CRPGAddict

[Bruticis]

It's a fallacy that you have to grind in Ultima IV.

While I agree people whine about grinding in U4 too much, some of the vitures (I'm looking at you, Valor) are a pain in the ass to grind.

 

[7hm]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

 

[Sceptic]

While I agree people whine about grinding in U4 too much, some of the vitures (I'm looking at you, Valor) are a pain in the ass to grind.

What? Valor is by far the easiest Virtue to raise, it practically raises itself. Just ignore it, and go around doing whatever else you should be doing, and as long as you don't run away from every single encounter it'll max out before you know it.

 

[7hm]

Wizard Wars is next. Anyone know anything about it?

edit: Huh. Looking at screenshots I think I may have played this a long time ago. Looks very familiar.

edit2: And Wiz 5 afterwards, followed by BT3. With BattleTech coming up very soon. Excellent.

 

[Wunderpurps]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

What a fucking idiot.

 

[7hm]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

What a fucking idiot.

Why?

I thought Wasteland was good. But if Fallout never came out, it wouldn't have the prestigious place in RPG history that it does. Certainly M&M2 and what I've played of PoR were better. (I wasn't a fan of Ultima 5 and haven't played the first M&M).

 

[MMXI]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

What a fucking idiot.

Should probably be higher than Ultima V. Probably tied with Might and Magic. Pool of Radiance is definitely better than it, though. However, it's not like Ultima IV, Starflight and Omega are bad games or anything. I don't see what the problem is.

 

[7hm]

I like his explanation of the GIMLET ratings system in that post.

The purpose of the scoring system is not to rank how good a CRPG was for its time, nor to assess it's value in the history of CRPGs. It is, rather, to assess how enjoyable it is to play the game today. The "historical value" stuff is hard to quantify, so I don't even try. I do my best to cover it in the text. But the score is supposed to allow you to rank games against each other regardless of the era. If I give Pool of Radiance a score of 65 and Fable II a score of 55, it means I think you will honestly enjoy Pool of Radiance more, even though it's more than 20 years older.

I really hope that he does finish Skyrim (on his own time dammit!) and rates it using this system.

 

[Wunderpurps]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

What a fucking idiot.

Why?

I thought Wasteland was good. But if Fallout never came out, it wouldn't have the prestigious place in RPG history that it does. Certainly M&M2 and what I've played of PoR were better. (I wasn't a fan of Ultima 5 and haven't played the first M&M).

I don't agree with that last statement about M&M as Wasteland is a great game but more important 53% for all those great games. The reviews I read gave me the opinion he just doesn't like RPGs, all the scoring is stupid like that. He game close to that score for some serious shit games as well.

 

[7hm]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

What a fucking idiot.

Why?

I thought Wasteland was good. But if Fallout never came out, it wouldn't have the prestigious place in RPG history that it does. Certainly M&M2 and what I've played of PoR were better. (I wasn't a fan of Ultima 5 and haven't played the first M&M).

I don't agree with that last statement about M&M as Wasteland is a great game but more important 53% for all those great games. The reviews I read gave me the opinion he just doesn't like RPGs, all the scoring is stupid like that. He game close to that score for some serious shit games as well.

Most games in this era lose points for:

- lack of NPC interaction (because it's pretty much nonexistent outside of the games that have been mentioned as being the best)
- shitty economies (broken by the endgame, a staple of RPGs)
- lack of quests (sidequests were the rare exception, particularly in the dungeon crawlers)
- graphics / sound / etc

The guy is playing crpgs from 20+ years ago for 6-30 hours and you think he doesn't like RPGs?

I guess it's my own fault for responding to an obvious troll or retard, but jesus.

 

[Giauz Ragnacock]

Wunderpurps:

In your mind all those games are gravy. You say, "Oh, but the historical importance/ The great things I have heard/remember about these games/ They are early/real CRPGs they belong in this order of greatness!"

The reality is he is just any other guy super into playing games within the genre boundaries occupied by "CRPG" long after his assessments would have much impact on game developer and producer profits. Some arbitrariness in the individual score categories means some games like Wasteland are tied with some other games in how much fun he had with the games in his current playthroughs. If you want some justification for the final score, read the paragraphs that zero-in on his reasoning for the sub-scores that make up the final score. If you want to get higher level than that, read every piece of information on his blog including viewing all comments and links.

Overall, I wish you more enjoyment and conversation from reading The CRPG Addict.

 

[Zomg]

I hate the gimlet thing but then I can only imagine if I took on such a huge project that I'd be forced to use silly turnkey writing shortcuts like that rather than go nuts trying to form consistent threads of criticism.

 

[Giauz Ragnacock]

Zomg: What are some good examples of how he uses turnkey writing? Just curious of what didn't quite sit right with you.

Also, if by consistent you mean that everything is nice and snug in its proper "place" all by itself and we can prove the games belong where they are with mathematical logic, humans are not able to do this (and I am not sure this is even possible). We have an inconsistent stream of consciousness, hosts of complexes, different tastes that can arbitrarily change out of the blue, and built-in double-standards.

So, the GIMLET a good read for me, unsatisfying to you, and just about right for the CRPG Addict because of logic that really only makes sense to the one conceptualizing it.

 

[Zomg]

Also, if by consistent you mean that everything is nice and snug in its proper "place" all by itself and we can prove the games belong where they are with mathematical logic, humans are not able to do this (and I am not sure this is even possible). We have an inconsistent stream of consciousness, hosts of complexes, different tastes that can arbitrarily change out of the blue, and built-in double-standards.

Of course of course, I am not taking that line at all... What I meant with the gimlet thing isn't that it's unfair or biased or whatever; I don't even care about the final scores he gives them by adding up the terms. Just that it's a rote procedural template for criticism, therefore turnkey. A "consistent" criticism would be something that considers each game holistically yet weaves together all the games into the grand criticism of RPGdom without kinda chopping them up with a system like that, and like I said I can forgive it because no one could ever get as far as he has with the project if they tried to do that.

It also annoys me because it reminds me of all the mnemonic acronyms you get from annoying bosses and professors and shit about Always Be Closing and Keep It Simple Stupid and shut up!!!

 

[octavius]

Mostly I agree with his ratings, but rating Pool of Radiance and Ultima V the same as Dungeon Master in the Graphics, Sounds and Input category was weird.
DM had superior sound, better graphics, and the mouse driven interface (but keys for movement) and paperdoll makes DM (and its sequel CSB) the only 80's CRPGs that plays almost as comfortably as modern games.

 

[Giauz Ragnacock]

octavius: Yeah, that seems a bit wierd for me as well as other posters on his blog as well. He did mention much earlier in his blog that graphics and sound don't factor so much into that part of the score despite the name. So, if the graphics, sound, and music (in general) are say Ultima 4 to Dungeon Master quality, well that's just gravy (though if I am not mistaken graphics and maybe sound could be a big plus to his dragon-slaying experiences in Skyrim). However, he was not sold on the mouse interface as I believe is much more of an old (A)ttack letters and numbers keyboard interface CRPGer. Pretty much his enjoyment of those aspects of Dungeon Master and like-sub-scored games amounted to about the same for better or worse.

Also, there are gratuitous to screenshots in the posts to make our own asthetic judgements. Personally, I can't get my mind off of "NES Dragon Warrior sprites and tilesets look awesome, especially how simple the builings were built like a bunch of blocks lined end to end to form the walls." I never knew about it as a kid and have never put more than maybe an hour into playing one, but the way everything looks and how town buildings are designed just looks so cool to me.

 

[7hm]

Also, if by consistent you mean that everything is nice and snug in its proper "place" all by itself and we can prove the games belong where they are with mathematical logic, humans are not able to do this (and I am not sure this is even possible). We have an inconsistent stream of consciousness, hosts of complexes, different tastes that can arbitrarily change out of the blue, and built-in double-standards.

Of course of course, I am not taking that line at all... What I meant with the gimlet thing isn't that it's unfair or biased or whatever; I don't even care about the final scores he gives them by adding up the terms. Just that it's a rote procedural template for criticism, therefore turnkey. A "consistent" criticism would be something that considers each game holistically yet weaves together all the games into the grand criticism of RPGdom without kinda chopping them up with a system like that, and like I said I can forgive it because no one could ever get as far as he has with the project if they tried to do that.

It also annoys me because it reminds me of all the mnemonic acronyms you get from annoying bosses and professors and shit about Always Be Closing and Keep It Simple Stupid and shut up!!!

This post was only worth the set of steak knives.

Anyway yeah I pretty well agree with the problems with GIMLET. I do like that he's consistently using a ranking system though and trying his best to explain it. It's interesting to see an overview of where he ranks the games, and see where they rank on my own mental list. I know I put some factors higher than he does, others lower.

Keep in mind that the graphics part is basically a "good enough" rating and the rest seems to be more about usability / interface design. Skyrim may take a hit on this actually.

 

[crpgaddict]

So this is where you all hang out when you're not on my site.

I thought I'd take the opportunity to respond to a few things. First, "fucking idiot" was a little harsh, but I don't deny that the GIMLET could be subjected to some valid criticism. Zomg was absolutely right that I use it as a bit of a template to ensure that I don't forget to consider something. But I've also been trying hard to put a bunch of free text before and after the 10 categories, to serve as the more holistic review that Zomg is talking about.

The final scores on the scale aren't supposed to be like high-school grades, where 70 is passing and you have to get at least an 85 or 90 to be considered "good." You want that, go to Gamespot. I like to have a lot of room in my scale, and a rating of 55 or 60 is quite good for me. You have to consider the scores relative to each other, not in some kind of absolute sense.

As for Skyrim, I realize that to a lot of people on this forum, liking it is like liking Twilight or something. While I was wrong to say that it might be the best CRPG I've ever played, I do find it incredibly addicting. While I can see why not everyone would rave about it--there are many elements that are quite poor--it mystifies me how someone could play it and not have any fun at all.

I would have been better off not posting about Skyrim at all, or if I was going to post about it, just post the things I liked and didn't like, instead of coming to a general judgment after only 8 hours of play.

 

[Wunderpurps]

His final rating for Wasteland:

This gives us a final score of 53. It ties with Ultima IV, Starflight, and Omega for my fifth-highest rated game so far. But I maintain that the two Might & Magics, Ultima V, and Pool of Radiance are better games. You can find pitchforks and torches at your local Home Depot.

What a fucking idiot.

Why?

I thought Wasteland was good. But if Fallout never came out, it wouldn't have the prestigious place in RPG history that it does. Certainly M&M2 and what I've played of PoR were better. (I wasn't a fan of Ultima 5 and haven't played the first M&M).

I don't agree with that last statement about M&M as Wasteland is a great game but more important 53% for all those great games. The reviews I read gave me the opinion he just doesn't like RPGs, all the scoring is stupid like that. He game close to that score for some serious shit games as well.

Most games in this era lose points for:

- lack of NPC interaction (because it's pretty much nonexistent outside of the games that have been mentioned as being the best)
- shitty economies (broken by the endgame, a staple of RPGs)
- lack of quests (sidequests were the rare exception, particularly in the dungeon crawlers)
- graphics / sound / etc

The guy is playing crpgs from 20+ years ago for 6-30 hours and you think he doesn't like RPGs?

I guess it's my own fault for responding to an obvious troll or retard, but jesus.

Yeah I'm just a fucking retard or troll because I said something you don't agree with or even understand.

The thing is, if those things are so important why do these games all "fail"?

It's like a blurb about Prophecy in another thread that said it had little in plot development. Well, no fucking shit. When did plot development mean jack shit for a game? That's actually 50% of what's wrong with modern games. RPG is not just game with a story, or else every game ever made could get judged on that basis.

The very means he uses to judge these games says he really hates the RPG genre, and they are very skewed to giving shit scores to RPGs, and by the same basis shitfests like ME get good scores. Sure you have more interactivity and dialog in mass effect, but I'll not only say it's shit, I'll just come out and say it's not an RPG. To widen the genre that far RPG means nothing any more, and in fact that is a lot of the reason they are getting away from using the term at all. Hey wait the thing we do is nothing to do with how you used to have character sheets and design a party, and our intended audience would be very angry and confused by anything like that.

I like to build a party, explore, develop character builds, fight monsters, get fat loot that is interesting, and figure out puzzles. If there's some kind of story or NPCs in there fine, but 80% of all characters of all games are written to a 10 year old's level. You can't think a game is better off to have Tali or Morrigan or [fill in any bioware character since BG series or any bethesda character that ever existed].

Wunderpurps:

In your mind all those games are gravy. You say, "Oh, but the historical importance/ The great things I have heard/remember about these games/ They are early/real CRPGs they belong in this order of greatness!"

I don't care about historical value, I just strongly disagree with how he evaluates and what value he places on various stuff. I mean economy is one of the big points he grades on WTF is up with that? Based on his scores and criteria all he wants is a fucking soap opera.

That he even thinks skyrim is an RPG shows he hates RPGs. He just wants to fuck around looking at stuff ingame and have content delivered to him. Much like Call of Duty. Or, well, any fucking game that gets made these days whatever genre they claim to be in. Walk walk walk cutscene, walk walk walk fuck around with a cart full of boulders. This is the stuff, man.

 

[Wunderpurps]

To simplify if you asked his definition of RPG it would be you play a role lolol. Plus economy. I worry about things like that a lot, because I am an aspie.

Then to read his ratings and comments, it's just obvious he is a dumbass who doesn't even realize he hates the RPG genre. Not everyone loves every old game and plenty on that list is antiquated shit even I wouldn't play, but he consistently shows he pretty much hates every decent RPG ever made except a handful of high production golden age ones which EVERYONE likes and ones fully entrenched in the decline.

So while it's sometimes interesting to read up on ooooold games I never even heard of he still goes straight to my dumbfuck.txt file.

 

[Morkar Left]

I like to build a party, explore, develop character builds, fight monsters, get fat loot that is interesting, and figure out puzzles.

Where did he say he doesn't like that, too? From his posts I have the impression that he really likes these things. In Wasteland, the latest game he played, he mentioned the puzzles positively. And from his other posts you can clearly say, that puzzles are really motivating for him. He often bitches about combat mechanics, too. See Wasteland; it was too simple for him because the encounter design wasn't challenging. Loot fits into economy and he mentioned the loot variances in M&M very positively, too. The other things like exploring etc. are often mentioned by him, too in a positive matter.
Maybe that's your problem; he mentions too much positive things of games instead of bitching about the bad parts (but he criticizes these, too)? Really, I don't know what you are talking about. Just because he likes to have a story and narration? PoR is a better game because of that, Starflight, too. And many other. Having a good story - that means in rpgs narration and fluff - does contribute to a good rpg. It is something positive. That problem is if it's the only redeeming value of the game.
Than it usually sucks. Like Arcanum

@addict

Hi! I'm really curious how you would rate Skyrim in your gimlet. And Oblivion in comparison. Personally I think your gimlet system is one of the better numerical systems to judge a game. Mostly because you use a lot of text to explain the score
In the end every gamescore is mostly a matter of taste. And therefore it is important to explain why you gave a specific score. The score without context is mostly useless.

 

[BLOBERT]

I THINK HE IS A TRUE BRO

 

[betamin]

[quote="crpgaddict"

First, "fucking idiot" was a little harsh[/quote]

I hope that you read some threads here before you take anything too seriously.

 

[Wunderpurps]

First, "fucking idiot" was a little harsh

I hope that you read some threads here before you take anything too seriously.

Yeah, sorry. I would not use such harsh commens elsewhere.

 

[DaveO]

As has been mentioned by previous posters, I believe the value of CRPGAddict is discussing games I've either never heard of or have not played. At the moment, I believe the harshest criticism is that he has a high tendency to abandon games.