For me it's the other way around; the combat system is FF XIII's most defining trait, coupled with the precise way it expects you to go about things. How constraining that actually is I'm not gonna fight you over because we wouldn't reach a consensus, ever ^^ But what it boils down to is that if it allowed you a way around it by grinding it'd lose the one memorible thing about the playing experience (not counting the soundtrack for the sake of the argument) it had going for it. I disagree that limiting grinding is never a good idea. Expanding the context easily shows counterexamples including my favorite, the Via Infinito from FF X-2. The Level 99 cap is actually a significant cap here because even at that level you're not overpowered for it. If it instead let you grind further and further to your heart's content, the dungeon would lose what makes it so incredible to me.
For me it's completely bad because it takes away the last bit of freedom that could have been offered, as everything else is a hallway. I did not enjoy the battle system, and I didn't have a problem with it, so because of that, boss battles were simply long and boring. Not to mention when I finally reached Gran Pulse, I would have been happy to grind to my heart's content. But sadly, I did not have that option. Limiting that is never a good idea. Compare that to how Dragon Quest VI handles overgrinding. Characters level up normally at all times, but in order to rank up in their vocation (job), they need to battle enemies at a level that is no lower than a certain cap. Many areas have level caps so you can't just go and master all vocations from the beginning. And this works much better because you still feel like you're making progress, even if you can't max out everything right off the bat. I just hate how constrained FFXIII is. This wouldn't have been as bad if the story was good - hell, look at Xenosaga which is almost as linear but at least that has an excellent plot to keep me involved. FFXIII is just failuire after failure after failure.
I find it interesting how much you dislike the fact that FF XIII restricts grinding and call that fake difficulty. For me it actually solved the issue I have with many RPGs how you can just outright circumvent difficulty by investing time which to me is not a way to make a legitimately fun game and having it be an option feels like it's undermining the other way of putting in actual effort in tackling the challenges head on. The fact that FF XIII actively prevents overgrinding is IMO one of its good points.
Oh, I do intend to try it someday, make no mistake I can already say it gets prompts for ambition as its so big. As for Danganronpa - I agree that it's in the pure entertainment category. It's just that at some point I took a different approach to games than I had in the past. And games that are pure entertainment and not much story depth but do it so well (though I'd argue Dr is still a pretty interesting commentary on depression and stuff like that, and it gets even more interesting in the sequel) are now pretty much equal to games that shake me up story-wise due to the fact that I've accepted it as a different medium with a different set of tools. Heck, that's probably what let me fall in love with the Dragon Quest series to the extent that I have.
Don't worry about it, I just feel like representing my own standpoint, that's all :P The thing for me is that while yes, Ace Attorney and Danganronpa have similar concepts, they're still fundamentally completely different kinds of games. They share the mysteries-investigations-trials theme but that's about it, the setting and atmosphere are day and night. Granted, I feel that the context in which that theme appears in Danganronpa works very much in its favor since it's always personal, directly engaging and life-risking, but taking the elements on their own I feel Ace Attorney nails them better. At least at times, when it's trying =P NGL, I had a bit of a malicious smile on my face reading 'my favorite VN so far', since I do place Danganronpa firmly and completely in the 'pure entertainment' category of VNs I've read, which doesn't come close in my list of favorites compared to the ones that actually affected me on a personal level. I'm really interested in seeing what you'll think of Umineko when you eventually read it ^^
Sure, go ahead I feel I should reiterate though, just to be safe I don't intend to bash AA because I like Danganronpa better - it's more like, through the comparison to DG, I kinda hope I can explain better why AA doesn't work for me so much, since not only is DG a similar concept, but it's also my favorite VN so far
Hmm, all I can really say is I enjoyed are cared for Phoenix and Edgey more than any of the Danganronpa characters. Ah one more thing I felt the need to point out in the AA/DR comparison: Ace Attorney did a much better job of railroading the investigation and deduction process than Danganronpa did IMO. In every single case in Danganronpa there was at least some element I figured out way ahead of time yet it took the characters ages to do the same. (SPOILER)LEON, Chihiro's true sex, Hifumi walking out of the nurse room himself, Sakura creating the locked room herself, just to name a few off the top of my head. The progression in Ace Attorney was much neater and I can only think of a couple of examples across the whole series where it became a problem. As I said before, I think that when Ace Attorney is at its best it's really good, and Danganronpa is in a rather constant state of pretty good. Hmm I'm starting to think I might have to write an opinion post alongside the review just to be able to touch upon issues like these in more detail as well.
I didn't mean the quirk as in they are more 3-dimensional. That's not really it. I meant from a meta perspective - I think the quirks are executed in a more interesting way. It's different when you use a quick stereotype to create a connection with one of 15 characters, more than half of which will be murdered before you know it, while AA for me doesn't go far beyond the cliches with its characters throughout three games even though they all live. Sure, there's character development, but ironically, I had a much greater connection with the Danganronpa final six after one game than with the AA cast after three games, and that's probably the whole thing just suspends my disbelief better. This is a completely ridiculous situation with kids that are not meant to be written as actual lawyers or anything, for example. In that way, for me, Danganronpa is simply much better than the sum of its parts, while with AA I just like some parts.
I don't think anyone wouldn't be Well that's different concepts. While Ace Attorney does love to make things personal - directly involving major characters - in the final cases, the majority is kind of... the daily life of a lawyer? Danganronpa is basically all like those final cases. So from one perspective I guess you could say the best concepts of AA, except condensed into one experience without the padding For me, at this point, I feel AA reaches heights DR doesn't, but also reaches lows DR doesn't sink to. And by that of course I'm solely referring to Danganronpa the first. Curious to see if SDR2 will change my stance~ >the quirky characters are more than just their quirks Honestly, much as I enjoyed Danganronpa, I'm not seeing the characters as having any sort of complexity to them. Though I'm perfectly fine with that in this context Oh by the way, I don't think I'll be pursuing School Life any further. I filled the report cards of my favorite characters and that's as far as I'll go for now. Achievement hunting seems like it'd be a pain in the ass anyways.
I'm always happy when someone enjoys my recommendation I kind of always compare this game to Ace Attorney as it has similar elements, but really does the things I wish AA did more often. Just don't get me wrong - I don't intend to bash AA, it's just that you know my stance on that game and I like to analyze these things It has incredibly high stakes, the murders actually have a big emotional impact, in spite of the zany atmosphere, the quirky characters are more than just their quirks, and there's one continuous story instead of episodes. Granted, this is all subjective, and like I said, I always enjoyed the conclusions to Ace Attorney games much more than the individual episodes, but I think that, knowing me from the perspective of a creator and consumer of stories, I think you can see why this is much more up my alley
