The Sims 2
I like the Sims 2 (the previous one was good, this is better). It's not exactly realistic, but it's fun to play God sometimes. Mind, I'm a good God, I like to make my Sims happy, enjoy them being successful. I set challenges for myself, like making a long lineage. I try to get my Sims to be the Donald Trumps of Simville. In other words, I play to powergame.
To my best understanding, the Sims 2 is considered a role playing game. And a simulation game. But I can't understand the former. To me, a role playing game involves the player in a specific role, hence the name. Pokemon has the player as a trainer; Oblivion has the player as a destined warrior; Final Fantasy X has the player as a whiny blitzball player who is probably one of the most useless characters I've ever seen. But I digress; all of these games have the core thought of the player being someone.
Mind, I don't understand some people who use certain games, like Oblivion, for true roleplaying. For instance, they'll eat the food, go out and perform some 'job', return to eat, then go to sleep for eight hours. Rinse and repeat. That's nice and all, but... Where's the interaction? What makes that role playing and not just robotery? Doesn't role playing require interaction of some sort?
Some may realize that I don't play the Sims 2 for role playing. I tried a few times (It's most amusing to have two brothers, one of which is gay and the other isn't, living in the same house. Especially when one is a gentleman and the other a... 'man of the town', respectively), but I just fell into the same routine: get the best characters, have them own a lot, build a big house, have a bunch of babies, rinse/repeat.
Hrm. Perhaps I could make the Landgrabbs...
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Posted Jan 9, 2008-
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Posted Jan 8, 2008You haven't played God of War? You've got a PS2, I'm assuming (given your rant on Tidus). You should play it, it's awesome. Unless you're under 17. Then you should wait. I would never endorse underage children playing violent video games.
The only game mentioned so far that actually fits your guidelines is Oblvion. Pokemon and Final Fantasy are both/all RPGs, no questions, but both follow fairly "linear" plots (as in what you do doesn't affect the outcome). There was a very good blog I read many years ago that got into this, sparked by the release of Kingdom Hearts. It discussed why KH was considered an RPG, while apparently similar games like God of War and the Lord of the Rings games were not. I wish I could find it, it made some great points...
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Posted Jan 8, 2008As for the RPGs, I classify an RPG as the following: An RPG is any game that has you play as the main character, making choices as that character that affect the progression of gameplay, and has stats that affect the game itself that go up as the game progresses. Halo has you play as the Master Chief, but there are no choices to make to change the game's progression, and there are no stats at all. Mario is the same. I never played God of War.
Is there such thing as an on-topic blog?
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Posted Jan 8, 2008I would NOT classify Sims as an RPG. It is a total simulation game (hence the title of the game). Though, nowadays, the term RPG is getting slapped onto alot of undeserving games. It begs the question what exactly defines and RPG. Your definition is rather loose; most games place you in the role of the main character. What makes Pokemon, Final Fantasy, and Elder Scrolls RPGs, as opposed to Halo, God of War, Mario, etc... see what I mean?
I don't know if I'm taking your blog a bit off-topic...