Poll: RPG's with no level caps?

[Brad Shepard]

without would make no sence, no lev cap means a lot of grinding to get so powerful nothing can stop you, at least with a lev cap, you get a challange, even if its from a superboss

 

[Jenova65]

It matters, a lot. How many RPGs do you play without a levelling cap, compared to ones with a cap?

Non-sequitur. I said there was no automatic functional difference between a game that scales things from 1 to 10 and a game that scales things from 1 to 100,000, so your obsession with bigger numbers is misguided. Here's a simple example: Diablo 2 had a hundred character levels. Final Fantasy X had some number much higher than 20, I'm sure -- and yet both those games ended up with roughly the same number of selectable character powers as Dragon Age did, and they're not notably longer than Dragon Age. So, besides the psychological validation of seeing a bigger number, what's the difference? "This one goes up to 11"?

But, hey, I think about half of the games I've played have included some form of "level cap" mechanic. Mass Effect 2 and Guild Wars, two of the RPG-style video games I consider to be strongest game-mechanically -- that is, on the level of moment-to-moment gameplay rather than just atmosphere or storyline -- pretty much neutered "levels" altogether. You don't get any automatic stat increases (like hit points) for leveling up in ME2, and GW really just uses "levels" to give you an extended tutorial.

Hell, in the pen-and-paper world, tons and tons of games just plain don't have levels. And, generally, they've better off for it. I've been quite happy with certain games that eschew conventional character-advancement mechanics altogether.

...

The level cap for ME was OK at 60, but a backwards step in ME2, level 30? What the hell is that, BioWare? It is annoying because if you starting a +game there is nothing new to learn since level 30 can be achieved on the first play through. And I hate seeing skills I know I can't ever get.....

I figure not being able to take every single power for a class makes games better by introducing, well, choices. You can always spend a bit of Eezo to retrain and swap in a new skill you want to try out, anyway.

-- Alex

Well that is your opinion and you are entitled to it, I however prefer the concept of 'actual' choice over imposed choice. As I said, if someone wants to fly be the seat of their pants they can, they can defeat a the minimum number of enemies to achieve the minimum level required to get through the game, great for them not great for those who prefer the actual freedom of being the best they can. And I don't want to retrain a limited number of skills (I know you can do this I'm not new to ME) I want to be able to train as many skills as I am supposed to have as Commander Shepard, saviour of the Galaxy, level capping at 30 prevents that and makes the bonus skill at the beginning and the 'stolen', skill in game just two more things I can't complete which irritates me.
This is my opinion to which I am equally entitled ;-)

 

[asam92]

I would of loved it if Secret of Mana was unlimited levels, however I never bothered to max out the levels anyway. The Health Bar would not accept more than 999 for the hero and I think 850 for the other 2, not sure what levels that they are at at those HP limits though, But I wanna be able (giving finding a good enough game to do it) to go so high that I can do a standard attack and kill the final boss in one hit. Back on Secret of Mana again that would also be impossible because the maximum amount of damage you could cuz in one hit was 999 so even if you had the ability to hit over 999 damage the game stopped you from doing so. Sigh...

 

[Olrod]

without would make no sence, no lev cap means a lot of grinding to get so powerful nothing can stop you, at least with a lev cap, you get a challange, even if its from a superboss

Curious you should say that, as from my perspective, grinding to get so powerful nothing can stop you IS the challenge I enjoy.

 

[Alex_P]

So by your logic we should never do anything that can resemble something else then? Unless it's entirely different we shouldn't do it, no matter what.

... Where are you getting this from?

The point is that it's useless to let us build up our characters if you're going to tell us how much we can and when we have to stop. "You can build your character however you want! Except you can't because we say so." You can't make your characters godly strong because of the level cap unless you exploit glitches, some people enjoy arbitrarily making over powered characters. Removing that aspect of an rpg is completely pointless while leaving it in adds in some replay value and another goal to people who otherwise might be bored of the game.

"You can grind as much as you want" is hardly "You can build your character however you want". There are much better way to design character-building choices into an RPG-style video game.

Adding support for endless grinding isn't always as simple as you make it out to be. It's not really an approach that works well for games built around carefully-placed set-piece battles rather than wandering in the open wilderness picking up "random encounters". There's also the issue Axolotl mentioned on page 1: if you don't add "level scaling", players are likely to over-grind and then turn around and find that the rest of the game isn't interesting because they've made their characters too potent, whereas adding "level scaling" is really the same as just giving up on the concept of levels altogether.

-- Alex

 

[Brad Shepard]

without would make no sence, no lev cap means a lot of grinding to get so powerful nothing can stop you, at least with a lev cap, you get a challange, even if its from a superboss

Curious you should say that, as from my perspective, grinding to get so powerful nothing can stop you IS the challenge I enjoy.

i mean, grinding is fun, but i love a challange, i brought down Omega weapon in 8, 10, and 1 at a preety low level (77, 78, and 80, in that order) and Yizema or however you spell the superboss's name in 12 at around 60, way to easy in my view sence you can run your ass away and heal up every time.

 

[Guttural Engagement]

I don't know if it has a level cap or anything cause I haven't beaten it or played it for a couple months (busy with school and friends); but I'm just going to quickly say that;
Secret of Mana is one of the best RPG's I've EVER played TO date.

Only rpg's I've played that beat it are TES:Arena and TES:Morrowind.
With Morrowind 1st, Arean 2nd, and Secret of Mana 3rd.

OT: No level cap - I don't see the point of having one? Leveled enemies are annoying (Cause your fighting the same monsters OVER AND OVER AND OVER (But they still get harder which makes it a sort of mindfuck)) - but standable; and at least it's better than no level cap and non-leveled enemies.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Personally I hate level caps now I much rathered the FF style way of doing it. There is little to no point in leveling in something like Mass Effect or Oblivion or Fallout 3 because everything is scaled to you which I call bullshit at.

 

[Kris015]

Depends. If it's an MMORPG i would say it needs a level cap. If it's an Action RPG it could be either with or without. But as long as the level cap is high (70-200) i don't really care cuz i never hit the cap anyways. But in games like Fallout 3 they could have raised it a bit..

 

[blippity]

I like the cap at whatever it ends at, but there should be some high lvl content for those who grind there. My brother played Chrono Trigger over and over until nearly every stat was ** and every level was 99. Fun to go walking through and kicking butt, but no real "challenge" in the game.

Usually, I never get to higher levels, only to what the average would be. When I played FFX, I wanted to get higher to take on some of the dark aeons and other higher lvl places, which meant grinding in the Monster Arena, but having those addition challenges made it worthwhile.

 

[Angerwing]

For plain RPG's it doesn't matter because your mainly playing single player.
For MMORPG's you need a level cap so you don't have "Make Love Not Warcraft" problems.

Except GM's wouldn't have an issue with deleting the GOD OF WARCRAFT cause they get bored.

He means so you won't have the one person with no life dominating everyone without being able to be beaten. If GM's deleted characters for being too good... I don't even know what would happen. I don't think any MMO is retarded enough to try it.

I know what he meant, captain obvious. But, they do that in some MMOs that don't have the level limit to seriously level the lifeless tard's E-peen.

Secondly, my comment was more geared about the show in reference where it depicted the Blizzard staff and GM's and total pussies.(which a mused me to no end.)But considering the ".killallplayers" command being a GM toy, I doubt I'd ever see a GM with a tiny in game internet cock.

I want waffles...

It's funny that you call me Captain Obvious, when you said that "GM's can kill people." That was completely irrelevant to the point he was making.

 

[veloper]

Levels without new feats, perks, spells (or whatever the game does) are pointless.
Why would I want to keep grinding when all the challenge is gone?
Might aswell have a level cap at some point then.

 

[veloper]

Levels without new feats, perks, spells (or whatever the game does) are pointless.
Why would I want to keep grinding when all the challenge is gone?
Might aswell have a level cap at some point then.

Higher stats to make your current spells and abilities are pretty rockin'
Then again I'm not the type who needs a shiny new toy every time I do something.

Doesn't do it for me. I don't want easier in my games, I want a new challenge.
New spells may enable new strategies, instead of just doing more of the same against mobs with more HP.

 

[Olrod]

Level caps were necessary on consoles for quite some time. For an example of why, Google "Phantasy Star IV level 99 glitch".

I don't mind caps at unreasonable levels, myself, but it's kind of annoying when they put one at 20.

Then again, what kind of masochist thinks grinding is fun?

Grinding is only fun when you don't need to do it. Games with steep challenge curves that require you to grind just to beat the next boss turn what should be a fun exercise into a chore. This is never a good thing.

When you can (if you want to, but you don't need to) spend some time fighting monsters, you can actually see how much more powerful you're getting your characters by how much easier it's becoming to win battles, this gives the player a sense of satisfaction, and lets you pwn a monster which should ordinarily present a challenge. Then the player can feel über, which is always a good thing.

 

[Jenova65]

Levels without new feats, perks, spells (or whatever the game does) are pointless.
Why would I want to keep grinding when all the challenge is gone?
Might aswell have a level cap at some point then.

Higher stats to make your current spells and abilities are pretty rockin'
Then again I'm not the type who needs a shiny new toy every time I do something.

Ditto! Some people like the sense of achievement involved in levelling, this isn't so hard to understand, and besides as you say it improves many things such as potency and raises defence stats, HP, luck and so on. No one minds a reasonable cap but give people who want to level up the opportunity to do so.

 

[kawaiiamethist]

You still can make your own paper rpg.

 

[Dante2015]

My biggest problem with level capping is that is stops you from filling out your stats/skills eg: ME2, even when you've hit max level you can fill several stats but can't fill one or two of them beyond the first dot/square/whatever.

 

[Blanks]

i don't mind lvl caps so much (though fallout 3's lvl 30 cap bugs me) usually because i don't reach the cap before i beat the game the only game where i reach max lvl was Final Fantasy 1 on my gba mostly because the extra dungeons were grindtastic and yet still fun and i don't usually mind finishing a game before i reach the max

 

[azukar]

So you're a fan of the Star Ocean series, then?

Honestly never heard of, in fact. Maybe I've found a new series into which to sink my teeth!

 

[Woodsey]

What fallout3 has done works. If you raise the level cap with each dlc, start off with a cap of say 50 then 60 70 80 90 100 when the DLCs come out.

What's the point in that?

You might as well set it higher to begin with (or take it away), especially in something like Fallout 3.

A huge open world, but you're stopped from progressing after a certain point (probably a while before the 120 hours people invest).