-Comando-
30th March 2003, 22:36
I’m not sure if I have any clue, anymore, as to where the boundary lies between RPG and Strategy games. The distinction gets more and more blurred with each new release. What has changed is the increasing incorporation of the RPG cornerstones of character development, and interaction with NPCs, into Strategy games. There are certainly many “pure” strategy games remaining, (Myth III, Red Alert/Yuri, Starcraft, and TA come to mind as pretty good examples), At the RPG end of the spectrum Icewind Dale, Baldur’s Gate II, and Wizardry 8 have been outstanding examples of the best in RPGs.
But there is a growing middle ground of next-generation games blending the best of both. Games like Disciples II, Diablo II, and the impending Heroes of Might and Magic IV (HOMM4) are excellent examples. These “Persistent Hero Games” (PHGs) have become some of the most successful retail releases in years.
A bit of History
Few would question that Heros3 marked the beginning of the PHGs. The elements of character development were limited, and had relatively modest impact on the outcome of a game. (I still believe that “logistics” and “diplomacy” were by far the most useful HOMM3 aspects to develop.) HOMM3 still relied upon resource development and amassing large armies to succeed far more than character development. But this little addition, character development, was responsible for turning HOMM3 into one of the best and most successful games of the past decade.
Advertisement
Two years ago, Disciples I, somehow overlooked by many gamers, made a big jump forward and came close to being an outstanding game. Serious problems in replayability (partially addressed by the Disciples Gold release) and combat balance prevented Disciples I from moving into the very top ranks. But I am convinced that Disciples I was very well respected and definitely recognized by the other leading game developers. It got their attention. The pros in the industry saw the germ of an excellent idea. Diablo II probably owes far more of its success to borrowing (and improving upon) concepts from Disciples I than it did from Diablo I!
But Diablo II was the breakthrough game. They got the PHG idea pretty much right. The key was Persistent Hero development. It involved the player more. It allowed a ton more replayability (by trying other characters, or different development paths for a character you like.) It somehow made it more “personal.” Should I put the new attribute point into increasing my druids awesome frost spell? Or should I increase my mana regeneration ability? A whole generation of action and strategy games never noticed that they had been quietly snookered into playing something that looked like, smelled like, and talked pretty much like an RPG.
Two weeks ago I picked up Disciples II. Despite my frustration with some dumb UI blunders, it is an outstanding game. It has every potential to outsell even Diablo II. If they put out a patch to fix a couple minor issues, and add some more scenarios to extend replayability, then it will challenge for the top honors for all of 2002. Heroes 4 will have some very stiff competition.
And then there is Etherlords. Here is a game with promise, and some potentially excellent gameplay. Yet it is so bad that I had to force myself to play enough hours into the game to include it in this comparison. Save your money. This one will be selling for $9.99 in the “discontinued bargain baskets” up by the checkout counter by mid year.
Comparing the PHGs
The following model was used in order to rank and compare four PHGs:
Heroes 3 • Diablo II • Disciples II • Etherlords
Please note one bias – I really enjoy RPGs, and am soon bored by pure action games such as Doom. Both the model and my evaluations reflect that bias.
The initial goal for developing this model was to look at some of the games I have most enjoyed over the past few years and to see how these new PHGs compared, and to see if there was any pattern to what games were huge commercial successes. Surprise. There was a pattern. The biggest hits of the past couple years all shared three common denominators:
Character development
Replayability
Ease-of-use
Maybe the biggest surprise was that leading-edge “graphics” was not a major differentiator.
This chart (more detail in a moment) ranks games on a scale of 0-100. The blue part is the “final” score. Black extensions at the top of a bar indicate a higher ranking that would have occurred had it not been for some serious errors, design flaws, etc. For example, looking at the ranking for Wizardry 8, the chart indicates a score of 70, but it could have been 80 if not for a deduction due to a serious flaw (the horrible “retreating enemy” bug.)
The model was based upon allocating 100 points among 12 categories. Please note, again, that the weighting of the categories certainly reflects just one point of view!
(Should anyone wish to play with this model, shoot me an email at v. I will be glad to send you the spreadsheet so that you can change the weightings, include other factors, or rate games yourself.)
Once a game is rated, I deduct up to 20 points for glaring errors that detract significantly from the game.
So – how did the four games compare? The result that will hardly be a surprise to all of us who are 3DO fans, is that Heroes3, despite being released years ago and using pretty dated graphics, can still hold its own with the big boys. One reason is that Diablo2 and Disciples2 shot themselves in the foot and lost points due to interface flaws and errors, while HOMM3 overcame the drawbacks in graphics with strong scores in the most important areas of balance and maps.
Combat Balance
Disciples 2 made huge strides here. Disciples I had a major problem with combat balance. There were many final battles where a maximized hero and party simply could not defeat the enemy. The only answer, too often, was to save up your spell resources, and throw a couple golems per turn at it for a few turns to wear it down to a defeatable size. At first blush, Disciples 2 has the same problem, but it turns out that is only true when your strategy is flawed! For example, there are two major parts of one campaign where you cannot defeat the monsters that are thrown at you. It is absolutely a 100% loss. BUT! The point of these really well-constructed scenarios is that the win does not require taking on those no-win battles. (Any more detail would be a spoiler!)
But there is a growing middle ground of next-generation games blending the best of both. Games like Disciples II, Diablo II, and the impending Heroes of Might and Magic IV (HOMM4) are excellent examples. These “Persistent Hero Games” (PHGs) have become some of the most successful retail releases in years.
A bit of History
Few would question that Heros3 marked the beginning of the PHGs. The elements of character development were limited, and had relatively modest impact on the outcome of a game. (I still believe that “logistics” and “diplomacy” were by far the most useful HOMM3 aspects to develop.) HOMM3 still relied upon resource development and amassing large armies to succeed far more than character development. But this little addition, character development, was responsible for turning HOMM3 into one of the best and most successful games of the past decade.
Advertisement
Two years ago, Disciples I, somehow overlooked by many gamers, made a big jump forward and came close to being an outstanding game. Serious problems in replayability (partially addressed by the Disciples Gold release) and combat balance prevented Disciples I from moving into the very top ranks. But I am convinced that Disciples I was very well respected and definitely recognized by the other leading game developers. It got their attention. The pros in the industry saw the germ of an excellent idea. Diablo II probably owes far more of its success to borrowing (and improving upon) concepts from Disciples I than it did from Diablo I!
But Diablo II was the breakthrough game. They got the PHG idea pretty much right. The key was Persistent Hero development. It involved the player more. It allowed a ton more replayability (by trying other characters, or different development paths for a character you like.) It somehow made it more “personal.” Should I put the new attribute point into increasing my druids awesome frost spell? Or should I increase my mana regeneration ability? A whole generation of action and strategy games never noticed that they had been quietly snookered into playing something that looked like, smelled like, and talked pretty much like an RPG.
Two weeks ago I picked up Disciples II. Despite my frustration with some dumb UI blunders, it is an outstanding game. It has every potential to outsell even Diablo II. If they put out a patch to fix a couple minor issues, and add some more scenarios to extend replayability, then it will challenge for the top honors for all of 2002. Heroes 4 will have some very stiff competition.
And then there is Etherlords. Here is a game with promise, and some potentially excellent gameplay. Yet it is so bad that I had to force myself to play enough hours into the game to include it in this comparison. Save your money. This one will be selling for $9.99 in the “discontinued bargain baskets” up by the checkout counter by mid year.
Comparing the PHGs
The following model was used in order to rank and compare four PHGs:
Heroes 3 • Diablo II • Disciples II • Etherlords
Please note one bias – I really enjoy RPGs, and am soon bored by pure action games such as Doom. Both the model and my evaluations reflect that bias.
The initial goal for developing this model was to look at some of the games I have most enjoyed over the past few years and to see how these new PHGs compared, and to see if there was any pattern to what games were huge commercial successes. Surprise. There was a pattern. The biggest hits of the past couple years all shared three common denominators:
Character development
Replayability
Ease-of-use
Maybe the biggest surprise was that leading-edge “graphics” was not a major differentiator.
This chart (more detail in a moment) ranks games on a scale of 0-100. The blue part is the “final” score. Black extensions at the top of a bar indicate a higher ranking that would have occurred had it not been for some serious errors, design flaws, etc. For example, looking at the ranking for Wizardry 8, the chart indicates a score of 70, but it could have been 80 if not for a deduction due to a serious flaw (the horrible “retreating enemy” bug.)
The model was based upon allocating 100 points among 12 categories. Please note, again, that the weighting of the categories certainly reflects just one point of view!
(Should anyone wish to play with this model, shoot me an email at v. I will be glad to send you the spreadsheet so that you can change the weightings, include other factors, or rate games yourself.)
Once a game is rated, I deduct up to 20 points for glaring errors that detract significantly from the game.
So – how did the four games compare? The result that will hardly be a surprise to all of us who are 3DO fans, is that Heroes3, despite being released years ago and using pretty dated graphics, can still hold its own with the big boys. One reason is that Diablo2 and Disciples2 shot themselves in the foot and lost points due to interface flaws and errors, while HOMM3 overcame the drawbacks in graphics with strong scores in the most important areas of balance and maps.
Combat Balance
Disciples 2 made huge strides here. Disciples I had a major problem with combat balance. There were many final battles where a maximized hero and party simply could not defeat the enemy. The only answer, too often, was to save up your spell resources, and throw a couple golems per turn at it for a few turns to wear it down to a defeatable size. At first blush, Disciples 2 has the same problem, but it turns out that is only true when your strategy is flawed! For example, there are two major parts of one campaign where you cannot defeat the monsters that are thrown at you. It is absolutely a 100% loss. BUT! The point of these really well-constructed scenarios is that the win does not require taking on those no-win battles. (Any more detail would be a spoiler!)