>> Witcher 3, Skyrim, plain old momorpegher like Guild Wars 2, if you're looking for a time sink. Minecraft if you're into farming, crafting, exploring. Dragon Age : Inquisition, I've heard good things about it.

i used up skyrim long ago. i'm looking for something that supports first person view. i find 3rd person view un-immersive, and technically speaking, the artificially enhanced situational awareness is cheating - i consider it a crutch for those who's fighter pilot skills at 3D spatial concepts and being able to mentally track targets outside their field of view are lacking. so a number of titles such as witcher were considered, but didn't make the cut. for lack of 1pv support they lost a sale.

>> I like the Mass Effect series, it's a nice RPG with half decent combat, but maybe not what you're looking for. Same with BioShock series.

yes, mass effect 2, bioshock, and deus ex all seem to be along the lines of what i'm looking for. but i'm afraid they're just open worlds with storyline based quests. or worse, non-open worlds and storyline based. i want to play in world, not play through a script.

>> and nowadays, they tend to take the facile route of a short main story, while peppering their 'open world' with side quests. TBF, doing a 25 hour main quest line is quite an undertaking these days.

yes, an open level design and a bunch of hard coded quests doesn't really make for a world you can play in long term. funny thing, when i used to play tabletop D&D, "quest" was a spell that a cleric would cast on you to make you do something you were unwilling to do voluntarily (getting a quest was something that would make you moan and groan). the only thing worse was a geas spell cast by a mage, which could actually kill you if you didn't pursue the quest. i only got 1 quest in 6 years of playing. and that was to clean out the original 3 dungeon modules (about 9 large dungeons / quest lines total). the reward was a small kingdom for each party member. the questor was the elven king. the DM wanted us to go though the dungeon modules, and that was how he got us to do it. i estimate that "quest" took 250-500 hours of gameplay - not easy to do when you have to gather the same 5 people around the same table at the same time to play.


take fallout new vegas for example. i bit the bullet and got it right after i posted my OP. so i started out just testing the RPG capabilities, no following quests, just looking for caps and action (XP). being a bethesda game, that meant looting bodies for gear. i soon discovered there was little action to be found, and ended up behaving like the T3 terminator 3: "I like your gun..." <g> before you know it, i've wiped out entire towns, failing quests left and right as i kill anything with loot. it automatically gave me a perk (forget the name) - i get bonus damage against everything cause i like to kill everything (not really - i just like their guns! <g>). i killed the kings and took their HQ over (i love the heart shaped bed, its probably the nicest bed in the game, better than the best beds at tops or lucky 38 casinos). i killed everyone in tops - even the customers - i killed Mr house and all his bots and took over new vegas (but i don't seem to get anything for it- maybe i should have stuck with caesar), i killed everyone in feeetown just looking for action. the NCR sent some troopers to "talk" to me about my behavior. i sent them home in a box and declared war on the NCR. i've wiped out every NCR thing i can find, except the visitor center at the dam - hey i'm only 10th level so far and those guys have power armor and rocket launchers! i have over 2 dozen NCR ranger dogtags in my inventory. guess there's something i could do - go finish those guys at the dam off. need caps for better weapons and ammo though, so that puts me back to wandering the wasteland looking for action and folks with nice guns. and it looks like it doesn't respawn much at all. soon i'll be the only thing left alive in nevada! ( well - i try not to kill the cashiers so i can gamble later, but my follower always kills them). one thing that's kind of cool is that the game realizes what i'm doing. i went to see caesar - and he knew what i'd done at tops - not just that i killed benny - that i killed everyone in the building - guilty and innocent alike - hell hath no fury like a man buried alive and left for dead!. and i'm teaching that lesson to new vegas one corpse at a time (evil grin <g>)

i think i'll have to start another game and play a nice guy and help everyone. it seems like that's the only kind of quests there are. goody two shoes BS. from what i've seen of the quests ( i did do the ringo quest - reminded me a bit of high plains drifter what with getting the town together to fight and all) it looks like it might not be bad for a law and order type character. but the game does not really seem condusive to the free style "fistfull of dollars" gameplay i've been doing. basically its too much work finding monsters, so i end up killing the NPCs for loot. i guess they assume you'll follow quests and not just go looking for action. and when i mean action i mean like taking on the NCR in the visitor's center at hoover dam. maybe i just need to turn up the difficulty level. its not much of a challenge unless i'm outnumbered at least 6 to 1 vs opponents with guns, not melee weapons. and my follower is just a porter, i don't give her any gear. i'm still running at default difficulty level (medium(?) diff level, not hardcore mode, true iron sights).

my fears about not open world were unfounded. its was just a newbie crying about the radscorps and deathclaws north of your start point between you and new vegas. i went north, maybe 2nd level at the time, no problem. it was fun messing with the deathclaws with my scoped 9mm pistol from high above in the rocks. before i knew it i was wandering around the perimeter wall of new vegas looking for the door. only to discover i needed 2000 caps to get in and confront benny. i think its at that point that i became less particular about how i made my money.

>> Haha, chaotic evil right there.

Next time perhaps follow the quest lines without killing? There's plenty opportunity for bad behaviour and gaining caps without looting corpses everywhere :lol:

yeah, that's the plan. overall though, i was quite impressed with new vegas' straight RPG world capabilities - until i realized i was running out of people with guns i liked! <g>.

the bad behavior is simply a chaotic neutral behavior focused on getting loot. "i don't care who you are if i like your gun" <g>. if thats not chaotic neutral, i don't know what is! <g>.

the real problem is now i have to build another game. not just an open world FPSRPG, a living world FPSRPG.

big sigh - so many games to make, so little time. well, the code from caveman will at least give me the guts for a FPSRPG game - so that's a bit of a head start.. and now i have to think of name for it! ugh - sometimes i hate game development! (or perhaps being addicted to it? <g>) .

Have you played the STALKER games? They're kinda in FPSRPG territory, with a living world. They didn't hit the mark they were aiming for (their living world plans were much more detailed than their implementation)... but it still feels pretty alive a lot of the time. The original one isn't very open world, but still feels living. They get more open in #2 and #3.

Mass Effect was fun, I just wish they hadn't bailed on the cooldown-instead-of-ammo idea from the original in 2. Especially the rather stupid way (thermal clips) it was attempted to be justified in-universe. That and the Gears Of War cover shooter mechanics

Half the fun I had in Mass Effect 1 was slowly using the sniper rifle to take people down from miles away...

Also, as bad as the inventory system was, I like looting bodies in RPGs and customizing my gear.

Stumbling onto random smuggler/pirate camps and thresher maws cruising around in the Mako was also nice, and made it seem more like the world existed outside of just the linear quest dungeons.

>> Have you played the STALKER games?

thanks! i'll check it out. don't think that one ever popped up on the radar during my googling.

>> Open worlds were introduced in Farcry 2 (taking place in Africa). Some games age better than others - Farcry 1 didn't age well.

are you saying farycry 2,3, 4, and 5 are worse than 1, or just different? i understand crytek made v1, and ubi did the rest. i was under the impression that the evolution of the series towards a more "open world - sandbox - living world" type game was a good thing.

>> Yea, Morrowind was fantastic, but it could've been alot more fantasticieriliar. Its dungeons were mostly sub-par, from a level-design perspective. The atmosphere was great, and the game in-general was great despite its weaknesses... but it did have a load of weaknesses (Still one of my favorite games though!).

for RPG elements, lots of lore, quests, exploration, etc it seems perfect. sometimes i think all they (the elder scrolls games) need is a good dungeon mod. and maybe a store with money.

>> I never played Mass Effect, but maybe that's more your cup of tea (watch a Let's play and see). Or try Deus Ex: Human Revolution (also something I haven't played (been meaning to get around to it) - but the earlier two Dues Ex's were great).

both of those popped up frequently in searches. i've held off for now, suspecting the were more FPS than RPG. but i've heard some really good things about mass effect 2.