Best RPG / adventure games for curmudgeons?

[morkus64]

I'm sick of all of the "look at my overpowered jerkoff run around and kill everything and collect so many piles of shiny things that I have to have imaginary shiny houses to put my shiny things in" type of games (Fallout, TES, etc, etc).

To me the best RPGs were text adventures. The best adventure games were Quest for Glory (particularly II).

What's a curmudgeon to do? I've kickstarted a few of the GfG inspired games (Mage's Initiation, Hero U) - maybe one day they'll actually be released, but I'm jonesing for a good game.

Recommendations?

 

[Drako]

Baldur's Gate II

 

[bystander36]

It sounds like you prefer adventure games, not RPG's. All the games you mention that you dislike are RPG's.

The only RPG that I can think of that you "might" like would be "Divinity: Original Sin", but only if you like old school group and turn based games like Baldur's Gate. Otherwise, there are not many adventure games made these days, and I know of none.

 

[DaveSimmons]

TellTale Games adventures - Tales from the Borderlands, Wolf among us, Walking Dead, etc.

You've got less than a day left to get them cheap in a Humble Bundle: https://www.humblebundle.com/telltale-bundle

 

[ImpulsE69]

Well you can get the entire Zork catalog from GOG for pretty cheap - sometimes they have the whole thing for less than $5.

I'll second the TellTale games.

You might like Pillars of Eternity (It's like BG or D:OS as mentioned above).

 

[morkus64]

It sounds like you prefer adventure games, not RPG's. All the games you mention that you dislike are RPG's.

I definitely prefer adventure games, but I like the character development side of RPGs. I think that's part of why I preferred Quest for Glory to King's Quest - it's minimal, but you do get to upgrade stats, learn new spells, etc.

 

[Rhezuss]

You want narrative and exploration? Divinity Developer's Cut.

It's still my go-to RPG when I want a unique experience with awesome narrative, great exploration and an overall amazing experience.

 

[mdram]

mount and blade series is kinda cool, its single player

 

[DefDC]

D&D : Temple of Elemental Evil
One of the best turn based role playing games ever created. I'm immensely disappointed more modules weren't created. But it's a long, fun game with fantastic strategic combat. Plenty of mods to be found, but playing vanilla will be fine too. (Circle of Eight mod restores "controversial" content and adds some bug fixes. Worth a peek)

Fallout 1 & 2. Absolute classics of real RPGs.

Planescape Torment, if you haven't played it yet, this is one of the best games, and a full top tier novel of reading. You will remember this game for the rest of your life.

Pillars of Eternity. Fantastic

Wasteland 2. Also for old schoolers like us.

 

[DefDC]

Baldur's Gate II

No joke. Even if you played them before, grab the new editions and play through again. These games were, and still are, completely awesome.

I still need to play through the Icewind Dales again....

 

[ControlD]

Divinity Original Sin is pretty decent as well, and feels like a throwback RPG to me. I am currently about 60 hours into the game and it is still fun. Lots of good suggestions mentioned already.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Dwarf Fortress, just be prepared to handle its menus

 

[StinkyPinky]

Hmmm...best i can think of is old school style rpg's (by old school, i mean 90s not 80s text based ones). Some that come to mind

Might and Magic X (modern but very much old school gameplay)
Baldurs's Gate series (it's been polished up, worth another play through)
Planescape Torment (very text heavy, great story)
Divinity Original Sin (awesome combat)
Pillars of Eternity (modern day Baldur's Gate)

But text based rpg's are dead, and for a good reason.

 

[sactoking]

I believe GOG also has the Gold Box TSR games catalog now as well plus the spinoffs like Eye of the Beholder and such.

 

[nerp]

GTAV. It kinda is like an RPG.

 

[fralexandr]

If you don't mind text based games, you might like MUDs
http://discworld.starturtle.net/lpc/
this one's based on the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett.

 

[DefDC]

I believe GOG also has the Gold Box TSR games catalog now as well plus the spinoffs like Eye of the Beholder and such.

I wonder if these hold up. I loved them so much on the Commodore 64. Should I leave the fond memories of the past alone?

 

[cronos]

I wonder if these hold up. I loved them so much on the Commodore 64. Should I leave the fond memories of the past alone?

I have posted about this before. In short, for me the later ones (came out mid-90s or so) are somewhat fine, but the early ones are a pain to play because the UI/mechanism was simply irritating.

It's tough because as they're released in several volumes of one long story (e.g. three games for Champions of Krynn, four games for Pool of Radiance), naturally we'd like to play the whole story from the beginning. But if we started the first one, it was not exactly a fun experience. I tried several times with Pool of Radiance and still haven't even been able to get to the third zone until I quit with frustration.

Anyway, if you are feeling nostalgic about this kind of game, might as well get modern ones. I think Pillars of Eternity was able to capture the essence of old-style RPG very nicely. Also Legend of Grimrock for Eye of the Beholder style of play (first person puzzle solving).

 

[BFG10K]

I definitely prefer adventure games...

How about this one?

 

[DigDog]

imho, the best RPG ever made was Wasteland. it had a solid quantity of fighting, dynamic skill use, a great story, excellent writing, was genuinely hard and unforgiving, and you had to do your own thinking to solve it.

later on, a worthy mention to Neverwinter Nights (1), mostly because of the TONS of free modules you could play, although it suffered from being a 3.0 version of D&D, which means character become ridiculously OP after about 15 levels.

Temple Of Elemental Evil was a really nice rendition of D&D, very tactical, quite hard, but broken and incomplete.


for whatever it's worth, i really liked Summoner 2 on PS2, although it was an action-RPG, it had A TON of content. The kick ability was OP but aside from that, it was a pretty cool game.

On the other hand, Summoner 1 was a steaming pile of shit, one of the worst games i have ever played.



also worth mentioning, Space Rogue (had strong RPG elements, although not immediately apparent), Mines Of Titan (Mars Saga), Champions of Krynn.

 

[Sulaco]

I feel like kind of a broken record around here, but lately I've really gotten into Pillars of Eternity.

I'm only about 20 hours in so far (which as any good D&D RPG player can tell you is nothing), but it has really captivated me. I wish I hadn't waited so long to dive into it.
I finished BG II just a few weeks back, and can honestly say it has me just as enthralled as BG 2 so far.

It is, however, a true RPG, so be prepared for the inevitable party mechanics, inventory/weapon/spell management, and of course, combat emphasis, which it sounds like you'd rather avoid.
But if you're looking for an engrossing world, plot, and characters, it's one of the finest of recent memory.

 

[Rhezuss]

Yep Pillars is awesome and a real legit successor to the old-school isometric RPGs like BG, IWD and Torment. I really like this game but need to finish lots of stuff before concentrating my time in this game to enjoy it at it's fullest.

That's what i'm doing with Witcher 3.

 

[ControlD]

I feel like kind of a broken record around here, but lately I've really gotten into Pillars of Eternity.

That will be the next game I play if I ever finish D :OS.

 

[shortylickens]

Pillars of Eternity is cool if you finally got tired of Baldurs Gate.

 

[runzwithsizorz]

Myst remastered / Riven
Longest Journey
Syberia
Not RPG's, just point and click adventure games with good stories()

L.A. Noire
Gabriel Knight Sins of the Fathers
Max Payne 1 and 2