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[Derek]

Has anyone played Rolan's Curse II?



It's a Zelda-esque game, except you can have 3 people traveling with you at any given time (you switch between them on the fly), and you level up by finding treasure chests that belong to each person.  If they aren't in your party when you find them, you get a healing potion and the chest will keep reappearing.

It's a pretty good game, actually.  It would have made a good jump to a 16-bit machine, but I don't think it was ever popular enough, sadly.

[Gravious]

Has anyone played Rolan's Curse II?

Nope.  I only played Zelda: Links awakening on the GB, it is one of my favorite games of all time.

I loved the SNES Zelda, that was great, but another favorite of mine was Legacy of Kain, why haven't we had more vampire RPGs??? (perhaps for my second game, heh...)

[RangerSheck]

I'm all about TBS - especially "tactics" style. I like to have a party of characters, and I like to be able to emphasize the characters' different abilities by having a small map to move them around on.

I'm also pretty sick of leveling systems. I think they are an artifact of Dungeon and Dragons and unfortunately they have plagued RPG games ever since. Personally, despite my preference for party-based RPGs, I actually don't like class-based systems either (again - D&D artifact, and I think a lot of us have grown out of it).

These are the reasons I built my web-game the way I did. Apologies in advance if this sounds like a commercial - please consider that a couple years ago, I would just be saying "if I could make a game, here's how I'd do it" rather than "here's how I did it". Instead of classes, you just have skills. You don't distribute skill points or something - the skills each character uses are the skills that improve for that character (and, therefore, no need for 'levels' either). I also agree with Lancer-X's point that "Fighting a ridiculous number of monsters logically does not make you ... take a hundred times the amount of damage." PCs in my game all have 100 health and that's it, it never increases.

I think a combat system can make or break an RPG, sadly. Yes, I'd like to say story is everything, but if I want a good story I can (and would much rather) read a book. A good RPG combat system can make a game fun. A bad one - or even an "average" one - can make a game tedious. Also, whether we want to admit it or not, if a combat system is too "unique" or too complex, it may be an obstacle for players who are used to all the cookie-cutter RPG combat systems out there.

Of course, a bad storyline can make a game unenjoyable. But even a good storyline, if too long, can become tedious when I want to play and not read.

[Golds]

i just got rolan's curse II.  looks cool.

Also, yes, Link's Awakening was great, except for the lame SMB2 ending.  A pox on you, Nintedo! (or was it Capcom?)

[Movius]

Anachronox

Except for it being less than half finished and the whole crashing every 10 seconds thing.

[Melly]

Anachronox

Except for it being less than half finished and the whole crashing every 10 seconds thing.

Wasn't that patched by the creator, even though he knew, like, 5 people would download it?

[Gravious]

Anachronox

Except for it being less than half finished and the whole crashing every 10 seconds thing.

Wasn't that patched by the creator, even though he knew, like, 5 people would download it?

Yup, and it added new features too.  Anachronox ROCKED.

[Outer God]

The worst are the 'RPG's' that don't even let you choose how to develop your characters, that have characters with completely preset skill and level progression in addition to a completely linear storyline. Those aren't RPG's at all for me, more like 'storybook' games.

i dunno, letting players have complete control over their character's development does have its downsides.  take FF12 for example: because all characters can be developed to be exactly the same as each other, they lose interest and a sense of uniqueness to the point where only their stats and appearance differentiates themselves from each other.

sometimes having a predetermined character can aid in having more tactical battles, preventing players from choosing the easy way out by utilizing what they have.  there is, of course, a downside to this as well, since you're given no real options in choosing your battle style and may be forced into utilizing specific characters (whom you may not like) for certain situations.

it's all really based on the kind of game you wanna make.  but i must say, options are always good to have.  too many, though, can make the game more cumbersome, what with balancing issues and what not.

might i suggest a hybrid of the two?  giving your characters options (exclusive to them or available to everyone) while still letting them retain those specific qualities that make that character who they are...and no, i'm not just talking about their limit breaks and looks.