Mandatory grinding is shitty, but being able to spend 20 minutes mindlessly smacking some imps so you can afford the very best equipment because you want to use a suboptimal character, or missed some chest somewhere, or used some strong consumables when you didn't need to, or can't figure out how to do something so you need to brute force it... that has its place too. Especially with the randomness in RPGs. I'd rather spend a little time grinding than restarting because of some BS status effect that a boss rolls lucky on. As a 100%er who leaves no corner un-sniffed, grinding was rarely an issue for me past about the PSX era, but most games I can think of that don't allow grinding, or severely limit it, tend towards the easier side because of those concerns.
I don’t like that I can’t grind at all. Like there is almost no point to the regular battles other than to take up time.
Wait, have we come full circle and miss grinding in games? I never thought I'd see the day.
But yeah, I hate wasting time in games. Grinding, random battles, long cutscenes, and open worlds tend to make me want to nope out of a game pretty fast.
I like grinding.
On the other hand I'm going to say that DQ1 is the only game I can remember where grinding was actually required. The rest of the time it makes it easier to do something but there was always a way forward, be it items or certain moves and status effects.
Grinding is just the fallback when people decide not to interact with the game anymore. Which is good.
Mandatory grinding is shitty, but being able to spend 20 minutes mindlessly smacking some imps so you can afford the very best equipment because you want to use a suboptimal character, or missed some chest somewhere, or used some strong consumables when you didn't need to, or can't figure out how to do something so you need to brute force it... that has its place too. Especially with the randomness in RPGs. I'd rather spend a little time grinding than restarting because of some BS status effect that a boss rolls lucky on. As a 100%er who leaves no corner un-sniffed, grinding was rarely an issue for me past about the PSX era, but most games I can think of that don't allow grinding, or severely limit it, tend towards the easier side because of those concerns.
I was looking at a random tactics rpg in the Xbox store and it described itself as something like:
"no character levels and no overpowered equipment means you can't bypass easily difficulty, you the player have to level up your skills instead"
And I couldn't nope out of there fast enough. Maybe the devs did an amazing job of balancing fights but that sure sounds like "beat my face against a wall until I luck out with combat rolls"
Carpy on
0
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I know I might be in the minority but give me a game that lets me walk in circles for hours fighting random encounters so I can overlevel and destroy the next boss…and I’m happy.
DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited December 2022
There is an art to grinding.
Sometimes it's nice to be able to turn your brain off and do a repetitive task that has a clear reward. Especially after like a hard day of work where you don't really want to do anything but still want to do something.
There has to be balance between time and reward that many people don't get right though.
A lot of people use grinding as a way to pad out their game when it should never feel like an inconvenience. It should always feel optional or like a part of the gameplay loop.
I would argue that the Atelier games tend to do this well. The games have a lot of grinding but very little of it is required. Its just there if you already enjoy the gameplay loop.
I don't mind grinding when it's progressing towards something concrete at a reasonable pace, but I'm not Josh from LGIO and I'm not gonna spend 40 hours farming 1 EXP from this starting mob to be max level before the tutorial ends.
Madican on
+1
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I generally like grinding for about an hour or so whenever I get to a new area then when I inevitably unlock whatever airship/flying balloon the game has I’m looking for that magical hidden island with the special bad guys that unload XP and gold on you
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
edited December 2022
My problem with Chained Echoes lack of grinding is your characters full reset after each battle so there is almost no real penalty or reason to fight the regular enemies except for loot drops.
Every JRPG should have a map that shows percentage of completion per area, including the number of chests in the area that haven't been found, quests, gathering locations, collectibles etc.
Let me run down the list checking things off for that oh so satisfying 100% completion on an area map.
+8
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Every JRPG should have at least 100+ hours of monster finding, quest doing, item making, and super dungeons after the main game is over
And finishing those should get you the platinum trophy
Oh DQXI…you were truly perfect and I’m glad I’ve spent over 400 hours 100% completing you 3 separate times.
Every JRPG should have a map that shows percentage of completion per area, including the number of chests in the area that haven't been found, quests, gathering locations, collectibles etc.
Let me run down the list checking things off for that oh so satisfying 100% completion on an area map.
But also, be able to 100% it on the first visit. Don't lock a couple random chests behind some as of yet unlocked map ability that you need to come back for three dungeons from now. Looking at you, Ys.
I like the Bravely Default solution to grinding where I could set enemy encounters and game speed to 200% and fuck around near a dungeon entrance for a while to grind, then turn encounters to 0 to sweep the dungeon so I can face the boss at full health. I'm not here for MP/item management.
I like the Bravely Default solution to grinding where I could set enemy encounters and game speed to 200% and fuck around near a dungeon entrance for a while to grind, then turn encounters to 0 to sweep the dungeon so I can face the boss at full health. I'm not here for MP/item management.
I still stand by this set of mechanics as the most enjoyable I've ever found any RPG. Give me the options to turn things on/off and slower/faster.
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I like the Bravely Default solution to grinding where I could set enemy encounters and game speed to 200% and fuck around near a dungeon entrance for a while to grind, then turn encounters to 0 to sweep the dungeon so I can face the boss at full health. I'm not here for MP/item management.
I still stand by this set of mechanics as the most enjoyable I've ever found any RPG. Give me the options to turn things on/off and slower/faster.
That it's paired with a job system so I can play around with party combinations to creatively break the game was great. The uh... looping bit was not. That was dumb, but at least I could turn off encounters and just go one-shot the bosses back to back.
I like the Bravely Default solution to grinding where I could set enemy encounters and game speed to 200% and fuck around near a dungeon entrance for a while to grind, then turn encounters to 0 to sweep the dungeon so I can face the boss at full health. I'm not here for MP/item management.
I still stand by this set of mechanics as the most enjoyable I've ever found any RPG. Give me the options to turn things on/off and slower/faster.
"No." - the same dev team for every subsequent game they've made.
I like the Bravely Default solution to grinding where I could set enemy encounters and game speed to 200% and fuck around near a dungeon entrance for a while to grind, then turn encounters to 0 to sweep the dungeon so I can face the boss at full health. I'm not here for MP/item management.
i agree, and yet there's also a sweet spot to MP/item management that i think the Etrian Odyssey games absolutely nailed
I think good design around resource management is absolutely crucial to me enjoying a game.
If there is none of it then I kind of feel like there is no point to it. I'm always going to win because the game gives me no way to fail.
Phantasy Star IV is a great example of a game that paced resource management well. If you just played straight through without stopping to level, but also not running away constantly, you'd end up pretty close to the edge after boss fights and such. You had to dip into the items to get through but the game provided enough to make it work out.
Resource management is fun but I also think most jRPGs aren't good at doing it in an engaging manner.
A lot of dungeon crawls were just periodic trips back to rest points until you were OP enough to just power through on stats and skills.
I'm pretty sure the entire reason 99% of people have the "no I must hoard all elixers and special items in case I need them later" mentality including through the last boss is because jrpg devs have been historically terrible at resource management stuff. I feel like I just auto attack everything down in every game and save all mana for healing because magic almost always does the exact same damage but is taxed with mana. Persona games kind of force you to use mana and items, but it is often a slog until you get persona skills to restore health/mana or get accessories that do the same (goth doctor is bae)
I liked the mechanic the Zeboyd games used where you had X number of random encounters and then after that they turned off. I also remember that you could trigger encounters on demand, but I can't remember if you had to finish the encounter counter before you could use it.
I feel like the resource-management elements that make me really enjoy an RPG migrated into the roguelike space. There might be something worthwhile in trying to make a JRPG that plays like an iterated roguelike? Do plot events in town, provision for the trip, and traverse a procgenned dungeon, carrying what you spent money to buy in town and picking up what you can in the meantime. Fail and you reset to town, maybe keeping any EXP you got but losing whatever inventory you were carrying; succeed and you continue on but certain consumables (potions, food, whatever else) are lost due to spoilage or however you want to justify it. Basically, taking the long-term bookkeeping out of the Megalixer problem and also reducing the "I've accrued 80 Phoenix Downs and therefore can't lose" effect.
My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
0
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I HATE that I’m so disappointed in Chained Echoes because it is a damn good game.
It’s just missing some of the key aspects I was expecting from an SNES era JRPG
I’ll finish it and I’m sure I’ll like it but I’m never going to be able to love it
I feel like the resource-management elements that make me really enjoy an RPG migrated into the roguelike space. There might be something worthwhile in trying to make a JRPG that plays like an iterated roguelike? Do plot events in town, provision for the trip, and traverse a procgenned dungeon, carrying what you spent money to buy in town and picking up what you can in the meantime. Fail and you reset to town, maybe keeping any EXP you got but losing whatever inventory you were carrying; succeed and you continue on but certain consumables (potions, food, whatever else) are lost due to spoilage or however you want to justify it. Basically, taking the long-term bookkeeping out of the Megalixer problem and also reducing the "I've accrued 80 Phoenix Downs and therefore can't lose" effect.
I mean you can just limit inventory maximums for items to handle the latter issue. One thing I loved about TMS#FE was that you were limited in how much of each kind of item you could carry. Makes it hard to store 20 megalixers when you can't hold more than 2.
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I think in addition to inventory caps based on the item type you need to also make it relatively painless to top off your supply between dungeons but not between encounters.
Resource management is fun but I also think most jRPGs aren't good at doing it in an engaging manner.
A lot of dungeon crawls were just periodic trips back to rest points until you were OP enough to just power through on stats and skills.
I don't really agree with this. I think people just don't actually prep for dungeons and expect to get through it with a full party without a risk of loss so they play it that way.
I almost never hit a dungeon more than once outside of something like Wizardry/Etrian. I spend most of my money on consumables and filling out a few slots if a party member hasn't gotten anything as drops/chests in a bit and I'm perfectly willing to scrape by with half the party dead. Keeps things going at a nice clip.
Maybe I'll wipe a couple times, but that's kinda alright by me? Recently replayed Inindo and it's far more interesting when I don't just grind out ten+ levels in the first dungeon like I did as a kid.
My strategy for JRPGs--when I don't just immediately decide the combat of a particular game is too boring and cheat--is to rush from cutscene to cutscene, skipping at many random battles as possible, thinking not at all about my inventory, then hope I can work things out with strategy or some busted setup when I hit a boss battle.
This results in odd things like me soloing the majority of Star Ocean 3 with Fayt, because I hit a boss too underleveled to keep my party alive...but then I realized you can neutralize any boss attack with the two defensive mechanics, but dead party members don't gain XP in that game. So by the final boss no one else could survive anything at all.
Or reaching the final boss of Suikoden 4 or 5 and having to cycle through party members I'd never used looking for someone with runes busted enough to let me eke through the fight.
+1
DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
Resource management is fun but I also think most jRPGs aren't good at doing it in an engaging manner.
A lot of dungeon crawls were just periodic trips back to rest points until you were OP enough to just power through on stats and skills.
I don't really agree with this. I think people just don't actually prep for dungeons and expect to get through it with a full party without a risk of loss so they play it that way.
I almost never hit a dungeon more than once outside of something like Wizardry/Etrian. I spend most of my money on consumables and filling out a few slots if a party member hasn't gotten anything as drops/chests in a bit and I'm perfectly willing to scrape by with half the party dead. Keeps things going at a nice clip.
Maybe I'll wipe a couple times, but that's kinda alright by me? Recently replayed Inindo and it's far more interesting when I don't just grind out ten+ levels in the first dungeon like I did as a kid.
Eh. I don't really know how much prep you can do outside of the regular equipment upgrades(which usually require some grinding depending on the economy) early game.
Most of the time you're going into a dungeon pretty blind. Sure you can make guesses based on the environment, updated shop items or what some random NPCs say but you don't know what's in there unless you're using a guide.
Why it's usually best to just have some general all purpose build.
Also, especially in the early game most of the strategy just comes from hitting an enemies weak point, which usually involves a spell, which usually involves some MP management, which usually cannot be done efficiently early game simply because you aren't given the resources to do so.
So like yeah there is management but I wouldn't call it engaging cause it's literally "don't use good thing too much" until you can actually manipulate things and it becomes a cakewalk.
Now I'm not saying it's hard(I don't visit dungeons more than once either) I'm just saying the "strategy" usually just involves only using your big spells when you can't just skate by on melee attacks, until it doesn't, and by then the combat is usually trivial.
Game: Here's a regular sword that does 50 damage.
Me: Cool *equips*
Game: And here's a fire sword that does 75 fire damage.
Me: Eew, what if i find an enemy resistant to fire? Or immune? *chucks it into the inventory to never use*
+2
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
One thing I don’t like is when you have to equip items. I just access to my inventory during a fight, I don’t want to worry about who is carrying my potions and who has my ethers or whatever
Game: Here's a regular sword that does 50 damage.
Me: Cool *equips*
Game: And here's a fire sword that does 75 fire damage.
Me: Eew, what if i find an enemy resistant to fire? Or immune? *chucks it into the inventory to never use*
Let's make it worse. You have to equip a sword for X battles to learn its passive skill.
Hooray! Now stats don't even matter! Fulfill your mandatory buddy time with all 50 different inanimate objects.
Game: Here's a regular sword that does 50 damage.
Me: Cool *equips*
Game: And here's a fire sword that does 75 fire damage.
Me: Eew, what if i find an enemy resistant to fire? Or immune? *chucks it into the inventory to never use*
Let's make it worse. You have to equip a sword for X battles to learn its passive skill.
Hooray! Now stats don't even matter! Fulfill your mandatory buddy time with all 50 different inanimate objects.
I actually like that system though. Was fun to pick and choose what I wanted to learn next.
+3
ShadowfireVermont, in the middle of nowhereRegistered Userregular
Game: Here's a regular sword that does 50 damage.
Me: Cool *equips*
Game: And here's a fire sword that does 75 fire damage.
Me: Eew, what if i find an enemy resistant to fire? Or immune? *chucks it into the inventory to never use*
"Whoa, cool fire sword! It looks pretty!" Equips and just bashes fire resistant enemies to death no matter how long it takes.
Raijin QuickfootI'm your Huckleberry YOU'RE NO DAISYRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I will equip the highest power weapon regardless of element and if I happen to face an enemy of the same element that character can just DEF each round
Bravely Default actually had me using elemental weapons now I think about it, because I could change weapons and armor during the fight without taking a turn. So if my fire sword was getting resisted I could swap over to something else no problem.
+2
ShadowfireVermont, in the middle of nowhereRegistered Userregular
ITT we continue discussing how great Bravely Default is.
Posts
I like grinding.
On the other hand I'm going to say that DQ1 is the only game I can remember where grinding was actually required. The rest of the time it makes it easier to do something but there was always a way forward, be it items or certain moves and status effects.
Grinding is just the fallback when people decide not to interact with the game anymore. Which is good.
I was looking at a random tactics rpg in the Xbox store and it described itself as something like:
"no character levels and no overpowered equipment means you can't bypass easily difficulty, you the player have to level up your skills instead"
And I couldn't nope out of there fast enough. Maybe the devs did an amazing job of balancing fights but that sure sounds like "beat my face against a wall until I luck out with combat rolls"
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI
Sometimes it's nice to be able to turn your brain off and do a repetitive task that has a clear reward. Especially after like a hard day of work where you don't really want to do anything but still want to do something.
There has to be balance between time and reward that many people don't get right though.
A lot of people use grinding as a way to pad out their game when it should never feel like an inconvenience. It should always feel optional or like a part of the gameplay loop.
I would argue that the Atelier games tend to do this well. The games have a lot of grinding but very little of it is required. Its just there if you already enjoy the gameplay loop.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI
Let me run down the list checking things off for that oh so satisfying 100% completion on an area map.
And finishing those should get you the platinum trophy
Oh DQXI…you were truly perfect and I’m glad I’ve spent over 400 hours 100% completing you 3 separate times.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI
But also, be able to 100% it on the first visit. Don't lock a couple random chests behind some as of yet unlocked map ability that you need to come back for three dungeons from now. Looking at you, Ys.
I still stand by this set of mechanics as the most enjoyable I've ever found any RPG. Give me the options to turn things on/off and slower/faster.
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Switch ID: MNC Dover SW-1154-3107-1051
Steam ID
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That it's paired with a job system so I can play around with party combinations to creatively break the game was great. The uh... looping bit was not. That was dumb, but at least I could turn off encounters and just go one-shot the bosses back to back.
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"No." - the same dev team for every subsequent game they've made.
i agree, and yet there's also a sweet spot to MP/item management that i think the Etrian Odyssey games absolutely nailed
most of the time it's done poorly
If there is none of it then I kind of feel like there is no point to it. I'm always going to win because the game gives me no way to fail.
Phantasy Star IV is a great example of a game that paced resource management well. If you just played straight through without stopping to level, but also not running away constantly, you'd end up pretty close to the edge after boss fights and such. You had to dip into the items to get through but the game provided enough to make it work out.
A lot of dungeon crawls were just periodic trips back to rest points until you were OP enough to just power through on stats and skills.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI
I'm pretty sure the entire reason 99% of people have the "no I must hoard all elixers and special items in case I need them later" mentality including through the last boss is because jrpg devs have been historically terrible at resource management stuff. I feel like I just auto attack everything down in every game and save all mana for healing because magic almost always does the exact same damage but is taxed with mana. Persona games kind of force you to use mana and items, but it is often a slog until you get persona skills to restore health/mana or get accessories that do the same (goth doctor is bae)
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14 kinda did? but made it weird
It’s just missing some of the key aspects I was expecting from an SNES era JRPG
I’ll finish it and I’m sure I’ll like it but I’m never going to be able to love it
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I mean you can just limit inventory maximums for items to handle the latter issue. One thing I loved about TMS#FE was that you were limited in how much of each kind of item you could carry. Makes it hard to store 20 megalixers when you can't hold more than 2.
FFXIV: Tchel Fay
Nintendo ID: Tortalius
Steam: Tortalius
Stream: twitch.tv/tortalius
I don't really agree with this. I think people just don't actually prep for dungeons and expect to get through it with a full party without a risk of loss so they play it that way.
I almost never hit a dungeon more than once outside of something like Wizardry/Etrian. I spend most of my money on consumables and filling out a few slots if a party member hasn't gotten anything as drops/chests in a bit and I'm perfectly willing to scrape by with half the party dead. Keeps things going at a nice clip.
Maybe I'll wipe a couple times, but that's kinda alright by me? Recently replayed Inindo and it's far more interesting when I don't just grind out ten+ levels in the first dungeon like I did as a kid.
This results in odd things like me soloing the majority of Star Ocean 3 with Fayt, because I hit a boss too underleveled to keep my party alive...but then I realized you can neutralize any boss attack with the two defensive mechanics, but dead party members don't gain XP in that game. So by the final boss no one else could survive anything at all.
Or reaching the final boss of Suikoden 4 or 5 and having to cycle through party members I'd never used looking for someone with runes busted enough to let me eke through the fight.
Eh. I don't really know how much prep you can do outside of the regular equipment upgrades(which usually require some grinding depending on the economy) early game.
Most of the time you're going into a dungeon pretty blind. Sure you can make guesses based on the environment, updated shop items or what some random NPCs say but you don't know what's in there unless you're using a guide.
Why it's usually best to just have some general all purpose build.
Also, especially in the early game most of the strategy just comes from hitting an enemies weak point, which usually involves a spell, which usually involves some MP management, which usually cannot be done efficiently early game simply because you aren't given the resources to do so.
So like yeah there is management but I wouldn't call it engaging cause it's literally "don't use good thing too much" until you can actually manipulate things and it becomes a cakewalk.
Now I'm not saying it's hard(I don't visit dungeons more than once either) I'm just saying the "strategy" usually just involves only using your big spells when you can't just skate by on melee attacks, until it doesn't, and by then the combat is usually trivial.
Me: Cool *equips*
Game: And here's a fire sword that does 75 fire damage.
Me: Eew, what if i find an enemy resistant to fire? Or immune? *chucks it into the inventory to never use*
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI
Let's make it worse. You have to equip a sword for X battles to learn its passive skill.
Hooray! Now stats don't even matter! Fulfill your mandatory buddy time with all 50 different inanimate objects.
I actually like that system though. Was fun to pick and choose what I wanted to learn next.
"Whoa, cool fire sword! It looks pretty!" Equips and just bashes fire resistant enemies to death no matter how long it takes.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1JI9WWSRW1YJI