Computer adaptations of RPGs

I have this MIGHTY NEED to roleplay, but I won't get a game rolling for weeks and even then it will probably be Call of Cthulhu so I thought, hey, perhaps I should look into those old adaptations of roleplaying games, you know, the ones that don't really have any roleplaying.

Here's my question: Which ones do you recommend? The Temple of Elemental Evil on PC must be the closest I'm ver going to get to that module and there's an old Speljammer adaptation around. There's also Planescape: Torment, which I haven't played.

I wonder how many of those would let me play a bard. I want to play a bard.


This reminds me I didn't like VtM Bloodlines much. It could have been a great game but it's clearly unfinished and gets worse the longer you play it.

What do you suggest?

Look for emulations of the Shadowrun games on the SNES and Genesis. The mechanics of the Genesis game are more inline with the pen and paper rules at the time, but the SNES version does a better job of dropping you in the setting. I prefer the SNES version.

nethack

Arcanum of Steamworks and Magick Obscura is very good but, if you haven't played Planescape, then it's easy....play it. It is far and away the best of them all.

Baldurs Gate Enhanced Edition is also good.

Oh man, Planescape Torment is SO GOOD. You should play it. It explores the concept of alignments in the D&D universe, as well as several of the outer planes, and the writing is the best of any RPG I've ever played. It was mind-blowing, especially towards the end of the game.

You could play a bard in Icewind Dale. Probably Baldur's Gate as well. Most likely Neverwinter Nights.

I bought Temple of Elemental Evil ten years ago and played the heck out of it. Sometimes I would play all the way through, exploring different strategies. Other times, I would just build really messed-up parties and see how far I could get in iron man mode. I moved on to other games, but eventually heard in 2006 that there had been some extensive modding to ToEE. I downloaded and installed a couple of those mods, which added in more monsters, more traps, more story and better tactics for the intelligent enemies.

Recently, I heard that ToEE had been modded even more. Now there is even more content beyond the original storyline, allowing for play all the way through 20th level. I am very interested in trying the new material, but am currently about halfway through an old game of it that I hadn't finished. I might need to bail on that game, though, because the average party member is 5th level, but the wizard is only 3rd because he keeps dying and can't catch up in XP. Those damned intelligent monsters sometimes rush my wizard like defensive linemen going after the quarterback.

Anyway, in answer to your original questions, yes to Temple of Elemental Evil. You can totally play a bard. It's a turn-based game that functions almost exactly the way D&D 3.5 is supposed to work, so you actually run an entire party, choosing each character's action when his or her turn comes around in the initiative order. The adventure also does an impressive job of recreating the original ToEE module, though adapting everything to D&D 3.5. And it's more fun than actually playing D&D 3.5, because the computer keeps track of all the fiddly stuff, especially actions and attacks of opportunity and spell durations. Also, I have heard that you can now buy ToEE for less than $5.

You also mentioned Call of Cthulhu, so you might want to try Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth. I haven't gotten very far into the game so far, but it's very intense and atmospheric.

Temple of Elemental Evil is awesome. Also insanely hard, as I recall. Save early, save often. I haven't tried any of the new content, but would definitely check it out if I was getting it today.

Arcanum is one of my all-time favorites. Not to be missed. Again, saving often is recommended. My last playthrough, I ended up getting into real trouble with my dwarven gunner. He couldn't make enough money to buy bullets. I was spending more preparing for a dungeon run than I was making on the run itself.

hotseatgames wrote: Temple of Elemental Evil is awesome. Also insanely hard, as I recall. Save early, save often. I haven't tried any of the new content, but would definitely check it out if I was getting it today.

Arcanum is one of my all-time favorites. Not to be missed. Again, saving often is recommended. My last playthrough, I ended up getting into real trouble with my dwarven gunner. He couldn't make enough money to buy bullets. I was spending more preparing for a dungeon run than I was making on the run itself.

The same design team did Arcanum before they did ToEE. Then they did Vampire: Bloodlines, which is another excellent computer adaptation of an RPG. Be sure to download the patches for both ToEE and Vampire if you try them.

What patches would you recommend for ToEE Shellhead?

I started a game of Planescape Torment. Seems closer to a graphical adventure than a grindfest, which I truly appreciate because it's very well written and fun.


@Hotseatgames

Funnily enough, I didn't quite finish VtM Bloodlines for the same reason. The entire last part of the game is a beat'em up and you cannot carry enough bullets to kill all enemies because the game was clearly designed for melee combat in mind.

Circle of Eight patches the problems with ToEE nicely, and also unlocks the amusing whorehouse location. There used to be other patches and mods, but Circle of Eight continued to improve their patch/mod. Version 8.0 is the newest one, so try to use that. I also vaguely remember that you will want to go to the options screen and disable autosave and also avoid using quicksave. Circle of Eight also gives you some other nice options, like stopping the NPCs from looting, and giving yourself maximum hit points or a maximum of eight fully controllable player characters in your party.

I vaguely remember a Moebius patch and maybe a Lavinia patch, and that Lavinia one really made the traps nastier and the opposition smarter. And there was some weirdness about certain subplots advancing if the players did or didn't do certain things. I'm currently playing through the Lavinia modded version that also works with an earlier version of Circle of Eight, and then I plan to install the current version of Circle of Eight on a different computer that I own, to try to play all the way through to 20th level.

Is the patch a "fix" like the fan patch for VtM is, or is it an improved version of the game?

Troika developed amazing, and sadly always flawed, games. I was sad when they closed down. If I recall, Valve had a lot to do with their demise. Vampire was the first Source engine license, and it was done before Half-Life 2. They were not allowed to release the game, and went broke waiting.

Erik Twice wrote: Is the patch a "fix" like the fan patch for VtM is, or is it an improved version of the game?

The original Circle of Eight patch was mostly just a patch, but it also unlocked the brothel and maybe a little other content that was created for the game but left out of the final release. Later versions of Circle of Eight added content, like restocking one of the dungeons later in the game. Recent versions of Circle of Eight apparently added even more content, extending the game significantly. Originally, you were playing a D&D adventure for characters of 1st through 10th level. Now you can apparently play characters that start at 1st level and make it all the way to 20th level.

Half a lifetime ago, I ran the original first edition AD&D Temple of Elemental Evil adventure for my gaming group, so I knew the adventure in a general way when I first started playing the computer version. This new content beyond 10th level is exciting for me, because I have absolutely no advance knowledge of what could happen.