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The Slowly-Dying Death of RPG's.
shadowlord30
Member Posts: 86
I've been thinking about this for a few days, and I felt that I needed to let it out.
RPG's used to be the sole domain of the Otakus, the Stat Geeks, and the D&D Junkies. In these video and pen and paper games, fans and fanatics alike could lose themselves in their chosen character, and experience on the TV and in their minds, a new world, a different world, than the one in which they lived. They could move, explore, grow, change, and affect the world around them.
The Golden Age of RPG's was during the Nintendo and Super Nintendo Eras. Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy, Breath of Fire, Chrono Trigger, Dungeons & Dragons, Secret of Mana. For any classic RPG'er, these names bring back lots of memories, and hours of fun. True, some people occasionally became social recluses while playing their particular "poison of choice," but it was all in good fun. So what if you only saw your family once or twice a day? You deafeated Kefka, and Lavos, and The Dragon Lord, and Deathevan, and you saved the world.
Then, the Mainstream came....
After the overwhelming success of Final Fantasy VII, the Suits started seeing the dollar signs instead of the quality. Slowly, the RPG games started to have less and less to do with RPG, and more to do with mainstream appeal. More and more RPG's started having lots of mini-games. Mini-games that had absolutely nothing to do with the main storyline of the game. That was just the start. The games started involving T&A, something that was anathema to most RPG games. Some gamers got absolutely turned off. Others took the guilty pleasure and ran with it.
The most recent slap in the face was the release of the game Final Fantay X-2. This game was released for one reason and one reason only: to capitalize on the media buzz around the Charlie's Angels movies. Hundreds of thousands of horny, teeange boys rushed to the stores to purchse a cheap knock-off of a cheap knock-off of a 1970's television series. The game creators were no longer designing the games. The Suits were. The Suits, who ultimately, had nothing more on their minds than the dollars signs.
Then, it looked like the geeks had a new refuge. The birth of the MMORPG Era created a new way for RPG geeks to get back to their roots, and even allowed them to converse and explore their new worlds together. But then, the Mainstream, with the Suits and the dollar signs reared their ugly heads again. Star Wars Galaxies and Final Fantasy XI were, in the end, a way for the Suits to get more money from obssessed fans who were clamoring for anything and everything in their chosen poison.
There have been a few bright spots recently, such as Star Ocean 3, and Morrowind. Other than that, most of the RPG's were cash cows; and we bought them even knowing what they were. The reason we bought them, was because they were the only things available.
So, let us give one final farewell to one of the greatest game genres in history, and mourn it's passing.
Comments
i feel what you are saying. I haven't been able to get into a game as much as the day i found an emulator and struck gold on a few great RPGs (Star Ocean 1, Super mario RPG, Tales of phantasia, Crono Trigger, secret of mana series).
Make of it what you will.
Hate to break this to you but, as a die hard Roleplayer and RPG Gamer and P&P Dungeons & Dragons and other games....
SWG is the single best MMORPG available. It's got more avenues for pure roleplay than any other MMO on the market, including Ultima Online, which in my opinion is 2nd. It has a very good atmosphere and is a ton of fun to play as well. It's got variety, depth and immersiveness. Something so many other MMO's that have hit the market lack.
Nice post though. I agree with some of it but I never thought of PC or Nintendo "RPG's" as anything but money grubbing attempts to leach off the roleplaying community. They were fun but they were hardly that great. PC games were (and still are) generally far superior to console. There are a few (rare) exceptions to this but for the most part any game written for a console is purely for profit.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
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"MMOs, for people that like think chatting is like a skill or something, rotflol"
http://purepwnage.com
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"Far away across the field, the tolling of the iron bell, calls the faithful to their knees. To hear the softly spoken magic spell" Pink Floyd-Dark Side of the Moon
Genres ebb and flow. They proclaimed CRPG to be a corpse just before BioWare renewed its popularity. It will return again, as it always does.
I have to agree with Elnator. From a role-players point of view, SWG is probably one of the best games out right now. There are so many things to do in that game.. Tons of different hunter classes, merchant classes, a few doctor classes, Jedi class, space fighting. Not to mention the fighting classes are so diverse, gun fighters, riflemen, pistoleers, martial artists, fencers, swordsman, etc.
I'm not saying the game is a great game, in fact I didn't really like it, but from a role-players point of view - it's a great game.
Also, you have a great post, but I beg to differ with the points you made. I feel that RPGs are very much alive now, single player RPGs are definitely coming back into the main light. I don't think X-2 really signifies the death of RPGs..
Another thing; you're talking about the death of RPGs. I'm going into MMOs now. You talk about FFXI and SWG being a signal of the death of RPGs. I don't understand this, like stated before, SWG in itself is a pretty good RPG from an RPers point of view. And I've known a lot of hardcore RPGers who have loved FFXI. If you're going to go into the death of RPGs, talk about CoH and WoW.
However, while I want to say the RPG market has flourished, I must agree that we're seeing a slow death of the concept of [MMO]RPGs. I think a lot of things contribute to this, I won't go into them all.
MMORPGs, in my opinion, have always been a haven for the older and more mature gamers. I think this was mostly due to the monthly fees and the general mechanics of RPGs. Well, of course the MMORPG market evolved and the inevitable happened, younger players started to flood in. There has been a max influx of players, consisting largely of players in the 13-16 year old range. Obviously there's nice players in that age range, but let's be honest here, it's not pretty. Two things have happened as a result of this influx of players and this budding new age group; a) the mechanics of games have changed immensely c) youre seeing a sort of counter-strike effect in the RPG market.
Firstly, the game mechanics of RPGs are really beginning to change. This is due to games trying to cope with the needs of the players and what is often referred to as the common player. The definition of the common player has changed too. Instead of going into what the common player was, I will state what I think it is now. I think term common player often refers to your a) younger teenage action gamer and your b) busier college gamer type. Anyhow, back to what I was saying. RPGs are really starting to change due to the new types of players we are seeing. RPGs have always been somewhat of a long term commitment and slow and tedious up until about a year and a half ago or so. I wont go really deep into it, so Ill start at CoH.
CoH was one of the most popular games last summer, it was plain and simple yet it made a huge impact on the RPG market. The game did not focus on leveling or making you better than anyone. Instead, it focuses on quick and easy fun. I guess we can call it instant action. Itll suffice to say, the game was simple and everybody friggin loved it. The game no doubt was made for the aforementioned casual gamer. Of course, you still had your pessimistic old-type RPGers nay-saying the game. I believe the attention the game got is what made some of us so bitter.
Also, youre going to start seeing a sort of Counter-Strike effect in the MMORPG world. And Im sure someone will really get on me for this comment, but CoH was such a great success, so WoW went in the same direction. Now lets look at WoW, it too is a pretty simple game, but extremely successful. WoW was probably one of the most successful RPGs in the past 3 years.
So Im pretty sure what will happen next. Game developers will take note of the success of CoH and WoW, and begin to make the mechanics of their games mirror those games. What well see is a rise of simple, instant action type games. IMO, games will begin to dumb down to a certain extent.
Itll work in cycles; the games will become really repetitive and boring, and then go back to the old grind system.
But now Im really sick of writing. This post was way too long. All I can hope is that you all will understand my point and not flame too much. Im sorry for generalizing so much but its just my opinion of things.
To summarize it all up: Games are changing, their communities and their mechanics. Whether it is good or not, Id rather not say. I figure Ill jump along the bandwagon and enjoy the ride.
You hit it on the nose friend, the very thing I've been saying for years too. RPG's, and video games in general are slowly losing sight of the bigger picture. I would gladly trade in my hundreds of games for 1 or 2 that were worth playing again and again. Morrowind is by far the only single player RPG that I still play, years after its release, it's still enjoyable, breath taking, fun, exciting, and emmersive.
MMOG's are a different story, still realitivly young compared to RPG's, they have alot to learn still. Ultima Online had the right idea but ultimatly failed to create a true virtual world. Many will try, and many will fail, some will show promise and deliver, other will hype you up and then let you down. such is the way of the market right now. I say it's time a dev team takes more than a step forward, and does what everyone else is afraid to do.
Well, if you agree with the problem then I suggest you might be contributing to it. The big picture for gaming companies, in general, is money. If you continue to keep buying their games even though you feel they're not worth playing more than a couple times.. they'll continue making them.
So, I submit that they game companies ARE seeing the big picture, which is.. "Consumers are idiots who can't wait to repeatedly burn their money on something they'll soon be complaining about, but will come back again and again."
Why should they make a game that you'll be satisfied with for a month? It's SMART to make games as they are now, since many consumers will just go out and buy another one after they finish the first. However contrary it may seem.. in today's market it's BAD business to make a game that you and I might consider "quality". I'm sorry to have to inform you, but the players who still like the old school values are the niche in the gaming market. Catering to the niche is a sure way to create a failing (or at least low profit margin) MMORPG.
Then again I suppose it's human nature not to take responsibility for things that WE cause. We delegate it. If the majority of people stopped buying games of lower quality (not everyone, since opinions differ on what's good and what isn't) then companies would soon realize they have to go back to making a quality game in order to retain it's customers.
- Nellus
The thing about RPGs is that the programmed NPCs are too predictable, the pathway usually too linear, an exception was Morrowind. But still it left me wanting something. That's why I'm so intrigued by the possibilty of MMOs. Other humans controlling the other characters leaves an almost limitless possiblity of interaction/challenge. The problem is exactly what was said in the previous long post. I think it is true to a great extent that the mainstream ones are being dumbed-down. But like you said, Munka, you would be happy with one or two quality games to play over and over - or continuosly in the case of a persistent MMO. There doesn't need to be a glut of quality games, only one REALLY good one. My money's on Adellion. It's not controlled by the suits, just a great group of VOLUNTEER devs. The quality promises to be great, and they have some great innovations to discourage out of character play and griefing. I doubt there will be many 13 to 16 y/o playing, not with all the other choices they have that offer INSTANT gratification. Check it out and see for yourself.
WWW.ADELLION.COM
Hmm I dunno I don't buy games that I only play once or twice. Rarely have I been burned because I know what I enjoy and I don't buy anything that I don't think I'll like. Every game I own I played for months, (years in the case of most of the MMO's I chose to buy). And most games I own I got a free trial or a demo or played on a friend's computer first. I rarely buy something I haven't had the chance to try first.
And I'm always open and honest with gaming companies as to why I choose not to buy their games on the beta boards (or on their feedback boards).
I suspect that if more people would tell gaming companies why they don't like their games instead of posting things like "This game is teh suxorz, bye" that they would improve the games instead of blowing off the morons who leave them.
Currently Playing: Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Sig image Pending
Still in: A couple Betas
want more opinions?
http://www.cmgsccc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1781
I've noticed a fun trend.
Anything that's marketed towards women is almost immediately taken up by the gaming community as being a betrayal to the genre, and things that are popular are inherently wrong.
If popularity ruined music, then I think you should first begin cursing the Rolling Stones, the Doors and other such groups. They were popular too, y'know. I'm willing to bet, even, that every band you listen to is going to mention one person who was extremely popular for why they even started music.
Anyhow, back on track. Holy crap, I said, they're actually going to have a game with three women as not only the main characters but the only characters? It was an understandable move to make for many reasons--one, Square Enix is going to spend itself out. Reusing popular characters for a game saved the company a lot of money; they were able to create a decent game with half of the overhead and thus save themselves from the Ultima problem of twice the money on each game and the same fan-base.
But wait. Their girls. It involves clothing changing somehow (nevermind the outfit changing on my MMORPG characters, that's cool when their appearance changes because I've new weapons and stuff) so tres lame.
My final word to you is: Tales of Symphonia. If you haven't found a good RPG since the golden age, my response to you is--Looking for them? It might help a little.