Any game that is trial and error should have saving as an option. I love hitman games but that annoys me as well. :P

I think checkpoints make me play some games more conservatively. I'm less likely to try something crazy if I know it means losing everything i've done up to that point, especially if I completed another section really well or just survived something horrible.

Hmm, quite the opposite in my opinion; "most" modern games have checkpoints every 10 seconds which isn't necessarily a bad thing (depends on the game)

Only modern and sometimes, old games that require playing in a specific way drastically limit your "game saving" option significantly

In most games i played this is a necessity, otherwise a lot of the difficulty would evaporate faster than dry Ice, and with it any possible challenge

When this is not the case, well, it's bad game design or worse, laziness from the authors

Unfortunately most modern not platform games are way too easy, And have a constant autosave function that trigger every time your character do something, practically anything that isn't breathing, so i am not sure to what kind of game you are referring to

Beside the above mentioned platform

I disagree. Generally, I think most modern games are way to freakin' hard. Then again, in most modern games I'm lucky if I can figure out the controls-let alone play the game. My brain never made the switch from 2D side scrolling games. I just can't manage that two joystick (one for camera, one for movement) thing-without getting sick at least. It's one of the biggest reasons I switched to PC gaming.

I will say a save in RPGs seems necessary (aside from the accidentally stabbing people thing I mentioned above) there's been a few times when a dialogue option doesn't mean quite what I thought it did --and someone tried to kill me because of it. It's one thing to misjudge someone else's reaction--it's another to not realize a comment you thought was sarcastic (and from a joking/sarcastic character) isn't.

I hate quick saving and I think it's fantastic that checkpoints have become the standard. The player shouldn't worry about managing save states, he should worry about overcoming challenges. Of course it's frustrating when there's a long and ridiculously tough passage in a game with checkpoints ten minutes apart but heck, quick saves aren't a solution, they are a lazy workaround either for the designers or the players or both.

You can play your game in any way you like, and playing an RPG this phrase is, or at least it should be, doubly true

If you want to always make the "Perfect Choice" that make everyone your best friend, fine, that's how you want to play it, and in that case you'll definitely need a manual and quicksave functions available pretty much at any moment

But in theory, such games are not meant to be played that way as an RPG should let you make your own choices and force you to stick to them, play them trough be them good or bad , just like in reality where there is no save functions you can use to try again

This is my idea of an RPG, where your avatar play a role, and that role may be you, or an idea you wish to play with, a fantasy if you want, or maybe a player may just want to fuck around a little, why not

Sarcasm and fun are meant to be the same thing but presented in a different manner, i can have a serious opinion and at the same time present it in a sarcastic manner, it my right to do so, and frankly i don't understand you animosity towards it

If you want to be a troll be it with someone else, i said my opinion and you said yours, period

But id you want to tell me that a game like DA2 or ME2 is too difficult, because that's what most so called "modern" RPG are at the moment, then i believe that your concept of hard gaming is more then a little lacking, beside unless you select the easy difficulty in a game it should not be easy, no challenge at all mean no fun, especially in RPG's

I hope all games had permadeath.
Multiplayer games = permadeath No? Why not single games?
But, I'm understand that not everyone wants it.

I do not quite understand this.

I love quick-saving for my portable RPGs (like on the Gameboy and such), but that's a moot point now with suspend-mode and extended battery life (and using solid-state memory instead of battery-backed RAM).

The check-points thing for action games is a bit odd, but I'm OK with that. Checkpoints in RPGs are odd (because I like the save-anywhere-not-in-battle features), but they have been a staple for action games (which is a little annoying if you re-spawn in an auto-scroll game beyond the point you can obtain power-ups) and rogue-likes.

To clarify, this is about games that do not provide a way of saving manually. Automated checkpoints are great but should always be included alongside manual/quick saves, never as a replacement for them.

I enjoyed "ARMA: Cold War Assault", (formerly "Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crysis") just because of that, well not "just" because of it, but because it was the only AI I actually liked plus the game was excellent, but the checkpoints made it all the more tense, just to walk around the woods or approaching houses, etc. You litterally felt the fear of picking behind a tree, being pinned and alone at some points and knowing that if you didn´t hide or run or had a try at that one chance hit you were history aaaaaand you had to make all the way again to that point. Knowing that makes you overly cautious and to think every little movement two times (sometimes more :P) before committing to it.
But in enjoying that I also understand the tediousness that it may represent.

Now tbh I quite enjoyed the arma games too. That is an example where it isn't required. That game is made to be tense.

For me, Dark souls is the best example of tension for cannot save-quicksave.

Ah, ok. I meant for the use of checkpoints.
However, games like Arcanum, or most of old rpgs games, without quicksave are to shoot yourself.