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As someone whose first TES was Morrowind, it set the bar so high in terms of worldbuilding, I was honestly a bit disappointed with the later entries into the series. Oblivion (more generic fantasy setting) and Skyrim (nordic with dragons) definitely played better, but the worlds were much less unique and memorable.
Had the same experience with Songs of Conquest. Beautiful game, but something felt off that I can’t put my finger on. The game felt really snowball-y, where your chances to win depend strongly on what resources you control early on, and the magic system (while interesting) felt really imbalanced. Nothing really managed to recreate the HoMM feeling for me.
Don’t forget Ennio Morricone’s musical genius. Many of the most iconic scores in Western films are his compositions.
No, I feel you. I did finish the game and enjoyed it overall, but the dialogue and writing was jarring. I’m not sure what exactly it was, but I was particularly annoyed by the characters being such clichés and the dialogue in the cutscenes being soooo slow (overused animations, dramatic pauses in every sentence, …).
Yeah, the vibe is different, but both are excellent in their own way. Part 2 is a more complex piece of story telling. It does some things that I had not expected from a game and that make it more (emotionally) challenging but also unique in terms of the experience. I personally found it really impressive.
God of War has two big strengths that make it a great game in my opinion. The first is the story with its great characters, presentation, and voice acting. The second is the overall “feel” of the game, which can be a bit “game-y” at times but is really tight overall with only a handful of core mechanics that are exceptionally well implemented.
Assuming that “masterpiece” refers to the quality and impact the games had in their time (not how well they aged) some of my picks would be:
- Baldur’s Gate 2 + ToB
- Star Wars: KotoR
- Morrowind
- Read Dead Redemption 2
- The Witcher 3
- The Last of Us 1+2
- God of War
- Shadow of the Colossus
- The Legend of Zelda: BOTW
- Mass Effect 1+2
- Disco Elysium
- Half Life 2
- BioShock 1
- Diablo 2
- Fallout 2
I don’t know how objective this list is. Some picks are definitely subjective and fit more in a “flawed masterpiece” category of games that had a large impact on how I perceived games but that may not be so widely acclaimed as some others on this list.
Civ games at launch are often a bit of a mixed bag, and the games improve over time with patches and expansions. That being said, the game isn’t even fully out yet, and early Steam reviews are notoriously unreliable and undifferentiated. For your first civ game, maybe look at earlier titles like Civ 5 or 6. They have aged very well, I still play 6 all the time.
True, but digital ownership is a fickle thing that depends in large part on how much I trust the seller. Between a >50% discount on Steam and a free game on Epic, I would still choose Steam every time, because I would feel like I “own” that game more than I would on Epic (where I would still hesitate to buy anything more than the 2-3 free games that would interest me there).
If I were a JRR Tolkien or Herbert with a universe in my mind, it would be so much more pleasing to make an engine that generates anything from that world that to just write out a few stories from it.
Tolkien was a linguist with a deep fondness for nature and spirituality. He loved creating languages and building beautiful, natural worlds around them. I can’t imagine a single person who would be less enamored by the idea of machinistic language devices that people use to “generate everything”. I think he would be either bored by this possibility or deeply disturbed.
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The Assassin’s Creed franchise nowadays seems more like one of those slushy machines at the mall that perpetually move the same ingredients around in a neverending cycle of despair and stagnation.