fix lighthouse best practice issues
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@ -5,7 +5,7 @@ title = "Impressive GBA RPGs"
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tags = ['rpg concepts', 'Final Fantasy', 'Yggdra Union', 'Fire Emblem', 'Golden Sun', 'Tatics Ogre', 'Final Fantasy Tactics', 'Riviera', 'feature']
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<img src="/img/articles/GBARPGs.jpg"/>
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Since the Nintendo DS has been released a couple of years ago, many game related websites predicted a quick and painful death for the Gameboy Advance. Thankfully, none of those predictions made it into reality since the GBA library is still steadily growing, although a whole lot slower than in 2002. Nintendo's smart marketing ideas enabled the DS to play GBA cartridges which indirectly prolongs the overall GBA's life. Therefore, a lot of potentially great games have been released but mainly ignored in favor of less entertaining DS games. So let's take a look at the most impressive GBA Roleplaying or Strategy games!
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@ -13,8 +13,7 @@ Of course no console or handheld's RPG collection is truly complete without any
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This leaves us with V and VI. Most people would probably agree VI is the superior one and one of the best FF games in the series. But you can't play it yet on your GBA unless you're Japanese. Final Fantasy V includes a complex job system first introduced in III, similar to Final Fantasy Tactics. You can swap jobs and keep certain special abilities, this enables you to build the ultimate magic swordsman. Good enough for more than 30 hours of handheld Roleplaying goodness. If you're looking for a handheld FF game, V is the game to get.
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<img src="/img/articles/gbarpg_fire.jpg"/>
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<center>Fire Emblem and Sacred Stones on the GBA. Thank you Intelligent Systems!</center>
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Next up, the popularity gaining [Fire Emblem](/tags/fire-emblem) series from Intelligent Systems. You should remember **Intelligent** from the more than excellent Advance Wars Gameboy Advance Turn-based games. Fire Emblem is the equivalent in a, well, more **Fantasy-ish** setting. In FE, you guide a devoted team of warriors, priests, mages and more to victory and reclaim the land (or cleanse the evil spirits, heh). If you're looking for more gameplay related information you should read the [Fire Emblem Wikipedia entry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_Emblem).
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@ -22,8 +21,7 @@ Two Fire Emblem games made it to the Gameboy Advance, and even Europe (woah! We
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Developing your main assault team is one of the highlights of the game. It gives a lot of satisfaction to transform a regular soldier into a sword master **+33% critical hits**? Hell yeah! But watch out though: once a character dies, you won't be seeing that one in the future: once dead always gone. Choosing between both games can be difficult, but I'd be safe to say both are very good GBA picks. If you never played any Fire Emblem game before, pick up the regular one (**Fire Emblem**, without the subtitle. In Japan, more than 4 FE games were released on SNES and sadly never translated).
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<img src="/img/articles/gbarpg_TO.jpg"/>
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<center>Tactics Ogre: Knights of Lodis and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance</center>
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One of the underdog highlights of the whole Gameboy Advance library is without a doubt Atlus' Tactics Ogre: Knights of Lodis. Before we continue to hail the game, let's straighten up one thing: No, it's not better than Tactics Ogre: Let us Cling Together. But yes, it's one of the best time-soaking GBA games. Especially if you love turn-based Strategy RPGs or like to customize your characters. Sadly, the game was never published in Europe, but I doubt that would dramatically increase the game sales. It's one of those freaky **hardcore** in-it or lose-it games.
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@ -33,8 +31,7 @@ And then there's Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (FFTA). As you can see, the game
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Not only that, FFTA is very very easy compared to Tactics Ogre. And the music gets so repetitive after a while, argh. Oh yeah, and the game lacks a good story line. Pick Tactics Ogre above it all day long, but if you're hungry for more, FFTA might be for you. Or maybe not.
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<img src="/img/articles/gbarpg_union.jpg"/>
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<center>Yggdra Union and Riviera: The Promised Land</center>
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Sting's GBA debut, [Riviera: The Promised Land](/tags/riviera), is in it's heart a Strategy Roleplaying game. But it utilizes some very weird and uncommon gameplay mechanics - that's not directly a bad thing. Once on a mission, you travel through many set scenes without directly controlling the protagonist. How's that? Say you landed on a deep forest. There are 4 "**actions**" to do: **Look at grass**, **Go North/East** and **Open Chest**. By executing one of those actions you lose action points (which can obviously be refilled). The grass may reveal a hidden item, but may contain a poisonous snake. Same story for the chest. This makes Riviera very linear (there are some secret places all right) but at the same time makes the game more enjoyable for a handheld system to play in quick bursts.
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@ -44,8 +41,7 @@ On the other hand, there's the very recent Yggdra Union: We'll Never Fight Alone
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Both games are quite different than traditional SRPG handheld or console games and both games have the same extremely high quality audio and amazingly done sprite work. If you're looking for something different than Fire Emblem, but still utilizing the same core thoughts, definitely consider Yggdra Union.
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<img src="/img/articles/gbarpg_sun.jpg"/>
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<center>Golden Sun 1 and 2: the Lost Age.</center>
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Camelot's attempt on a traditional/retro console Roleplaying game was very Enthusiastically received back in 2001. Golden Sun is in essence a contemporary presentation of the traditional console role-playing game formula, where the player guides a cast of four characters as they journey through a fantasy-themed game world and interact with various Non playing Characters. Golden Sun also "**features**" random battles (good or not), just like the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest series. One of the strongest points of the Golden Sun series is the strongly embedded puzzle aspect of the game.
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@ -5,7 +5,7 @@ title = "RPG Concepts: Items"
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tags = ['RPG Concepts', 'Divine Divinity', 'Ultima', 'Temple of the Elemental Evil', 'Blue Dragon', 'Neverwinter Nights', 'Baldurs Gate 2', 'feature']
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<img src="/img/articles/RPG.jpg"/>
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### Items present in the World
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@ -13,12 +13,11 @@ Did you ever play an RPG, wondering why the world is so empty? Do you ever wonde
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Let's start with an excellent example. In Larian's first Roleplaying game called Divine Divinity, it was even possible to move closets and chairs and beds. If you really wanted to, you could carry some furniture along with you. Of course that does not really make any sense, unless it's used in a useful way. And it is: carrying a bedroll will enable you to rest out in the wilderness. You can also grab various types of food, normally only used for display purposes. Every single closet has an interesting item for you, with some value to it. Libraries contain enormous amounts of books (or rather scrolls), which are interesting to read. Baldur's Gate 2 enabled you to learn about the game's history via these very same scrolls. Too bad DivDiv's randomized content system didn't work out very well since most stuff was severely underpowered.
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<img src="/img/articles/RPG-world_divdiv.jpg">
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<center>Yes you can steal bread. Would you want to?</center>
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I'll have to give some credits to Bethesda for integrating some of these ideas into Morrowind and Oblivion. If you really wanted to, you could steal every single object in every house: some plates, forks, vases, spices, you name it. If the owner sees you lending his furniture, he'll react accordingly. At least, that's the way we'd like it to see. There are enough exploits in these games which makes stealing ridiculously easy, sadly enough. Sell all items and you won't be needing any money as quest rewards anymore. It would be nice to see these items actually used. Besides, this process hardly involves any role playing.
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<img src="/img/articles/RPG-world_ultima.jpg">
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**Addendum** - fable at Gamebanshee kindly pointed out that Ultima VI and VII both offered this kind of item interactivity as well, Bethesda merely copied it's concept. While you are unable to do something useful with most of the items you can carry with you in the Elder Scrolls series, most of them were actually usable in Ultima VII. Larian's Divinity series was also heavily inspired by the Ultima games.
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@ -26,8 +25,7 @@ In contrast, there are more than enough recent RPGs which kindly ignore the "car
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Of course it would be impossible to place interesting and relevant items in all houses, spread across all towns, especially in very large worlds like Amn. Waukeen's Promenade in Athkatla has enough nearly empty houses. But every house is still accessible, and every house contains at least one container, with set loot. A couple of gold coins, some potions or sometimes even gems. This makes visiting non-interesting area's worthwhile. At least for me.
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<img src="/img/articles/RPG-world_toee.jpg">
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<center> Left: Temple of Elemental Evil. Right: Icewind Dale II.</center>
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### Scripted or Randomized content?
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@ -35,8 +33,7 @@ Generating randomized content could be done, but most games failed using this te
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Neverwinter Nights also uses scripts to generate container contents. Most boxes or low level chests placed in towns or area's contain generic non-interesting equipment, also found in normal stores. The most powerful items are set items, as always. BioWare too seems to have embraced the randomized content technique: see the Infinite Dungeons module. In Wizardry 8, almost every chest contains randomly generated items, but this principle is done slightly different. Every chest has a limited amount of set items with a possibility percentage. Upon entering the area, the content is generated by picking items from this list. This method prevents every non-set chest from containing the same "junk items". Many of the most powerful weapons can be found in these chests, if you are lucky (Rapax King's Chest, Davy Jones Locker, ...)
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<img src="/img/articles/RPG-world_bluedragon.jpg">
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<center>Blue Dragon's World invites you to check every single stone for items.</center>
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Console Roleplaying games typically endorse placement of less items in better context. Especially with the old but still mainly present Overworld system, you won't find anything of interest there, except in a very limited amount of set chests. Dragon Quest VIII for example delivers a solid job creating busy and beautiful towns with many hidden items to discover in closets and vases. But once you explore further and exit the town, the over-world has almost nothing to offer, except set chests in semi-hidden locations and monster drops. Utilizing a little too high randomized battle rate, chest hunting can get very frustrating.
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@ -5,13 +5,13 @@ title = "RPG Concepts: NPCS"
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tags = ['RPG Concepts', 'Knights of the Old Republic', 'Oblivion', 'Wizardry8', 'Wizardry7', 'Arcanum', 'feature']
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<img src="/img/articles/RPG.jpg"/>
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<a class="internal" data-to="#vids">Watch the NPC Reaction video tests! >></a>
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An NPC is basically a character not controlled by the player, who can be of great importance during the many main or side quests. NPCs vary in importance and placement: they can either be annoying and useless or interesting and useful. Many Role-playing games only give the most important NPCs something useful to say or do. Talking to other characters makes no sense since they only answer with one of the standard sentences: "oh, you're the princess!" or "good weather, isn't it?". This concept destroys the whole role-playing experience since it transforms role-playing into trying to find the right character to chat with, without any interest to other local inhabitants.
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<img src="/img/articles/rpg-npc_blocking.gif"/>
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Everyone probably already encountered a couple of NPCs just standing there, doing nothing. When you talk to them, they respond with "hiya stranger". When you talk to them again, they repeat that exact same sentence. After the tenth time of "hiya stranger" you begin to wonder whether the person was on drugs or not. What is the purpose of this NPC? Exactly: a useless object to fill the otherwise void space. Players can enjoy a "guess who holds the quest" puzzle. Things get even worse when each NPC is called "stranger x" or "villager y". This does not give them any personality and give you even less reasons to replay the game since the living world feels artificial and dead. There's a difficult balance to be kept within a city full of NPCs: do you want extreme activity but soulless beings or a less crowded area, where everyone has their own personality and interesting story?
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@ -21,8 +21,7 @@ Especially on console RPGs, it can get very frustrating to wander around town, t
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This quest system can also reward you for talking to all NPCs if you intend to do so anyway. Some "Star Constellation Magnus" in the game can be traded for rare items otherwise not found. These constellations can be found by looking in every container and box you see. This works exactly the same: it gives you a reason to check containers, otherwise 50% empty or full with useless junk.
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<img src="/img/articles/rpg-npc_dontdie.jpg">
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<center>Don't open it! It could contain... err... An NPC-turns-hostile trigger!</center>
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It's very easy to implement a shield which renders quest NPCs immortal. Of course, how else can you finish the quest if you killed the person to deliver item x or get goods y? That's one way, but not the acceptable way. Role-playing - yeah right. If you decide to attack your quest related person, you may do so. One of the consequences could be unable to finish the quest (if it's a side quest of course). Another better one would be to include different ways to tackle this obstacle. If you kill the NPC, everyone will turn hostile or run or just ignore you depending on their parameters (easily offended or threatened, easily scared, drunk, ...). The NPC will leave his quest item for you to collect, if you managed to get rid of everyone else. There could be a high level relative, standing next to the killed person, who frenzies if you hurt the NPC. Ha!
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@ -32,8 +31,7 @@ Other mechanics which greatly unbalance the importance of various NPCs include v
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Interaction with those people are mostly done throughout a limited series of questions. You can select one (which might alter his personal reaction, or even attack you, the classic Dungeons & Dragons way) and the NPC will react to that selected question. The questions are usually built depending on the active quests. You can't possibly ask something about a stone mask if you did not start that quest first. Although this limited interaction technique is even being used in new Role-playing games (including Mass Effect), these have their own problems.
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<img src="/img/articles/npc-rpg_kotor.jpg">
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<center>Knights of the Old Republic: select your answer among a limited amount of possibilities.</center>
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For instance, why can't you ask someone about his neighbor? Why is his neighbor running in circles? Or why is this person not sleeping at night? Why is he aligned with faction x? What does he know about your previous boss encounter? etc. One of the early Final Fantasy games introduced a system in which you can store key words said by NPCs, and ask about them to others. This concept sounds very nice, but lacked execution. Most of the time the NPC did not know what you were talking about.
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@ -41,8 +39,7 @@ Wizardry VII introduced a nice system which allowed players to literally type in
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Of course keywords are still available and stored automatically if you did not follow every conversation.
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<img src="/img/articles/npc-rpg_wiz8.jpg">
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<center>Wizardry 8: The 'talk about' feature.</center>
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**Avoid at all costs:**
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@ -86,21 +83,23 @@ Of course keywords are still available and stored automatically if you did not f
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#### Wizardry 8
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<div class='vspace'></div><div class='indent'><em>Marten's Tomb (SPOILERS)</em>
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</div><p class='vspace'>Sir-Tech's [Wizardry 8](/tags/wizardry8) includes like VII a beautiful NPC interaction system which allows the user to talk about anything, including obscure words (and you'll get appropriate reactions! Wait for vid#2 to see that) Here, I ask Marten, one of the main plot characters, about the dark savant, the higardi, "die", "f*ck" and some more stuff. I forgot to wear the helmet so all members went insane... Whoops.
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</p>
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##### Marten's Tomb (SPOILERS)
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Sir-Tech's [Wizardry 8](/tags/wizardry8) includes like VII a beautiful NPC interaction system which allows the user to talk about anything, including obscure words (and you'll get appropriate reactions! Wait for vid#2 to see that) Here, I ask Marten, one of the main plot characters, about the dark savant, the higardi, "die", "f*ck" and some more stuff. I forgot to wear the helmet so all members went insane... Whoops.
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{{< youtube "n9RgBmP5qpU" >}}
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<div class='vspace'></div><div class='indent'><em>He'Li's Bar in Arnika</em>
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</div><p class='vspace'>He'Li kicks my butt as I attempt to intimidate her with my impressive vocal skills. Vi teams up, shoving a boot through my rib cage. Amazing stuff, Sir-Tech. I love the voice acting. (Fully voiced, EVERY NPC).
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</p>
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##### He'Li's Bar in Arnika
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He'Li kicks my butt as I attempt to intimidate her with my impressive vocal skills. Vi teams up, shoving a boot through my rib cage. Amazing stuff, Sir-Tech. I love the voice acting. (Fully voiced, EVERY NPC).
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{{< youtube "HV7P5bCNUZI" >}}
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<div class='vspace'></div><div class='indent'><em>Trynton's Chief (SPOILERS)</em>
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</div><p class='vspace'>After chatting with Trynton's Chief, I decide to attack him with Madras (a trynnie) in my party. That was *not* a good idea. Glad to see he reacts properly to my actions in the game.
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</p>
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##### Trynton's Chief (SPOILERS)
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After chatting with Trynton's Chief, I decide to attack him with Madras (a trynnie) in my party. That was *not* a good idea. Glad to see he reacts properly to my actions in the game.
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{{< youtube "q52EROdDuCU" >}}
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font-size: 1.15rem
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body, h1, h2, h3, h4, article p, article li, .box-masonry .box-masonry-text p
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body, h1, h2, h3, h4, article p, article li, .box-masonry .box-masonry-text p, .copyright, .copyright p.credit a
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color: var(--textcolor)
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.latest-all
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var url = me.attr('href');
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if(url && url.startsWith('http') && url.indexOf(host) === -1) {
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me.attr('target', '_blank').addClass('external');
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me.attr('rel', 'noopener');
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}
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})
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};
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