I've been playing Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic of late. The game came out in 2003 but I was looking for a good RPG and this was given as one of the best.

I don't even feel like I'm playing it. There are a couple of fights that I had a hard time getting through but nothing much. And this in spite of the fact that I intentionally made a character who isn't good at combat.

Let's say that you're on low health after a semi-difficult battle. No problem. Just "fast travel" (or whatever) back to your ship. This warps you right back to the safety of your ship where you're given full health. Then "fast travel" back. Now you're right back where you were after that battle.

THAT'S STUPID. Totally takes any difficulty out of the game. Even if you die, no problem. Unless everybody in your party dies, you're just brought back to 1 hp after the battle. Then you can just fast travel back to your ship and fast travel back.

Also, I like games that involve inventory management. You can only carry so much shit so you have to decide what to take and what to leave and which characters should carry what. Not an issue with this game. You can carry as much shit as you want.

The game was made in 2003, so that's pretty long ago, but not long enough, it seems. I like the old school games that actually presented a challenge. This game is effectively impossible to lose. And the maps are all pretty much linear so you just walk forward.

I didn't really like the Ultima series, I didn't play them until I got the Ultimate RPG Archive that had Ultima 1 through Ultimate 8. This was like 1999 and Ultima 7 (the best in the series) was released in 1992. So not that much earlier, I guess, but far back enough to look dated. In those days, graphics were getting better by leaps and bounds every year.

Still, I enjoyed Ultima 7 and played it for many hours and it was a big open world with character inventory management and you had to figure out what to do and it was possible to die. Never got close to beating it.

Chrono Trigger. Played it for many hours. Actually, I don't know how difficult or not it was to die but I played it and enjoyed it. I'm not sure how close to beating it I was.

Much more obscure, Dungeons and Dragons: Order of the Griffin for the Turbo-Grafx 16. I had this game as a kid. Very difficult. I never made it past that...I don't know...I think it was some mansion or something in some city. Or maybe the Iron Ring Forest. Weird that I remember the name. Anyway, there was a bug or something and the game would break at a certain point.

But beside that, it was also a tough game with a lot of combat and if you were low health, you were out of luck. There was no warping back to base with full health and then warping back to where you were. That would be really, really stupid.

So Knights of the Old Republic gets a thumbs down from me. But I've been playing for about 40 hours so I don't know. It's basically a visual novel.