I don't give a sufficient amount of fuck to make this step.I haven't really played Zelda because I haven't owned a single console in my life.
gameboy roms/emulators are a google search away
I don't give a sufficient amount of fuck to make this step.I haven't really played Zelda because I haven't owned a single console in my life.
gameboy roms/emulators are a google search away
Yeah, but I'm not going to buy/steal Oblivion and its DLC (horsearmor, lol) just to marvel at a shitty/bad/passable dungeon.I removed it from the article, but the whole point was kinda showing all the things a dungeon can have and Oblivion's dungeon DOESN'T.
This is the Codex. Not being mean and bitter is treated like mental illness (by the actual nutcases, but I digress).Felt very mean and bitter (it was)
The map might have mislead me into thinking it might be interesting.This is the map:
For example, the entrance has a gate asking for a password. Cool, an obstacle! But the password is in a bag in front of it. And I mean LITERALLY IN FRONT:
That actually got me to think and I think I have come up with something interesting regarding multiple entry points/paths in cRPGs, why they often end up looking like a waste of development effort (sadly they do) and some ways to prevent that.Why? Because Oblivion doesn't have dialog trees or persuasion skills, there's no alternate paths and they don't trust the player enough to hide the diary. Tabletop RPGs would allow hundreds of solutions, from blasting the door down to disguising yourself, Fallout would have the classic combat/dialog/stealth solutions, an immersive sim would at the very least give optional paths for you to crawl through....
I now wonder which Morrowind dungeons (if any) you'd consider good.Everything else is just walking across very obvious paths, killing the same level scaled enemies and reading poorly written notes on the ground about the lore of a mega dungeon DLC that didn't even bother to fucking name its NPCs.
And what about Skyrim (yeah, I know, most dungeons are linear slogs, but not all of them, especially if you consider dungeon complexes consisting of an indoor/outdoor hostile dungeon hub connecting multiple smaller locations, and even some of the smaller, more linear ones can offer some interesting gameplay variations).
That's very true.And since Oblivion's combat is so shitty, fighting for so long gets really boring, really fast.
The sad thing is that if you compare it to all the other dungeons in this game...In short, someone at Bethesda adapted their lame home-made D&D dungeon into Oblivion, called it "the deepest & most challenging dungeon" and sold it to suckers. And those suckers still haunt reddit, telling people that it's a good dungeon.
Additional thought:
What about good computer non-RPG dungeons? It's not like cRPGs tend to do very good job giving player multiple verbs to use (and choose from) so they are not at actual advantage here, compared to other games.
Would, say, Azrael's Tear be a good dungeon?
Have to agree, the best dungeons I have played through are probably all from A Link to the Past. There are some great ones in cRPGs, but Legend of Zelda pretty much takes the cake when it comes to dungeon design.
Tomb Raider Anniversary is a pretty faithful remake of the first game, there are some modern consoletard additions to it but overall they kept the level design and puzzles intact.
My favorite is TR4 because it has some of the best dungeons and puzzles in the series.
They are great, mix really well the puzzles with some excellent level design.Legend of Zelda dungeon design blows any western rpg out of water but high self esteem codexers won't agree with this statement.
They are great, mix really well the puzzles with some excellent level design.Legend of Zelda dungeon design blows any western rpg out of water but high self esteem codexers won't agree with this statement.
But do you play RPGs for that? A short segment might be a nice change of pace, but Zelda's dungeons have no complex combat, no place for character skills, no choice & consequence, no dialog trees, no factions, no multiple approaches depending on your class/race, no epic loot...
It's a bit like saying metroidvanias should have platforming challenges like Super Meat Boy. Hollow Knight did that a bit with The Path of Pain, but that's an optional, ultra-hard challenge. The game would be worse if they added more of that, as that's not why people play metroidvanias.
But do you play RPGs for that? A short segment might be a nice change of pace, but Zelda's dungeons have no complex combat, no place for character skills, no choice & consequence, no dialog trees, no factions, no multiple approaches depending on your class/race, no epic loot...
That's not my post you're quotingThey are great, mix really well the puzzles with some excellent level design.Legend of Zelda dungeon design blows any western rpg out of water but high self esteem codexers won't agree with this statement.
But do you play RPGs for that? A short segment might be a nice change of pace, but Zelda's dungeons have no complex combat, no place for character skills, no choice & consequence, no dialog trees, no factions, no multiple approaches depending on your class/race, no epic loot...
It's a bit like saying metroidvanias should have platforming challenges like Super Meat Boy. Hollow Knight did that a bit with The Path of Pain, but that's an optional, ultra-hard challenge. The game would be worse if they added more of that, as that's not why people play metroidvanias.
I love anime
I think this is a very interesting aspect when talking about RPGs.There’s even a certain metroidvânia aspect, as you can learn spells like water-walk, levitate and fly, then return to previous areas to explore further.
That's not my post you're quoting
Thanks for the tip, TR4 looks perfectly fine indeed and very enticing. I had another look at some TR2 and TR3 playthrough videos and I actually find that early 3D engine look quite charming, I think it would rather add something interesting to the experience than detract from it.
I'll be a bit off topic (sorry for that), but your suggestions here and in this thread renewed my interest in the series so I've put together a playthrough order, would you mind sharing your thoughts on that? I'm more or less a completionist and I like to go through things in order when that's preferable, although I'm not completely sure if the order matters that much with the TR games (in a way like it matters for the Gold Box series, for instance).
Start with...
TR Anniversary (instead of TR1)
TR2
TR3
TR4
...then play
Legend
Underworld
Stay way from
Chronicles
Angel of Darkness
Tomb Raider And The Temple Of Osiris
One more question, Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Tomb Raider 2013, are these worth playing at all? I hated the action sequences, the cutscene overload, the "RPG-light elements", and the trophy collecting achievement shit in Rise of the Tomb Raider, I only kept playing it for the puzzles and atmopshere of the tomb levels really, which were excellent and made me forget about the rest.
My suggested sequence of playthroughs would be: TR1/Anniversary->TR2->TR4 and then TR3 only if you feel like playing more of the same.
I played an RPG that kinda does this: Maimed God's Saga, a mod for NWN2.RPGs should take a completely opposite approach from Metroid done wrong, the use of tools should be limited to certain characters but so that your exploration depends a lot on your party that won't be enough, you should also for a big part choose spells, skills and buy tools beforehand (like before entering a dungeon). In practice, if I'm totally fine with only choices, and I'd even add that I'd really like to play many more games with advanced party creation and a starting pool of gold you spend on some tools rather than others, I'm not against a balance between choices and Metroid done right approach if only because a "walk on water" spell which will trivialize some parts may generally be a satisfying reward for completing a dungeon more often than another weapon is.
Haven't played Metroid, but at least in Maimed God Saga it felt very arbitrary to me, because you can't really plan for these encounters. Ultimately, you have to plan your spell memorization with a view of combat, and if you happen to guess what the next scripted encounter will require - that's a nice bonus, but you can't make a strategy out of it.I played an RPG that kinda does this: Maimed God's Saga, a mod for NWN2.RPGs should take a completely opposite approach from Metroid done wrong, the use of tools should be limited to certain characters but so that your exploration depends a lot on your party that won't be enough, you should also for a big part choose spells, skills and buy tools beforehand (like before entering a dungeon). In practice, if I'm totally fine with only choices, and I'd even add that I'd really like to play many more games with advanced party creation and a starting pool of gold you spend on some tools rather than others, I'm not against a balance between choices and Metroid done right approach if only because a "walk on water" spell which will trivialize some parts may generally be a satisfying reward for completing a dungeon more often than another weapon is.
Basically you are forced to play a Cleric, and the entire game is based around the use of spells as a role-playing resource. You can use them in combat, but they are often used as possible solutions to quests & events. For example, you enter a room and see a necromancer. Before you rush in to attack him, the game gives to option to cast Silence on him. If you have that spell available, you can fight him 1:1. If not, he'll summon undead when the combat starts, as a scripted event.
It's an extremely cool mechanic, that I wish other RPGs would try.