Decline The Worst CRPG Ever?

[DraQ]

Well, the worst cRPG is probably some obscure shovelware crap no one has ever heard about (at least no one still outside an asylum), but if

you're not a really bad game if you didn't fool hordes of people into playing.

then Oblivion, hands down. It's the absolute worst pile of festering diarrhea riddled with ebola and gangrenous pus to ever be broadly considered "teh best gaem ever!!1".

As for Gorasul, I haven't played it but wasn't it generally rated "meh" to "sort of ok" rather than "make it stop! make it end!"?

Wizardry 8 because I can't see anything good in it.

Have you tried turning your monitor on.

 

[Shaewaroz]

Definitely not Ruins of Myth Drannor! To me it's a flawed jem - with some extra polish and changes to combat mechanisms it would have been one of the best and most faithful adaptations of an oldschool tabletop RPG experience.

What did it do right?

Atmosphere and method of environmental storytelling + the use of DM as a narrator. The dungeon floors were absolutely huge and fun to explore, and it had a good map to help navigate the dungeon.

 

[*-*/\--/\~]

You forgot Dungeon Lords.

 

[Azalin]

Not even close to any of these. Pools of Radiance deleted my hard drive twice and it's not even as bad as some of the shit I've played.

How the fuck did you manage to do that twice?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Not even close to any of these. Pools of Radiance deleted my hard drive twice and it's not even as bad as some of the shit I've played.

How the fuck did you manage to do that twice?

He reinstalled it, obviously.

 

[Xathrodox86]

Ultima, only beacuse it was never finished and also beacuse fuck you EA.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Modern kiddies have no concept of elite awfulness. Can you imagine the global catatonia that would result if a AAA game today melted your graphics card and formatted your hard drive? That takes PoR beyond all competition - it's its own end-boss of software awfulness.

 

[Azalin]

Not even close to any of these. Pools of Radiance deleted my hard drive twice and it's not even as bad as some of the shit I've played.

How the fuck did you manage to do that twice?

He reinstalled it, obviously.

I would assume most people who got their system files deleted threw the box out the window and didn't reinstall it for a second try just to format your hard drive for the lulz

 

[Outlander]

I finished Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor

But the truly horrific ones are those that fool people into playing them, into having high hopes

On that note, I have no experience with most of the games featured on the poll, except PoR and Lionheart. For me: Oblivion, Dragon Age: Origins (poll should probably include DA2), Fallout 3 (not that I had high hopes for this one, but it's sheer shittiness washed over me in a (not) awesome wave.

To all the Gothic3 defenders:

Got it full price on release, most anticipated game of the year at the time. Tried to love it. Religiously. Forced myself a lot. Fooled myself into really enjoying it. Became a fire Mage in desert (gothic vets will get it). Tried further. The fucking thing piled up with bugs so bad I quit.

First and last time I ever preordered anything. I did finish it, though.

 

[Outlander]

Not even close to any of these. Pools of Radiance deleted my hard drive twice and it's not even as bad as some of the shit I've played.

How the fuck did you manage to do that twice?

He reinstalled it, obviously.

I would assume most people who got their system files deleted threw the box out the window and didn't reinstall it for a second try just to format your hard drive for the lulz

It didn't happen to me, but I would assume that in a time without or with limited internet (2001), where you can't instantly check for stuff like you can today, you can't really be sure that the game was responsible for deleting your system. Most people at the time must have thought 'shit, I caught a virus or something'.

 

[Catfish]

First and last time I ever preordered anything. I did finish it, though.

Well, guess you had more patience than me . I remember really pushing against the bugs, with an actual effort. At some point something went irredeemably wrong, like a key npc bugging out or something. I vaguely remember just ending up trekking to the tower and murdering the wizard dude out of sheer spite.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

The dungeon floors were absolutely huge and fun to explore

That's the part where you won't find much support here. I agree with you, but most hated the slow pace of exploration, monotonous wall textures, repetitive enemies and slow combat.

and it had a good map to help navigate the dungeon

This, OTOH, I disagree with, the map was not the worst I've seen, but definitely not good.

I've never shared, or really understood the hatred for PoR : RoMD, but it's here to stay, so trying to redeem it is kind of a lost cause. Nevertheless, godspeed Shaewaroz !

 

[felipepepe]

Honestly, my hatred onlygrew after I player it up to the end. The game actually improves once you finish the 4-5 floors of brown monotony, with more enemis, spells, party members and some decent and unique outdoor areas. Is like they did their best to hide any good quality they had.

 

[kwanzabot]

Anyone who says something other then pool of radiance ROMD or gorasul or m&m 9 prolly hasn't played those games

I didn't like oblivion or dungeon seige or NWN 1/2 or fallout 4 or mass effect or dragon age or fable or soulbringer or jade empire or kotor or any diablo clones or diablo or morrowind but i wouldn't call those games the worst rpg ever, not by a long shot

POOL OF RADIANCE RUINS OF MYTH DRANNOR lol i actually broke the cd in half because i felt bad selling it on ebay

the i always thought the wizardry games were really really really boring but idk bout worst rpg ever lol

e-forgot about ultima 8 and 9 those could be contenders too

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I played (or rather tried playing, in most cases) all of those except for the "hd" remake of RoA and didn't care much for any of them. More like the most meh I'll just uninstall this crpg ever. Though admittedly, Ultima, M&M and Gothic aren't exactly my favorite game series so that's probably why I wasn't pissed off.

If expectations and hype are what counts here, then NWN should definitely be on the list and would be my pick.

 

[Average Manatee]

Went with Ultima 9, but thread should be titled "CRPG that failed expectations most horribly" or something if that's what we are going for.

Not even close to any of these. Pools of Radiance deleted my hard drive twice and it's not even as bad as some of the shit I've played.

How the fuck did you manage to do that twice?

I need to know this too.

 

[TripJack]

some russian trash probably

 

[Neanderthal]

Voted Ascension because it was such a decline and sad end, but I actually think worst I ever played was far more recent and a far more perfect example of decline, an that were DA2. From very beginning it showed what CRPGs could become if made by unimaginative, lazy idiots:

• Voice acting and the "cinematic" vision took priority over gameplay and player choice, despite the cinematics being just two talking heads, as basic as you could fucking get.
  
• The voice acting took away from the complexity and choice of dialogue, which became just upper, middle and lower right, (idiot, second rate Joss Whedon idiot or constipated idiot,) and they all lead to same fucking results nine times out o ten anyway.
• The characters and situations were all told about in a certain way, oh that guardswoman is so strong, oh this pirate bird is so strong, and yet it was shown that they were all weaklings who needed player to wipe their arse for em, came and went like trained dogs and didn't even ask for pay. Idiot slaves hanging around for no reason, lot or em.
• The city was dead and non interactable, basically just a poorly painted grey backdrop, for fucks sake you could even walk through people, lazy fucking shortcut is that? Vizima, Britannia, Tarant all shame that shit.
• The plot made no fucking sense and you achieved nothing, mages want freedom from their towers and equality with their fellow man, yeah 'cept its set in a feudal medieval period so equality wi your fellow man is servitude as a serf and being fucking owned not freedom.
• That whole templar versus mage shit, no human or grown up could have written such awful, simplistic drivel, everything painted in such broad strokes.
• Qunari (and everybody really) turned into fucking inept morons, unable to do owt or say owt, even protagonist is a fucking idiot who lets killers go so they can later kill his mam. Which I have to admit were hilarious, shit awful cinematics trying to be tragic while old bird did Michael Jackson Thriller shit, laugh I near bought a round!
  
• And that fucking supposed family who you can't even talk to, folk defend game wi this shit, saying that the personal story of one person trying to save their family was good. No it wasn't, they were fucking strangers who you didn't even know or care about, and just as much silly fuckers as everybody else in game.
• Oh but it did something new in trying to introduce a characer who is not a chosen one, I hear twats saying. Just because your not chosen by anybody dunt mean that you have to be a useless, unmotivated, idle dogsbody for anybody who is willing to pay you to trawl through linear corridors, fighting until reaching final conversation before last combat. Which were copy pasted design o whole game.
• Honestly is this best a multi million dev can do? Alternate combat and conversation in dull grey corridors, fuck me Gygax were doing better than this when he first invented fucking RPGs, and far more imaginative and ambitious.
• Oh but they only had eighteen months to make it! So much more than many classics o genre and about equal wi New Vegas, that dunt fucking wash, premise and gameplay were flawed from inception.

For me it showed everything that were wrong wi modern industry, and was perfect example o shit that was being shovelled out and defended as innovative and groundbreaking. And to quote Led Zep song remains fucking same now, nothings changed.

Fuck me I sound a bit butthurt dun I? Any cream around?

 

[miles teg]

My vote goes to the first Heimdall game, since the second one was actually pretty fun.

Oh and Cobra Mission deserves a nomination as well.

I'd also like to mention "It come from the desert" but it's not a real crpg so...

 

[dragonul09]

I don't see how Lionheart fits into that poll,it was a pretty good game,sadly the last part felt like it was done by someone else.

 

[Viata]

Most of those games are shit because of what came before then. Ultima IX, for example, would just be a bad game if not for being a Ultima game. Descent Underworld is so shit people even forgot Avellone was one of the designers just so people can say he never did a horrible, shit, boring game. Red Crystal was a horrible game, I still hate that swords moving here and there. I have played many shit games, but Red Crystal takes the top(or bottom).

 

[PhantasmaNL]

I remember Druid - by SirTech.

Is it an RPG? Not sure. It has an inventory and attributes and stuff.

Is it pure shit. Yeah.

I finished it in about an hour. Iirc it was fighting 1 creature for about 55 minutes (this green thing kept respawning the minute i killed it, so i thought i would train my Druid for upcoming battles), then i got into a rocket ship, The End. Not sure what they were thinking, maybe Cleve can shed some light on this.

 

[agris]

Lionheart is much better than the other ones, shouldn't be in the poll.

False, it's a piece of shit. It was a shitty game during development and still is. I tried to play it about a year ago, the dialogue was Bethesda-level derp, but to add insult to injury, it was being delivered by historical characters that we have actual written accounts of.

OTOH, the maps looked pretty nice. Someone was porting them to the IE format on the Beamdog forums.

 

[Melan]

Dungeon Siege (2002), for its paper-thin plot, utter linearity, repetitive gameplay, and because with all the automated character behaviour - going off automatically to fight the enemy, hoovering up all the loot, and I think even selling most of it automatically, the game was practically masturbating playing itself. It reduces player choice to the bare minimum, and doesn't even have a modern AAA "cinematic" experience to show for it. Other games may have been more offensive, but Dungeon Siege - by God, it was dull. Its only saving grace was the pack mule, but the designers ran even that concept into the ground.

Runner up:
Knights of Legend (1989), which was... yes! a CRPG developed and released by Origin, long before EA took over. Knights of Legend is famous for one thing, its detailed tactical battles which would put Jagged Alliance to shame - with detailed movement, varied offensive and defensive actions, realisim, the works. All of these actions needed several key presses to launch. This means a battle between a party of adventurers and a party of random monsters will take more than an hour, and trying to do something like laying siege to a castle will take several hours. It was deadly dull, and none of the promised expansions were ever released. Read the CRPGAddict's review.

 

[octavius]

Runner up:
Knights of Legend (1989), which was... yes! a CRPG developed and released by Origin, long before EA took over. Knights of Legend is famous for one thing, its detailed tactical battles which would put Jagged Alliance to shame - with detailed movement, varied offensive and defensive actions, realisim, the works. All of these actions needed several key presses to launch. This means a battle between a party of adventurers and a party of random monsters will take more than an hour, and trying to do something like laying siege to a castle will take several hours. It was deadly dull, and none of the promised expansions were ever released. Read the CRPGAddict's review.

I actually kind of enjoyed it, when I learnt how to play around all it's weakness and annoyances.
So reroll to get as high stats as possible, use Save States, run from every random encounter (you don't get anything from them anyway) and reload if unsuccesful, and just concentrate on getting those 18 quests done.
Despite the game having the worst encounter design in the history of CRPGs (you never faced more than one kind of creature in an battle, and they are all generic creatures; you never face "The Big Foozle"), the actual combat was good enough that the game held my interest long enough to finish it.
I like to view at as an Idiot Savant amongst CRPGs.

Of the games on the list I only played MM 9, but never finished it.
That game too I kind of enjoyed.

Neverwinter Nights is probably the worst CRPG I've played, at least the original campaign. Bland, boring, constant fight against camera, only controling one character. But I guess it's redeemed by the things you could create with it.