E3 Awards lists nominees

[Saint_Proverbius]

<a href="http://www.e3awards.com">E3 Awards</a> has announced their <a href="http://www.e3awards.com/nom.html">Big List O'Nominees</a> for the <i>best of the best</i> of the show stuff to be judged on June 10th by <a href="http://www.e3awards.com/judges.html">big names</a> in the gaming journalism arena.

<blockquote><b>Best Role Playing Game</b>
- Deus Ex: Invisible War (Ion Storm/Eidos for PC/Xbox)
- Fable (Big Blue Box/Microsoft for Xbox)
- Final Fantasy X-2 (Square-Enix for PlayStation 2)
- Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic (BioWare/LucasArts for PC/Xbox)
- Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines (Troika Games/Activision for PC)</blockquote>

Kind of an odd list, isn't it? I only see one I'm moderately interested in.

Spotted this at <a href="http://www.homelanfed.com">HomeLAN Fed</a>.

 

[Deathy]

I think that's because it's questionable if any of those titles are actually real CRPG's.

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

hey

I'm kinda interested in Fable, they have some cool ideas of how your character can evolve. The game sounds like it should be on PC, but it's on Xbox instead.

 

[EEVIAC]

Re: hey

I'm kinda interested in Fable, they have some cool ideas of how your character can evolve. The game sounds like it should be on PC, but it's on Xbox instead.

Agreed. It sounds as much a simulation as it does an RPG. I like a lot of its ideas, I'm just not sure whether it will all work as a game though. Running around in your underwear scaring people sounds like fun.

 

[Azael]

Personally, I would probably put ToEE over Bloodlines, as it sounds more interesting to me. Guess it's hard to compete with the latter's graphics though.

Deus Ex, well, to me it seems like they removed the last RPG element in the game when they replaced attributes with augmentations. Final Fantasy fails to interest me at all and Fable doesn't exactly strike me as a RPG either.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I second that, although I lost all my fingers trying to get the sword

 

[Azael]

Dang, that was a cool website! The game's graphics are amazing, but I'm a bit skeptical about how the gameplay will turn out.

 

[triCritical]

Dang, that was a cool website! The game's graphics are amazing, but I'm a bit skeptical about how the gameplay will turn out.

Isn't this that stupid game from the maker of Black and White that will have girlfriends and all. If so I heard about this game. You just got a love a game that is more boring then real life.

 

[Zetor]

Isn't this that stupid game from the maker of Black and White

Don't forget Populous and Syndicate.

That said, I think it's probably going to suck... mr. Moly is having a severe case of 'Kitchen Sink Syndrome' which'll probably result in a lot of missed deadlines and/or a huge amount of broken / missing features.

Also, am I the only one here who is looking forward to DX2? Sure, it's linear and they killed the skill system in the consolization process, but I still think it has the potential to be a good, intelligent FPS. Ah well, gotta wait and see I guess.

-- Z.

 

[Greenskin13]

Also, am I the only one here who is looking forward to DX2? Sure, it's linear and they killed the skill system in the consolization process, but I still think it has the potential to be a good, intelligent FPS. Ah well, gotta wait and see I guess.

I am, somewhat. I liked the first DX as an above-average FPS, but I'm not sure if getting rid off the attributes was a good idea just to dumb it down for the port. In the end, I'll probably look into it, but it probably won't save me from dissapointment.

 

[Elwro]

Isn't this that stupid game from the maker of Black and White

Don't forget Populous and Syndicate.

Didn't he also make Dungeon Keeper? BTW, I remember playing Populous on two PC XT machines connected by a COM cable 1200 baud. Those were the times...

 

[huh]

Dungeon Keeper 1 and 2 were great, I thought. played them a lot. yes, by Molinaux (sp?). there were plans for DK3. in the ending cut scene in DK2 you can see how it was supposed to go... then it got canned. well, there is something like that in the pipeline - Evil Genius ( www.howevilareyou.com ), sounds pretty cool.

I think Molinaux has tons of great and original ideas, but sometimes loses something basic in the process, like in B&W. maybe they'll fix it with B&W2. there are supposed to be armies and sieges and other traditional gameplay things.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

There's also Ghost Master, which looks like it's taking a page from Dungeon Keeper as well. I don't think Molyneux was involved with Dungeon Keeper 2, though.

 

[huh]

ah yes, Ghost Master! completely forgot. thanks for reminding. this is a game I'm looking forward to. and true Malinaux wasn't directly involved with DK2.

[edit] oh, yeah, he's also working on http://www.themoviesgame.com/ 8)

 

[EEVIAC]

Isn't this that stupid game from the maker of Black and White that will have girlfriends and all. If so I heard about this game. You just got a love a game that is more boring then real life.

I admire the fact that you're given so much choice. Yes you can have girlfriends/wives, they can complain that you spend all your time out on campaigns and not enough t ime at home, and you can divorce them if you want, with your sword. The game does actively support the evil player.

And true Molyneux wasn't directly involved with DK2.

I don't think he's directly invovled with Fable's development either, he's more of a creative consultant.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Evil in B&W sucked though. If you trained your creature to be a good creature, he'd actually save your ass in the later end game by relieving you from doing a lot of the micromanagement. If you trained him to be evil, you wouldn't get that help from the creature and in a lot of cases, it'd force you to do more micromanagement. The spoils of evil in the game didn't match up to the consequences.

 

[Eldar]

I always play the good guy anyhow (making up for my evil ways in real life) but I found Black and White rather tedious. I going to have to pick up an X-BOX soon, though, just to give console RPGs a chance. I have discarded them out of hand so far but I don't want to let my prejudice get in the way of a good game.

Now, I know folks around here are going to be pretty much universally against consoles. Fair enough. ...But the idea behind Fable isn't so bad. Getting it done right on the other hand *Shrug*

 

[Zetor]

Console RPGs aren't bad, per se -- they usually have good graphics, nice sound / music and sometimes an interesting combat / character system. The #1 problem with them is how freakin' static each and every one of them is.. there's no innovation anywhere and each of them plays exactly the same. Oh, sure, the story / characters / etc are different, but ... I'm not playing a game to read a [half-assed] story [thought up by some crackhead new-age guy]. Reading a book is much more effective forconveying a story (I recommend George R. R. Martin's 'A Song of Ice and Fire' series). Add to that an insane amount of teenage angst and a multitude of cliches and presto, instant console RPG.
FF fanbois are also extremely scary and detached-from-real-life; if you want to see for yourself, go to any console-oriented board. Incidentally, if you were to ask what RPGs they think the most innovative, you'd get a lot of replies like "omg FF7 was teh most innovativ an bestest gaem evar!!11!! ^_^ sephiroth LUV". No comment. Never mind that they haven't even PLAYED any PC RPGs... oh, and convincing them or at least having them acknowledge the existence of PC RPGs is a lost cause. [I tried, the only reply I got was 'that was a long post, too long to read', while it wasn't anywhere near the length of that one guy's posts who hex-edited his class in FFT to an enemy-only class and soloed the game... mmm, mutable attention spans, gotta love it.]

Now, this doesn't apply to all of the console RPGs out there, only like 99% of them. Some do try to innovate and usually end up as niche titles to be declared 'gay' by the millions of mouth-breathing fucktar-- er, sorry, FF fans. But overall they're a fine example of mainstream gaming stifling innovation and encouraging 'safe' entertainment. If PC RPGs [cept for Blizzard and Bioware] are the <insert geeky-yet-good show here> of the gaming world, console RPGs are "Friends". Safe, risk-free entertainment for the masses. sigh.
[for the record, I did play through a LOT of console games, from FF6 to Grandia 2... most of them on a SNES emu, on my friend's PSX or the PC where there was a PC port to begin with; the ones I'd recommend playing are Chrono Trigger, FF6, Tactics Ogre, Vagrant Story and perhaps Xenogears]

whew, that was a long rant... it wasn't aimed at you, sorry if you took it that way it's just one of my pet peeves.

-- Z.

 

[Rosh]

Zetor, for a good, classic case of a console CRPG moron, check out the Fallout Enforcer thread at VideoGameReview.com, link found in the original FOS thread on the CRPG forum here.

Solid Shithead was the fellow's name, I think.

 

[Zetor]

Heheh, yeah, I remember that guy -- a true classic. At first I thought he was just trolling and trying to paint console gamers in a bad light, but after a few posts it became apparent that he was the real thing. [tm]

-- Z.
"omg ff7 = best rpg evAr!!11111"

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

I tend to agree with that assessment, since the main problem I've always had with console CRPGs is that from the time you start playing, how the game plays out is determined by the writers all the way to the end. Every single event you deal with is locked in stone. About the only thing you determine for yourself is how many random encounters you do for the simple sake of levelling up to beat the next boss monster.

Any "change" your character makes in persona is always scripted. There are no choices on the subject. The "role" is not yours.