I wish *console* RPGs would die! I am convinced that they are created by a random number generator and no longer have any human input in their design.

ROFL! That statement is so true.

Hey, SquirelZero: you keep on saying that Seriously, is there anything you cna let loose on that? 'Cos I have to say I'm intruiged

As for the two paragraphs thing...I really meant to say 'a couple' Not enough to rate a decent article, IMO, especially not considering the message. Dead on on the amount of comments though

As for innovation: strangely enough, after everyone sayiong that that would be the modders prerogative, it IS consoles where the innovation is. Look at the real innovative mods on the pc: Airbuccaneers and Natural Selection. The rest is WWII mods, changing-an-FPS-to-a-racer-mods and the like...no real innovation. Then have a look at the consoles: Ninja Gaiden, God of War (although kinda doubtfull, that one), Katamari Damaci(!), Kingdom Hearts, some of the later Mario's, Paparapa the Rapper, that simulated mobriot game... .
Especially lately, it does seem that the mayority of the innovation is going on in the console world. Maybe that lone modder who can't convince anyone else of his vision is plugging away at his mod, doing all the coding, art and sound all by himself and will stun the world in the next couple of months...but name me a mod for HL2, UT2kx or Doom3 which has been groundbreakingly innovative?
I would really like to know, as I'm one of the camp who thought the mod community would be the ones to provide the innovation...but really, the only /new/ game genres in the past years have been GTA3 and Katamari Damaci...

This comment was edited on Jun 21, 21:20.

I wish *console* RPGs would die! I am convinced that they are created by a random number generator and no longer have any human input in their design.

the only innovation left in gaming is found SOLELY on consoles.

doh that's the oxymoron of the week.
Consoles embody the -antithesis- of Innovation.

Quality RPGs are scarce because they don't conform to the modern mass market media model of mediocrity mandated by marketing. ( 8 M's! i win! ) Games today, particularly on consoles, are mostly about purdy grafix and blowin stuff up reel guud. yee haw.

BTW: the linked to story was just two paragraphs! And that could have just been reduced to a single sentence! Not FP worthy, if you ask me.

How do you figure 2 paragraphs? There were 2 pages, each with a few paragraphs. And as far as FP worthy is concerned, that article got a lot more comments on here than 90% of the other content on the FP.

I think the RPG genre is just really hard to categorize. Where one title emphasizes one game play attribute, another title will go to the other end of the spectrum - which makes fans of each game think that fans of the other are nuts for liking the other game.

That is a good point about the number of good games in any genre though. Kinda depends on the person though. I know some people who just eat up FPS games just because they are FPSs. I'm sure the same thing goes for some RPG fans though.

The CRPG isn't dead. It's just starting to have its lines blurred by meshing with other genres. I'm a huge oldschool CRPG fan (Fallout, Gold Box, etc) and i can tell you that i'm involved in a genre-bending CRPG project that is definately contributing to keeping the genre alive and well.

Lol!

Well, JRPG's never had good stories; they where always way out there, convoluted, cliched and spaced out. Sure, there where a couple whioch actually did make sense and have good, involving storylines...but mostly they really screwed up. Look at FFVII: started out cool, with this whole resistance thing...if they kept that up, the story would have been classic...instead (together with the REALLY tired play/combat mechanics) it devolved into some wierd crap (although Sephiroph was admitedly quite cool).

As for quality RPG's: yeah, there's been kinda a dearth of them: but remember the golden ages had all the SSI stuff, and games like Planescape: Torment, BG etc to live up to. We're talking genre defining games. And the last genre defining RPG to come out was Morrowind (which you had to get into...it's just a shame that it took litterally a couple of hours gameplay to get into it).
Note I don't include KotoR; it did nothing a Final Fantasy hadn't done already...the pausing realtime gameplay meant that actual combat wasn't much different from any JRPG. Did have a decent story, though.

But anyway: the RPG is far from dead...but it's nowhere near as filled with cool titles as it was. But we do have the list that Creston mentioned coming up...as well as Oblivion

BTW: the linked to story was just two paragraphs! And that could have just been reduced to a single sentence! Not FP worthy, if you ask me.

-edit-
I just had to add this: how many truly great games come out anyway, for any genre? Not that much...two, three a year per genre? Maybe 5 truly great games across genres each year? That kind of has bearing here, too.

This comment was edited on Jun 21, 14:15.

WTF? Is Creston advocating playing console games

?

Have I ever NOT done that? I'm probably one of three people on here who says that the only innovation left in gaming is found SOLELY on consoles. I also currently own an Xbox and PS2, I will own an Xbox360 and PS3, I have owned, in the past, a Sega Genesis, Super Famicom, Playstation and Nintendo64.

So me and consoles is not like news or anything

Also, I did kinda just skim the article, so I missed the point about the QUALITY of roleplaying games, but that's a point that sucks even worse. The last four roleplaying games I've played have been good or GREAT. Not a stinker in them. Anyone who bitches about lack of quality in RPGs has obviously not played Jade Empire.

"I never realized that two was such a big number. Obsidian and Bioware produce great games but they take years to develop. The end result is that we get 1 CRPG a year, if we're lucky."

How is this a decline from what we used to have, though? We used to have Bioware and Black Isle, who did one game every other two years.
I fail to see how it's in decline. But I guess it makes for a more edgy article rather than saying "CRPGS going strong as ever."

Creston

The DECLINE of the RPG?

You bet. You're correct that the MMORPG market is booming, but MMORPGs and CRPGs are really two entirely different genres. Yeah, they may have a few common features but for the most part are completely different.

We've got two developers doing nothing BUT RPGs

I never realized that two was such a big number. Obsidian and Bioware produce great games but they take years to develop. The end result is that we get 1 CRPG a year, if we're lucky. Given that a new AAA shooter comes out at least once a month, I'd be willing to say that CRPGs are in decline.

there's tons of RPGs out and coming out for consoles

WTF? Is Creston advocating playing console games? Again, the JRPG, like the MMORPG, and the CRPG are two entirely different genres.

I just took a look at the article, probably would've been smarter to do that before typing a response, and it appears he's talking about a decline in JRPGs. I don't play JRPGs anymore so I can't say whether or not they are in decline. CRPGs I do play and while they arn't dead like Space Combat Games, they are heading that direction.

Better graphics are mostly killing RPGs I think. They spend so much time and money on the engine that they don't have the resources left for the story and characters. And those fancy engines that none of the old RPG devs are used to end up causing all kinds of bugs, that and not having enough time (world famous excuse).

I liked it better when they kept using the same engine and making new stories and characters to play with, even though the graphics weren't the latest (by far) you knew the game was going to be great anyway, and playable for a long time. Now it's more focused on graphics and the games are shorter and lose a lot of depth.

I'm enough of a realist to know publishers dont want to make things that will do "ok", cause I would still play games made on the infinity engine and I'm sure some others would, but most people won't pick up a box that doesn't 'wow' them. Or have some kind of hunting or suggested nudity.

I have a hard time looking forward to these new RPGs because almost all recently have been disappointing and they all say they didnt have enough time, and I won't be surprised if it doesnt happen with all these new titles as well.

I think the point isn't decline in the number of titles produced, but the QUALITY of the titles produced. Its like anything else. People argue all the time that the movie industry is in a state of decline, yet there are more movies being produced now then there were 30 years ago. Did you even read the article?

It's not the quantity of them, it's the quality of them at issue. I believe that is the real bent of the article.

The DECLINE of the RPG? What the FUCK are these guys smoking? We've got two developers doing nothing BUT RPGs, there's more MMORPGs out there than children, there's tons of RPGs out and coming out for consoles, we've got Dragon Age, the Witcher, NWN2, KotOR3 coming out, and they say the RPG is in decline.

Hey, I guess the WORLD'S POPULATION IS IN DECLINE TOO.

Blue, doesn't news actually have to be TRUE to get posted?

Creston