Games that were ahead of their time (and in what way)

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Mummelmann said:

Betrayal at Krondor, which is also my favorite game of all time.

It was a story-driven, 50-hour RPG, open-world and massive, with turn-based combat with a grid system. It had item degradation with repair mechanics and skills, adaptive skill system that leveled them with actual use, with the added feature of being able to highlight "specialty" skills for extra gain. It had a health/stamina mechanic where you needed extra herbal remedies to recover from more serious injury, and your combat efficiency degraded along with lost health. Your spells culd be heightened, in favor of losing more stamina, and once stamina is gone, it costs health (same for melee fighting and crossbow hits). It had a teleport/fast travel system via temples. You could even assume a defensive stance in combat, and there were flanking mechanics as well as percentage-based impact on accuracy with missile attacks (spells and bolts alike) when an ally was adjacent to the target. There were poisons, food-spoilage, blessing for gear, buffs by way of magical items for weapons and armor, fatigue mechanics and mandatory rest/survival elements, summoning tools, alternative ways of solving certain fights (you can chase away trolls with a tuning fork!). There was haggling, troubadour mechanics in taverns, varied sidequests (like learning a secret chess-move) And much, much more. My favorite mechanic of them all was the Moredhel Word Puzzle chests - you open them by solving a riddle which needs either a translation spell or a Moredhel party member (Gorath) in order to be read. It favored those who had already read Raymond E. Feist's books set in the same universe and world, but most could be solved simply by taking in the plot and lore (such a "are you paying attention?" mechanic probably wouldn't work today though).

Oh, and this was all in 1993. It's not a very well-known title by any means, but its impact on the RPG genre as a whole, and even the industry, is undeniable. I still replay it about once every year.

I have not played the game, but I read the novelization when I was in Year 7, I remember taking it on a school camp, where it gave me a lot of comfort as I struggled with being away from home as a kid. Feist is one of my favourite authors and I love the world he built with Midkemia.