I would buy a turn-based Fallout game in a heartbeat. Fallout Tactics was the first FO game I ever played, and I always did the combat in turn-based mode. I would not call it an rpg, but rather a combat simulation though. Like the X-Com games were (goddess, I loved those games!). When dealing with a squad-sized group of people real-time play just does not work for me. I cannot order around six people at the same time. That is why I have never liked RTS games. Rome Total War is the only one I have ever been able to play, and that is only because I had to pause the game every few seconds (in essence, breaking it up into turns where I could order around all my units).

If Bethesda were to make a sequel to Fallout Tactics I would not hesitate to buy it. Seeing a game like that with modern graphics, and the ability to move the camera around to any angle, would be just great. I played FT a bit yesterday for the sake of nostalgia, and it was still riveting. The tension that is created by having to sit and think out every move, knowing that one thing wrong is likely to doom one or more of my squaddies to an ugly death, is just spellbinding. It is nice to play a game like that sometimes, where thinking is what matters most, rather than just reflexes and hand-eye coordination.

I wouldn't buy a turn based game outside of an RTS game. So, no turn-based Fallout for me.

You just blew my mind with that statement.

Aside from the whole "this or that mode is better for roleplaying" discussion, I just to tend prefer turnbased combat. It's a different kind of tension than realtime, it makes me approach combat situations differently. In RPGs, I also have a much easier time accepting abstractions such as hit-points, people surviving shotgun blasts to the head etc in turn-based modes.

I don't mind real-time games at all, but I find it sad that turn-based is more and more regarded as a "relic". It's not about old and new at all, it's just a different approach. I like the variety in my games.

At least I'll get to play some turn-based glory in Civ V soon.

I would buy a TB Fallout game. I love the old games.

As far as if it's viable.
Well.
They shouldn't have it as a major project if ya catch my drift, and have the entire team working on it.
Doesn't mean I want to have a super small team on it.
But map-size, since it only needs maps for each town and random encounters I'd say that the total mapsize would be maybe 10-20% of fallout 3's at most.
They wouldn't need voices for everyone either so they could cut back on the budget right there. (Only around 20 to 40 people would need talking heads)
I think that a medium small team with a an average budget could make a game the size of fallout 2.
Doesn't need to be bigger.

It's just that, a TB game just won't do as good as Fallout 3.
It just won't.
So if they want to make profit they'd have to cut back on the budget somewhat.
Not that it's a bad thing.

But I'm no game producer so I'm probably talking out of my ass on this subject. (Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong)

Still, I do think that a TB Fallout game could do well, just not as well as Fallout 3.

And one final thing, I read somewhere "TB can't be as good for roleplaying as real time combat is".
Uh-huh.... Create 40 different characters in fallout 3 then go to oldney with only an assault rifle for each of them.
Where is the roleplay?
Nowhere.
In combat you have few choices.
Change weapon.
Shoot.
Heal.
Run.
VATS.
...
Almost every character is the same when it comes to combat, all that's different is the stats.
Realtime is no better than TB when it comes to the role you've chosen when in combat. IMO .
And it's not like the game is turnbased when you're in town and outside of combat and stuff. >_>

I agree with nu_clear_day that the current trend of video games does not seem to support TB for big-production games anymore, but I'm in the camp that actually enjoys a real-time experience more than the TB ones. TB has its places without doubt, and there are Many players would do prefer games at TB, but it ruins immersion for me personally - I like the action to flow continuously instead of stopping at points for everyone to get a turn in. I saw the mod that attempted TB with Fallout3 and it re-affirmed my desire for the real-time experience.

What would be Nice is if the gaming companies gave us more of a choice by supporting both. Some would argue that it's not possible, but after seeing it done for Fallout3 I would argue that it can definitely be added as long as the hooks for it are supported by the engine. There are always balance arguments between the two systems, but I don't envision those as being so massive that they couldn't be overcome. But alas the demand for TB has to be there for the companies to even consider it, and the mass market are younger and more attracted to Twitch games these days. I can't say I am personally upset as the trend is going my way, but I respect TB in the right game situation all the same.

Lets hope more sophisticated games in the future will gives us more options to play As We Wish in this respect.

There is no such thing. :huh:


------

The second game that I bought on Steam [and that being this year too...] was a Turn Based tactical RPG'esque Sequal to a it's 2002 predecessor.

(I honestly did not expect to see it on the shelf at Walmart so I bought it on Steam ~yet it is on the shelf at Walmart ; big surprise... had I only known).

I think, if they were to make such a game, they should make it as they do their other games and not cut back on all areas. Expand the system on all categories, add realtime combat option (for those who just can't stand TB) as Van Buren would've done and as Arcanum did. Rotateable and zoomable camera and all the current tech bells and whistles (the early http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzYmQyHl2bc even presented both FPP and ISO gameplay). Make it as big and as diverse as it needs to be, and as good as they can. And of course save some money where ever possible. If they make a good and polished game, I'm sure that even in the current market it can do well enough - some twichers and CoDkids might not like it, but then again not everybody liked Fallout 3 either. I mean, there are a lot (A LOT) of crud games in the market that are getting sequels (obviously they made well enough, despite the horrendous reviews and bad sales), so I don't see making a good game like that as a major risk.

I'd buy a game made as you described, most definitely. But I'd also be a bit disappointed if it would turn out feeling like a sidejob between the real work (with cut down team and overall - by todays standards - game).

That's my 2 cents on the subject.



Turnbased realtime strategy. :laugh: I didn't even see that.

http://www.gog.com/en/gamecard/disciples_2_gold , http://www.walmart.com/search/search-ng.do?search_constraint=0&ic=48_0&search_query=disciples+3&Find.x=0&Find.y=0&Find=Find


*That's the catch with these though... Combat in these games, has always had few choices; It really boils down to "Attack what enemy with what Party member" (or the option of a hero to use an item instead of to attack), but its still tricky to win, and the choice of actions largely dictates who does (although damage done is not a precise number).
Disciples 2 is like playing an interactive oil painting, while D3 is a bit closer to King's Bounty (but they are very different games).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8h7Cpgd9kU

**One thing I especially like though is that enemies level up from direct combat ~so you can't wear them down and run too often, or they might greatly increase their power (and fully heal) for the next fight.

I'm all for the rest, but this bit I wouldn't want. It is easy to design a good real time combat system ~it is hard to design a good turn based one; and it seems almost impossible to design a good mix of the two. I like both Arcanum and ToEE; I loved combat in ToEE, but combat in Arcanum was/ is broken. (and I couldn't stand RT mode in FO:Tactics).

IMO a game should stick to one or the other as a project design goal ~else its like mixing Cake & Garlic.

I agree. I just put it there for increasing appeal, since it's been tried before. Who knows, maybe with all the tech and knowhow available, it could be pulled off (as an either/or per session thing) well enough. I wouldn't need it, though.

I haven't played ToEE or Tactics, so I can't comment on those, but Arcanums combat was indeed broken (not that it bothered me all that much, but it sure could've been better).


BTW. Is Disciples 3 any good? And how much does it resemble the HoMM series?

Yes... definitely not as Arcanum did... That game is a good reason for not giving such an option between RT & TB. Neither was done well which was a terrible shame.

There's absolutely no need for a game to have two such modes. I do not want real time games with a turn based option as an afterthought just to shut me up.
Neither do I want never a game to be made again with real time combat. I simply want games that would work better with turn based combat to have turn based combat!

It some times seems to me like people believe that there is only one game in the world and we are arguing whether that one game should be made in a very specific way or have options to satisfy every human being in existence. FFS there are so many games being made that even if half of them were turn based you would still have a huge choice of all kinds of real time ones to never even need to touch them.

Oh, I agree with you. On all points.

It just seems that in these days of catering to slow attentionspanners and instant gratificationees, a turnbased game like Fallout is thought to not necesserely do well enough for the developers to even try (if there was no hook to fish the twitching crowd along).

Anyways, I gave Arcanum as an example not because of how it did it's combat modes, but because it simply did it. And the idea I was after was basically only if a realtime option was considered necessery (which I do not consider it to be). I wouldn't want a haflassed TB mode anymore than you or Gizmo do. Just some ideas thrown in the wind.

This is a very good point. Perhaps I’ve been thinking about this in the wrong terms. Instead of trying to convince a game company to create a turn based game that could also appeal to the FPS crowd, the game companies just need to realize that there is enough TB fans to support the game. As long as it’s well made and not trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator (not meant to be a slam against FPS fans but as a precaution against an overly simple TB System) then I think it will please TB fans and make some new ones.

Another TB Gameplay thought. Timed Missions.

Timed Missions have always been the bane of my videogame experiences. In one game I had 5 minutes to input a code I got at the end of level 2, and to increase the sense of urgency the pause button was disabled. I knew the code was important when I first got it, 3 weeks before, so I wrote it down. Sadly I couldn’t find the scrap of paper in time and have never actually finished that game. There are also the timed mission that come in stages, 2 minutes for stage one, 3 minutes for stage two and 90 seconds for stage 3. No matter how fast/slow you complete stages 1 & 2 you always have the same 90 seconds for stage 3. However the worst, for me, are the timed driving missions. You have to have the exact route planned and hope that the random traffic generator doesn’t put a garbage truck or police car in your way. If everything goes completely right I still muck it up when I cut a corner too close and hit an errant pixel which totals the car.

Consider this.
A missile has been launched. The only way to stop it is the Self-Destruct button on the fire control station. The missile control room is full of bad guys and has guard outside the door. The missile will impact in 35 Rounds. In this scenario you move in Turn Based Mode and can still sneak or initiate combat, but at the end of each turn the timer/counter drops by one. You get that sense of urgency but still have time to think about what you need to do.

Glad you agree with my point. :foodndrink:

Though, what have timed missions to do with TB combat (I might've missed something in your post, but I don't see the connection as TB is supposed to offer an abstraction of timeconsumption like what RT has for granted)?

My point on Timed Missions was that it is a staple of many RT games but it could be done in a TB enviroment.

Just one of my random thoughts.

Oh, ok. I agree. Though I still can't see the connection to TB . WIth the concept of timed quests, as most of course need to be "do or fail", I'd like to see some that, instead of just failing, affect the conditions of doing it (the quest conditions, or even conditions of the gameworld) and outcomes of it.

I would likely not buy a turn based RPG regardless of the setting. I thought the combat in FO1/2 was ok for awhile, but then it just got annoying to me. I have come to enjoy the Beth style real time FP combat.

I have Civ5 on order, and I'm looking forward to TB in that game. But in an RPG? For me, at least, that is a thing of the past.

I guess in an RPG (I'm also eagerly awaiting Civ5 - I've already warned the wife that I won't be seeing much of her for little while,) for me, it depends on the context of the turn-based system. The old Final Fantasy games come to mind, for example. I think it was #12 that really kind of made that particular style of turn-based completely irrelevant (that was the one where you kind of "programmed" all your team's AI, effectively automating what had always been a rather repetitive system in the first place.

With something like the new Elder Scrolls and Fallout games, they're designed from the ground up to be played in real-time and to take advantage of that particular style. I don't see much point in arbitrarily tacking on extra mechanics just to make me happy. (VATS always seemed like a nice compromise to me, as even if it's not TB, it at least gives me a chance to think and catch my breath - which is also the reason I liked how Mass Effect was set up.)

But I would absolutely play an RPG that was designed from the ground up as a fully-3D turn-based experience, that wasn't effectively retreading mechanics and philosophies that were getting stale ten years ago. I mean, shooters today are more than simply graphical upgrades compared to the likes of Doom and Wolfenstein - the game mechanics and concepts have taken leaps and bounds since then. I don't see why the same couldn't be applied to turn-based gaming, either. There remains ample potential for evolution - it's just a matter of someone deciding to do it. :shrug:

Well honestly, I personally think it has nothing to do with whether the game is 3D or not, but more of whether or not it's pulled off right, now I would make an arguement, but I havn't read any of these long winded posts and I feel that I couldn't make such a long post to support what I think right now, I could but I just don't want to. lol

Final Fantasy 13 did a pretty good job reinventing the turn-based RPG, IMO.
It's not everyone's cup of tea, I'll admit, but let's face it. The Japanese know their turn-based combat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNT_H7Q5yCE

Well FF13 looks like they spent some time trying to improve thier classic combat system (again) and hopefully it really delivers. However I feel that the classic FF battle system is itself stuck in the past. Way back when the very first Final Fantsy came out and I spent hours on end trying to earn enough gil to but some armor for my two knights, the combat was a great way to go for the graphics and control limitations on the NES. With modern computers and consoles there is a lot more that can be done than just photorealistic imagery. Final Fantasy has never put a lot of effort into character movement/position. In FF7 there was a part where you had to defend a mountain top against a Shinra assault that play a bit like an RTS, I found myself wishing that they had converted the overall combat for the game to a turn-based version similar to that mission. At the very least it would have been nice to bring more than 3 characters into battle.

I recently played a Lord of the Rings game on the Gameboy Advanced, and for the life of me I can't remember the name, that was turn based. the combat was based off the concept of Command Points, for each Command Point you could use one character, the character could move (distance was dependant on character type) or attack. It did get a bit akward when I had more command points than units, or when I had 15-16 units but only 7-8 command points. I was very disappointed that this game/gameplay was not expanded on and at least brought to a home console system, I think there could be some major improvments that could have broad appeal.

Anyway, I guess the point of my ramble was that had a different model of turn based combat been used for the original FF, seeing as how a GBA is basically a hand held NES, then turn based combat may look very different today.

no back then it was but this is is turn base combat is still viable thread not a ohh look at my classic jrpgs thread

As a fan of RPG-FPS crossovers like the System Shock series, the original Deus Ex and the Elder Scrolls series, I would like to see a vastly improved first person real time experience however I'm also a fan of games like Arcanum which managed to do both real time and turned based combat. I'd cry myself to sleep with joy every night if Obsidian were allowed to produce isometric Fallout games and Bethdesa continued to produce Fallout titles under supervision of the original creators. Both combat systems appeal to me massive ways but it would be refreshing to play a good turned based RPG again. Sadly, I think that the X-Box generation of gamers has ruined the industry, they're responsible for Deus Ex 2 svcking, they're responsible for Oblivion being dumbed down in comparison to Daggerfall or Morrowind and they're responsible for the death of the turn-based RPG in the west. I don't think a turn-based Fallout isn't viable, I just think that there is more money to be made doing FPS-RPG crossovers because the X-Box generation is more likely to buy it and that is why the developers will likely stick to real time Fallout games in the future. I just hope that they start to lift the bar a little when it comes to fleshing out the Fallout world, Fallout 3 seemed less lively to me than Fallout 2 despite the massive improvement in AI and graphics.

(A late reply, but I've been abroad, spaced out on a sunny beach and all that)

The point that I was trying to get across is that the REPRESENTATION of the role play of a character CANNOT be properly represented in turn based play.

Not when there are reactions, visually, to other combatants actions to contend with.

The situation is always in a constant flux, it is not a question of finger twitching, it is the fact that turn-based play CANNOT represent that constant flux of play, that constant change in situation.

Not when in visual engagement anyway, when the engaged parties will be visually reacting to each other‘s change in actions. Only the human brain with movements via mouse/keyboard has the ability to properly make those changes in the flux of play ... and that is best represented in real-time non turn-based play.

The actual speed of play may well be quite slow, but the altering of the situation during your pre set actions is where turn-based play will always fall down ... it just isn't the best representation of the role-play.

It has nothing to do with the speed of twitch.

If players have a problem if events happen a bit too fast for them, try using the pause button until getting a bit more familiar with how the enemy usually reacts, and how best to approach situations.

Having in mind what your intentions are but having the ability to change your mind as the situation changes, is the best way to play, and without doubt the best representation of role-play.

As shown - turn-based play is a less viable representation of the role-play of a natural character.

So you're saying that turn based combat is not less viable in an RPG, but it would be perfectly fine in a heavily stat based tactical combat game with a great storyline and excellent choice and consequence? What you're complaining about is the title of RPG- something completely unrelated to this thread. In fact, it's like the people who say they'd have liked Fallout 3 if it wasn't called Fallout 3. While I don't agree with you on what an RPG is, this doesn't matter at all. Talk about the merits and faults of turn based combat, or if anyone is still willing to use it- don't try to fall back on saying that turn based is worse because it doesn't let you roleplay as easily.

My thoughts: I think there's definitely a market for tactical turn based combat out there. The problem is that everyone in the industry is trying to target one demographic (except for some people who target babies and young kids) and the only way to compete is to release games that are not a risk at all (high graphic, high action). If you look at the movie industry, there are things for everyone. We have the high graphic, high action (ie: Transformers), but we also have other stuff (ie: Requiem for a Dream).

The thread title is -
Is Turn Based Combat still viable?

... and I have shown that turn-base play is less viable as representative role-play than non turn-base (real-time) is ... and is entirely on topic.

Point 2. I am not complaining about that fact, I am just pointing it out.

Point 3. It is just that real-time play has more representative 'faculties' of a natural person than turn-base play.

... in other words -- turn-based play is less representative of the role-play of a natural character (think I said that before somewhere) ... and in that sense it is less viable.

Point 4. Those are the faults of turn based play. The merits of turn-based play are that it can however make an enjoyable game.

Point 5. I can understand if fanatics of turn-base will deny any short-comings of turn base, but I feel almost duty-bound to spell out those short-comings, for the benefit of the makers of Fallout3, that most players, I'm sure, would prefer future versions of Fallout to be in natural real-time play ... in case we end up with another undesirable change to a Fallout game caused by the vocal minority ... similar to what happened with the level cap.

If you like turn-based play, fine, but 'Fallout' has moved on from there. Having played the early Fallouts turn-base play, they were at the time great fun, but playing Fallout3 now, for me there is so much more game-play to the game when playing it in real-time.

Perhaps players should try to visualise playing Fallout3 turn-based and imagine the horror (short-comings) .. if you can .. I can, no-no-no. Laughs.