Story is more important than combat in rpgs

[Kev Inkline]

 

[undecaf]

I don’t think combat alone is, or should be, more important than any other feature (unless the game is clearly about combat). But story is more like an icing over a gameplay (of which combat and certain narrative mechanics are a part of) cake.

Good gameplay can cover up for even lousy writing because if you’re having fun playing, who gives a shit what the story is like; but bad gameplay most usually ruins even the best of writing because you have to suffer through the lousy mechanical swamp to get to and through the story.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

When you have bad story but good combat, game is not good. But when you have good story and bad combat, game can be enjoyable. So having good story is paramount in making good rpg.

Having a good engaging story keep you interested in the game. What is the point of having good combat in lousy driven story? One can argue that in almost all rpgs stories are lousy so all that left is good combat. Those people identify themselves as combatfags.

Story is more important than writing in books

When you have bad story but good writing, book is not good. But when you have good story and bad writing, book can be enjoyable. So having good story is paramount in writing a good book.

Having a good engaging story keep you interested in the book. What is the point of having good writing in lousy driven story? One can argue that in almost all books stories are lousy so all that left is good writing. Those people identify themselves as writingfags.

Choruses are more important than solos in metal songs

When you have bad chorus but good solo, song is not good. But when you have good chorus and bad solo, song can be enjoyable. So having good chorus is paramount in making good song.

Having a good engaging chorus keep you interested in the song. What is the point of having good solo in lousy driven chorus? One can argue that in almost all songs choruses are lousy so all that left is good solo. Those people identify themselves as solofags.

Scripts are more important than special effects in movies

When you have bad script but good special effects, movie is not good. But when you have good script and bad special effects, movie can be enjoyable. So having good script is paramount in making good movie.

Having a good engaging script keep you interested in the movie. What is the point of having good special effects in lousy driven scipts? One can argue that in almost all movies scripts are lousy so all that left is good special effects. Those people identify themselves as specialeffectsfags.

Works with dick size vs technique in sex too.

 

[anvi]

Darkness has fallen upon the land of Aenileroth, since The Bad One opened a portal to another dimension from which demons emerge and reap terror upon these once peaceful lands! Oh [player name] you must leave your [generic backstory] behind and save the world from this evil once and for all, by killing stuff and doing chores for virtual peasants to gain levels so that you may finally face The Bad One! But fear not! Many friends will aid you in your quest. Lililira the quirky female halfling, Eadar the snooty spell casting scholar, and Bonk the tough one dimensional dwarf cliche. Coming soon, to JarlFrank's jizz encrusted basement.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

When you have bad story but good combat, game is not good. But when you have good story and bad combat, game can be enjoyable. So having good story is paramount in making good rpg.

Having a good engaging story keep you interested in the game. What is the point of having good combat in lousy driven story? One can argue that in almost all rpgs stories are lousy so all that left is good combat. Those people identify themselves as combatfags.

You’re a brave one.

Story isn’t everything. Games with awful combat but good stories still tend to be mediocre to bad.

Serviceable combat, that is combat that isn’t great but doesn’t want to make you crush your own balls either, is in many of the best RPGs. The Witcher series, Fallout 1, 2 and New Vegas, Morrowind, Torment, PoE 1 and 2, MotB, the list is very long. The combat in those games wasn’t great but they were saved by other elements - the world, the characters, the atmosphere, and yes, the story.

Looking at the best RPGs I can’t think of many that had bad stories but great combat.

 

[HarveyBirdman]

For my part, I found the spectre of lorefaggotry to be a constant and unwelcome shadow in Dark Souls. From all the NPCs waffling on about shit that made absolutely no sense (though I don't think this is unique to Dark Souls, so much as just that the Japanese are physically incapable of writing a dialogue scene that doesn't resemble a bad French arthouse film) to the fact that every online community discussing the game seemed to obsess over item descriptions and characters who were never even encountered in the game.

It didn't impact on the gameplay directly, but all the 'DEEP LORE' shit was a bit like playing the game with somebody masturbating loudly in the next room. Yes, you can ignore it, and it's probably not actually going to affect you, but until it's over you'll never quite be free of the fear of getting hit in the face with it.

Dear God, it's like idiocy itself has manifested into living creature.

 

[BING XI LAO]

Daily reminder that combatfags should go play dota2

 

[anvi]

Dota2 isn't an RPG, duh.

 

[mfkndggrfll]

Daily reminder that combatfags should go play dota2

The last thing the Dota 2 community needs is toxic codexers. Please dont.

 

[BING XI LAO]

Dota2 isn't an RPG, duh.

That's why it's perfect for combattards

 

[Darkzone]

What is more important the salt or the pepper in a soup?

 

[Micormic]

Unless there's alot of crappy combat.

 

[Black]

An RPG with good combat and puzzles (like most blobbers, for example) and a barebones story is better than an RPG with a good but completely linear and non-interactive story (like 99% of JRPGs out there).

Only japanese and Cleve can still make blobbers these days.

And only one of them makes them right.

 

[Agesilaus]

Here is a list of the greatest RPG titles ever produced in the history of mankind, in alphabetical order:

Age of Decadence
Crescent Hawk's Inception
Geneforges
Nethergate
Teudogar and the Alliance with Rome
Ultima VII

Questions? I didn't think so.

All of these games have extremely strong settings, and either strong reactivity to player decisions, or else the game engine allows a lot of exploration and some freedom to be a creative arsehole and do hilarious stuff.

In terms of combat, though, it varies. The Spiderweb titles and AoD had amazingly good combat. Crescent Hawk's Inception was good but kind of cumbersome and the encounters were mostly randomly generated fluff. Teudogar's was very intuitive and good at what it did, if a bit simple. Ultima VII was just a hilarious shit show, probably I should label it as terrible combat but it's too ridiculous to hate.

So, strong setting and reactive storyfags win, eat shit combat queens. I will admit that a game with weak combat AND a restrictive game engine will never be top tier, though.

 

[J1M]

When you have bad story but good combat, game is not good. But when you have good story and bad combat, game can be enjoyable. So having good story is paramount in making good rpg.

Having a good engaging story keep you interested in the game. What is the point of having good combat in lousy driven story? One can argue that in almost all rpgs stories are lousy so all that left is good combat. Those people identify themselves as combatfags.

The setting is the most important thing.

You can have a good RPG with bad combat and bad story if the setting is good.

Example: Mass Effect 1.

Even though you are wrong the game industry of today agrees with you. That's why we see millions of words of 'story' in Pillars of Eternity, but the game feels lackluster due to the weak setting. Unable to diagnose the problem, the studios continue to throw more and more 'story' writing at the problem. The equivalent of this for 'combat' is the trend towards slapping an experience point grind and skill trees on everything, confusing 'progression' with enjoyable combat.

It's much easier to create more story or progression (in part because these things can be easily outsourced to more people) than it is to increase the setting or combat quality.

 

[Agesilaus]

When you have bad story but good combat, game is not good. But when you have good story and bad combat, game can be enjoyable. So having good story is paramount in making good rpg.

Having a good engaging story keep you interested in the game. What is the point of having good combat in lousy driven story? One can argue that in almost all rpgs stories are lousy so all that left is good combat. Those people identify themselves as combatfags.

The setting is the most important thing.

You can have a good RPG with bad combat and bad story if the setting is good.

Example: Mass Effect 1.

Even though you are wrong the game industry of today agrees with you. That's why we see millions of words of 'story' in Pillars of Eternity, but the game feels lackluster due to the weak setting. Unable to diagnose the problem, the studios continue to throw more and more 'story' writing at the problem. The equivalent of this for 'combat' is the trend towards slapping an experience point grind and skill trees on things, confusing 'progression' with enjoyable combat.

It's much easier to create more story or progression (in part because these things can be easily outsourced to more people) than it is to increase the setting or combat quality.

Okay, I side with J1M. Setting is paramount; if you don't want to be in that world, you're going to hit uninstall pretty damn quickly. I will buy and play an absolutely terrible game if it has a top-tier setting.

The setting must be right. Then the reactivity and exploration must be right. Then combat.


On the other hand, I played a lot of PoE 2, yet I hate the tropical islands and pirates.

 

[mfkndggrfll]

Here is a list of the greatest RPG titles ever produced in the history of mankind, in alphabetical order:

Age of Decadence
Crescent Hawk's Inception
Geneforges
Nethergate
Teudogar and the Alliance with Rome
Ultima VII

Questions? I didn't think so.

All of these games have extremely strong settings, and either strong reactivity to player decisions, or else the game engine allows a lot of exploration and some freedom to be a creative arsehole and do hilarious stuff.

In terms of combat, though, it varies. The Spiderweb titles and AoD had amazingly good combat. Crescent Hawk's Inception was good but kind of cumbersome and the encounters were mostly randomly generated fluff. Teudogar's was very intuitive and good at what it did, if a bit simple. Ultima VII was just a hilarious shit show, probably I should label it as terrible combat but it's too ridiculous to hate.

So, strong setting and reactive storyfags win, eat shit combat queens. I will admit that a game with weak combat AND a restrictive game engine will never be top tier, though.

Stop! Thou art wasting it!

Aiiiiiieeeeeeee!

 

[Clockwork Knight]

I don’t think combat alone is, or should be, more important than any other feature (unless the game is clearly about combat). But story is more like an icing over a gameplay (of which combat and certain narrative mechanics are a part of) cake.

Good gameplay can cover up for even lousy writing because if you’re having fun playing, who gives a shit what the story is like; but bad gameplay most usually ruins even the best of writing because you have to suffer through the lousy mechanical swamp to get to and through the story.

One could argue that if you're willing to stomach shitty gameplay just to get to the next bit of the story you're invested on, then it must be more important than mere icing on the cake.

I consider story and setting to be more or less the same thing (or too interlinked to look at separately) though

 

[jungl]

Story is always nice when there a attempt to do it and when its well done can really keep you engaged and addicted to keep playing. Parasite eve comes to mind good story ps1 game. Story is basically like a sci fi thriller mystery and its like a roller coaster ride with u wanting to know what happens next. Its really hard to do a game with a complete shit story/setting.

 

[laclongquan]

Story in games is like story in porn. You notice if it's not there, but it's not that important.

Point of order: I like story in porn. I was frequently disappointed in this regard but I do like story to go with my porn.

Second: While I agree strongly that gameplay is more important than story (icewindale2 at one point even forget to explain why we had to chase to the underdark etc...). Story still can ruin a game irrepareablely while gameplay cant do that. Example: Fallout3.

 

[Excommunicator]

Exploration is where it's at. You can have an RPG without combat and you can have fun with an RPG without a good story (I think everyone can agree it's more common than we'd like).

Setting is icing on a cake - a good setting will set everything off, but you can still have a very basic or generic setting and still make it fun to explore the world

Take out the exploration though and it's a crappy walk on rails and not worth the time nor the label of RPG.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Here is a list of the greatest RPG titles ever produced in the history of mankind, in alphabetical order:

Age of Decadence
Crescent Hawk's Inception
Geneforges
Nethergate
Teudogar and the Alliance with Rome
Ultima VII

Questions? I didn't think so.

All of these games have extremely strong settings, and either strong reactivity to player decisions, or else the game engine allows a lot of exploration and some freedom to be a creative arsehole and do hilarious stuff.

In terms of combat, though, it varies. The Spiderweb titles and AoD had amazingly good combat. Crescent Hawk's Inception was good but kind of cumbersome and the encounters were mostly randomly generated fluff. Teudogar's was very intuitive and good at what it did, if a bit simple. Ultima VII was just a hilarious shit show, probably I should label it as terrible combat but it's too ridiculous to hate.

So, strong setting and reactive storyfags win, eat shit combat queens. I will admit that a game with weak combat AND a restrictive game engine will never be top tier, though.

Lists Geneforge. Leaves out Arcanum and Fallout and Planescape.

 

[Agesilaus]

Here is a list of the greatest RPG titles ever produced in the history of mankind, in alphabetical order:

Age of Decadence
Crescent Hawk's Inception
Geneforges
Nethergate
Teudogar and the Alliance with Rome
Ultima VII

Questions? I didn't think so.

All of these games have extremely strong settings, and either strong reactivity to player decisions, or else the game engine allows a lot of exploration and some freedom to be a creative arsehole and do hilarious stuff.

In terms of combat, though, it varies. The Spiderweb titles and AoD had amazingly good combat. Crescent Hawk's Inception was good but kind of cumbersome and the encounters were mostly randomly generated fluff. Teudogar's was very intuitive and good at what it did, if a bit simple. Ultima VII was just a hilarious shit show, probably I should label it as terrible combat but it's too ridiculous to hate.

So, strong setting and reactive storyfags win, eat shit combat queens. I will admit that a game with weak combat AND a restrictive game engine will never be top tier, though.

Lists Geneforge. Leaves out Arcanum and Fallout and Planescape.

Arcanum is decline, Planescape is pure and absolute decline, Fallout 1&2 are good but not good enough.

PST is one of the worst RPGs ever, tbh

 

[jewboy]

If a good crpg needs a good story then there have only been one or two good crpgs: PS:T and to a lesser extent MoTB, but MoTB was sort of a blatant attempt to copy PS:T at a certain level. It was done well so it was ok. I can't think of any other crpgs with stories that were anything but completely laughable and which would be unpublishable if submitted as novels. Almost all of my favorite crpgs had terrible and badly written stories. I think the important thing is that there is a story at all even if it is badly written and full of cliches. Otherwise you get open world games which are boring as fuck hiking simulations. Even in the case of PS:T it could be argued that the story was not good enough to publish on its own.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Here is a list of the greatest RPG titles ever produced in the history of mankind, in alphabetical order:

Age of Decadence
Crescent Hawk's Inception
Geneforges
Nethergate
Teudogar and the Alliance with Rome
Ultima VII

Questions? I didn't think so.

All of these games have extremely strong settings, and either strong reactivity to player decisions, or else the game engine allows a lot of exploration and some freedom to be a creative arsehole and do hilarious stuff.

In terms of combat, though, it varies. The Spiderweb titles and AoD had amazingly good combat. Crescent Hawk's Inception was good but kind of cumbersome and the encounters were mostly randomly generated fluff. Teudogar's was very intuitive and good at what it did, if a bit simple. Ultima VII was just a hilarious shit show, probably I should label it as terrible combat but it's too ridiculous to hate.

So, strong setting and reactive storyfags win, eat shit combat queens. I will admit that a game with weak combat AND a restrictive game engine will never be top tier, though.

Lists Geneforge. Leaves out Arcanum and Fallout and Planescape.

Arcanum is decline, Planescape is pure and absolute decline, Fallout 1&2 are good but not good enough.

PST is one of the worst RPGs ever, tbh

This is why developers don't listen to you retards.