How RPGs Were A 30-Year Detour

[MisterStone]

Hey guyz back when you were a kid playing PnP Dungeons and Dragons, at heart you really just wanted to be LARPing. I mean, look how LARPing obsoleted all PnP games amirite?

 

[Gondolin]

Matthew Findley worked with Mr. Fargo at Interplay Entertainment since 1989.

Decline of an oldfag.

 

[Joe Krow]

So, I think we've always wanted to get around to making a fantasy action game.

He even took the time to name the genre. Acronym is spot on. Moves the whole thing forward if you ask me.

 

[Xor]

10/10 would rage again.

 

[MisterStone]

So if we were to interview this guy ourselves, what would be some good questions? One that stands out in my mind:

"How does it feel to be working on a shitty Prince of Persia ripoff?"

 

[Excidium]

So it has a face now.

Matthew Findley worked with Mr. Fargo at Interplay Entertainment since 1989.

Decline of an oldfag.

That doesn't mean anything.

10/10 would rage again.

 

[sgc_meltdown]

There's kind of this convergence across all games where the genres are really getting blurred. Like, I don't think people playing BioShock realize they're playing an RPG. Or even in Grand Theft Auto, you go into the weight room and pump up your character. There are all these elements of your character getting better. That's what those games are really about.

This sounds familiar.

http://www.nowgamer.com/news/5141/biowa ... s-audience

With Dragon Age II’s release imminent, senior producer Fernando Melo feels the sequel has far more reach than Origins, even potentially attracting the same kind of crowd that flocks to gaming’s biggest franchise, Call Of Duty.

Speaking to NowGamer Melo said: “We have data that shows there are a lot of people that enjoy playing RPGs although they won’t necessarily call them RPGs. They’ll play Fallout, Assassin’s Creed and even Call Of Duty, which have these progression elements – you’re putting points into things – but they don’t necessarily associate that as an RPG. So we think that if we expand that out we’ll attract a much bigger audience.”

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/6 ... php?page=4

For me, I guess, fundamentally, there are more people who are ready to play RPGs than realize it. These are people who will play FarmVille. These are people who have shot enough people in the head that they've leveled up in Medal of Honor. They've gained XP and have received awards as a result. That's an RPG mechanic. They've played [Grand Theft Auto] San Andreas and they've run enough, and gotten buff enough, that their endurance is a higher. They've leveled.

So I think there's more people out there with RPGs, and then it's honestly on RPGs to try to figure out how to take the mechanics that people are actually loving in other genres and say, "No, no, no. We had those years ago, but we understand that they kind of were scary."

So there was no mandate, but I mean there were decisions that we made as a team that said, "Okay, this is, I think, more welcoming." Not "dumbed down" or anything like that, but welcoming. Like starting the game, your character walks up, says something kind of over the top, and immediately starts exploding Darkspawn. I haven't set my decks at all. I haven't spent points.

What it does, is it lets you get into the game and go, "Okay, cool. This is what their combat is like. I get that." Then the next thing you do is build your character.

Then you level up and you start spending points, and the RPG mechanics are introduced in a way that's gradual, in a way that welcomes someone who would otherwise maybe go, "Whoa! Too complex!" and shut it off immediately, and lets them slide into it without even recognizing it ‑‑ which frankly, ideally increases the overall RPG customer base, which means we can make more RPGs, which means I can play more RPGs that I don't know the ending to. I like that.

 

[Mortmal]

My C64 was so powerful it ran mostly action games.

Commodore machines were waaaay ahead of their time , ah the C64

Adventure games with real time , fast paced action!

Real time fencing, jousting , sieging!!

Real time strategying !

An action rpg with real time combat!

 

[Gondolin]

That doesn't mean anything.

It does. Motherfucker should know better than to talk such shit.

 

[Excidium]

Well when the classic RPG designers go full retard, it doesn't surprise me that some obscure dude goes even further to get some recognition from the industry.

 

[Shemar]

I realize its marketing talk, i realize he does not mean it, but it still hurts...

No, he does. The world is full of morons that just don't get it and many of them are running the gaming industry.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I used to think that older gamers would've known the differences between Ultima or the Gold Box titles and Golden Axe and Galaga and been able to choose a preference one way or the other. I now realize they're all the same thing, just some better realize the fullness of the action potential they strive for.

 

[villain of the story]

When I play RPGs, I really want to go out there and get some action but legal technological limitations prevent me from experiencing anything for real short of LARPing with morons, so I am limited to this ridiculous trend of "vee-dee-oh gayems". God, how archaic. I can't wait for future for action games to become obsolete!

 

[grdja]

Why do they even bother to bring the "no game would have ever been boring dumb turn based if only we had NextGen(tm) technology back then" argument?

Their audience learned to read and write in the 3rd millennium, they don't know of anything other than NextGen(tm)

 

[Thrasher]

All chess players are closet LARPing black queens, doncha know...

 

[CorpseZeb]

Why everyone sound so surprised? In spite of lack definition of Role Playing Game (we have only somewhat fuzzy set of core, proper RPG titles, to which we can add some games or remove them, but this still not a definition, but bunch of examples) every game can be called “Role Playing WOW Button Experience” – from Sudoku to Crysis 2.

But, yeah, I wondering why many developers nowadays insist on calling their action game a rpg game. Is't some magical selling point? (sort like... look, mom, this is serious rpg not stupid action game, y'know, these zombies have not only boobs but statistic also...).

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

Disgusting subhuman vermin. Filthy larper scum.

I can't get past the line "I think these games always wanted to be action games at their heart. I think all those old turn-based games, it's just that's all the technology would allow."

Oh, yeah, if those designers back in the day had only had better tech, they'd have made Hunted instead of Pool of Radiance and Wasteland. If only!

I really wish designers would seriously study videogame history instead of buying into the linear view that what is made with better tech is inherently better. Any good designer would know better than that.

At least one man there stands up for the truth .

 

[Jasede]

This made me angry.

 

[Achilles]

 

[glasnost]

a modern audience that wants to see action.

Why not conscript them all?

or

It would save time to replace developer interviews posted here with "You are not being served."

 

[Metro]

I fully expect Hunted to be as 'awesome' as that Bard's Tale remake.

 

[Jasede]

I want to press a button and something awesome happens!!!

 

[Achilles]

I want to press a button and something awesome happens!!!

That only happens in RPGs, in action games you don't even have to press the button. You just do awesome stuff, all the time. Get with the times bro!

 

[Brotherman Bill]

Developed by inXile entertainment, a company founded by Interplay founder Brian Fargo

Does BF still work there? Does he share Matt Findleys opinion?

 

[LibertyRansom]

that's definitely part of it. I mean, the reason those games were turn-based sword battles is that was the only option you had. I think, now you get that twitch element of "me at the controller." When you take the monster down because you successfully hit, blocked, switched to exploding arrows, and shot him in the head, you're getting that same depth that you would have had through 30 years ago D&D experience, but it's happening fast-paced, quick, and in real-time for a modern audience that wants to see action.