Plutone00

I agree. Any strory that is thoroughly written and thought through from all angles is gonna be good. But it does not have to be made into RPG game. I can be made into a movie, TV series or even a book. I'm sure everyone has their own favorites in those categories. The difference is games make the player directly involved in what's happening. Most of them force already premade decisions that could infuence the outcome and put words in protagonist's mouth (things the player often does not agree with) instead of giving the option to choose your own path. In the end all player is left with is a level full of monsers and a final boss to defeat. Since the player is already involved, he/she should be involved all the way, not just cleaning up the mess. Otherwise there is no need to make an RPG, just movie is enough. It should or they are going to lose customers. I don't even buy linear RPGs anymore, they are no fun. Inability to influence events or anything really is simply frustrating. Just grind, gather loot and defeat the final boss. No, thanks. Done it all before many-many-many times.

Actually, they don't. "To appeal to casual public" english localisators practically lobotomised japanese games, especially in the 90s, sometimes simply cuttig out ENTIRE PIECES of the game, so not to leave any refference to the japanese lifestyle and culture. "Luckily" nowadays with anime boom, english localisators just stick to deforamted translations and horrible voice acting "to appeal to casual public", stubbornly refusing to include original japanese VOs (with rare exceptions). Thank God that undub scene exists.

There are a few japanese RPGs that have true branching storylines, not just non-liearity, but unfotunately at their core they are more of VNs with RPG gimmick. If we are not talking cinematic quality here, there is no need for big budget. Even 2d SNES-style graphics would be enough as long as every branch of the story is well written and gameplay doesn't come down to simply runnig around from dugeon to dugeon fighting monsters.

Wing Commader 3 for old time's sake. Purchased the whole series during GOG holiday sale.

Single-player RPG with not just non-linearity, but with true branching storylines, kinda like VNs. Most non-linear RPGs follow the formula of slightly different events during the course of the story depending on player choices and then comes the choice that affects the ending right before the "final boss" and those endings are usually not that different, most of them end with "final boss" defeated and one in which player joins "team bad guys". You still go from point A to point B. Even Witcher 2, that fancies itself a game with branching story still follows that formula: no matter who you side with, you still have to go to Loc Muinne in chapter 3. Let's take Skyrim for example. You can be thane of every hold and head of every guild. "Realistically" that can't happen. What if you could choose only one home and one career? What if guild story arcs were more polished with their own twists and turns and friends/love interests and took about 10 hours to complete? Not talking Skyrim-specific here (just took it as an example, since most people probably played it), but that's the kind of RPG I want to see: a game with a branching storylines that lead to different places, not just to one same final boss. Doesn't even need to be a good vs evil type of thing. Life as swordsman/soldier would be different from life as a mage/scholar - the people in your immidiate circle, the things that you do and want to do would be different. Not just doing an origin story, throwing you in the world, role-playing a couple of converstions and running to defeat the "final boss". Careers of the swordsman and the mage have to be totally different stories and totally different expiriences. TOR mmo attempted to do it, but it is a very bad example since aside from picking your faction and career at char setup, it still followed "from point A to point B" formula, but true branching storyline is impossible with mmos anyway. I realise a true branching storyline is hard to do outside of VNs, especially if we are talking cinematic quality RPGs here, but I won't lose hope and if sometime there will be a kickstarter for it, I will pledge my every single penny.

AP was very underrated. I considder it one of the best non-linear cinematic games. it belongs with the likes of KotOR and Deus EX. I definitely want another spy-themed non-linear game even if it's not AP2.

@Qistina It gets worse in TOR. Revan, one of the most powerful force users in history with all his power from both sides of the force, is just a level 38 character and one of the easiest bosses in a game gets totally beaten by party (consisting of mediocore power level chars, which are not even necessary sith), supposedly barely escapes with life and is never seen again. Yeah, I wish TOR never happened.

I'd like to be Obsidian Order's Scout of the Northern Wastes