: OK THAT'S IT! Ducky cannot hold in his murderous rage
: now!!!
: First of all, Jenova, please take no offense at any of
: this. I am merely trying to inform you of a mistake
: that you made, IMHO. Oh yes, and the things I say
: about FF7 actually apply to most computer/console
: RPG's.
: Now that I've said that, let me tell you the stuff. Do
: not ever give me the feces about FF7 being the best
: selling RPG in America. All of us Myth players know
: that it doesn't take huge sales for a game to be good.
: It takes a good game. Starcraft and Quake 2 sell tons
: more than Myth II, but does that make them good
: games??? ABSOLUTELY NOT!!! Those games sell more
: because they appeal to young teenagers who want
: nothing more than mayhem and explosions, and want
: nothing new to learn! Myth II may not sell as many
: copies as Starcraft or Quake 2, but there is no doubt
: in my mind or any other Myther's mind that Myth will
: never be worse than a second rate, near storyless game
: with an extremely outdated style of gameplay! oooo,
: wow, first person shooter and warcraft style game.
: wooopedie doo!
: Final Fantasy 7 is so much better selling than REAL role
: playing games because of the same reason that
: Starcraft sells more than Myth. It appeals to pretty
: much everyone, therefor everyone will buy it. That
: does not mean it is better quality! There has never
: been a single computer/console RPG that has EVER come
: close to being as spectacular as a true RPG. The
: reasons for this will follow shortly, but bear with me
: here.
: But before I tell you why, I have the reason for FF7
: being the best selling "RPG" in the world or
: whatever it was. With FF7, your average 13 year old
: gaming enthusiast writes "FF7" on his
: christmas wishlist. His parents find a box in the
: computer store with the words "Final Fantasy
: VII" on it. THey buy it and give it to the kid
: for the holiday, and he proceeds to enter his room and
: not come out for the next 7 hours. He installs FF7 on
: his computer and starts playing immediately. He's
: played before on his friend's playstation, and has a
: book full of hints to beat the game, so a few days
: later, he emerges from his room having finished the
: game and uncovered every secret in the game. Wow, that
: was fun, he thinks. But wouldn't it have been cool if
: I could've played as someone different? Or what if I
: could've done something besides kill or run away from
: almost every enemy I found? He will never know how
: cool it would have been because this just would not
: have happened on FF7 unless there was a certain point
: in the game that called for that to happen. THen there
: would be almost no other way to go about getting past
: that obstacle. Well, time for the next game, or maybe
: I'll play throught FF7 again and just try to get my
: character as high level as I can?
: That was exciting! One game that provides for a week of
: entertainment before the replay value starts to effect
: things.
: Now, what would happen if Little Timmy had decided to put
: "Vampire: The Masquerade rulebook" on his
: wishlist because his friends told him it was the
: coolest thing in the world? His parents would have
: bought it for him, unthinkingly, and wrapped it up for
: xmas. Timmy, being a computer gamer would read the
: first few pages of the book thinking "wow, cool,
: this is a neat intro. Vampires and stuff." After
: seeing the table of contents, he sees that there are
: over 200 pages in the book. He saw that it took him
: about 15 minutes to read the first page while taking
: in all of the detail, does some quick math on his
: computer's calculator and finds that reading the book
: from cover to cover would take him 50 hours total. He
: thinks once again: "lots of time. this doesn't
: take as long as FF7, but my friends say it is
: cool." A few days later he has read the entire
: book and is very disappointed. There was only one
: chapter on combat in the game, and the whole thing
: required ROLE PLAYING (gasp). This was too different
: from FF7! He would actually have to MAKE HIS OWN
: CHARACTER (gasp again) and ROLE PLAY A PERSONALITY
: (gasp even more). Little Timmy then went and returned
: the book, disgusted, and bought FF7 with the money.
: You see what I'm getting at?
: Now... Why are computer/console RPG's so much more
: horrible than the real things? Let's start with the
: meaning of the game type. Role Playing Game. That
: probably means that the player role plays, which means
: he assumes the role of a fictional character. In FF7,
: the player assumes the role of Cloud, a guy with a
: sword that's as tall as he is and wields it like it's
: made of tin foil, and has a set personality, and lives
: on the world that is set in FF7. In Advanced Dungeons
: and Dragons, the player assumes the role of a warrior,
: wizard, priest, or rogue, on any of an infinite number
: of worlds, with any type of personality, and any type
: of equipment he could possibly imagine. Are you seeing
: the difference yet?
: THe definition of Role Playing from one of the many true
: RPG creators- Ed Simbalist, creator of Chivalry &
: Sorcery: "Role Playing is the means by which we
: can escape our daily existence to enter those exciting
: worlds of fantasy. We assume the identities of
: characters. We leave our own existences behind and
: create for ourselves personalities who have their own
: personal histories, their own passions and interests,
: and, above all, adventurous lives which we could never
: hope to know in our humdrum existences... There is a
: lot more to role-playing than 'rolling up' a character
: with a few throws of the dice, giving him a name, and
: then jumping right into the middle of the action
: without further thought. To do that denies us the
: almost magical experience of being part of an
: imaginary world that we come to know and understand as
: if we were born to it and lived in it all our
: lives."
: There is more, but I don't feel like copying two full
: pages of text to this rant. Suffice it to say that FF7
: is not a real RPG. No console/computer game can, or
: ever will be. There are many things that computers,
: even with their complex AI's and everything. No
: computer can do anything more than it was programmed
: to do, nor will it let the player do anything more
: than it was programmed to allow him to do. It cannot
: determine the complex thought processes that go on
: inside a person's head, so it can't converse with a
: player, use complex strategies, come up with infinite
: possibilities, or let the player do any of these.
: Computers will never be able to do these things, at
: least not in our lives. A true RPG is run by a human,
: therefor anything is possible in a true RPG. The
: players can be any characters that they want to be,
: can converse with NPC's regularly, can create their
: own personalities, go off course, and bascially do
: whatever they want.
: NOW... you probably are unaffected by this rant. I can't
: say I blame you. But know this. Any time you are
: talking to a person who plays True RPG's, and who
: you've never met before, it will most likely offend
: them a lot if they tell you that they play RPG's and
: you say "What, you mean like FF7?"
: I feel it is necessary to reiterate: NO CONSOLE OR
: COMPUTER GAME WILL EVER BE WORTHY OF THE TITLE
: "RPG!"
: PLEASE! Respond to this Jenova. I really want to hear
: your opinion on the matter, and it took me a half hour
: to write all of this, so I need something to justify
: it :)
