Community The RPG Codex's Top 101 PC RPGs (With User Reviews!)

[Deleted Member 22431]

Ball’s Gate in third place, a stealth game in eighth place. Joke. Fucking NWN2, this abortion of a game, is above Grimoire. Alpha Brotocol is above King of the Dragon Pass. Battle Brothers and Darklands are bellow Pillars. Degenerates.

 

[Sigourn]

That would make for a much more boring list than this one. Instead of popularity contest at the top, then further down some less played games that a few people feel very strongly about, you have popularity contest all the way down. Yours would be a more accurate popularity contest, but I prefer that there be some hidden gems, which is both more informative and more entertaining.

Oh, by "stack up" I didn't mean to say to sum up the scores, but to take all votes into consideration and draw the average. So:

• 10 people score Might & Magic II, the average score is 4,60.
• 100 people score Oblivion, but the average score is 3,20.

That would help people know that only a very small amount of Codexers have played M&MII, and yet they consider it to be amazing, whereas a considerable amount of Codexers have played Oblivion, yet they agree it is mediocre. It offers a better insight.

 

[gurugeorge]

My only real complaint is that System Shock is far too low, it should be in the top 20.

 

[Grauken]

That would make for a much more boring list than this one. Instead of popularity contest at the top, then further down some less played games that a few people feel very strongly about, you have popularity contest all the way down. Yours would be a more accurate popularity contest, but I prefer that there be some hidden gems, which is both more informative and more entertaining.

Oh, by "stack up" I didn't mean to say to sum up the scores, but to take all votes into consideration and draw the average. So:

• 10 people score Might & Magic II, the average score is 4,60.
• 100 people score Oblivion, but the average score is 3,20.

That would help people know that only a very small amount of Codexers have played M&MII, and yet they consider it to be amazing, whereas a considerable amount of Codexers have played Oblivion, yet they agree it is mediocre. It offers a better insight.

While Felipe Pepe's approach isn't perfect, at least it forced people to allocate a limited resource which means people really cared about those points. The problem where those who divided their vote among many games while others just voted for fewer games, but overall at least people voted for games they actually played and liked. Your approach would just invite people to shit on games they haven't played, and your results, like your dungeon crawler list, is essentially worthless (apart from the fact that Dungeon Crawlers are basically everything and their kitchen sink)

 

[Sigourn]

While Felipe Pepe's approach isn't perfect, at least it forced people to allocate a limited resource which means people really cared about those points. The problem where those who divided their vote among many games while others just voted for fewer games, but overall at least people voted for games they actually played and liked. Your approach would just invite people to shit on games they haven't played, and your results, like your dungeon crawler list, is essentially worthless (apart from the fact that Dungeon Crawlers are basically everything and their kitchen sink)

I disagree. At the very least, there's nothing in my polls that gives people the idea that some games were purposely shat on. To vote on a game you had to play it, and notice how the bottom games are very obscure games most Codexers never, ever, mention, with a few notable exceptions (like octavius talking about Tom Proudfoot's games).

 

[Lady_Error]

Fucking NWN2, this abortion of a game, is above Grimoire.

Only because of Mask of the Betrayer.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Kingmaker not only making it on the list, but in top 15.

 

[Taurist]

Beyond the addition of Kingmaker, Underrail and AoD its not a great update. Nier 2 is barely a JRPG never mind a CRPG.
Also Risen, an actually good PB game, has left the ranking while ELEX has joined (even ELEX apologists can admit Risen is the better game).
I didn't play Tyranny, but I thought the general assessment was that it was shit?

 

[Lady_Error]

Tyranny should be way higher up on that list. It probably suffered from peoples' disappointment in Pillars, so not that many played it. I found that it is a much better game than I expected.

 

[Zer0wing]

Kingmaker not only making it on the list, but in top 15.

Still seething over slavic gamedev slowly eating out all Obsidians fanbase alive?

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Kingmaker not only making it on the list, but in top 15.

Still seething over slavic gamedev slowly eating out all Obsidians fanbase alive?

No, I'm quite happy Kingmaker sold so well, because it exposed all the RTwP loving primitives who were previously hiding their plebeian tastes.

 

[Morality Games]

This list isn't quite the horror show I'd imagined it would be, although some things are just odd.

Greatest fault is that clear second stringer Planescape: Torment beat the original Fallout (again), proving that given the chance at redemption Codexers wouldn't take it.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Kingmaker not only making it on the list, but in top 15.

Still seething over slavic gamedev slowly eating out all Obsidians fanbase alive?

No, I'm quite happy Kingmaker sold so well, because it exposed all the RTwP loving primitives who were previously hiding their plebeian tastes.

It's a turn-based game

 

[Zalanthis]

Thanks to everyone who put this together, it's a considerable achievement. Now, for what's wrong ...

I'm surprised not to see the Katauri King's Bounty games somewhere on this list (Crossworlds does pop up at #221 on the extended list in a 58-way tie for last place). I thought my enjoyment of these titles was not particularly unusual. I can only guess codexers toss KB in the same box with HOMM, which makes them city builders, even though you can't do any city building in King's Bounty, just rpg-type things ... hmm.

Also surprised to not see Nantucket place at least somewhere on the list. Probably my favorite whaling card-based rpg of all time, it's always a pleasure to see my entire crew wiped by newborn narwhals.

And, no matter how much anyone tries to convince me otherwise, The (original) Sims is an rpg, and a damn good one. Quite tricky to get to the top of any career and stay there for any length of time. I guess the sequels completely wiped our collective memory of what an odd little gem the original was.

A bunch of games I haven't got around to that didn't make their way higher than Oblivion:
Darkest Dungeon (made it to rank 108 in the full list)
Ghost of a Tale (186)
any Styx games
any Bard's Tale games (221)
any Banner Saga games (221)
Deep Sky Derelicts
Mutant Year Zero
StarCrawlers

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Kingmaker not only making it on the list, but in top 15.

Still seething over slavic gamedev slowly eating out all Obsidians fanbase alive?

No, I'm quite happy Kingmaker sold so well, because it exposed all the RTwP loving primitives who were previously hiding their plebeian tastes.

It's a turn-based game

You definitely had to take turns to restart it after crash every 3 minutes.

 

[Lambach]

ELEX higher on the list than ToEE.



I blame Darth Roxor for this.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Thanks to everyone who put this together, it's a considerable achievement. Now, for what's wrong ...

I'm surprised not to see the Katauri King's Bounty games somewhere on this list (Crossworlds does pop up at #221 on the extended list in a 58-way tie for last place). I thought my enjoyment of these titles was not particularly unusual. I can only guess codexers toss KB in the same box with HOMM, which makes them city builders, even though you can't do any city building in King's Bounty, just rpg-type things ... hmm.

Also surprised to not see Nantucket place at least somewhere on the list. Probably my favorite whaling card-based rpg of all time, it's always a pleasure to see my entire crew wiped by newborn narwhals.

And, no matter how much anyone tries to convince me otherwise, The (original) Sims is an rpg, and a damn good one. Quite tricky to get to the top of any career and stay there for any length of time. I guess the sequels completely wiped our collective memory of what an odd little gem the original was.

A bunch of games I haven't got around to that didn't make their way higher than Oblivion:
Darkest Dungeon (made it to rank 108 in the full list)
Ghost of a Tale (186)
any Styx games
any Bard's Tale games (221)
any Banner Saga games (221)
Deep Sky Derelicts
Mutant Year Zero
StarCrawlers

Problem with Banner Saga games is that the combat was poorly designed, and they never fixed it in any of the installments.
Turn order is alternating without any sort of initiative, if you have only 1 unit then that same unit goes every other turn.

 

[Morality Games]

The most average cRPG of all time: 17
Walking simulator in the woods and on the meadow: 19
The best cRPG ever: 45
Tyranny 95? Good joke. Top 10 is the minimum.
Original Sin better than Original Sin II?
Such lists should be alphabetical. Otherwise, they do not make sense.

On the Original Sins, it's a case of significantly better systems vs. marginally better content.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

ELEX higher on the list than ToEE.



I blame Darth Roxor for this.

IMO ToEE is a hard game to rank. It does one thing so well that it should be recognized for it, but it falls short in a lot of other areas.
It's one of those games that you want every person designing an RPG(esp. one based on D20) to be forced to sit down and play just to understand what they're doing wrong.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Turn order is alternating without any sort of initiative, if you have only 1 unit then that same unit goes every other turn.

From what I remember about it game stopped doing that turn alternating when one side had only one unit left.
It was called pillage mode or something like that.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Turn order is alternating without any sort of initiative, if you have only 1 unit then that same unit goes every other turn.

From what I remember about it game stopped doing that turn alternating when one side had only one unit left.
It was called pillage mode or something like that.

Was keeping it simple for explanation purposes.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Turn order is alternating without any sort of initiative, if you have only 1 unit then that same unit goes every other turn.

From what I remember about it game stopped doing that turn alternating when one side had only one unit left.
It was called pillage mode or something like that.

Was keeping it simple for explanation purposes.

Even when that "simple" is just outright lie?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Turn order is alternating without any sort of initiative, if you have only 1 unit then that same unit goes every other turn.

From what I remember about it game stopped doing that turn alternating when one side had only one unit left.
It was called pillage mode or something like that.

Was keeping it simple for explanation purposes.

Even when that "simple" is just outright lie?

The implication was that small parties(i.e., purposely gimping yourself) are superior and make the game easier.
and fyi, letting the enemy go into pillage mode with a solo alette on overwatch is a valid and very powerful strategy.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Turn order is alternating without any sort of initiative, if you have only 1 unit then that same unit goes every other turn.

From what I remember about it game stopped doing that turn alternating when one side had only one unit left.
It was called pillage mode or something like that.

Was keeping it simple for explanation purposes.

Even when that "simple" is just outright lie?

The implication was that small parties(i.e., purposely gimping yourself) are superior and make the game easier.

Yeah, that's outright weakness of that combat system.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Kingmaker not only making it on the list, but in top 15.

Still seething over slavic gamedev slowly eating out all Obsidians fanbase alive?

No, I'm quite happy Kingmaker sold so well, because it exposed all the RTwP loving primitives who were previously hiding their plebeian tastes.

It's a turn-based game

You definitely had to take turns to restart it after crash every 3 minutes.

Still faster than waiting for the loading screen in pillows