Brace Your Wallets

[Bobchillingworth]

Oh man, if I had played Divinity II without the expansion I would have been unbelievably upset



The random loot was actually my favorite part of the game! So much sweet gear to deck your PC out in. Of course by the end of the expansion all of the best stuff is just bought in stores with pocket change, but it's the thought that counts!

[Ichabod]

Missed opportunity: with the opening chapter they had, they could simply have had a great story about... merely saving your own skin.

By the way, I have exactly the same issue with The Witcher 2: clearing his name should have been enough for a great storyline.

Never played the games in question, but I couldn't agree more with your point. Just make the story about the characters and their own challenges, not how they need to help everyone (besides them). All this forced epicness everytime make things really boring and shallow. Having to save the world every single time is just stupid.

[Wyatan]

Oh man, if I had played Divinity II without the expansion I would have been unbelievably upset

Never, ever, even consider reading Tad Willimans' Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn cycle then.

The random loot was actually my favorite part of the game!

To me, their are two types of "CRPG" games regarding loot.
- Games with endless respawn (Diablo-style): in those, random loot makes perfect sense. Unique items are actually a design flaw there, but that's another debate.
- "Closed" games, with no respawn and thus finite ressources (Baldur's Gate series for instance): in those, I consider random loot a mistake.

There's that common idea that "random" and "procedural" makes for a lot of replayability... I hold the opposite view: for me at least, it hurts replayability a lot since it removes a lot of the planning element.
Case in point, FTL: I've enjoyed the game and spent a lot of time with it (close to 200 hours I believe)... but I've come to the conclusion I would have enjoyed it a lot more and would most likely still be playing it if the encounters were fixed, and not random.
I simply enjoy planning and executing more than just reacting.
With the randomized sectors, the overall plan is always the same (try and max out encounters, ...). Note that the main variance comes from the non-random element: ship designs.
With a fixed map, I could have gone and planned for a lot of challenges (lowest number of jumps, lowest scrap spent, ...). But the random map makes those meaningless.

Guess I'm just variant scum.

[MJW (ya that one)]

The original binding of Isaac is on sale for $1 for 48 hours.