Re: What Have You Been Playing... IN APRIL 2025?

On Sat, 03 May 2025 09:58:29 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

On Fri, 02 May 2025 17:17:27 -0500, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:

On Thu, 1 May 2025 02:18:22 -0000 (UTC), in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Ant wrote:

>

>
Baldur's Gate III
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It's lost its luster, but every now and then I go back, run a combat, do
a few quests. I don't know why Baldur's Gate games seem to lose their
appeal as soon as you get to Baludr's Gate (for me), but that's my
experience.

>
I assume it's because in an urban area the adventure takes a turn more
towards those interacting with NPCs than the simpler but more directly
fulfilling find-kill-loot cycle of adventuring you do in the dungeons.
>

There's not a whole lot of talking, tbh. Where there is, it's been
interesting, as always. The game has very good dialogue trees. If there
was more talking, I'd be enjoying it *more* not less. Planescape: Torment
is one of my favorite games, after all.

The problem is quite the opposite: there's an excessive amount of
silence, lots of tedious travel, and therefore little plot advancement.

Which is neither to condemn urban adventuring or your tastes; it's
just that the loop is more immediate and quicker to resolution
(usually) outside of the cities. Meanwhile, in-city you're forced to
endure more talkie-talkie-talk NPCs (which, regardless of how good the
writing is, are still essentially signposts dropping quest-lore on you
and with whom you have no emotional connection), which can drastically
slow down the challenge/reward cycle. It doesn't help that CRPGs often
lock you into city-adventures for long periods before releasing you
back into the wilds, which just makes everything drag on even longer.
>
Is this true of BG3? I don't know; I haven't played it yet. It's
common to many CRPGs though.
>

An interesting take. I'll expand for you what I'm experiencing, because
you made me think it over.

For me, the cities in Baldur's just get kind of directionless. It's not
clear where to go next or even why. They also introduce a bunch of
sub/sidequests with no clear sign of which ones will be rewarding or
interesting and which will just be a notch on your belt. Story
progression grinds to a halt as you wear out your shoes, and there's
confusion as to whether something is story progress or side adventure.

For example, I just finished, for all appearances, a flavor side quest
and got an ally for the final battle which is one of the main quests
(collecting powerful allies). And it was someone who should have been a
shoo-in ally in the first place because I already freed them from an
eternity of torment. The only reason I completed it was because it was
unresolved in my journal. At that point, the game mechanic is "checking
boxes." So "gather your allies" is "complete a (long) checklist."

Another example: One of the urban quests in BG3 is a mass murder
plot/conspiracy/mystery, and it's basically just an endless series of
fetch quests, where you're fetching things for *yourself*. Mostly
evidence. And they're spread out all over the place. Even with the warp
point system there's a whole lotta clickity-walking involved, and the
background activities in the city wear out quickly when you walk past the
same colorful script for the 50th time. This could have been tightened
up.

You can break that thread up with other things, but I would say the main
problem here is a) writing, and/or b) CRPGs are just not good at this
kind of thing.

I lean mostly "b." You can't really run a Sherlock Holmes case in the
middle of a CRPG. The kinds of things that make such an experience
interesting are very poorly realized in that genre. In any computer game,
really. And if it is run, it should be local, not all over the city.

But there's a whole lot of "a" too. It becomes content for content's
sake, with no imagination of what a chore it is to go to twenty different
locations spread throughout the city to pick up a single clue in each.
And, mind you, I still don't know if this is busy work or essential to
advancing the plot! There's a powerful impulse for the developer to
deliver that "big urban experience," but too often they're just adding
things without reason. It's a trap. CRPGs cannot deliver the "big urban
experience" without devs putting in so much work that they never release.

If you go to Baldur's Gate in a FtF Realms game, it's not for the flavor
of taking in the whole city like a tourist. You go for specific things.

Finally, the cities in specifically BG1 and BG3 come at the endgame and
there is a "cool loot" deficit. By the time you get there you're kitted
out. So, any magic items you pick up are usually "Well, I'll put it on
the sale pile." I'm happy with my builds, they're mature, and I'd have to
find something truly extraordinary to even consider replacing an item.
Furthermore, +1 incrementals pack less punch. When you have +6 or +7
already, it's not as remarkable as going from mundane to +1 or +2. That's
just a matter of ratio, which is just a general problem with D&D. Getting
your armor from +4 to +5 is just not as cool as your first suit of +1.

...and you know, don't get me started on 5e past level 10.

In truth, there are whole lot of moving parts here. Some of it is
specific to cities and the way those locations are realized in all CRPGs.
Some of it is game structure in this series. In Baldur's Gate it happens
at endgame, where things need to wrap up, and instead the game throws you
into an enormous blob of mixed-quality content that requires repeated
backtracking through old locations rather than the previous exploration.
No new shops. No new scenery. Nothing of interest going on in the urban
bustle scripts the 5th time you're seen it. That newsboy is always there,
and he's always saying the same three lines.

Now, when I pass him, I just wish he'd STFU. The game has no recognition
that it's just uninteresting noise at that point and that his squeaky
voice was never much of a treat in the first place.

--
Zag

This is csipg.rpg - reality is off topic. ...G. Quinn ('08)