Raithe

Hm, Civilization, Masters of Orion, Alpha Centuari maybe? There are lots of choices and consequences you make within those sorts of strategy / exploration / research type games. They don't always have much story to them (although AC did make a nice effort), but they definitely have a wide open ability to choose as you wish and then have consequences to deal with from every choice. But you are not playing a character, are you? The lack of the PC is what makes a strategy game not an RPG, although there's plenty of C&C of course. On a certain level you do have a "pc" .. Alpha Centauri you picked a leader and the type of ideology they had.. customising the benefits of your "group" and deciding what approach you'd take to events.. I wouldn't call it an rpg.. but it has certain fuzzy elements. Especially if you look at it from the right angle with a squint

Well putting the question here might cut down on some of the thread derailment of "what is a crpg" on the assorted DA and ME2 threads.. Maybe. If we're lucky. Very lucky. That and it might produce some interesting exchange of ideas rather then venting linked to specific current games.

Yup, I can agree to a lot of what Boo says. Personally I enjoyed the Eye of the Beholder games at the time, although I didn't really consider them crpgs. More that it was a fun adaption of the D&D I played with my friends. I don't like Diablo, and most of those styles of games, because they come down to combat grind with very little in the way of.. interactive storyline. I consider them inspired by rpgs... but I don't really think stat advancement and a few elves and orcs make for an rpg by themselves.

I'd agree with those. Hm, and I think it's the C&C within the storyline , and how other characters react to you that make me feel that Alpha Protocol is much more an rpg then anything else. Or at least, the C&C that's supposed to be within it. For the thread derailment : dang it, I really want to try it out and see if it's really as c&c as they say it is...

Ah, maybe the reviewer felt that TIM was the final boss and you had to fight him or not using purely those dialogue options? I mean, the had the options of choosing a paragon reason for whacking it, a renegade reason for whacking it, or the generic middle of the road reason for whacking it..

Thereby firmly linking the need for a story to rpg's... (although to be fair, Alpha Centauri did link things to a shallow storyline.. hm, and so did Alien Legacy but that's a fairly ancient game now)

I would guess the "hard choice" he's talking about is your response to the Illusive Man .. whether to Some people might take that as a "hard" choice to make depending on how you view it..

Hm, Civilization, Masters of Orion, Alpha Centuari maybe? There are lots of choices and consequences you make within those sorts of strategy / exploration / research type games. They don't always have much story to them (although AC did make a nice effort), but they definitely have a wide open ability to choose as you wish and then have consequences to deal with from every choice.

.. a game with a gru about to eat you? Edit: for a proper answer. But depending on the storyline that went with it, I could see a rpg using purely dialogue to play through. Some of the best pen n paper rpg sessions I've had with friends involved no combat, but was pure roleplaying dialogue in various situations.. political machinations and the like, whether d&d fantasy based, vampire emo angst based, or even space opera Star Wars.. All dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, with choices and consequences.. If the storyline works with it, that's all you need for roleplaying.

Although to be a tad more serious, I think c&c along with the "puzzle" aspects in one form or another make up an adventure game, not just the c&c.

.. Or most japanese . hm. bishojou games?

The awesome twist to the end of ME2 "insert disc 3".

I'm wondering if he's going to assemble a rag-tag fleet of allies, and then tell the Reapers "To Get the Hell Out Of Our Galaxy!" Although the surprise twist that the Reapers turn out to be descended from Morrigan's baby would be...

"After losing to the collectors Shepard renames the Normandy Serenity & starts a career as space pirate in the Terminus Systems " " Shepard is killed in action, the suicide mission is carried out by Blasto the Hanar, who yells "ENKINDLE THIS!" at Harbinger"

hm, can you imagine what a Reaper Blue Screen of Death looks like?

Hm, accumulation of "stuff" isn't really character advancement. It might be "game advancement" but guns and gear by itself isn't representative of growth of the character. Maybe the increase in capabilities in using gear could be growth, but just getting access to the gear wouldn't. At least to my mind.

I think it gets rolled into the idea that as the story progresses, and you make choices within that tory, a character should grow and development in some meaningful ways. In books and films, that tends to be represented by emotional maturity more then "stat growth" .. hm, although the standard training montage in most martial arts movies could represent stat/ability growth.. Within the arena of computer roleplaying games, mechanical stats are a fairly simple way to represent character growth and increased skill levels.

Finding the origins of the super-secret, long dead (or almost all dead) species that created the original Reapers back in the dawn of history... and the location of the mystical Reaper Ctrl-Alt-Del key..

I hadn't realised you were such an optimist Purkake.. Hm, I would go with the generic having a central character you can take the role of, and choose various course of actions during the story of the game, with your choices affecting the course of the story. Unfortunately, I also think that's kind of the "ideal" which doesn't really happen in most crpgs.

They didn't say if there's any more crates in it... But I do wonder if they've added the utility to use duct tape in missions yet...

The funky hyperdrive thing if you wanted to get the really "good" ending.. there was a handful of not so good, and fairly appaling "you screwed up" endings if you weren't careful...

Was more efficient if you had 6 level 1 research then 1 level 6 research.. But still was a dang good game once you got to grips with it...

There's just too little data about it to go one way or another... So we just clamour for more info and spin wild theories and speculation on limited knowledge.. But hey, that's what forums are for, yes?

Trying to give the guys the image of lingerie pillow fights?

I do get the feeling that the future of crpg's is going to lean heavily into the "main hero" and "two companions" style that they seem to be doing lately.... mostly because it's "easier" to set up games like that on consoles. And that seems to be the all important market for games development lately. Much as it sucks for those of us who love our pc's. There seem to be a lot of games developed for the console that will get "ports" onto pc's... and games developed for "console & pc" but which tend to be designed so the consoles can handle it, and thus even the pc version won't be that un-consolified. Mouse and keyboard work great to control larger parties.. but console gamepads.. eh, not so much.