Give me one example of a "Golden Age" RPG that is superior to Fallout, Jagged Alliance 2 and Deus Ex.
Why does everything need to be superior? I've never suggested that. I said that early 90s games have gameplay elements which do not exist in the late 90s and 2000s, see V_K's post for some examples.
I also said that the Renaissance era introduced many new things, I'm not saying that they are unimportant, just that they are missing important parts of their legacy. A trend that has continued to this day.
I'll also caution that I'm not very interested in defending "my games" vs "your games". I don't think that tying one's identity to a couple of trinkets and defending them at all costs is very fruitful.
I'm only interested in finding out the good and bad ideas within games and how they come in concert to create experiences which stand out on their own, regardless of the sum of their parts.
Taking the example of U7 and Serpent Isle since they've been mentioned:
- NPCs have pages of dialogue and a seeming life of their own
- Each town is detailed and has its own problems, some of which don't have solutions.
- There is the presence of a mysterious looming threat that can not be approached with violence
- There are also many other "hurdles" that will divert the Avatar's attention, which could be called "side quests", but that term is not really appropriate, as they aren't really structured like that; even though a few of them are optional.
- There are connections all throughout the optional activities, the intermediary objectives and the main objective
All of these elements interact with each other. The NPCs mention details and locations, these details can then be discussed with other specific NPCs and the means to reach these locations can be explored, this is true in every rpg.
However, while doing so, the player stumbles on other clues, some of which are completely unrelated, others which lead to optional content and some that are just flavor text.
Finding out the difference between each through trial, error and logic results in most of the experience of the game. In between those events, there's a (not so good) combat and you might stumble on a well designed dungeon, which in turn will have even more clues which leads to even more note taking and exploration.
This creates an investigative feedback loop similar to adventure games but that is not simply based around solving puzzles but on telling apart fact from fiction, leads from diversions. All of this on the scale of interaction and progression that is proper to an RPG. This is heightened by the lack of an in game journal, forcing you to keep track of every story bit and NPC development. It's a game that captures a lot of the design principles of that era, and seemingly to prove that it excels at them; includes a combat system that is completely anecdotal, with an extension that maxes out the player's stats and doubles them some more to show out the pointlessness of resolving the world's trouble with murder and how it offers challenges that can be much more complex.
Yet, even though it does that, it still manages to recreate the tension and mystery of a dungeon within its stat maxing extension and throughout the rest of the adventure...
Now add to this that there's a coherence to the world of Britannia that's been honed for more than a decade with so many connections between flavor, optional, side and main content that it becomes extremely difficult to tell them apart and you have an immersive experience unlike any other.
While being under the thrall of the game, EVERYTHING could be important. Every single word could be a vital clue to progress, every single crate could hide a vital note, a key, an item, anything. The player's sense of attention is heightened throughout because of this feeling of a lived in world, where yeah, you could find a goblet of Everlasting Nourishment on the decadent dinner table of a nobleman's house, because he'd have that kind of money.
This feeling of a massive world is not something that you can replicate by following the fallout and BG formula of "talk to this guy, get the quest, get a clue (if there is), do the thing and if you're lucky, there will be a few ways of doing it", rinse, repeat and onto the next quest hub. Though it requires less investment on the part of the player, it also limits the sentiment of possibilities that the game offers to you, even if in F1, there's many more options and quests.
Doing what U7 did requires trusting the player's attention and wits, providing him with just enough for him to have a vague sense of direction, but not enough that he can know what comes next. There is no sense of a "formula" in games that take this design philosophy to heart. Everything is quite unique, seldom reused and it is precisely that you can not know what's around the corner that makes exploration and investigation feel worthwhile, rewarding and limitless, even if on paper, there's less C&C, less side quests, less NPCs...
The Less is more effect that U7, Wiz7, bloodstone, RoA and all those games have is the very thing that makes PnP rpgs great. Technically, there's much less in a PnP campaign than in a game like BG, fallout or planescape. I don't think there are many DMs that can capture the writing of Avellone or the flow and speed of combat that BG has, even if they simplified things.
And yet, mapping out a dungeon at the sound of your DM's voice, not knowing what lies around the corner; or talking with an exuberant NPC, not knowing if he might become an important character as your group takes a liking to him goes miles beyond any form of media despite the "limitations" of writing and flow/speed of events. It's the illusion of infinite possibilities that we all know isn't true, but that we still consent to, because of the thrill that comes with it. Your DM doesn't have an infinite amount of prep time, nor are his improv skills enough to completely change the setting of a campaign at a whim, and yet... He just might, just this once...
It's the same with the investigative thirst that these games can offer to anyone who is motivated enough to keep going with them, despite the difficulty or clumsiness of their UI and mechanics.
They aren't superior, they're unique, different and incredibly refreshing, their ignorance of many of the codes RPGs hold today led to their audacious blends of genres and designs, stuff like Albion doesn't exist in the Renaissance era. Yet, the values and codes to which they held dear are still unmatched today, it's a tough call to find the dungeon design that MM5 and W7 had. Though it is true that their combat may have been a bit simpler than JA2 and F1, the era still put out games like XCOM and Dark Sun, which to me are a much fairer comparison, like father and son.
Ignoring these games altogether would perpetuate the trends of simplifications that we've seen since the Renaissance era.
In short, these games are the source of Incline, if you want to understand what makes good games, broaden your tastes and hopefully re-inspire a generation of developers to tend towards a new renaissance, this is where it's at.
Bullshit. In addition to Arcanum, Fallout and Baldur's Gate have lots of investigation and mystery (Glow and Durlag's Tower, for starters). The reason why you don't think they do is because you read a walkthrough on your first playthrough, thereby ruining the experience for yourself.
I have no idea why you'd think that anyone would ever need a walk-through for fallout and baldur's gate, literally two of the most accessible and simplest games to get into...
