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RPG Liposuction: How much fat should be trimmed?
Professor Snugglesworth
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Recently, we've been seeing a bit of streamlining done with the RPG genre. Mass Effect 2 has been released, eliminating much of the first game's equipment management, as well as cutting down on field wandering to the point that you're practically dropped in front of each mission.
Final Fantasy XIII has already received mixed opinions over following a linear path, with dungeons reduced to a single straight line at times, and the complete removal of towns. Equipment management is also cut down.
While not enough RPGs are being streamlined enough to consider this a trend, is this something that you'd like to see as a trend? Should RPGs cut the fat and focus on its main plot without too many distractions?
Personally, I'm all for it. The RPG market has become far too bloated, and I no longer look forward to visiting "Huge RPG Town A" while spending ten minutes re-arranging my party's equipment. I have found Mass Effect 2 to be infinitely more enjoyable than the first game now that I don't have to spend so much time on managing equipment or running around overly huge areas, and instead get to jump into a mission and shoot shit up like, you know, a videogame. I suspect I'll like Final Fantasy XIII for the same reason.
I'm not saying to get rid of the oldschool ways entirely, but the simple fact is that the quicker a a game gets to the point, the more it'll grab your attention. I enjoy Dragon Age Origins because the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, but I also hate that impending feeling of dread where I go back to camp and have to methodically check each character's equipment to make sure they're up to speed, then configure their abilities, THEN sell my old junk to the shopkeeper dwarf, and THEN beef up my weapons further with "ENCHANTMENT!".
No game should have parts that feel like a chore, and RPGs have been getting away with that crap for too long.
Final Fantasy XIII has already received mixed opinions over following a linear path, with dungeons reduced to a single straight line at times, and the complete removal of towns. Equipment management is also cut down.
While not enough RPGs are being streamlined enough to consider this a trend, is this something that you'd like to see as a trend? Should RPGs cut the fat and focus on its main plot without too many distractions?
Personally, I'm all for it. The RPG market has become far too bloated, and I no longer look forward to visiting "Huge RPG Town A" while spending ten minutes re-arranging my party's equipment. I have found Mass Effect 2 to be infinitely more enjoyable than the first game now that I don't have to spend so much time on managing equipment or running around overly huge areas, and instead get to jump into a mission and shoot shit up like, you know, a videogame. I suspect I'll like Final Fantasy XIII for the same reason.
I'm not saying to get rid of the oldschool ways entirely, but the simple fact is that the quicker a a game gets to the point, the more it'll grab your attention. I enjoy Dragon Age Origins because the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, but I also hate that impending feeling of dread where I go back to camp and have to methodically check each character's equipment to make sure they're up to speed, then configure their abilities, THEN sell my old junk to the shopkeeper dwarf, and THEN beef up my weapons further with "ENCHANTMENT!".
No game should have parts that feel like a chore, and RPGs have been getting away with that crap for too long.
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Want an RPG with almost no fat? Go play Super Mario RPG.
Or do you mean the good Mario RPG (the one by Square)?
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Honestly, I'm not against cinematics (at least the ones relevant to the plot). The first priority of an RPG is to tell a story, so the cutscenes are integral.
If it becomes a choice between wandering around a town or dungeon and getting lost, or sitting back and watching the pretty graphics, I choose option B.
Xenosaga: Episode I was at its best when it was showing off its intriguing story through cutscenes, instead of making me walk around the Woglinde for two hours while playing a very not-fun crane mini-game.
Of course that brings up the whole "just make it an anime/movie instead of a game" debate, but that's not the purpose of this thread.
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I think it just depends on the game. Mass Effect 2 is very plot driven and it makes sense for it to be more streamlined. Dragon Age was also fairly "trimmed" in some areas too, though. There really weren't that many items in DA, at least not compared to the infinity engine rpg's or even final fantasies. I loved DA, but there were a few things that were annoying, like the way poisons worked, but the main draw for me was that I could customize and control my whole party. Dragon Age is also a bit more open, but it's following a very linear story, you just chose the order that you play through the middle chapters. Both games are heavy on giving the player choices that have consequences later in the story, which is a trend I support, but that's not anything new and can be called tedious from the same perspective that you have on item management.
I do enjoy the freedom of choosing my characters' abilities in DA, but the problem is that you can't customize them the way you want. If your gambits (I know that's not what they're called, but face it...they're gambits) aren't effective, you'll get reamed six ways from sunday by the enemies (and even if they do match up, this will still happen. It's a fucking hard game).
ME2 focuses more on customizing through an aesthetic point of view, and it works. I always hated having to give up a cool looking armor in the first game in favor of one with better stats. Being able to customize how I look with no consequences is more fun.
Edit: You know what else needs to go? Obtaining lower-tier weapons when you're already carrying something better. How many times in DA would I open a chest and it winds up to be some piss-poor wooden shield? I know the main purpose is to sell it back for cash, but then.....why not just make it cash in the first place?
Again, something ME2 did right. Boy, they really thought up some good shit with that game.
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DA really isn't that hard, especially on the easy difficulty. If you don't have the hang of the gambit system for the game yet, just use a default configuration and pause to issue commands to the whole team occasionally during fights. As long as you try to have some strategy to your spell and ability use in the big fights you should get the hang of things pretty quickly. And the big fights are usually pretty easy to recognize since they're huge, plot events, or feature a badass looking enemy most of the time.
I wanted more armor in ME2 more than any other item. You have three suits really, not counting DLC, that you can mix and match the pieces of, but they all look more or less the same. You can change the color of your armor but it still looks like the same Shepard suit, which is what Bioware was going for and I appreciate that. I prefer DA's system though, where I can choose which look fits which character in my party. ME2's only party customization is a subtle alternate costume.
This told me a lot about what I personally like and dislike in the genre.
Yeah, FFXII was certainly streamlined.
The only problem is they cut out the goddamn story.
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God I love finding new shops with new weapons/armor.
FFXII would be the best in the series if they released a director's cut version:
Cut Vahn and Penelo completely out of the game, and allow you to use the other 4 characters simultaneously (instead of 3 at a time), with enemy difficulty upped to compensate.
It was fine in older games when new equipment had a clear advantage.
But these days you have to decide if the extra STR was worth the drop in DEX, while the slight VIT boost might edge out the AGI drop, and so forth.
I'm becoming more of a fan of upgrading what I have, plus the occasional "super awesome non-DLC armor/gun/sword/gun-sword."
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This is why I really, really hate the increasingly simplified/streamlined direction RPGs are taking.
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If I want something traditional, then I've got your Final Fantasies and Suikodens.
Also, I think the term MAINSTREAM'D applies here. :P
I think it depends how it is implemented. I'd say that Fallout 3, for example, had an excellent travel system, as it had interesting things to stumble upon and also let you fast forward past just walking through worthless shit. And it's possible to have a rich selection of varied equipment to choose from that presents advantages and disadvantages.
I'd say it isn't so much about excluding those aspects as making good design choices and emphasizing strong points while eliminating bad ones. Selling vendor trash isn't really interesting, so either make it interesting (make meaningful choices) or exclude it. Put something interesting between point A and B or exclude it. Etc.
To give an example, SMT: Nocturne is very light on the equipment side, because the game is all about finding, leveling, and fusing demons. The game would only be poorer if they threw in shit you needed to sell, or swords of +1 to +5 you needed to find and equip. It concentrates its complexity and time spent on its most interesting, unique, and well developed part, and that is awesome game design.
Edit: This applies to all genres, for that matter. Shooters cutting out medkits in favor of regen health for the most part has been great, because that was often dumb shit. Conversely, some shooters have benefited from keeping it, like MAG, which is team based and has medics who can heal you, or you can carry around either a personal or general use health for yourself, but it takes up some of your build points (so, do you want self-heals or claymores, for example?). Again, cutting what might seem like a standard genre convention can pay huge dividends if you think carefully about what your game is about, and why it is different from others in the same genre.
I was about to mention Valkyria Chronicles as a great example as well. You have a town, but you only visit the essential bits like the shopkeeper. All of your weapons and gear are upgradeable, and can be customized to your preference.
The mission structure also cuts down on the wandering, and keeping the cutscenes and missions separately (you choose when to watch the cutscene, which has its own chapters) give you an equal balance of gameplay and story.
The whole regenerating health thing is something that's becoming more commonplace as well. I'm told that not only does FFXIII do away with MP, but that your HP automatically regenerates after each battle.
Again, that's the sort of progress I like to see.
Also, I really don't think Fallout 3 and Oblivion quite fall into the standard RPG genre. I consider those type of games "Open World RPGs", in which case the large areas and tons of loot is okay, since the game's pacing is entirely in your hands.
It's much different from, say, Mass Effect's Citadel, in which you're required to follow a specific objective to advance but have a ton of shit in your way.
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Fuck the complicated bullshit of other RPGs.
Dungeons wise i have never understood the whole straight line cave thing. Half of the enjoyment i got out of some of the older FF games was wandering in a dungeon, getting lost, only to stumble upon a random chest or a really cool vista in the background that you would not have seen if you went just on the straight path. Exploration had rewards, rewards made me want to keep going till i found everything i could find. I think one or two games came out that had all the exploration, but little reward. They then threw the baby out with the bathwater instead of adding the treat at the end of the paths.
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FFVII got me into RPGs, and I had always thought I had played too many of them in the PS1 days that by the time I got to PS2, I was nearly burnt out. But I wasn't burnt out. It was simply a gameplay system I didn't dig, and unluckily, not all of them had the solid plot and characters of the FFs to keep me motivated.
For proof of this, I think of the inverse. ME2 and the recent FFs I find to be the best, sure, but you know what I'm really digging most? RPG mechanics in other genres, that's what I'm digging. Character progression. RPG-light elements. Action games are full of them nowadays, and I couldn't be happier, because they're essentially getting rid of the worst part of RPGs to me: the RPG gameplay.
Mass Effect 2 is so good goddamn
I love RPG's like The Magic Candle, where traveling overland was dangerous and time consuming. And you could whore out your party members to different jobs around town to raise cash to train skills. And remember Phantasie 3, where if one of your characters limbs got chopped off in combat, then they were screwed unless you were high enough lvl for the regen spell? I love that shit!
When I compare them to the 'lite' RPG's today, I get a little sad. I guess what I'm saying immersion matters more to me than fancy graphics or convenience. Having different factors that directly affect the game makes it more enjoyable.
I think CRPG's have been trending towards streamlining since their initial release in the 80's. It makes good business sense, but is bad for genre.
"but the simple fact is that the quicker a a game gets to the point, the more it'll grab your attention."
I disagree. The enjoyment comes from the journey, not arriving at the destination.
"I also hate that impending feeling of dread where I go back to camp and have to methodically check each character's equipment to make sure they're up to speed, then configure their abilities, THEN sell my old junk to the shopkeeper dwarf, and THEN beef up my weapons further with "ENCHANTMENT!"."
Funny you point this out, because I have the opposite view. To me, each character should have their own inventory, and be hampered by encumbrance. Furthermore there is no magical traveling dwarf always at your campsite to sell your loots. That way you would have to be picky about what loots you pick up, lending preference to the lightweight shiny stuff. Also coins should have weight! So you would have to use a bank in town (which you would have to travel to). Another thing in reference to Dragon Age, camping out in the wilderness should have random encounters based on the location of the map you are at. This can be expanded upon in multiple ways. Like if you are camping out in the middle of the blight, you would have more hostile encounters than along the road. Also, you could make it to if you have the dog in your party, you would less likely to be surprised. And maybe another companion would be good at hiding your campsite, so they would reduce chance of encounters.
This is the kind of stuff I want to see in a CRPG. Personally, I wish they would devote more resources to "fatty" things and less to fluff like voice acting and cutscenes.
...unless there's a "just kill them" option. Which is probably why my secondary characters are invariably genocidal assholes.
As for inventory... well. I like the big equipment, so to speak. I love screwing around with different combinations of armour and weaponry and amulets (or implants, depending on the flavour) and seeing what's what. It's the disposables that clog up my inventory and get irritating, especially because in the likes of Dragon Age you don't have the advantage of knowing you're going to need the warmth balm until you enter the next room and fireballs are getting shoved down your throat. Sometimes I wish they just sat somewhere until they were needed- not taking up any space, of course- and automatically being consumed when you receive fire damage.
The thing is, RPGs could stand to lose a lot of traditional elements and they'd still be RPGs- but everyone's tastes are different. Some people find it really immersive to backtrack through the forest in order to tell the talking tree that you've stabbed a hermit in the face. Others would prefer it if everyone had a little videophone and you could converse with any character, any time, any place. Some people wouldn't bat an eyelid if a title had little or no combat... others demand explosions and gore for at least 64% of the whole experience. Some people know that their Vitality is their Health + .5 of their next highest physical stat and that their Immunity bonus could be doubled if they purchased the Hardcore aspect but others... they hit Autolevel every damn time and get back to the hackin' up.
Personally? I welcome RPGs that introduce fast travel, or that have simplified (if not outright simple) inventory systems, but I can sure as hell appreciate that that's anathema to some players.
Also the other bonus is I won't have an enormous pile of X-Potions left over at the end of the game.
How are the new Mass Effect 2 side quest planets anyway? I hope they don't just drop you in a tiny area, kill the baddies and then make you leave again, like in Dragon Age. I kinda liked exploring in the first game actually, it was just totally meaningless and the side quests were dull.
Funnily enough, I would have almost completely agreed with the OP that streamlining was good if it weren't for Mass effect 2. Especially after playing Dragon age a few months ago, playing something that cut down just isn't doing it for me. The number 1 reason being getting 1, maybe 2, items for even each major mission, half of which you have to 'buy' anyway.
Well, that and a number of interface niggles that were really annoying compared to how well ME1 felt like a PC game. You know, like having reasonable sized fonts, or at least the ability to scroll with scroll wheel, or some interface things requiring you to use wasd while others only recognized the arrow keys. Or how little sense it made to merge both the sprint and interface keys to not only the same button, but not letting you assign them to separate key bindings. And let's not even mention how poorly adapted the scaning mini-game is, where you have to keep picking up the mouse to keep scrolling, as opposed to simply holding a direction, like you would with a d-stick.
Of course, I do recognize that I'm atypical. Heck, I'd be perfectly happy if they just saved the voice acting for only major characters/events, and heck let's even say no CG cutscenes, if it meant that they could add another major quest hub or two (filled with nameless NPCs which only have a single text box pop up when you interact with them).
Funnily enough, one of my most anticipated games for 2010 is Alpha protocol, where your interaction is limited to 3 main options, with a occasional [headslam] 4th one. At least the 3 options aren't good/bad/neutral though, this new trend of [strike]binary[/strike] trinary morality systems can go die in a silly goose.
I rather approved of FFXII because of this. It has the distinction on being the only RPG I've been able to play with my feet for an extended period of time. Just lie back, toe on joystick and away you went.
That said, I'm not saying that complication is a bad thing, because Dragon Age has me tightly in it's clutches at the moment and I'm enjoying the hell out of it, inventory management and character levelling included, but sometimes not having to tell everyone what to do - including the character you control - can be a nice change of pace.
All the Suikodens are playable one handed I think. IV+V for sure.
I've been playing Mass Effect 2 as well, and along with Dragon Age, I've noticed some particularly peculiar oversights and just plain lazy programming.
Little things mostly, and I haven't been focusing on them. They are there though.
When does it stop being "streamlined", and become "lazy"?
Many of you might scoff, but I'm willing to bet a lot of companies will "trim the fat" and sell it as DLC.
It's already been done.
Nothing pisses me off more than getting 4 hours into a game only to find out the combat doesn't really get better.
I'll admit I like looking for loot in dungeons and managing equipment when it's done right but I don't mind the streamlining in newer RPGs.
I'm not generally a fan of extreme linearity, especially if there are things you can easily miss without having a guide in front of you, and only one chance to access those things as you go through an area. I don't replay epic RPGs; I don't have the time for that, and I don't want a bunch of stuff hidden in my game with the assumption that I'll play again and try to find it.
I guess I appreciate a middle ground. I want a game to have enough interesting complexity to entertain me, but I don't want needless complexity or poorly-designed additions to the game. I want to fully experience the combat system if it's interesting and fun, but I don't want to fight a random battle every 6.2 steps. I *do* want a relatively open world that allows me to return to old areas (unless there's a compelling reason not to, like they've been destroyed or occupied as part of the story) and explore them more fully.
I am in a similar situation too, but I found myself playing a lot of sports games with very good rpg elements. Pro evo soccer 2010 is close to being of my favorite RPGs last year.
As much as I love character development (complex stat-building) in RPGs, the moment I fiirst open up the inventory and see 20 slots for equipment, I die a little. I know I will be spending hours just messing with equipment, unequiping, and selling again, only to find some item 5 minutes later that makes me have to reorganize everything.
Add to that a horrible menu system (I'm look at you, Dragon Age) and it just makes it worse. And yeah, I know it was optimized for PC, but I played it on consoles, so it doesn't get a pass.
I think a good example of a stripped down RPG is Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter. Inventory is limited in what you equip, towns are easy to explore, MP is never an issue. It's just about struggling to survive the game.
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A pretty good point was made earlier about Dragon Age throwing you garbage when you open treasure boxes. What the fuck is the point of yet another tier 1 leather piece when your guys have tier 3 or better?
My perfect idea of a game would be Secret of Mana's large overworld. Towns were never too big and usually the only homes you could enter were shops which had useful upgrades. Inventory items that were meaningful (until you got the water spirit). Near-instant fast travel that wasn't just scrolling down a list of previously visited locations and load screen-warping there. Bring back Final Fantasy 9's equipment method of each weapon and armor teaching your mans new spells and passive skills. Then there's no question about what is an upgrade and what isn't. Sure, you'd need to wear a crappier item for a while to get that 20% str bonus, but once you've learned it, upgrade to the new armor that teaches you nothing, or a new skill entirely. Throw in a few cutscenes that tell the story in nice detail without it feeling like the boring part of a movie, and you'd have a million copy selling RPG in my opinion.
Some games just did things right. "Antiquated" RPG methods can still be fun to people if they're done properly.
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If you're going to 'trim the fat', so to speak, it can't be from all areas of the game. If you're going light on the gameplay stuff (inventory management, skill progression, spells/magic/biotics/the force) then you'd better make up for it with plenty of freedom in dialogue and story choices. I think ME2 does this beautifully.
On the other hand, if you're going with a JRPG-style linear story with a pre-determined protagonist and the player's sitting through cutscenes instead of participating in the dialogue, then you have to give them freedom on the gameplay end of things. Tons of skills, weapons, armour, extra bosses and dungeons and sidequests and minigames.
If you 'streamline' all aspects of the game, in my opinion, it becomes a boring and linear shitfest that isn't worth the $70 because there's absolutely no reason to re-play it. Might as well just watch a movie. Odds are it'll be better written, anyway.
I used to love JRPGs. KOTOR made me start questioning them a little bit (but Revan was a mute puppet of a character so JRPGs still had the edge there). But after playing Mass Effect and now ME2, where the character still has a personality while letting you make choices? Fucking awesome. I'll play FFXIII out of obligation, but it's gonna be a hell of a chore...
Do... Re... Mi... So... Fa.... Do... Re.... Do...
Forget it...
Ahahahahahaha
ahahahahaha
ohgod I can't stop
...sorry.
It's just that, for a while, I've been wondering: why is this stuff actually called a RPG? I mean, there's sure as hell no role-playing involved in FF XIII whatsoever. Fighting is not role-playing, as you don't make any decision as a character, but only as some kind of battle director. It gets "better" with what we typically think of as a western RPG, since there's usually more choice involved, but generally, it's more a choice between two paths.
So I thought for myself: well, then, if RPGs aren't RPGs because of their story, then we should just accept that "RPG" is a technically wrong term for games about number-crunching. The battles have basically become what defines RPGs, as opposed to where the term originally came from. The battles are pretty much the only thing that can even be called "game", and they are usually all to some extent determined by numbers you can influence, and the rest: tactics. So, in a nutshell, if a RPG doesn't include a tactical aspect, their is no game. This, of course, only under the assumption that you aren't playing any role anyway.
And so, the term "tactical RPG" strikes me as absolutely hilarious- because it implies there's RPGs out there which consist of NOTHING but not-game! Cutscenes, shitty dialogue, some more cutscenes, drawn-out dungeons without puzzles but a lot of random elements, some fetch quests (never much more complicated than the "fetch" part), and some starring at weird character designs.
So, yeah. Remove all that stuff. Then, maybe, there's an actual game worth playing.
My point is, RPGs are built up by a strong character development, almost always driven by player decisions. Consequently, many, many RPGs (especially JRPGs) aren't RPGs since they are linear in both plot and character development.