Decline in Roleplaying Games

[Just Locus]

Discuss.

 

[sebas]

It was in decline between 2002 and kickstarter era (2014ish). Nowadays who gives a shit about AAA when you've got so much incline from indies.

 

[Russia is over. The end.]

Immediately after VTMB.

 

[Dishonoredbr]

2004 until 2014/5. I think nowdays is fine, if you ignore Triple As.

 

[octavius]

2002 is the key year.

 

[Crispy]

First release	Diablo January 3, 1997

 

[Cryomancer]

I would say that after around 2004 for mmos. Everyone started to copy wow and we no longer got games like meridia 59, ultima online and so on. Only gear farming cooldown managing games with little to no rp.

In singleplayer, same time. When morrowind was launched, pc gamers loved it but console gamers criticized it and bugtheada started to dumb it down. Due consoles, bioware also dumbed down da : o then da2 and inquisition.

2004 to 2014 was the greatest decline.

Nowadays, as longs you ignore aaa, there are lots of great rpgs

 

[Lord of Riva]

First release	Diablo January 3, 1997

The first Diablo is a Gem.

It was innovative and is great to this day, there has not been anything like it either.

To fault this game for the decline is just wrong.

 

[Aemar]

The decline began with Planescape: Torment the start of a trend where storyfaggotry supersedes good gameplay, solid mechanics, or interesting lore in RPGS. But arguably you can blame Ultima for the decline too, for each approaching installment gameplay is gutted to make way for "Majestic' Storytelling, games like Arcanum, Kotor and the like are just the fruits of Torment's critically acclaim reception. Now you have hacks such as MCA held to the highest pedestal of the genre, and a continuing trend of dumb downed game mechanics., Poor combat, and disgusting info dumps.

For the Golden Age/Silver Age terminology, see JC Matt Barton. The Golden Age is the games of classic design elements, and the companies who backed it began abandoning rpgs or outright failing in the early 90s, culminating in the destruction of SSI. RPG sales versus costs went into the pits as the 90s tech race took off, and games that required a lot of human resources to support long development times and lots of text, they just didn't make the cut. There was a period then, however brief, where no one wanted to make rpgs anymore, and the rpg industry died off.

A few years later, though, came the redesign. The rpg was action-ized with IE and Diablo, and the 'not your daddy's rpg' tagline. This brought about a brief resurgence of the rpg, this period dubbed the Silver Age. However, in this Silver Age, anyone who tried deeper mechanics was stuck with the same old sales rut that had ended SSI and the other Golden Age companies. It was only the action-ized games that continued to find success and stay in business. The Silver Age was short and already ending when Bioware shed itself of the shackles of d&d for mainstream success.

But the key for the Codex is, the Codex was founded in '02 in the wake of people who had been already fed up for years about the direction the rpg industry was going. While the Xbox (which was a failure, by the way) would be emblematic to a later group of people for the direction of the entire games industry, the Golden Age had already come and gone before the Xbox was even a gleam in Bill Gates's eye, and the Silver Age was already fading out while Microsoft was still playing footsie with Sega. The Xbox may indeed have sucked up a lot of action game lines (though that was more the 360), but on a site devoted to rpgs, the loss of a bunch of action game lines should not be considered the source of decline. The source of decline should, you know, involve the end of rpg development.

 

[Just Locus]

The first Diablo is a Gem.

I played Diablo I recently, I think it's good if not average, though I've heard Diablo II is infinitely superior.

 

[Strange Fellow]

The Xbox is a home video game console manufactured by Microsoft that is the first installment in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was released as Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console market on November 15, 2001, in North America, followed by Australia, Europe and Japan in 2002.

 

[Lord of Riva]

The first Diablo is a Gem.

I played Diablo I recently, I think it's good if not average, though I've heard Diablo II is infinitely superior.

The issue with comparing D1 to D2 is a very different approach to game design.

D1 is a failed experiment of trying to make a rogue clone that is faster, it has a very unique rythm and atmosphere to it.
Diablo 2 is an action "RPG", it's vastly superior in that regard in pretty much all aspects and I think it's what King Crispy crispy is refering to when he says D1 was the reason for decline.

The first one is an odd and unique RPG, the second one is barely an RPG.

 

[Just Locus]

The first one is an odd and unique RPG, the second one is barely an RPG.

Huh, That's fair enough, I haven't played any of the Diablo games which is why I only started with 1 a few months ago since I wanna play it chronologically (I'm still conflicted on whether I should eventually play Diablo IV because of it's...many flaws).

 

[Alex]

While games like Fallout, Planescape: Torment and even Darksun and Ultima did many things very well and were in various ways improvements over games that came before, they also championed a different view of what an RPG should be; which led to a certain sort of decline since there wasn't enough market (or at least the developers thought so) for various different types of CRPG.

I wouldn't be surprised if this is true of even earlier games as well, but since that would be before my time, and since the the earliest choice is the 90s anyway, that is what I voted. In particular, I think there was a sharp decline when SSI went under and bobbers became rare.

 

[Crispy]

Fallout had everything: character development depth, meaningful NPC interaction, actual C&C, tactical combat (although admittedly flawed), excellent for its time graphical fidelity, good music, good inventory, parties, a fucking car, etc.

Please don't ever include Fallout in any discussion about the decline of computer roleplaying games again.

I got shot too many times in the back by Ian to listen to that kind of shit.

 

[octavius]

First release	Diablo January 3, 1997

Decline compared to what?

 

[sebas]

It definitely takes a copious amount of nostalgia to say that pre 1994 games were the golden age and everything afterwards sucked because it didn't have good combat yet had too much story. And I love blobbers! Developers simply found new ways to mix combat with story (you know, the roleplaying part in an RPG).

As for Diablo, it was the first mainstream RPG that really got attention which is probably why people point fingers at it. But if we're going to beat on good games for corrupting the industry we might as well pick Age of Empires because that was THE game that really created a wide gaming audience.

 

[sebas]

Decline compared to what?

Wizardry 7 I assume. I mean, it went from 3 years to 15 hours in length so..

 

[Alex]

Fallout had everything: character development depth, meaningful NPC interaction, actual C&C, tactical combat (although admittedly flawed), excellent for its time graphical fidelity, good music, good inventory, parties, a fucking car, etc.

Please don't ever include Fallout in any discussion about the decline of computer roleplaying games again.

I got shot too many times in the back by Ian to listen to that kind of shit.

It definitely takes a copious amount of nostalgia to say that pre 1994 games were the golden age and everything afterwards sucked because it didn't have good combat yet had too much story. And I love blobbers! Developers simply found new ways to mix combat with story (you know, the roleplaying part in an RPG).

As for Diablo, it was the first mainstream RPG that really got attention which is probably why people point fingers at it. But if we're going to beat on good games for corrupting the industry we might as well pick Age of Empires because that was THE game that really created a wide gaming audience.

Like I said, Fallout is a great game, but it is also part of a move of the industry away from a certain kind of game for which there was little attention for a good while. It is a decline because if you wanted to play a game like the golden box titles, or maybe something like Wizardry 7, you wouldn't have any options for several years from that time forward (and even then; many of those got exploration wrong).

 

[asfasdf]

Early 80s

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

1975-1986: Age of Incline
1987-1994: Golden Age of CRPGs
1995-2003: CRPG "Renaissance"
2004-2011: CRPG Wasteland
2012-2018: Age of Hemi-Semi-Demi-Incline
2019-????: Tacticool Renaissance

 

[KörangarTheMighty]

Around 2006/2007, when it was clear that everything was just going to be reiterative of what came before rather than expanding the scope of both roleplay and gameplay.

 

[Glop_dweller]

Fallout had everything: character development depth, meaningful NPC interaction, actual C&C, tactical combat (although admittedly flawed), excellent for its time graphical fidelity, good music, good inventory, parties, a fucking car, etc.

________

The problem with RPGs (&CRPGs) is that mainstream players equate Roleplaying with occupation-playing; instead of playing the character's personality they play their skillset as the character's only purpose in life. The characters might as well be hand tools; hammer, scalpel, ratchet, band-aid...

Devs are often part of the problem, because they often assume the same point of view about it. When InXile's Torment was in development, I asked a dev on the forums whether the characters had walking states, as well as run states... and the guy could not fathom why they would ever need to walk. That right there sunk any hopes I had for the game long before any other details for it were released to the public. How could they craft an RPG when they were fixated on turn-based Diablo.

*And besides all: Planescape even had an optional disguise for the PC, that required him to walk while it was worn; running tore, and ruined the costume/makeup.

 

[Nikanuur]

You don't need to look no further. It was the year 2007, and something closer to an interactive movie than to a game graced the world with its presence. The fabled Mass Effect!
Magnificent hard-core sci-fi setting, great character choices, story so intertwined it wouldl make your head explode...
...and that's it. Other than the character choices, the RPG elements were severely underpar; the FPS part was so-so with some bright moments; almost non-existent exploration (hello, mmorpg crates in plane sight); and so much talking, even Planescape: Torment needed its alone time.
But it was apparently judged a great *game* instead of a great interactive movie.
I mean, there's nothing wrong with liking the later. On the contrary, the opus should get its well-deserved praise. I just hate it when they say it's good gaming, because that's where the decline begins, right there.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

2012-2018: Age of Hemi-Semi-Demi-Incline

Can we rename that era to ´kickstarter romanticism`?