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 Posted: Sun Aug 27, 2006 5:50 pm
I don't remember where I heard it exactly, but I once heard the term "Space Opera" used when describing Star Trek and Star Wars. From what I gathered, the phrase "Space Opera" basically refers to a show, or game, or movie, or whatever, set in outer space and spanning at least the better part of a galaxy which uses heavy doses of science fiction and an imaginative, galactically epic plot to examine human beings and their inherent natures to discover new twists on old wisdoms. And of course, obviously something like Star Trek: The Next Generation, in which a crew of stark individuals journey through the universe and learn at least as much about themselves and each other as they do about what their galaxy holds, qualifies.
Lately, there've been a few RPGs popping up here and there that I would term as Space Operas. The ones I'm familiar with are the Xenosaga games, the Knights of the Old Republic games, and Star Ocean 3 (the first 2 barely have anything to do with their promised sci-fi premise, so they don't count, even if their events do comprise SO3's history significantly). All of'em take place in an advanced, space-faring future, with energy weapons and robots and aliens and so on.
Now granted, Xenosaga 1 and especially 2 have their flaws, and Star Ocean 3's not perfect, either (the KotORs I got 0 complaints about, though). But overall, this new genre in RPGs is one I'm finding I like quite a lot. I like the new and original ways to examine humanity and the universe though science fiction (SO3's got some great material on existence, and the Force can be used to examine any aspect of humanity you can even imagine). I like the idea of having powerful weapons like guns actually be effective, rather than having some idiot protagonist/antagonist with a stupid katanna somehow beating people who, in a world that wasn't retarded, would just shoot him in the head and end the game's dilemmas. I like the aspect of exploration and detail to the universe of these Space Operas, and I even like the odd and unique time frame and flow of the games--it seems these games have a sequence of events far different than a normal RPG's, somehow.
I'm not ready to trade in my fantasy worlds of unicorns, legendary swords, and knights in armor for a world of Sith, lightsabers, and KOSMOS just yet, of course. But I do hope that this trend continues at least a bit, and we see more RPGs with an expansive, epic plot set in science fiction. How about you all? What do you think of the RPG Space Opera? And do you know of any others besides the ones I've mentioned?
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Posted: Mon Aug 28, 2006 7:45 am
Ess_Tii_Eph_Yuu I like the idea of having powerful weapons like guns actually be effective, rather than having some idiot protagonist/antagonist with a stupid katanna somehow beating people who, in a world that wasn't retarded, would just shoot him in the head and end the game's dilemmas. This I think is the biggest thing in Space RPGs that I enjoy. Not having to go to the four coners of the earth fighting him and beating him a billion times before he actually goes away. I think it's a fresh market for rpgs, but it has been done a good bit for adventure games.
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Posted: Mon Sep 04, 2006 2:43 pm
I like how RPGs are expanding into to the science-fiction category - I've never really gotten into sci-fci as literature/movies/TV shows mainly because it never really caught my interest, but nowadays that category is really starting to get my attention, especially the games. 3nodding
I'm not going to drop fantasy for futuristic, but I can't wait to see what other RPGs go into space, and what RPGs would go and blend fantasy with space. XD
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Posted: Mon Sep 04, 2006 6:59 pm
Well, the Star Ocean series has tried to blend fantasy and science fiction throughout its run. The problem is that the first game had about 10 minutes altogether of science fiction, with everything else taking place in a fantasy setting--and most of THAT taking place in that fantasy setting's PAST. Star Ocean 2 attempts and fails miserably to be a little better by going from a fantasy world to a futuristic world about 60% of the way through the game, but the problem there is that the futuristic world is 80% based on evolved magic and still uses legends and mystical crap almost completely, so you feel like you're just in an advanced fantasy setting still. And if you choose Rena as your main character, which is understandable considering just how big of a dweeb Claude is, you don't even see most of the few minutes here and there concerning the science fiction elements of the Earth Federation's involvement in the whole affair.
Star Ocean 3, at least, gives you a reasonably acceptable blend of fantasy and fiction in that, though far too long still, the fantasy part of the game doesn't completely and totally usurp the overall plot. Actually, it's a problem in how much it doesn't--the time you spend on Elicoor II, the fantasy-world section of the game, seems almost completely pointless and irrelevant to the overall plot. So SO3 unfortunately comes off overall as a sci-fi game that has a lot of fantasy in it, but the two aren't actually blended almost at all.
So yeah, thus far, there's still not much that really blends sci-fi and fantasy together to speak of. There're a couple games that have a blend of mystical stuff with technology and such, like Shadowrun for the Genesis and SNES, but not much concerning space-faring quests.
EDIT: You know, I just thought of a really great series which, while not fitting the Space Opera ideal that I meant the topic to discuss, IS a great blend of science fiction and fantasy in an RPG: Phantasy Star. Best to start with 1, then do 2, and finally 4 (3 is just not worth it), but 1 and 2 are old-school hard, so if you gotta do just 1 of the games, do PS4. The series is insanely unique and inventive, particularly for its time (PS1 had anime cutscenes on the Sega MASTER System, and starred the very first female protagonist, and the series just kept going with innovation from there).
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