Games similar to Might and Magic?

[koval321]

First RPG i played was Ishar 1-3 and am recommend that for sure, later played M&M just because it remind me it a bit (IMO best is 2 then 1 and worst 3)

Ravenloft 1, 2 and Menzoberranzan (which is probably part 3) this should be somewhere on top of list

Yendorian tales are HERE

Wizardry 1-8 played only part 8 what dont liked was too much monster respawns (am wonder if exist mod which fix that)

Elder Scrolls 1-5 is pretty interesting (and few rare games from this gameworld Battlespire and Redguard)

Realms of Arkania 1-3 it have impressive RPG complexity, sometime feel like its too good

Betrayal at Krondor its close to M&M later part Betrayal at Antara also ok but Return to Krondor not that good, different style

I think the same about Lands of Lore 1-3 where first part i feel was best

You can also search for Redshift Legacy and Quest probably full version is only on PocketPC the same as Undercroft

Beside this which i think may be close is Ultima V - Lazarus total conversion mod to Dungeon Siege also Ultima 9 and Gothic serie worth to look at (well in fact its not close to M&M style, but RPG in open world)

[BTB]

Even unfixed, Morrowind is actually a roleplaying game, while Oblivion is more the inverse of a roleplaying game.

Roleplaying, yes. Game, no. Morrowind was made several years after things like "balance" and "game design" were all but forgotten by developers in favor of making things pretty. I have a few choice words for the boys at Bethesda - all of them are vulgar.

To put it another way, Bethesda spent five years developing a retail product that was essentially a tool that the Morrowind community spent twice as much time using to create a game that isn't horribly broken. At this point, Bethesda should be paying us.

[hatsforclowns]

Even unfixed, Morrowind is actually a roleplaying game, while Oblivion is more the inverse of a roleplaying game.

Roleplaying, yes. Game, no. Morrowind was made several years after things like "balance" and "game design" were all but forgotten by developers in favor of making things pretty. I have a few choice words for the boys at Bethesda - all of them are vulgar.

To put it another way, Bethesda spent five years developing a retail product that was essentially a tool that the Morrowind community spent twice as much time using to create a game that isn't horribly broken. At this point, Bethesda should be paying us.

Huh? I've played through Morrowind several times with no more than 2 or 3 small mods o_O (more gold to merchants, a few tweaks to enchanting/soul trapping, and a tiny house in Seyda Neen)

What exactly is so mind-blowingly broken that you'd almost go postal at the Bethesda offices?

[BTB]

What exactly is so mind-blowingly broken that you'd almost go postal at the Bethesda offices?

My mod list (http://btb2.free.fr/morrowind.html) states some of my more basic, broad grievances. However, I don't think I really snapped until I started work on my own mod. Two years of working with the Construction Set and seeing pretty much the entire game laid out before me showed me in a way I'd never seen before just how little effort and how entirely halfassed this particular part of game development (that is, the gameplay itself) had become. The work on such things as spells, the alchemy system, equipment and item stats, etc. was sloppy, buggy, and ultimately failed to contribute much of anything to the game. And every time I found something new that needed fixing was yet another straw on the back of the camel that was my growing hatred for the people whose job I found myself doing.

If you're looking for specific things that bugged me, it's far too much to reprint here. The readme for my mod (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/V ... il&id=7904) is about the size of a small novel and goes into detail about all the things about the game that are wrong, which most people should be able to agree with whether or not they like how I went about fixing them.

Granted, I could play the devil's advocate and say that the Might & Magic games had a lot of the same problems that Morrowind did. As an open-ended, freeform game, some gameplay balance issues are simply unavoidable. But you at least feel that the guys who made Might & Magic were actually *trying*. Also, modding the events.lod file to make MM7 more challenging took me two weeks rather than two years. That probably helped.

I think the biggest part of it is that Morrowind, unlike Might & Magic, was built almost entirely on the premise of modding it. This isn't necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, as the modding community as a whole has done some very wonderful things with it (quite a bit, I should mention, with the parts of the game that the devs *didn't* intend to be moddable, such as the source code itself). However, it gives the finished product that was shipped to us much, much less of a "finished product" feel and more of a "build your own damn game" feel. It's like Linux, only in game form.

[Bandobras Took]

A game's got to be pretty bad before it can beat Oblivion's "Major skills you actually use lead to gimped characters" levelling system.

But yeah, I don't qualify Oblivion as a roleplaying game, because there are too many areas where the character can never be better or worse than I am in real life.

[BoardGuest808888]

What exactly is so mind-blowingly broken that you'd almost go postal at the Bethesda offices?

My mod list (http://btb2.free.fr/morrowind.html) states some of my more basic, broad grievances. However, I don't think I really snapped until I started work on my own mod.

Game balance is just a matter of perspective. U can't simply tell it just because u don't like how's it's being made. Anyhow, u even knew those because of the Construction Set only. I'd bet if there be no Construction Set, u won't even know if the game really balanced or not, let again creating a novel-long these 'bou that

[tolich]

IMO, Morrowind is too pointed on the player character. The NPCs all around are always ask their what-do-you-want from the player, when he walks close for his own needs but never, never talk to each other. HalfLife beats it on this field.

[XEL II]

HalfLife beats it on this field.

Although it's not like Half-Life has poor NPC characterization (the sequel, at least)

[BTB]

Game balance is just a matter of perspective. U can't simply tell it just because u don't like how's it's being made. Anyhow, u even knew those because of the Construction Set only. I'd bet if there be no Construction Set, u won't even know if the game really balanced or not, let again creating a novel-long these 'bou that

I was well aware of how broken the game was before I even knew how to use the Construction Set - using it simply made me aware of how extensive the problem was. It is quite seriously the most user-unfriendly piece of garbage I've ever had the misfortune of using, but that's a different topic altogether. I relied on other mods to fix my problems for years before finally admitting that they just weren't going to cut it and decided to learn how to use it myself. Two years later, I'm the proud creator of one of the most commonly-used gameplay balance mods out there. I'm making that point not to brag, but merely to point out that a *lot* of other people can agree with me that the gameplay is broken.

Again, I won't really go into it here, since my mod's readme is more or less a thesis on everything that was done wrong in the original game. Someone once called it the biggest exploit to vanilla Morrowind in existence, and I can't say that description is too far off. Whether or not people agree with how I've handled it (many don't) isn't really the question at hand. My point is that nobody can really make anything resembling a sane argument that the gameplay isn't broken a dozen ways from Sunday.

A game's got to be pretty bad before it can beat Oblivion's "Major skills you actually use lead to gimped characters" levelling system.

Morrowind actually has this same problem, though to a lesser extent because less of the game is leveled. My mod "corrects" said issue simply by making miscellaneous skills no longer gain experience through use. It takes a page from the old-school RPG book, since it actually makes your class selection mean something. It also makes paying for training much less of a waste of money, since it becomes the only way to level your misc skills.

[thrakk]

ohhh shiii. I didn't even notice that you are BTB when I suggested Morrowind Overhaul over all of your preferred mods. Then again Morrowind Overhaul probably uses tons of your preferred mods. I DO think 'BTB's Game Improvements' are really important.

I ended up adding a lot of my own mods to the Morrowind Overhaul base because I've gotten addicted to finding additional improvements.

I started playing Morrowind for the first time this year (I've played for a couple hours before in its vanilla form). I ended up buying a new graphics card just for modded Morrowind. My computer is now good enough to handle MGE. Shaders are a bit much, but I got the best graphics card my PC can handle.

BTB, your game improvements are great. I usually try to get the most updated 'Sorted Alchemy' and 'Unique Finery Equipment'. I'm not quite sure if they are up to date with your latest changes in 'Alchemy' and 'Equipment' but you've been updating those a lot recently.

I've been playing Morrowind your hardcore way - where minor skills don't level up. I work my ass off to get +5 bonuses now. (I'm still addicted to using efficient leveling but I'm really glad that Skyrim is getting rid of the stupid bonus system).

I just got up to level 9. I'm hoping that even though I'm using efficient leveling, the game won't become easy after I've maxed out most of my skills. It's not easy right now.

One thing I will say is that there has been quite a few times that I've had a hard time finding a place to rest. I definitely like this challenge a lot more than being able to rest/replenish yourself anywhere. However, one thing that I'm not entirely in favor of is finding a bedroll but having to wake every hour to fight a new creature. For example, the npc owned bedroll by ghostgate. I also think there are some places that could really use a bedroll.

One general question: My Breton is 50% resistant to magic. Would this effect the 100% invisibility I'm supposed to get when I wear 'Dwemer Diving Helm' from abot's Water Life mod? I think her mod is counterproductive to your alchemy balance but I don't plan on making potions with the new ingredients. Containers often have a lot of the new ingredients mixed in with the old ones. There is one rare ingredient that is worth 300 gold and another that is worth 200 gold. Do you think this extra loot is overly counterproductive to your game balancing? I think that it's nice to have a bit extra cash when trying to do efficient leveling. I don't think the perks of having more valuable ingredients changes the game balance too much. (Maybe the balance would be ruined if I were to use the new ingredients for potion making)

[thrakk]

I wouldn't mind finding a way to level cap my character if at some point additional levels would be overkill

[BTB]

ohhh shiii. I didn't even notice that you are BTB when I suggested Morrowind Overhaul over all of your preferred mods. Then again Morrowind Overhaul probably uses tons of your preferred mods. I DO think 'BTB's Game Improvements' are really important.

Don't worry about it. I've got a huge amount of respect for Kingpix - and that's not just because I know that he plans on including my mod in the "game experience" half of his overhaul. I remember when he first contacted me about getting my permission and dismissing him as yet another one of those naive kids who was going to try and put a mod pack together. There's been a lot who have tried and failed; Kingpix is the first to have ever succeeded.

BTB, your game improvements are great. I usually try to get the most updated 'Sorted Alchemy' and 'Unique Finery Equipment'. I'm not quite sure if they are up to date with your latest changes in 'Alchemy' and 'Equipment' but you've been updating those a lot recently.

Yeah, I don't think that the finery is 100% up to date, but if you use both it and the plugin from my mod, it should cover everything.

I've been playing Morrowind your hardcore way - where minor skills don't level up. I work my ass off to get +5 bonuses now. (I'm still addicted to using efficient leveling but I'm really glad that Skyrim is getting rid of the stupid bonus system).

It is? I must admit that I haven't been keeping up with it... my views on modern games are dismal at best. I figure that I've spent the last nine years fixing the Elder Scrolls *three* (and have yet to actually play it as a result) that even thinking about number five would be out of the question.

I just got up to level 9. I'm hoping that even though I'm using efficient leveling, the game won't become easy after I've maxed out most of my skills. It's not easy right now.

That's what I was aiming for.

One thing I will say is that there has been quite a few times that I've had a hard time finding a place to rest. I definitely like this challenge a lot more than being able to rest/replenish yourself anywhere. However, one thing that I'm not entirely in favor of is finding a bedroll but having to wake every hour to fight a new creature. For example, the npc owned bedroll by ghostgate. I also think there are some places that could really use a bedroll.

I'm not aware of any transportable bedrolls in the original game (though, as I've said, I haven't really played it much). The "get attacked immediately when you rest" thing is actually a failsafe to my main solution, which is simply to disable camping in all cells. The problem is that there's so many situations where that won't work, such as in cells that have been added by mods.

One general question: My Breton is 50% resistant to magic. Would this effect the 100% invisibility I'm supposed to get when I wear 'Dwemer Diving Helm' from abot's Water Life mod?

Shouldn't be. Magicka resistance only applies to negative effects.

I think her mod is counterproductive to your alchemy balance but I don't plan on making potions with the new ingredients. Containers often have a lot of the new ingredients mixed in with the old ones. There is one rare ingredient that is worth 300 gold and another that is worth 200 gold. Do you think this extra loot is overly counterproductive to your game balancing? I think that it's nice to have a bit extra cash when trying to do efficient leveling. I don't think the perks of having more valuable ingredients changes the game balance too much. (Maybe the balance would be ruined if I were to use the new ingredients for potion making)

Abot's a girl? >.>

And no, ingredients are still ridiculously cheap compared to the rest of the loot you find throughout the game. I'd be more concerned about imbalances coming from the availability of positive effects without negative ones to counterbalance them.

Honestly, working with the ingredient effects was by far the funnest part of that whole mod.

[thrakk]

I'm not aware of any transportable bedrolls in the original game (though, as I've said, I haven't really played it much). The "get attacked immediately when you rest" thing is actually a failsafe to my main solution, which is simply to disable camping in all cells. The problem is that there's so many situations where that won't work, such as in cells that have been added by mods.

Oh, I didn't mean transportable bedrolls. I was just thinking that I would like there to be more safe (permanently fixed) sleeping mats so that I could have a little more places to camp. This isn't a deal-breaker by any means. It's just that sometimes I think I'm pretty far from any place to properly sleep.

Abot's a girl? >.>

I'm not sure. My guess is yes

And no, ingredients are still ridiculously cheap compared to the rest of the loot you find throughout the game. I'd be more concerned about imbalances coming from the availability of positive effects without negative ones to counterbalance them.

Honestly, working with the ingredient effects was by far the funnest part of that whole mod.

I haven't made a potion yet. I probably ought to; I've been saving all my comberry for the right time. Potion-making, spell-making, and enchanting is something I tend to bypass in elder scrolls games - at least early on. I remember discovering just how broken vanilla Oblivion was when I made a custom 'elemental damage'/'soul trap' blade that could easily be recharged with Azura's Star

cheers

[BoardGuest808888]

I was well aware of how broken the game was before I even knew how to use the Construction Set - using it simply made me aware of how extensive the problem was. It is quite seriously the most user-unfriendly piece of garbage I've ever had the misfortune of using, but that's a different topic altogether. I relied on other mods to fix my problems for years before finally admitting that they just weren't going to cut it and decided to learn how to use it myself. Two years later, I'm the proud creator of one of the most commonly-used gameplay balance mods out there. I'm making that point not to brag, but merely to point out that a *lot* of other people can agree with me that the gameplay is broken.

U'r just exaggerating things. If the game really was 'that' broken, they wouldn't even make money out of it anyhow. What u said about lot of people complaining were because they read other's complains, not necessarily because they know the issues themselves. It's just fad, band-wagon effect

If King in Chess doesn't wear crown, do u wanna say Chess is broken as well ?

Just like what u said about leveling system, what is or isn't correct was u'r own interpretation, not what an absolution of any kind.

Anyhow, if u want to really complain about this particular, I'd suggest u start new topic and not just taking over one

[Bandobras Took]

U'r just exaggerating things. If the game really was 'that' broken, they wouldn't even make money out of it anyhow.

That's not really that accurate when talking about sequels to successful titles -- such titles can make money regardless of how broken they are simply on the strength of the previous title. This is doubly true if the design flaws are not immediately obvious.

[DeTHiCa]

I also recommend Arx Fatalis and Wizardry 8.
Of "smaller" games I can recommend the Avernum series(turn based, isometric 2D, party). http://www.avernum.com/

[skinothetis1]

When i saw Wizardy 8 i was hooked but there is a very serious problem.When time passes and you continue play, simple enemies became more and more powerful so the game get's extremely difficult and you simply cannot go back to a previous place because the enemies ahead will get more powerful when you meet them.
So it got very frustrating to have to make a war plan so i can kill an ooze and i dropped the game.

[Marzhin]

For those looking for a game similar to MM3-5 (tile-based movement, etc.), there's a little free game on iPhone called Undercroft which recreates this kind of gameplay quite nicely.
http://www.undercroft.com/

[BoardGuest808888]

That's not really that accurate when talking about sequels to successful titles -- such titles can make money regardless of how broken they are simply on the strength of the previous title. This is doubly true if the design flaws are not immediately obvious.

Seems to me it's even more difficult for sequels to make any real money, the stronger titles would make it even more difficult. Unless the devs can somehow liven up the hype, it's easier for sequels to fall apart.

When making new titles, it's like a gamble. It can be real hit, or not. But when making sequels, everyone already know what's to expect, when, and how much it worth. Sequel can't be more lame than it's prequel. The devs would work even harder on new ones (either that, or just let it go altogether). And this not to mention other factors such as competition, trends, and technology availability.

[tolich]

Sequel can't be more lame than it's prequel.

In fact, it can. MM9 and XCOM3 are examples.