Lack of meaningful choices/shallow RPG elements

This is my main beef with video games since the previous generation. You know this feeling when the game supposedly gives you a choice to spare someone or kill them only to show you that no matter what you do, that person dies anyway. Is it really that costly to create new scenarios influenced by your choices? Or are the publishers like: "don't allow meaningful choices, our focus tests showed that 99% of people went for the A option"? I really want to know, is it really that costly to create different sub-scenarios after players' choices? The Witcher 2 showed us all that it is possible to not only create different story branches, but also whole different acts altogether (along with different environments). Why are so few developers doing it nowadays?

In the original Deus Ex, there were so many variables, that even almost a decade after finishing it, I'd see something that I didn't think was possible to achieve in the story!

Or take game endings into consideration. Some games indeed have different endings and you have some illusion of choice. You can choose whichever one you like, and it is just a matter of reloading a savegame to choose a different one, instead of having them dynamically permutating as you go through the game and excluding one another. In the latest Sherlock Holmes, even if every case has 5 or 6 different outcomes, each with 2 different variations of endings, so 10 endings per case, you can - upon choosing one ending - choose whichever one you want how many times you please.

Then there's the matter of "RPG elements" where you supposedly have separate trees but over the course of the game you end up having them all and thus eradicating any specialization element and thus replayability. Do you remember how unique were choices that you made in System Shock 2 that basically put you in separate classes with gameplay that varied wildly between them? Now it's all but gone.

The very worst thing is, all of the above apply also to a number of modern RPG games.

mass effect = the thread.

that game epitomises fake choices

i killed off the rachni in me2 but oh hold on a second they are back in me3 yay

Any choice involving stats is the work of Satan and must die until it is dead !

The Witcher 2 = Best way to implement choice and consequence system inside a story

Divinity: Original Sin = Best way to provide freedom to do quests within the gameplay itself

@Lulu_Lulu:

You should not be allowed to talk about RPGs. Most of the time , it doesn't make sense.

@Cloud_imperium

That depends.... Is it me not making sense or you simply not knowing what I know hence can't comprehend my rants ?

people always talking about these "meaningful" choices and to be honest, the only game I've seen where choice really affects the story it's on Heavy Rain. The rest are nothing else but a illusions of choice.

Anything is possible.

Not sure if you paid attention to the plot details or just skipped every cutscene. If you killed the Rachni Queen in the first game, the Rachni Queen is an indoctrinated clone built by the Reapers.

Having the illusion of choice is just fine. What matters is how they present those choices and make them feel meaningful.

Agree! Mass Effect is so silly in that regard. The game incentivize you to make choices based on color, not by what you actually think is right.

You're the best, LuLu. I'm a grumpy, jaded old trollop who burnt himself out on flaming and trolling years ago. You make me smile...

Meet the new generation of "core" gamers.

That was my big problem with L.A. Noire

You're choices didn't impact the story whatsoever

We should thank consoles for that. Thanks god we have PC exclusives like this that save the day.

@Zelda187: Great game but yeah you would just score less for missing evidence or clues.

New Vegas has dire choices

Wow only games I can think of is NV and Mass Effect

Choice in video game stories is really overrated.

Maybe it's time to stop forcing RPG elements into games that shouldn't have them.

No, it isn't. In the 1990s it was the norm and it was fully fleshed-out, even in the mainstream.

Lulu_Lulu should be banned from threads like these.

Doesn't Divinity: something something have meaningful choices? I have it installed but haven't started yet.

@Sushiglutton

And to have access to those colours you gotta build up them Dialog Stats.

@trollop_scat

Thanks... I guess. ;)

@Zelda187

Atleast it was Stat Free and it does affect the conclusion of the Story in a few of the cases.

Yes.

I would agree. I laugh at Bioware game choices because most of them are nothing more than: want to listen to more dialogue? No? then there is no choice. Main plots and story points will be the same irregardless of what you say or do.

There is more C&C than just choices in the story. Once upon a time, character building could be C&C in itself. Where a diplomatic character would lock himself out of certain quests because the quests would not fit his abilities and vice versa. Nowadays though with respecs, said C&C is now gone. C&C is more often than not, just cosmetic nowadays, especially when the unholy BioWare corporation is involved.

But there are games with good C&C, last year (or maybe it was early this year cant remember, Long Live the Queen was released). But a genre that still embraces C&C quite well in this day and age would be the 4X genre, you make choices that have a future impact all the time, in fact that is what makes said genre so fun. Same goes for sandbox mmorpgs. Non sandbox mmos and 4X examples include,

1. Fallout: Some of the finest C&C I have seen, in the early version. Sending a caravan to your Vault would increase the water supply by quite a bit, but would also result in the Super Mutant threat finding your home faster. And this is just one of many examples. Like any good example of C&C would provide. Your choices may determine which quests you can and cannot take and more importantly, it all feels extremely natural too, and the consequences do not feel forced.
2. Kichikuou Rance (NSFW): Not only does what you choose make an impact, but when you choose makes a similar impact locking/unlocking future events and characters. The game has 5 endings which are built up from an accumulations of your actions and choices throughout the game. Each individual character (roughly 60 characters) also has a good and bad ending, better yet, not every character can have a good ending. You cant eat the cake and have it too.
3. King of Dragon Pass: Choices you make in this game can make or break your kingdom. In my opinion this game has the best C&C I have witnessed.
4. Wizardry series: Your choices in previous games come in the sequels, in particular it determines your start in the sequels. Not mind blowing by any means, but it certainly is more fascinating than modified codex entries and emails.
5. Vampires of the Masquerade: Bloodlines: Troika's finest RPG also has some of the finest C&C I have seen. Much like the above examples (minus wizardry), choices here change your standings, and may prevent you from accessing certain quests. And determines what various paths you can and cannot take. Even the character creation is a excellent example of C&C where which race you pick can have serious consequences and greatly affect your playstyle and social standing among various groups.
6. Sengoku Rance (NSFW): See Kichikuou Rance. Furthermore, the game has an absurd ammount of commanders, all with their own personalities, and several with events related to them. Of all these commanders, you can only pick 30 of them.
7. Witcher 1: Multiple choices you make in even side quests can come and bite you in the ass in the future.
8. Witcher 2: See Cloud_imperium's post.
9. Guild Wars 2: Your choices will determine your personal story missions for the next 10 levels.
10. World of WarCraft: Warlords of Draenor: During your levelling process from 90-100, you may come into several situations where you may build one building or the other. Which building you choose not only determines your bonuses for that zone, but also which quests will be available to you.

DA Inquisition has meaningful choices that really affect gameplay and yes you decide who lives or dies and whether or not to turn them into allies all the choices are there.

This won't be popular but outside of the story The Witcher is painfully shallow. You don't even get to decide who you are or what you look like you just 'play out' Geraldts experiences it doesn't get much more shallow than that. I've always thought of it as a sort of modern Golden Axe (hack and slash absolutely dominant over all other game types) with very light RPG elements. I like The Witcher games as games I really like them for what they are but as RPG's they are terrible.

It was a lot easier to do branching stories when nothing was voiced over and graphics and level design was far more simple.

Filling up text files with different responses wasn't difficult nor was creating alternate versions of levels to reflect on those changes. Now video game levels take hundreds of thousands of manhours to design, create, populate with content, and then polish. It's too expensive.

So the question is, will you sacrifice high production values for larger branching stories? That's the decision devs have to make. The amount of people who demand branching stories in RPGs are a lot fewer than those that demand higher quality and higher production values. Some devs can make branching stories work, but they are always far more limited than they used to be. Dialog trees are going to be less intensive due to the amount of voice acting required.

I stopped playing game that said that your actions and décisions will make a difference ... I played Telltales The Walking Dead and the whole selling point was that the game adapted to your decision and no it doesn't matter one bit. They even said in the second season that our save filed will be exported and it will make an impact and it also didn't matter it was a very big disapointment to see who came back.

I prefer japanease rpg as they have a more cohesive story that build up to an epic finale which is never the case with western rpg which have more of a sand box type of structure.

That's probably true for lower budget games but a lot of major releases are guilty with no excuse. As an i.e. I said DAI gives meaningful choices and it does and it's all voiced but they also have a lot of dialogue filler I mean literally tons of it that just doesn't need to be there. It's nice I suppose but just not necessary. So I suppose my point is the devs are giving the wrong priorities to the voiced dialogue. Make it punchy and make it meaningful and players will respond to it much better than just endless random 'exchanges' that most people really don't care about.

The only games I've ever played with actual meaningful choices that matter are visual novels (VN's). VN's revolve almost entirely around choices, with many story branches and each one having its own unique scenarios, outcomes and endings. The choices and branches often go far deeper than anything you'd see in even the best RPG's (for example, even the choices in The Witcher 2 pale in comparison to an average VN).

Since VN's are low-budget 2D games, this allows more resources to be directed towards the script, dialogues, audio, choices, and branches, which can be multiplied without having to create more expensive graphical resources for each branch. On the other hand, big-budget 3D RPG's require the assets, polygons, textures and programming to be multiple for each and every branch, making it very difficult and expensive to pull off even a small amount of story branching. Maybe this could improve in the future, but right now, the level of story branching in RPG's today are no better than what VN's were doing 20 years ago.

Then how comes my Wrex is dead? I miss his big ass.

Pretty much this, it's not complicated to understand at all.

Forgot to give some examples. Here are a couple of visual novels (available in English) that have meaningful choices & consequences: Clannad, Steins Gate, Shadow of Memories, Banshee's Last Cry, Eve Burst Error, YU-NO, Ever 17, 999, Zero Escape, Fate Stay Night, School Days, Time Hollow, etc. The choices & consequences in these VN's are a lot more meaningful than what you'd see in RPG's. For example, simple choices or decisions in these VN's could have drastic consequences on how the story unfolds (for example, leading you down towards completely different storylines) or how other characters develop (for example, a friendly ally in one story branch becoming a psychotic antagonist in another story branch). VN's are great examples of how to do choices & consequences right.

I think moral choices/branching paths are kind of a gimmicky selling point. I'd much rather a game drastically Change how I can play it.

A game like deus ex human revolution did that pretty well I think, as did bravely default there are so many different synergies between classes. Games that give the player multiple options and let them craft there own strategies. Rather than just lame branching dialogue trees.

@Wild_man_22

Or a game with so many ways to play that it doesn't have an objective anymore.... Kinda like The Sims.

Ditto.

if you want literature read a fucking book.

video games can't tell top shelf emotionally engaging stories like even the crappiest head candy dime store novel can.

that's how simple this is.

i just finished walking dead season two and thought it did pretty good on an emotional level but that was specifically made as an interactive story with some light game elements.

Yeah I do't get why fake choices are so popular these days. It'd be cool if they actually changed the way the game unfolds (although games like Deus Ex Human Revolution and dishonored did a solid job of making them impactful even though it didn't change the course of the game). But a recent example of pointless RPG elements is GTAV. I saw literally no point in leveling the individual stats up. It had no noticeable impact on the gameplay.

DA Inquisition has some cool choices mixed in there... It is pretty shallow on stats and stuff, which is fine. I just like the whole recent emphasis on open world freedom in more recent post-skyrim RPGs.

Go try wasteland 2 if you want to have to make choices with no good outcome and permanent repercussions.

@parkurtommo

Fine ?

I think its fantastic.

@blue_hazy_basic

And Stats... Don't forget them stats.

Not sure what you hate about ability stats exactly?

DAI plays almost like a fucking shooter. I am not a fan of the combat at all. The world is pretty cool though.

@blue_hazy_basic

An Ability is not a Stat... Its an ability, it can't be quatified by a number. Well it can... RPGs do it all the time.... I just don't see the appeal of numbers over mechanics.

The combat? The combat is textbook dragon age man, you just auto attack and press hotkeys every once in a while. I don't see how that is like a shooter?

Err mechanics do use numbers that are quantifiable and abilities almost always user numbers to quantify how useful they are. You're arguing semantics. In RPG's stats let you customise a character so you play and act differently, ie roleplaying rather than just pew pew pew, smash smash smash.

Maybe it just plays differently on a console to how I used to play it on the PC, but pretty much don't bother with tactical combat in most fights, just point and shoot (as a mage) with the trigger with the odd button pressed here and there.. How is that not like a shooter?

Well in a shooter you have to aim. :P

I use a controller to play DA:I on PC actually. This game was obviously designed with a controller in mind, and I won't bother "resisting" that design choice by playing with clunky keyboard controls. I'm a rogue so, I guess it's a bit more fun than playing as a mage since I have to move around a bit. But anyways the combat is the least interesting part about DA:I.

@blue_hazy_basic

Obviously..... And are you telling theres no difference between lock picking in Splinter Cell game and lock picking in an RPG.......

One uses a mechanic, it requires a certain level of skill, the other is a contextual single button press tied to number, which requires a stat/skill check.

Thats a pretty big difference for just semantics. And if lock picking doesn't cut it for you then theres Persuasion in interactive Dialogues like the ones in Fallout and Mass Effect.

And to a lesser extant the samething happens in combat. Where do the stats begin and the mechanics end ?