Betrayal at Krondor doesn’t play anything like any RPG I’m used to and I don’t understand what I’m meant to be doing. As for Realms of Arkania, the actual play is fairly similar to other games I’ve played in the past, but I don’t know what skills or spells are going to be useful so I can’t figure out what constitutes a good and viable party build. I’ve tried to make characters like the hint books suggest, but that involves a ton of rerolling and bleh to that.
In what way is it confusing? The objectives in each section are made pretty clear as I recall. It’s a different CRPG in that you are playing pre-made characters (all from Feists books, the world the game takes place in), but you don’t need to have read the books to understand them. They are pretty typical fantasy class types.
I tried to play BaK many years back - it was already old then, but probably a decade younger than it is now.
If found it to be a horrible experience.
The grainy, sometimes indecipherable graphics, the sub-par engine, lack of direction … I just couldn’t get into it.
Maybe there is a lot of fun™ in the package, but I couldn’t even open the box.
RoA is, I imagine, also hard to go back to after all these years - I knew the basics of the Dark Eye rules before I ever started playing, so I had a idea about which spells where usefull etc., but char development is still pretty daunting.
There’s lots of unique stuff in RoA that I haven’t seen in any other games - like you’re expected to get proper winter clothes before venturing into the snow, you can get sick when spending time in the swamp etc.
Char development is very deep, the story is nice enough - but sometimes too hard to follow (hidden placement of relevant plot stuff, as hinted at by Daniel). Overall, many subsystems of the game are too laborous.
The things I always liked best about the GoldBox games are the combat and the fact that it has a “Grand Campaign”, i.e. you can play through up to four games in a row with the same party. I did just that numerous times, though that was many years ago.
If you like the basic design of the GB games, I highly recommend firing up Unlimited Adventures (the GB based RPG-construction-kit) and hunt down some of the user modules made for it. People broke most limitations of that software through hacks, and there’s quite a few high-quality modules for it out there - I especially recommend the works of s dude named Harri Polsa, he created some sci-fi themed, story heavy modules aimed at a mature audience that have a quite different feel to them compared to the ordinary GoldBox game.
Finally, if I was to recommend a old game to go back to, it’d be Darklands.
rezaf
Well, Darklands isn’t exactly easy to get into either, if you didn’t play it back in the day. I own the CD, and I tried to play it, but the graphics are hard to look at today, and the interface seems tricky. It’s not awful, and it can be done, but most of these old games are hard to play in some way.
My experience with Realms of Arkania back in the day:
You set off adventuring
Minor fight - win!
Party member #1’s shoes have worn out - huh?
Party member 1 takes 1 point of damage every 3 moves - but the town is 50 moves away…
Party member 1 has died - dammit!
Party member 2 has caught a cold.
Party member 2 has died of their cold - huh wha???
Party member 3’s shoes have worn out. Gah!!!
That pretty much sums it up.
BaK was an incredible game. I actually still feel bad about this when I think about it, but late one 1993 summer night I knew I was close to finishing it, yet the wife and I were supposed to go out that night (it was Sat). I kept putting her off, thinking I’ll finish and we’ll catch a late movie. But then I get into the final sequence and lose all track of time. When I come up for air, game completed, I realize it’s after 1am, and the wife is asleep on the couch downstairs.
Well put - I poured hours into Betrayal at Krondor and Darklands and loved the both … back in the day. I think the expansive quality of today’s RPGs would tend spoil my fun if I replayed them, let alone the graphics.
On the other hand, the story in BaK was fantastic and if I chose to engage it as a work of interactive fiction then perhaps it would be a better way to go. Besides, I still think the “lockpick” mechanism for chests in BaK was the best ever to be implemented in a game. DO NOT USE GAMEFAQS or some other cheat list to work your way through the chests, otherwise you’ll kill a fun challenge.
Some guy over at VOGONSimplemented save states for Dosbox, that should make playing Realms of Arkania bearable.
Don’t let the dead ends and the thousand ways to die put you off, the game will actually drop hints that venturing further in a certain direction is a bad idea.
Just keep in mind this isn’t D&D, get your party all the stuff they might need to survive a long and dangerous expedition into a hostile wilderness before you depart and you will most likely be fine.
Also playing the first part will make RoA2 much easier, if you’re only going to play one anyway go for the sequel.
I just remember being completely at sea when starting it up. Maybe I’ll go back to it sometime and see if it makes any more sense.
Well I went with Krondor.
Bad thing is that while looking through my games bin I realized there were a bunch of games I never even finished (surprise, surprise).
So I had to go and reinstall Icewind Dale 2. Loved the first, liked this one but three times I gave up, twice at some ice palace and the last time in some forest. Game got a little tedious at that point, not as well paced as the first. Still, I always have a blast just rolling up new parties so started a new game last night :)
Also threw Oblivion in the HD - Morrowind is one of my favorite RPGs of all time but Oblivion was just a huge disappointment. Started a new game about 5 or 6 times but each time only ever make it just past Kvatch and start playing something else. Thinking I’ll try to give it another chance and this time try to finish at least the main quest.
Looking forward to Krondor though, may just start a game tonight to see what it’s like.
I think i said that to myself atleast 10 times.
What? Why would you want to miss out on the thrill of losing half your skill points on failed upgrades each time you level? What about the experience penalty each time you save outside of a temple? What about the awesome wilderness events where you try to cross a river or chasm and one of your characters stumbles and dies?
Scandalous.
Umm… so since no one here has had anything good to say about Realms of Arkania… why is it even in the debate?
The p&p version of Realms of Arkania was pretty fun.
How’s that? ;)
RoA isn’t THAT bad, it’s not like Dunquan writes above, he just sorta … summarized it, yeah.
But it’s all a matter of perspective - nobody takes offense when in a roguelike you encounter an Ogre on level 3 or somehow fail to find any food and starve to death - similar things can happen in RoA.
It’s just that in a story based RPG that can take weeks to finish, things are bound to be perceived a little different, and while a responsible dungeon master would tone down the harshness of the rules somewhat instead of killing off everone brutally because they forgot to take spare shoes with them, the computer knows nothing of such acts of mercy.
About Darklands, while the interface has definately aged, it’s not really that difficult to grasp imo, and the graphics are of course OLD, but it almost looks like a low-res version of Baldur’s Gate (in combat), so it’s halfway passable even today. But DL wasn’t on the table in the first place, so it was just a remark anyway.
rezaf
Obviously I have to vote for Krondor. ;)
BaK is a masterpiece. Good story, comfortable interface (for its time), excellent combat mechanics.
The only real drawback is the barely tolerable graphics. It looked better than average back then, but today … uuaagh!
A 100% complete solution can be found at the BaK Help Web.
Return to Krondor is a nice snack between serious RPGs. Good game for the weekend. 25 enjoyable hours, superb graphics at its time (still tolerable today), some good ideas, but really easy. Don’t expect too much and you’ll have a good time.
The Realms of Arkania trilogy is a true classic, but it’s much too hardcore for a lot of players. The slow start certainly also doesn’t help.
The Dark Eye roleplaying system is very interesting. If you want a reasonably easy start consider Drakensang (good game but requires patience and sunglasses) or wait for the international release of the prequel Drakensang: The River of Time (very good game which requires 80% less patience and still sunglasses).
I’ve been waiting for months on River of Time, any word on its international release date?
Drakensang is in my “To Finish” pile as well, heh.
Actually loved the skill system but game was a little on the dull side - suffered from the same flaw as NWN 2: very slow moving speed + lots of backtracking through large areas/long corridors. Story was a little slow to start, too.
However, will return to it at some point, only played about 7 hours or so into it.
The most accurate that I’ve seen on that is “hopefully this year.”
edit - as an aside, Drakensang is a MUCH better game than Realms of Arkania.
That hurts my soul a little…
I really love the original RoA series, and think Drakensang is very poor in comparison. Everything felt so… blunt. The quests, the story… everything.