CRPGs To Try After Baldur's Gate 3

so you like balers Gate 3 and you want more but the prospect of navigating through scores of massive 100 plus hour crpgs horrifies you do you wish you had a guide through this landscape of Epic Games someone who say has spent thousands of hours living virtual Adventures while ignoring real life social situations and responsibilities well fear not I've spent my life immersing myself in Virtual stories instead of making friends or having actual experiences so I'm the perfect man for the job I'm here to categorize some of the best the genre has to offer so whether you're a crpg newcomer or veteran you can smoothly embark on your journey into some of the best games ever made but first can I briefly talk about balers Gate 3 when balers Gate 3 released a few months ago it exploded out of the gates and defined itself not only as one of the greatest games of the year but one of the best crpgs of all time traditionally crpgs or computer role playing games were more of a niche category of games that had a High difficulty curve but if you can Crest that difficulty curve it would allow a player to enjoy an immensely satisfying experience to see a 100 plus hour fantasy crpg meet critical Acclaim and Commercial Success is something amazing and I hope it opens the genre to many who have never given it a chance in order to help you get into crpgs I have decided to break some of my favorites in this genre down into four categories first you got baby's first C RPG oh look how adorable they are they're graphically gorgeous and feature approachable gameplay they're so cute then you have your beginner C RPGs which will hold your hand pretty well but offer some challenges after that we got the first day of high school and you don't have any friends intermediate level RPGs oh my God the hallways are so crowded you you don't know where the h-wing of the school is oh geez and finally we have the pound you in the ass super expert crpgs which are incredibly rewarding but very very difficult to master so without further Ado let's get started Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age Origins walked so balers Gate 3 could run as someone who has beaten this phenomenal title three separate times I can say that while playing balers Gate 3 I have had many moments of deja vu you got a big world-ending threat a wide array of abilities and classes to choose from and a bunch of horny people in your Camp who all want to have sex with you oh jeez Gail we just met I I don't want to explore the weave with you right now come on man Dragon Age Origins is basically a blueprint for how to build a successful crpg when you start the game you given the choice of six different backgrounds to choose from and your choice will have implications across the entire 60-hour game you play as a Grey Warden a race of superhuman beings who are tasked with stopping an evil dragon and its dark spawn armies you have to go around the world making decisions finding allies and best of all you get a dog that you can name and if you don't name him bark spawn you're playing the game wrong for a game that came out in 2009 the visuals still hold up surprisingly well and as an added bonus you can get the game and all of its phenomenal DLC for pretty cheap on Steam it even has a cool DLC where you get to play as the evil forces at the end of the game and systematically kill the hero and his or her party before ruling the world I always thought that was a cool wh if scenario that I wish more games would have but yeah if you're new to crpgs going from balers Gate 3 to Dragon Age Origins will be a natural Next Step just do yourself a favor and skip the sequels to Dragon Age Origins which both devolve into boring MMO style fetch quests with a cast of characters who slowly get stupider and stupider with each title until half your companions in Dragon Age 3 are mentally challenge losers who have no motivations joking fear can't think from the medicine but the cuts rack me with every heartbeat whoa careful don't cut yourself on that edge there Cole Divinity original sin 1 and two while these games may be difficult for someone who has never played a crpg before if you've played balers Gate 3 you can easily go into them considering they are also made by larion in fact Divinity original sin 1 and two have more rudimentary combat and more simplistic narrative choices than balder's gate so going into these titles will offer easier experiences they both follow your typical role-playing Fanfare with evil ancient dragons shifting alliances from mysterious foes and quality combat but they do add a few cool things into the mix in Divinity 1 you're actually making and controlling two characters instead of one and their relationship and action shape the story in interesting ways in the second one there's this really cool combat system where different elements can combine to form interesting and devastating results so combat is always kept interesting while these both are simpler when compared to balers Skate 3 they offer a great path forward into the world of crpgs and keep to a formula that will make novice players comfortable while giving veteran players a fun experience oh no one of the lizards has set our Mage on fire with a reckoning fireb quickly she makes a grein and the fire is dowsed Mass Effect legendary edition okay this one isn't exactly a crpg but I had to put it on here because this is just so amazing one of the most important things in a quality crpg are the companions having a diverse group of interesting and cool people to tackle the challenges the game throws at you makes the entire experience way more engaging and for my money companions don't get much better than Mass effects roster across the three titles you have access to over 20 Squad members all of which have unique backstories and histories you got a lizard assassin a sexy blue lady who's part of a race of sexy blue space lesbians an angry turtle and so many cool characters it's impossible to have a favorite except I'm lying because the best is obviously G's vieren who's basically space Batman well at least it's impossible to have a least favorite except I'm lying again because there's Ashley Williams the space racist who thinks aliens are stupid Hey Shepherd see all these cool aliens that are awesome well I hate them want to read the Bible and talk about my sisters uh-oh looks like we need someone to go on a suicide mission and never come back I wonder who would be perfect for the job for real though this game is the most engaging and dynamic Space Opera of the medium and despite a lackluster ending in the third one the whole thing is wildly engaging for well over 100 hours while the combat is pretty simple especially in the first game it is more than made up for by some of the best character writing and plot of any any RPG out there again this isn't really a c RPG but if you like balder's gate and Dragon Age you need this on your list you told Admiral hacket to abandon the destiny Ascension I've had enough of your disingenuous assertions Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic everybody wants to be a Jedi Knight they got a cool laser sword they get to be heroes and fight robots and evil people and they're forced to be celibate what's not to love the problem is if you pop a SE ROM into your original Xbox and you are immediately given a lightsaber it doesn't really feel that special you start off with the coolest weapon in all of fiction there's no way to go up from there Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic lets you be a Jedi but you have to earn that [ __ ] you start the game as some basic [ __ ] nobody who has to fight with a lame fibro blade you're weak enough to get bodied by a couple of bad guys and for a lot of the adventure you're running errands for inconsequential NPCs for a good 20 or 30 hours you're a weak loser you have to go through all this [ __ ] like being stuck in a stupid diving bell suit moving slower than a slug and I hate this part of the game holy [ __ ] it's so boring but if you keep at it you start doing crazy stuff and you get a lightsaber and you begin to influence the very fate of the Galaxy Star Wars writing especially in the Disney era is hilariously bad but Knights of the Old Republic features quite literally some of the best twists I have ever seen across any medium seriously if you haven't played this game don't look up the plot if you go into it blind there's one twist that will absolutely floor you while the game is a little bit clunky and we were promised a remaster that looks like it might be cancelled this is definitely worth a playthrough it is not possible to destroy the master it is suggested you run while my blasters warm up meatbags tyranny what do you expect from a role-playing game you play as a farm boy turned hero who who gallivant about a kingdom gets together a ragtag team of teenage adventurers and kills a great evil or a God that's standard fair for most RPGs right well in tyranny you play in the aftermath of a scenario where evil has conquered the world and you act as a judge who has to carry out the will of the evil Overlord oh what's that you want to do the right thing [ __ ] you put down this rebellion and kill everybody who dares to rise up against the overlord while you have a degree of freedom and how you pass your judgments and you can show Mercy at times ultimately you are the oppressor in this game regardless of what you do you are the bad guy because this game flips the script on the typical good vers evil Quest it leads to some truly unique situations where you have to be creative if you want to make morally good decisions if you want to be a vindictive [ __ ] you can do that but if you want to be Noble you have to work within the confines of a foul leader and his demands on my playthrough I actually decided to rebel against a big bad guy but unlike many traditional crpgs with this plot I face a lot of very realistic opposition most RPGs make it easy to get a group of people to go on a near Suicide Mission Against the ultimate Evil but in tyranny it wasn't so easy people couldn't fathom me going up against the evil force many mocked my ambitions and no one jumped at the chance to join me this game doesn't rely on dice rolls to determin social interactions so if you want to convince someone of something you have to use logic and Charisma to get your way like when I was trying to get some of the most important people in the evil regime to switch sides and join me I encountered this guy who acted as the grand judge he was well-versed in the law set forth by the Dark Lord that ruled the world and acted in his name because he felt the law was just but if you methodically point out the subtle contradictions and unjust foundation of the bad guys's law he will agree to help you having a long conversation with someone about the Equanimity of law may not sound like something you would traditionally ascribe to video games but if you want a game where you are forced into a shitty situation and have to use your wits to overcome it this one is for you and it's only about 20 or 30 hours so it's not as big a Time sync as most crpgs how could we have known that the fade of thousands would rest in your hands Pathfinder King maker many games take you from a simple peasant to a heroic Adventurer but something this game does well is it really makes you feel like you are amassing the social rewards of becoming a hero like you know in Skyrim how if you're the head of every Guild the arch Mage and the true dragon born you may turn a corner and have some bottom bits try to steal your gold like that doesn't make any sense why would a bandit try to steal from a guy who looks like this Pathfinder King maker does a great job at making you feel like you're rising up in the world at the beginning of the game you're just saving towns and helping illiterate Farm hands but as you start to get stronger and take on greater challenges you begin to have Villages cities and whole armies fall under your influence in Pathfinder King maker you aren't just traveling around a static world but as your influence grows you actually build a kingdom kind of like a king maker you can appoint companions as advisers who help you sort through well-written dilemmas you can improve your Holdings and upgrade [ __ ] hole towns into sprawling cities and as you amass power you catch the eye of other rulers with shifting alliances who could be friends or foes the power fantasy aspect of crpgs is something that has been done many times before but Pathfinder King maker actually makes it feel like the world is reacting to your increase of status in Pathfinder kingmaker you aren't just improving yourself but the world itself is reacting to your Ascension in a way that I've never seen emanated quite so well into your hands we commend our lives and humbly request you address the Fate that awaits for us under your rule pillars of Eternity pillars of Eternity is basically someone looking at balers gate one and two and saying what if we made this but made it not terribly confusing to play in modern times in my opinion this is the closest modern game to Classic balers gate Adventures the isometric Graphics are very similar the story deals with elements of Souls and godhood in a similar way to balder's gate and in both games there's a weird goofy ass holy man that shouts awesome onliners go for the eyes boo go for the eyes r a purification is coming and this fire shall consume them both this game is made by obsidian the guys behind Fallout New Vegas tyranny and the outer worlds which is basically just Fallout in space but anyway with every game they make your choices have legitimate consequences pillars of Eternity presents you with some amazingly well-made moral quandries that have massive massive repercussions on the world there are many points in this game where you can make a decision that will fundamentally alter the fate of the entire world and everyone in it pair that with a well-made battle system and solid Companions and you're in for a good time maybe after you played balers Gate 3 you thought about playing the first two balers gate games I mean it's the same series how different could they be well playing the original balers gate after playing balers Gate 3 is basically like trying to start a fire with flint and Tinder when you're used to turning on your fireplace with a wireless remote but if you try to play pillars of Eternity first that's like making a fire with a match it's tougher than you're used to but you're not going to end up freezing and miserable step forth and be assured of the great worth of your life's course Wasteland 3 when Fallout 1 and two look like this then they made Fallout 3 look like this some people said wait a minute I don't want my Fallout to look like that I want it to look like this while Bethesda has left isometric Fallout behind in Exile entertainment has made their own isometric Fallout with Blackjack and hookers and a giant mechanical statue of Ronald Reagan it is irrelevant whether one is communist communist communist if you can't get enough of the Fallout series and have found a newfound desire for crpgs this is a perfect intersection for you Wasteland 1 and two are both solid titles but Wasteland 3 is the most polished of the bunch and in my opinion has the best story and characters the whole series is roughly connected but you can hop into Wasteland 3 without playing the other two the setting for this game is a post-apocalyptic world that doesn't look like all the other post-apocalyptic worlds out there hold on I can fix that let me just slap a sepia filter over it and there we go now it looks like a desert with sand and every other [ __ ] post-apocalyptic thing so you form a party of Rangers and meet Logan Roy of Colorado who wants to go full succession with his three heirs the dorsis didn't just attack you they attacked my city this one was trying to burn down our jail you have to navigate a complex web of relationships and factions to ultimately determine who will come the rule this Frozen hellscape and during your journey you will come across all the quirky fun one can expect from game seem like Fallout I got my good buddy Clarence here to help me Clarence Clarence no Clarence he was two days away from retir balers Gate 1 boy balers Gate 3 sure was great I should try balers Gate 1 balers Gate 1 and two are fantastic games in fact I would wager they have some of the best fantasy stories ever told in gaming but accessible they are not the first two balers gate games are based around the second edition of DnD which was released in 1989 so you'll have to understand an Antiquated system over 30 years old to even play this game have you ever heard of tho before or what about not always using a D20 for hit rolls what's that you don't like watching all of your characters miss their attacks for 5 minutes in a row before hitting any thing oh also the game doesn't have a quest log that works what am I supposed to do get a pen and paper and write down all this [ __ ] add to that the fact that many parts of balers gate are horribly obtuse and you have a very difficult experience for newcomers to the genre that being said there are many positive things about this game like the bad guy is named sahok right and he's a huge [ __ ] but at one point you meet a guy named corvus and he's a total bro and he's like hey man serox suck sucks so tell me how you plan on killing him again then you tell him and he's like you fool Cirus is sovok backwards then you're just sitting there staring at your screen realizing you're a [ __ ] idiot and you just told the bad guy all your secrets and your last quick save was like 25 minutes ago are you [ __ ] kidding me there are plenty of moments like that and if you can push past the insanely High learning curve you will enjoy a wonderful story with a level of Freedom the likes of which few RPGs even to the this day have achieved just be warned if balers Gate 3 is your first introduction to the series this is definitely not your best next step boo giant shrunken heart Thrills to see you again as does my own Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic too Star Wars is the most intellectually bankrupt IP in the history of entertainment oh Excuse me while many of the movies and shows are decent you have the exact same plot played over and over again small band of good Rebels fights a big evil empire the good guys are always good even when they blow up millions of people and the bad guys are always bad even when they Massacre annoying teddy bears there's no in between and the morals have the depth of a puddle however in Star Wars nights of the Old Republic 2 obsidian attempted to add a little more complexity to the system in this game you have to navigate through a lot of gray are and on your journey the traditional RPG tropes are turned on their head like you'll come across some kid who is starving and your choices are to give him some money or food or to stab him in the face with your lightsaber it's pretty easy to see what's good and evil there right well your companion Korea offers you an alternative perspective if you give the kid food she says you're actually hurting the boy by prolonging his suffering and he will eventually starve anyway whereas if you kill him you would end his suffering it's it's an interesting argument that many RPGs wouldn't even bother to make and this game is chalk full of situations where your morals are challenged in interesting ways unfortunately like most obsidian games this game is a glitchy mess in fact in its vanilla State the game not only has several gamebreaking glitches but entire areas and endings that were never put into the game luckily a fanmade patch has added a lot of cut content to the game but just know that there are some challenges in this game due to many many rough edges I am but a mirror whose only purpose is to show you what your own eyes cannot yet see disco elesium disco elesium is what would happen if you combined Sherlock Holmes and a barrel full of LSD the basic plot is simple you're a washed up cop who has to investigate the death of a man who was hanged behind your hotel but what starts off as a simple conundrum evolves into a wild and wacky Journey unlike anything else I've ever played the game doesn't have have traditional skills like survival or perception but instead each of the 24 skills in the game acts as part of the broken psyche of the player so let's say you've put points into conceptualization you may be talking to some kid about what happened and then a voice in your head the voice of conceptualization will tell you details about the scene that is unfolding in your mind and you will be able to ask additional questions based off what you're seeing in your head it's so cool to basically see in the mind of a neur itic person and you are literally Guided by the voices in your head the world itself is fantastic as well with over 6,000 years of History built into it a variety of factions representing various social constructs and a plot that unfolds in directions you will never see coming there is a lot to love in Disco elesium but the key part of that sentence is a lot juggling socioeconomic Concepts neurosis and characters with devious motivations is not an adventure for the faint of heart going from balers Gate 3 to this would be like going from a coloring book to war in peace this is a text Heavy game that will challenge your brain in unique ways but if you're in the mood for something nuanced unique and strange this is the game for you be warned though it's not an easy game true story on my first playthrough I awoke hung over and reached up to grab my tie that was on a ceiling fan I failed a physical check had a heart attack and died game over in 5 seconds it's weird in obscure but I can't think of any other game that allows you to die from a heart attack in the first 5 Seconds Kuno knows to respect that violent [ __ ] you should see kun's Dad kun's Dad doesn't give a [ __ ] about anything balers gate 2 balers gate 2 expands on everything from balers Gate 1 there are more quests more companions bigger Maps more glitches more confusion this is one of the best games ever made but no part of this game holds your hand you're put into a massive open world with huge challenges multiple factions and wait to your every decision the game takes place right after the first one as well so playing through balers Gate 1 is a must that being said there's a reason why this game was the gold standard for crpgs for decades this game is not easy it's not forgiving and if you don't quick save every 5 Seconds you're bound to do one little thing that will [ __ ] up your entire playthrough but on the other end of the struggle is an experience the likes of which will be eclipsed by very few games buts will be liberally kicked in good measure plcape torment talk about a game title being accurate if disco elesium is like War and Peace planescape torment is basically a textbook on calculus in Chinese by modern standards it's borderline unplayable it presents a world with no basis in reality the game features next to no combat and the conversations you have with people are so detailed and expansive it makes this feel less like playing a game and more like reading a novel and yet it is brilliant Beyond comparison decades Before Dark Souls was bold enough to keep the plot and World a mystery to players plcape torment was hiding everything you wanted to know about his world behind a thick veil of intrigue and mystery when you play the game you wake up in a mortuary you don't know who you are what you have to do or why you should do anything but as you explore you piece together fragments of a massive narrative that is unrivaled by any game before or since this is not like your traditionally fun games one of my Fondest Memories of this game is wandering into a bar which happened to feature a man permanently on fire in the center of it but don't worry about that and talking to a guy about the nature of life and death he was considering ending his life and you as a player could explore why he wanted to do this and what his reasoning was the entire sequence was a 20-minute conversation where you are using your reasoning and logic to try to understand what this person wants to do and why they want to do it I think Diane Carr of Game Study said it best in 2003 when she described the game as such plcape torment aims to provide its players with a sense that they are Excavating a history the Avatar is forgotten past while exploring more or less at will a vast and bizarre invention it's a bizarre Trek through an Avant guard fantasy world that is insanely difficult to grasp for gamers who did not grow up on crpgs but if given the time and patience this game is one of the most rewarding jauns through a uniquely beautiful world that all of gaming has to offer what can change the nature of a man a game without a good story is really just a simple exercise in passing the time stories in games make us laugh they make us cry and they make us want to keep playing long into the night while there are plenty of quality games out there I feel like crpgs have consistently featured some of the most complex and deeply rewarding Adventures there are but they have hidden them behind difficult mechanics and Antiquated systems luckily with the success of balers Gate 3 I'm hoping that for many gamers this will open a door into some of these fantastic experiences sitting in front of a computer screen in your underwear at 400 in the morning when you have to start work at 6:00 doesn't seem like an adventure but the magic of crpgs has always laid in their ability to transport the game to a completely different world they lack the graphics and approachability of many titles but with a little bit of patience imagination and persistence they can unlock gaming memories that will last a lifetime so whether balers Gate 3 is your first foray into crpgs or you're a veteran of the genre I recommend checking out some of the games that I've listed and hopefully by ordering them as easy to hard it will allow you to navigate this fantastic genre a little bit easier if there's a game I've excluded or if have any questions about these games or recommendations of your own go ahead and say so in the comments and I'll check those out I should have a new video coming out in maybe two or three weeks I think it's going to be an animation that I'm finishing up now so stay tuned for that and if you like this content like And subscribe I look forward to seeing you guys on the next one thanks bye

Channel: Pancake Sean

Views: 4,762

Keywords: Games Like Baldur's Gate 3, CRPGs Like Baldur's Gate 3, Like Baldur's Gate, CRPG Planesape Torment, CRPG Dragon Age, CRPG Knights of the Old Republic, CRPG Mass Effect, CRPG Pillars of Eternity, CRPG Pathfinder Kingmaker, CRPG Tyranny, CRPG Disco Elysium, Games like Planescape Torment, Games like Dragon Age, Games like Knights of the Old Republic, Games like Mass Effect, Games like Pathfinder, Games like Disco Elysium, Games like Tyranny, Pancake Sean BAldur's Gate

Id: p53rBJ9g6m4

Length: 27min 19sec (1639 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 10 2023