A good RPG cannot be short

[Blaine]

Nah a good rpg can't be short.

This is correct.

I challenge anyone to name one short RPG that saw great success or that was remembered more than five years later, other than the Quest for Glory series, which were adventure hybrids and still pretty damned long if you were a kid without a hint book.

cRPGs take time to get acquainted with and digest properly. When an RPG ends after 8-15 hours (and fortunately I've only blindly walked into one or two of those), I suddenly understand what it's like to be a woman who's just finished coitus with a two-pump chump.

 

[polo]

What do you call short? Fallout 1 is not a long RPG by any means.

 

[StrongBelwas]

Nah a good rpg can't be short.

This is correct.

I challenge anyone to name one short RPG that saw great success or that was remembered more than five years later, other than the Quest for Glory series, which were adventure hybrids and still pretty damned long if you were a kid without a hint book.

cRPGs take time to get acquainted with or digest properly. When an RPG ends after 8-15 hours, I suddenly understand what it's like to be a woman who's just finished coitus with a two-pump chump.

Fallout 1 can be 100%ed in about 14 hours, the one bugbear maybe is the mother deathclaw for someone on their first time.

 

[Blaine]

Fuck off, retards. You can also speedrun Fallout 1 in something like 15 minutes, if I recall correctly, but there are far more than 14 hours of beef on that hoof even during the first playthrough.

Here's a thing: https://howlongtobeat.com/game.php?id=3338

Fine, let's say there's been one cRPG in history that was somewhat short, except that it was eminently replayable to such a degree that I didn't even notice, even though I generally hate short cRPGs.

So basically, in order for short-ass length to be acceptable, you have to be as good and as replayable as Fallout. You know any short cRPGs that fit that bill?

 

[CptMace]

I challenge anyone to name one short RPG that saw great success or that was remembered more than five years later, other than the Quest for Glory series, which were adventure hybrids and still pretty damned long if you were a kid without a hint book.

Fallout 1

Fine

Challenge lost in 2 minutes

Jokes aside, you deceitfully went from the original claim "an rpg has to be long in order to really be considered good" to "there's no good rpg that last 10 hours". That's the problem here, I feel we're not talking about the same thing. I don't think an RPG has to be long particularly to be very good. Then again, obviously, short games need to be pretty dense in order to impress, precisely like fallout imo. These games have a nice advantage though, it's easy to play through them again without spending a month on it. I although liked serpent in the staglands or kotor ii in the "not long" category, off the top of my head.
edit : actually the original claim was indeed that a good rpg can't be short owell

 

[Lacrymas]

AoD can legitimately (i.e. no rushing) be beaten in 10ish hours, that's probably a normal playthrough actually.

 

[FreeKaner]

AoD can legitimately (i.e. no rushing) be beaten in 10ish hours, that's probably a normal playthrough actually.

If you play a merchant start and do your part as a merchant with no deviations you can finish the game in like two hours.

 

[polo]

Dunno, coming from the top of my head Chrono Trigger is not too long either, unless you do every side quest and grind the shit out of it. I mean, there are multiple endings and stuff, but still, overall its kind of from the shorter side of things.

Just as a clarification, i like my rpgs long and full of unique content, and hand placed enemies, loot, and shit. But w/e, there are some good shortish RPGs.

 

[Blaine]

Challenge lost in 2 minutes

Nah. You might be able to rush through to the end of Fallout in 14 hours, but a reasonable first play of the game while taking the time to converse with most of the characters, explore, and poke around will be closer to 25-30 hours, and probably more, as the HLTB poll numbers indicate. "Main story" means exactly that. Fallout is pretty tight, narratively speaking, but there's still more to do than complete the main story—and unlike a great many RPGs, it's extremely replayable. In fact, it's so replayable that a person is likely to play it again right away or soon after the first playthrough. That's something I did only with Fallout and Fallout 2 (and then again, and then yet again), but never with any other RPGs until Underrail and AoD were released for public consumption well over a decade later.

But yeah, if you define "completion" as finishing the main story with absolutely no stops along the way, ignore several critical factors, and fudge the numbers, then sure, you won the challenge. That's not actually how I define "short" RPGs, though. I'm thinking of the ones that can be completed in 10-15 or so hours, the whole meat of them, and then you're done with them because there's no genuine replayability/desire to replay.

Fallout is an exceptional and cherished RPG anyway, so rushing straight for it rather than coming up with other examples is about as faggy as you can get. I'm still waiting for more actual examples.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I wouldn't at all mind a 20 hour RPG that's basically just a main plot with no filler.

But you'd have to be mad to even attempt something like this. The audience wants their 40h-50h gameplay, and modern gamurs in particular want their precious aimless expluration and their pointless collectibles and they want to play house with their sweet Ydwin.

I mean, imagine if you took Wasteland 2, deleted Nomad Camp and Prison, replaced them with Holywood and Rodia, and deleted the LA map entirely (except the endgame stuff). Would it be a better game? Twice better I dare to say, tighter, more focused, packed to the brim with all of the best content and little to none pointless filler. Would it be received better? Fucking no chance at that. Too short.

 

[FreeKaner]

Length is essential, don't let people fool you about the motions of the ocean or the usage of the tool. Good content is a good RPG and quantity is a quality of its own.

 

[CptMace]

Challenge lost in 2 minutes

Nah.

But yeah.

Nobody talked about rushing through fallout. It doesn't take more than 20 hours to complete pretty much anything a character can do. Then yeah, of course, another build opens more possibilities.
Playing with low intelligence means an even shorter game I guess.
We gave you other examples.

You're even the one who notes the strength of a short good crpg, they're easily replayable. They can focus on reactivity rather than providing the player a shit ton of more or less interesting things to do.
I note you're more eager to ask for good short rpgs (and ignore the responses altogether) than to explain your point of view. This, actually, is pretty faggy. And retarded. Mostly retarded.

Good content is a good RPG and quantity is a quality of its own.

Nobody denies this. The question is : is this the only way to make a good rpg ?

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Length absolutely is essential, but the way developers accomplish that length is by filling the game with half-assed filler. Why do you think this genre has such a ridiclously low completion rates. People get bored slogging through pile of shit looking for something that's actually interesting to do.

 

[FreeKaner]

Length absolutely is essential, but the way developers accomplish that length is by filling the game with half-assed filler. Why do you think this genre has such a ridiclously low completion rates. People get bored slogging through pile of shit looking for something that's actually interesting to do.

Of course filler just for sake of filler is trash in every sense of the word but getting higher quality content is exponentially harder so a game will tend to get shorter exponentially also to raise the levels of its overall quality. I feel the happy medium is way before the game can be finished in one sit-through, where there are some varying levels of acceptable, decent, good and high quality content spread so the contrast itself within the game world becomes a content of its own.

 

[Blaine]

Nobody talked about rushing through fallout.

Yes, 14 hours absolutely is rushing through Fallout, which is the amount of time Dong Bellend initially cited.

We gave you other examples.

Chrono Trigger is a JRPG and really doesn't apply here, although I personally suspect many people spent a minimum of 40-60+ hours playing it. HLTB suggests that's probably accurate. Nowhere did I define "short" as the minimal amount of time to complete an RPG's main story, or the fastest possible speedrun. I certainly don't play them that way.

The quantity of unique, non-repeated content in Age of Teleportation is far higher than two or ten hours. I'd clock it somewhere between 30 and 50 hours, although I haven't seen it all, so I'm not entirely sure. That breadth of content is separate from the possibility of playing through essentially the same content differently, with different builds and/or making different choices. You can finish a "character arc" in two or ten hours, but the game isn't really finished, and everyone knows it.

If this is what you have to resort to in order to prove that "short" RPGs can be good—by framing RPGs that clearly aren't short by any reasonable metric as being short based on arbitrary criteria set by you—then feel free to declare yourself a winner. Maybe chop some more single words out of my posts to take out of context and drive the point home.

 

[CptMace]

Why come on now, I didn't take single words out of context to make a point, I did it to make silly jokes. Hence my "jokes aside" comment. You took these too seriously (i thought they were super clever and super fun personally, i rate them 10/10.)

Although, fair enough, we don't have proper criteria for what game qualifies as a short rpg. I notice that we definitely don't have the same thing in mind though, because I wouldn't count the sum of non-repeated segments that can't be experienced in a single playthrough as the total duration of a game.
I had in mind games that last 20 hours or less, which is the duration for fallout with side content in the link you've posted by the way.

Cut the nonsense about "winning" an argument, you might come up with more quality posts in the future.

 

[Lacrymas]

It's hard to think up a short RPG in general, let alone a good one which is short, so I don't think we have the necessary sample size to determine whether short RPGs don't work. I think Fallout 1 is on the shorter side compared to the average RPG, though. This obsession over playtime does more harm than good, if you've already exhausted all the quality content you can think up in the time it takes to develop a game, then I think it's time to stop and polish whatever it is you got until the deadline. Yeah, some filler is necessary so other things can stand out more, it also depends on what you mean by filler. In Classical sonatas, there's usually a short passage of trivial music (called a transition) linking the first theme with the second and I'd call that filler, but it's essential to smoothly get to the second theme. That's how I think of filler in moderation in RPGs, something elegantly chaining the important things together, giving breathing room. I think that's a good starting point of conceptualizing an RPG structure.

 

[aweigh]

i wouldn't consider FO1 a legitimate short RPG because it's obviously not intended to be won in 15 minutes same as Morrowind wasn't inteded to be won via potions and shit without ever leaving 1st village and it is obvious to anyone with common sense that both games i'm using here as examples have enough content for 20 hours and more for a 1st playthrough.

(20hrs being the apparent consensus on whether a game is long or not).

also judging RPGs by their length (insert penis joke + width meme here) is a dubious way to go about it because of the interactive nature of video games where repetition is fundamental.

EDIT: btw another "noteworthy RPG" that can be completed in less than 10 hours with meta-knowledge? Wizardry 1. Half of Wiz1's levels are skippable.

 

[Blaine]

Cut the nonsense about "winning" an argument, you might come up with more quality posts in the future.

I didn't say a word about winning an argument. RPG-related arguments are essentially unwinnable, and there are hundreds of redundant Codex threads to prove it. There can be no victors here, only varying degrees of loser. We're currently enjoying the Nth repetition of a game-length argument that probably began one week after the site was founded.

I was thinking maybe you'd win a nice banana sticker as a reward for your contortionist tactics:

It's hard to think up a short RPG in general, let alone a good one which is short....

There's a reason for that.

The quality > quantity argument is older than Abraham, and while there is truth to it, that truth is contextual and there are obviously practical limitations. A platforming game the length of stage 1-1 in Super Mario Bros. isn't going to be well received by anyone, for example, no matter how elaborate and lavish it is. There's an ideal middle ground, and for cRPGs that middle ground has consistently proven to be somewhere between 25-50 hours, presuming that time is taken to enjoy, appreciate, and explore most or all of the content. That number can obviously be modified by the game's format and replayability.

Pure puzzle games are a good example of a different thing being held to a different standard. I've played many pure puzzle games that can be completed in 4-8 hours (2-4 by expert puzzlers) and been perfectly happy with them, because by the time you reach the end of the game you've hopefully been eased from solving the beginner-level puzzles into solving viciously difficult puzzles. That's satisfying and can be considered proper and complete. RPGs on the other hand are based on exploration, world-building, character progression, choice and consequence, and often aspects such as character arcs and relationships and plotlines that are epic in scope. These sorts of elements generally require much more time to reach "satisfaction saturation," so to speak.

 

[Daedalos]

Rather have 10 hours of tight, interesting and engaging gameplay/ with a good story, twists and turns and C&C, than 60 hours of shit, with the main quest being 5 hours long and the rest are shitty sidequests.

Just sayin.

Quality over quantity as always.

Keeping a player fully engaged with the story and intriqued with the gameplay and the world for 50-60 hours+ is a special feat, hence why not many have done it. Because it requires quite a bit of ressources, handling of those ressources and competent people to structure it all together so it never becomes a bore or just unengaging.

It's basically the movie vs tv series all over again.

Rather have a tightly constructed and engaging movie for 2.5 hours than 10 hours or 60 hours of shitty seasons of some shitty tv show that tries to emulate the same things that the movie did.

Or I'd rather have just a mini-tvseries that is 10 hours, than a tv series that lasts 8 seasons, because that shit is bound to become boring or a harsh drop in quality at some point-.

Some of the best tv-series has been only 10 episodes long or even less, while you probably COULD make it 70 hour long, but at a cost.

 

[Efe]

tyranny is short, is more reactive and has more replayability
so dex finally agree Tyranny is better than PoE?

 

[Daedalos]

tyranny is short, is more reactive and has more replayability
so dex finally agree Tyranny is better than PoE?

Tyranny is a hot steaming pile of dogshit in every sense of the word. PoE is a modern art masterpiece compared to Tranny.

 

[Theldaran]

Length... well, considering that typically, length is bloated by including trash combat, a short game is also good. But yeah, it has to be replayable.

 

[Falksi]

Game length all depends about what's stimulating you and wht you're getting with it.

I'm only on my first POE playthrough and have just finished act 1, but I'm really enjoying it and any "padding" which I've come across doesn't really feel like padding because of how it's done. It feels like a natural part of the world, and because the game keeps throwing new things & the odd surprise at you, there's always that sense of anticipation & discovery.

The music helps a lot. It's got some stunning tunes, and sometimes I can just chill out on my phone & listen to the music.

 

[Theldaran]

In fact, the start of PoE was maybe enjoyable, maybe more than the rest.

Too bad there's a huge disconnection between the different acts. Dyrwood has bad consistence.