RPG cliches you hope to see avoided and/or mocked

[Cryticus]

I would rather have cliches, I am not of that people that think that just because something was done before it is infiriour to somethin that is new.

Games are played to have fun, and story or characters can be cliqe, and very fun, NwN 2 was full of them, and yet I had much fun in playing that for example NwN Its about execution .

As said making everything diffrent and uniqe, just for the sake of screaming look at , look at it I have race of three headed, four leged, six armed, rhinos with pig snouts I am so Orginal.

Certain things just work , LotR is famous for a reason,

[YourVoiceisAmbrosia]

Cliches aren't necessarily bad. It really depends on execution and how they're used. Besides, you can just as easily argue that attempting to avoid cliches has become cliche in of itself.

[Shevek]

Romances.

[Cryticus]

Romances.

 

Okay changed my mind this cliche could at least be rewritten .

[svartelric]

Well, the Chosen One/Hero stereotype seems to be the most feared feature of RPGs; so a Playable Character like the one in ToEE should be good, considering we have Tim Cain, we could hope for that!

[Cryticus]

Well, the Chosen One/Hero stereotype seems to be the most feared feature of RPGs; so a Playable Character like the one in ToEE should be good, considering we have Tim Cain, we could hope for that!

 

This is really something that just need to be executated in good manner. Look for example on Bethesda Morrowind , we play choosen one , but for once he is choosen one of one religion that is technicaly just a sect, the prophecie isn't about saving the world just saving a group, and what i feel is the greates idea is that we arent choosen one because we were born the choosen one, we are choosen one because we do what chooes one was supposed to do.

[kabaliero]

the chosen cliche can be somewhat beaten, too

it's like when even if our character IS chosen, we'll kinda have to have no clue about it, till the very end

 

like a simple juicy final chord in an epic varied instrumental might just break out a tear

[Death Machine Miyagi]

Cliches aren't necessarily bad. It really depends on execution and how they're used. Besides, you can just as easily argue that attempting to avoid cliches has become cliche in of itself.

 

Clearly the only solution is to avoid the cliche of snubbing cliches by embracing cliches.

[JFSOCC]

I would rather have cliches, I am not of that people that think that just because something was done before it is infiriour to somethin that is new.

Games are played to have fun, and story or characters can be cliqe, and very fun, NwN 2 was full of them, and yet I had much fun in playing that for example NwN Its about execution .

As said making everything diffrent and uniqe, just for the sake of screaming look at , look at it I have race of three headed, four leged, six armed, rhinos with pig snouts I am so Orginal.

Certain things just work , LotR is famous for a reason,

I play to be engaged, not just have fun.

[Monte Carlo]

Cliches aren't necessarily bad. It really depends on execution and how they're used. Besides, you can just as easily argue that attempting to avoid cliches has become cliche in of itself.

 

Clearly the only solution is to avoid the cliche of snubbing cliches by embracing cliches.

 

Thus, surely, creating a cliche vortex that will destroy the universe.

[Freshock]

The typical RPG dialouges is a cliche I'd like to see being avoided. There's so many corny writing in most of the RPG games I've been playing lately. Sure there can be some funny dialouge, but they have to be careful not to cross the line of facepalmness.

[Rosveen]

the chosen cliche can be somewhat beaten, too

it's like when even if our character IS chosen, we'll kinda have to have no clue about it, till the very end

 

like a simple juicy final chord in an epic varied instrumental might just break out a tear

Baldur's Gate. Something important is happening, but we don't really know what and why we should be involved. What's more, while we are a chosen one - sort of - there are others just like us.

 

I'd like to see this in Project Eternity. Even if we are unique and the fate of the world depends on our choices, we don't necessarily have to discover it 5 minutes into the game.

[Death Machine Miyagi]

I kinda liked what Arcanum did with the Chosen One:

 

You spend a huge chunk of the game being told you're the second coming of a Christ-like figure...

a Christ-like figure who is actually still alive and contemptuous of the idiots who venerate him. In the end, you're just some random guy/gal who got lucky when the zeppelin crashed and burned, special only because you're doing something about the main plot.

 

Edited October 28, 2012 by Death Machine Miyagi

[centurionofprix]

The stats thing was sort of... dumb. Case in point, what happens when I actually want to play a fighter but still get a decent ending and dialog options? I have to gimp myself to do it. That is bad design, no two ways about it.

 

Then you put points into wisdom/int as the game explicitly advises you to do. Not letting you min-max your stats as a fighter isn't gimping you, particularly when the gameplay revolves so much around investigation, unless you see 18-18-18-3-3-3 as the standard (and THAT, to me, would be poor design). Encouraging balanced characters is perfectly sensible and I hope it continues in PE.

 

The no sword thing however was downright stupid and where the line gets crossed.

 

It wasn't challenging a trope, it was being different just so they could say "we were different". Especially when you factor in one of your party members has a sword, and you encounter and sometimes kill multiple npc's who all also clearly have swords. It is really odd how almost every enemy in the game drops the weapon they use when I kill them, but when they used a sword it is nowhere to be found? When I got to a market where someone screamed about having the "finest Toledo blades" (uh what? Why would people in Sigil be using swords from Spain?) only to find out none of the vendors sold what they were yelling about I wasn't thinking "oh cool" I was thinking "who thought this was a good idea?"

 

That was merely inconsistent execution of the details when it comes to enemies with sword graphics. Dak'kon and Trias's swords were meant to be out of the ordinary in the setting. I don't see anything wrong with the attempt to distinguish the equipment from traditional high fantasy, especially as the same design sensibilities extended to the entire setting.

 

Planescape is NOT the direction this game needs to go in.

 

I hope they emphasize the PST over the BG.

Edited October 28, 2012 by centurionofprix

[Zoma]

Romances = Cliche.

 

Need more hate-mances to balance things out.

[Death Machine Miyagi]

Also, I would say a cliche is, pretty much by definition, a Bad Thing to some extent or another, or at the very least Not Good. Check a dictionary and you'll find it linked to words like 'trite', 'stereotyped', 'predictable', 'tired', 'overused'. Just as you can't describe something as being trite, predictable and overused without implying that its on some level not good, the moment you describe something as a cliche you are attaching a negative image of that thing.

 

Now, the degree to which it is a negative is a different matter altogether, and most cliches are pretty harmless. They're just examples of the creative types phoning in their work, which isn't laudable but at least allows them to (in the best case scenario) focus more attention on those aspects of their work they want to make really new and fresh and interesting.

[Osvir]

I hope they emphasize the PST over the BG.

 

I hope they emphazise the PST in the BGT of the PST without the BGT around the PST through the BGT and finally with a dip of IWD.

 

EDIT: Random jokes aside, I agree. I would not mind PST fused together with BGT though.

Edited October 28, 2012 by Osvir

[Ieo]

Aye, there's a wide range of how you do it, naturally. I love Blazing Saddles to death (shame about all the horrific animal cruelty and what-not that went into making it...), but it's probably not the tone Obsidian's angling for.

 

Thing is, I can't really request the mocking/subverting/whateverthe****ing of a particular cliché because... well, it's not clever if I know it's coming.

 

I think the examples from Planescape show the best way to do it: they don't directly mock the cliche, they just subvert it and leave the player puzzled as to why they can't find a good old magical longsword friggin' anywhere.

 

Oh, the elderly hive lady who outright mocked adventurers was a hoot. I wouldn't mind a hidden gem like that!

 

We're good on the "no chosen one" thing. And the chain bikini/boobplate thing is put to rest, probably. I mentioned in the other tropes thread that having no Tolkien races would be nice, but at least it looks like Obsidian's direction is certainly different enough. There's also cliche and heartbreaker fantasy, and I definitely don't want the latter implementation; but I think Obsidian is preventing that from happening, given the technical bits we know so far, so...

 

I'll just say I'd like Obsidian to avoid the D&D bestiary. There are just too many assumptions built into them, though creating an amalgam of two things and giving it a different name and ethology wouldn't be bad. No "purely evil orc" race and that sort of stupid nonsensical cliche.

[UncleBourbon]

Also, I would say a cliche is, pretty much by definition, a Bad Thing to some extent or another, or at the very least Not Good. Check a dictionary and you'll find it linked to words like 'trite', 'stereotyped', 'predictable', 'tired', 'overused'. Just as you can't describe something as being trite, predictable and overused without implying that its on some level not good, the moment you describe something as a cliche you are attaching a negative image of that thing.

 

Now, the degree to which it is a negative is a different matter altogether, and most cliches are pretty harmless. They're just examples of the creative types phoning in their work, which isn't laudable but at least allows them to (in the best case scenario) focus more attention on those aspects of their work they want to make really new and fresh and interesting.

 

But cliche is also synonymus with things like "platitude" and "truism". I think it depends on the cliche and presentation - after all, enough small, detailed differences can make a large-scale cliche still important.

 

One cliche I'd certainly like to see would be a slime/gelatinous cube/pudding/ooze type monster - seen in many rpgs, but still cool if they're presented right (a huge block of jelly oozing toward you down a hall, and no real way to fight it without magic.

Edited October 28, 2012 by UncleBourbon

[Monte Carlo]

No "purely evil orc" race and that sort of stupid nonsensical cliche.

 

Hmmm.

 

So having dependable villains is a cliché?

 

I worry, as per my initial post, that the swan-dive away from "cliché" risks ending up with too-cool-for-skool pretentiousness.

 

It matters not if they are barbaric savages, humanoid tribes or whatever, but a race of dependable mooks is a standard and, in many ways, helpful gaming trope. Subvert it, sure, give it a twist, liven it up. But... nonsensical?

[Gromnir]

thumbing noses at cliches w/o a meaningful purpose is stoopid. ps:t sales were stoopid given how much interplay spent on development. why no swords? 'cause chrisA were tired of swords? took YEARS and many reduced price releases for ps:t to finally break even... which is a loss as far as publisher and anybody that matters is concerned. is not as if there were no swords in game, just none usable by tno. why? people like swords-- they like elves and dwarves. the planescape setting had swords and elves and dwarves and were just as nifty and irreverent as ps:t. so what were the Purpose in subverting the common tropes people actual were wanting? chrisA's tongue-in-cheek mockery of crpg tropes were very funny. am wondering if the titter he got from avoiding tropes people Like were worth the crappy sales his game got. were a joke for himself with a Big cost in long run. were there a reason or explanation for absence o' swords or were it simple a frustrating absence for peoples who like swords?

 

keep in mind that ps:t were our favorite crpg, but chrisA were perhaps a bit immature with his practical joke on crpg fans. subvert dominant paradigm and embrace iconoclasm... but do with a purpose other than just to be different. callow teens maybe get piercings, dye hair or go goth for a year or two. "Look at me!" is kinda childish, but nobody gets hurt. the thing is game development is too expensive and chrisA is too old to be indulging such immature impulses.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Death Machine Miyagi]

I worry, as per my initial post, that the swan-dive away from "cliché" risks ending up with too-cool-for-skool pretentiousness.

 

Are you worried P:E is being developed by RPG hipsters?

 

I don't mind killing orcs so long as I can do so ironically.

[Monte Carlo]

I worry, as per my initial post, that the swan-dive away from "cliché" risks ending up with too-cool-for-skool pretentiousness.

 

Are you worried P:E is being developed by RPG hipsters?

 

 

Only occasionally.

[UncleBourbon]

I worry, as per my initial post, that the swan-dive away from "cliché" risks ending up with too-cool-for-skool pretentiousness.

 

Are you worried P:E is being developed by RPG hipsters?

 

I don't mind killing orcs so long as I can do so ironically.

 

Killing orcs ironically? What, you mean walking through a forest, juggling knives and an orc flies out and gets stabbed? Really, orcs make find meatshields, but Icewind Dale did well in taking a commonly underestimated monster and making it a serious threat. Heck, I wouldn't mind seeing a menacing sub-society of half-eves out to destroy a society that villainizes them.

[Ieo]

No "purely evil orc" race and that sort of stupid nonsensical cliche.

 

Hmmm.

 

So having dependable villains is a cliché?

 

I worry, as per my initial post, that the swan-dive away from "cliché" risks ending up with too-cool-for-skool pretentiousness.

 

It matters not if they are barbaric savages, humanoid tribes or whatever, but a race of dependable mooks is a standard and, in many ways, helpful gaming trope. Subvert it, sure, give it a twist, liven it up. But... nonsensical?

 

Nonsensical in the "orcs are evil to their bones" boring Tolkien way. PE doesn't have alignment, after all. Make them a race with different motivations and culture and maybe even a faction (go go World of Warcraft!), and that's one way to do it better. But the Dragon Age darkspawn fell into that booooooring trap, to be sure.