Can you solve this riddle?

[Mandle]

Gah too easy obviously!

I actually thought it was Donkey Kong at first, smashing barrels and all, but you said "almost every time"...

Good job keeping it fair there!

I'll put one up:

North, south, east, or west.
You decide which is best.
If you thought open world was new fare,
Check out this old software,
You might have to jump into a forge,
To snatch out one of your rewards.

[Stupot]

Betrayal at Krondor?

[Mandle]

Betrayal at Krondor?

No

[CaptainD]

Lords of Midnight?

[Mandle]

Nope

[dayowlron]

Zork?

[Mandle]

Naw

[Stupot]

RuneScape

[Mandle]

RuneScape

Hahaha! I wonder if my old character on that still exists...

No, much older than that, but the fantasy setting is correct.

[CaptainD]

Only game I can think of atm is Rogue, but doesn't really feel like it fits the clues.  My suspicion is that the last rhyming couplet in your clue holds the key to solving this, but it's just not ringing any bells.

[Danvzare]

The Hobbit? (I'm fairly sure the answer is at least a Text Adventure, I just don't know which one.)

[Stupot]

Yeah or some MUD.

MUD1?

[Danvzare]

Neverwinter Nights?

[Mandle]

None of those. It's not a text adventure. It has graphics although a bit crude.

The game was mind-blowing at the time because you could travel around wherever you wanted on foot, by horse, or even own a ship. You could go into towns and the NPCs there were moving around doing stuff instead of just a guy behind a counter that you bought stuff from. And there was no pressing main quest like a big bad boss villain to beat. There was a quest but it was more a personal journey of growth than anything material and you could take your time with it if you wanted or just not do it at all and simply live in the world.

Many say that this game was the moment when computer RPGs grew up.

In fact it might have been too grown-up for its time as the series soon returned to the usual formula of find-and-kill-the-all-powerful-baddie after this one. I guess players just didn't know what to make of so much freedom. I loved it to death and played many, many times: This time I'll be a hunter and live off the land. This time I'll be a pirate sailing the seas for plunder. This time I'll be a cold-blooded killer. This time I'll master all the magic systems. This time I'll be... etc. etc.

I guess it was one of the first games where the player could set and achieve their own goals instead of the game deciding them for you.

[CaptainD]

I did wonder if it was an early Ultima game, so I'm going to actually guess Ultima 1 now (or just "Ultima" I guess?!?)

[Mandle]

I did wonder if it was an early Ultima game, so I'm going to actually guess Ultima 1 now (or just "Ultima" I guess?!?)

Cutting to the chase: Ultima IV: Quest Of The Avatar.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultima_IV:_Quest_of_the_Avatar

The last two lines in the riddle refer to:

Spoiler

To find the rune of Sacrifice the player must throw themself into an operating blacksmith's forge and walk through the fire, taking damage each move. The rune is in the back corner of the forge. You need a lot of hitpoints to survive. Gotta wonder why you couldn't just ask the blacksmith to turn off the forge first or what he must have been thinking when he saw you jump into it...

[close]

[CaptainD]

Two brothers there were
But they didn't get on
They both had pots
But not of money
They would visit the other's grave
But only to laugh, not to grieve.

[CaptainD]

Two brothers there were
But they didn't get on
They both had pots
But not of money
They would visit the other's grave
But only to laugh, not to grieve.

No-one?  Not even a wild guess?

[josiah1221]

Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons?

[Mandle]

Uncharted?