I like it when people bash JRPGs and then cite no examples for their grievances other than Final Fantasy.
I have yet to find someone who displays a strong degree of hate for the 16 bit era of square RPGs. Find me the man who hates CT, and I will show you a man with no heart.
I have an intense hatred for all the SaGa games except, for some reason, SaGa Frontier 2. Does that count?
I like it when people bash JRPGs and then cite no examples for their grievances other than Final Fantasy.
I have yet to find someone who displays a strong degree of hate for the 16 bit era of square RPGs. Find me the man who hates CT, and I will show you a man with no heart.
I have an intense hatred for all the SaGa games except, for some reason, SaGa Frontier 2. Does that count?
Fuck you got me. My repression skills are too great, it seems.
EDIT: At this juncture, Skies of Arcadia must be mentioned again in the support of the notion that the overall complexity or power of a story is reasonably moot in most games, even in an RPG. Simply put, the game had execution nailed down harder than the true cross. The characters were not, as Yahtzee puts it, "androgynous, angst-filled teenagers," but instead were happy and drawn with lots of primary colors with strong black borders. The atmosphere of that game was stellar, and it is one of the few JRPGs that needs to be copied MORE instead of less, especially in the area of the overworld map. The sheer amount of objects and destinations in the overworld map really tips the scales and makes that game a winner. Subtle aspects of game mechanics really help build on a strong fundamentals (simple, remixed thematic music, good graphics, decent story execution and giant fucking airships) to create a strong atmosphere, which is key for immersion, drawing the player in and making him WANT to continue.
I was talking with my fiancee today about this topic, to me she replied "it's simple, I like flashy attacks, airships and ridiculous plot contrivances."
What most people feel for RPGs, I often feel for many FPS games or racing games/driving sims.
I loved Skies of Arcadia, but the combat was junk. (Apart from ship combat, which was AWESOME). Thing is, I was playing this game as a social thing - a group of us at university sat around together, passed the controller around, talked about where we should go, put forward our ideas on where the plot was going, etc. etc. We treated the game like most people treated a soap opera, and it was good.
Normally, if I don't like the gameplay mechanics, I won't play the game. Skies was an exception, as was Planescape Torment. Baldur's Gate? Tried to play it a few times. Can't stick with it. It's just... so beardy and clunky, I guess. Torment, at least, wasn't stupidly punishing trial-and-error fights where you had to reload if anyone died. KotOR was great - if you died in KotOR, it was because you did something wrong. (Or tried to beat the bounty hunter on the first planet as a level 3 Scoundrel 'cause you were saving all your levels for JEDI POWERZ).
On the subject of gameplay, TWEWY. I can't stress it enough. The characters are actually pretty non-angsty in the main, at least, for a Squeenix game. Sure, there are a couple of 'Wow this is harsh we must RISE ABOVE IT!' but y'know? They rise above it, as opposed to wallowing in it. Like Cloud. HATE Cloud. Anyhow, uh, yeah!
I love Skies of Arcadia as well. But why do you think the combat was junk? It was... pretty standard, really. Apart from there being way too many fucking random battles even on the GCN version, I had no issue with it.
I love Skies of Arcadia as well. But why do you think the combat was junk? It was... pretty standard, really. Apart from there being way too many fucking random battles even on the GCN version, I had no issue with it.
The dreamcast version got a few angry soda-can tosses for random encounters. I actually thought ship combat was more hollow mechanics wise than player combat, but man it was awesome to watch. I still point to this (and chrono trigger, sorry!) as examples of "DO THIS" in what I consider to be a decaying genre.
Boil the RPG down to its core, and you've essentially got one interesting question that occurs in every(?) instance of the genre, which is this: Is the amount of resources I've spent so far sufficient to ensure my success on the next level?
The "next level" can refer to whatever. In some games (Wizardry, Nethack, Persona 3...), it literally means the next level in the dungeon. In other games, it means what's just across the bridge on the world map (Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy). The key decision that you make in an RPG is whether or not to cross that bridge.
RPGs are games of risk and reward. If it turns out that you're not prepared for what lies in wait on the other side of the bridge, you lose everything (in some RPGs, at least...). If you made the right choice, if you're strong enough to survive, you're rewarded.
The reward varies from game to game. You get the next part of the story, or you get a new part of the world to explore. Mostly, though, you gain access to new weapons/items/spells/whatever--new resources to leverage in your quest to reach the next level. That's reward enough in itself.
But it's the risk that is most important, and the risk is very tangible--you're risking your time. The ideal strategy for an RPG is to level up your character(s) as much as needed to reach the next level, but no more--because to do so would be a waste of time. But if you don't level up enough, you'll die, and you'll have to invest even more time to get back to where you were.
Of course, the effects of "death" in RPGs vary tremendously from one game to the next. I think the best RPGs, though, have the harshest "death penalties": Persona 3 and Etrian Odyssey make you restore from a saved game (and you can't save inside the dungeon!); Dragon Warrior sends you back to the first town in the game, with only some of your experience intact; Roguelikes end your game entirely, and if you want to play again, you have to start from the beginning. In these games, the risk of lost time is very real.
The fact that your time is an extra-diegetic resource (it exists in the real world, not inside the game) makes the risk all the more real, which is why (I think) RPGs can be addictive in the same way that games of chance played for money are addictive, like Poker. Both involve the thrill of putting on the line a valuable, real-life resource.
This is also why "grinding" is an activity that is pretty much endemic to the genre, and inseparable from it. If you couldn't grind in an RPG, then the choice between staying put and moving forward would never arise--you'd have no choice but to move forward.
I can't think of any other traits that RPGs share--except, maybe, stat management of some sort, but I think that just provides a context for making the key choice I've been discussing (stay or go?) more sophisticated. Combat style isn't a criterion for RPG-ness--Puzzle Quest is just as much an RPG as Final Fantasy is. Emphasis on story isn't categorical either--does anyone actually care about the stories in, say, Etrian Odyssey or Wizardry? And "Role Playing" in the sense of "playing a role" certainly doesn't do it. I mean, Erdrick from Dragon Warrior is as blank a slate as you can get, when it comes to video game characters. Pretty tough "role" to "play." But you can't deny that Dragon Warrior is an RPG.
Anyway, the reason I play RPGs: when you risk a lot and reap a commensurate reward, it feels good. RPGs more than any other genre in gaming deliver this kind of good feeling.
(note: just talking about computer/console RPGs here... I'd guess that tabletop RPGs have an overlapping but different set of choices and affordances when it comes to game mechanics.)
Great post in the sense of being interesting and a cool response to the actual original post.
Of course, it made me think "damn, I've been doing it wrong all these years" because I kind of let my OCD take over whenever I play any RPG and try to complete all the content I can before moving on. I suppose that's one of the only points in favor of random encounters--they make completionists like me behave.
I'm not sure if I agree that risk versus reward is the core RPG mechanic, but I can see your argument. I think for some the core mechanic is how powerful can I make my character(s) given the resources at hand.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
But god dammit if I don't get addicted to finding the perfect character balances. Most JRPG's can't pull me in, but consistently any rpg with "Dragon Quest" or "Dragon Warrior" in the title, instantly pulls me in. Currently I'm logging my 40th hour into "Dragon Quest: Monsters: Joker" on the DS, which is just a constant grind fest, and I couldn't be having more fun.
But I hate RPGs that aren't Dragon Quest, as a rule.
I like a lot of action RPGs though. For instance I love Kingdom Hearts. I liked a lot of RPGs on NES, and I liked a lot of RPGs on GBA/DS, and I liked a lot of RPGs on SNES. The PS1/N64/Saturn era only had a few RPGs I cared about, and the current gen, outside of Oblivion hasn't had anything thats caught my eye that hasn't been portable.
Anything with Mario in the title, that is an RPG, is perfect, btw.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
I love Skies of Arcadia as well. But why do you think the combat was junk? It was... pretty standard, really. Apart from there being way too many fucking random battles even on the GCN version, I had no issue with it.
The dreamcast version got a few angry soda-can tosses for random encounters. I actually thought ship combat was more hollow mechanics wise than player combat, but man it was awesome to watch. I still point to this (and chrono trigger, sorry!) as examples of "DO THIS" in what I consider to be a decaying genre.
Well, the elemental system seemed to be less a 'Switch weapon elements to hit the weakpoint for MASSIVE DAMAGE' and more 'make sure everyone's on the element you want to grind experience for at the end of combat for the bonus', which irked me. That was the main gripe, really. Elemental attributes on weapons didn't really have the kind of impact on combat that I thought they should. So, I guess a more tactful way of saying it was that I didn't like the player combat. The actual special moves and all were awesome, but the main elemental combat mechanic didn't really seem like much of a mechanic at all.
That and yeah, way too many random encounters. I did like the way the DC had such a loud drive that you could hear the disk spinning up to load the encounter before it hit, though. MONSTER FOOTSTEPS!
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
To that I would say "and all of the above".
I feel the core mechanic should be roleplaying, but I think that RPGs are the biggest, most comprehensive genre, and there's plenty of room for good stat management and combat and a good story and characters and roleplaying. There's even room for reflex-based action and puzzles.
That's how awesome the RPG genre is.
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
I love Skies of Arcadia as well. But why do you think the combat was junk? It was... pretty standard, really. Apart from there being way too many fucking random battles even on the GCN version, I had no issue with it.
The dreamcast version got a few angry soda-can tosses for random encounters. I actually thought ship combat was more hollow mechanics wise than player combat, but man it was awesome to watch. I still point to this (and chrono trigger, sorry!) as examples of "DO THIS" in what I consider to be a decaying genre.
Well, the elemental system seemed to be less a 'Switch weapon elements to hit the weakpoint for MASSIVE DAMAGE' and more 'make sure everyone's on the element you want to grind experience for at the end of combat for the bonus', which irked me. That was the main gripe, really. Elemental attributes on weapons didn't really have the kind of impact on combat that I thought they should. So, I guess a more tactful way of saying it was that I didn't like the player combat. The actual special moves and all were awesome, but the main elemental combat mechanic didn't really seem like much of a mechanic at all.
Yeah, I'm surprised that particular feature was never expounded upon (the weakness system in general was wonky as fuck and the game did a piss poor job indicating weaknesses), but I did like the ability to branch.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
To that I would say "and all of the above".
I feel the core mechanic should be roleplaying, but I think that RPGs are the biggest, most comprehensive genre, and there's plenty of room for good stat management and combat and a good story and characters and roleplaying. There's even room for reflex-based action and puzzles.
That's how awesome the RPG genre is.
No, that's what we call a mixing of genres.
Same way that you can have a FPS with the same features.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
To that I would say "and all of the above".
I feel the core mechanic should be roleplaying, but I think that RPGs are the biggest, most comprehensive genre, and there's plenty of room for good stat management and combat and a good story and characters and roleplaying. There's even room for reflex-based action and puzzles.
That's how awesome the RPG genre is.
Well that's true. I think any game with a good combination of these things is going to outshine most others in the genre.
On that note, why don't more JRPGs have fucking puzzles in their dungeons? Like Wild ARMs, Golden Sun, the Mario RPGs. They make dungeons so much more engaging and fun. MORE PUZZLES DAMMIT.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
To that I would say "and all of the above".
I feel the core mechanic should be roleplaying, but I think that RPGs are the biggest, most comprehensive genre, and there's plenty of room for good stat management and combat and a good story and characters and roleplaying. There's even room for reflex-based action and puzzles.
That's how awesome the RPG genre is.
Well that's true. I think any game with a good combination of these things is going to outshine most others in the genre.
On that note, why don't more JRPGs have fucking puzzles in their dungeons? Like Wild ARMs, Golden Sun, the Mario RPGs. They make dungeons so much more engaging and fun. MORE PUZZLES DAMMIT.
As long as the puzzles that involve movement don't have random encounters. That was the single best design decision of Final Fantasy X
I love Skies of Arcadia as well. But why do you think the combat was junk? It was... pretty standard, really. Apart from there being way too many fucking random battles even on the GCN version, I had no issue with it.
The dreamcast version got a few angry soda-can tosses for random encounters. I actually thought ship combat was more hollow mechanics wise than player combat, but man it was awesome to watch. I still point to this (and chrono trigger, sorry!) as examples of "DO THIS" in what I consider to be a decaying genre.
Well, the elemental system seemed to be less a 'Switch weapon elements to hit the weakpoint for MASSIVE DAMAGE' and more 'make sure everyone's on the element you want to grind experience for at the end of combat for the bonus', which irked me. That was the main gripe, really. Elemental attributes on weapons didn't really have the kind of impact on combat that I thought they should. So, I guess a more tactful way of saying it was that I didn't like the player combat. The actual special moves and all were awesome, but the main elemental combat mechanic didn't really seem like much of a mechanic at all.
Yeah, I'm surprised that particular feature was never expounded upon (the weakness system in general was wonky as fuck and the game did a piss poor job indicating weaknesses), but I did like the ability to branch.
But the game was awesome because of the character design and...
The ability to see Aika naked.
underage fanservice
:winky:
Seriously, though. I loved the way it looked, I loved the minimal use of VA to 'set the tone' during dialogue, and the story was so awesomely over the top it really -was- just what we needed at the time.
Actually, two of the people I was playing that game through with got married at the weekend. I think they still play RPGs through together on occasion. We had a long conversation (the group, not just the bride and groom - we all got back together for the weekend) about how playing RPGs together are probably more entertaining in the evening than watching some crappy sitcom, too.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
To that I would say "and all of the above".
I feel the core mechanic should be roleplaying, but I think that RPGs are the biggest, most comprehensive genre, and there's plenty of room for good stat management and combat and a good story and characters and roleplaying. There's even room for reflex-based action and puzzles.
That's how awesome the RPG genre is.
No, that's what we call a mixing of genres.
Same way that you can have a FPS with the same features.
Most of the things mentioned are staples of the RPG genre. Action and puzzles, no, but they've been mixed with the genre since at least the early 90s, so...
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
First off, Blitzball. I reloaded my game so many times trying to win that very first Blitzball match. I don't even remember now if I ever did, but I made the ultimate Blitzball team and destroyed everyone.
FF X has a special place in my heart because I logged about 180 hours in it. After I beat it I found this guide to redo the sphere grid and followed it until everyone had max stats. I still have that save. I had just got out of college and was working full-time and trying to save enough money to move out of my dad's house, so for months all I did was play FF X. Holy shit.
Systems are what appeal to me in an RPG. Sphere grids, jakyou manor, materia, even the Dragon Quest job system. Also, there is some part of me that enjoys doing repetitive tasks over and over again, and I've never understood why. I could never work on an assembly line, but I used to grind all the time in RPGs before I even knew it had a name. Oddly enough, I hate grinding in WoW. Never really figured that one out.
Grinding often occurs within a timeframe dictated by the player. In a traditional RPG, grinding is reasonably linear and consistent in the rate of reward. In wow, especially as you get higher up, the rewards for your grinding (quest drops, epic drops) become more and more variable.
And yeah, back when I played the table top game in high school, we cut alot of the crap out of it because we're not number fetishists. The complex rules work better when there is a computer there to instantly calculate stuff.
What you call "crap", some folks may attribute to "depth". But there are a plethora of rules systems out there ranging from the ultra simple (Castle Falkenstein/FUDGE) to the complex (Champions. And Champions. Do Want.), and most folks choose a system based on their own preferences, or pretend they are playing a system when they are actually playing a different game retrofitted onto the system they are playing. Anyway, Cheesechick was talking about the tabletop game, not the Pseudo-Turn based Infinity/Aurora games on the PCs.
As far as Platformers, I'd say that Pixeljunk Eden and the new Prince of Persia series show how platformers have evolved way past the early same "archaic mechanics".
And yeah, back when I played the table top game in high school, we cut alot of the crap out of it because we're not number fetishists. The complex rules work better when there is a computer there to instantly calculate stuff.
What you call "crap", some folks may attribute to "depth". But there are a plethora of rules systems out there ranging from the ultra simple (Castle Falkenstein/FUDGE) to the complex (Champions. And Champions. Do Want.), and most folks choose a system based on their own preferences, or pretend they are playing a system when they are actually playing a different game retrofitted onto the system they are playing. Anyway, Cheesechick was talking about the tabletop game, not the Pseudo-Turn based Infinity/Aurora games on the PCs..
Yes, but I was talking about the video games and I brought up the discussion. And not necessarily about the infinity/aurora engine ones, I was primarily talking about the turn based D&D games by SSI.
For example, the first RPG I tried to play was FF8.
This was your big mistake.
No one's first RPG should be Final Fantasy anything.
I would suggest starting with something Action RPG-ish like Dark Cloud or Secret of Mana.
I loves RPGs for many reasons but the main reason I love them so is the degree of customization they offer. Unlike a lot of games back in the day RPGs let me customize how each my characters fought, who I could use, what equipment I used, hell pretty much everything. You could wipe out an group of enemies using numerous strategies based each character's capabilities. It's the whole personalized embodiement of ass kicking that drew me in.
TheMaskedMan on
We wouldn't even be havin this problem If I still had my Dracular powers.
Hmm. Another thing that I haven't seen mentioned is that RPGs are connected from one stage to the next. FF1 has the starting town, and you leave it and you're on a world map, actually walking to your next destination. Whereas in mega man, you pick a stage, hey you're there, you're done, okay pick another stage to be put into.
It's a negative for me in mass effect you pick where you want to go, and other than the mako parts you're instantly there. a lot of the FFs 7 and after do this too.
Hmm. Another thing that I haven't seen mentioned is that RPGs are connected from one stage to the next. FF1 has the starting town, and you leave it and you're on a world map, actually walking to your next destination. Whereas in mega man, you pick a stage, hey you're there, you're done, okay pick another stage to be put into.
It's a negative for me in mass effect you pick where you want to go, and other than the mako parts you're instantly there. a lot of the FFs 7 and after do this too.
What do you mean? This was basically just FFX, I thought. Which I hated, I love actually exploring the world map.
In FFX you basically walk from the bottom of the map to the top and then you get the airship so you can go anywhere, which you don't need since you've been everywhere.
I enjoy RPGs because I like to be able to get into my character's train of thought and personality. The free range exploration is a positive aspect, but if a story is good then I can get behind it all the way. Gameplay for me can be turn-based or realtime as long as its not overly complex or simple, thats why I play Final Fantasy. I'm actually not looking forward as much to the battles in XIII because they said they were trying to replicate the kind of fights they had in Advent Children, needless to say there will be endless button smashing and timed techniques. Thats not a bad thing I just hope it's not dripping with them.
But god dammit if I don't get addicted to finding the perfect character balances. Most JRPG's can't pull me in, but consistently any rpg with "Dragon Quest" or "Dragon Warrior" in the title, instantly pulls me in. Currently I'm logging my 40th hour into "Dragon Quest: Monsters: Joker" on the DS, which is just a constant grind fest, and I couldn't be having more fun.
Hey hey, I've been looking for someone to talk to about this game. I'm a bit over 60 hours in and I beat the main portion of the game, and now I'm trying to fill up my libraries the best I can, although I don't think I'm going to be able to fill them up that much, I don't know how much longer I'm going to be playing it. What sort of super monsters have you been able to create so far, and what are some of your favorites?
Schide on
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited August 2008
I think another good thing about RPGs is the sense of adventure they give. Really, few other games(I can only think of platformers and action/adventure), give you the same thing.
And I'm not talking open-worldness like GTA and all that. While you can travel around in those games it doesn't have the same feeling of discovery, I don't understand why really.
It's a negative for me in mass effect you pick where you want to go, and other than the mako parts you're instantly there. a lot of the FFs 7 and after do this too.
The problem with trying to appeal to everyone is that typically improving one aspect of a game comes at the expense of other aspects. For example, the more time you spend on plot & story, the less time the player spends on stat manipulation and combat. For example, I started playing Xenosaga 3 lately and though it seems that there's some good gameplay there, it's hard to tell so far because 90% of the game has been watching the story progress. Or for example, if you want your game to focus on roleplaying thus giving the player a lot of freedom to make their own choices, typically the story & gameplay tend to suffer.
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
I think there was a discussion in another thread about how not enough games use the tower of hanoi puzzle.
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
I think there was a discussion in another thread about how not enough games use the tower of hanoi puzzle.
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
I think there was a discussion in another thread about how not enough games use the tower of hanoi puzzle.
Well, I know in Cardboard Tube's thread about gameplay mechanics that people hate, that puzzle was in his OP, and he hated it because it was in so many games already. I didn't read much more of that thread so I don't know if people came out saying they like it or not or something.
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
I think there was a discussion in another thread about how not enough games use the tower of hanoi puzzle.
Well, I know in Cardboard Tube's thread about gameplay mechanics that people hate, that puzzle was in his OP, and he hated it because it was in so many games already. I didn't read much more of that thread so I don't know if people came out saying they like it or not or something.
Had problems with that sarcasm dietector lately? :P
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
I think there was a discussion in another thread about how not enough games use the tower of hanoi puzzle.
Well, I know in Cardboard Tube's thread about gameplay mechanics that people hate, that puzzle was in his OP, and he hated it because it was in so many games already. I didn't read much more of that thread so I don't know if people came out saying they like it or not or something.
Had problems with that sarcasm dietector lately? :P
For example, the first RPG I tried to play was FF8.
This was your big mistake.
No one's first RPG should be Final Fantasy anything.
I would suggest starting with something Action RPG-ish like Dark Cloud or Secret of Mana.
I loves RPGs for many reasons but the main reason I love them so is the degree of customization they offer. Unlike a lot of games back in the day RPGs let me customize how each my characters fought, who I could use, what equipment I used, hell pretty much everything. You could wipe out an group of enemies using numerous strategies based each character's capabilities. It's the whole personalized embodiement of ass kicking that drew me in.
Everyone's first RPG should be Grandia II, not for the story but for the gameplay.
The thing about it was the combat system, it was dynamic and entertaining (Ten sei ken SLASH!). I didn't have a chance to play the other ones in the series that came later (Extreme and IV).
I didn't mention this before but party systems in RPGs are a positive trait but sometimes they can get a little confusing. The party system in Baldur's Gate I & II, Torment, and Icewind Dale I & II was excellent but the party system in Neverwinter Nights was not since players couldn't directly control what the party members (other than the character the players create) can do. Party systems can be a bit confusing since it involves keeping track of more characters and can cause players to do more level grinding (which can be annoying) since some games (FFVI) require more than a few party members to be used in certain areas. Party systems in which members not being used also gain experience when enemies are beaten are a good thing IMO since it cuts down on level grinding. Summon Night Twin Age (very fun game) uses that idea and it's a really good thing that it does.
As for JRPGs using anime-style art, I don't necessarily mind it being used once in a while but sometimes it may go out of hand. For example, I didn't like the Dragonball Z-style artwork in Dragon Quest VIII or the Dragonball Z-style character portraits in Chrono Trigger (looking forward to playing the whole thing on the DS though); however, the artwork for the character portraits in Summon Night Twin Age is alright to me.
For example, the first RPG I tried to play was FF8.
This was your big mistake.
No one's first RPG should be Final Fantasy anything.
I would suggest starting with something Action RPG-ish like Dark Cloud or Secret of Mana.
I loves RPGs for many reasons but the main reason I love them so is the degree of customization they offer. Unlike a lot of games back in the day RPGs let me customize how each my characters fought, who I could use, what equipment I used, hell pretty much everything. You could wipe out an group of enemies using numerous strategies based each character's capabilities. It's the whole personalized embodiement of ass kicking that drew me in.
Everyone's first RPG should be Grandia II, not for the story but for the gameplay.
I finished it for the first time without realising you could buy skills and equip them, game was hard. But the second time, it was more fluid and forgiving. It had its share of clichés but they were few and tolerable. Then my little brother, a completist, got all the mana eggs with all the spells with 5 stars at another run, awesome .
The thing about it was the combat system, it was dynamic and entertaining (Ten sei ken SLASH!). I didn't have a chance to play the other ones in the series that came later (Extreme and IV).
Having no idea what you're doing tends to increase the challenge, yes. In Grandia 2, for example, once you figure out that magic is cheap as dirt and hits most of the field, you stop pretending like there's any strategy and just nuke every single random encounter. And there goes 2/3rds of the game.
Hmm. Another thing that I haven't seen mentioned is that RPGs are connected from one stage to the next. FF1 has the starting town, and you leave it and you're on a world map, actually walking to your next destination. Whereas in mega man, you pick a stage, hey you're there, you're done, okay pick another stage to be put into.
It's a negative for me in mass effect you pick where you want to go, and other than the mako parts you're instantly there. a lot of the FFs 7 and after do this too.
What do you mean? This was basically just FFX, I thought. Which I hated, I love actually exploring the world map.
In FFX you basically walk from the bottom of the map to the top and then you get the airship so you can go anywhere, which you don't need since you've been everywhere.
Yes... 8, 9, and X-2 all had world maps. Don't know about XII since I haven't played it.
I think with the number of open ended sandbox games these days, this argument is almost irrelevant though. If you want exploration a ton of games offer it now. That said, I have a special love for RPG exploration because you get to visit so many different TYPES of places. You aren't confined to just one city or what have you.
These people are lying to you and their pop psychology will do them no good against the thugs, play Eye of the Beholder, and work your way up from there.
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I have an intense hatred for all the SaGa games except, for some reason, SaGa Frontier 2. Does that count?
Fuck you got me. My repression skills are too great, it seems.
I loved Skies of Arcadia, but the combat was junk. (Apart from ship combat, which was AWESOME). Thing is, I was playing this game as a social thing - a group of us at university sat around together, passed the controller around, talked about where we should go, put forward our ideas on where the plot was going, etc. etc. We treated the game like most people treated a soap opera, and it was good.
Normally, if I don't like the gameplay mechanics, I won't play the game. Skies was an exception, as was Planescape Torment. Baldur's Gate? Tried to play it a few times. Can't stick with it. It's just... so beardy and clunky, I guess. Torment, at least, wasn't stupidly punishing trial-and-error fights where you had to reload if anyone died. KotOR was great - if you died in KotOR, it was because you did something wrong. (Or tried to beat the bounty hunter on the first planet as a level 3 Scoundrel 'cause you were saving all your levels for JEDI POWERZ).
On the subject of gameplay, TWEWY. I can't stress it enough. The characters are actually pretty non-angsty in the main, at least, for a Squeenix game. Sure, there are a couple of 'Wow this is harsh we must RISE ABOVE IT!' but y'know? They rise above it, as opposed to wallowing in it. Like Cloud. HATE Cloud. Anyhow, uh, yeah!
The dreamcast version got a few angry soda-can tosses for random encounters. I actually thought ship combat was more hollow mechanics wise than player combat, but man it was awesome to watch. I still point to this (and chrono trigger, sorry!) as examples of "DO THIS" in what I consider to be a decaying genre.
Great post in the sense of being interesting and a cool response to the actual original post.
Of course, it made me think "damn, I've been doing it wrong all these years" because I kind of let my OCD take over whenever I play any RPG and try to complete all the content I can before moving on. I suppose that's one of the only points in favor of random encounters--they make completionists like me behave.
I'm not sure if I agree that risk versus reward is the core RPG mechanic, but I can see your argument. I think for some the core mechanic is how powerful can I make my character(s) given the resources at hand.
Regardless of what the core mechanic of the genre actually is, I would argue that the core mechanic should be actual roleplaying. For computer/video RPGs I think this boils down to at least the illusion of making choices that will impact the game world, so that you feel like you are actually immersed in the game experience and are in fact guiding it.
But god dammit if I don't get addicted to finding the perfect character balances. Most JRPG's can't pull me in, but consistently any rpg with "Dragon Quest" or "Dragon Warrior" in the title, instantly pulls me in. Currently I'm logging my 40th hour into "Dragon Quest: Monsters: Joker" on the DS, which is just a constant grind fest, and I couldn't be having more fun.
But I hate RPGs that aren't Dragon Quest, as a rule.
I like a lot of action RPGs though. For instance I love Kingdom Hearts. I liked a lot of RPGs on NES, and I liked a lot of RPGs on GBA/DS, and I liked a lot of RPGs on SNES. The PS1/N64/Saturn era only had a few RPGs I cared about, and the current gen, outside of Oblivion hasn't had anything thats caught my eye that hasn't been portable.
Anything with Mario in the title, that is an RPG, is perfect, btw.
But that's just what you want from the genre. As we've seen in this thread, what people look for in RPGs varies wildly. Some people want choices and roleplaying, others want stat management and combat, and some people just want a good story and characters. There's really no reason to say "all games in this genre should aim for this specific mechanic" because RPGs are diverse and there's plenty of games within the genre that can fulfill pretty much any of these desires.
Well, the elemental system seemed to be less a 'Switch weapon elements to hit the weakpoint for MASSIVE DAMAGE' and more 'make sure everyone's on the element you want to grind experience for at the end of combat for the bonus', which irked me. That was the main gripe, really. Elemental attributes on weapons didn't really have the kind of impact on combat that I thought they should. So, I guess a more tactful way of saying it was that I didn't like the player combat. The actual special moves and all were awesome, but the main elemental combat mechanic didn't really seem like much of a mechanic at all.
That and yeah, way too many random encounters. I did like the way the DC had such a loud drive that you could hear the disk spinning up to load the encounter before it hit, though. MONSTER FOOTSTEPS!
To that I would say "and all of the above".
I feel the core mechanic should be roleplaying, but I think that RPGs are the biggest, most comprehensive genre, and there's plenty of room for good stat management and combat and a good story and characters and roleplaying. There's even room for reflex-based action and puzzles.
That's how awesome the RPG genre is.
Yeah, I'm surprised that particular feature was never expounded upon (the weakness system in general was wonky as fuck and the game did a piss poor job indicating weaknesses), but I did like the ability to branch.
No, that's what we call a mixing of genres.
Same way that you can have a FPS with the same features.
Well that's true. I think any game with a good combination of these things is going to outshine most others in the genre.
On that note, why don't more JRPGs have fucking puzzles in their dungeons? Like Wild ARMs, Golden Sun, the Mario RPGs. They make dungeons so much more engaging and fun. MORE PUZZLES DAMMIT.
As long as the puzzles that involve movement don't have random encounters. That was the single best design decision of Final Fantasy X
But the game was awesome because of the character design and...
Seriously, though. I loved the way it looked, I loved the minimal use of VA to 'set the tone' during dialogue, and the story was so awesomely over the top it really -was- just what we needed at the time.
Actually, two of the people I was playing that game through with got married at the weekend. I think they still play RPGs through together on occasion. We had a long conversation (the group, not just the bride and groom - we all got back together for the weekend) about how playing RPGs together are probably more entertaining in the evening than watching some crappy sitcom, too.
Most of the things mentioned are staples of the RPG genre. Action and puzzles, no, but they've been mixed with the genre since at least the early 90s, so...
I was opening all those spoilertags hoping to see that too.
FF X has a special place in my heart because I logged about 180 hours in it. After I beat it I found this guide to redo the sphere grid and followed it until everyone had max stats. I still have that save. I had just got out of college and was working full-time and trying to save enough money to move out of my dad's house, so for months all I did was play FF X. Holy shit.
Systems are what appeal to me in an RPG. Sphere grids, jakyou manor, materia, even the Dragon Quest job system. Also, there is some part of me that enjoys doing repetitive tasks over and over again, and I've never understood why. I could never work on an assembly line, but I used to grind all the time in RPGs before I even knew it had a name. Oddly enough, I hate grinding in WoW. Never really figured that one out.
Also, I thought this quote was hilarious:
This. The game's overall story was hard to take for some of the VO, but that ending definitely tugged on my heart strings.
Also, I loved Blitzball. There, I said it.
As far as Platformers, I'd say that Pixeljunk Eden and the new Prince of Persia series show how platformers have evolved way past the early same "archaic mechanics".
Yes, but I was talking about the video games and I brought up the discussion. And not necessarily about the infinity/aurora engine ones, I was primarily talking about the turn based D&D games by SSI.
This was your big mistake.
No one's first RPG should be Final Fantasy anything.
I would suggest starting with something Action RPG-ish like Dark Cloud or Secret of Mana.
I loves RPGs for many reasons but the main reason I love them so is the degree of customization they offer. Unlike a lot of games back in the day RPGs let me customize how each my characters fought, who I could use, what equipment I used, hell pretty much everything. You could wipe out an group of enemies using numerous strategies based each character's capabilities. It's the whole personalized embodiement of ass kicking that drew me in.
It's a negative for me in mass effect you pick where you want to go, and other than the mako parts you're instantly there. a lot of the FFs 7 and after do this too.
What do you mean? This was basically just FFX, I thought. Which I hated, I love actually exploring the world map.
In FFX you basically walk from the bottom of the map to the top and then you get the airship so you can go anywhere, which you don't need since you've been everywhere.
Hey hey, I've been looking for someone to talk to about this game. I'm a bit over 60 hours in and I beat the main portion of the game, and now I'm trying to fill up my libraries the best I can, although I don't think I'm going to be able to fill them up that much, I don't know how much longer I'm going to be playing it. What sort of super monsters have you been able to create so far, and what are some of your favorites?
And I'm not talking open-worldness like GTA and all that. While you can travel around in those games it doesn't have the same feeling of discovery, I don't understand why really.
Stars of Arcadia. Do it. Do it now.
As for puzzles in dungeons, I'd rather have no puzzles than have poorly implemented ones. So far, the only RPG I've seen that really did a good job in this aspect was Lufia 2: not only were the puzzles interesting, but generally speaking, the hard ones were optional and only resulted in extra treasure thus you rarely ran into an instance where a puzzle stopped the flow of the game.
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I think there was a discussion in another thread about how not enough games use the tower of hanoi puzzle.
Needs more t{7, 6} tower puzzles.
Well, I know in Cardboard Tube's thread about gameplay mechanics that people hate, that puzzle was in his OP, and he hated it because it was in so many games already. I didn't read much more of that thread so I don't know if people came out saying they like it or not or something.
Had problems with that sarcasm dietector lately? :P
Only when the sarcasm is poorly presented.
Everyone's first RPG should be Grandia II, not for the story but for the gameplay.
I finished it for the first time without realising you could buy skills and equip them, game was hard. But the second time, it was more fluid and forgiving. It had its share of clichés but they were few and tolerable. Then my little brother, a completist, got all the mana eggs with all the spells with 5 stars at another run, awesome .
The thing about it was the combat system, it was dynamic and entertaining (Ten sei ken SLASH!). I didn't have a chance to play the other ones in the series that came later (Extreme and IV).
This is a jewel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUVfQHOpCXg
"We have years of struggle ahead, mostly within ourselves." - Made in USA
As for JRPGs using anime-style art, I don't necessarily mind it being used once in a while but sometimes it may go out of hand. For example, I didn't like the Dragonball Z-style artwork in Dragon Quest VIII or the Dragonball Z-style character portraits in Chrono Trigger (looking forward to playing the whole thing on the DS though); however, the artwork for the character portraits in Summon Night Twin Age is alright to me.
Having no idea what you're doing tends to increase the challenge, yes. In Grandia 2, for example, once you figure out that magic is cheap as dirt and hits most of the field, you stop pretending like there's any strategy and just nuke every single random encounter. And there goes 2/3rds of the game.
Yes... 8, 9, and X-2 all had world maps. Don't know about XII since I haven't played it.
I think with the number of open ended sandbox games these days, this argument is almost irrelevant though. If you want exploration a ton of games offer it now. That said, I have a special love for RPG exploration because you get to visit so many different TYPES of places. You aren't confined to just one city or what have you.