Prisons and RPG

[Tychu]

after playing Fable-- one of the greatest games in history minus the funny Irish accents i realized this one small thing. Now before people jump on me that their favorite rpg isnt like this heres a list of the rpgs that i played

Fable, KOTOR, Dragon Warrior 1-4,7, DW: Monsters 1 , Paper Mario, Mario RPG, Final Fantasy 8, Star Ocean: Til the End of Time

It seems that in most of them, i cant remember all of them but in most you can be happily going about your quest fighting monsters with a party or not and than on one mission you go along like any other but this time the bad guys dont attack but surrond you and put you in prison. You awake after some text story or a visually story and you have no weaopns or armor. Fable you have nothing but some Union Jack undies, KOTOR we all know to pick one of the females so they appear in their undergarments or if your a girl you pick the guy characters. Dragon Warrior 7 your party finds themselvs with no weapons and in a prison city. Paper Mario and RPG you get locked up but you have your weapons and i gave up on FF8 and still playing Star Ocean.

I think the developers want to make it interesti ng but if you play enough RPG's you kinda expect it after a while.

[GeneralTacticus]

You can add Deus Ex and Crono Trigger to the list of RPG(ish) games that use that particular trick. And, though I can't speak for most of those games, as I haven't played them, it can be immensely satisfying to sneak past the guards, locate your equipment, and then go to town on them.

[White Haven]

What always infuriates me in that sort of situation is that, nine times out of ten, you've been chewing through heavily-armed minions like some sort of bipedal walking blender, and then suddenly a couple of them point guns at you. As opposed to the eighteen dozen of them who've been attacking you with machine guns for the past hour. And you surrender. FFX's wedding scene comes to mind, as does the battleship in Shadow Hearts: Covenant. Hell, SHC is even worse, you'd just macked on a boss, dude in battle-armor with a machine gun, supported by other guys with battle armor and machine guns, and then three Navy pukes with /pistols/ come in and tell the six of you to give up. And you do. Prison scenes are all well and good, but MAKE THEM MAKE SENSE! In all fairness, SHC's real prison scene is after you're gassed with a paralytic. Kinkier too, but let's not go there.

[GeneralTacticus]

Well, Deus Ex's prison scene capture involves you either being 'killed' while trying to escape an area infested with enemy troops (you go down and wake up in a cell), or else leaving a subway station and walking into a park filled with all manner of heavy firepower pointed at you, so it seems the designers avoided that particular problem.

[RogueIce]

I love the RPG death scenes of main characters. Sort of like what he stated above: you've gone through all manner of hell, been shot, stabbed, slashed, flamed, iced, zapped, poisoned, and God knows what else. And you still keep going. Then some momma's boy comes off the roof, stabs you, and bam you're dead.

And, for whatever reason, all your wonderful cure and revive magic and potions/items are suddenly...useless.

Why the hell didn't he just use that same sword earlier?

If you can't guess which game I'm talking about, you need to come out from under your rock now.

[White Haven]

Sometime I want to see a death scene in which said now-dead person was just walking along with the rest of the party when he suddenly fields a LAW to the chest. Something sudden, brutal, actually deadly even to that grade of character, and unexpected.

[Stark]

Its what comes of having levelling up. Dramatically, someone is likely to surrender if someone points a gun at their head. In a game, where all the pistol will do is take away 5 of your 7,893 hp, it makes no sense at all.

Say it with me : poor combat modelling.

Realistic combat in these games would make the 'sensible' cutscenes make more sense.

[Coalition]

I think there was one game, where instead of getting 4-5 (or 6) digit HP at higher levels, you only got 1-2 HP per level (level 1 = 1 HP, level 20 = 30 HP), and that was if you were a fighter. So you might get harder to hit, and your swordwork might get more accurate, but any sort of area effect, and you better run for cover.

First strike becomes very important in those situations, or at least, avoiding ambushes.

[Master of Ossus]

Baldur's Gate II has a scene like that, but that one makes a marginal amount of sense (though I still think my party could have taken those illithid).

[Vendetta]

Well, Deus Ex's prison scene capture involves you either being 'killed' while trying to escape an area infested with enemy troops (you go down and wake up in a cell), or else leaving a subway station and walking into a park filled with all manner of heavy firepower pointed at you, so it seems the designers avoided that particular problem.

Not quite.

If you're monumentally hard, you can fight your way though that scene, except Gunther, who is invincible.

[White Haven]

Either low-HP characters OR some sort of shielding effect that they use to be that bloody durable. In fact, that would be hella, hella cool to see some guy whip out an SMG and open up at the party, only to see the bullets deflect off of an Edea-style shield or some such. Something like that would make for some far more intelligent prison scripting, instead of just giving up, the PCs would, well, try to bring up their defenses, fail, and go 'oh damn,' or some such. Same applies to powered battle-armor, MGS2-style Fortune magnetic wierdness, etcetera.

[McNum]

I never really thought about the whole prison thing, but you're right! FF7, FF8, FF9, and FF10 all have prison sequences. So does Skies of Arcadia. (Sadly that FF10-2 and KoTOR kind of rounds off my RPG knowledge...)

I kind of like the way Skies of Arcadia does it, though. Bad guy walks up to your party and demands you surrender. You can coose to surrender which takes you to the prison or choose fight him in the game's battle system only to get handed your collective asses by a singe tough as nails swordsman. That he attacks your party later in the game and still give you a good beatdown only makes the final confrontation with him more fun. I would wish he wasn't invulnerable in the first two battles, just holding back until 50% HP and unleash something very painful by then...

[PeZook]

Not quite.

If you're monumentally hard, you can fight your way though that scene, except Gunther, who is invincible.

And there is an "invisible barrier" around Battery Park. I have actually avoided all those goons and would be able to get away if not for this little thing.

[Drooling Iguana]

I love the RPG death scenes of main characters. Sort of like what he stated above: you've gone through all manner of hell, been shot, stabbed, slashed, flamed, iced, zapped, poisoned, and God knows what else. And you still keep going. Then some momma's boy comes off the roof, stabs you, and bam you're dead.

And, for whatever reason, all your wonderful cure and revive magic and potions/items are suddenly...useless.

Why the hell didn't he just use that same sword earlier? :?

If you can't guess which game I'm talking about, you need to come out from under your rock now. :D

At least in Phantasy Star II they tried to use the game's character-resurrection mechanism after one of the party members died. It just wouldn't work for some reason.

[White Haven]

I rather liked Grahf from Xenogears. You fight him god only knows how many times throughout the course of the game, and even beat him once or twice, but the last time...the last time, you utterly mack on him, and it's so very satisfying. Plus, like, he was cool in any case. And had an awesome-looking gear. Aaanyway

I guess my beef is that if you're going to capture the PCs, do it with overwhelming force, not the same force they've been facing all game that they suddenly happen to be afraid of. A battlemech, a battallion of soldiers who don't attack three at a time, a gas attack, helicopter gunships, a trap of some kind...not, like, three dudes with handguns, or a dozen with machine guns, UNLESS, of course, guns have been something to be feared up to that point. Consistency.

[Jaded Masses]

Just thougt I'd throw out there that it happens in Half life too. Remember right after you fight all thouse assassines outdoors and you walk though the door? Blackness desends and you hear them talking- the decide to place you in a garbage compacter.

Though now that I think about it you're just captured and don't go to prison. Nevermind.

[RedImperator]

They did that early in Duke Nukem 3d, too. Not that that's in any way, shape, or form an RPG, but they did do it, leaving you in the next scene to try to escape an electric chair and overpower armed guards totally unarmed, then take down more guards with nothing but a pistol and a few clips you stole from the guards you just beat to death.

GTA III and its successors, of course, love leaving you up shit creek with all your guns missing right when you need them.

[Trogdor]

The prison scenarios don't bother me so much as the "two grunts guarding the door" scenario. You know, the one where you know you have to go to a certain place to move the story along but you haven't talked to person x yet, so the two grunt monsters won't move away from the only entrance.

But I've killed LEGIONS of you idiots. I should be able to kill you, too!

Often the battle will be prevented by the monsters being stupid. You know, something like "you don't have to wear your human disguise in here, friend."

[SyntaxVorlon]

This happens in Tales of Symphonia as well.

Well you want your character to be bad ass he's got to do time, like Griff in RvB.

[Tychu]

I was thinking about it more now that people brought up Deus Ex, i havent played a Deus game but am i correct when i say its a FPS? not an RPG?

anyways the prison thing happens in the N64 cult classic GoldenEye in the 2nd Bunker. Good ol James sneaks into the bunker again after the very hard Surface 2 level only to walk into a trap with like 4 guards at the bottom of the Bunker stairwell.
How do i remember the names of the levels? well i didnt turn on my dusty 64 but who didnt play that game 24/7 with at least 4 of your friends?

I knew once it started that i was going to get "captured" in Fable but i have a reasoning, your mother is following you and being tourterd for god knows how many years so you really dont want to put her at risk

but, the game goes on to say 1 year later, meanwhile the cave is exactly the same all the people remember you and your mother says the exact same things at the same time in the cave "Were almost there!" it was annoying.

[GeneralTacticus]

I was thinking about it more now that people brought up Deus Ex, i havent played a Deus game but am i correct when i say its a FPS? not an RPG?

It has elements of both. In terms of gameplay, it's largely an FPS, but it has a lot of RPG-style elements, like the development of your character's skills and augmentations, not to mention the acquisition and upgrading of your equipment.

[Tychu]

oh i forgot i played Phantasy Star 1-3 when it was rereleased for GBA

the first one was short the second one i gave up on after the first battle when the battle system was weird and the 3rd one plays to slow
if anyone played these games say if it has a prison scene

[The Yosemite Bear]

Buck Rodgers: Countdown to Doomsday.

yup, lo I am become death shatter of worlds, I have beaten their boarders and then they just gassed me (funny I had full powerarmour with breathing filters, and they gassed me?)

[Pcm979]

I didn't have a problem with getting caught in KotOR; What I had a problem with was Bastilla heroically 'saving' me from Malak when I was OWNING HIM. In every way possible.

[Vendetta]

That kinda got to me too. I was slapping him around like I was the school bully.

I have to wonder about her real motives there, was she really trying to save me, or was she covering her defection to the dark side.