hybridial

The Graphic adventure genre's been built on this idea since Zork. As such just about any game I ever enjoyed in that genre could count and I've played a lot of great ones, from classics like Broken Sword, Beneath a Steel Sky, Gabriel Knight, Tex Murphy, Grim Fandango and Monkey Island to newer titles that still carry that greatness like Grey Matter, Primordia, The Book of Unwritten Tales, Deponia, it's an incredible genre that's given me a lot of joy and narrative pleasure over the years. Mass Effect... strangely the plot isn't great, the climax to the story isn't the best. But what else can you say when what is so significantly great about that trilogy is the time you share with its characters, and the time you spend in its setting? I mean by 3 the game mechanics had been polished to an intense shine, but really, "story" means more than just plot, and Bioware built the greatest fictional setting in videogame history by far. speaking of that, I'm sure people will think about Bioshock. Well Infinite was horrible, and the original disappointing to me especially narratively, but I did like 2 and Minerva's Den a lot for their stories. (also more fun to play but that's by the by.) Silent Hill 2 and Silent Hill Shattered Memories, great horror games, even better narratives. Some JRPGs I've played with strong stories include Suikoden II and V, shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne, Shadow Hearts and Shadow Hearts Covenant, Digital Devil Saga 1&2. Shadowrun Returns so far in both of its campaigns have been great and I do play them for the story. The gameplay is fine but clearly Hairbrained Schemes built a receptacle for delivering Shadowrun content in all it's cyberpunk fantasy glory as opposed to something focusing on great mechanics.

Right This choice is pretty much personal, it's subjective, it's all about what game gave me the worst experience and there's a lot of of nuance to this, but when you ask this question, the only game that immediately pops into my head is... Bioshock Infinite. The writing makes me angry. The shoddy execution of the gameplay does as well to a lesser degree. Levine spat on his legacy with this game. Hell, I can't say I loved Bioshock all that much but Infinite makes that look like a masterpiece. There's no game I can think of that made me feel my time was more badly spent. but then, I kinda don't make a point of playing bad games just because they're bad.

Hm, I'd say so far, and splitting JRPGs and WRPGs up because it's just easier, that my favourites are - JRPGs: Shin Megami Tensei III Nocturne and Suikoden II WRPG: Baldur's Gate and Fallout New Vegas I still have to play Baldur's Gate 2, but if the first one was anything to go by, it's gonna be hella good. Planescape Torment is also on my list.

I haven't been able to stop listening to Virgin Steele for weeks now This was the first song I heard a few months ago and now they own my soul.

For me it was back when I first got a Mega Drive in the 90s, and I got Sonic the Hedgehog and Streets of Rage 2 with it. Now I liked Sonic, but Streets of Rage 2 blew my mind. The over the top violence, design, music, everything, I fell in love with it and to this day I still feel this informs quite a bit of what I like in videogames (and why Dragons Crown is the GOTYAY for me, lol)

For a while, I was doing like what quite a lot of people I imagine do and try to use mods to make Skyrim a better RPG. You know, excellent mods like Frostfall, Realistic needs & Diseases, Morrowloot etc. But I feel that this approach is a bit hollow sometimes. It really doesn't mesh with what clearly was Bethesda's main goal with Skyrim. It certainly wasn't trying to be like Morrowind or Fallout. So I thought, a lot of the game's appeal comes down to character building. My favourite mod for the game is probably SPERG, simply because it's a relatively clean and easy (sorry Skyrim Redone) mod that massively enhances the character archetypes you can aim for in the game, without changing the acknowledgement that this is a combat game, and that speechcraft mainly exists to make more gold and to Dragonshout better. With the open world and emphasis on loot and character building, Skyrim feels closer to the first Sacred more than it ever does Morrowind, at least for me. So it raises the interesting question, there's so many mods available for Skyrim, and people often talk about the ones that try to enhance immersion and realism over ones that simple enhance it as a combat experience. i believe the most important mod for this philosphy is the excellent Dynamic Loot mod. By having enemies drop gear it kinda removes the necessity to rely on crafting for everything, which solves the issue of how to play an effective character who ignores crafting. That allows for a bit more choice about specialisations. It also adds easy motivation for you to go out into the world and hack enemies to bits, you'll actually get something for your trouble. Mods that enhance player abilities and the combat definitely help to. EnaiSiaion's series of mods that add greatly to the magic and powers in the game fit very well, and furthered the idea of choices and empowerment in the game. Now choosing to be an assassin has more meaning, because say, taking the Shadow stone power in Aurora Doomstone gives you a teleport rear ability that allows for backstabbing. Whilst a lot of this makes the game easier, it can be balanced out by using mods that make the game harder, however, I am unsure what mods work work best for that. So I put to the denizens of the Nexus, what mods have I not mentioned that can make Skyrim a good lite ARPG?

I've been a user of the site for quite a long time (I was kinda surprised to read I joined in 2008, man I'm old) But this is my first time posting in the forums. I'm a guy, I'm from Scotland, I like (good) anime, (good) videogames and (good) books. Oh and Metal. Endless love for heavy metal. I'm sure there will be more to detail as I post in other sections, but I'm glad to be here where maybe I can talk about my unhealthy Skyrim modding addictions.

Hi, first post here really so I'd just like to say first of all that I appreciate the hard work that Bethesda put to developing Skyrim, and the hundreds of modders that make playing it an even more enjoyable experience. Basically, my topic is a fairly general question that I'm sure can help a lot of other people so any advice anyone gives me I'd be extremely grateful for. I want to drastically overhaul the gameplay balance of the game and there are a lot of options, the main thing I want to ask is will the following mods work together and if they do have issues, how best to sort them out? The mods in question are - HBE, ACE Complete Crafting Overhaul Weapons & Armour fixes So basically, I know that all of these mods tackle a lot of the same things (Smithing is massively affected by all of them in particular) Can these mods combined and if so, how best to do it?