You may have noticed that I deleted my Mass Effect 2 review. Well, probably not, but you should know that I did. Why did I do it, you ask? Well it's mostly due to me hating that game and everything it stands for in the RPG hobby. I've also grown to hate Dragon Age as well, but we'll get to that. The point is that I have raised my own personal "bar of quality" as far as RPGs are concerned, back to where it once was rather than where the guys who ridiculed me told me it was suppose to be at.

Where to begin? Hmmm...

Around the beginning of august I became supremely bored with gaming. So much so that I lost all desire to even play games, much less engage in some good late night CRPG'ing. After going shopping and hearing two idiots talk about how awesome their xbox 360 version of Dragon Age was, I decided to take a quick fourth trip through my PC version of the game and see if it really was as amazing as they (And unfortunately, myself) though it was.

It wasn't.

The magic wasn't there and at the end of the trip I felt like I forced myself through it. The game was incredibly easy even on the hardest level and was such a hands-off affair that you don't even need to issue commands half the time...you just sit back and let the script control everyone's combat actions. It's a travesty to call combat like that part of an "RPG".

So I sat there watching the credits roll by and thought to myself "Do I have a game similar to this that actually forces me to use strategy?"

It didn't take long to find an answer, thanks to a friend here on gamespot who PM'ed me about the Realms of Arkania games and asked if they were worth the money they were selling them for on GOG's website. After explaining how incredibly complex and ball-bustingly hard they were, I finally came up with the answer to my earlier question:

Drakensang.

I had only beaten Drakensang once, and part of the reason I gave it a low 8.0 here on Gamespot and never went through it a 2nd time was due to me finding the game to be incredibly hard in some areas. So hard that I broke a keyboard over the last area. Usually I play a game a second time and learn all of tis tricks and properly min/max my character so as to no longer be challenged by it. Normally the second trip is my "power gamer trip" and the first clumsy trip I make through an RPG is meant to be half-arsed and sloppy. Unfortunately, I never gave Drakensang the chance to educate me with a 2nd trip and I moved on.

Not now, however.

So I booted Drakensang back up, rolled up a battlemage and went at it. 50 hours later I not only emerged victorious for the second time, but learned so many tricks about character creation and manipulating skills that I didn't die a single time after the game's halfway point. Many of the boss battles I had deemed impossible and only winnable through trickery and exploitation were now easy as pie to me and could be done without much effort. I was now ready to go through a 3rd time on the hardest difficulty!!!

...then a funny thing happened. One of my very best internet friends, who I had known for ten years but hadn't seen in 3, suddenly reappeared online. He raved about how amazing "Mount & Blade" was and demanded I play it. He posted videos of it, cancelled his MMO accounts to play it and could not stop talking about it.

So I abandoned my planned third trip through Drakensang and bought Mount & Blade Warband.

I really don't regret it either.

Wow. If you want to know how much I liked it, go and read the review I just posted of it. I wanted to give it a 10 but didn't want to repeat what happened with Mass Effect 2 back in February. Simply phenomenal game that has to be played to be believed.

So, what am I getting at here? what kind of sense am I trying to make with all this silly gibberish?

I realized that my standards have lowered over the past year. Partly due to the teasing and torment I endured by so-called genre "experts" on "other sites" in the past, I felt that I needed to appreciate simpler RPGs like Mass Effect and dragon Age in order to be called an RPGer. I thought that faulting them for being easy wasn't fair and that I needed to "Grow with the hobby" and learn to "accept what it has become".

No way. Not now, not ever.

So here I am playing Drakensang on the hardest difficulty, Mount & Blade on Steam and a German language demo of Drakensang 2 and I'm LOVING it.

Really, it all boils down to this: What kind of RPG is a game that has you set up scripts for your party members and lets easily you beat the game on the hardest level without even touching a single hotbar key? What kind of RPG does all the combat-based "heavy lifting" for you and lets you sit with your hands down your pants while combat occurs without your direction? That's not an RPG, that's a movie.

What I love about Drakensang is that here is a game that has ZERO script control and has party members who DO JACK DIDDLY SQUAT until you order them to. Oh they'll do normal attacks against an enemy...usually...but that's about it. You have to constantly monitor their skill use and manually guide them at all times, much like how the original Baldur's Gate was, only with Drakensang there is no script system to fall back on. Combat is 100% controlled by YOU.

Now, while I'm drooling over Mount & Blade and yammering about the new-found awesomeness I've discovered in Drakensang, I want to talk about something else in the RPG hobby that has me fired up:

Gothic 4.

I've been hearing a lot of bad things about the game. First I heard it was going to require a 3ghz Quad Core CPU...which although I have (An Intel Q9650, to be precise) I have a feeling that the game isn't optimized for PC and will end up being as buggy and lag-filled as Gothic 3 on launch.

Secondly, Gothic 4 has been revealed to have a "GTA-style" world where large swaths of it are locked off until certain requirements are reached, namely...your experience level. Apparently, they've dumbed this game down so much that the tried-and-true gameplay element that Gothic 1-3 was based on, the idea that you get punished for going into "hard areas", has been removed. Obviously they did this to placate the kiddies and help them enjoy a game even with their horribly feeble RPG skills.

In a video I recently watched (EDIT: I FOUND IT HERE), the guy doing the walk through of Gothic 4 said that they were aware how hard and frustrating the original Gothics were so they endeavoured to make this new one as modern as possible by putting in "aids" that make the game more playable for everyone. These "aids" were things such as quest markers, easier combat, chain-able combos moves and a simpler leveling system.

Making it worse was that the intro quest had them killing some molerats with a staff...and it was easy.

Yes, easy.

A Gothic game where you can easily kill molerats at the start of the ******* game. Pro-***'ing-posterous. Who the *** **** **** thought this **** would pass for a Gothic game? Gothic is meant to be hard, to be challenge, to be punishing at all times...not a button mashing baby ARPG where you can kill things right out of the character creation screen. That's not Gothic, that's Oblivion.

One of the best features about Gothic 1 and 2 were that you couldn't do jack **** at the start. You had to gain your first five or so levels by piggy-backing NPCs or doing non-combat dialog based faction quests.

Oh Gothic, how far you've fallen my friend.

Remember how I did a top 20 list a little while ago?

My new #1 is Mount and Blade Warband and my new #2 is Drakensang.

Now, to import the foreign Drakensang 2 and learn German.

Lately, there has been a lot of discussion about what constitutes calling a game an RPG and what features such a piece of software should have in order to be considered one. Some, such as those at the infamous RPGcodex, would lead you to believe that it is "Choice & Consequence" that makes a game a true RPG. Many gamers think it's all about dialog choices and cinematic flair. You'll even find some folks who think an RPG is about large open worlds and non-linear gameplay.

So who is right? Are any of them truly correct?

What if I told you that, behind it all, an RPG was about *math*?

First we have to look at what birthed the genre and what purpose it originally served.

RPGs started, quite simply, as tabletop wargames. Long before you could buy a consumer-level personal computer in your home, RPGs were only available in tabletop format. These very early tabletop "Pencil and Paper" RPGs were mainly wargames that focused on strategic combat and had quite a bit of math backing up their rules. Nearly everything you did was controlled by some sort of mathematical formula and required dice to act as a random number generator. From attacking to movement rates and even encumbrance, there was some sort of strictly adhered to mathematical formula governing its use.

Though RPGs existed long before SSI's goldbox games, it was this series that finally moved those tabletop wargames into a digital format. While barebones by today's standards, these games did a spectacular job at taking all of the mathematical formulas present in the tabletop games and putting them in a computer program that did all the computation for you. Granted, they didn't have a live "Dungeon Master" there to dynamically change your game or provide direction, but it was still a very faithful representation of the "real thing".

While this "math" was an important aspect of an RPG, the story was a integral part as well. Though technology at the time prevented the kind of cinematic NPC interaction we enjoy today, there were still games that went the extra mile and included quality narrative along with their strong mathematical backing. Take one look at Ultima 4 and its revolutionary NPC reputation system and you'll see what I mean. Though it appears archaic to modern RPG fans, its "Remembering how you acted" NPCs paved the way for this new system to be used in other games such as Ultima 7, Fallout and later the Gothic series.

Unfortunately, as technology moved forward so too did the cinematic aspect of the RPG genre. With more powerful GPUs and with modern consoles becoming nothing more than small form factor PCs, the horsepower existed to make RPGs more about visuals and cinematic flair than numbers...

...and the genre went from scarlet-letter branded "kiss of death" to mainstreamed money making dynamo.

Sometime in the last decade, this gradual slippage started happening, and nowhere can you see this the easiest then in Bethesda's famous Elder Scrolls series.

Originally, the Elder Scrolls was the brainchild of game designer and former founder of Bethesda named Chris Weaver. This man, who loved simulators and happened to be a big tabletop gaming fanatic, decided to make an RPG that combined the realism of the pencil and paper RPG experience with the untapped power of modern computers. Though his first game "The Elder Scrolls: Arena" was well received and earned many accolades, it wasn't until the sequel, Daggerfall, that he finally saw his dream come to fruition.

Though Daggerfall was full of bugs and barely finished, you could chalk up its broken nature to the fact that Weaver was aiming too high and his lofty goals simply couldn't have been met with 1996 computer technology.

Even still, the game was unfathomably deep. With a character creation system that gave you four dozen skills, 8 magic schools, 6 reputation categories and around 60 different "traits" to adopt, Daggerfall's complex character creation has long been the bane of young retro-gamers everywhere. Like the Realms of Arkania series (Or Das Swarze Auge for you Germans out there), Daggerfall's character creation was so deep that even those who fully understand it still find aspects of it that remain untapped and allow for new character builds to be discovered.

Chris Weaver toyed with a couple Elder Scrolls spin-offs in the late 90s (Battlespire, Redguard) but his true triumph was none other than Morrowind.

Though Morrowind's character creation, non-linearity, and landmass were nowhere near Daggerfall's, it actually worked to the game's benefit. Having a much easier to attain goal, Weaver was able to make the game he originally wanted and managed to make Bethesda a major force in the RPG hobby. His game went on to earn hundreds of accolades and made his company a household name.

Then he left...and Todd Howard took over.

So with tabletop war-gaming aficionado Chris Weaver no longer in control at Bethesda, what did the next Elder Scrolls game become?

Oblivion.

What an apt title, don't you think? Oblivion was simply what its title stated it to be: A huge black nothingness with no discernible features...or at least no features worth mentioning.

Howard gutted the character creation, removed the dice rolls that governed combat hit chance and even simplified the faction system by boiling everything down to a "You either hate me or love me" reputation flag. The game that at one time was the ultimate RPG "simulator" was now nothing more than a watered down whack-a-mole game with minor RPG elements and a very insignificant mathematical backing.

Yet it sold like gangbusters and changed the face of the hobby forever.

Now we see the effect Oblivion had on the genre. With its dumbed down mechanics and over-emphasis on cinematic flair and dialog attracting people to the genre that were once scared of the hobby's obtuse math and esoteric formulas, developers no longer saw any need to make their games true RPGs. The dumbed-down variants that were selling so well were far easier to make and much easier to market.

"Money Talks, you-know-what Walks"

So now we find ourselves in an era of RPGs where the story, dialog and cinematic flair matter but the math has been totally removed so that "the average folk" will buy the game and make the developer's a gigantic pile of cash.

In the past, I've been criticised for saying this and told that dialog options alone make an RPG an RPG. While I'll agree that you need a great story and powerful NPC interaction to make a game an RPG, you also need a strong mathematical underpinning or else you are making a game no different than any other action/adventure hybrid on the market. After all, without the statistics, build creation or dice rolls there is no real difference between a so-called RPG and an action game with a hitpoint bar. If that's all it takes to make it an RPG, then one could say games like Grand Theft Auto, inFamous and The Force Unleashed are RPGs since they also share that same feature.

RPGs were born from tabletop wargames and that first "R" in their acronym was known by us early fans as having two very distinct meanings. We not only considered that first "R" word to be "role", but we also considered it to mean "roll" as well. The dice, and therefore the randomly generated numbers they created, were the pillars upon which the genre stood. Without the math and complexity of the formulas it formed you would be playing nothing more than an isometric version of Monkey Island, only far less humorous and probably a bit more tedious as well.

Unfortunately, that's what today's RPGs have become. Without a strong mathematical underpinning they are nothing more than point-and-click adventures that rely on dialog choices and slightly non-linear plot progression to differentiate them from Halo and Gears of War.

For me, the hobby is dead.

2015:

Fable - Legends Officially Announced

It was announced today that industry luminary and RPG mastermind Peter Molyneux has just begun work on "Fable - Legends", the fifth game of the series and perhaps his most complex RPG to date. After hearing a year of rumors about the game, it came as no surprise that it was already well into development...though that didn't stop us from pestering Peter with some key questions about his latest project.

Talking only to us, he managed to queel many of our concerns and reassure us that this game will be every bit as deep and complex as the well regarded second entry in the series. Perhaps most refreshing to hear was the inclusion of the new "Quick Story" system in place.

"One of the common complaints about my previous RPGs was that they took far too long to get to the big story pay-off" Molyneux emphatically tapped his finger against his temple as he continued speaking, "And that got me thinking...why not allow people to see the story without having to slog through tedious gameplay and solve puzzles to get there?"

In this new "Quick Story" system, Molyneux will allow the gamer to skip straight to any point in the story, including the ending cinematic itself. Using a serious of pre-defined key presses to let the game know you wish to skip ahead (Molyneux says it hasn't been settled yet, but is likely to be both the A+B buttons pressed simultaneously) you can immediately set any and all current quests to "Completed" status and move ahead to any point in the story without having to fulfill any of the game's requirements or obligations to get there.

Even better, you earn any and all gamerscore acheivement points that you would have obtained from the areas you skipped.

"I think gamers are more interested in the art, the story, and the beautiful literary tapestry that these modern RPGs weave" Molyneux smiled brightly as he continued our interview, "The actual game has, for far far too long, stood in the way of that art...and games have matured enough to where we can confidently allow the user to skip the boring things such as combat, exploration and character development so they can get right to the good stuff."

Before Molynuex and his team began referring to this as the "quick story" system, the internal project name was "Win Button", but Molyneux felt it inaccurately portrayed his desire to make Fable - Legends the game he always dreamt it would be.

"I don't think it's a bad thing to want your game to appeal to a wide range of gamers" Molyneux's brows furrorwed while he spoke, "RPGs were always seen as stuffy, unappealing, obtuse and only played by social outcasts with pimples and bad hair."

"Those days are ones we don't want to return to, so to move the genre forward we must appeal to your grandmother, your 5 year old sister and your aunt who has a thing for cat posters...RPGs are still as great as before, but we must let everyone in so we can all enjoy them!!"

Though our interview was regrettably short, before leaving Peter wowed us with a few new features that will appear in Fable - Legends. Among these was the complete removal of hit points, instead relying on a much deeper and more complex system where upon sustaining enough damage to where you would normally die, you instead get temporarily stunned and have to wait 3 seconds until you can press the attack button again. Molyneux assured us that this isn't as difficult as it sounds and that you can turn it off in the options screen so that you no longer suffer the annoyance of getting stunned and can hit the attack button as fast and as furiously as you want, all without ever being penalized by death.

Fable - Legends will be available for Xbox 720 this fall and is fully compatible with Kinect2 and is being co-developed by the same team responsible for that other Kinect2 hit, "Furry pleasure paradise - cuddling with anaimals".

Rumors have been heard that the design team from "Furry Pleasure Paradise" will be working on making the dog companion in Fable - Legends, so expect an unparalleled level of realism where the pet is concerned. Early reports suggest that not only can you feed and bathe your dog, but you will also be given the option to engage in a lifelong domestic partnership with it as well. What exactly this means is anyone's guess at this point.

Upon hearing this news, PETA gave the game a gold rating on their website and has declared the logo of Lionhead studios to be the new standard emblazoned upon their flag.



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2016:

Diablo 4 To Require Facebook


Blizzard, still hot off the success of their recently released World of Warcraft Expansion "Apocalypse" that not only added 50 new single player friendly zones but finally updated the graphics for people who play the game with at least a Pentium 2 450mhz, has shocked the world today by announcing that the much anticipated Diablo 4 will require a Facebook account in order to play online.

Talking with us last night, Blizzard CEO Michael Morhaime helped set the record straight about both Diablo 4 and his company's plans for the future.

"Look, everyone nowadays has a Facebook account...your sister, your mother, your teachers, probably even your dog" Morhaime handed a nearby employee a can of mountain dew after they mysteriously collapsed underneath of him, "If you don't have a Facebook account you are obviously an anti-social reject who hates people and probably has no real life friends, so quite frankly, you don't belong on battle.net".

"We only want sociable, friendly people on battle net that share our company's philsophy" Morhaime stated with confidence, "Back in 1997 most of our web users were trolls, basement dwellers and ne'er do wells who made us look bad, we really don't need losers like that playing our games."

When asked what features full and mandatory Facebook integration with Diablo 4 will give us, Morhaime was all too willing to divulge his company's once top secret plans to the public.

"Well, first of all, the game will be run inside of a Facebook games java applet window, and will be playable with either the mouse cursor or an Xbox 720 gamepad" Morhaime reached for a bottle of Jack Daniels before clearing his throat and continuing, "Also, it will integrate with other Facebook games and dole out rare equipment to your character depending on your skill at other popular Facebook games."

Morhaime went on to give examples of this, such as the size of your farm in Farmville controlling how many hit points you get per level-up and the amount of money you have in Mafia Wars determining the quality of item drops you recieve. Naturally, this has the vast majority of gamers psyched to see the game's holiday 2016 release.

As with any great new pioneering technology, however, there have been a few detractors. Morhaime does not seem fazed by them, however.

"Like I said, only anti-social rejects don't have a Facebook account by now." Morhaime's speech slurred slightly as he took another swig of jack, "We also now know that Richard Garriott was right when he said Facebook gaming was the future of the industry, and as one of its biggest developers we go where the money is...and the money is here."

Morhaime's logic is certainly solid, since sales figures of the recently released Facebook-only EA-produced Deus Ex reboot currently has over 56 million players and counting.

Before leaving, we were able to get a few more choice words out of Morhaime concerning his epic action RPG sequel, namely the statement concerning the game's use of real-life player names online.

"Sure, it was a big deal back in 2010 when people got upset over REAL ID being used in the forums, but since we require Facebook it's a moot point." Morhaime dropped the empty bottle of Jack in the trash and motioned for a nearby employee to retrieve another, "As soon as you log in, people will not only see your name but the fat girl you've been sleeping with, the photos of your drunk dad mooning your mom, and those embarrassing photos from last year's office Christmas party...so what does REAL ID matter anymore?"

"Plus, if you don't have something to hide, then you shouldn't worry, right?"

Also, Morhaime went on to later explain the new game systems employed in Diablo 4. Since the downplay and almost near removal of health potions in Diablo 3 was such a huge hit and helped to ease the game's transition to the Xbox 360 platform two years later, Morhaime and his men at Blizzard have done one better this time and gave Diablo 4 a constantly regenerating health bar akin to such ****c games as Halo and Gears of War.

When asked how this works, Morhaime was anything but tight-lipped.

"People don't want a hard game anymore, they want to enjoy themselves, socialize, and look at the breath taking art around them" Morhaime grinned knowingly, "Nothing makes someone stop playing a game quicker than dying and losing all of their gear as well as half of their experience points just because they weren't smart enough to read a character build FAQ and obtain the proper gear."

"I mean, we don't want no-lifers who enjoy that kind of challenge clogging up our battle net."


------------------

November 9th, 2016:

Nintendo Pii-NES Announced, Becomes First Totally Controller-less Console.

With their complete dominance of the home console market secured, Nintendo was reluctant to replace the Wii. With it still dominating the top spot on sales chart a whopping 10 years after its initial release, the "Big N" saw no reason to make a more sophisticated machine. With the little white box still outselling both the PS4 and the Xbox 720 combined, no one could logically blame them for their hesitance. It was assumed that the Wii would be the only system Nintendo would ever need, at least, outside of their trillion-selling Nintendo 3DS.

That is until today.

At the big tenth anniversary celebration that NOA president Reggie Fils-aime threw for investors only, he announced that Nintendo of Japan is currently developing the Wii's successor, the brand new Nintendo Pii-NES.

Though Nintendo's investors were frightened that their stocks would take a dip, Reggie managed to calm their fears and reassure them that the Pii-NES would be big, and stay big, for as long as it could be maintained.

First of all, the Nintendo Pii-NES will have no controllers at all. Every single game will be controlled with the player's body. With a next generation motion sensing device, the Pii-NES will track and monitor a player's every movement right down to facial twitches and their breathing (The latter of which is being used for a health monitoring game that is meant to warn your local EMTs when you're about to have a heart attack due to the strain your out of shape body is going through from having to stand up to play a video game).

This motion sensor is the most advanced the world has developed, and is so incredibly powerful that it can see players through their couch, walls, and even from their back yards...giving formerly recluse gamers a reason to get outside and catch some sunlight.

Secondly, and perhaps most revolutionary, is that the Pii-NES's library will be completely made up of re-issued 8 bit NES games. The following was recorded from Reggie's impassioned speech during last night's investor's dinner:

"The P in Pii-NES stands for People, because people are what brings us together. People make gaming fun, and without people there is no game. At Nintendo we believe games are about one thing and one thing only, that thing being People. It's about people having fun with other people and being together, because games aren't about sitting alone in a dark room and playing a slow game, they are about socializing with people. At Nintendo, we are People persons, and we want our gamers to be people persons too. People are wonderful, and People are why games exist. This is why we chose the first half of the name, because People make life great!"

Reggie went further on the name in his next statement,

"The NES part of the name is the most exciting part...it comes from the fact that the entire library of games on our new system will be re-re-re-re-released versions of ****c 8bit NES titles."

Later in the speech, Reggie talked about the special relationship his company has with the copyright holders of these 8 bit games and how they intend to work together:

"We all know that people really dig that retro vibe, right? The sales of the re-hashed Mega Man games proved this, as does our own meager selection of hackneyed 80s titles on our Virtual Console service...so we here at Nintendo thought what better way to make money and not have to do any work to earn it then to simply re-re-re-re-release the same exact games to a bunch of gullible teenagers that think they are being cool by playing games that 40 year old gamers already know are garbage? We not only don't have to actually spend any development time or money on these games to put them out to market, but we can repackage them and sell them at inflated, unfair prices and claim they have new features..."

...That feature, of course, being motion control."

Response on the internet the next day was alarmingly warm, with every single reader of every website already swearing to pre-purchase the system and in some cases, buy two of them. In one live chat with a large group of this website's readers, we were happy to see the excitement in their positive comments:

"Nintendo has never failed us, they are number 1 for a reason you know" said Nintendofanboy1998, "I mean, like, they totally INVENTED video games like what, 7 years ago?"

This sentiment was followed up by another poster named "Mario4LYFE03" who said "Retro gaming is so cool, it's great that I can pretend like I know the history of this hobby because I make my mom buy me all these old games and then act like I played them when they first came out so the veteran gamers on the message boards don't tease me like they normally do."

Yet another web posting, this time from a subscriber named "SONEESUXORZzZzZzZzZzZz" seemed to agree, "Look, all these other companies do is copycat Nintendo, you know, because like none of them can make games the hardcore fans want. You know, games like Super Mario Kart, Mario Sunshine, Kirby's yarn and Wii Sports. That stuff is ultra hardcore, not like that baby stuff you find on Sony and MS like Dragon Age, Demon's Souls, Killzone, Halo and Uncharted...who plays that baby stuff? NOT ME!"

A recent report from Gamestop claims that they already have 69 million pre-orders for the Nintendo Pii-NES, and expect it to reinvigorate the sagging video game industry, which has made Nintendo only a very dismal 895 Trillion dollars over the past 3 days. No doubt this very meager amount of money they are making will increase once the Pii-NES thrusts its way into the market and penetrates the sales figures.

There is a disease in this hobby, and this disease is being spread by money.

More to the point, it is being spread by money hungry developers who have begun to see dollar signs where game industry luminaries once saw nothing but shiny rainbows and limitless potential. Gone are the days when gaming was suppose to be about experimentation, expression and fun...now it's all about money. After all, now that gaming eclipses both the music and movie industries combined, how can anyone not want to hop on this gravy train and ride it to capitalist heaven?

Ok, so I'll spare you my ultra left hippie views. Still, you can't deny that this hobby has been taken over. Taken over by greedy men who want to milk you dry of every last cent you earn.

Don't believe me?

Where do I start? Well, a lot of news has been circulating over the past few months concerning this money-influenced take over, and it's getting rather hard for me not to open up my browser and immediately rage uncontrollably over the sorry state of my hobby of choice. Whether it's Nintendo claiming they are losing money (That's a laugh) or Bobby Kotick saying that making games "shouldn't be fun" or Blizzard telling us that Starcraft 2 will be cut into three parts and sold in episodic pieces it's hard not to be just a wee bit upset at these changes. It isn't like I don't have the money to support my addiction, it's just that I feel gaming shouldn't have descended this far into both mediocrity and capitalist h-ell. It was never suppose to be about making money, it was about making experiences.

It all began with the push to episodic gaming and DLC. Five years ago it was unheard of to buy a game that had locked content on the disc that you had to pay money to access. The mere mention of that would have brought up lawsuits, picketing and idiotic little online petitions all over the world. Now, however, it is accepted as a reality and is so commonplace that a company can rip us off right under our nose and people pass it off as a normal part of the hobby.

Just look at what this company has to say about it. apparently, it's perfectly normal now for a game to be released unfinished. It's now considered bad business practice to put out whole games. After all, why give you 60 dollars worth of content for a 60 dollar game when they can give you half of it and charge you double over the course of a few months worth of DLC? Why should they let you get your money's worth? They raised the prices of games 10-15 dollars over the previous generation and nobody cried about it, so why not gouge the customer a little more since it seems no one minds getting rammed up the ***, right?

You know what really bugs me about this though? It isn't that the rich pig-dogs running the hobby think it's ok...I expect as much from a bunch of tragically affluent and woefully out-of-touch middle aged men. What truly irks me is that the average gamer will come onto a site like this and, upon hearing me state these facts will not only attack me but stick up for the rich men that are this very minute laughing behind their backs.

Yet even though the guys heading up these big game development houses openly hate on their customers, people still blindly worship them as gods and fanboyishly defend whatever piece of hardware or software they shove out of their 70-hour a week no paid overtime sweat shop.

Still not mad yet? Still not fired up that this hobby is now about screwing you over instead of giving you memorable gaming experiences? Let's try something else, shall we?

Recently, Modern Warfare 2 fans were suckered into paying 15 bucks for a DLC map pack that was mostly recycled maps and assets from the previous game. I suppose they thought they could get away with anything, because just this week it was leaked that they plan to force a subscription onto their Call of Duty series.

Oh, I know what you're saying. Your'e thinking "Tax, that's just a rumor, it's utter bull".

Really now? How about if I show you an article from June of 2009 that said this was going to happen? You believe it now?

Not to get off topic here, but I'm a big Tom Petty fan and I've gone to see him in concert three times. He's wonderful to watch live and I've always felt a kinship with the guy. His songs always felt truthful and sincere, and everything about him always struck me as being "real" in a world where people get paid to be fake. Now there was one song of his he made years ago that I feel captures my feelings about this whole "Gaming is money" bullsh*t, and it's this right here.

They want to see if you'll pay for what you used to get for free.

Now, they do have excuses lined up as to why they have to do this. Apparently it's expensive to make games. Well, that's all find and dandy, but why is it that some indie games have outsold major publisher titles and acheived critical acclaim while being made on extremely small budgets? Oh, they say it's because the indie genre is different and that they have much higher goals to meet. It's all total bullsh*t though. There is no logical reason why they have to spend 100 million on a game unless the game is so broken and horrible that they need to make it look as pretty as they can (as well as hype it as much as they can) in order to get suckers to buy into it.

I often blame the whole "Art movement" in gaming for making modern games shallow and unchallenging, and while that's the truth as I see it there is also a greater truth. That greater truth is that the large amount of cash that gaming has been making since it went mainstream has attracted white collar business d0uchebags who sniff out money the way a shark does fresh blood. Once they saw the flow of fresh green, they descended upon this hobby teeth bared and ready to suck it (and us) dry of every last penny until they were able to afford more sex tourism trips to Singapore and a fourth yacht for their trophy wife and spoiled children.

We have nobody but ourselves to blame. The community has let this happen and with things having gone so far and for so long, I don't believe there is any turning back. Sure, we have the indie gaming movement and companies like Valve that release games for free, but that's a drop in the pond compared to the ocean of greed we are drowning in.

God help us all.

(Excuse me for these last 4 entries being a bit brief, I'm tired from work and have a huge RPG backlog. It makes it hard to concentrate!)

#4: Baldur's Gate 2 (PC)

I've been criticized in the past by other RPG'ers for being a combat addict who, according to them, doesn't like to read or is functionally illiterate. All this because I want a strong combat system. I never said I want the story to be gutted and forgotten about. I simply want an equal balance of BOTH, but I demand a much higher quality of combat than I do a story. It's why I could never get into story-lite RPGs like Grandia Extreme, Enchanted Arms or (god help me for even mentioning it) Dungeon Lords.

On the flip side, I also can't get into Story Heavy games that replace challenging, frequent combat with hour long dialog such as Planescape.

Instead, I prefer a sweet and harmonious combination of the two, and rarely have I ever found such a wonderful balance of these two things than in Baldur's Gate 2.

No review or even drive by critique of the game should never go two sentences without mentioning the party interaction, since it was Bioware that basically invented this system of interacting with your comrades. Oh sure, Garriott did it with Ultima 7 to some degree, but BG 2 completely reset the bar when they added the much loved relationship quests and "Banter" to their games.

All of a sudden, party members mattered. They could like you, love you, hate you, turn on you or even sleep with you. How you treated them both inside and outside of combat ultimately determined what would happen to your friends. Just pick any possible recruit-able NPC in the game and there are dozens of different side quests and non-plot interactions that can and will take place over the course of your journey. Take whimsical little Aerie for instance...

Keep Aerie in your party with Minsc long enough and he adopts her as his new witch. Let her die and Minsc becomes withdrawn and even more vengeful than before. Keep Aerie in with Ha'er Dalis and then romance her and you'll find yourself fighting the bard for her affections. Put her in with Korgan and laugh as he taunts and ridicules her.

As much as I love the combat in the Infinity Engine games, I love these inter-party reactions even more. In what has since become a Bioware trademark, BG2 injected life into your party members and made them something more than just mere numbers and letters on a GUI bar. Bioware made them real. So real that I will admit that I can't go through an evil game in BG2 because I am unable to go even a few minutes without hearing Minsc's witty comments and *insightful* musings. He was always my favorite RPG character and after a couple dozen trips through the game I still find myself laughing at the same lines for the 500th time.

That was the magic behind BG2. Yeah yeah...the combat was typical 2nd edition goodness (I'd have preferred Turn based though) but it was the interactions with your party memebrs and their constant chiming in during plot scenes that made it feel like it was "alive". You cared for your party and you honestly felt like they cared for you. BG2 was the pinnacle of NPC interaction and even Bioware themselves have yet to surpass it. Even though ME2 came remarkably close.

Also, I'd normally put a video of the game here but eveyr single one is done by a nerdy-voiced man-baby who sounds like their testicles never descended. Really folks...let's cool it with the voice overs and just show gameplay, alright? Christ.

Though I initially hated Bioware for "dumbing down" my precious D&D, Christmas Eve of 1998 changed that when I finally got to play BG1 and realized how fun a little "mainstreaming" could be. It only got better with the sequel and I soon found myself enjoying their games just like the rest of you. Though they've had some slip-ups (Jade Empire, Mass Effect 1) they still manage to get me to cry/scream/cheer over imaginary characters on my monitor screen...and that really isn't easy to do anymore.

BG2 is one of those games that I simply can't go a full year without going through. It's always there, sitting on my hard drives, waiting for me to come back to it like a dependable old friend, always there to rekindle old memories with or even create some new ones. BG2 never gets old and thanks to the modding community, never gets boring either.

A truly legendary game from one of the best designers in the business.


#3: Fallout 1 (and to some extent, 2) (PC)

Here's a shocking bit of Taxonomic history: I didn't buy Fallout when it first came out. It wasn't until later in the spring of 1998 that I finally grabbed a copy. A friend of mine, Matt, was a huge Fallout fanboy and kept telling me that I HAD to try it. I was skeptical, and also very caught up in my 7,823rd play through of Diablo, so I never paid him much attention. It wasn't until boredom overtook me that I decided to take the plunge and buy it.

What happened afterward was me getting written up at work because I was late coming in...due to me having stayed up to 3am playing Fallout when I had to get up at 7.

Fallout was one of those magical "Everything you want, nothing you don't" games that hit me like a freight train and changed my RPG playing life forever. Turn based combat, great NPC interaction, an original story, a moderate challenge and even a pretty decent (if repetitive) soundtrack. More than that though, it was the very last of the true turn based games and the game that sort of signaled the end of an era.

Fallout was "our" game. It was a game made by two hardcore RPG nerds (Fargo and Cain) and was more of a love letter to the genre than the cash grab most games would soon become. It was their gift to the community and their way of saying thanks. It was "Wasteland: Re-imagined" and it was a game that to this day has no real equal.

So what made Fallout so great? So revolutionary?

Moral ambiguity and a very deep reputation system, the two crucial fallout trademarks that Fallout 3 lacked.

Fallout didn't measure your actions by a lame good/evil bar, it instead measured them on a person-by-person basis and computed your overall reputation in each area. It also rarely gave you clearly good or evil choices and required you to make hard decisions that had no real "nice" solution. Hell, the whole Mordino feud in New Reno (Fallout 2) is a perfect example of that. Do you want drug runners or gun runners to rule the city? Either way you're screwing someone up for years to come.

turn based combat, crotch shots, strategic battles, true non-linearity, an original world (That has been since copied dozens of times over) and a captivating story made Fallout 1/2 the best game of the 90s BY FAR.

It's a shame I can't say that about Fallout 3 and the previous decade. Though I've had enough angry arguments with FO3 fans in my lifetime to not want to stir up the bee's nest again.



#2: Gothic 2 (PC)

Gothic 3 wounded me greatly. I expected the third game in my fgavorite RPG series to be at the very least a playable experience, but what did I get? I got a broken, easily beaten game that played like a fanmade sequel that had been coded by 15 year old hackers.

Why so passionate about a little known series that most of you have probably never played?

Well, Gothic was the Ultima of the 2000's. A game that took the highly interactive and responsive world of Ultima 7 and put it into a 3D engine. An RPG that recreated a living, breathing world in digital form and never cut any corners. Characters hunted for food, conversed with each other, eat, drank, worked and even went to the bathroom whether you were there to see them or not. Life went on without your character and it created a feeling that I haven't felt in any other RPG since. The game world felt alive, and to this very day no other company has been able to come close to what Piranha Bytes did way back in 2001 when the first Gothic was released.

While others worshipped Morrowind, I worshipped Gothic 1.

...and why did I like it so much?

Besides the extraordinarily interactive world, the game had a very punishing difficulty level that forced you to approach each enemy with a great deal of fear and apprehension. It forced gamers out of their comfort zone and made them worry more about positioning, speed and enemy behavior then stats or equipment. Though this combined with the "odd" interface to scare off most of the average gamers, it attracted weird ones like me who enjoyed the added realism. You couldn't kill things by mashing the left button, you had to actually plan each strike and time your movements to match those of your enemies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgSPWakEjdQ

Gothic was one of those games that came and went with very little fanfare. The first one came out right at the start of the "European RPG renaissance" and the second one was already written off by the gaming media as a forgettable "B-level" game that wasn't worth anyone's time due to the awkward controls and high difficulty. In an era where simplistic, easy-to-grasp "Sandbox" games like the Elder Scrolls series is considered revolutionary, Gothic stood tall as one of the few games that refused to fit into that formula and instead kept faithful to its Ultima-inspired roots. Like that series, Gothic 1 and 2 were all about having a huge and highly interactive world that was filled with NPCs that weren't dependant on the player to give them worth. Even the excellent faction play didn't remove this feeling, since no matter what you were never made "Boss" of your faction and still felt like an outsider amongst your own kind.

Unlike The Elder Scrolls, gothic's game world didn't need you. It could easily go on existing without you.

This is a game that was about as "Ultima" as you can get without pulling Garriott out of his facebook game phase and forcing him to code another RPG at gunpoint. Gothic really was the spiritual successor to Ultima and even though the 4th one coming out this September may knock my opinion of it back even further...

At least we have "Risen".

...god I hope Gothic 4 doesn't suck. I really really do.



#1: Deus Ex (PC)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKp0DP1O4bs

God did I hate this game. I played a demo of it around the time it came out and was really turned off by it. The weapon sight sway caused by low rifle skill levels, the reliance on stealth, the inability of my character to instantly one-shot enemies...it pissed me off so much that it wouldn't be until I bought the game of the year edition at a Best Buy the next year that I finally got into it and realized what the game was.

Deus Ex corrupted me. It tainted me. It altered forever the way that I would see games. If you wonder why I'm such an elitist prick this game right here is the reason why.

That first day I installed it after buying it was like the day when you finally realize you like girls, or the day you finally realize you have to start shaving. It was one of those unmeasurable moments that live forever in your mind and shape what you become. Hell, I even started going to conspiracy websites soon after and checked on the names and organizations that appeared in the game. Spooky stuff, let me tell you.

So what was so great about DX?

In the categories of story, atmosphere and player interaction, there is NO game on ANY system in ANY genre that comes even within a light year of this. It was this magical one time in a lifetime strike of lightning that will probably never be copied and, sadly, always be exploited by companies trying to make a quick buck.

First of all, Deus Ex is all about telling a story. Yeah yeah....all games are, right? Sure. The thing with Deus Ex is that unlike most other games you are free to f*ck the story up as much as you want without getting a lame a** "Game Over" screen. Go ahead, kill Anna Navarre on the airplane, see the game adapt to your harsh decision and actually alter the part of the plot where you normally would fight her. Do the same to Gunther by figuring out his killswitch. Feel like avoiding combat entirely? You can do that!!

Deus ex was a remarkably non-linear game. I say remarkably because we ARE essentially talking about an FPS here. stats be damned, this game is still, at its core, a shooter. Though through some of the best story writing and scripting you'll ever see in a shooter, most of the interaction is done outside of cut scenes and the direction of the story is guided completely and totally by the player character. Everything you do matters, and every line of dialogue you speak affects something. No two playthroughs are ever quite the same, even though there are really only three distinct endings.

Deus Ex also had some very large areas, making it easy for Warren and his team to give players several different ways to enter into buildings. Sneak, hack, shoot or bribe your way in, you could find a new way to get through each mission every time you played and all would be valid. It was like Fallout, only in first person and taking place in a cyberpunk dystopia.

Which brings me to my favorite part of the game: The Atmosphere.

Deus Ex has one of the best and most underrated soundtracks in all of gaming. Combine that with all of the memorable NPCs its known for (Tracer Tong, Paul Denton, Bob "Bill Gates" Page) and you have a game that does a good job of sticking with you long after the credits roll. It creates a believable world that feels, sounds, and looks real, even though the graphics have aged considerably since its release. The intrigue, the drama, the tin-foil hate conspiracy nut talk...it all feels so real and lends so much credibility to the game that this is the only piece of software you "games are art" people can call ART and I wouldn't laugh my head off at you.

Because Deus Ex really IS art.

The non linear gameplay, the music, the atmosphere, the well defined characters, THE DRAMA...it's like playing a big budget summer blockbuster and you're both the starring role and the director. That's the only way I can describe it.

Sometimes I wonder if Spector didn't just accidentally create this game. Like it was one of those once-in-a-lifetime things that just HAPPENS and no one knows why or can recreate it.

I think the game is best explained by a youtube video, which for some damn reason I can't find right now, where a user pieced together a video of clips showing how the simple act of spying on a female employee in the UNATCO restroom snowballed into a series of in-game events. It was incredibly hilarious and shows you how f'ing DEEP this game goes, when even story NPCs remark on things as mundane and unimportant as you walking into the restrooms and looking up a woman's skirt with the camera.

If you don't like Deus Ex, you simply do not like video games. I am being completely honest when I say that. It is truly perfect in every single way and to get bored with it (or even dislike it entirely) isn't even POSSIBLE for a gamer who claims to love playing games. Deus Ex is the kind of game that gamers wish we'd get more of, and get enraged when we don't. It is the game to which all others are judged.

At least by me, anyway.

#8: Phantasy Star Online (Dreamcast)

It sounds so cliche, but PSO has something that is nearly impossible to describe to someone who hasn't played it. Maybe it's the beautiful art st.yle of the game's ahead-of-its-time 2000 era graphics, or maybe it's the perfectly balanced multiplayer, or it could be the addictive real time ranged combat (which most 3D RPGs still cannot do correctly), or perhaps it is the ease of play and ingenious controller-centric GUI. I don't know why, but for some reason the game has never become boring and I still play it from time to time.

PSO was a risky move for Sega. So risky that, much like the recently released Monster Hunter Tri, they opted not to charge to play the game online. While this helped move copies off the shelf, it also let a lot of troublemakers into the game. Hacking was horribly bad in the game and finding legit players that wouldn't Resta PK you or corrupt your game saves with codebreakers was about as hard as trying to find a bikini store in Iran.

Still, this didn't deter me from enjoying the game. PSO was just so well balanced. I'm sure you always hear me talk about combat and think I'm a nut, but when it comes to RPG battle systems you won't find anyone more knowledgable than me. I study them, dissect them, and absorb them. I love the math, the formulas, and obsess over cl@ss balance.

The wonderful thing about PSO is that the game is a textbook example of perfect balance. Every cl@ss can dominate if equipped and played correctly, even the RAmarls. Seriously though, the game is one of the most supremely polished action RPGs ever made. It may be glitchy and buggy as hell, but it's rock solid when it comes to cl@ss and monster balances.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmkWyWIg0xs

Another impressive aspect of PSO is its soundtrack. Not only is it the best Sega ever produced on *any* system, but it's my third favorite soundtrack right under Earthbound and Baldur's Gate 2. This is fortunate, since the repetitive nature of dungeon grinding needs that wonderful music in the background to alleviate some of the tedium.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6Ufyp3F4tU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afj4sXyx3kc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjDQvHBQpK

and Musambani's favorite track:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=039VsX9vjSQ


#7: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl

Remember how I said I hated Earthbound at first and ended up loving it later? Well, oddly enough, other than the game that is going to come in at #1 on this countdown, there is one other game I absolutely HATED with a vengeance when I first played it. This is that game.

I bought S.T.A.L.K.E.R. in early 2007 after a friend I met in Phantasy Star Universe (Prior to us quitting the game) recommended it to me. As a shooter fan, I figured I would bust the game out in a weekend and move on. I was very angry to find out that not only couldn't I "bust the game out in a weekend" but the game's weapon decay system and headshot-dependant gameplay resulted in me running out of weapons, armor AND ammo by the halfway point...causing me to uninstall the game and give up. I swore I hated it and never intended to go back to it.

Then a funny thing happened. I played Fallout 3 a year later.

What does FO3 have to do with anything? Well, look at it this way, imagine sleeping with an ugly girl who is good in bed, and leaving her because she's hideous. Then you meet a gorgeous woman who lays there motionless like a cold fish as you plow her. This is sort of what happened with me and those two games. Every time I played FO3 I kept thinking "This is fun to mess with, but absolute SH*T to sit down and play...this is nothing but a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. rip off."

After finishing FO3 I reinstalled the first S.T.A.L.K.E.R. about a month later and decided to approach the game as if I was playing Fallout. You know what I mean, just play it slow, gather resources, "Farm" areas, comb every square inch of every tiny zone for every teeny little bit of items I could sniff out and be the same methodical OCD nutbag I usually am with my RPGs and purposely forget that I was playing an FPS...

and I beat the game with a character that looked like this

It was then that I finally "got it". S.T.A.L.K.E.R. was about being slow, methodical and playing the game as if you were just going through another replay of Fallout 2. You needed to bleed every NPC, container, shopkeeper and building dry of their goodies and use the money to make YOU stronger. Hell, by the halfway point of my first successful trip through S.T.A.L.K.E.R. I had over 300K in rubles and a modified GP37 with around 1600 rounds of armor piercing ammo. I had finally figured the game out and understood why I was getting blown away all the time.

You needed to equip weapons according to SCOPE power, not bullet power. You needed to ALWAYS aim for the head behind your scope. You also needed to do every single friggin quest for every single friggin NPC until they either stopped giving you quests or you ran out of places to stash your rewards, whichever came first.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AM2AmqZZMs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmaNBf7f4Sk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dp-YaCovWs

I don't really like to compare it to SS2 or Deus Ex because unlike those games there is *NO* character development or creation system. The only *development* that goes on is the development of the player who has to unlearn everything they've been forced to accept as facts from other shooters and play the game the exact opposite of what their gamer instincts tell them to. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is about exploration, being thorough, taking it slow, "grinding" quests, improving faction ratings, stockpiling and resource management. Partly due to this, I think a lot of folks either find it unappealing or just plain cumbersome at times. Though I can understand why they feel that way, I get the same feeling playing S.T.A.L.K.E.R. as I do the first two Fallout games or Baldur's Gate. It has that same slow pace and reliance on resource management that only the best CRPGs exhibit.

Ohhhh, but the best part is the atmosphere.

Remember when I said Arx Fatalis had a great atmosphere? There is something about Europeans and their games that I always loved. I think it's because the consoles always had problems getting PAL versions of their games over there, so most Europeans grew up as untainted PC nerds that mainly stayed away from the recycled trash of the consoles. Whatever the reason, their games are unusually detailed and spooky beyond words. The lighting in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. really helps my theory too, since if you watched those videos above at night and alone you probably felt a twinge of panic in your chest.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is part RPG, part headshot crazy shooter and part Silent Hill inspired freak fest. Its a game that throws so much at you and in such weird ways that you never get that feeling of tedium or repetitiveness, even when doing the same damn quest over and over again.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is about mood, lighting, atmosphere, loneliness, seclusion, helplessness, and danger. It's a somewhat non-linear hybrid shooter that unlike others in the genre (Borderlands, Bioshock 1/2, Fallout 3) doesn't dumb its gameplay systems down to make the shooter fans happy...and also doesn't complicate itself just to make obsessive RPG nerds like myself happy. It just merely sticks to its developer's gameplan and doesn't budge an inch. Ohhh...you got one-shotted for the 50th time? It's called "Learn to duck". Ohhhh...you ran out of bullets? It's called "Learn to do more quests". Ohhh...your gun jammed? It's called "carry spares".

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. won't hold your hand and it most certainly won't be your friend. It will, however, give you the kind of challenge you won't find in any other shooter. Not even the one other "shooter" that is ahead of this game in my top 20 countdown. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is as hardcore as a game gets, and though Pripyat is a nice "scaled back" sequel that helped a lot of folks get into the series, I hope that when GSC Gameworld works on the next game they remember that we S.T.A.L.K.E.R. fans loved the difficulty just as much as the atmosphere.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is why I love Ukranians. You talented guys, you. Please invade my country.


#6: Diablo 2 (PC)

You knew it was coming, didn't you? If you don't like Diablo 2 you don't even belong on a PC. You might as well take a sledgehammer to your tower and heave the wreckage in the trash. Diablo 2 is why you're here. It's why Blizzard had the money to burn when making that god awful baby RPG called WoW. It's why Bill roper had people lining up to throw money at his Hellgate London project. It's why the B.net forums are the trashiest place on the internet. It's why millions of unwashed nerds are unemployed and stcuk in front of their computers. It's why after 11 years the game is still in the top 10 of Gamestop's PC sales chart. google it...you'll see I'm right.

Diablo 2 is more than a game, it was a game CHANGER. Much like DOOM, Pac-Man, Ultima and Super Mario Brothers, it was one of those games that forever altered the hobby and inspired the next generation of game designers for years afterward. It was one of those games where whether you liked it or not, you couldn't escape its reach and were subjected to it no matter what you were playing or WHERE you were playing.

Hell, even the consoles became infested with Diablo 2 clones (Dark Alliance 1 and 2, Norrath 1 and 2, Black stone, SF Neo/EXA, D&D heroes, Hunter Redemption, Xmen Apocalypse etc etc etc...) and after more than a decade we are STILL calling all of these games Diablo clones. This is how big of a game changer D2 was. Like it or not, it altered the gaming landscape in a way not seen since DOOM.

Ok, but who gives a flip about that right? Is it really any good?

Diablo was a drug to me. It was one of those games that really tapped into my obsessive RPG nerd nerve and made me swear fealty to it. Along with the #1 and #3 games on this list, it is one of the three games I *always* install on every machine I buy build or borrow. A desktop that doesn't have the launch icon for Diablo 2 isn't even a PC to me. If I don't see Diablo 2's icon on your desktop, you're dead to me...I just won't consider you a PC gamer. You simply *HAVE* to have D2 installed, or you should go hang your pathetic head in shame and go play some Wii with your grandma.

Seriously though, Diablo 2 is one of those games that I can't see anyone not liking. I know hardcore nose-in-the-air RPG elitists that worship Planescape Torment's script hate Diablo 2 due to it being an "Action RPG" (Go to RPGcodex, over there Diablo is hated just as much as Oblivion), but what those inbred virgin sacks of fail haven't realized is that Diablo has more strategy than most actual RPGs. Its hell difficulty requires more pre-fight planning, character build control, gear acquisition, resource management and teamwork than anything Bioware has ever made...Baldur's Gate included. Throw in the synergy system they added with their post release patches and you have *THE* deepest action RPG skill systems ever developed.

When Diablo 2 came out, I bought the collector's edition and for the next five or six years afterward I kept the box on my desk. I only moved it when I got a bigger monitor and no longer had ROOM for the thing. That's how much I revere it. How much it means to me. No action RPG is as challenging, deep, and most of all...fun to play in co-op.

(I opted not to post videos of D2 from the net since EVERY SINGLE ONE has whiney emo metal/emo punk/ emo pop junk bands that some kid put over the video because he thinks we care about his poor music tastes)

Diablo is a game you can easily get lost in. A modernized re-imagining of the old school roguelike that unlike others in the genre, doesn't skimp on the difficulty. Sure, the first two difficulty levels may be easy to someone who grew up playing Falcon's Eye (Good times), but once you hit the final "Hell" dificulty you either need to grow some balls or give the hell up, because the game goes from average everyday ARPG to "OMG WHAT?" in about the three seconds it takes you to walk from the spawn point to the first monster that does 600 damage a hit.


#5: Temple of Elemental Evil. (PC)

Ahhhh, we've finally come to the top 5. The 5 best games that were ever made. This is where the cream of the crop is displayed, and where the good games are separated from the "EPIC" games. From here on out, everything is so good that there have been times when net friends of mine have talked smack about these games and I've "removed" them from my lists/blogs/etc. Yes, I'm that serious. Sad, isn't it?

You know how I keep talking about combat and how I'm a math nerd that gets off on stats, character builds and such? Well, when it comes to satisfying my need for all things strategic, there is nothing that comes close to this game right here. Not only is it tough in its regular unpatched form, but when you apply the Circle of Eight mod pack you turn the game into a "hard" D&D RPG to a "Holy crap you mean I'm suppose to beat this without suffering a coronary?" type of RPG.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGMB-j1PdsU

I've gone through the game 5 times now, three of those with the CO8 pack and one of those three using the Ironman mode (I once posted a youtube video of the ending/boss fight 3 years ago, but back then no one gave a sh*t about this game) and after becoming a supreme master of it I still find myself slamming my fist on the desk over the sometimes insane difficulty that this game contains. It is a merciless, unforgiving juggernaut of D&D combat complexity. It uses rules (5 step, coupe de grace, 100gp Identify reagents etc etc) that even most tabletop players don't consider fair. It is as authentic to a real D&D experience as you'll ever find and that is more than likely the reason why it failed.

Well, that and it was the buggiest game ever created.

When I first bought the game sometime in the fall of 2003 it only took a week for the constant crashing and forced rebooting the game caused my machine to suffer under to permanently hose a large swath of my hard drive. It went on to corrupt most of my C drive and I even blame it for later borking my windows install since it even took out the new machine I had built for it a year later. Through patches, tweaks, blowouts and system instability brought on by this buggy piece of coding, I soldiered on and managed to make my first two trips through the game regardless of how badly the game didn't want me to play it.

A couple years would go by until I heard about the Co8 mod and I reinstalled the game on my then brand-spanking new XP rig. Though it still was a bit unstable, it didn't meltdown my machine and was, for the most part, playable. With the added difficulty, removal of the level cap and introduction of even MORE rules and items, I found a new reason to go through the game and 5 years later still play it to this very day. Although to be honest, my saves still get corrupted from time to time no matter what machine I play it on.

Still, it's one of those games I just can't get myself to ever give up on. It feeds my hunger for strategic/tactical D&D combat and whenever I feel modern RPGs are holding my hand too softly I boot ToEE back up again and remind myself how gigantic my RPG E-peen just so happens to be. Hah...

ToEE is that one game, even more so than Wizardry 8, that separates the men from the boys in this hobby. Although I used to get ridiculed in the community for this, I wouldn't consider anyone worth listening to if they didn't first beat ToEE in Ironman mode with the full CO8 mod pack on. Doing this not only proves to me you are a living god amongst the RPG players of the modern dumb-down age, but you are someone who has the kind of refined tastes I both respect and admire. ToEE is the great mother F'ing dividing line when it comes to RPGs, and if you can beat it at its absolute hardest than you can beat ANYTHING.

Actually, this year's "Resonance of Fate" kind of reminds me of ToEE. Part of me wanted to put RoF on this list because it's the only other RPG I've played that has that same kind of "D*ck enlargement" feeling when it comes to RPG elitism. Both of these games are the kind that are only completed by the cream of the RPG player crop. Normal folks can't hack these games and go home cryin' to mamma. ToEE in ironman with the CO8 mod is just one of those games that requires massive amounts of intelligence, D&D knowledge and a superhuman amount of focus and talent. Either that or you just need to THINK you have these things. Either one will probably work.

ToEE is pure perfection. At least when it comes to RPG combat. You won't get much in the way of narrative, nor will you get any NPC interaction or inter-party banter. What you WILL get, however, is enough lopsided and unfair combat to choke a tarrasque to death. There are even optional battles with two of the Greyhawk world's gods that, if you are min/maxed to oblivion the way I did my parties, can be beaten and actually have their terror of you mentioned in the ending vignettes.

How awesome is that, right? You kill 2 gods and at the end you get THEM fearing little old mortal YOU.

ToEE was a really bad move by Tim Cain though. While the game is superb in every way (other than the glitches) it isn't the type of D&D game that moves units off the shelf. This is a game meant for obsessive compulsive losers like me. Normal people don't play Toee. Normal people don't like having a level 1 party fight a level 5 ogre with 250 hit points and an AC of 33. Normal people don't like the idea of a boss that can only be struck if you roll natural unmodified 20s. Normal people don't like perma-death.

This just ain't a normal people type of game.

ToEE is the kind of game that really speaks to people like me. I really don't need a story, I just need combat. ToEE gives me this and lets me murder every living soul in the entire game. It lets you initiate combat with any NPC, no matter how important to the "story", and beat them into the ground in hardcore turn-based combat. That is what ToEE is about and that is why I adore it so much.

It is also the hardest RPG ever made. There will never be any game that is as hard as this, and if there is, I'll probably commit ritual suicide while crying over my ToEE manual.

#12 - Arx Fatalis (PC -Also on Xbox1, but please don't play that version)

Ever play the cl@ssic DOS RPG "Ultima Underworld"? So did the makers of Arx Fatalis. They were admitted psychotic fanboys of it and had a plan to not only make a modern day version of it, but attempt to add enough to the game in order to actually...get this...improve upon it. Just a small group of RPG loving Frenchmen and a Directx 7 developer's kit. That's it. No fancy programs or software or hardware, just a group of RPG fanatics and a strong love of the genre.

What they made still stands today as one of the very best first person RPGs ever developed.

Arx Fatalis never compromised its gameplay to make itself easy or palatable for the mainstream. The tenacious enemies, the weapon swinging system, the spell casting system...reviewers called it "Awkward" and "clumsy" and "needlessly complex" but really what they all failed to do was sit down and learn how to play the god damned game. Sure it was "different", but it was that difference that made the game fun to play.

Stocking up fireballs in spell memory and unleashing them on enemies from down the hallway, backstabbing goblins as they retreated for help, this was all part of the experience and many reviewers completely missed out on it due to their bias.

The real beauty of Arx Fatalis wasn't in its combat or spell system though, the real meat of the game was in its ability to create a realistic underground with a living community and a strong atmosphere of seclusion and hopelessness. It was sort of like an "underworld version" of Gothic 2.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmMzBqjuV7c&feature=related


In the dozen or so times I've gone through Arx Fatalis I've never reached a point where roaming through the water-logged and blood soaked caverns of its underworld have failed to frighten me. The screams, the pitter-patter of goblin feet as they roam around, the realistic reactions as the enemy AI "sizes you up" and acts accordingly (sometimes running for help elsewhere in the maze) it feels so ALIVE and dynamic that each play-through brings with it a new experience. It's one of those rare games that never gets old and only strengthens with age.

Even the graphics, which can't really hold a candle to the shader model 4 beauties of the modern genre, still amaze me with how the lighting and texturing give the world such an authentic worn-out look. While other games may ramp up the texture size and poly count, Arx Fatalis did what every good RPG does: prioritize atmosphere and mood creation over sheer visual impact.

Doesn't really make sense does it? Well, the game is on Steam, so if you can't find a boxed copy then you have no excuse not to try it. I can attest that it runs perfect on XP and Vista (Though you'll need a small texture hack if you have an Nvidia card) so go out there and try it for yourself. If you love moody, realistic, challenging first person dungeon crawls you simply won't find anything ever made that was better than Arx Fatalis.


#11 - System Shock 2 (PC)

I'm currently playing through Dead Space on the PS3, and while I actually do love the game, I can't shake the feeling that it is a poor man's System Shock 2. The story is exactly the same as SS2, the monsters are born the same way the SS2 monsters were, and they possess similar abilities as well. I suppose this is a given, considering EA *stole* the rights to the System Shock series once Looking Glass folded...but the differences mostly end there.

System Shock 2 failed. It failed big time. I heard that at final count they only sold around 12,000 copies of it, of which I proudly own one with the manual and box still perfectly preserved. The game really does mean that much to me.

Picture me in the fall of 1999. Twenty-three years old and scared to go downstairs in my small bachelor pad because I was playing a game so scary I thought I was no longer alone in my own home. Yes, it freaked me out that bad, and even now after 4 trips through the game I still find myself shaken from the experience.

System Shock 2, much like Deus Ex, is a game that is neither a shooter, nor an RPG. Yes, it does have a lot of first person blasting going on, but it also has in depth character building and a fabulously well paced plot that makes Bioshock's vaunted "novel quality storyline" look like a cold puddle of piss.

Like Arx Fatalis, System Shock 2 was all about atmosphere and mood. Using the already old Thief engine, it didn't exactly scream high tech. Nonetheless, it managed to suck you into its world in a way very few games do anymore.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0b5oFI2aMQ&feature=related


I could talk forever about the horror aspects of System Shock 2, but that isn't what I felt was truly amazing about it. The great thing about SS2 that set it apart from nearly everything else I've played is that it was immensely replayable and had an unusually deep character development system for a game that was, in the end, still ****fied as an FPS.

Hacker in the Navy, soldier in the Military, crafty Psy-ops infiltrator...you could combine any of the skills in these three ****s to create a character that could approach each situation in a way totally different than someone else. Hacking security cameras and turning turrets on the "many" enemies, shooting mind blasts at your foes, researching exotic alien weapons and using them in close combat...there are so many ways to handle the game's dangers that one or two trips won't really give you the full System Shock 2 experience. Like Deus Ex (Again with the Dx comparison!) it's a game that is impossible to truly understand or appreciate unless you've gone through it multiple times in multiple ways.

System Shock 2 came out right at the tail end of what I like to refer to as "The second gold age of PC gaming". The first, having been in the late 80s/early 90s was my childhood. However the second, which spanned the last few years of the 90s and the first two of the 00's, were my adulthood. It was the last big hurrah for deep, complex, thought-provoking PC games. An era that would soon end when companies realized how much easier it was to throw in some deathmatch or just port a half-arsed game to console for a quick buck.

Unlike Deus Ex, however, System Shock's name was never dragged through the mud with horrible sequels (Invisible War) or broken spin-offs (Project Snowblind). System Shock remains untainted and stands tall as one of the most immersive and complete horror gaming experiences you can get. I'd be shocked if someone out there thought of the game in any other way.



#10 - Might & Magic 6 (PC)

Making modern day sequels to a game can be a tricky thing. More often than not the developers screw up the formula while trying to placate the mainstreamers and in doing so tick off the diehard, oldschool fans in the process. As a kid who grew up playing Might & Magic 3 and Xeen (4-5), I wasted no time in pre-ordering the limited edition of M&M6 and looked forward to the game the same way a child does Christmas morning. It was an innocent time back then in early 1998. Games on the PC had yet to get dumbed down for the masses, and a modern day sequel to a ****c franchise wasn't about stronger visuals or weakened gameplay, it was about improving what was already there and giving you more of what you loved about the original. Might & Magic 6 was that kind of sequel.

Sadly, the Pentium-133 (32 megs of ram, however) I owned at the time wasn't quite capable of running M&M6 too well. Still, it didn't stop me from going halfway through the game...until I bought a brand-spanking new Dell that September and finished the second half at a much higher Frame rate.

Might & Magic 6 was a clever, if perhaps misunderstood RPG. While it did have real-time underpinings to its combat system, it stillr etained the initiative-based phased combat of its older siblings, and re-imagined the dungeon exploration of these older games in such a way that even a cranky elitist like me found little fault with it. While I'll admit it did take a while for me to get used to the first person perspective at the time, once I did I found myself hooked and continue to play the game till this day.

Funny story time: Next to my PC, my highest score in M&M 6,7 and 8 are printed out and taped up on the wall for everyone to see....when I beat my best score/time, I print it out and replace it...heh.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95wJgIJsOBs

So what makes Might & Magic so special?

The challenge, the depth, and the stats.

Might & Magic, at least up until the 9th game, was a series that never once dumbed down its stats or make the game an action hybrid. They kept mostly the same system throughout the series and only made small adjustments that, rather than water the games down, added more replayability and challenge to them. Might & Magic celebrated its difficulty and its immense dungeons (Tomb of Varn, I really ****ing hate you) in a way that RPG designers nowadays are deathly afraid of doing.

From the very moment you are dropped on the world and get your *** handed to you by flame arrow shooting goblins on the bridge outside of town, you know you have your work cut out for you. By the time you finally eek your way through the hordes of green skinned baddies, you find a place like The Temple of Baa (Ever notice the animal references throughout the cults in the series? Mooooooo....) where about 100 high level wizards immediately zap you with every spell in the game and kill you in one hit. It's only through proper preparation, buff spell use, enemy group splitting and careful allocation of skill point that you'll see your way through the game, and that's the way an RPG should be. No free rides, no easy victories.

One of the biggest tragedies in the world of RPGs is that this series always played second fiddle to other series within the genre. In the 80s, Might & Magic struggled behind the shadow of Ultima. In the 90s, it struggled behind Baldur's Gate...and it's last chapter (9) was so abysmally bad that I'd rather play Alpha Protocol again then sit through even 5 minutes of it.

True fans instead choose to remember the good times. Might & MAgic 3 to 8 were the "core" of the series and any of them could sit here in my ten spot as one of the very best games of all time.


#9 - Wizardry 8 (PC)

Might & Magic's last installment stunk. Ultimas last two installments stunk. Nearly every ****c 80s RPG withered and died by the time it hit the modern gaming era. It's just the way things were meant to be, right? ****c CRPGs were no longer made and no one would buy them due to their difficulty, complexity and length.

Oops, someone forgot to tell that to Sir-Tech, since their last Wizardry game was also their best.

While I loved Might & Magic 6/7/8's 3D turn based combat, I'll admit it was a bit "wonky" at times. The start of rounds was poorly defined, character initiative was hard to gauge, the distance of your enemies was always difficult to measure and the overall ease of looking around and surveying the battlefield while in combat left a bit to be desired. While M&M's modern 3D turn based combat was decent, it lacked that extra level of polish and usability that I wanted in a next gen 3D turn based RPG.

Wizardry 8, however, pulled it off splendidly.

Rounds began as soon as enemies saw you, which helped clearly define round start times, character initiative was only calculated when YOUR first round began (not when the enemy attacked you), enemy distance was never a factor since range of sight determined whether or not a round could begin and the battlefield was represented on a radar screen which showed you exactly where all the enemies were at all times. In others words:

Perfection.

Those who know me know that I'm a combat nerd. I love my math, I love my formulas, I love my stats and I love my min/max'ing...to a degree. Wizardry 8 gives me just the right amount of these things and in such well spelled out and documented ways that I really don't care that the faction systems and non-linear story are so strong, I just want to fight non-stop and enjoy the expertly crafted combat system.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87fuHh2xles

I often tell people who try to "Act better than me" at RPGs that if they really want to test their RPG prowess, they need to man-up and play through Wizardry 8 on hard mode. Very few can even beat the game on normal. As a matter of fact, back when the game came out, I had gained minor fame on the Gfaqs boards by being the first gamer to beat the game and upload their save file for all the weak-*** little walkthrough writers to mooch off of and finally get through to the ending. Of course, I would have been a big man in the Wizardry 8 community had I not rubbed it in all of their faces and called them out on their lack of skills. Ahhh....memories.

Wizardry 8 is a merciless game that will randomly spawn nearly impossible monster groups on you without ever expecting you to actually beat them. The key is, as I once wrote in an FAQ I posted for the game, to destroy the "math" the game holds itself to by circumventing the formulas and breaking the odds of combat. You had to create characters that purposely extend beyond the limits and super-spec them into oblivion. Rogues with devil chains and maxed blunt weapon skill, warriors in permanent rage mode with dual weapons and no skill points anywhere but strength and swords...you need to simply beat the game at its own math.

That's the kind of RPG I LIVE for.

Ok, so it's not all math and combat. There is, believe it or not, a very well done faction system and around a dozen different ending combinations to see thanks to a somewhat non-linear story.

...but I don't play Wizardry 8 for the story, I play it for the combat. The merciless, keyboard-slamming, downright insane combat.

Only one other RPG is tougher than Wizardry 8, and that will be a little higher up in this list.

#16 - Phantasy Star 4 (Genesis)

Growing up in the mid 80s, I had only two "main" game machines I played...an NES and a Commodore 64. Though other systems and other PCs would replace them by the end of the decade, they were the only two platforms I knew at the time. I mention this because I had a lot of bitterness towards Sega Master System users for their ability to play the first Phantasy Star. If you saw how pathetic the standard NES RPGs (Dragon Warrior, Zelda, etc) were compared to it, you'd probably understand why I was so jealous of SMS players at the time. I even offered my cousin my NES and about 50 games for his SMS and Phantasy Star, but even he wouldn't take the trade. That's how amazing that game was for the kids who experienced it.

In the early 90s I made up for this by buying a Sega Genesis and getting Phantasy Star 2 and 3. They were everything I wanted in a JRPG. Incredibly long dungeons, "meaty" turn based combat, guns, futuristic settings, robots...it wasn't exactly your typical JRPG. Though since it was more than a bit harder than your "typical" JRPG, it never really caught on the way it should have. Only the obsessed (As Shigeru Miyamoto once described us) "Lonely, angry people secluded in dark rooms" enjoyed the series. I think the fact that they re-issued Phantasy Star 2 with a mandatory strategy guide should give you an idea of how complex that game was.

Then along came PS4. At the time, I had to go behind my parent's back and, after scrounging up 100 bucks to pay for the game (Yes, it was 100 dollars at launch, due to the cart size) snuck it into the house and proceeded to burn away the next three weeks playing it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws0f6c4nRLM

Most of you know me as "The PC elitist nerd" but I do love console RPGs when they are done right, and they don't get much more "right" than PS4. Top notch Genesis soundtrack, large dungeons, great graphics/animation, wonderful story, great dialog (Which was more rare at the time than even now) and a cast of characters that really made you feel. I often compare Aeris' death in FF7 to the one major death scene in PS4. Aeris' death never moved me since she was never properly developed as a PC and her death was dealt with heavy handedly. However, the death in PS4 always moves me. Not just because it was my favorite character of the series, but because of the way it was handled.

Phantasy Star 4 was a wonderful end to the series and one of the very best console games ever made, bar none. I even got Musambani to play it and fall in love with it the same way I did. I can't imagine anyone not liking it. It's one of those games that we'll just never see another of because, quite frankly, the genre doesn't hold itself to those same high standards anymore.

#15 - Revelations : Persona (Playstation 1)

I imported a lot of games for my Sega Saturn, and one of the games I always wanted translated into English but was never able to play because of "Americans being too dumb" was Devil Summoner.

I knew very little about the game beyond what Diehard Gamefan wrote in an import review of it back then. I knew you played as a disco-reject who summoned demons and made references to the occult. I knew of the God = Dog joke, I knew it was highly controversial.

I also knew I wanted it.

A year later when I heard a game related to that series was coming out for the PS1, I jumped on it like it was the last chopper out of Vietnam.

To say I became obsessed with it would be an understatement. My second IRC nickname was "Guido Sardenia" (Yeah, everyone thought I was insane too, but I was only 20.) and I made my first internet password "persona" (Bad bad move....) I simply couldn't get enough of the game and if you ever played the original Persona you'd know why.

Take the massive trap-filled 3D first person dungeons of Wizardry/Might & Magic, then combine it with highly strategic turn based combat and throw in an unusually deep magic system and you had one of the best games to play if you suffer from terminal ADHD. Though it was a bit on the "grindy" side, it had that magical weirdness that just made it tolerable enough to continue on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnqg5ExHzQY

A lot of people look back at it as being the game that finally popped the cork on all the "weird" JRPGs that Japan thought we Americans couldn't handle. While it definitely pulled open the floodgates, I think it gets unfairly criticised for the edits Atlus made to it. Yes, Mark was turned black and the translation was ghastly-horrible, but back in 1996 an occultish post-modern JRPG that encouraged demon summoning and machine gun use was something you didn't really expect to see. This was a magical moment in gaming, and no other Megaten game has meant more to me than this one right here.

Persona 3 and 4 may have killed my love of the series (Social networking? Dating ugly looking anime girls to improve your skills? Not being able to control your party members? HEAVY GRINDING FOR HOURS????) but Persona 1 and 2 (both parts, thanks to the translation hackers) still remain some of my favorite console games ever made. Matter of fact, I have the first persona game ripped and stored on my PC and occasionally boot it up in the emulator just for old time's sake. It's one of those games that really takes me back.

It's so sad that the series has become a dating sim. It's even more sad that the losers following the series now are nothing more than japanophiles who don't respect the true purpose or direction of the Megaten series. They think it's just a dating sim with RPG elements. They don't understand it's suppose to be a mature game with mature subject matter. Not a story involving an emo boy's love quest to score with a Ganjuro Girl while fighting monsters who keep him from his school studies.

I hate mainstreaming...

#14: No One Lives Forever 2 (PC)

I'll never understand why NOLF doesn't get spoken of in the same sentence as Quake, Unreal or Duke Nukem. What it lacked in nonstop action and multiplayer fun it more than made up for in storyline and humor. NOLF2 had a sexy and undeniably strong female lead (Cate Archer) that was everything Lara Croft wasn't. Sexy but reserved. Hot but tough. Smooth yet professional. As a James Bond nut, I actually consider her to be the female version of 007 and don't know why she didn't rise to cult status the way he did.

It's weird to just talk about one character instead of the entire game, but if you've played NOLF1 or 2, you know why that is. Cate's humor, the perfectly delivered lines, the laughably inept enemies, the 70s schtick, the ridiculous gadgetry...NOLF2 is just as fun to WATCH as it was to play. Go load up some Youtube videos of it and see for yourself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODeEuPokFRk&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ny2scpc_N5w&feature=related

It's more than that though, it's also a very finely tuned FPS.

Doing away with the mandatory stealth of the first game (but still keeping it an option) NOLF2 pairs together epic-level voice acting and clever dialog with expertly designed levels (Such as a trailer park caught inside a tornado) with a faux-RPG level up system that rewards exploration and skillfull combat.

...but Cate Archer. Wow. Has there ever been a more likable, amazing, incredible main character in a video game? She's right up there with BG2's Minsc and Fallout 2's Sulik in terms of awesomeness. She is, without a doubt, the best female video game character ever developed and really...the ebst FPS character ever too.

A rare poster of her hangs in my game room alongside of Leon Kennedy. The two best "action heroes" in gaming.

I stand behind that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ss4r7SMLnms&feature=related

It may be 14 on my list, but NOLF2 has a place in my heart that no other game will ever fill. Very rarely does a game leave a permanent mark on me as deep as NOLF2 did.

#13: Earthbound

This is for those who think I'm a console hater. No, I am not. I just wish consoles made more games like Earthbound.

Here's a funny little story: I was a graphics wh0re growing up and also a bit of Squaresoft fanboy (FF7 would go on to kill that part of me) so when I saw a 15 page preview of Earthbound in my Nintendo Power, I tore it into shreds and threw the whole thing into the garbage. Gotta love my temper, right?

I was a 19 year old punk and saw Earthbound as a watered down, childish looking RPG that made "my genre" look bad. I swore to never buy the game and promised to convince others to do the same...but the summer of 1995 was a bad year for RPGs and I found myself needing a "fix" and was ultimately unable to find an RPG to fulfill my needs. RPG withdrawal is a terrible thing with me (Ask Musambani) and I needed a game to sate my thirst or else I'd go nuts.

So I bought Earthbound.

And guess what? I loved it.

Earthbound really isn't a game you'd expect someone like me to enjoy. On the surface, it appears childish...but if you play it, you'd find out that the game is unusually hard (especially later in the game when you fight starmen) and incredibly funny. The game repeatedly "trolls" the player by not only making fun of the genre, but also of its players as well.

Finding HP recovering food in trash cans, using a magical eraser to erase a giant pencil that blocks your path, using a giant eraser eraser to erase a giant eraser that later blocks another path, a giant teddy bear that you can use in your party to absorb enemy blows, condiments that when added to food makes them heal more hit points, a zombie infestation ended when someone turns fly paper into zombie paper and lines the town's tent with it...you get the idea. Nothing in Earthbound makes any damn sense whatsoever, and it is this very same craziness that makes it so appealing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3dIWyvNoxM


It's a heartwarming story wrapped around a very odd game saddled with a crazy hard combat system that while a bit grindy (Aren't all JRPGs?) is very hard to find fault with.

From the very moment your character wakes up in his pajamas and gets drilled by his mother to go upstairs and change/comb his bedhead hair, you'll be hooked. The game never ever takes itself seriously and will go to great lengths to make you laugh at yourself. It sort of reminds me of what Brian Fargo tried to do with the new Bard's Tale game a few years back. You know, make the hobby look silly and ridicule it?

Earthbound beat him to it, and managed to make a good game out of it to boot.

Also, (spoiler) Baldur's Gate 2 is my second favorite RPG soundtrack of all time. Wonder what my first is?

Right mother ****ing here.

Earthbound's music is god given chip tune magnificence. It just doesn't get any better than this. Don't believe me? Check out OCRemix. No game other than FF7 has more remixes for it than Earthbound. That soundtrack is the stuff of legends and even if you don't play the game you simply have to download it.

Also, it has the very best end boss battle music EVER in a game:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDyCZiomOS4

Orgasmic. Even after all these years.

Also, here is a bit of a spoiler: Other than a console MMO that reaches the top 10, this game is the LAST console game you'll see on my list. It is, therefore, the very best single player console game ever designed. I can't say that enough. To not have played it means you never truly experienced what a console RPG can be...what a console RPG can aspire to. Earthbound is perfect in every way, even in its glaring, obvious faults.

#20 - Dungeon Keeper (PC)

Those who know me are aware of the fact that I don't particularly care for real time strategy games. While I am a PC gamer and I understand that the RTS is one of the main reasons to stay a PC Gamer, I still have never found them to be very enjoyable. Perhaps it's due to their hurried frantic nature and the fact that I prefer my games turn based and slower paced, but whatever the reason I've never been able to get into the genre, even when trying hybrid RTS/RPGs like Spellforce and Dragonshard.

There is however, one exception.

Bullfrog's 1997 release, Dungeon Keeper.

Amusingly, I didn't even know the game was an RTS when I bought it. As someone who was deeply entrenched in Diablo at the time, I took my friend seriously when he told me that Dungeon Keeper was, quote, "Diablo in reverse". I thought he meant you'd play as a demon and walk around a randomly generated labyrinth killing off heroes, not play in an RTS building game ordering monsters to guard your heart. Looking back, I think he just wanted to make a sale of the game due to the fact that not only was he one of my longest-known friends but also assistant manager of the local Software Etc store. Clever.

Regardless, I ended up enjoying the game immensely. The dark British humor, the constantly changing objectives, the slow pace and the easy to understand gameplay all worked together to ensure that I'd not be going to bed before midnight for the next couple of months.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cxzw3rLHQ3w

The greatest reason for Dungeon Keeper's lasting appeal is that it came from an era in which Peter Molyneux valued gameplay and challenge over such meaningless aspects of video gaming as graphics, sound or "ability to play the game with your arms flailing around like a mental case". At that time, Molyneux was a man who designed games rather than what he is now...a man who designs casual titles meant to be used by over-hyped peripherals.

I still believe the lack of "Black & White" achieving substantial commercial success (Even though it garnered high critic praise) caused Molyneux to have a nervous breakdown and change the way he made games. It turned him from a brave gaming frontiersman who was unafraid of risk to a play-it-safe white collar company man who made games for the lowest common denominator.


#19 - Ys Book I + II (Turbografx CD)

In the summer of 1991 I managed to convince my parents (thanks in part to having good grades the previous school year) to buy me the $400 CD add-on for my Turbografx 16 system. That Christmas I managed to also convince them to buy me the game thatw as the sole reason I wanted the system for: Ys Book I + II

Most of you have probably played the re-release for the Wii Virtual console, but if you never experienced the game when it was new you certainly missed out on something magical. At a time when RPGs were considered "The Touch of Death" and their fans were viewed as second ****gamers (at best), Ys was the one game that made even non-RPG'ers stand up and take notice. Even EGM, which was known for their hatred of the genre and a heavy bias towards fighting games, gave the game a few 9's and a 10 when their fabled "Review Crew" covered it in their magazine.

Ys was everything your typical Japanese RPG wasn't. The lead character wasn't angsty or pompous...he was a quiet protagonist who always ended up scoring with whatever hot chick he met in the game. The music wasn't full of repetitive chip tunes, it was beautifully played CD quality orchestral tunes that at times would make my speakers shake. The game didn't require massive grinding or pre-fight preparation, it merely required skill, focus and knowledge of bosses' movement patterns. It was the Anti-JRPG and a lot of gamers became fans of the series because of that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIE3lKzC008

Ys still remains one of my favorite games, and though recent additions to the series have improved upon the first two and its admittedly simplistic combat, there is still a lot to be learned from those first few entries. As simple as they may be, they are some of the best JRPG stories ever written and were the first JRPGs to not only gain mainstream appeal but break out of the genre's shell and introduce both maturity and high production values to a genre that, at the time, was still in its infancy.

The anime cut scenes, the incredible soundtrack, the intense boss fights and the ridiculously long levels (Darm Tower and the sewer section of Ys 2 both come to mind) all helped make this game a permanent resident of my now playing list all throughout the early to mid 90s.



#18 - Pool of Radiance (PC/C64/Amiga/MAC, etc. etc. etc.)

The SSI (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Box) goldbox games. No doubt if you've been reading my blog or you're one of the people who I frequently PM here you've heard me talk about them. Since most of you are RPG fans you're probably intimately aware of them and have probably toyed with them at one time or another. If however, you're like me, you look back at them the same way Catholics look back at their child's christening or the first time they drove themselves to school. As corny as that may sound, Pool of Radiance was the game that made me the hardcore RPG'er I am today.

In a recent discussion with Musambani, I mentioned that at one time RPGs were far more time consuming and difficult than they are now and cited Pool of Radiance as a perfect example of that. In the SSI goldbox games each piece of gold had its own weight, and that weight would actually alter your speed, change the amount of moves you could do in combat and even (in large amounts) make it so you were totally unable to move and force your character to collapse...making him susceptible to critical blows from even the lowliest of monsters. Even level-ups were more hands-on, since you didn't just magically improve your stats when you hit the needed amount of XP to level, you instead had to track down the appropriate trainer and stay with that person for a full week of in-game time as they taught you how to use the experience you'd gained. In some of the games you even needed to make sure the trainer was a higher level than you or else the training wouldn't work and you'd lose both the money and the week of game time.

So yes, there was a time when an RPG was a real RPG and not just an action game with a hit point bar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyVZghMKrVk

I have fond memories of playing my C64 in the sweltering summer heat that year, stuck in the upstairs computer room with a box fan and an open window overlooking the street as my only means of cooling off. Hours, days, weeks, months, years would pass as I spent my off hours playing through these games at a time when other gamers were marveling at the shallow RPGs being released for their NES. The quiet sound of this game (No music) and the occasional "PING" or "BOOM" from a spell was the only thing you would have heard in my house after getting home from school. It was my way to unwind, and helped set the stage for what would be my serious RPG addiction.

It's sad that ever since NWN2, there hasn't been any further continuation of the series. No new Baldur's Gate, no new NWN, not even a 4th edition action RPG such as a new Dark Alliance sequel. It's as if the RPG has died once again and people have forgotten the titles that brought this genre to the mainstream. All we have now are RPG hybrids or watered down RPGs with shooter elements sprinkled in with them. No more D&D, no more grand epic adventures and no more strategic combat. The best you can do is pick up NWN and get a hardcore rules module and hope for the best...which, admittedly, isn't a very good substitute for the real thing to begin with.

D&D died thanks to a combination of RPGs going mainstream and the 4th edition being nothing but a cash grab orchestrated by WotC's greedy corporate white shirts.

/rant over


#17 - Quake (PC)

Shooters were never really an obsession for me until I upgraded to P-133 and bought Quake in October of 96. Until then, I viewed them the same way I did platformers...fun little diversions that were meant to last a few hours and then forgotten. As an RPG'er, I found that they while they were fun they were unusually repetitive and had very little replay value. That is, until I had a 28.8bps modem and a copy of Quake to convince me otherwise.

Though Wolfenstien was my first FPS, Quake was, much like how Pool of Radiance was to my RPG addiction, the game that caused me to crave more of the genre. The grotesque enemies, the gore, the music (Nine Inch Nails) the genius level design and the co-op (Yes, ****ing co-op, thank you) all helped to make Quake my nightly destination for quick and easy multiplayer. Though Diablo would unseat it a few months later in 97, Quake was me and my friend's go-to game when it came to multiplayer mayhem. This was so true that even to this day my one of the friends I frequently played with (And who still comes over to play Halo with me, which is the only reason I even still play the game) brings up our "Hatchet-only" co-op play as one of his favorite gaming moments. It left a mark on a lot of gamers and though it has been replaced by other better shooters, Quake is still a game worth praising for the giant leap it forced the FPS genre to take.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Et3UByMSmg4

Quake was built with Id Tech 2, and next year we'll get to see Rage, using ID Tech 5, in action. There seems to be considerable hype over the game, and as someone who has been anxiously awaiting it since early last year I'm curious to see how it'll turn out. Especially on the PC, considering how ID had been saying they made the game with the console controller/gamepad in mind. Hopefully ID hasn't forgotten their roots and will deliver the kind of FPS I know they're capable of designing.

It won't be long until we find out.

After several discussions about the sorry state of modern gaming with both Musambani and Weedman1985, I was left with a substantial amount of rage-inducing topics to write about on my pathetic little blog. The downside, of course, was that I had so much to talk about that I couldn't pick a single topic to expound upon. To remedy this rather meaningless but nonetheless bothersome problem I've decided to throw them all into one big wall of electronic text and see if it alleviates my anger.

It probably won't though.

First up, we have a little story here about the new Xbox 360 slim and its ability to prevent Red Rings of Death...

Oh wait, it doesn't really prevent them, it just has the red light removed and instead shuts down with a warning screen!

Really Microsoft, have you STILL not learned your lesson? You treat the 360 like a console when you know damn well that modern consoles are actually small form factor PCs that require adequate heatsinks, powerful fans, spacious interior ventilation and liberal application of top quality thermal paste. Unfortunately, while Sony has done this with their PS3 the wizards working in Redmond have not. Microsoft continues to cut corners even after four (Counting the Falcon and Jasper) hardware revisions and several lawsuits, furthering the belief that they are to the tech world what McDonalds is to restaurants.

Though I suppose being in the position they are in, MS feels awfully safe and secure. They must, since their Nintendo Wii knock-off "Kinect" is going to retail at $150 bucks. Knowing that your first year or so with the device will be spent having "fun time" with virtual animals in a furry paradise, I'd have to question the sexuality of anyone who purchases it. Even moreso than I question MS's insistence on selling the ridiculous thing for over three digits.

So will Ms ever spend the required amount of money on making a 360 that is as hale and hearty as the Wii or PS3? Not as long as they know there are suckers out there who will keep buying the plastic paperweights every time their current one breaks. Until that happens, take a final look at this.

Next up, we have the taint.

No, get your mind out of the gutter, I'm talking about the taint that the lucrative and wildly successful "Free to Play" MMO market has corrupted mainstream online gaming with.

As if WoW wasn't enough, there has been a movement towards doing away with subscriptions and tricking people into playing "Free to Play" MMOs that advertise themselves to gamers too cash-strapped to afford a pay-by-the-month online game. While this sounds good, those who are familiar with the Korean MMO market aren't so easily fooled.

Lately, much ado has been made about Vindictus, a game that appears to be, on the surface, a very promising online action RPG. Unfortunately, what they are trying to hide from people is that the game is a Korean MMO called "Mabinogi Heroes" and has a very deceptive payment plan meant to lure people into forking over cash for a game that has been advertised as subscription free.

How do they intend to make you pay for a free game? How about forcing you to pay money in order to gain the ability to talk to other characters? How about charging money for being able to cast ressurection spells? Or how about locking off the end game equipment to do high level dungeons by making the items no-drop/no-trade and putting them up for sale in a marketplace that costs real world money?

Sounds brilliant, doesn't it? Other games, such as Dungeon Fighter Online and Maple Story have been doing this for years both here and abroad, so I expect this sort of thing from an Asian game development company....but what about an American one? What about Blizzard?

Recently, me and weedman had a little discussion about Diablo 3. He wondered why someone who rated Diablo 2 a ten and considered it one of his favorite games wasn't interested in the upcoming sequel. I told him that I wasn't too pleased with Blizzard dumbing the game down for consoles or vowing to charge money to play it online. He didn't believe I was telling the truth and wanted proof. So, I gave it to him:

Link

Link

Link

Link

...and the smart alecky article about blizzard charging for B.net services.

Bill Roper, a former Blizzard employee, was caught doing this with 2007's Hellgate London, and he was promptly drummed out of the PC gaming community and is now about as revered as the guy who caught that ball at the Cub's playoff game a few years back. Which is to say, everyone wants his fat head on a pike.

Now, thanks to the stateside proliferation of these free-to-play Korean MMOs, everyone is feeling comfortable with being charged money for such asinine "features" as more than one character slot, the ability to enter chat, the "right" to start a guild and the privilege of having end game equipment that non-paid players aren't allowed to pick up. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it?

Thirdly, we have the news that the Nintendo 3DS will be a "PSP Killer" and will sell like hotcakes.

Really? At a pricepoint of $250 in an economic downturn of epic proportions? REALLY?

What's incredibly sad about this is that when Musambani went and posted this around the net, they laughed heartily at the thought of the 3DS failing and claimed that Musambani was lying about the $250 price point. Really now? Maybe they should have looked at Gamespot's article about the price before they took it down....oh yes, Gamespot removed it. At least, when I checked just now to link it, it wasn't there anymore.

Instead, you have to look here or here.

Nintendo no doubt realizes that the 3DS, if priced anywhere above the 200 mark, will simply not sell. Not at a time when most people are even too skittish to pay over a C-note for Microsoft's Kinect.

I predict that the 3DS will fail miserably if it is priced at over 200 at launch. If Nintendo has lied and has in fact decided to pull an MS ****move by selling their hardware below cost, then I can see a $150-$199 3DS selling briskly over time. However, with the DS still incredibly strong (For Christ's sake, I have no idea why) and the PSP finally hitting its stride in terms of top-shelf games coming out I just don't see why anyone with even the smallest bit of common sense would buy it. After all, for every Resident Evil and Metal Gear it gets, you'll have 50 casual games that assume we are all 8 year old girls that have an unhealthy fixation with the color pink.

...and all those young girls will be the next generation of Nintendo game designers.