Lord Andre said:
Name the game that you consider is the best RPG. I'm curios. No troll.
I'm not going to pick a "best" RPG because that invites extraneous argumentation. An RPG that I very much enjoyed recently would be Knights of the Chalice, although by no means is it perfect. I have, in the past, enjoyed other styles of RPG as well, though.
Hamster said:
So, your problem with PST is that it is not an open world 3D TES game?
Um, no?
And, it doesn't get us any closer to being able to distinguish good gameplay from shit gameplay.
A game is a ruleset system that one or more players interact with (interaction implies feedback), that has explicit goal(s). Any game that isn't terrible involves challenge, which implies that the player must learn new skills in order to succeed.
I'd say a good game is one where it's fun to interact with the ruleset in an attempt to complete the goal. Modern single player games are bad because it's not fun to interact with the ruleset in an attempt to complete the goal. Typically this is because (a) they're too easy (b) the ruleset is not interesting (c) the game is challenging but for the wrong reasons (d) you don't have to learn anything to succeed (e) the game is TOO difficult (f) reasons I haven't though of?
Mass market consumers don't care because game publishers have discovered something better than fun: accomplishment. Kids can have fun doing anything; they can go out with their friends, smoke cigarettes, and have a great time. But there is no other competing medium that allows you to exchange money for the feeling of accomplishment (besides, maybe philanthropism, but kids don't usually do that), which feels deeper and is self-reinforcing. It's not just kids, too. Young adults are especially susceptible because a lot of young adults have crap jobs that don't fulfill them which leads them to feel like they could accomplish more.
We know what the ruleset is. What's the goal of PST? As designed, the goal of the game is to finish it. How do you finish it? By reading dialogs, occasionally solving adventure-game-esque item puzzles, and perhaps fighting some monsters. What is challenging about PST? Nothing besides certain combat encounters but a lot of times you can skip the combat entirely and, if not, it feels like a nuisance. The dialog certainly isn't challenging. The adventure-game aspect isn't challenging. I'd venture to say that you don't need to learn very much to succeed, either, since typically the main thing you need to learn in a cRPG is how to win combat encounters. Since it's not an action game, there is no visceral fun to be had either. Because the main source of challenge in PST feels mostly like a nuisance, then I'd say it falls between category (a) -- too easy, and (c) above -- challenging for the wrong reasons.
A lot of you say you enjoy going around PST and interacting with NPCs in order to gain personal knowledge about the story and world. That's not gameplay, though. That's, if I'm being charitable, more like a world simulation. If I'm not being charitable, it's a tedious method of dispensing story/lore with minor simulation aspects.
A point and click adventure game with seemingly no loss conditions, like Monkey Island, is still a game. The ruleset is clearly defined and, in a good example of the genre, it is fun to interact with the ruleset in order to accomplish the challenging goal (beat the game via solving puzzles). Monkey Island does have a loss condition, though: failure to complete a puzzle. You just don't get a YOU LOSE screen attached to it. A bad old adventure game is typically too difficult (e) and therefore progressing is no fun because you do it by chance (randomly clicking items on the environment, for example). A bad new adventure game is typically too easy.
Why is Monkey Island a good GAME and PST possibly a bad GAME, when they both involve extensive dialogs with fictional characters and lots of walking around environments? The reason is because the dialog in Monkey Island colors the gameplay - i.e., beyond simply enjoying what characters say, you're also learning key information that you need to solve the challenges. In PST, you also learn information that helps but you largely don't NEED that help in the first place. Your progress in PST is mostly stopped by invisible game state flags that are tripped by simply selecting certain conversation options, not by puzzles that you, as a player, have to figure out. In other words, I'm 75% of the way through PST right now, and the game never really tests me, as a player, to see if I'm even paying attention.
Zomg said:
Earlier in the thread you said, Man, U7 is great. U7 is also basically devoid of gameplay, in a slightly different configuration than PS:T. So we ain't playing them for gameplay. We are playing them to pretend or to get behavioral reward stimulation.
I didn't say U7 is great, I said the beginning is great. I didn't really enjoy U7 after that. I do get your point though... and over the years I have consciously changed my behavior to reflect this. For example, I try to avoid any RPGs, or games in general, that force the player to run errands (I'm making an exception for PST). I spend less time gaming now but I enjoy it more. Basically, if a game is ONLY "enjoyable" because it manipulates my human need to feel like I've accomplished something where, really, I accomplished nothing, I try to avoid it. This rules out a ton of RPGs, obviously, even older ones. Roguelikes, for example, sidestep this because winning them actually IS something of an accomplishment. Obviously, you don't need to be a rocket scientist but you get what I mean hopefully.
