Bioware Archive

Turn-Based Combat in Western RPGs – A Eulogy

SSI Gold Box Combat

Turn-based combat in SSI's "Gold Box" series of AD&D CRPGs.

In the early days of computer and console role-playing games, turn-based combat was the norm.  This was not a compromise imposed by technological constraints, as one might suspect.  Most early computer and console video games, influenced by the arcade, were twitch-based action games.  Including real-time combat in an RPG would have been no more difficult than including it in any other genre.  Early RPGs like Wizardry, Might & Magic, Ultima, and The Bard’s Tale adopted the turn-based combat mechanic by choice, because their designers took their cues from pen-and-paper RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons, which employed turns and dice rolls to simulate combat.  This design resulted in combat systems that challenged a player’s ability to build and develop characters, and to think tactically in battle, rather than relying on fast reflexes and gamepad (or, at the time, joystick) mastery.

Some of these games, like The Bard’s Tale, presented turn-based combat as a series of menu choices.  The player would consider the strength and number of the enemy, the hit points and supplies of his or her party, and then select (for example) to Attack, Defend, Cast Spell, or Flee.  Other RPGs, like Ultima 3 and SSI’s Gold Box series of AD&D games, presented combat on a separate battle screen, where the player and the computer took turns moving party members and enemies around a map like figurines in a tabletop war game.

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Lair of the Shadow Broker: Thoughts on the latest Mass Effect 2 DLC

Lair of the Shadow Broker Mass Effect 2 Liara

Lair of the Shadow Broker brings Liara back to the fight -- temporarily, at least

I remember the days of expansion packs with pleasant nostalgia, so the concept of a self-contained mini-adventure downloaded straight into my game appeals to me – the chance to take my party out on one more quest from which I can triumphantly emerge with experience points and loot (and, on the Xbox 360, achievement points).  This ideal DLC isn’t exactly what Bioware delivers in Lair of the Shadow Broker.  For one thing, there’s minimal loot and only one level’s worth of XP.  But what the episode does deliver is pretty damn good.

For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, Lair of the Shadow Broker is the latest downloadable content pack for Mass Effect 2.  The plot involves helping former crew member (and, depending on your actions in the first Mass Effect, love interest) Liara T’Soni track down an evil power monger called the Shadow Broker and rescue some dude he kidnapped.  (I have not confirmed this, but I suspect the origin of this lore can be found in the Mass Effect comic books that came out around the same time as Mass Effect 2 and starred Liara as their central protagonist.)

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