The worst space game ever?

[Mánagarmr]

Wait...Mass Effect is considered an RPG? I've always seen it as a story-driven cover shooter.

[Shrugging Khan]

It's...pretty?

No it isn't. It has many polygons and pixels and visual effects and colours and whatnot, but it is not pretty. Technologically up-to-date maybe, but the design sucks hard - everything is taken from Cliché. Boxy robot race ships, swarming insectoids, a bird race that makes its ships look like birds...and the humans just get everything from W40k. No accomplishments there.

[Histidine]

Infinite Space definitely was a great game, for all its limitations (DS small screen cramps the UI; some balance issues; a couple of Guide Dang It death points; left-field ending; some generally unclear stuff). If there was a PC remake I would be a happy man.

[Misery]

Wait...Mass Effect is considered an RPG? I've always seen it as a story-driven cover shooter.

Yep.   It's considered an RPG.

To me, that says that the RPG genre has kinda fallen.  Down 13 flights of stairs.  Into some mud at the bottom.  Which has bees swarming over it.

Cant exactly say I'm a fan of that game.

[chemical_art]

While I consider writing to be nice, I place gameplay as my first concern, even among RPG's.

[Mánagarmr]

Wait...Mass Effect is considered an RPG? I've always seen it as a story-driven cover shooter.

Yep.   It's considered an RPG.

To me, that says that the RPG genre has kinda fallen.  Down 13 flights of stairs.  Into some mud at the bottom.  Which has bees swarming over it.

Cant exactly say I'm a fan of that game.

ME 1 was pretty good. A bit hamfisted writing and awkward gameplay. ME2 was pretty much a masterpiece in my mind, but hardly an RPG. But as a story-driven covershooter? Yea! ME 3 was nice. Repetitive gameplay but better writing. SHITTY end

[eRe4s3r]

I think if anything it just shows that I place a slightly different value on story/immersion than gameplay. The gameplay was really bad in ME 1  through 3.. but story, character development and immersion were top notch. If you look at 1 through 3 as a whole.

Ending was meh, but at least it was one. Lots of RPG's don't have proper endings.

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Wait...Mass Effect is considered an RPG? I've always seen it as a story-driven cover shooter.

Yep.   It's considered an RPG.

To me, that says that the RPG genre has kinda fallen.  Down 13 flights of stairs.  Into some mud at the bottom.  Which has bees swarming over it.

Cant exactly say I'm a fan of that game.

Hard to disagree with you on these comments. I recently played The Witcher 2 RPG that's supposed to be a pinnacle of the genre. Yeah....that's not a good sign if that's true.

I'm still writing my thoughts on the review but it's about 50/50 on positive/negative.

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Wait...Mass Effect is considered an RPG? I've always seen it as a story-driven cover shooter.

Hmm...technically it's an RPG but I'd say it's one of the lightest RPGs I've seen from AAA devs.

[Zebeast46]

Heard from so many people that skyrim was amazing, got it and was so badly disappointed I forgot about it after 8 hours. As a veteran of Mount and blade warband (over 350 hours) I was combletely disappointed in the gameplay (i mean, when you hit a half naked guy with a giant hammer you expect him to stumble a bit). The writing was great, but after a bunch of quests I realised that nothing I did changed the world in any shape or form (that's a lie, it only changes slightly from your actions on major quests and not at all on minor quests).

I know alot of people here like rpg's and Skyrim, but after getting bored of it I decided not to play another rpg because apparently the pinnacle of the genre is boring to me.

[eRe4s3r]

There is generally a large rift between RPG's that give you tons of freedom (Skyrim, Fallout 3/NV) and RPG's that give a guided path with some branches (Witcher, Mass Effect, Dragon Age)

But if you didn't like either of those games then RPG's are generally not for you There are games that are in-between both, guided path with some freedoms, Torment, BG/IWD/NWN* (at least some campaigns) so maybe one could call that the "balanced" approach, but at the end of days I've seen people call Divinity Original Sin a good RPG, and then I have to REALLY cringe. (imo has some of the worst writing since... NWN main campaign)

To me, an RPG's defining points are writing, character *growth*, general dialog, character writing (Ie, backstory, personality) and choices, party interactions and related consequences of all these elements. And going by that all the games mentioned are RPG's, but only few of them are actually any good. And saying that Mass Effect for example, just reiterates established Sci-FI tropes is unfair, no game before or after ever did that with such polish. And the sign of a AAA game is not innovation, but polishing an idea so much that it becomes a big budget game.

And you shouldn't forget that you can be judging Mass Effect now years after it concluded, when Mass Effect 1 came out, that was an absolutely fresh experience.


Last point, there are always some people that do not seem to be able to immerse themselves completely into a story and world, for those both Skyrim and Mass Effect must be the worst games ever


Ps.: Infinite Space runs nicely on desmume with mouse and keyboard, hah. Played it a bit but seems very very repetitive. Not a huge fan of this combat system

[Coppermantis]

Yeah, a lot of modern RPGs have been de-emphasizing stuff like character stats and things like that, which is disappointing, but I still enjoy a lot of them. The Witcher series, Dragon Age, and Mass Effect are all very fun and are still decent RPGs in my opinion because they do give you a chance to roleplay a character, which, as far as I'm concerned, should be the only standard for what an RPG is. Some people insist that you need to have a ton of party/character stats like in traditional tabletop RPGs, but I don't think that's the case. ME2 and 3 had pretty bare-bones stats systems, but are still RPGs in my mind despite some claims.


That said, I am disappointed in how a lot of stats are being streamlined. Take Dragon Age: Inquisition. I greatly enjoyed that game, but playing it after Origins I was disappointed in the removal of herbalism, trapping, and especially speechcraft skills. Those aren't necessary to make a good RPG, but I enjoy having them to give more depth to building my character. I like having a Speechcraft skill because I enjoy being able to solve problems without violence, like is frequently possible in Fallout and DA:O, for instance.

[Misery]

To me, an RPG's defining points are writing, character *growth*, general dialog, character writing (Ie, backstory, personality) and choices, party interactions and related consequences of all these elements.

This, I think, is a perfect example of why I loathe the RPG genre so much.

I dont play games to watch the game.  I dont play games to read the game either.  I play games... TO PLAY THE DAMN GAMES.  I expect good gameplay to take the forefront over.... absolutely every other conceivable concept that may be a part of the game, with not even one tiny exception EVER.  The moment when something starts to overtake that is, to me, the moment when things start to go horribly wrong.

As such, RPGs bore me absolutely to death.  And they're almost always EASY, too.  Though I admit that my idea of difficulty may be a little... warped.  But still.

I've never once seen a compelling arguement as to why I should ever choose playing an RPG (which, more often than not, tend to have bad storylines/writing/everything to begin with) over reading a book (where the entire point of their existence IS stories and such) when I feel like enjoying a good story.

The "role playing" aspect in particular I dont get.  I see something like Mass Effect being played, and.... that's not role-playing to me.  It gives a canned selection of dialog options at each juncture..... almost none of which I would ever actually say, in most cases, but the game forces the choice of one anyway.  Even if my ACTUAL choice would be "Stop talking already, I get the point.  Let's just get to this big thing we gotta do and get it done now, yeah?", or in some cases, simply kicking someone and then wandering off.    Even as not fond of story stuffs in games as I am, I'd take the pre-written stuff without choices over that any day.

Ugh.  I'll never understand those, or things like, well, any AAA game or things like that these days.  Just.... bah. 

[Coppermantis]

If that's how you like games, that's fine. In a lot of cases, I'm quite the opposite--it takes a good story to really get me engaged with the game. Stuff like, say, One Finger Death Punch are quite fun, but I usually don't come back very often after I've had my fun, though I still will pick one up from time to time if I just need a quick dose of fun. I like an engaging story just as much as I like engaging gameplay.

Of course, games meet with varying degrees of success when it comes to telling a good story. Yeah, if you want a story, there's always books as you say, but I don't think that precludes a game having a good storyline. A lot of games don't, but I don't think it's true that no games tell as good of stories as novels do. Matter of opinion there.

Plus, for me, experiencing a story through a game is different from a book. There's music, which, if used properly, can augment any given scene, visuals and such, and a different sort of pacing than you'd find in a movie or a book. Your choices having an effect on the story (where it actually happens, not like Skyrim where what you do is basically irrelevant) can make events more powerful too since you have a stake in what happens.

If you don't think any games have successfully accomplished this, then fine. I just disagree. I've read a lot of books and written a novel myself, and I certainly understand what you mean when you say that books are better at telling a deep story because the author generally gets more creative freedom, but playing a story-based game does provide a different experience and I don't think it's any less enjoyable. Just because someone else has told a better story somewhere else doesn't mean that another story isn't worth reading.

[Captain Jack]

It's funny you say that Misery, considering just how many times Mass Effect lets you tell the plot to sod off and let you get back to playing.

I'd actually recommend you Star Control 2. It's a tragic dead branch for how RPGs could have developed, but it seems like it'd be more your thing. This is a serious suggestion by the by since it seems you're more irritated with AAA "standards" (note sarcasm) than RPGs.

saying that Mass Effect for example, just reiterates established Sci-FI tropes is unfair, no game before or after ever did that with such polish.

Wat. No. This isn't true at all. Star Control 2 came out in 199-freaking-2 and does science fiction miles better. Mass Effect's science fiction was clumsily wrapped around Bioware's "go to four places and then a fifth for the final boss" plot. Now production values? You're absolutely right, and I say that as someone who likes Mass Effect.

And the sign of a AAA game is not innovation, but polishing an idea so much that it becomes a big budget game.

And you shouldn't forget that you can be judging Mass Effect now years after it concluded, when Mass Effect 1 came out, that was an absolutely fresh experience.

Sorry if it seems like I'm beating on you, but the sign of a AAA game is marketing dollars. Spore and Sim City 5 were AAA games. Were they polished? On no one's planet. And it's absolutely fair to judge Mass Effect now, people still play it now. Good game design is timeless,  which is why people fall in love with games made before they were born.

(Also if you think the IS is repetitive now just wait until you get fighters. Ridiculously overpowered. Still, even if it never quite gets past rock-paper-scissors+chicken, I actually found later combat exciting.)

Heard from so many people that skyrim was amazing, got it and was so badly disappointed I forgot about it after 8 hours. As a veteran of Mount and blade warband (over 350 hours) I was combletely disappointed in the gameplay (i mean, when you hit a half naked guy with a giant hammer you expect him to stumble a bit). The writing was great, but after a bunch of quests I realised that nothing I did changed the world in any shape or form (that's a lie, it only changes slightly from your actions on major quests and not at all on minor quests).

I know alot of people here like rpg's and Skyrim, but after getting bored of it I decided not to play another rpg because apparently the pinnacle of the genre is boring to me.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say the people who told you that don't play many RPGs. Skyrim's the pinnacle of cool locales to superficially interact with, but not RPGs. And were you joking about liking Skyrim's writing? I can't tell, but in my opinion it was a big step away from good writing. Pretty bombastic though.

If what you specifically want is tactile feedback I suggest Dwarf Fortress. Even shooters don't model realistic impacts until death-ragdolling.

Fake edit: Coppermantis, you've said exactly what I feel about videogames, better than I could. I wouldn't say that Misery doesn't like stories in videogames so much as for him, the story is his relationship with the game's systems. Anything that hinders that relationship, like a critical path, ruins the story.

I won't ever agree with that way of looking at it since I have far too much affection for my clumsily written game stories, but just imagine if every game's story felt like Heavy Rain. Blech.