Re: How long till rpgs die?

On Fri, 21 Feb 2025 11:39:53 -0500, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg, Spalls
Hurgenson wrote:

On Thu, 20 Feb 2025 02:00:01 -0600, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:
>

Besides, I don't think graphic adventure died. It just left the
mainstream. Now text adventure. That died proper. Last one I can remember
is Anchorhead.
>
Besides, JRPG is quite alive and well. You have a Western perspective on
this, and I'm not sure you're even right there. BG3 may be niche, but it
is a commercial success.

>
Not to mention pretty much every major game now includes RPG mechanics
of some sort or another. Features that used to be definitive to the
genre --stats, leveling, inventory, etc.-- are now common across
multiple game-styles.
>
RPG dying? It's arguably more popular than it ever was before.
>
>
As for text adventures... even those live on, albeit greatly reduced
in popularity. But there are still commercial releases (Example: "The
Filmmaker" on Steam). Yes, many of these aren't 'true' text adventures
(in the classic early-80s sense), as they include some visuals. But
even if you really insist on being a purist, ifdb.org will more than
satisfy your needs. There's a lot of traditional interactive fiction
there, with new games released every year.
>
But I'm a lot more lenient, and a few pictures and maps don't exclude
a game from the genre, as far as I'm concerned (even Infocom
eventually included those features!) You could even argue that many
'visual novels' are just the latest iteration on the concept.
>

Oh yeah. By "die," I mean "died in the mass market." I have an install of
Inform 7 on my desktop. Interactive Fiction is still very much a thing.
Even the purist, no graphics kind.

The last mass market IF I saw was in Talos Principle 2, as a bit of a
joke and homage. A game within a game.

As I said, I think "Anchorhead" was the last commercially released text
based IF title on Steam. It may have pictures.

Meanwhile, graphic adventures in the style of Sierra still have mass
market releases. They are not by any means "dead."

But everything worthwhile thrives on its own. There's Inform, ADRIFT,
Git, and a newcomer called Twine that I haven't looked into, where people
author IF. Beyond that, there's Frotz, the Magnetic Scrolls interpreter,
etc. if you haven't played all the old commercial titles from the 80s. I
even have a bunch of old Scott Adams games in z-interpreter format.

I still vow that I will finish "The Lurking Horror." Someday.

--
Zag

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