RPG Setting/Lore Discussion Thread

[water dog]

This... ultimately comes down to opinion.

FENCE OF TEXT TIME:

The main reason I dislike FF style fantasy is because of how... elaborate it is, in terms of design. They all look like fashionistas when they're meant to be like, saving the world. You are not going to a party you don't need to accessorise you need to stop a monster from eating your guts okay. Your armour consisting of huge metal shoulderpads and greaves with your stomach almost completely exposed might look nice if you're a complete twink but it's not going to do much to stop you getting EVISCERATED.

Maybe this boils down to my intense distaste for girly frilly shit.

I tend to prefer western style fantasy because it's usually more convincing (chainmail bikinis notwithstanding) and ultimately more human. Also (elves notwithstanding, fuck elves) the men actually look like men rather than children which is nice. :C

I'm never really going to convince you otherwise, I'm not really hateful towards FF or anything, it just isn't my cup of tea. I guess it's partly because I was really cool and popular as a kid and spent a lot of time playing DnD, so I'm always going to have a soft spot for that kind of thing. There's still a lot of shit in the genre though, and way too much "safe" tolkien stuff.

One thing I will definitely say in favour for jRPGs, even though they have a lot of elements I really, really don't like (angst and girly shit, basically), at least there's more surprises in it. You don't see, I dunno, Freya and go "Oh I know exactly what her entire race is going to be like, ugh".

That's actually something that annoyed me a bit about Dragon Age, now I think of it. The elves, despite being forest-dwelling as is the archetype, weren't the frilly magic-obsessed nature lovers that they usually are; they're very warlike (and have totally badass polynesian style tattoos), which was awesome. But the dwarves were... well, dwarves. I was really impressed when I came across their library / records, because having them as obsessive about history was kinda new, but they were still mostly miniature vikings. It would've been nice if they'd been made to be more scholarly, just for a change of pace.

I can totally understand people not liking Western fantasy, because there really is a lot of generic shit, and you have to dig a lot to find the good stuff. Also they tend to be Very Wordy and big on developing lots and lots of lore -- if you're as cool and attractive as I am, you'll be all over that shit, but I can understand other people finding it boring.

thank you. :- )