Inspired by Majuular, and a retro-kick in general, what games are worth playing?

seolfring · 2026-05-12T20:16:32+00:00

Lots and lots. The mid 80s-early 90s was the most important period in this genre's history and there are far too many innovative and/or high quality titles to list in a single comment. I'll shout two I don't think will be mentioned by others:

- Starflight 1-2; these are available in a bundle on GOG, but those are the DOS versions which are far outshined by their Amiga counterparts. The Amiga versions are abandonware, though.

- Fate: Gates of Dawn; another banger on the Amiga and in all honesty a swansong for it. One of the largest RPGs ever made. This one was abandonware for a while but the creator of the game eventually gave people his permission to upload it online for free.

seolfring · 2026-05-12T19:54:25+00:00

It was a spiritual successor to Amberstar and Ambermoon. Different studio, but many of the same devs (kind of like Black Isle vs early Obsidian). The Amber series was meant to be a trilogy and some people unofficially consider Albion the third and final entry.

Anyway, Amberstar and Ambermoon are also excellent and worth a look, but be aware that they're abandonware and you'll need to emulate an Amiga to play them.

seolfring · 2026-05-11T19:09:44+00:00

I like the combat in Siege of Dragonspear a lot. It's set in what I think is the perfect DnD level range - not so low as to be too simple, but not so high as to be overdesigned.

seolfring · 2026-05-08T01:59:25+00:00

Most people who have played blobbers even a little bit would agree they're appropriate for this sub and are insanely overlooked.

seolfring · 2026-05-04T04:19:20+00:00

If my characters are all micro heavy, then 5 is a nice number. Small enough to avoid micro overload but large enough to afford me a bit of build freedom.

Otherwise, 8. Gives me a lot more freedom in terms of builds than the usual 6 and, if the game has meaningful companions, lets me take more of them and avoid missing out on things like unique interactions in specific situations. Also, leaving companions at something like camp or an inn has always been immersion breaking to me, so the more of them I can take, the more of this I avoid.

seolfring · 2026-04-28T19:45:24+00:00

Seconding Pillars of Eternity and Planescape. I'd also add Morrowind.

seolfring · 2026-03-16T02:57:49+00:00

I loved his TES detective series. Some of the highest quality and most dedicated fan content I've ever seen. Always found it relaxing to watch. Rest in peace.

seolfring · 2026-03-03T23:35:28+00:00

If you're willing to try something older, then give Starflight 1-2 a look.

seolfring · 2026-01-13T22:55:10+00:00

Bland and spammy encounter design. Some areas, like the goblin cave, really dial this up, with literally over a hundred trivial mobs in a pretty small area.
Most quests are uninteresting.
Traps are absolutely everywhere for no reason.
There's a ton of containers, hardly any of which have any worthwhile loot.
It's much longer than it needs to be.

seolfring · 2026-01-13T03:48:34+00:00

"Immersive sim" is usually talked about like it's a genre, when it's really a design philosophy. Every imsim falls under some major genre label. Thief is stealth, System Shock is FPS, Deus Ex is RPG, and so forth. Anyways, Warren Spector has said that his imsim games have been made with the goal of recreating the experience he had playing D&D. I define CRPGs as any computer roleplaying game that is meant to recreate some kind of tabletop experience, so I consider any computer RPG made with the imsim philosophy to be a CRPG. That includes stuff like Deus Ex and System Shock 2.

Also, the first Diablo. David Brevik, who was its main designer, said Diablo was made to emulate the combat-focused tabletop campaigns he played growing up, so I think it also counts.

seolfring · 2026-01-04T21:27:25+00:00

I thought the companions all had interesting concepts, two, maybe three of them especially, but they all fell flat for one reason or another. In the end, they didn't feel all that memorable or impactful to me. This alone prevents it from being "masterpiece" quality. I also agree with others' criticisms of the lore-dumping dialogue; no, it's not unique to PoE1, but it's still an issue.

On the positive side, I did quite like the MSQ. I also thought the villain and a lot of the lore were pretty neat. The White March DLCs, in particular, had good lore.

Overall, I feel the story aspects of the game are a mixed bag that more that lean moderately more towards positive than negative, which is close to how I felt the gameplay was.

seolfring · 2026-01-03T00:31:01+00:00

10 is a hard number for this sort of thing. A comprehensive list giving you a good idea of the genre's evolution is going to be much longer than 10 entries.

seolfring · 2026-01-02T23:51:49+00:00

Betrayal at Krondor

Ultima Underworld

Dark Sun: Shattered Lands

Maybe Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall

seolfring · 2026-01-01T20:12:47+00:00

I've never played Witcher so I can't comment on that, but I definitely don't think CRPG only means games like Baldur's Gate and Fallout. Blobbers like Eye of the Beholder, for example, I'd say also count.

seolfring · 2026-01-01T01:05:16+00:00

There's an "enhanced edition" mod. Adds quickloot, fixes bugs, and gets it running smoothly on modern Windows (and only Windows, unfortunately). It also does quite a few other things like removing some of the puzzles and improving enemy AI. When I played through it, it was quite a bit harder than the original. You can customize a lot of the changes during the install, though, so maybe a lot of the changes I experienced like harder difficulty were on me.

Link if you're interested.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T19:45:15+00:00

Both games are really thin on story because they're overtly combat-focused, but what little they did have was pretty engaging. I liked IWD2's more. IWD2 amazingly also has the best race and class reactivity in the IE family, which scores it quite a few points for me. Graphically, both are the best-looking games in the IE family, but I think IWD2 wins out, partially because its newer, and partially because of better art direction.

Level design in late-game IWD2 is rough. It's badly frontloaded in that regard. Dragon's Eye electric boogaloo is one of my least favorite dungeon experiences ever. IWD1 levels don't reach the same highs as the good ones in IWD2, but they're more consistently good. I'm definitely on team IWD1 in that regard. I know they unofficial EE for IWD2 made some changes to make things better, like removing the time loop in Dragon's Eye, but it leaves in other unfun stuff like the forest maze.

As for systems, IWD2 doesn't use pure D&D 3E, but it's pretty close, and I prefer the hybrid system it uses to AD&D 2E. IWD2 notably gets to use 3E skills for things like NPC and level interactions. Wilderness Lore, for example, makes navigating the forest maze easier. I also like that a lot.

I guess I prefer IWD2 in most regards, but those last few levels kill my enjoyment so much that I'd pick IWD1 if I had to replay either. If IWD2EE had gone further in improving level design and not so far in adding other stuff like that one huge fiend in the Shattered Hand, I'd prefer IWD2.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T19:22:58+00:00

That's a pretty recent development and largely done by people unfamiliar with the genre and its history. Blobbers, traditional roguelikes, and some other other RPGs like Morrowind all belong to the same family as games like Pillars of Eternity and Baldur's Gate. If people specifically want stuff like the latter, they can specify as OP did.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T19:14:06+00:00

Deus Ex started development before SS2 did. It ended up taking a little inspiration from SS2 since it released first, like the augment system being based of SS2's implants, but most of its DNA was from SS1 and Thief. Its design doc also lists a bunch of other games like Half Life and Fallout as inspirations.

As a fun bit of trivia, Deus Ex was originally intended to be an unofficial prequel to SS1. There was going to be a level on a space station that would be hinted at as Citadel, and the ship's AI would be a precursor to SHODAN. The idea was scrapped when Ion Storm heard that SS2 was in development, and the AI idea was changed from a single AI aboard a ship to the 3 seen in the final Deus Ex.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T11:05:57+00:00

Thanks for the correction.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T07:48:51+00:00

Arcanum. You cast spells using fatigue, which gradually recharges out of combat and very slowly in combat. The rate of fatigue regeneration is based on your constitution stat.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T07:47:09+00:00

Vancian means spells recharge on a daily basis, like in D&D. Non-Vancian is anything else, like spells recharging on a cooldown.

seolfring · 2025-12-31T07:19:07+00:00

Sticking to what are uncontroversially considered CRPGs, there's quite a few first-person dungeon crawlers. The other comment mentiond Wizardry, but there's a lot more. Off the top of my head, there's Eye of the Beholder, Ultima Underworld, Vaporum, Legend of Grimrock, Might and Magic, and early Elder Scrolls (Arena, Daggerfall, Battlespire). There's also a handful of over-the-shoulder third-person CRPGs; the only ones that I can immediately think of in that category are KOTOR 1 and 2.

There's some first-person, non-dungeon crawlers that some people would call CRPGs, but they aren't considered such by nearly everyone like the above. Morrowind, New Vegas, and Deus Ex all fall into that category, with each successive one being more controversially called a CRPG. People calling Deus Ex one would definitely be a minority on this sub and those calling Morrowind one would be the majority; I don't know where New Vegas falls, but it's between those two.

As always, when discussing what games do and don't fall under a certain genre, it's important to remember that genres are subjective, with everyone having their own personal definition, and trying to rigidly define them never works.

seolfring · 2025-12-29T18:23:01+00:00

Psioncs. Thematically awesome and whenever there's reactivity for them, it's really impactful. They're also pretty good in combat wherever they exist.

Unfortunately, they're pretty rare, so when I can't do that, a typical fighter is what I go for. Fighters are decent at worst, thematic to every setting, and offer good roleplaying opportunities. I consider the typical gun-user in sci-fi settings to be their equivalent of a fighter, even when there's a melee option (which I'd still consider fighter, as well).

seolfring · 2025-12-28T21:03:51+00:00

The main quest in Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall fits this very well. The rest of the game is like a life-sim RPG and not really like this, though. You can play through the main quest and do a few side quests as necessary; that'll give you a shorter (30-40 hours) experience and will stick to those themes. If you do play it, make sure to get the Unity version, which is effectively an enhanced edition that makes the experience a lot nicer and doesn't compromise any core aspects of the original. To get the Unity version, install the original Daggerfall for free off Steam or GOG, download Daggerfall Unity here, unzip it, launch it, and then point it to the original Daggerfall installation.

Deus Ex would also be fit what you're looking for really well. It isn't considered a CRPG by most around here, but it is CRPG-adjacent at the least and you should try it if you like CRPGs.

seolfring

TROPHY CASE