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Notes -
I got the current CRPG humble bundle https://www.humblebundle.com/games/rpg-legends-baldurs-gate-beyond-bundle
and I am wondering what my playthrough priority will be (if I manage to not pile of shame the majority of games :/ )
Included games:
Pathfinder WOTR
Neverwintern Nights Complete
BG 2 enhanced Complete (also Dragonspear)
BG 1 enhanced
Planescape Torment enhanced
Icewind Dale enhanced
I think my favourite of those is the old planescape, but I also played this the most times already in my lifetime. Any fellow CRPG-enjoyers here? Whats your favourite? Any moderately unknown CRPGs you can recommend?
Tyranny tyranny tyranny tyranny tyranny. And another great crpg not enough people have played is Tyranny. Which bills itself as 'the rpg where you're the villain' but is better described imo as planescape with better combat. Your choices dramatically shift the course of the story, and because you are 'evil' from the get go, it spends a lot of time exploring concepts like morality and justice.
Another surprisingly deep (but way jankier, which is saying something) and not well known crpg is inquisitor, which is sort of to Torment what Gothic was to Morrowind - riddled with bugs, brutally difficult and incredibly confusing at times, but even more interesting if you can get past all that.
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BG 1+2, not just for the scope and the story but also for the proper co-op support.
Wildermyth is quite fun for a short+casual introduction to CRPGs (and also proper co-op support!), but if you've played through BG1+2 then you may be disappointed with the shortness+casualness; there are a number of campaigns so the game as a whole isn't too short, but you're also not going to be playing for tens of hours building up a single story throughline.
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Planescape is my favourite of the bunch as well.
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BG2 is always going to be my favorite (Irenicus is just so damn good as a villain), but I've been enjoying the modern Pillars of Eternity games. Gilded Vale in the first is one of the finest CRPG setpieces I've encountered, but the rest of the game doesn't quite maintain that high point (understandably).
I also enjoyed Torment: Numenera, but I have a soft spot for the setting, and the game is not consistently good in play or writing. Some of the companions have fantastic ways for their stories to end, though.
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Play Underrail. It's so damn good once you get in the hang of the wonky character system
I second that. Most fun I've had since Fallout: New Vegas. It's tough, very good at scratching the exploration itch and the environment feels mostly alive, not like the fake worlds of most RPGs which seems just like a prop for a game.
It's also getting a second game soon-ish, well, if we use Valve timelines, which should be good judging on the increase in quality between Underrail and the DLC.
The second game is in development and dev diaries are being posted on the formus.
It's going to have a system where the stats of the characters are reflected in how they look in game, which should prove entertaining, I think if dev breaks the unwritten rule of 'sex is only cosmetic' and introduces RL sexual dimorphism into the game. But hey, no publicity like free publicity and paradoxically injecting a small dose of reality into a Sf/fantasy game should cause a lot of uproar.
The worldbuilding in Underrail is incredibly unique. At first glance it just seems like another 'slavs in a metro' STALKER clone, but it's so much weirder than that. I can't wait for the sequel to expand on the realms and cultures outside of lower Underrail that we barely got to see in the first game.
There was a fair bit of west underrail lore added in the DLC.. Or have you never visited the West Underrail military base ?
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I'll recommend the OG Boomer's Gate. What many people enjoy about it is the companion characters you recruit and experiencing their stories while balancing their personalities to keep them happy. I'll admit I've never experienced that; I always make 6 custom characters and play the game with them. For me the enjoyment is purely in the well-written story and the amazing combat system.
It runs off of 2nd Edition AD&D, which is a really cool system and will have some interesting differences for players of modern D&D/CRPGs. Most of the differences are in how spellcasters work. For example, spellcasters use Vancian magic, which means they prepare spells in advance and can only use each spell as many times per day as they prepared that spell. For example, if your wizard knows 5 1st-level spells and 4 2nd-level spells but can only prepare 4 slots of 1st level spells and 2 slots of 2nd level spells, you must allocate a spell to each specific slot. Want to cast sleep more than once per day? Better prepare it multiple times. This is really cool and will satisfy that Batman fantasy. It's a lot for a new RPG player to learn, but an experienced player will really enjoy the system.
The other big difference is how casters scale. They're incredibly weak and fragile early. Most of the time they're slinging terrible darts terribly since they can only cast 2 spells at 1st level. They scale incredibly though - if you play the same wizard from Baldur's Gate 1 to the end of Throne of Bhaal in BG2 you'll watch them go from a weakling who will die to a stiff breeze to a reality-warping demigod. Newer editions try to balance casters to martials at all stages of the game, so playing a game where this is very much not the case is a nice change.
I'd recommend playing Baldur's Gate 1 then importing/remaking your squad in Baldur's Gate 2. Throne of Bhaal is an excellent finale to the series. Play Icewind Dale if you really love the combat system of Baldur's Gate, because there's very little story in that game, just lots of encounters. Ironically I liked the encounters in BG much better, but it's still good content.
I'm strongly recommending against using all custom characters - the pre-written ones are amazing and interact in many ways, so far IMO unsurpassed and are really not that bad stat wise for you munchkins, with some like e.g. Edwin actively cheating - he has a unremovable amulet that gives him extra spells per level.
It's really noteworthy how much more complex the casting system is compared to later games. There's something like a hundred spells, with majority being useful.
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I want to second this. I adore the unique power scaling of different classes in AD&D. I'm horribly annoyed that every other class had mage envy, and tabletop designers gave in and basically turned every class into a mage. With feats or talents or dailies or whatever the fuck they call the special abilities that warp reality every fucking character has now.
Also, that unique feeling of seeing your magic users balls finally drop when they learn fireball. It's so cute watching them grow up, learn to walk, talk... mass murder...
I think that Wizards had the right of it. In a video game, it's fun to have the mage member of your party get so strong that the other party members are an afterthought. In a pen and paper game, not so much. Also, early levels as a mage in 3e (my earliest pen and paper D&D experience) are pretty much the worst gaming experience I've ever had. It's a complete buzzkill to have one or two spells per day, and after that you're useless.
Imho if you had that problem you were playing wrong. I was in a pnp ad&d 2e game a few years ago. Played a fighter with very middling stats. But those extra weapon proficiencies really let me take advantage of more of the equipment the rng gods bestowed on us. I also made ample use of my loot to purchase potions, especially fire breathing potions, to keep up.
There are plenty of extra curricular ways to punch above the confines of your class. I think this is hardest for munchkins and crpg addicts to grok.
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Let's be real, here. The Baldur's Gate experience involves a lot of saving and loading early on, no matter what you are. Whoops, basilisk. Whoops, random encounter, six bandit archers killed you in round one. Whoops, bear. Whoops..
Game's atrocious until you have a few levels' worth of HP gains.
You have to play it safe. Have to stay on the road, run away from scary things. You're not the Lord of Murder at level 1. Unlike a lot of other games, there is no handholding here.
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Eh, it's really not that hard starting out.
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