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I've also heard good things about Betrayal and Return to Krondor as story driven RPG's - if you don't mind going old school. I bought them a few months ago and have them on my to do list.

I'm not really a stealth-person, and a leveling system is integral for my RPG experience, so Thief's out. (That's not to say that your arguments are without merit, though.)
I started Betrayal at Krondor once, but it suffered from the pixelation problem. Either it was too small, or too blurred out. It's on my GoG shelf, though.

GawainBS wrote:I'm not really a stealth-person, and a leveling system is integral for my RPG experience, so Thief's out. (That's not to say that your arguments are without merit, though.)

It might not be for you.

There is however only one way to be certain..


It will be interesting to see if anyone else comes up with something different for PC. I've got other games I really like, but none come to mind that meet your requirements (that haven't already been played).

I think I'm going to settle for a third play of Alpha Protocol. I have some average hopes for ToR as well.

I'm surprised that nobody mentioned the Realms of Arkania trilogy. Drakensang is pretty much the same setting.

Two Worlds 2 is much improved. I've just done the tutorial and multi-player co-op but I am thinking highly of it and the critics also admitted it was a big improvement over 1.

What about Risen?

I find "the critics" to be generally a bunch of incompetents, or at least inconsequents. "The critics" also praised FO3 & Oblivion for example. Besides, Two Worlds 1 left too bitter a taste. Even then, would it offer what I'm looking for? Sandboxing isn't really my thing.
Same reason I'm not THAT fond of Gothic and Risen. There's not enough "engaging story" to keep me intrested.

Have you tried Mass Effect?

Yes, both. A bit heavy on the action side, and ME2 is also quite light on the statistic side. Very enjoyable games, though.

Check out Jagged Alliance 2. It has the best cutscenes in the history of gaming, no joke.

Have you played ALL the Mario RPGs? Like Paper Mario, Paper Mario: TTYD? Lots of great stories and characters in those too.

You should also check out Heretic Kingdoms, a great action-RPG in the vein of Diablo and Divine Divinity, but much more story-heavy and story-driven, if I remember correctly.

There's also Challenge of the Five Realms, an old DOS RPG. Good story if I remember correctly, but it might take several playthrough to get to the ending. The gameplay I guess is like a cross between Ultima, BG, and Jagged Alliance, or something.

I guess Ultima VI and VII should be mentioned by someone? I haven't played them yet though, except domr of VI...

Ogre Battle 64 is a great game if you can find ut. Really crazy strategy-RPG gameplay too. Definitely not traditional JRPG gameplay - mission-based with lot, LOTS of customization. If you have a Wiii you can get it on Virtual Console.

Betrayal in Antara is probably good if you enjoyed Betrayal in Krondor (I think they are in the same package on GOG). It's the same engine (except hi-res) if I'm not mistaken. I don't know about the story though.

I played JA2.

I never knew there was more than one Mario RPG, but I'm not looking for a JRPG. No matter how good, they always have something that puts them apart. I am considering Tactics Ogre, though. I don't have an N64, so Tactics Ogre is out.

I played Heretic Kingdoms too. Surprisingly good game.

The Ultima games never did it for me. They always came across as boring, lacking depth or having needless depth.

The Feist RPGs are on my GoG account, but I never got around to playing them for long, since the combination of my monitor and their low(er) resolution makes it virtually impossible for me to read things. I'm really saddened by that.

GawainBS wrote:I've still got plenty of action RPGs on my shelf, but I'm burning through the story-driven ones pretty rapidly.

So far I've played:

All Infinity games.
Everything NWN.

*snip*

Any recommendations you can make?

You tried NWN on multiplayer persistent worlds as well?

No, but I won't. I'm not THAT fond of NWN's gameplay.

The Feist RPGs are on my GoG account, but I never got around to playing them for long, since the combination of my monitor and their low(er) resolution makes it virtually impossible for me to read things. I'm really saddened by that.

That is sad, I loved Betrayal at Krondor an instance of the game being far better than the book. I was disappointed in Return to Krondor though, I actually preferred Betrayal in Antara, the real successor to BaK.

galraen wrote:That is sad, I loved Betrayal at Krondor an instance of the game being far better than the book. I was disappointed in Return to Krondor though, I actually preferred Betrayal in Antara, the real successor to BaK.

Don't rub it in, please. I'm trying to get an old monitor or something to make them work on it.

What exactly wrong with the new monitors resolution? I have a new monitor, I don't get it, especially when Antara has diferent res than Krondor...

GawainBS wrote:I never knew there was more than one Mario RPG, but I'm not looking for a JRPG. No matter how good, they always have something that puts them apart. I am considering Tactics Ogre, though. I don't have an N64, so Tactics Ogre is out.

Tactics Ogre is different, a turn-based tactical-RPG instead of a real-time strategy-RPG like Ogre Battle. Not at all like typical JRPG, so I figured I should suggest it.

Given your stringent requirements (not even M&M VII?), I guess your best bet is the DOS RPGs. CRPG, let alone a story-driven one, is pretty much a dead genre now.

Realms of Arkania
Challenge of the Five Realms
Albion
Lands of Lore
etc

MMVII still consists mostly of killing things. Every statistic is focused on that. Again: I love the MM series, just not what I'm looking for.

When I play older games, the pixels are huge to the point that I can hardly make out individual letters.

I just tried a game called Eschalon book II that is pretty good. Its not a bioware-esque story, but I think you might like it if you don't mind an old game.

Its loaded with roleplaying stats. Turn based.

Isn't that quite a recent one? I played the demo of the first one. Not sure why I didn't bought it.

I don't know how recent it is. The focus is not on graphics it only took like 10 minutes to download the whole game

So far it looks cool. You choose what region you are from, what religion (atheist, agnostic, druid, altuistic, nefarious), what class: rogue, thief, fighter, healer, mage....

Then you have dice rolls for 4 physical categories and 4 mental and the ability to distribute 20 points.

Then skills there are very many skills and it is true rollplaying. For example I put 3 pts into blunt weapons (I started with 1 bc I am a barbarian), and 3 pts in light armor, cartography, and dodge.....



Ok so I start in a cottage and there are all sorts of places to check for items, I found an apple and a club and some other things. Filled my waterskin and went to town. Along the way I explored and found some rats and killed them but I got a tapeworm which makes my hunger bar go down faster and I have to eat more. I bought some armor and I didn't have enough money to bless the tapeworm away...

Then in town there were 2-4 new quests I am working on. And this is just the prologue I think its a quite vast game.

So far combat doesn't seem very well done by what I am used to. You just club things and they hit you back your fighting on a grid and its sort of like BG2 half turnlike but half realtime. I am playing a barbarian though.

The dialogue is not dramatically written, but it does give you choices for how to deal with people. For example the blacksmith sent me on a quest to get payment for his sword he sold. Then the lady I asked for payment said the sword was not delivered in time for the magistrates birthday and that the blacksmith defaulted.

So I choose what to do and there is somewhat of a choice of what things to say. Of course once you replay it several times you know what is what and then it doesn't seem as suspenseful choosing what you say.. Do you see what I am saying?