What would happen if a FPS & an RPG had a baby?

[PKerr]

I give you BORDERLANDS!!

I've been watching this one a for while, looks really cool.

http://www.giantbomb.com/borderlands-comic-con-trailer/17-1076/


Anyone know the name of song in the trailer?

 

[Robert Maxwell]

What, Deus Ex didn't count?

Warren Spector FTW!

 

[backstept]

Fallout 3? Oblivion? S.T.A.L.K.E.R.?

 

[clint g]

Fallout 3? Oblivion? S.T.A.L.K.E.R.?

System Shock? As well as the previously mentioned Deus Ex and Deus Ex 2

 

[Canadave]

Everyone took my snarky responses!

*sulks*

 

[darthraidr]

don't the latest Call of Duties and Battlefield's have skill up's also? granted this brings up a good point, what components are needed for a game to be an RPG?

 

[clint g]

Ohhh ohhh lets not forget Bioshock!

 

[Jax]

Mass Effect ppl

The rest are just inbred cousins

 

[FordSVT]

don't the latest Call of Duties and Battlefield's have skill up's also? granted this brings up a good point, what components are needed for a game to be an RPG?

It certainly requires more than being able to add talent points to certain skill sets. To which we segue into...

Ohhh ohhh lets not forget Bioshock!

Love it, but completely linear, no quests, no ability to create a character. You can modify your abilities with talent points, and that's it. Doesn't count as a FPS/RPG hybrid IMO. Emphasis on a coherent plot does not make an RPG either.

I'd say an RPG requires a set of quests to be completed, some mandatory, others not. NPCs to interact with (talk, give quests, buy/sell/trade). There should be a rather in-depth inventory and skill system; the ability to either configure a party or personalize a character. Most of them have open world exploration of some type (like Final Fantasy and Mass Effect and Fallout 3).

They've already been used as examples, but hold Fallout 3 or Mass Effect (best FPS/RPG hybrids) up to Halo 3, CoD4 and Bioshock (premier FPSs of this past gen) and you can pretty clearly see where we can draw the line.

 

[Trubinator]

Bioshock sucked big time. Fallout 3 and Mass Effect were absolute gems to be adored and worshiped.

 

[Da'an]

Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus?

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss?

You can thank me later.

 

[darthraidr]

don't the latest Call of Duties and Battlefield's have skill up's also? granted this brings up a good point, what components are needed for a game to be an RPG?

It certainly requires more than being able to add talent points to certain skill sets. To which we segue into...

Ohhh ohhh lets not forget Bioshock!

Love it, but completely linear, no quests, no ability to create a character. You can modify your abilities with talent points, and that's it. Doesn't count as a FPS/RPG hybrid IMO. Emphasis on a coherent plot does not make an RPG either.

I'd say an RPG requires a set of quests to be completed, some mandatory, others not. NPCs to interact with (talk, give quests, buy/sell/trade). There should be a rather in-depth inventory and skill system; the ability to either configure a party or personalize a character. Most of them have open world exploration of some type (like Final Fantasy and Mass Effect and Fallout 3).

They've already been used as examples, but hold Fallout 3 or Mass Effect (best FPS/RPG hybrids) up to Halo 3, CoD4 and Bioshock (premier FPSs of this past gen) and you can pretty clearly see where we can draw the line.

so with this set of parameters, is GTA (especially San Andreas) an RPG? what about sports games, especially as they add more character building segments (like training in Fight Night, i think the NBA 2k games had some character building stuff as well)? what about the Zelda series?

the way i see it, most genres are blending together. Stats, open world, optional quests/objectives, customizable characters... it's nothing new, it's just been slowly seeping into games and people aren't really noticing it. a poker game i worked on years ago had a lot of RPG elements... Rock Band has a lot of RPG elements... many games have RPG elements... so that line that you can clearly see, is getting blurred very quickly.

FPS/RPG baby is nothing new, it's happened, it'll keep happening, it'll become so commonplace that we'll one day look back and wonder how an FPS ever existed without the RPG portions.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Is Elite a RPG? Especially Frontier: Elite II and the later X Universe games?

Depending on the life you want to lead, you can be a trader and buy and sell your way through the game with a ship suited to carrying bulk amounts of cargo, or you can be a fighter - a law enforccement officer, a bounty hunter, or a pirate - and customise your ship with all sorts of weapons, or you can produce goods by mining (or, in the X series, building space stations).

Best of all, it's all done in the first person perspective.

 

[clint g]

don't the latest Call of Duties and Battlefield's have skill up's also? granted this brings up a good point, what components are needed for a game to be an RPG?

It certainly requires more than being able to add talent points to certain skill sets. To which we segue into...

Ohhh ohhh lets not forget Bioshock!

Love it, but completely linear, no quests, no ability to create a character. You can modify your abilities with talent points, and that's it. Doesn't count as a FPS/RPG hybrid IMO. Emphasis on a coherent plot does not make an RPG either.

I'd say an RPG requires a set of quests to be completed, some mandatory, others not. NPCs to interact with (talk, give quests, buy/sell/trade). There should be a rather in-depth inventory and skill system; the ability to either configure a party or personalize a character. Most of them have open world exploration of some type (like Final Fantasy and Mass Effect and Fallout 3).

They've already been used as examples, but hold Fallout 3 or Mass Effect (best FPS/RPG hybrids) up to Halo 3, CoD4 and Bioshock (premier FPSs of this past gen) and you can pretty clearly see where we can draw the line.

By that definition you would have to completely discount many many JRPGS, such as Eternal Sonata and Final Fantasy X. An RPG is exactly like it says in the title. A Role Playing Game. Having a character and building up said character. So long as you have that, it counts, so no, I can't see where you draw the line because I disagree with you

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Is Elite a RPG? Especially Frontier: Elite II and the later X Universe games?

Depending on the life you want to lead, you can be a trader and buy and sell your way through the game with a ship suited to carrying bulk amounts of cargo, or you can be a fighter - a law enforccement officer, a bounty hunter, or a pirate - and customise your ship with all sorts of weapons, or you can produce goods by mining (or, in the X series, building space stations).

Best of all, it's all done in the first person perspective.

Yeah, but that's a space shooter, so it's missing the "person" part of "first person shooter." Space shooters have long been cockpit-view.

I agree with darthraidr's contention that genre lines will continue to be blurred. Pretty much any game that puts you in the shoes of a specific character is going to have at least light role-playing elements these days--stats, inventory, customization, etc. People are demanding more from games and they want a richer experience, not so much just the "go here, shoot this" mentality that used to get us by.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Best of all, it's all done in the first person perspective.

Yeah, but that's a space shooter, so it's missing the "person" part of "first person shooter." Space shooters have long been cockpit-view.

The cockpit view IS a first-person perspective.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Best of all, it's all done in the first person perspective.

Yeah, but that's a space shooter, so it's missing the "person" part of "first person shooter." Space shooters have long been cockpit-view.

The cockpit view IS a first-person perspective.

Yeah, but for whatever reason, it's always been considered a distinct and separate genre.

I think it's really more of a technology thing. It's much easier to have a starfield and spaceships flying around in it, than to render floors, walls, and ceilings. So, we had space shooters long before we had FPS.

And then you have games like Descent that just defy such categorization. Is it a space shooter? Is it a first-person shooter? Who the fuck knows!

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Yeah, but that's a space shooter, so it's missing the "person" part of "first person shooter." Space shooters have long been cockpit-view.

The cockpit view IS a first-person perspective.

Yeah, but for whatever reason, it's always been considered a distinct and separate genre.

I think it's really more of a technology thing. It's much easier to have a starfield and spaceships flying around in it, than to render floors, walls, and ceilings. So, we had space shooters long before we had FPS.

And then you have games like Descent that just defy such categorization. Is it a space shooter? Is it a first-person shooter? Who the fuck knows!

Once floors and ceilings were rendered, the first person perspective game took on a whole new life of its own, if you ask me (although games like Battlezone and Geoff Crammond's The Sentinel, and indeed many racing games, had been doing this for years) and became popular. Arguably Ultima Underworld was the one that a lot of PC games developers took notes from, and certainly without it, there would have been no System Shock or Deus Ex.

But to my original point: I still like to view space combat trading games like Elite (the fact that it was from a first-person perspective was convenient for argument's sake ) as a role-playing experience in their own right, for reasons described above. I mean, it ultimately led to EVE Online and all...

 

[Robert Maxwell]

The cockpit view IS a first-person perspective.

Yeah, but for whatever reason, it's always been considered a distinct and separate genre.

I think it's really more of a technology thing. It's much easier to have a starfield and spaceships flying around in it, than to render floors, walls, and ceilings. So, we had space shooters long before we had FPS.

And then you have games like Descent that just defy such categorization. Is it a space shooter? Is it a first-person shooter? Who the fuck knows!

Once floors and ceilings were rendered, the first person perspective game took on a whole new life of its own, if you ask me (although games like Battlezone and Geoff Crammond's The Sentinel, and indeed many racing games, had been doing this for years) and became popular. Arguably Ultima Underworld was the one that a lot of PC games developers took notes from, and certainly without it, there would have been no System Shock or Deus Ex.

But to my original point: I still like to view space combat trading games like Elite (the fact that it was from a first-person perspective was convenient for argument's sake ) as a role-playing experience in their own right, for reasons described above. I mean, it ultimately led to EVE Online and all...

I don't dispute that games like Elite were RPGs, I just think they belong in a separate genre from FPS. I guess it's what you'd call an "open-ended RPG" that happens to use space shooter gameplay.