While the state machine argument is correct, one could make that argument of our own universe. But the fact is with many games you don't even get to make some basic choices. You don't choose your enemy, they choose you. You don't choose your solution, it chooses you. Heck, in Dragon Age, you don't even get to choose where you stand when a battle starts. The loss of these choices over many generations of games is, in part, due to a conversion of focus from content to superior look and feel. Some even see this as a good thing and I can't say they're wrong, just that it isn't my preference.

These are the types of things I'm talking about. In Mass Effect 2 do you get any choice but to work with Cerebus? No. There's a galaxy of societies, organizations, companies, governments, etc... and you have to work with this one, even if your character's world view strictly forbids it. What if you want to work with the villains? What if you want to choose non-involvement? What if you could concievebly argue for any other possible organization in the entire galaxy to be the one you work with? Well we didn't write that. What about Liara? Why can't I join her on tracking down the Shadow Broker and put off dealing with the Reapers? We didn't write that either. Check out our new artillery though! Looks cool when it explodes, huh?

I'm talking about the all too precious few moments in most games these days where you actually get to choose the problem domain, instead of simply being presented with it. But to offer this developers have to write more than one path through a game, write more content, account for more choices when presenting later situations, etc... but their hands are full with developing awesome art assets.

A good example is the way you build your Keep in NWN2. You want to focus on income at the expense of the people? Be prepared to deal with Harpers and others looking to convince you otherwise. You want a stable economy? Well now you might not have enough to keep things running. A simple "state machine" yes, but by the time you're done, it feels like you've built a nation and depending on your character, have a reason to fight for it. Or not, maybe you gave control completely over to others because you don't want to be a leader or you just don't care. Your choices affect whether these people live or die later, how many survive and what their fate is, how powerful the enemy gets, who your allies are, your reason for fighting, etc... Unfortunately it even doesn't go as far actually allowing you to side  with the villains or trying to be autonomous from coming events, but it broke some ground. Choice is good and here you have a lot.

We can also take Mass Effect 2 as an example, but in a different direction. Your choice of who ends up residing on the council may change some side quests that are offered, and even change the look of the Citadel and some other areas. But does that change who you ally with or what your goal is? Why can't you choose to just save Humanity and sell out the other races? With almost all Humans on the council would there really be the same problem with convincing them of a threat, especially if your character is focused on Diplomacy? Oh wait, Diplomacy is largely just another statistic to get you cheaper prices on weapons... There's only one solution to most situations and even if there is more than one "choice" the outcome is largely the same, with a small deviation like that maybe you lose access to an individual in your list of who comes to fight more aliens with you. About the coolest choice effect for me in this game is the chance at irreparable failure of your mission. Nice, but should this really be the Gold standard? Because there are those to point to it as such and dismiss any who would argue otherwise. Maybe not here, but I've had this conversation a few times.

It's this carte blanche acceptance of a "set storyline" that tweaks me the most though. It keeps the demand focused on art development instead of character or world development and it's why I would propose some find the industry in a state of decline today. In that view I'm inclined to agree with the OP. Sure, there's a market for these shiny new games, as has been demonstrated quite thoroughly, but to defend it as the only way to make a game, or to say there's no market for anything else dismisses larges groups of people out of hand. I think I and others are here then to voice our opinion on the subject and to demonstrate that there is a market for a product like this. I'm definitely not here to state that there shouldn't be a market for what we have now though.

Really what it comes down to is an expression of opinions and an intelligent discourse on their merit, which I'm glad to have found a good place to have that.

I don't know who is defending "it" as the only way to make a game or even suggesting that there isn't a market for something like you describe. The game you describe sounds wonderful and pretty much non-existent. I don't think we're even close to what you describe, but it's not because those of us who like RPGs would reject it, at least I don't think so. But I still stick by what i said before, I don't need original, "out there" kind of ideas to be drawn into a story. I don't even need voice acting, or a parade of support cast members. I just need to be drawn in. I have been a fan of Bioware for awhile now, but there are lot of things i dislike about them. Being a fan of their games doesn't mean I dont have complains. I don't like what they are doing to DA 2 at all. I don't like that most of their games are designed for you to take a "good" or "bad" path and if you try to travel down the middle you wind up being penalized. They keep talking about not wanting people to be focused on these numbers, and yet if you don't concentrate on getting these magical decision numbers, you wind up missing out on some powerful skills (Jade Empire), conversation decisions (ME 2), or losing out on some of the companion issues (ME2).

I'd like my character be able to just punch someone in the mouth because they're being a jerk and not think oh no, i picked up 3-5 renegade points, now I might not have enough to deal with xyz situation later. I want to do it because it fits the role I want to play. I'd like to be able to play elves because they're a little different, and while it didn't change the overall story, it was still interesting to walk around having people mistake me as a lowly servant in DA and promptly correcting them. It was a nice addition that is completely removed from DA 2. Would I like the "big stuff" you are talking about? Hell yeah I would. For now, I settle for the small stuff, and the small stuff is what I feel they are taking away.

I tend to agree that ME is a 3rd person shooter with some minor RPG elements.  And if that's what you want, it does it pretty well I suppose.  I went into it expecting a careful blend of the two, and so was not impressed.  ME2 looks fantastic and the gameplay looked much smoother than ME1 from what I've seen.  But it's not a RPG anymore, and should not be billed as such.  It's a cinematic shooter where you have some control over the dialogue.

Which is why I also agree they should have left the core DA formula alone for DA2.  DA may not have lived up to BGII like they claimed it would, but it was still a solid CRPG where the PC felt like your avatar, not a pre-defined character like Shepard in ME.

Is that in reference to Alpha Protocol?  I heard it was bad...

 

From what I gathered from reviews, the critics hated it because it was not ME.  They wanted it to play like a 3rd person shooter with some RPG and stealth elements.  But that's not how the game worked; combat still involved behind-the-scene dice rolling like KOTOR, and if you ignored your gun skills you were not going to hit anyone.  If you didn't put points into stealth, you weren't going to sneak by anyone.  There were obviously some bugs that warranted a lower score, but the harshness it got was from spolied critics who clearly had forgotten what a RPG is supposed to be like.  One point in pistols does not mean you can hit a dime from 100 meteres away.

ME was a typical Bioware RPG with some Third Person Shooter mechanics.  ME2 is a Third Person Shooter with some Bioware RPG mechanics.

Everything you complain about is some generalized sentence with no actual point to it. You guys, you people, you're all dumb. Do you have any specific points you have an issue with or is your point to just sit over there stewing over the fact that some people dare to take issue with what Bioware does, their fans and their detractors.

The Witcher owns anything Bioware does. 

FWIW, I've stated a few times on my blog that Bioware is my favorite game developer.  I'll buy pretty much anything they put out.  But that doesn't mean I'm not going to speak up when I disagree with what they do.  If they want to create a 3rd person shooter, fine more power to them.  But don't say it's an RPG and expect me to be all "I love you so much Bioware, this is so great because you're such an awesome company."

Later,
LAR

That's fair. I think Dragon Age has some things wrong with it for example. I don't know what your blog is so I would be oblivious. I'm a Bioware fanboy. Fanboys will be fanboys!

Yes. I would buy a Bioware Hello Kitty RPG.

You should really try to play Arcanum if you haven't yet. The game has a ridiculously unprovoked "PREPARE TO DIE" line in nearly every conversation. Boy, I love that game.

Anyway, I agree with most here that BioWare hasn't satisfied my RPG needs in the last couple of years. ME was a fun, but massively flawed game. It made things more linear, less deep and generally less RPG-ish. It's only gone down from there on. I certainly had fun with Dragon Age, but it also had a cookie-cutter storyline (That had some serious holes in it IMO. One game and an entire expansion and we still know absolutely ZERO about the darkspawn?), it was very linear and character development was rather shallow. Just like ME, it ended feeling like another "On-rails" storyline. In Baldur's Gate, I always felt like I was living my own adventure. And I still feel that today when I get a chance to replay it.

ME2 really is the worst game BioWare has made so far. First of all, the storyline is terrible. It's not only amazingly clichéd, it's also poorly executed, feels like it's taking place in a different universe, didn't involve me, was anticlimactic, and it really only posed more questions than it answered. I had the feeling it was even MORE linear than ME1. At times I had this feeling Muzyka was watching over my shoulder and slapped my hand whenever I did something he didn't want me to do. The game was easy beyond belief (I played it on Veteran the first time and didn't use Medi-gel once. I died once because I wasn't paying any attention. Note that I am generally a terrible gamer), which made the "suicide mission" almost laughable (Nobody even died for christ sake). It also felt a lot more repetitive than previous titles, and the handholding just made me nauseous at times. I found about 2 or 3 of the promised "connections" to the previous game. Even the judgement of the council at the end of the first game didn't have a whole lot of effect. I got the feeling that there were barely any choices to be made, and the games writing had an overall "B-script" feeling to me. For me the game was really a step in the opposite direction of where I wanted BioWare to go.

And when you hear that Dragon Age 2 won't even have a customizable character, I'm starting to ask myself some serious questions. Defenders might say that RPG's shouldn't follow the same mold every time, but Dragon Age series was advertised as the spiritual sequel to the Baldur's Gate series. Dragon Age: Origins didn't have a whole lot in common with those games to begin with, but I'm beginning to fear there will be nothing left of it in Dragon Age 2. I just wonder what made them change so much.

I couldn't get out of the Zeppelin crash site starting area in Arcanum. Not for lack of trying mind you, boy did I TRY to play that game. But honestly I've only ever seen it actually work on one person's computer. I did however play and really enjoy Temple of Elemental Evil. That took quite a bit of patience, understanding, and long hours of research for unsupported patches, fixes, etc...

I'm not sure if I miss Troika, though I should really figure out where their designers ended up. They dreamed no small dreams, they just couldn't make a build stable to save their life.

UPDATE:
Jason D. Anderson is at inXile games, working on Hunted: The Demon's Forge - http://www.huntedthegame.com/
Leonard Boyarsky is at Activizzard working on Diablo III. (...)
Timothy Cain is at Carbine Studios working on an unnamed MMORPG - http://www.carbinestudios.com/ (Artwork looks cool.)
Read more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troika_Games

Strange, I just ended ME2 and thougth it was the best RPG since Planescape: Torment.

Maybe because i dont need stat juggling, stupid loot lists (especially in Sci-Fi games) or useless skill lists in my RPG's.

JMHO of course.

PS: Also i find the ME triology story leaps and bounds better then the BG story. Never ended BG2, so i cant comment on that one.