You've got a point. Games like Ultima and Wasteland represent the party as "blobs" just as much as say Wizardry does, only from a top-down perspective. That's why, if it were me who was making the list, I'd only include "pure" blobbers where both combat and exploration happens in first person. That'd make the term consistent at least, if not particularly descriptive.
Exactly what I was proposing, otherwise the term is too all-encompassing.
Then again, arguing about which arbitrary box to put different games in might be the single least productive discussion we have here, so while I like the list, I don't really give a shit how exactly the games are grouped.
I won't lose sleep over it either, I just like terms and words to be well-defined, otherwise they start losing their meaning because they converge to covering more and more over time... Think it as a hobby of mine. And this is a particularly bad abstraction; the fact that people still keep arguing about what constitutes a blobber is the ultimate proof.
But like I said, you can just treat the word "blobber" as noise, and then this becomes a list of good oldschool RPGs, which is all good.
Yeah, imho true blobbers are your first person perspective games be they solo or party with either rt or tb mechanics.
I think so too, if you want to keep the term blobber and want it to have a focused meaning. If the combat switches to top-down view, it's not a blobber anymore (so no Gold Box, Uukrul, Perihelion, etc.)
Funny I never called them that until a few years ago. Blobber... boomers.. ???
Me neither, we always just called them dungeon crawlers, or grid-based first-person view RPGs, or DM-clones, and so on (depending on the game).
What rubs me the wrong way the most is the idea behind the term that the party moves together as "blob". Well, there is no "blob", that is a made up thing, these are just abstract dungeon crawlers where the whole party moves together one unit at a time. You just don't see your party because of the first-person view, that's all. Then you can change formation in DM-clones (cut your blob into pieces, then glue them together in a different way?), kick out / recruit NPCs (cut off pieces of the blob and stick on new pieces?) and even split the party in some games (blobs can multiply, after all). It just devolves into silliness if you give it some deeper thought.
Where is the "blob" in grid-based games featuring top-down combat? The "blob" disintegrates before combat, then fuses itself together again afterwards?... Again, you only have these conceptual problems because you have invented a quite wrong abstraction. Just call them oldschool first-person view RPGs, and the whole problem goes away.
Besides, in what party-based RPG doesn't the party stay together at all times (barring splitting parties in a minority of games)? As far as I know, full individual character control only happens in some adventure games, such as the LucasArts games and Thimbleweed Park. Otherwise, the party travels together at all times, then individual character control only really comes at play during battles. (Okay you can pick one character in Infinity-engine games to use as your scout, but you cannot leave the location with that single character, the whole party has to travel together.)
Anyway, I've said all I wanted about the term "blobbers"
The list is still great!
