Yep, it was the first two games and yes, you are right the camera went bonkers because I was close to a wall, and tomb raider 2 especially had no shortage of tight spaces (that shipwreck level was a nightmare). The button to look around was insert on the number pad and yes, I used it frequently. It did help a lot but in some places but places like the shipwreck with flames spewing out broken pipes, not so much, sometimes it was trail and error.

You are also right about many games having worse issues with the camera than TR, especially in the late 90's, 3D graphics era in gaming where every 2D platform game had to become a 3D platformer (I really hated this transition period in gaming). In Mario 64, getting Mario to walk straight in certain levels was a nightmare, camera would go everywhere and movement was relative to the camera too. Earthworm Jim 3D? Ughh, I just gave up on that game, the camera was even worse than Mario 64. Worms 3D was frustrating and fun at the same time. Sometimes the camera angles made it hard to judge distances though, not something you want to do under a time limit. Beyond Good and Evil could be a nightmare with the camera, especially when driving. Still going into first person puts that under control. I know there's more but yeah, the camera in TR was fairly mild compared to some of these games.

Grim Fandango and Baldur's Gate are probably the biggest two for me. I actually prefer IWD over BG.

FF7 and 8 i guess. And Resident Evil 1, though i played the NDS version. because i don't even want to play them, because DRM, i don't want to buy another console, and my PC isn't made for "modern" gaming?
sounds like they were trying to mimic the "realism" in some of the ultima games, i guess. many old skool rpgs also did that.

That's one of the best things imho.
The common level up system that teaches you skills suddenly out of nowhere is breaking the immersion for me, I love the realistic approach that you need experience and a proper teacher that is better than you and willing to take the time to teach you stuff. I really want more games to do it this way. If you have good relations to someone he might even do it for free or at least for less money. That's real role playing going on there.

The controls in the first part are crap, that's true, the excellent open world athmosphere and dialogues got me through the learning curve of it though. The controls of the second part are pretty good imho, the more techniques your character has learned, the less perfect the players timing has to be, so fighting gets way easier later in both games which makes you rely on less aggressive strategies as long as you are still weak and untrained, like talking, getting supporters, avoiding fights, etc...
Most people that hate Gothic are people that just don't want to run away from a fight in a game but that's exactly what you have to do if someone is stronger and more experienced than you and at the beginning everyone is it of course.

Well, if I was to add mine, I would simply say "all Bethesda developed games minus Morrowind", for the reasons I stated so many times I am tired to wrtie them myself! :P
To make things short (this is just my personal opinion, I have no intention to start flame wars, let's just agree to disagree): I think they have some among the worst writers in the entire industry (and that does not want to be an hyperbole. Fallout 3 simply forgot the ABC of narrative, period), they are awful programmers that rely on their community to fix even basic bugs, I feel like their combat systems fail on both action and role-playing mechanics and their character progressions are a farce. Also, their "masterfully crafted worlds" are imo just empty boxes of soulless program generated content.
I really believe they conquered their undeserved fame only because their games are a modding heaven, and I am convinced that many of their most famous modding community members are far more talented than them.
Piranha Bytes, Rockstar and CDProject Red destroy them on all fronts.

It wasn't exactly like that. Who classifies Gothic as an Action-RPG would be right, but the game does not fit the definition in the usual sense.
All Piranha Bytes games approach combat in a duel-like way: there is no running and whacking (well, except for the move you mentioned, but that is basically useless unless you are a demigod beating weak monsters), you have to hold your position and attack from the front or the sides, while parrying or sidestepping to avoid hits.
Most of the fights with real enemies are one-on-one, while you can go hunting groups of beasts when you are skilled enough to hold a bow properly, lower their numbers form the distance and finish off who remains with a melee weapon.
That said, controls are indeed a bit clunky (even if training reduces that feeling a great deal)... just not THAT much! :)

Exactly. It's like in real life, give some amateur who has no clue about martial arts a sword and he will move horribly inefficient, train him a few months/years and everything seems to be way easier.
Of course the player's character completely sucks at fighting in the beginning, that's how it's supposed to be.
Most people just can't imagine, that the controls get easier the better trained your character has become.

I hate to tell you this but if they're decent games, they're decent games doesn't matter what they're called. That line of thinking is fecking stupid.

System Shock 2

Far Cry 2

Having to hit a directon then the attack button afterwards causing mess ups like running past enemies is extremely clunky and bad design. Granted, 2 isn't as bad as 1 in that effect. But it's still a clunky game in comparison to 3.

Warhammer 40K

I don't understand this. This is so much inferior to Starcraft (1). I know the political story between the two, but I don't get the so many positive reviews.

Final Fantasy 7. Take FF6, a game that has some good aspects (like the non-linear later part of the game) and some bad aspects (excessive cutscenes before said point, poor game balance). Now, throw out all the good aspects, make the bad aspects worse, reduce the party size, and force a specific character into your party for the entire game.

To make things even worse, add mini-games of the sort that do not belong in a cRPG, many of them mandatory (the CPR scene is annoying and makes no sense). To add insult to injury, punish the player for progressing through the game; a certain character is unusable past a certain point in the game.

(Dragon Quest 5 spoiler in the following paragraph.)

While I don't hate it, I consider Dragon Quest 5 and 8 to be overrated. DQ8 replaced the nice class change system with a skill point system (I have found that lately I don't like skill point systems). Also, the battles are slow compared to the rest of the series.

(Dragon Quest 5 spoiler in the following paragraph.)

DQ5, on the other hand. reduced the party size and has less interesting playable characters. Also, DQ5 fails when examined from a feminist perspective; the female characters, at least those that you keep for any decent portion of the game, all seem to exist as (potential) wives or the daughter of the main character, and they don't seem to have any other identity outside that. (Especially bad: The son becomes the legendary hero, while nothing interesting is done with the daughter, who doesn't get any unique skills or particularly notable unique equipment.) Compare that to the female characters in Dragon Quest 4, who have more distinct roles in the story, unique personalities, aren't all offensive mages (one is, the other two aren't), and don't exist solely for the purpose of furthering the plot of the male characters. There's also the fact that DQ4 lets you even make the main character female, but DQ5 omits that option.

Well said! :)

The trilogy was great but I notice he does not mention RE Survivor, Gaiden, Survivor 2, Dead Aim, Outbreak 1 + 2. All before Resi 4 and all of them were shite.