But the #1 reason that CRPGs aren't dying...

[Lancer]

If you want to talk about party interaction and story, Squaresoft was really doing that from FF IV on.  Maybe they did really pioneer that.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thank you Ender for bringing up another good point which I neglected to mention earlier about Torment being inspired by JRPGs.

 

In addition to my earlier claim that Fallout is an example where you can have more advanced party interaction without the more "emotional" JRPG-style interaction elements...

 

Look at the complexity of Fallout's story compared to Torment's... Now compare Torment's story complexity to that of any good JRPG. Now tell me which game is closer to the more story-driven style of JRPGS?

Now there are more western RPGs that have been trending towards being more story-driven ever since.. Look at the Baldur's Gates, Arcanum, KOTOR, Deus Ex, System Shock, Vampire..etc..

 

JRPG's have always been story-driven whereas western RPGS (with the Ultimas as notable exceptions) had always been less story-driven in the past placing the emphasis more on the gameworld and on customizability.

[EnderAndrew]

Fallout just decided to focus on humor more.

[Lancer]

Torment had lots of humor too, actually.. i.e. Morte, Annah, Nordom the modron, the Brothel of Sating Intellectual Lusts :D ..etc

[EnderAndrew]

Good point!

 

I need to replay Torment!

[Lancer]

I do too *sigh*

 

I *love* that game

[Yst]

What western RPGs came out between Torment and Serpent Isle?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Actually not too many memorable ones aside from Daggerfall, Fallout, Eye of the Beholder III and then a whole bunch of hack and slash games.

 

This period actually corresponds to the "dark ages" of western RPGs.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

The way I see it, it wasn't a dark age from the point of view of quality titles released. It was only a dark age in sales figure terms, and quantity of publicity achieved amongst the public at large. It seems to me the 1990-1996 period was as rife with good RPGs for PC as any era. They just didn't make big news, with Daggerfall perhaps being the major exception.

 

As far as other games from this era that offer party banter and interaction on PC, Lands of Lore, released in 1993 offered in-party banter and dialogue (with voice over!) in a format so completely different from the JRPG style of the day (and so completely in line with the CRPG tradition from which it was spawned) that claiming its inspiration from any such source would seem ridiculous.

 

The one truly serious attempt to bring totally undisguished JRPG stylings to the PC arrived rather late, with Septerra Core. And virtually no one argues for its historical importance or overall quality. Nor do I think its failure particularly encouraged CRPG developers to copy its all-out JRPG-clone model.

[Guest Fishboot]

Fallout just decided to focus on humor more.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Well, really, any more necessary plot points in the narrative would make Fallout less open ended. As much as the water chip timer in Fallout gets maligned that's exactly the kind of game element that can focus an otherwise open-ended game, and it did - it's odd that no one has gone back to that well.

 

I tend to agree with the "narrative focus comes from Infocom/adventure games in general" theory floated earlier, now that this has devolved into a history lesson. I think party interaction is kind of a red herring, to be frank, nothing more than an extension of a focus on narrative, and not some particular evolution of one gaming tradition or another.

 

 

 

Would I sound like a heretic if I said I can't make myself replay Torment? Once I understood the PS setting and more or less understood the

Practical/Paranoid/Good memories

I found that replaying the game without the prospect of surprises or substantial new insight is just too boring to manage given the exposition explosion nature of the game. I've kept it installed for the entire life of my computer and managed to get out of the mausoleum or to Pharod 3-4 times but I always end up abandoning those games, and by the time I get back to the game I no longer feel connected to my savegame and I start over again to the same end.

[metadigital]

I was stating my incredulity at your statement that no cRPGs would be made if all the [current] developers were forced into receivership or console platforms.

 

It beggars belief to conclude that no-one would develop a cRPG whilst there is stil a PC on which to develop one.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Let's put it this way.. If the cRPG market "dies" it would make no business sense for a developer to continue pursuing a dead market.

 

Certainly that doesn't stop someone from trying although they wouldn't stay in business long.

 

Unless you want to make them.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, no, let's put it this way: as long as there are PCs, there will be people who will use them to play games, and some (a lot) of those will be RPGs, whether they exist or have to be created.

 

Stating that the PC games market is dying or dead is a little premature, methinks.

 

The PC games market will continue as long as the PC does.

 

Also, games are constantly mutating; RPG elemets, for example, are being transplanted into other genres, just as any other componentry is being bolted onto any new game (like better graphics).

[EnderAndrew]

There was a PC gaming market when there were far fewer PCs on the market.

[metadigital]

EDIT:  I wouldn't be so sure about JRPGs having the "party interaction" so to speak, at least not like KOTOR.  In JRPGs, I could never initiate conversation.  In games as old as Ultima VI (and perhaps even earlier) I could actually sit down and shoot the ****e with a party member about whatever the heck I wanted.

 

In any case, even if this is a JRPG feature, it's by no means a bad one.  All CRPGs that have party members should have some sort of party interaction IMO.  It's silly not to as far as I'm concerned.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

By the nature of the beast, the party interaction style of a cRPG has to be different from the party interaction style of a console RPG. A typical cRPG is all about choices and in theory more non-linear play than a JRPG... As KOTOR was designed to appeal to both console and computer RPGers it needlessly had to have elements of both. However, the obvious similarities are ...

...

In KOTOR, which tried to appeal to both gamers I thought the JRPG elements were quite clear...

...

4) Like PS:T (which also had some JRPG influences) there was a heavy emphasis on the PC's interaction with his fellow party members. And in JRPGs, this fleshing of the PC's supporting cast is ubiquitous. You didn't really start seeing this trend in modern cRPGS until Torment. This was kind of started with Ultima VII but was not capitualed on until 1999. This trend toward improved character interaction, however, is something I deem good that we borrowed from JRPGs.

 

Baldur's Gate only had #1 and Icewind Dale had none of the above. Although BGII had a little bit of point 4 continuing what Torment had started.

 

Get this...KOTOR had even more JRPG elements than Torment did... And in Torment's credits the designers even admitted that the game had been influenced by the Final Fantasy series.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Whereas PC games before (with the notable exception of Ultima VII part II: Serpent Isle) for all practical purposes almost completely ignored any substantial party interaction, this has been a mainstay in JRPGS since well the 8 bit days.

 

And I never said that "party interaction" was a bad thing. Quite the contrary, I think this is something that PC RPGS should have been doing all along.. Especially since many PnP campaigns have always featured such party interaction well before cRPGS finally caught on. It is about time, IMHO, since cRPGS supposedly have always been designed with an eye towards recreating the tabletop game on to the computer.

 

EDIT: Who knows? Maybe there would be more JRPG players that would also play cRPGS had the party interaction concept been established in cRPGs from the get-go.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Firstly, the proceed from a false premise. I concur with Yst:

It seems to me one might just as easily argue that party banter and complex NPC dialogue came to CRPGs by way of the Adventure genre and its offshoots and hybrid incarnations, as by way of JRPGs.  Actually, the prior strikes me as the more credible claim, since Adventure genre design concepts informed so much else in the development of story-focused and character-driven western RPGs.

 

Realistically though, I think it's silly to draw a direct causal link to any one source.  ...  Maybe CRPGs which employed in-depth character interaction early on applied principles they'd seen in JRPGs or Adventures, but on the other hand, maybe they were just applying principles completely generic to every single PnP roleplaying game since the beginning of time.  It doesn't take much creativity to stumble upon this particular notion.  Merely to apply it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It is pointless and even misguided to pursue this distinction.

 

Way back when cRPGs involved multiple player characters, there was party interaction. I can remember Ultima III had that, and that was the eighties, and eight bit computing (Apple ][, Commodore 64, etc).

 

I think you are missing the big picture, by trying to be too clever about your categorisations.

 

Computer games, as an organic beast, is the result of cross-breeding from all influences, whether it is Hollywood blockbuster cinema or Japanese anime; likewise, the RPG has given and received concepts and techniques from the FPS, Flight Sim, Strategy, Simulation and even Platform genres, but

[EnderAndrew]

I'm a stalwart defender of the mighty Ultima series, but party interaction wasn't much of anything until Ultima V.

[metadigital]

I'm a stalwart defender of the mighty Ultima series, but party interaction wasn't much of anything until Ultima V.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Maybe the actual in-party interaction wasn't as developed as it was later on, but there was certainly interaction with all characters, and you had to meet your fellow party members before they joined.

 

I guess now I might sound like I'm being technical, but in line with Yst's comments (which I have quoted directly above in my previous post), I think it was a natural progression from the occidental RPGs of yesteryear as much as it was a cross-polination from their oriental cousins.

 

Anyway, the point is: what's the point? Lancer was (initially) using this as some sort of prophesy of doom for the occidental cRPG. Which is what I was rebutting as patent nonsense.

[EnderAndrew]

Debating opinions is the point of message boards to an extent.

[metadigital]

I am very tempted to quote Kaftan's sig at this point.

If you want to talk about party interaction and story, Squaresoft was really doing that from FF IV on.  Maybe they did really pioneer that.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thank you Ender for bringing up another good point which I neglected to mention earlier about Torment being inspired by JRPGs.

 

In addition to my earlier claim that Fallout is an example where you can have more advanced party interaction without the more "emotional" JRPG-style interaction elements...

 

Look at the complexity of Fallout's story compared to Torment's... Now compare Torment's story complexity to that of any good JRPG. Now tell me which game is closer to the more story-driven style of JRPGS?

Now there are more western RPGs that have been trending towards being more story-driven ever since.. Look at the Baldur's Gates, Arcanum, KOTOR, Deus Ex, System Shock, Vampire..etc..

 

JRPG's have always been story-driven whereas western RPGS (with the Ultimas as notable exceptions) had always been less story-driven in the past placing the emphasis more on the gameworld and on customizability.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Again, I ithink you are misinterpreting perfectly innocent evolution and placing a sinister connotation to it; your initial post was a doomsay of the occidental cRPG, and you have been using your interpretation of the influence of oriental CRPGs onto the Western cRPGs as a prescriptive cause.

 

I disagree with your analysis and your conclusion.

 

Firstly, your analysis totally ignores the true nature of any market: any advances in audio equipment will be utilised in the car industry, for example.

 

Secondly, your conclusion is specious. Even, as I pointed out earlier, in the unlikely event that all occidental cRPG developers and publishers either became insolvent or pursued the oriental console JRPG market, this would not preclude the ever-sprouting and ingenious talents of the users of computers.

 

For the final piece of evidence, notice that all consoles are propreitary (and fixed hardware specifications) systems, and all of the games from redundant consoles is now available, through emulation, for the PC.

[Volourn]

"Bioware making the move over to consoles because that is "where the money is" concerns me."

 

I'm out of the loop as I was so sure that Dragon Age was PC only. I didn't know BIO decided to make DA console. This is HUGE news! I'm gonna make a new thread dedicated to this very shocking news bit! WOWSERS!

 

Thanks for the heads up.

[metadigital]

"Bioware making the move over to consoles because that is "where the money is" concerns me."

 

I'm out of the loop as I was so sure that Dragon Age was PC only. I didn't know BIO decided to make DA console. This is HUGE news! I'm gonna make a new thread dedicated to this very shocking news bit! WOWSERS!

 

Thanks for the heads up.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

R00fles!

[Lancer]

"Bioware making the move over to consoles because that is "where the money is" concerns me."

 

I'm out of the loop as I was so sure that Dragon Age was PC only. I didn't know BIO decided to make DA console. This is HUGE news! I'm gonna make a new thread dedicated to this very shocking news bit! WOWSERS!

 

Thanks for the heads up.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

BGDA means Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance which was published by BIOWARE for the PS2.

 

I wasn't at all talking about Dragon Age.

 

I am sorry that you missed that. *shrugs*

[Lancer]

As far as other games from this era that offer party banter and interaction on PC, Lands of Lore, released in 1993 offered in-party banter and dialogue (with voice over!) in a format so completely different from the JRPG style of the day (and so completely in line with the CRPG tradition from which it was spawned) that claiming its inspiration from any such source would seem ridiculous.

 

I played Lands of Lore many, many years ago... Hardly remember it now. Although, I never claimed that it was inspired by JRPGS.

 

The one truly serious attempt to bring totally undisguished JRPG stylings to the PC arrived rather late, with Septerra Core.  And virtually no one argues for its historical importance or overall quality.  Nor do I think its failure particularly encouraged CRPG developers to copy its  all-out JRPG-clone model.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Septerra Core was a JRPG made for the PC as opposed to being a PC-style RPG with JRPG elements(i.e. Torment).

 

Septerra Core was actually really similar to the Genesis game: Phantasy Star IV.

[Volourn]

"BGDA means Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance which was published by BIOWARE for the PS2."

 

Bioware had nothing to do with BGDA. It was published by Interplay, and developed by Snowblind. BGDA2 was devloped by Black Isle. Again, Bioware had nothing to do with either BGDA outside that BGDA shares the same city as Bioware's Baldur's Gate game series.

 

 

 

"I wasn't at all talking about Dragon Age."

 

You were saying that Bioware has made the move to console because it's 'where the money is' yet Dragon Age - a Bioware game - is for PC only. Not to mention the fact that it is impossible for Bioware 'to move' to console since they have been virtually devloping console or console/PC games since their inception.

 

 

 

"I am sorry that you missed that. *shrugs* "

 

I am sorry your facts are wrong. Don't blame me for pointing that fact out.

[Lancer]

I disagree with your analysis and your conclusion.

 

What a surprise. I also disagree with--- wait.. You don't have an analysis and conclusion.

 

Firstly, your analysis totally ignores the true nature of any market: any advances in audio equipment will be utilised in the car industry, for example.

 

My analysis is independent of equipment concerns. It is based more on my assessment of overall trends in the gaming market. Whether they are right or wrong. And I wasn't advocating the end of PC RPGs, in that post you quoted (or in any) , I was just merely stating there that designing story-driven PC RPGS is a good idea.. And one that was inspired by JRPGS.

 

Secondly, your conclusion is specious.

 

Ok.. I am still waiting for your better one.

 

Even, as I pointed out earlier, in the unlikely event that all occidental cRPG developers and publishers either became insolvent or pursued the oriental console JRPG market, this would not preclude the ever-sprouting and ingenious talents of the users of computers.

 

 

And how many ingenious RPGs of the calibur of Torment and Fallout do you know of that have been sprung by independent users?

 

For the final piece of evidence, notice that all consoles are propreitary (and fixed hardware specifications) systems, and all of the games from redundant consoles is now available, through emulation, for the PC.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

And this is evidence for what exactly?

[Lancer]

Bioware had nothing to do with BGDA. It was published by Interplay, and developed by Snowblind. BGDA2 was devloped by Black Isle. Again, Bioware had nothing to do with either BGDA outside that BGDA shares the same city as Bioware's Baldur's Gate game series.

 

Ooops.. Hack and slash is not my specialty. Interplay, Bioware whatever. But, doesn't change my point about how developers need to adapt as they move from one platform to another (in this case, from PC to console). BIS went from producing a profound game like Planescape: Torment on the PC to a hack n slash game like BG:DA2 on the console.

Apparently, they felt the change was necessary to reflect the different market that console gamers are. I doubt that BIS would ever make a "Torment" or a "Fallout2" on the console and the above is the reason why.

 

You were saying that Bioware has made the move to console because it's 'where the money is' yet Dragon Age - a Bioware game - is for PC only. Not to mention the fact that it is impossible for Bioware 'to move' to console since they have been virtually devloping console or console/PC games since their inception.

 

Really? According to this Bioware didn't branch out into the console arena until 2000 with MDK2. This is a full 5 years after Bioware's inception and by that same year it had already made BGI, BGII, ToB, TotSC, and Shattered Steel which are *all* PC titles. Up until 2000, Bioware hadn't made any console titles. Since then they have developed the following console titles: MDK series, KOTOR, and JE. Undoubtedly more console projects are along the way.

 

EDIT: And if you can't discuss things without trolling or insulting then I will ignore your future posts. Just to let you know in advance.

[GhostofAnakin]

You bought the Jade-Box too, Ghostie?      ^_^

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

No. Luckily for JE, my current roommate has a XBox. But he's likely moving out and/or will not likely be buying a XBox 360 or PS3, which means if I want to play console RPGs I'll have to dish out the cash.

[alanschu]

Undoubtedly more console projects are along the way.

 

Which makes me ask...what's the point of this again?

[GhostofAnakin]

Which makes me ask...what's the point of this again?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

To debate whether the PC RPG market is dying/dead?

[Lancer]

Which makes me ask...what's the point of this again?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

To debate whether the PC RPG market is dying/dead?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I don't think it is dying per se, but I prefer to remain cautious.

 

PC RPG companies that used to be about making nothing but PC games making console games just makes me a tad nervous and skeptical about where the market is headed. Troika and Interplay/Black Isle being gone I also don't consider a good sign regardless of how you look at it.