Create your dream game!

[Farm Boy]

I was thinking of downloading Mount & Blade recently actually.

Is it good?

Mount and Blade II "Bannerlord" looms on the undefined horizon. We'll see if Taleworlds can do it twice or if they drop the ball.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Most likely, it'll be beyond my computer's specs to run Mount & Blade II.

 

[Farm Boy]

Well, I'm sucked back into Warband after years of not touching M&B. It's quirky, it's glitchy, it's ugly, and it's far more fun than it should be.

 

[Phrossack]

The most fun I've ever had in it- I think- was in AD1257 when I started up the Kingdom of Sardinia. I had been a noble in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, but we'd conquered the whole Levant, things were getting boring without a crusade, and the kingdom was growing so quickly that it was getting internally fractured, with lots of nobles changing allegiances. So I renounced my position, packed up all my troops and things, and sailed to Sardinia, where the Tunisian Hafsids were taking a lot of land but had a hard time holding it. I captured a castle, declared myself King, and started whipping the Hafsids with a combination of better troops, better leadership, and not a few crusades (courtesy of my buddy the Pope, gently persuaded with the aid of 95,000 denars/florins/whatever per crusade).

 

[EgonSpengler]

Alternate-history games are fun. That's part of why I still play Empire: Total War.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Is this in Mount & Blade? Can you actually do this?

Because, holy crap, awesome!

 

[Light Cleric]

First place is a sequel to Guild Wars that was actually similar gameplay-wise to the original. As a hardcore fan of GW1, GW2 was a massive disappointment for me because they went out of their way to get rid of everything related to GW1 mechnically, even the good things. The complexity of combat and stuff was gone. Everything was, for lack of a better phrase, dumbed down.

2nd place would be another Command and Conquer game developed by Westwood Studios before EA bought them out and eventually killed the franchise. Generals was a fun game but it had nothing to do with C&C in either story or gameplay. C&C3 was a great game. Red Alert 3 was dumb and C&C4 was a garbage fire. Then Generals 2 was so badly received in early testing they killed it.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Not only that they killed Generals 2, they killed the studio making it.

 

[dominatr]

Civilization III that has more than 31 civilizations on one map and runs a bit faster

Also i wouldn't mind an in game leaderhead maker, but that's even more of a stretch

 

[Phrossack]

Is this in Mount & Blade? Can you actually do this?

Because, holy crap, awesome!

Yup. In the 1257 mod, that is.

The base game takes place in a fictional world with historically-inspired factions, arms, and armor, so there are no crusades or things like that. However, you can still strike out as an independent warlord and declare yourself king if you capture a settlement on your own. Of course, if you have low Right to Rule (gained by being in a faction that concludes a war, or if another faction gets destroyed), other monarchs will see you as an upstart and will try to take you down. It might be a good idea to wait until you have high RtR to found a kingdom, but if you don't, conclude some wars (you don't have to "win," a ceasefire is enough) and try to establish diplomatic relations with other monarchs. Depending on how they respond, you might be implicitly recognized as a legitimate monarch. Fighting a war and concluding a peace treaty increases RtR, since the other monarch is essentially recognizing your right to negotiate.

 

[Farm Boy]

Plus you can carry around a butcher's knife and stab people in the face. Bonus points if you do that to heavily armored knights while wearing a dress. When my companions piss me off I stick them all in dresses until they've proved their worth in a couple battles.

 

[Phrossack]

Plus you can carry around a butcher's knife and stab people in the face. Bonus points if you do that to heavily armored knights while wearing a dress. When my companions piss me off I stick them all in dresses until they've proved their worth in a couple battles.

I give my companions captured or hand-me-down stuff. But I'm impressed if your people can actually pull that off, since generally the knife bounces off their armor while they cut you down, especially since your knife can't parry.

 

[Farm Boy]

Proving their worth may involve taking a couple dirt naps. But I do love the courser charge in the pastel dresses ahead of everybody else.

You can pull it off a little better yourself. Once you land a stab with a knife it's so fast they aren't going to get a block up if you just keep screaming "right in the mouf!"

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Paradox Interactive+Sid Meier's Civilization.

+ Total War + Dungeon Keeper (especially the feature where you can jump into the head of one of your underlings) + a well-done future-tech-tree + space stage of spore + high-quality videos and texts accompanying the whole game and explaining the real story behind everything ...

Haaaaah....

 

[gay_Aleks]

+ Total War + Dungeon Keeper (especially the feature where you can jump into the head of one of your underlings) + a well-done future-tech-tree + space stage of spore + high-quality videos and texts accompanying the whole game and explaining the real story behind everything ...

Haaaaah....

Or, alternatively, if Sony are bastards and don't let Total War things to be used in another game...

Battles resolved ala Heroes 3 style.

EDIT: note to self: always do tutorials when playing a Paradox game.. always.

 

[Tarquelne]

My ideal games, by type:

FPS:
FEAR came close, but I'd rather be a wizard and occasionally go invisible, control minds, or just destroy large groups with withering fire.

RPG:
Grand scale - Something with a unique and fascinating setting or backstory like Morrowind, but rather than just running errands you, if you want, lead armies, or assassinate kings.
Speaking of assassinate kings...
Story-focused - As a mass market release, it'd be hard to beat the Witcher. The "Full Combat Rebalance" mods take it that step further. Into something even grittier and more challenging.
And speaking of gritty and challenging.
Small scale - STALKER, with a bunch of mods, fits the bill well. Explore, kill things, gather anomalies, have the occasional conversation over some rotgut, camp, run away when you hear something you can't identify. Hard to beat.

Strategy -
4X: Civ, highly moddable, with a much much better AI would be great. Fantasy or sci-fi for bonus points. (So ... FFH2, with a better AI.)
Tactical-RPG: I'd like a faithful, but updated, version of Jagged Alliance, please. X-Com, and Fallout Tactics were pretty good, too. Something with some depth.
Tactical wargame: "Combat Mission" with an overhauled AI, better graphics (why not?) and TCPIP wego is what I dream of.
Casual wargame: Games like Panzer General and its clones or Battle of Wesnoth are a not-quite guilty pleasure.
"Real" wargame: Anything with a campaign. Just give it graphics that make me glad I bought a computer this century and a good AI.

Flight Sim
IL2 + mods, installing from a single disk, all at once, with custom hardware.

Board games:
It exists, but I currently dream of Illuminati, with the cheating rules, so ... it.

Traditional games:
Go, but changed in the only way that could possibly make it better: Added laser beams and explosions. But is it possible?

CCG/LCG:
L5R with rules as simple and elegant as Android Netrunner.
Or Android Netrunner, with cards that are better templated, ala MTG.
Or MTG, with all the cards burning in hell.
Any of those would be great.

Pen & Paper RPG
I like having different games for different genres ("realistic" being a genre in this case, for which I use GURPS. (Hi, Gori!)), but my favorite is Ars Magica. My dream game would be Ars updated into the modern world, but with slicker, somewhat more sophisticated rules. (ie, what Mage should have been !)

 

[Mouthwash]

Civilization IV with Paradox levels of immersion.

This, except it can feed, bathe, and have sex with you.

 

[Phrossack]

From the Random Rants thread:

I would love to do a historical game in which the primary conflict deals with maintaining the integrity of the state. My biggest problem with the EU games paradox games is that they grant the player absolute and authoritarian control over the state. This isn't accurate. The struggle in any state is motivating the major players of the state to go along with what you want to do. The CK series has probably gotten closest because you have to cede administrative control of provinces to other nobles who may have aspirations of their own which might conflict with your goals.

The other big part of it I would love to see in a game is one which actually portrays time and travel historically. Going back to EU, the biggest advantage you have is that you can see what's going on in all parts of your kingdom/empire at all times. Your capital is in Madrid and you can see everything happening in your colonies in Mexico and Jakarta down to the minute. This is silly from a historical accuracy standpoint. Even in the 16th century it could take months for news to filter just from Brittany to Lyon or Bordeaux. It wasn't until the 17th century that you really get anything bordering on a permanent administrative capital in a European state. Kings traveled around their countries almost endlessly, holding court, hearing cases, dispensing patronage to the local elite, ensuring taxes were being collected properly and with a minimal amount of embezzlement. I would love to see a game do that.

You play the administrative ruler of the kingdom. Just him, you control nobody else directly. You pick administrators to run your provinces. Finding the right administrator can be a difficult task. You need to find someone who is competent and loyal to the king, but at the same time plays nice with the local elite and isn't going to stir up unrest. News needs to arrive to the king for the map of that region for information to become available. Obviously you can station your king closer to a region to get news faster, but that could also but the king in danger. Moreover if the region in question identifies as a different ethnicity or doesn't like the king, stationing yourself closely could cause unrest or harm tax collection efforts. In some provinces autonomy or client-status may be preferable, even if it means you have less direct control. On the other hand, if the province is far-flung the whole region could have been plunged in an uprising or the noble could have taken arms against you without you having the faintest clue until he's already burned through half the territory.

Military management could be interesting likewise, although I don't know how doable it would be, given how AI tends to play out in these games. EU becomes a fairly easy game because you have absolute control over the movement of your armies. You are free to micromanage every piece of every unit to your heart's content. This isn't how things tend to work, historically. Instead you have to appoint generals to run your army. Again, loyalty is important, especially here as you're giving a potential upstart a sword with which to behead you. But you also want competence. You could put in a sycophant, but maybe they're just good dancers/court men and know nothing of combat and loyally piss your armies away. Maybe they're unfair disciplinarians and your whole army revolts on their watch. You can set general goals for your generals, but the day-to-day management of troop movements, tactics, and recruitment are left up to them. Meanwhile, again you're stuck relying on news to filter in to know if your attacks are succeeding. You can personally take command of the army to a) control the movements of your army yourself, and b) gain much better vision over how the war fares, but it comes with the caveat that you are exposing yourself to risk via death in battle or from disease, and the added drawback that news from elsewhere takes longer to filter in and you have looser control over your dominions and there is a greater risk of revolt or dissent in the ranks.

An idea like this may be beyond current technology and I don't know how much of a market there would be for such a game. Most people like being able to pain continents in their color, and a game like this would make simply uniting Germany or Italy, or Hispania, or simply keeping England or France together a monumental task. I would personally love to be able to do something like this, though. To show, through game form, just how monumentally difficult and how incredibly powerless rulers were in this time period.

The only game I know of that comes anywhere near that is Mount & Blade: Warband. It's not exactly a strategy game, but more of a medieval sandbox TPS/FPS RPG, but there are elements of strategy. If you do become a king or queen, you don't control everything. You'll need vassals to support you, and you'll need to grant them fiefs to support them and keep them loyal. They rule and manage the fiefs in your name, but you'll need to work to keep their loyalty. If they don't like you, they won't listen to you, and they may even attempt to pledge loyalty to another king and take any castles and towns they have with them. You could exile them and confiscate all their lands before they rebel, but any friends they have will be upset, and unless you have good reason, others will begin to suspect that you are unjust and may do the same to them. You only directly control yourself, your fiefs, and your personal war party. If your vassals or allies join you in battle, you can directly control them during that battle. Communication is tricky because you will usually have to actually physically track down and meet with a lord to talk to him, or, if you own a castle or city and have a spouse, you can host a feast there and hope they show up. Some mods enable you to send messengers to deliver messages or collect recruits from fiefs, bring them back to a castle or town, and train them, but they have to physically travel to these places just as you do, and run the risk of getting waylaid by bandits or enemies.

As for waging war, the one time I was king I made myself the marshal, which grants me alone the right to summon vassals for war. If you do so, those lords who are so disposed will follow you with their war parties--for a while, at least, until they get tired of the campaign. Marshaling your forces is the only real way to gather enough men to defeat enemy marshal armies and capture fortifications, since there's a fairly low limit to how many troops your party can have, and you suffer a lot of penalties for having a big party. You can also appoint a vassal to the marshal status, though it may be best to confer with your vassals first, since they all have their own preferred candidates based on friendships, family ties, and personalities. They will then lead the vassals when they call for a campaign, but generally they'll be less competent than the player, of course. Rapid expansion is dangerous, since you'll have to garrison all the castles and towns you take and appoint each one a lord. Any vassal who wants the fief for himself and who doesn't get it, which is usually most of them, will be upset, so it's a constant balancing act of maintaining loyalties between competitors without making the disloyal lords too powerful. Expand too quickly, and you'll quickly damage relations with everyone when inevitably they get turned down for one fief or another.

Important note: Barring a few mods, lords can't die, ever. If defeated, they may be taken prisoner, but may escape, and usually are ransomed sooner or later. If this were not the case, every lord would get himself killed in short order and the world would be empty. New lords don't appear unless you appoint some equally immortal companion characters (except in some mods), and since the time passes at something like one or two days a minute in real time, the time frame doesn't allow for things like new generations.

Vanilla Warband takes place in a fictional medieval fantasy-free world, but many mods put it in a historical setting, like Europe/North Africa/the Middle East in the mod AD 1257, or Britain and Ireland in 636 AD in Brytenwalda.

 

[Mouthwash]

Doesn't seem that much deeper than CKII, and doesn't really give Owen what he wants here.

Also, I thought the Rants thread was for posting all the spam you wanted without having to call it spam. What the heck have you been doing on there?

 

[Hygro]

Call Owen's game "The Prince". I'm game. I've always wanted a game like that.