. Picked the wrong feat by accident or made a bad call? Don't worry, it might prove useful after all.

Don't save-scum

Obvioiusly, ruins muh immersion. Stick with what you get.

Increase difficulty

The greater the challenge, the more rewarding gameplay will be.

Be spontaneous, not completionist

Don't try to visit every location. Don't try to complete every quest. Leave something for other play-through. I'm not advocating role-playing strictly speaking. But tend to do stuff which makes sense. Clearing five dungeons in a row doesn't.

Don't binge on dialogue options (by eXalted)

Don't exhaust all conversation options if you don't find them interesting. And yes, there could be a quest hidden there, who cares?

Keep cycling savegame slots

Try to save less often. Certainly don't spam the quicksave button. Continuity of experience is key to immersion.

Live with your consequences.

Failed a skill roll? Attacked someone by accident? Jammed a chest? Try this experiment and don't reload. That liberates you from OCD and made my runs much more memorable and distinctive e.g. that time when I was caught stealing, that time when I drank the wrong potion etc.

Role playing

Obviously a subject which can be widely interpreted however just making consistent dialogue choices works.

Play it like it was meant to be played (by Wayward Son)

Sure, you COULD look up that dungeon map or use screenshots to take notes, but the game was built around the lack of easily accessible internet and/or screenshots, so this can ruin the gameplay. Ultimas are a good example of this, they were built around you taking good, concise but accurate notes or you were up Shit Creek without a paddle.

Spontaneity is king

This is where all the fun and good gaming memories stem from.








Do you have any suggestions? I wish more games would encourage such behavior.

Hope all these swell plans don't backfire due the game itself and it's secret bugs and imbalances your wits couldn't foresee. The things that you look up later and "the devs didn't implement it properly / at all" "point of no return unprepared -- play it where it lies (in your ass) if the game is less properly designed". Assuming documentation of the game is all within your purview and accurate, how much do you want to know? just the story in the manual and the gameplay flow? suikoden 1 and 2 were fantastic to play "as it lies" because the failures you make result in a far more emotionally moving narrative in both of them (jRPG? stone the unbeliever!) but so long as you are rewarded in your own way for playing as smart as you possibly could that would be swell. Lots of alt paths / true pathing scares the impulsiveness out of me assuming a sizeable game.

Getting old hell... I'd do dumb shit like (OH SHIT JRPGS AGAIN) fight your dark knight form with Cecil's paladin form in final fantasy 4 and WIN (farmed like crazy for cure2s and levels because i didn't know one simple trick that Dark Knights Hate! back then) or found a grand total of 1 ultimate weapon in FF7 and wondered why yuffie was my hardest hitting character (didn't see omnislash until the very final cinematic when you get the last 1v1 ending battle (which made it cooler frankly).

What mistakes have you made on blind runs of rpgs that left you with distinct good memories when you finished them? That's the best encouragement for more blind running -- good tales from old tall tell tellers instead of getting too much optimization information from the rest of the hive.