Some concerns about games, and thoughts about RPGs

I suppose I don't really know where to begin. I've been enamored with games since I was a kid. I think they're awesome. The music, the atmosphere, the violence (or lack thereof, in the Myst games for example), it's all so cool. That being said, at the risk of sounding like a "noob", I think designers have the bad habit of making their games too damn difficult and/or frustrating. This isn't an issue in some games, but I'm tempted to say the vast majority of games are too hard, or have parts that are too hard. If you're good enough to play them like that that's great, but often I can't really imagine how a designer intended for the game to be played. Having to quit a game because it's too hard is a total disappointment.

On a related note, I sent this message to someone who does let's plays of a lot of different computer games, and many RPGs. Since he hasn't responded yet, and I don't think he will, I'll post it here, and you can all respond to it.

"I admire your ability to play through games from the beginning to end. To me, it's kind of like being able to read a book from beginning to end. I usually end up losing interest at some point, and stop playing. I did that about 1/4 of the way through Arcanum. I wish I stuck it through to the end. I find Divine Divinity to be quite(!) difficult, and don't know if I really want to continue it. I have attention deficit disorder, so I've always had problems starting projects and seeing them through to their conclusion. I've beaten a fair number of games, though nowhere near as many as you have.

I've admired games like Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Neverwinter Nights, Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment, and the Temple of Elemental Evil from afar, but I really should play them. They seem like classics that are really worth playing. As with all games, though, I fear that I will be stuck reading walkthroughs or getting frustrated with bosses, or getting stuck at puzzles, as games often provide challenges which I find very difficult or impossible to traverse. How do you deal with these problems? Besides the games I've mentioned, are there any others you might recommend? I think game developers make their games too difficult, and there really should be a difficulty setting when there isn't one. I personally have no idea how anyone can play Skyrim on anything but the lowest difficulty. The enemies just quickly kill you.

Most of the games I've beaten are first person shooters, but I've always been interested in the epic, rewarding journeys of RPGs. Maybe you can provide me some guidance on which games to try? GOG provides a good selection."

Concerning Skyrim, the lowest difficulty is pretty easy, but the next difficulty up, apprentice, many of the monsters do too much damage, and I'll end up running out of potions midway through the dungeon. Having the quit and backtrack all the way out of a dungeon midway through kind of sucks. I don't really understand how people play it on the higher difficulties.

Divine Divinity is freaking hard. I don't see how someone could think otherwise after facing the powerful monsters in the game's first dungeon. If you try to fight them they kill you quite quickly. On one of the levels of the dungeon, I just had to run away from the monsters and get to the next level of the dungeon, I'm not talking about the very end of the dungeon where you run away from the mob of monsters that attacks you.

Despite all this, I wouldn't consider myself a novice gamer. I suppose I'm a novice at RPGs and strategy games, though I've gotten pretty far in Lunar: A Silver Star Story, and Final Fantasy VII. I managed to beat the Protoss campaign in StarCraft: Brood War. StarCraft can get pretty difficult. To give you an idea of my playing ability, here are some games I've beaten:

I've beaten Doom 3 and Resurrection of Evil on Veteran, The Doom 3 lost mission on marine, Ultimate Doom and Doom 2 on Ultra-Violence, TNT on either ultra violence or hurt me plenty, Half-Life on normal, Opposing Force on normal, blue shift on normal, HL2 on hard, Quake first 3 episodes on hard, last episode on normal, Quake 2 normal, a quake 2 expansion on normal, Quake 3 on normal, Max Payne on normal. If memory serves, I beat the first campaign in the original Empire Earth on normal. The original Myth on the lowest difficulty (there's a hard game). I beat Castlevania Symphony of the Night. I've beaten Goldeneye on agent. There's a game that hasn't aged well. Speaking of N64, is it just me or are the Turok games fucking impossible? I also beat Devil May Cry and Silent Hill 2 on normal.

Skyrim isn't actually an RPG, and further more it is the most dumbed down of the series it's in.

As games have gotten easier overall, hard difficulty modes usually just scale up enemy health/damage, rather than actually putting effort into rebalancing enemy placements or mission design. It's stupid.

Also, GoldenEye's still a great game. If you play it on a difficulty where there's actually challenge involved, rather than auto-aim doing everything for you, that is.

I think I've beaten a total of eight games. Not including my second play through of Max Payne and Max Payne 2 on the hard setting.

I've started well over sixty different games or more. I haven't even beaten some of my favorite games, including Doom or Jedi Knight.

I'm surprised Dark Souls didn't get mentioned; it's one of my favorite RPGs.

Dragonsbrethren said:

GoldenEye's still a great game. If you play it on a difficulty where there's actually challenge involved, rather than auto-aim doing everything for you, that is.

It's great that the game has a custom difficulty which you can adjust yourself.

Clonehunter said:

I think I've beaten a total of eight games. Not including my second play through of Max Payne and Max Payne 2 on the hard setting.

I've started well over sixty different games or more. I haven't even beaten some of my favorite games, including Doom or Jedi Knight.

How can one NOT beat Doom by now? Get on that! Its only a bunch of nine-level maps :p

Skyrim irks me - it's an action RPG with NO ACTION. Battles are SEVERELY unbalanced. It's almost fun going toe-to-toe with enemies, but they tend to whip out a "finishing move" that can randomly end you with 1/4 health left (sometimes more if you're lightly armored). There's no way to prepare for that so you're forced to top off your health after every battering. Even if you're healing with one hand (which is effective for the 5 seconds that your MP lasts AND puts you at a loss for weapons or a shield) this means pausing the action EVERY THREE FUCKING SECONDS.

Leveling up resolves this, but not in a remotely fun or engaging way. By level 50 your character is either a tank or a glass cannon, meaning you kill people instantly or they kill you instantly. Usually both are equally likely unless you've got the best armor.

I don't know if the PC version has this, but the console version would've benefitted from shortcut keys THAT DON'T INTERRUPT THE ACTION. The Favorites menu is bullshit. It's just another menu. Like, let me assign a button on the D-pad to potions. While I'm at it, I'll assign another button to poisons so it's not a god damned ordeal to debilitate enemies with my arrows. Oh yeah, and I'm going to capturing a few THOUSAND souls so there's another process that could be made less convoluted.

The term RPG is flawed. You play a role in every game. TF2 you play a class or a role. Skyrim, Fallout 3 and Elder Scrolls games are FPS with magic yet Bioshock isn't considered a RPG.

MMOs are considered World of Warcraft and Star Trek online, yet TF2 and DOTA2 are not considered MMOs but its a massively multiplayer online.

To me RPGs are Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. Adventure RPGs are Secret of Mana... yet Zelda is an adventure game. Uncharted is an Action adventure game. Many consider Dark Souls a RPG, when in my opinion its a Dark Fantasy 3rd person action if not beat em up game. I laughed when the Longest Journey was considered a RPG when its really just a point and click adventure.

Too many things are RPG. Such as Mass Effect. Heck COD even has RPG elements. Leveling your character, stats and so on. RPG = almost everything.

geo said:

The term RPG is flawed... RPG = almost everything.

the term is flawed in that it originated outside of video gaming, unlike "FPS" or "RTS"... early computer RPGs were derivative of contemporary tabletop role-playing games, which were in turn derivative of tabletop war games but were on a smaller scale: so the difference was "the unit on square C17 has the best odds on a diceroll of defeating the enemy's unit on square C18" versus "dave's rogue character has the best odds on a diceroll of disarming the spike trap", hence dave is "playing a (specialized) role (within the party)". which in video games translated to one player in control of a party of specialized characters with an rng determining outcomes based on skills, attributes, etc.

"RPG" in video game terms can be basically translated to "stat blocks and dice rolls enabling a strong separation between player and character skill". this has become really muddied especially in recent years since the two biggest western developers of AAA "RPGs", bethesda and bioware, have put the biggest emphasis on other elements (sandbox exploration and storyline/character interaction respectively) at the expense of strong system design.

Liam said:

the term is flawed in that it originated outside of video gaming, unlike "FPS" or "RTS"... early computer RPGs were derivative of contemporary tabletop role-playing games, which were in turn derivative of tabletop war games but were on a smaller scale: so the difference was "the unit on square C17 has the best odds on a diceroll of defeating the enemy's unit on square C18" versus "dave's rogue character has the best odds on a diceroll of disarming the spike trap", hence dave is "playing a (specialized) role (within the party)". which in video games translated to one player in control of a party of specialized characters with an rng determining outcomes based on skills, attributes, etc.

"RPG" in video game terms can be basically translated to "stat blocks and dice rolls enabling a strong separation between player and character skill". this has become really muddied especially in recent years since the two biggest western developers of AAA "RPGs", bethesda and bioware, have put the biggest emphasis on other elements (sandbox exploration and storyline/character interaction respectively) at the expense of strong system design.

Regardless of the origins of the term RPG it really isn't that flawed. In tabletop role playing the term "role playing" doesn't refer to throwing dice and determining the success of your disarm trap skill, but to pretending to be your character. Acting, if you will. A lot of older CRPGs embraced that notion, but sometime after Diablo and Diablo 2 the term RPG has been applied to games that have character systems but no actual role playing in them. JRPGs are an entirely different beast altogether, since they very rarely provide the player with any freedom at all, and the freedom to act as your chosen character is a key component in any role playing. Planescape: Torment, Fallout 1, 2 and NV, even Deus Ex to an extent are some examples of PC games that actually allow you to play your role as the protagonist. In some of them you can create the character you want to be, in others you can influence the given hero to act and influence the world as you see fit.

The difference between non-role playing games and role playing games isn't that difficult to see either. Jason in Far Cry 3 doesn't have any other freedom of choice except picking the gun he wants to use. JC in Deus Ex can choose how he approaches each mission, and his choice affects how other characters in the game world respond to you - not just in terms of dialogue, but also in ways that actually affect the gameplay meaningfully. Dissecting why Bethesda games aren't role playing is something that we could write books about. But the bottom line is, even if you are given an arbitrary label of being person X by the developers doesn't mean that you are him, unless the game mechanics allow you to control him in meaningful ways. Most of the time the characters are simply scripted actors that could have been removed from the game entirely without affecting gameplay at all. Hence not being a role playing game.

Bucket said:

Skyrim irks me - it's an action RPG with NO ACTION.

More like an Action Adventure without RPG imho.

Jodwin said:

Regardless of the origins of the term RPG it really isn't that flawed. In tabletop role playing the term "role playing" doesn't refer to throwing dice and determining the success of your disarm trap skill, but to pretending to be your character. Acting, if you will. A lot of older CRPGs embraced that notion, but sometime after Diablo and Diablo 2 the term RPG has been applied to games that have character systems but no actual role playing in them. JRPGs are an entirely different beast altogether, since they very rarely provide the player with any freedom at all, and the freedom to act as your chosen character is a key component in any role playing. Planescape: Torment, Fallout 1, 2 and NV, even Deus Ex to an extent are some examples of PC games that actually allow you to play your role as the protagonist. In some of them you can create the character you want to be, in others you can influence the given hero to act and influence the world as you see fit.

The difference between non-role playing games and role playing games isn't that difficult to see either. Jason in Far Cry 3 doesn't have any other freedom of choice except picking the gun he wants to use. JC in Deus Ex can choose how he approaches each mission, and his choice affects how other characters in the game world respond to you - not just in terms of dialogue, but also in ways that actually affect the gameplay meaningfully. Dissecting why Bethesda games aren't role playing is something that we could write books about. But the bottom line is, even if you are given an arbitrary label of being person X by the developers doesn't mean that you are him, unless the game mechanics allow you to control him in meaningful ways. Most of the time the characters are simply scripted actors that could have been removed from the game entirely without affecting gameplay at all. Hence not being a role playing game.

Shouldn't it then be called 'DTG Dice Throwing Game?'

On the subject of RPGs and how we label them so:

Reaper978 said:

Concerning Skyrim, the lowest difficulty is pretty easy, but the next difficulty up, apprentice, many of the monsters do too much damage, and I'll end up running out of potions midway through the dungeon. Having the quit and backtrack all the way out of a dungeon midway through kind of sucks. I don't really understand how people play it on the higher difficulties.

Skyrim on TRULY easy mode: level enchanting, smithing, destruction, sneak, and archery.

*First and foremost, sneak basically EVERYWHERE to get that levelled up quickly and put points in it until you get your bow sneak attack damage.
*Focus on destruction and get the abilities that power up your 3 elements.
*Take every soul gem you see and get enchanting levelled to 100 ASAP so you can enchant gear to make destruction casting cost zero mana, then you can toss around lightning bolts, ice storms, and fireballs willy nilly.
*Make a gazillion iron daggers to level up smithing and then make some Dragon armor of either type (light armor will make sneaking a little better), a dragon bow, and whatever melee weapon you choose to focus on (daggers can get 13x sneak damage if you are leveling your sneak!)--then refine everything.
*Put points in archery to boost its base damage.

By the endgame you'll be focusing on archery more than anything, and you'll be putting dragons down to critical health in one arrow and finishing them off with an ice storm or two.

Game is super easy even on Master with this shit. My pockets are usually filled to the brim with potions that I never use.

I used to love that show. Now its just kinda talking for the sake of talking.

Jodwin said:

Regardless of the origins of the term RPG it really isn't that flawed. In tabletop role playing the term "role playing" doesn't refer to throwing dice and determining the success of your disarm trap skill, but to pretending to be your character. Acting, if you will. A lot of older CRPGs embraced that notion, but sometime after Diablo and Diablo 2 the term RPG has been applied to games that have character systems but no actual role playing in them. JRPGs are an entirely different beast altogether, since they very rarely provide the player with any freedom at all, and the freedom to act as your chosen character is a key component in any role playing. Planescape: Torment, Fallout 1, 2 and NV, even Deus Ex to an extent are some examples of PC games that actually allow you to play your role as the protagonist. In some of them you can create the character you want to be, in others you can influence the given hero to act and influence the world as you see fit.

Skyrim is really annoying with that. It looks like an RPG and it could be one -- there's a lot of mechanics put into it that are designed to help the world react to your choices, what with the faction system and radiant events and stuff -- but it most definitely isn't one. The Dovahkiin is not a character but a puppet. The game is designed to encourage you not to play a role, though a mixture of hand-holding ("hey, you really should do that quest and we'll nag you in your journal and clutter your inventory with quest items you can't remove or sell until you do the quest") and rail-roading ("now that you have done step A, here is the step B you should do, even if it seems absurd to you, there's no other way out"). You jump from honorable warrior to ambitious wizard to noble knight to depraved cannibal constantly, and nobody cares.

What a waste.

Jodwin said:

Regardless of the origins of the term RPG it really isn't that flawed. In tabletop role playing the term "role playing" doesn't refer to throwing dice and determining the success of your disarm trap skill...

in computer role playing games that is exactly what the term "role playing" means, and crpgs were and still are a very different experience from tabletop rpgs, which was my point. computers, especially those around at the genesis of crpg development, can't replicate the spontaneity and emergent gameplay allowed by a human gm nor enable player's imaginations in the same way. but they can enforce the underlying rule sets, roll the dice and crunch the numbers a hell of a lot faster. the common thread between all older rpgs is separation of player and character skill, not blurring the line between them (fallout and planescape are not really older rpgs but they agree with this anyway).

in diablo and diablo 2, the character systems are the roleplaying; just as in the gold box D&D games or wizardry or dragon quest. fallout and DX's multiple pathing and choice and consequence were governed and enabled largely by their character systems. bethesda games certainly qualify as well although as i noted the rpg systems have been getting weaker as design focus has shifted elsewhere; i haven't played skyrim but could present oblivion, which has a character system so pants-on-head retarded it's actually better in a metagaming sense not to engage with it.

on the other hand, half-life truly immerses me in my "role" as gordon freeman through it's presentation and storytelling technique, visual novels allow me agency and the ability to alter the course of the story, far cry 2 allows me freedom of approach and the chance to meaningfully affect the flow of gameplay based on my choices. noone would consider these games to be RPGs even though i can arguably roleplay in all of them. which is exactly the trouble with the intuitive definition of an RPG based on the term "roleplaying"; it's extremely subjective, excludes a majority of the genre (most stuff before fallout and literally almost everything before U7) while including, as geo said, almost everything else.