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Decline The lack of recovery among American RPGs, visualised with graphs

Humanophage

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I have previously noted that there is a dearth of good new RPGs from the US, which never really recovered from the console assault in the mid-2000s. Apart from New Vegas, the Great American RPG has been essentially vanquished by the console invasion and then its already struggling form got kicked around by the journos. The US didn't take much of a part in the world-wide recovery from the decline.

However, I think it is worth revisiting this issue because we can now see the dynamic showing just how radical and swift the collapse was. So I added the region and years to the data from the most comprehensive vote so far. Some games are a bit ambiguous when it comes to region (like AoD), but it is clear enough that they are not primarily American.

At the same time, back when US RPGs were genuinely alive in the Golden Age, they truly secured their place in the pantheon and are much more distinguished than any recent entries.

6Cnj3B7.png


Version with labels, followed by the relative proportion of US RPGs by period in terms of total points and frequency.

Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.
 
Last edited:

agris

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It’s like you wanted to do principle component analysis, but lacked the stones for follow through.

:hero:
 

Humanophage

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america is really gay so it makes shitty games. there's your analysis without the graphs, folks.
Nope, the point is that it used to make great games, then suddenly it stopped (together with everyone else). Then others recovered, but America didn't.
 
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Codex Year of the Donut
Have you considered that your data might be flawed because the preferences of the site shifted? Eastern European games became more popular... when the codex gained more eastern european posters. It's a mystery, for sure.
Canada is a US territory, btw.
 
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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Serpent in the Staglands Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
The lack of recovery among American RPGs, visualised with graphs

This isn't a new insight.

(a) the American cost of living is too high for AA RPGs to provide a reliable return on investment for any company. It's not fundamentally impossible to make a good AA RPG (Shadowrun: Dragonfall would be the best example in the 2010s), but development is laborious unless the vision is streamlined (like Shadowrun: Dragonfall) to keep development focused and costs down. Anything more complicated always ends up butchered because shoestring budgets can't buy their way out of usual development problems (every Fargo Kickstarter game was always borrowing against the future). A couple million doesn't go far when you are paying dozens of people a professional California salary.

(b) going in that direction, programmers are the nuts and bolts of game development and getting them to stay in the company and/or industry is difficult unless you command AAA budgets. Sacrificing personal income for art was fine in the 90s when even programmers got a chance to voice and defend creative ideas to the development team, with the expectation at least some of these ideas will be accepted and implemented, but now programmers have nothing to do with the developing the creative aspects of content. To the extent there is any fun in programming at all, it is way more fun to it with a physics-intensive action game like Skyrim (hence the large modding community) or Grand Theft Auto than Wasteland 3. It might be possible to get game designers, writers, and artists to stick with your game development company as long as you can pay them, but turnover among programmers is always a problem. You would have to be some kind of idiot to prefer to program for inXile or Harebrained Schemes or any company that might make AA RPGs when you can get a job at Bethesda, ID Software, Rockstar, or some other AAA developer.
 
Last edited:
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
50,754
Codex Year of the Donut
The lack of recovery among American RPGs, visualised with graphs

This isn't a new insight.

(a) the American cost of living is too high for AA RPGs to provide a reliable return on investment for any company. It's not fundamentally impossible to make a good AA RPG (Shadowrun: Dragonfall would be the best example in the 2010s), but development is laborious unless the vision is streamlined (like Shadowrun: Dragonfall) to keep development focused and costs down. Anything more complicated always ends up butchered because shoestring budgets can't buy their way out of usual development problems (every Fargo Kickstarter game was always borrowing against the future).

(b) going in that direction, programmers are the nuts and bolts of game development and getting them to stay in the company and/or industry is difficult unless you command AAA budgets. Sacrificing personal income for art was fine in the 90s when even programmers got a chance to voice and defend creative ideas to the development team, with the expectation at least some of these ideas will be accepted and implemented, but now programmers have nothing to do with the developing the creative aspects of content. To the extent there is any fun in programming at all, it is way more fun to it with a physics-intensive action game like Skyrim (hence the large modding community) or Grand Theft Auto than Wasteland 3. It might be possible to get game designers, writers, and artists to stick with your game development company as long as you can pay them, but turnover among programmers is always a problem. You would have to be some kind of idiot to prefer to program for inXile or Harebrained Schemes or any company that might make AA RPGs when you can get a job at Bethesda, ID Software, Rockstar, or some other AAA developer.
American devs make plenty of RPGs, they just focus on making ones that actually sell rather than appeal to niche weirdos on internet forums.
How many of you are aware that Outer Worlds won plenty of RPG of the year awards?
 
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Codex Year of the Donut
How many of you are aware that Outer Worlds won plenty of RPG of the year awards?
I'm aware that companies are paid to market products, yeah.
Like it or not, it was very popular amongst normies. The codex is an ideological bubble.
Much of what these games get shit on for was already present in say, BG2. BG2 would be far less popular on the codex if it wasn't for its inertia. Also, there's an inherent bias for old=good, you can see this in e.g., the slow overall rising opinion of DAO.

As a sidenote, you can also see the eastern european influence in the decline in popularity of blobbers, blobbers basically fell off the top list if you compare the top 70 vs top 101.
 

Humanophage

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Have you considered that your data might be flawed because the preferences of the site shifted? Eastern European games became more popular... when the codex gained more eastern european posters. It's a mystery, for sure.
Canada is a US territory, btw.
Rather, good RPGs remain disproportionately popular among Eastern Europeans, hence the Codex is attracting them because it is a website dedicated to good RPGs. This pertains to decent recent US-made RPGs as well (especially if we count Canada as a US territory). E.g.:


Conversely, trashy marketing-driven console-oriented RPGs that have always been hated on the Codex are popular in the US, but not especially popular in Eastern Europe:

Like it or not, it was very popular amongst normies. The codex is an ideological bubble.
Much of what these games get shit on for was already present in say, BG2. BG2 would be far less popular on the codex if it wasn't for its inertia. Also, there's an inherent bias for old=good, you can see this in e.g., the slow overall rising opinion of DAO.

As a sidenote, you can also see the eastern european influence in the decline in popularity of blobbers, blobbers basically fell off the top list if you compare the top 70 vs top 101.
Why is being popular among the normies important to being a good RPG? Mass Effect was likewise popular, for instance, as was Fallout 3.

"Old=good" is a fair attitude because new games are shoved into your face aggressively, so it provokes a natural aversion and you need some time to pass judgement. Then time sometimes proves that they weren't as bad as they seemed. That said, some previously highly praised games fell, like KOTOR.
 

Nutria

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Strap Yourselves In
I'd say it's very simple: Americans don't have any advantage in the market anymore. Back 25 years ago, most people in the world were either too poor to own a good computer or spoke some weird language that made it hard for them to reach a global market. The rest of the world has made huge gains in wealth, education, and English proficiency since then. So now we're competing on a level playing field, except that Americans have to pay more for rent.

Notice that the output of good games from countries like Britain and Japan has also plunged over the same period.

good RPGs remain disproportionately popular among Eastern Europeans, hence the Codex is attracting them because it is a website dedicated to good RPGs

This is the most hopelessly optimistic thing I've read in my life.
 

Butter

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USA has always been a console market first, PC market second. KotOR and Morrowind were the games that showed you could profitably sell your RPG to console players, and if those games had come out 5 years earlier, the pandering to console players would've started 5 years earlier, and we wouldn't have Arcanum or Wizardry 8. It was only the perception that RPGs were inherently niche that gave us those Golden Age classics.
 

Zboj Lamignat

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The most important point to make is that the "quality" of the NA crpgs made in the first wave of the so-called renaissance pretty much ensured that actual renaissance never happened. And probably never will.
 
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Codex Year of the Donut
if those games had come out 5 years earlier, the pandering to console players would've started 5 years earlier, and we wouldn't have Arcanum or Wizardry 8.
If Troika had decided to release vtmb on consoles they'd likely would have still been around.
It's amusing that e.g., Bethesda gets shit for selling their games on consoles but Warhorse Studios doesn't.

The answer to "why doesn't america make more niche RPGs?!" is right there in Troika. Maybe you guys should have bought more copies.
 
Last edited:
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Codex Year of the Donut
I'm sure buying more copies of Arcanum would've caused a vortex of incline big enough to consume the entire gaming market.
Basically all the american companies making niche RPGs went under or broadened their target demographic because it just wasn't profitable.
It will happen in eastern europe too as the cost of living rises btw.
 

Zboj Lamignat

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Yeah, I know. I'm just taking a jab at the old "buy more bad games from devs you perceive as well-meaning as it will surely cause more good games to be released, 100%" sentiment.
 
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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Serpent in the Staglands Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
Have you considered that your data might be flawed because the preferences of the site shifted? Eastern European games became more popular... when the codex gained more eastern european posters. It's a mystery, for sure.
Canada is a US territory, btw.
Rather, good RPGs remain disproportionately popular among Eastern Europeans, hence the Codex is attracting them because it is a website dedicated to good RPGs. This pertains to decent recent US-made RPGs as well (especially if we count Canada as a US territory). E.g.:


Conversely, trashy marketing-driven console-oriented RPGs that have always been hated on the Codex are popular in the US, but not especially popular in Eastern Europe:

Like it or not, it was very popular amongst normies. The codex is an ideological bubble.
Much of what these games get shit on for was already present in say, BG2. BG2 would be far less popular on the codex if it wasn't for its inertia. Also, there's an inherent bias for old=good, you can see this in e.g., the slow overall rising opinion of DAO.

As a sidenote, you can also see the eastern european influence in the decline in popularity of blobbers, blobbers basically fell off the top list if you compare the top 70 vs top 101.
Why is being popular among the normies important to being a good RPG? Mass Effect was likewise popular, for instance, as was Fallout 3.

Wouldn't say it is (I also wouldn't say it isn't, since 'good' exists in the user experience).

Regardless, it is important to being wealthy, powerful, famous, and having a lot of influence and standing in global gaming industry and entertainment culture. These are typically the things Americans value and pursue, which is why basically anyone would prefer to work at Rock Star, Bungie, or Bethesda rather than any AA company.

As most rational people would, if they had the ability. It isn't like winning Codex Game of the Year or placing in the Top 101 gets you more than a temporary reprieve from Codexers dismissing your creative output as shit (in fact, you usually don't get any reprieve at all). Even Tim Cain didn't get a lifetime pass for his numerous contributions to the genre.

If Todd Howard had made Age of Decadence rather than the Elder Scrolls, it wouldn't have given him a fraction of the wealth, fame, and power he currently possesses.
 
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Hace El Oso

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If Todd Howard had made Age of Decadence rather than the Elder Scrolls, it wouldn't have given him a fraction of the wealth, fame, and power he currently possesses.

So what, am I supposed to empathize with his choice to abandon any pretense to artisanship in exchange for a bag of shekles and a place at a wannabe-movie premiere where cheaply bought d-list celebrities shit all over the ‘product’ he was pushing (and totally sidelined his people who actually made it)?
 
Last edited:
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Dec 12, 2013
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4,229
The thing with US and cRPGs is the same problem behind most issues that country has: greed and an relentlessness focus on profit over everything else. Big companies make games that will give them the biggest return on investment, while indies create games that can be quickly made and are easy to sell. When you create cRPG you need to put more effort and can expect to get lower profits than you would if you did other genres. The idea of putting more effort for lower RoI literary breaks a neoliberal brain. They can't handle the idea, they are are too cynical for that. It's like trying to teach a dog to do math. A corporate brain rot is antithetical to creating good cRPGs or good anything else.
 

Grauken

Gourd vibes only
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Messages
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I have previously noted that there is a dearth of good new RPGs from the US, which never really recovered from the console assault in the mid-2000s. Apart from New Vegas, the Great American RPG has been essentially vanquished by the console invasion and then its already struggling form got kicked around by the journos. The US didn't take much of a part in the world-wide recovery from the decline.

However, I think it is worth revisiting this issue because we can now see the dynamic showing just how radical and swift the collapse was. So I added the region and years to the data from the most comprehensive vote so far. Some games are a bit ambiguous when it comes to region (like AoD), but it is clear enough that they are not primarily American.

At the same time, back when US RPGs were genuinely alive in the Golden Age, they truly secured their place in the pantheon and are much more distinguished than any recent entries.

6Cnj3B7.png


Version with labels, followed by the relative proportion of US RPGs by period in terms of total points and frequency.

Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.

How does the picture looks like if you take out all action-based real time games
 

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