7th December 2004, 2:47 PM
Quote:Geez, now you have to steal my lines!
When they apply to you, sure.
Quote:What a great rebuttal to what I wrote...
A very effective and compltely accurate one, but I did want more detail so I added a few paragraphs there. Reread that part.
Quote:I have to compromise so should ABF! Really, though, ABF, you should play Morrowind before you talk about it rather than simply making assumptions based on the previous titles in the series. It's no different than what you accused me of. Again, PLAY MORROWIND, or just talk about the other games in the series.
If you go back and read what I was saying in the first thread about this, I created the thread talking specifically about Arena and how playing that influenced my opinion of open-ended RPGs vs. more focused ones. Yes, Morrowind was in the background because Morrowind is also a open-ended RPG and a TES game, but I didn't start talking about it until it became the main subject... and even then, I don't think I've been making assumptions about it that are false. If you want to prove that wrong find something I said about Morrowind in specific that isn't true, but I don't think that I did much of it and if it was it was definitely unintentional...
And I can't play Morrowind because that would require buying Morrowind, and there are a few PC RPGs that I want a bit more (Wizardry 8 for instance)... stupidly there is no demo. But I have a pretty good idea of the way teh game works, and on the level I'm talking about I am sure that playing it would simply show that what I am saying is correct (that is, that the more open-ended you make your game the less sense of place each location has, the less unique the quests are in each area, the weaker the story is, etc...). That has been true for every other open-ended RPG I have played (not just the TES games) and I am sure that Morrowind is no exception. The only question is the degree... and based on the reviews, it seems to vary from category to category along the lines of the previous TES games. Which is about what I'd expect... sure, if I played Morrowind I could talk better about Morrowind. But my case doesn't hinge on Morrowind. OB1 seems to still think so, but it never did and still doesn't.
In fact it is the opposite. Morrowind is a game that could help present my arguement better, to be sure, but it is not necessary to talk about it to discuss how much linearity or open-endedness affects RPGs. It would work about as well if we discussed some of the many other games I reference on this issue, or others... so many PC RPGs have some non-linear element that it's a rich field for discussion for anyone who has played much in the genre.