I think I've been spoiled by Planescape:Torment.
themazingness
Member, Mobile Tester Posts: 702
So I have this problem with RPGs. Every time I play an amazing one, I have a hard time getting into the next one. And I have this huge library of RPGs I haven't gotten around to finishing or even starting.
This last happened after I finished the Gold Box Pool of Radiance. I tried Hillsfar and Curse of the Azure Bonds, but I just couldn't get into them. I'm sure Azure Bonds is awesome, even if it isn't as good so I'll be coming back to it. I decided Hillsfar is fine to pass over. It was just too cheesy for me. In the same pass I tried some to see if D&D in a different form would help. But I couldn't get into Dragonshard or Demon Stone.
I finally got out of my funk by playing Siege of Dragonspear. It was awesome gameplay. So I was about to go on to BG2 which I never played before. And then PST:EE came out. I started playing, and I was hooked. I didn't have the usual crash and burn since I transitioned from Dragonspear to Planescape:Torment.
The only problem--this is the best RPG I've ever played and now I don't have the attention span when I try to start another one. I tried BG2: Black Pits (because that's how I started my BG1 run), and I wasn't satisfied. I tried a couple of NWN persistent worlds and about gagged on how slow the combat was and how annoying the controls/interface were. I wanted my Infinity Engine back! That and I wanted some good mobs and a full party.
I think I might have a solution. I got through most of the beginning of Baldur's Gate 2 now (not the Black Pits). But still, I miss my quirky characters and excellent plot.
Anybody else feel like once they have the best RPG everything else just feels weak? I have a bunch of D&D and 16-bit era RPGs on my to-play list, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, but none seem to be satisfactory after Planescape: Torment.
This last happened after I finished the Gold Box Pool of Radiance. I tried Hillsfar and Curse of the Azure Bonds, but I just couldn't get into them. I'm sure Azure Bonds is awesome, even if it isn't as good so I'll be coming back to it. I decided Hillsfar is fine to pass over. It was just too cheesy for me. In the same pass I tried some to see if D&D in a different form would help. But I couldn't get into Dragonshard or Demon Stone.
I finally got out of my funk by playing Siege of Dragonspear. It was awesome gameplay. So I was about to go on to BG2 which I never played before. And then PST:EE came out. I started playing, and I was hooked. I didn't have the usual crash and burn since I transitioned from Dragonspear to Planescape:Torment.
The only problem--this is the best RPG I've ever played and now I don't have the attention span when I try to start another one. I tried BG2: Black Pits (because that's how I started my BG1 run), and I wasn't satisfied. I tried a couple of NWN persistent worlds and about gagged on how slow the combat was and how annoying the controls/interface were. I wanted my Infinity Engine back! That and I wanted some good mobs and a full party.
I think I might have a solution. I got through most of the beginning of Baldur's Gate 2 now (not the Black Pits). But still, I miss my quirky characters and excellent plot.
Anybody else feel like once they have the best RPG everything else just feels weak? I have a bunch of D&D and 16-bit era RPGs on my to-play list, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, but none seem to be satisfactory after Planescape: Torment.
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Comments
The way I've dealt with it is just accept that whatever you play won't be as good, even though that may sound depressing. Just making sure that you don't let something really good cast a shadow over something else that is really good is the most important part. If Planescape ruins other video games for you, maybe it really isn't as good as it seems!
Highly recommend NWN2 original campaign and it's continuation > Mask of teh Betrayer.
If you missed it then the original NWN Shadows of Undrentide is the first part of long campaign which continue in Hordes of the Underdark... utter awesomeness from level 1 and low level adventure to Epic levels with gods and whatnot...
@themazingness I agree with you. Fortunately I met PS:T after BG1 and BG2
And BG1 was cool, gave me feelings that I play Tabletalk rpg with my computer DM.
Etc etc, eventually you'll burn out and be ready to play something new and you'll give Torment a long enough break before you replay it, that you'll forget lots and lots of stuff, and allow yourself to wake up on the slab fresh and new
I don't know if you've tried Bloodlines? but if you havn't, you should. And if you can manage very, very old 3d graphics, i would suggest Anachronox, and Deus Ex. If you're in to turn-based combat games with minor RPG elements, then i also recommend Silent Storm, ToEE and Black Guards. Other great RPGs are Fallout (the best RPG of all time), and New Vegas. (Never been a fan of Fallout 2 which i dislike)
Even the low-resolution graphics play a role in this, as they provide my mind's eye with a framework it can fill with its own details, much like it does (or, well, did) when playing tabletop.
Oh my, I'm salivating over the thought.
It's like Fae Food. It is said if mortals eat food from the Fae, they are unable to ever eat normal food again as it simply cannot compare, and so are doomed to die of starvation unless they remain in the Fae lands to be toyed with for the rest of their lives.
PS:T is very delicious, indeed . . . .
While working on pst I discovered that the story and characters of Nier are basically pst dialed up to 11.
The gameplay isn't at all similar, but it should shake itself up enough to keep you interested if a more hack and slash approach to combat isn't your thing.
you: I choose githyanki's floating skull inhabited by restless spirit. Also I can't die.
game: ...
Little did I know I would play my four favorite games all back to back XD
I feel your feels exactly.
PS:T is not an ideal either. For its amazing story/writing it pays the price of being very unflexible. Not only it is a rather linear game to begin with, there is also basically only one way to play it. You want to pump WIS, INT and CHA, and then lack of physical combat skills will push you into a role of a mage. Not increasing these stats is just not worth it - you will miss out on about a quarter of content this way. It's not even like Fallout, where creating a dumb character is hilarious as wherever you're trying to talk to anyone you can only manage grunts and caveman-speak. In PS:T no INT simply means no dialogue options open, no WIS simply means no memories, and so on; there is just no reason whatsoever to not get them, it's not a trade-off, it's do-you-want-content-or-not. So every PS:T game is the same WIS, INT and CHA mage-TNO game. At best you can rotate few party members, but there's so few of them that the variance is pretty limited either way.
As for the setting, it's again limited by the contraints of the game's story. "center of the multiverse governed by a lady who probably is six giant squirrels with control issues, and whose world is literally shaped by philosophy" is a nice idea to think about, but in practice it boils down to you getting Mazed if you piss off the Lady of Pain once, and accidentally creating Adahn if you play pretend him too much.
But if you can broaden your horizons to appreciate other aspects of these kinds of games, then there are other very solid choices. Icewind Dale is a nice dungeon-based game, though there's very little role-playing to be done in it; Temple of Elemental Evil is probably the single best tactical-combat game of this type, though its scope is limited; while BG and especially BG2 are strong in all of these areas though not necessarily "best" at any of them.
Broadening your horizons a bit more, you can consider Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, which are strong modern successors to the IE era, or maybe Kingmaker now that some of its bugs have been worked out. You could also take a look at the original Fallout 1 or Knights of the Old Republic, which have a lot of similarities in spirit to the old IE games and certainly have strong role-playing elements even though both have dated graphics/interfaces and are in need of an EE-style refreshing.
If you're willing to consider games with less role playing and a bit more of a Diablo flavor, you could consider D:OS and D:OS2, which sold way better than any of the games listed above and offer a faster-paced alternative to IE-type products.