The Long and Short of RPGs

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@hooby:
The article was about her being afflicted with OCD (Obsessive Completionist Disorder). Basically, she can't exercise the necessary amount of self-control to NOT do a sidequest, and that's what's keeping her from holding her interest in a game. She even said that she absolutely must get everything, leaving no stone unturned.

 

[hooby]

@hooby:
The article was about her being afflicted with OCD (Obsessive Completionist Disorder). Basically, she can't exercise the necessary amount of self-control to NOT do a sidequest, and that's what's keeping her from holding her interest in a game. She even said that she absolutely must get everything, leaving no stone unturned.

Exactly my point.

"everything" = full version of the game.
shortened version of the game = NOT everything.

she absolutely must get everything

So she MUST get the full version of the game. Even if there was the possibility to play a "gamers digest"/shortened version of a game (choosable at game start), she just couldn't do it, since that would mean a whole lot of unturned stones.

Having the possibility to play the shortened version of the game is the same thing as having the possibility to skip side-quests. You just skip all side-quests at once rather, then one after the other. But if you are not able to skip one single, tiny side-quest, how could you possibly be able to skip them all at once?

Again, that's not the way the game was intended, or the "true" experience. It's rather a lot like watching the movie versus reading the book: Both might be entertaining, but the book is the real version.

Exactly. Your suggested "shortened game" version wouldn't be the "true" expierence nor the real version either, would it?
(It's not that i think it is a bad idea, or that it shouldn't be tried or anything. It's that i think in this special case, it wouldn't help your problem at all.)

But about this "true" experience... you talk about "padding". This is done to lengthen the game, and in most cases will be something that has been decided by the companies management, by the publisher ("there must be at least X hours of gameplay.."), oder some sort of market research department. If these things were planned by the games inventor from the very beginning, as a part of the game itself (which you refer to as "core game"), it wouldn't be a "padding".

I don't think that a side quest can be "padding" (which per definition is something additional) AND part of the "true" experience at the same time.

So you can't skip side-quest since you would be missing a part of the "true" experience, but then you complain, that all these sidequests you don't skip, are NOT a part of the "true" experience.

Well either these sidequests are a part of the true experience, than you can't skip them. Neither during the game, nor at the start of the game.
Or this sidequests are extraneous padding that can be skipped without missing the "real version", then it doesn't matter when and how you skip them.

I still believe a shortened Version wouldn't change anything.

 

[Iblis]

Given that you've written at least one other post in first person, the switch to third still strikes me as curious. But whatever blows your skirt up.

Iblis is currently 2:1 in third person vs first. Ego is a terrible thing.

I'm not decrying any genre -- I love RPGs of every color and stripe. The whole point of my column is not that there is anything wrong with the games, but rather with me, and if games can make allowances for skill levels, why not patience levels, too? It was just an idea as to how more people could be allowed to play and enjoy RPGs all the way to their conclusions.

A button in the options menu so you can just jump to the end credits?

Let me re-emphasize the point I made in my post that I genuinely enjoy the time I spend playing these games, whether I make it to the end or not. I don't "despise" any of them--or, more to the point, I'm not wishing there was a way to make it to the end of games I don't enjoy. I simply put them aside and never think about them again. My column was about those games that I did enjoy, whose stories intrigued me, whose characters and settings entertained me.

There's nothing wrong with absolutely despising Final Fantasy, either... But aren't you just describing the feeling you get after playing a mediocre game of any description?

Do I think that there's a lot of padding in most RPGs, Western or Japanese? Oh, heck, yeah. I don't consider that a flaw, per se, I just think it means that you can -- if you wanted to -- skip a lot of the content and still get the gist of the core of the game. Again, that's not the way the game was intended, or the "true" experience. It's rather a lot like watching the movie versus reading the book: Both might be entertaining, but the book is the real version.

Again, is it padding if you like it? Surely again you are just describing mediocre games - much as one reads a mediocre book once or sees a mediocre film once. Disposable media. Whereas the true classics which worked for you, you return to time and time again.

 

[snave]

I suggest to anyone reading this who enjoy action RPGs to try digging up Nox:

Its a bird's eye action RPG but plays like an FPS in overarching game design.
* There is a level progression.
* You cannot backtrack.
* There are 3 classes.
* The game is short (~10 hours) but each class has entire levels modified beyond recognition or simply replaced with new ones.

But heres the big catch: * Everything is finite.

Monsters, gold, expereince, inventory. Thus, the game doesn't need to worry about grinding exp or scaling monster difficulty anywhere.

You cannot buy every killer item and you know it. Secrets are found via puzzles not stupid deadends, and usually those are located in regularly visited locales like town.

The big-problem from "finite enemy" RPGs, namely tracking down every last monster like they're secret items for the EXP gain is removed. Experience scales based on how many of that monster type you've killed. A rat gives the same experience as a demon. Second one you kill gives like half that. 10 more later you get dick.

And yet the game rarely feels overtly linear. Yeah the OCD factor does come into play in the last stage (but what if theres a second boss beyond the boss?) but by that point, you've been spared it for what, 90% of the game?

Seriously an underrated game for basic RPG mechanics.