What Are Some of Your Favorite RPG Quests? 229
Ryosen asks: "The current issue of PC Gamer Magazine has a rundown on the MMORPGs due out this year. Reading over the list of hopefuls and checking out some of the websites and comments, I continually ran across complaints from players about the tedium in a lot of the quests from various games. These are typically of the non-imaginative 'take this message to that person' variety, or 'go kill 4 of these creatures' sorts. Obviously there have been some great quests and plots in games of the past and, with so many new RPGs in development, I thought this would be a great time to reminisce over some of our favorites. Who knows? Maybe some of those designers might find some inspiration for their upcoming creations."
Involve players in the epic storyline (Score:5, Insightful)
That's if you're talking about GM-run quests. If you plan on automating your quests, you're going to be kind of doomed from the start. Anything automatic will eventually become boring to players.
Re:Baldur's Gate 2 (Score:5, Insightful)
In my mind, Baldur's Gate 2 has not been outdone yet.
Best quest ever (Score:4, Insightful)
It must be the best quest, since it appears in the two best RPGs ever written.
Re:Star Control 2 (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't really play RPGs but I wondered if there were any out there that used a more natural format for quests. So someone's talking in the town about a rising threat in a nearby area. It's not mentioned as a specific quest, but should you not decide to deal with it, the threat's power may develop at a later date to the point at which it is simple too difficult to defeat. e.g., take care of a brooding Sauron before he's amassed his power.
Or is the concept of a quest to finely engrained in the level-up, "I've achieved something" format of games?
Final Fantasy VI - The Opera (Score:4, Insightful)
It's so beautiful, but sad, and it foreshadows what happens during the second half of the game. Arguably the most famous sequence in the game, in 2002 Electronic Gaming Monthly declared the opera scene one of the "20 Greatest Moments in Console Gaming."
Dragon Quest VIII (Score:3, Insightful)
I have to chime in for Dragon Quest VIII. It probably isn't the best RPG I've played - I'd say there are some parts of Final Fantasy US3 that can make my eyes water (locke's girlfriend and the phoenix)... but DQ8 is a throwback to Old school RPG's. It has excellent grapics in the "cell shaded" style, and I can not possibly say enough good about the music. The game has a good storyline, it's never taking its self too seriously, and I can't wait to see how it all ends.
~Will
Re:Progress Quest (Score:3, Insightful)
"Placate the Ochre Jellies"
"Seek the Crafted Spangle"
"Seek the Proverbial Galoon"
Re:Morrowind (Score:2, Insightful)
World of Warcraft has some good ones... (Score:3, Insightful)
After the fall of Darrowshire, the Redpath family was split up. The ghost of the daughter starts the chain sending you off to located the remaining living family members. Through magic you rewrite their historic battle to allow yourself to enter into the defense of the town. The last quest involves gathering up to 39 other friends to fight along side the ghostly town defenders against the undead scourge onslaught. Really an epic conclusion to an interesting fantasy story.
The Glow (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Favorite WoW Quest (Score:3, Insightful)
Coming back on topic (or at least this particular thread of it), I personally enjoy doing the quest chain that gives access to Onyxia's Lair. It's one of the longer, more complicated quest chains in the game but it has one or two really nice parts to it. I don't know exactly how much health and armor that Highlord Bolvar Fordragon has, but he can tank for me anytime.
The basic problem with quests in World Of Warcraft is that they have to be accessible to the average player, and by that I mean that they have to be pretty much idiot-proof. Any quest that wasn't would only:
1. Cause a disproportionate number of GM tickets (support requests from a Blizzard employee);
2. Be ignored by most players unless it offered particularly good quest rewards;
3. Be completed by 95 percent of players only after they looked up the complete solution on a site like thottbot.com or allakhazam.com.
If you want to over-analyse things then you'll find that there are only four core quest types in WOW: killing, collecting, delivering and escorting, and that all the quests are basically made up of one or more of these elements. But then there are only actually seven core stories/plots used in novels and movies, and all of them can basically be boiled down to a combination of one or more of those too.
Yes, if you just look at quests as "kill 10 murlocs" or "collect 8 murloc scales" then they will seem rather banal, but if you actually take the time to read the back stories, and the various non-quest-related texts around the world of Azeroth then there is a lot more depth to the story to appreciate.
Again, it's to WOW's credit that if you don't want to take all that in that you don't have to: if you just want to kill, collect and level up then you can do that, and have a lot of fun doing it without having to totally immerse yourself in the rich lore all around you.
CRPG quests = mostly errands (Score:3, Insightful)