Weekend Question: Which game has the best loot?

[PCG Jody]

I ask the PCG staff a regular Weekend Question and post the answers on the site. If you'd like to throw in an answer here, I'll squeeze the best into the finished article!

This week's question is: Which game has the best loot?

Maybe there's a particular classic RPG where every magic item has its own history worth reading, a looter-shooter where the guns are extra nice, or an action-RPG that excels at bundling bigger numbers with a dopamine rush. Maybe it's loot with its own lore, or gear you can craft to your own needs. Whose loot do you think is beaut?

 

[Pifanjr]

This is a hard question. It's so broad that I'm having a hard time to mentally go through all the games that might fit.

One that does come to mind is Sacred Gold. There are a ton of different randomized modifiers that you can find on gear. Even if a piece isn't good enough to equip, it can be fun just seeing what kind of weird stuff it does.

It's also great finding a good piece for another class and putting it in your shared chest to use with another character later, or to give to a friend playing another class. My shared chest was usually filled to the brim with legendary loot or pieces of sets for other classes.

The graphic design of the weapons and armor is pretty great as well. The dark elf blades in particular looked awesome. You can also get a lightsaber or even a lightwhip.

Your abilities must be found as loot as well. You can find ability runes as loot that level up a specific skill when used. You can find runes for all classes and can choose to store them in your shared chest or you can exchange a bunch of them for a rune of your choice.

Gear can also be enhanced. Each piece has a certain amount of slots (the amount is also randomized per piece of loot and has different levels) wherein you can put rings, amulets, ability runes (each of which gives a specific bonus if used in this way) or skeleton heads.

 

[dxchase]

Hard to pick one, im a huge fan of the loot in Borderlands, Diablo, Division, Outriders etc... but to pick one, for me, is Destiny (2). They have some of the greatest guns to go after and have some of the best ways to do that, not all of them for sure, but a good portion of them. They also have some really great outfit pieces to find as well, with special abilities. Its one of the biggest parts aside from gunplay on why i still finding myself playing that game, even with its major lows.

 

[Frindis]

Right of the bat, I would have to say Borderlands 2. I have mentioned both Borderlands 3 and Morrowind in another thread when it came down to cool and funny weapons, but right now I feel Borderlands 2 deserves the throne because of the grinding for hours getting the Infinite pistol from Doc Mercy with the right stats. The drop rate back in vanilla (at least from what I remember) was extremely low, but thankfully there were a couple of good tactics for killing the boss quite fast. It took me at least 100 times before I got my hands on the gun and seeing the legendary drop color was quite the rush.

The Infinite pistol was so amazing because it could shoot without using ammo and it just looked and sounded really cool. It was a great weapon for leveling up or when you did not have ammo left on other guns, or just wanted to save a little. The game had plenty more awesome loot, but it was this episode from Borderlands 2 I remember most clearly and that gun will always be in the book of some of my absolute favorite loot.

 

[McStabStab]

Escape from Tarkov. The loot you find can change a session from a casual raid to a heart pounding extraction run. It brings you the highs of escaping with high value items and the lows of losing it. The scarcity of the items also is done very well, and with the addition of the flea market and the upgradeable hideout it's added a whole different dynamic. There's now a new form of in-game economy diversifying the loot's purpose.

 

[drunkpunk]

Risk of Rain 2. The game itself contains SO MUCH LOOT that dramatically alters the way you play or progress through a level. As you go through it, you unlock additional loot drops so the game continues to evolve as you complete runs. The rogue lite nature of the game keeps it fresh, IMO. Hades is another good example of something similar, although I haven't put nearly enough time into it yet to really see what it has to offer.

Project Zomboid also does a pretty good job with it. What I like about that game is you'll find loot where it logically makes sense most of the time, and even the most basic things have a solid purpose that will help you survive.

 

[mainer]

Both Sacred Gold and Sacred 2 had a great loot system and Grim Dawn will also just drown you in various loot, some of which you can't use because of your particular class, but there was a shared chest that you could use for other class builds shared across your different games. But the king for me is still Diablo 2, there was just a certain pacing and balance to the loot system that is still hard to beat.

 

[Zloth]

BattleTech for me. Especially early in the game where you're putting a lot of what you find into use in the next mission.

Honorable mention to City of Heroes, which had some pretty funny loot, like Black Blood of the Earth

 

[McStabStab]

BattleTech for me. Especially early in the game where you're putting a lot of what you find into use in the next mission.

Woah, I never thought of salvage from dead mechs as loot but that totally makes sense. I always saw them as upgrades but you're right, they're what a big part of what drives the game from mission to mission with more than just objective purpose.

 

[Ryzengang]

I think Borderlands 2 for me as well. Not common that I really love loot systems but BL2 did it for me. Really unique legendary weapons and overall a lot of variety while still being recognizable (e.g., you knew how a Jakobs would generally behave)

 

[Pifanjr]

The rogue lite nature of the game keeps it fresh, IMO.

Since you mentioned Rogue lite, one other game that came to mind was Angband, a Rogue-like where loot is everything. Most of the game is spend looking for loot that allows you to cover each resistance so you can't be one-shotted unexpectedly.
Inventory management becomes the most important part as you decide whether to bring an extra set of scrolls, potions, staves, wands or rods.
It's a great game to unlearn the tendency to keep loot thinking it might come in handy later.

 

[Zloth]

Oh, I had forgotten about that new Mechwarrior game! Reviews were.... tepid but I'll need to give it a look now that it's had time to mature.

 

[Zloth]

By the time I get to it, I expect the DLC will be part of the gold/complete/director's cut/final/ultimate edition, so no worries there!

 

[Colif]

Both Sacred Gold and Sacred 2 had a great loot system and Grim Dawn will also just drown you in various loot, some of which you can't use because of your particular class, but there was a shared chest that you could use for other class builds shared across your different games.

Sacred 2 with the community patch had so many items I had 14 characters I used as banks even with a shared chest. Given there were about 6 or so sets per character class, and they all had different levels (meaning you could get a new version of the same part of a set every 15 levels) I had characters that just stored set items, and swords... so many swords.

I miss that game, it was fun, but I know better than to try to get a 12 year old game made by a developer who stopped existing 1 year after the games release, to work on my new PC. I know community patch at least added support for higher resolutions. Being able to see more around you doesn't help if they can also see you. running away to despawn a group doesn't work if the screen size is bigger.

I have to let go, I played it for years on end. Lvl 125 before I died. Death in that game was not to be taken lightly, the longer you stayed alive, the higher to lvl of creatures around you and the better the drops. Dying reduced everything back to your lvl and made playing on almost a waste of time. I had backups, from before he died, but I knew... that was enough.

it only had a little map with about 190 quests, many you didn't have to do. It rewarded you for exploring as it had entire areas you didn't have to go into. The lake in the centre for instance, just there for 1 quest chain. And it was a hidden quest chain at that. So many things to kill...

i have more somewhere, I helped set up a wiki of the game

guess this was just before he died once... its hard to tell, it appears I had more than 1 over 100 as I can see a few in screenshots.

edit: seems I misremembered and quest count is closer to 600.

 

[Frindis]

@Colif Had a lot of fun playing as a Dryad. Strong class and *looks around*.. naughty 😛 Still remember my first easter egg in the game, the Alien encounter (SacredWiki). I'm picking it up again, but first I need to finish Metro Exodus Iron Mode and Assassin's Creed Odyssey.

 

[Lutfij]

Alien encounter, you say, does that have to do with Yoda's distant cousin...? 🤣

 

[Colif]

there is a yoda character in the game

it was ahead of its time in regards to Easter Eggs. the entire game was full of them

Dungeons shaped like popular TV Show starships

check

Unusual things written on floors of caves

Quest to rescue a bands instruments before they can play their concert, Including as a reward going to concert and getting a video clip made up of ingame assets?

check

Every cemetery a source of much chuckling as backers got to write inscriptions.

That's the wiki I helped with screenshots

Dryad is nothing in a game with the Seraphim in it.

 

[KingPSPC]

Kingdom Come: Deliverance
Was a surprise for me but this game has a very good economic system.
I really hate it when a game throws cash at me but idk what to do with it.
A game i recently played was GTA IV, Niko Bellic is a great character but whenever he gets asked about his motive he replies with "I need money" but i never understood why.
He buys nothing with the money and i finished the game with too much money on me that i only spent less than 10% of on nothing useful, mostly health care cuz i died a lot.
In kingdom come deliverance you need to keep track of so many things which makes you need to constantly trade, also everything is expensive!You can steal by picklocking chests of random houses, which is illegal so youll have to go to prison or pay a fee. You can loot the bodies you kill but thats illegal too and youll have to pay a fee for it, you can sell any item you have, if you have too many items on you youll get heavy you won't be able to run or jump, theres just so many aspects to currency and inventory which makes the game feel more in depth, you'll get to worry about a lot of things instead of one main mission.
I love a game that makes me value the money, i love it when money has a meaning in the game and not just something we have for no reason.