Editorial Baldur's Gate is Game Developers' All-time Favorite

[thesoup]

These lists are depressing. I think I'll find another hobby.

Honey, the cRPG genre has been dead, the corpse raped and a liquefied organic smelly mass for years now.

Granted only (a few) indie's are the ones making them now.

That's not the problem with the lists. Most games on these lists are either pure shit or overrated.

 

[Excidium]

So...? I don't see why one would get all worked up over this.

 

[PorkaMorka]

I remember thinking Baldur's Gate "new dumb crap" when it came out.

Funny, I remember discussing how much of a breath of fresh air Baldur's gate was with my pen and paper D&D group.

The time was 1998. Gaming was still a non terrible hobby, but CRPGs had been in a big dry spell, especially D&D CRPGs.

The most recent D&D CRPG was 1997's Descent to Undermountain. Before that we had DeathKeep, Ravenloft, Menzoberranzan, other Ravenloft. Nothing but shitty first person action RPGs. Well, I guess there was also Al Qadim, another mediocre action RPG. Do you remember how disappointing it was to have to play shit like Menzoberranzan instead of proper CRPGs?

It's not until you go all the way back to 1994 that you get another true D&D CRPG, Wake of the Ravager.

Nowadays, we think nothing of going years and years without a CRPG, but back in the 90s this was a pretty fucking big dry spell, as gaming wasn't a complete joke of a hobby yet.

BG's success directly contributed to the fact that we saw the production of seven isometric party based D&D CRPGs with tactical combat between 1998 and 2003; BG, BG2, IWD, IWD2, PS:T, POR:ROMD, TOEE. We also got 4 expansion packs and the horribly shitty NWN during this time period.

Sure, none would deny that in the long run BG contributed to the decline. But you have to give it credit for sparking a temporary revival of proper D&D CRPGs. And for being a big step up over Menzoberranzan.

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

So...? I don't see why one would get all worked up over this.

But he was doing it only because of politics!

I remember thinking Baldur's Gate "new dumb crap" when it came out.

Funny, I remember discussing how much of a breath of fresh air Baldur's gate was with my pen and paper D&D group.

The time was 1998. Gaming was still a non terrible hobby, but CRPGs had been in a big dry spell, especially D&D CRPGs.

The most recent D&D CRPG was 1997's Descent to Undermountain. Before that we had DeathKeep, Ravenloft, Menzoberranzan, other Ravenloft. Nothing but shitty first person action RPGs. Well, I guess there was also Al Qadim, another mediocre action RPG. Do you remember how disappointing it was to have to play shit like Menzoberranzan instead of proper CRPGs?

It's not until you go all the way back to 1994 that you get another true D&D CRPG, Wake of the Ravager.

Nowadays, we think nothing of going years and years without a CRPG, but back in the 90s this was a pretty fucking big dry spell, as gaming wasn't a complete joke of a hobby yet.

You missed the part when two Fallouts came out before Baldur's Gate and Tim Cain was already planning an AD&D party-based cRPG when working on Fallout.

And Baldur's Gate didn't begin anything. Bioware brought their RTS prototype to Interplay and Interplay told them to make a PnP cRPG on its engine or GTFO. The tendency for making non-Diablo style in Interplay was already there.

 

[Excidium]

So...? I don't see why one would get all worked up over this.

But he was doing it only because of politics!

That's what everyone tried to believe. "Tim is trolling Bethesda, he's so clever!"

Denial is a funny thing.

 

[SCO]

I do so enjoy the kaleidoscope of wrath that comes from a long time spent with something you despise

Weidu is also fun. A language where the while loop evaluates for 0 as false and where other parts of the language that test booleans return 0 for true is always fun.

As well as that whole business about the parser rupturing the language in two, with duplicated statements Patches( work while weidu is COPY-ing a file) or Actions (that don't).

Always fun to see parser and lexer warts come out in a language semantics.

It's also a ducktyping language where variables have to be "evaluated" before they will give you what you expect.

OUTER_SET len = STRING_LENGTH ~%KEYS%~
is what you'd expect, length of the string referenced by variable KEYS
OUTER_SET le = STRING_LENGTH KEYS
is 4 (length of the KEYS, length of the name of the variable)

 

[Roguey]

Re: Baldur's Gate is Game Developers' All-time Favorite

Also, I was around when BG came out, but maybe I missed something: what was that other rpg with better combat and character development in '98?

Might and Magic 6 was the best RPG of 1998.

Deadspace (20th)

Deadspace being one of the 20 favorite games of developers is mindblowing. I can figure an (weak) argument for any of the 19 previous games, but for this shit?

http://www.kotaku.com.au/2009/06/questi ... -avellone/

I repeatedly use System Shock 2 and in more recent titles, Dead Space as “design doc” games for how games or functionality should be designed. I think Dead Space did so many things well technically that I keep referring to it with design.

In terms of recent games, though, I enjoyed Fallout 3, Mass Effect, and Dead Space very much, not to mention a host of DS games.

http://planetfallout.gamespy.com/articl ... s-Avellone

The way Dead Space turned turn-based combat into a power and then changed the "typical" shooting mechanics so that you bisected foes instead of just doing headshots and body shots was interesting, and I also loved the interface in that game.

http://forums.obsidian.net/index.php?au ... wentry=134

What are your favorite games of all times? And what about movies/music?

Fallout 1, Chronotrigger, Zuma, Final Fantasy III, the Hero System, Illuminati, Chez Geek, System Shock 2, Bomberman (multiplayer), Robotron 2084, Myth 1, Ultima Underworld I. I have a lot of "design doc" games that I think all designers should play (Dead Space's interface is really incredible, for example).

Chris Avellone: Massive Dead Space fan. It turned turn based combat into a power y'know.

 

[Johannes]

Goddamnit why aren't they voting for games you like??

 

[Excidium]

Goddamnit why aren't they voting for games you like??

 

[Volourn]

". Bioware brought their RTS prototype to Interplay and Interplay told them to make a PnP cRPG on its engine or GTFO"

Lie. Interplay did no such thing. They had BIO udner contract to make a RT strategy game with the Bg engine. Mr. FU suggested they use the D&D rules because Interplay was under durrress due to their complete ineptness with the license to that point and the licesne holder was unhappy. Interplay couldn't tell them to 'GTFO' since theyw er eunder contraxct to pay them for the game.

Plus, BG was not the first game BIo did for Interplay and they on good terms with inetrplay at that time. BIO did Interplay a favor because we all know Interplay didn';t have a clue on hiow to make a good succerssful D&D game until BIO babysat them with their engine.

There's a reason why BIo is still making successful games and Inetrplay is too busy having fun playing Lawyer with Betehseda.

R00fles!


P.S. BG1 is overrated. BG2 is awesome.

 

[LittleJoe]

Goddamnit why aren't they voting for games you like??

No Morrowind, Age of Empires, Total War, or Gothics?

 

[Morbus]

 

[PorkaMorka]

You missed the part when two Fallouts came out

I didn't forget about Fallout, it just isn't that relevant to my interests, although it may have signaled in a general way that it was safe for developers to go back into the CRPG waters.

And Baldur's Gate didn't begin anything.

It was financially and critically successful enough that it inspired a wave of similar games over the next few years, some of which I enjoyed.

You can't honestly claim that the success of BG didn't inspire the other Infinity engine games and that the success of the Infinity engine games didn't significantly encourage the developers of PoR:RoMD and TOEE.

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

And Baldur's Gate didn't begin anything.

It was financially and critically successful enough that it inspired a wave of similar games over the next few years, some of which I enjoyed.

You can't honestly claim that the success of BG didn't inspire the other Infinity engine games and that the success of the Infinity engine games didn't significantly encourage the developers of PoR:RoMD and TOEE.

It could become financially successful only because they were told to make a cRPG. If there wasn't a already existing tendency to make cRPGs in Interplay, they wouldn't be told so. They would be told "make us a Diablo clone" or "go on with your RTS project".
The success of the infinity engine didn't encourage the developers of ToEE because Tim Cain already said that he's going to make a D&D party based game in future in the early Fallout development.
I don't know about the Black Isle games. Since they already did a Fallout sequel, they could probably do some other RPG project. They were the Interplay's RPG division after all.

 

[shihonage]

I remember thinking Baldur's Gate "new dumb crap" when it came out.

Funny, I remember discussing how much of a breath of fresh air Baldur's gate was with my pen and paper D&D group.

The time was 1998. Gaming was still a non terrible hobby, but CRPGs had been in a big dry spell, especially D&D CRPGs.

The most recent D&D CRPG was 1997's Descent to Undermountain.

If you're that attached to D&D then I can see the value you can find in BG and other Infinity Engine spawns.

Though I am pretty sure that D&D combat was supposed to be turn-based, and BG didn't offer that, which raises the question, how much "D&D depth" did that game really have? What appeal of depth did it retain to a D&D player?

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

AD&C combat was phase-based. I think it was something like Wasteland combat. You declare actions for all your characters and then they are executed.

 

[shihonage]

Well, in that sense, KOTOR had the same combat too?

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

Well, in that sense, KOTOR had the same combat too?

I have never played KOTOR.

It looks like this:
1. DM decides what NPCs will do.
2. Players declare what their characters will do.
3. Initiative is rolled.
4. Actions are executed in sequence based on initiative.

I think that Wasteland is the closest to this.

 

[PorkaMorka]

Though I am pretty sure that D&D combat was supposed to be turn-based, and BG didn't offer that, which raises the question, how much "D&D depth" did that game really have? What appeal of depth did it retain to a D&D player?

While I prefer turn based, I see turn based and real time with pause as two ways of attempting to accomplish the same thing; non action based, tactical combat that gives you as much time as you like to plan your moves.

Real time with pause tends to be a bit irritating when you are trying to pull off complex maneuvers (lots of pause, wait 3 seconds, pause again) and it creates as many problems as it solves, but you're still getting party based tactical combat with the majority of D&D rules intact. Keep in mind, BG is not strictly real time in some ways, but round based, in order to keep things more in line with the rules. Hence they animate a fighter swinging his sword several times, but only give him the one attack that the rules say he deserves.

Another thing to keep in mind is that this is AD&D we're talking about, not 3rd edition. The 5 foot step had yet to be invented. This may be controversial, but I'd argue that the classic AD&D RPGs released prior to BG (Gold Box, Dark Sun) were tactical, but not *incredibly* tactical.

The the combat wasn't utterly mindless. It was engaging enough to keep my interest (at least back then). But we're not talking about JA2 level sophistication here, not by a long shot. Generally you'd be spending much of those games on autopilot and only a small number of fights would really require much brain activity.

So I don't think that all that much was lost by converting these 2nd edition games to real time with pause. It introduced a lot of exploits, but you could just not use them. It made certain fights awkward, but it made the trash fights quicker. It was probably a net loss, but not a huge one, especially if you played the game as intended instead of endlessly kiting.

BG1 was pretty mindless for most of the game, but not significantly more so than many of the classic AD&D CRPGs. But BG2 greatly surpassed all other AD&D CRPGs in terms of depth because of how much detail they put into the spellcasting system.

Once 3rd edition came out and the combat system explicitly focused on precisely measuring movement with grids and miniatures, I felt that real time with pause became a lot more inadequate. For this reason I feel IWD2 suffers from doing the third edition rules in RTWP.

But back in 1998? BG had AC, at had THAC0, it had the proper attacks per round, it had the right spells and monsters. It had a full party that you could actually move around. Compared to what we had been getting for the last 4 years? BG1 was pretty solid.

 

[MMXI]

It looks like this:
1. DM decides what NPCs will do.
2. Players declare what their characters will do.
3. Initiative is rolled.
4. Actions are executed in sequence based on initiative.

I think that Wasteland is the closest to this.

 

[Jaesun]

It looks like this:
1. DM decides what NPCs will do.
2. Players declare what their characters will do.
3. Initiative is rolled.
4. Actions are executed in sequence based on initiative.

I think that Wasteland is the closest to this.

 

[Volourn]

"Well, in that sense, KOTOR had the same combat too?"

It does. Just a shitty dumbed down version of D&D rules which is exactly what KOTOR is.

 

[Turjan]

Eh. Not sure why anyone gets overly excited about that list, one way or the other. It's not about RPGs, and as most game developers are younger, I don't expect to see any of the really old games. It contains lots of very popular games, but none of the completely shitty popular games, so it's not that surprising.

And sure the list contains whole series. You just have to look at the original magazine that Eurogamer refers to:

 

[Dire Roach]

By Baldur's Gate series they're referring to the Dark Alliance games, obviously.

 

[DwarvenFood]

I heard of all those games, but never of Shadow of the Colossus ?