Sooo- I started playing Dragon Age Origins because it was free on Origin.. AND OMG! I freaking love it, an RPG that isn't "roll over your keyboard easy" I've died.. I've died a LOT, it's a huge challenge, and that's what I love about it- Some battles I die within 15 seconds on the start and when I try it over again I work on taking out a key enemy that gave me lots of trouble the first time and it becomes a much more fair fight... It's just great. With so many games today that are just laughably easy, this game is a true challenge- and I really appreciate that.
I don't want a hard game that is hard just for the sake of being hard.. And from what I gather it's hard in rather cheap ways.
Sure, have a look at biowares earlier stuff, the knights of the old republic series are hard if you crank the difficulty up. Divinity original sin and Wasteland 2, hard mode.
Divinity is ok. I would go for the classics myself, Baldur's Gate 1&2 (I prefer the first game) both available in "modern" enhanced editions. Icewind dale series, also Neverwinter nights games. If you like reading walls of text and a twisted plot, Planescape: Torment. Or just get Dragon Age: Inquisition which comes out next month.
Spot-on, I can't consider Dark Souls an hard game in the traditional sense, it's just unforgiving. A mistake and you're dead. Miss the timing on a block or a strike, you're dead. Turn a corner at the wrong time, you're dead. A misstep, and you're dead. Big enemy? You're probably going to die. It's grindy. Die and do the same section all over again, enemies respawn after death. And since you'll die a lot, you'll just play the same thing multiple times, the only difference will be that you know when to dodge, when to block and where to go. Sadly, there haven't been many games like Dragon Age: Origins. Most RPG's aren't challenging at all, just fun for the story and character/loot leveling. It's very hard to recommend a game for you, because what was easy for a player, can be hard for another. Just search the web for top 20's, try a few games, and if you don't feel challenged, just stop playing and move on. Although if you haven't played the Mass Effect series, then that would be an obvious choice to try. Mass Effect 1 is easy, but 2 and 3 offer a decent challenge on Veteran. You're kept on edge on some encounters and I think that's what you're looking for.
But Dark Souls isent realy an RPG. I would also go with Divinity and Wasteland, those are 2 modern games that come closest to Baldurs Gate ect. In both Games the battles where pretty hard, even positioning of your group can mean an instant fail of a combat.
That is so to speak Baldurs Gate 3 Sadly not out yet, and who ever pays for Early Acces... well suit yourself. No cent from me until its done.
Dragon Age - I highly recommend to just get that Ultimate edition and play it through. Kotor 1-2 - Very similar to the first Dragon Age, but I highly recommend the Restored Content mods for both of them. Jade Empire - Did play once through, won't play again. Dragon Age 2 - DLC's are way too expensive, no Ultimate Edition. Mass Effect Trilogy - Solid choice even if you'd hate FPS games because it is an RPG with a rich story, and you can import that Hero/Heroine of yours with the choices what actually do matter. No Ultimate Edition, same deal with the expensive DLC's.
SO guys I would like to thank you SO much for your suggestions and feedback- From what I understand Dragon Age- Origins is difficult "for a modern RPG". Out of the lists that I've seen from you guys, I've seen games that I've played before- Baldur's gate and Icewind dale.. I've played both of those on the Neverwinter Nights II engine (total conversion campaign, imported music and voice acting). NWN1 loved it Jade Empire was great Knights of the old Republic 1&2 were both fantastic games. I've only seen bad reviews for Dragon Age 2- Angry Joe hated it, and he LOVED Dragon Age Origins. So I feel sketchy about it. ME series really grated me with the Day 1 DLC- that was already ON THE FREAKING DISC. ScoobyDoo I freaking love Paradox- they published one of my favorite games ever (Mount and Blade) and they did the Hearts of Iron series which was quite good- I'll take a look at this Pillars of Eternity.
Dragon age 2 is ok. I have both and I did enjoy Origins the most. DA2 was shorten up, and the classes and abilities where shrink wrapped. Its still a good game and definitely worth playing especially if you enjoyed the story. Bioware got a lot of backlash for it and after skyrims release when back to the drawing table to make a true successor to Dragon age orgins. Hopefully this holds true as we will find out in the next couple weeks.
I played the entire thing on Hard first time around and then because there is so much variety and decisions alter so much in the story, I played the entire thing again on Nightmare. The battle in the Fade (not sure if you've got there yet, but I hope that you don't consider that a spoiler, it may even be an optional battle), was excruciatingly difficult on Nightmare. But it was the right kind of difficult - each time I played it I worked out a little more closely the strategy to beat it. When I'd played through the entirety of the original game on Nightmare, I went onto play the DLC Golems of Angmarrak, Witch Hunt and Awakening on the same difficulty. None of those were as difficult due to the fact that my imported character was very high level by that point. But they were still great fun. I would recommend you get all the DLC for DA(O). I didn't play the Darkspawn Chronicles and it had no appeal to me so I can't comment on that. But get the DLC now as parts of it are only appropriate at certain points in the story. The gifts make some of the romance options a little too easy though. DA2 is not much like DA(O) imo. Maybe you'll like it, I found it intolerable and I only played the Demo! But DA:I is looking very promising. I'm hoping it will live up to DA(O).
It's not hard for the sake of being hard. Just don't talk sh*t about games you know nothing about. There's not one single cheap death in DS1, there's a couple of those in DS2 I'll give you that. It's about skill and accumulated knowledge, simple as that
It's not talking ****, stop being so sensitive, I'm basing it on the couple hours I spent watching a friend stream it and reviews I've seen for it- one of the things that really stood out to me was enemies being able to hit the player through walls and the player not being able to retaliate.
Divinity : Original Sin would be the obvious choice for OP. It's hard, has a tactical battle system similar to DAO and is littered with walls of text everywhere. No conventional questing and you seem to need to talk to everyone just to get clues on where to go/what to do.