Wada Discusses the future

[Wolf Kanno]

#!@$%^@#% I typed the whole thing up and then accidentally hit a hotkey erasing everything with no hope of recovery. Here I go again.

I hate when that happens...

In regards to the ‘ATB-ness’ of FFXII, it wasn’t in regards to any specific comments in this thread, just the general attitude that FFXIIs system is a departure from traditional FF mechanics. If we take away gambits, (which aren’t really mechanics so much as bots on top of the existing mechanics) it really reminds me of a SNES era system more than a PS1 era system.

I find there is little difference in PS1 generation and SNES generation versions of ATB. Except possibly IV and VII, IV cause it put in "cast" time for abiulities so your character never did immediately do what you asked them to. VII cause it made multiple spell effects cast simultaneously instead of the past where each enemy gets hit one at a time thus speeding up some of the animations. Even then if you could add that speed to other FFs you would still get the effect.

As for setting up gambits, I simply automated all the tasks in the game I found repetitive and thoughtless, and I wasn’t left with anything else. I could have taken some control away from the gambits but I wouldn’t have enjoyed doing it manually myself any more. (Think if you had a computer controlling FFX for you and you were told that you would enjoy it more if you controlled it yourself.)

X pretty much tells you how to do everything and then further insults your intelligence by making the game ridiculously easy to boot as though it was so hard you really did need the computers help. It treats you like a child.

To me it just sounds like you think combat is tedious and repetitive (which it actually is) so when you switched the gambits for it you found nothing else, once again I feel this says more about the player than the game. To be honest, XII really opened my eyes to how much I felt random normal encounters are tedious and pointless but I never once felt it was XII's fault, rather thinking back made me realize how often I don't like normal encounters cause all I usually do is mash X and read a book.

Because of this discovery I started to play more with Gambits and the License Board (which is actually what I do in most games so this does not make XII any different from past installments) and found ways to creatively use things to make the game a more enjoyable experience for myself.

FFXII was the last straw in me deciding I didn’t like side quests mid game. I wasn’t high on them to begin with, but with Mark Hunts (and FFXII in general) being a great new paradigm in game development I decided to give it an honest go. As you can see it did not end amicably.

Fair enough, I guess we'll just agree to disagree.

For me one of the most enjoyable parts of any video game is trying to min/max my party to the best of my ability. So when I make something at the start of the game and feel no need to change it as I play though, you can understand how I am a little disappointed. In a game, such as FFT, the first time I play through I am constantly trying to make my party as powerful as possible, and am constantly having to adapt and think of new things as new enemies/abilities are introduced, not to mention my knowledge of the game increasing as I go along. FFXII never had that for me in the least.

I believe in Min/Max as well, where my school of thought differs is that I don't believe in clones. I treat melee and magic as opposites and instead min-max the concepts themselves. I don't build ultimate omni set-ups in FFT nor did I bother in XII cause my major complaint with RPGs that allow you to build parties based on a group of generics is that you have the ability to make them the same and even though they are powerful, it doesn't any less cheapen the experience of the game itself for me.

Anyone can build an army of clones and I feel its not very difficult to do so even in games like Tactics, true skill in my crazy train of thought comes from making any combination good instead of just building the best combination but this is how I've always approached Min/Max in RPGs. Overall, I learned along time ago that Ultima spamming in VI wasn't fun and instead I got more of a kick out of specializing each of my characters and XII brought this all back to me.

In regards to handicapping, if you have to handicap yourself on your first play through to make it enjoyable it is a broken game. Subsequent play throughs it is a given, but the first time is inexcusable. Even in FFT when I handicap myself to try out new classes and strategies I lay the ground rules at the start of the play through and then try and tweak and max out my party as much as I can within those rules.

See I don't consider this handicapping, rather you are choosing to approach the game differently while still using all the tools available. You can still have one character be absolutely perfect but choose to specialize the other two, how is that really handicapping? cause you know an abusive combination that makes the game less fun for you? Handicapping to me in XII would be choosing not to use the License Board or using a stating equip set up only, or choosing not to level. Handicapping is what I have to do to make X fun cause in order to make the game challenging I have to ignore using the Sphere Grid completely and never use Aeons which are core components of the gameplay. Handicapping to me is ignoring what the game tells you what you should do and nowhere does XII say that building a party of perfect omni-clones is the only way to approach it.

Utilizing a Limited set-up and handicapping are very different things in my opinion. Limited set-up just requires that you are focusing all your resources into making them the best at their specific task. I don't see how making an ultimate black mage is handicapping myself cause he can't use armors or swords and I stuck to only giving him skills to make him good at one thing over others. This is really all you are doing In XII as well You throw light armor on one, magic armor on another and heavy on the third and go from there. If I need my magic user to be a warrior I change their set up to reflect this and then switch out another character to fill in the void my magic user left.

Just because you can build an army of clones doesn't mean that is what the system is designed for and can only be used for. I still feel you are approaching this game with a narrow view but if that is your choice then its not my place to say you are wrong or not. Obviously the game just wasn't designed for you in mind.

As you can probably guess I’m not a fan of sandboxy titles in general.

I actually don't like them either but I felt XII hit the right balanced. Though I feel we share a very different opinion on what "open-ended" means

One problem with the weaknesses of party members (I agree with it as a game mechanic whole heartedly) is that you are then forced to chose between play style and favorite characters. I generally try and build my party of my favorite characters first and foremost (this is the one constraint that overrides the min/maxing I mentioned above), mainly because I know if I pick a party of people I don’t like as characters I will probably lose interest in the title and stop playing. And generally I don’t fell like having a good section of a games characters in my party (I’m a fairly misanthropic person). Now, in some games where there is virtually no difference game play wise I am free to do what I want. In others this can lead me to into a choice between choosing characters I won’t enjoy playing as, or a play style I won’t enjoy. Something like FFXII where anyone can be anything isn’t a bad design paradigm, but the fact everyone can be everything kind of smurfs it up. (I prefer the FFT idea where you can learn everything but still have to be highly selective as to what you can actually be.)
Of course this has been marginalized by the proliferation (Is it a good or bad day when I have to stop myself from using paradigm too many times in an argument?) of cutscenes and voice acting, forcing every character to be in every plot scene.

The few games I've played that utilize this mechanic has never bothered me. Of anything it really changed my way of approaching games as I found myself using characters I never would have thought to use and enjoying it sadly enough. By specializing and building in strengths and weaknesses you can set up dungeons and gameplay to cater to specific characters and allow them to shine. I really feel the best design for the future of RPGs was made in Persona 3 cause it pretty much does all I've been talking about. Better usage of NPCs better gameplay that focuses on strategy over power leveling, and just more thought into how you use a party or how you should build a game world, not to mention the title is challenging. Its a linear game that utilizes very non-linear gameplay choices and options.

[VeloZer0]

I really have to bump Persona up my to play list so I have a better idea of these concepts you are trying to describe.

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In regards to combat being tedious, I think the one thing that separated FFXII from other titles (for me) was the amount of mana regen. I regained more mana than I spent, even on boss fights. I am extremely cheap when it comes to managing resources, so usually what keeps me engaged in battles is trying to budget it so I use the least amount of MP possible. If I don't cast offensive spells I will use too much MP healing, if I use too many I run out, ect... Thus in FFXII I had absolutely no incentive to be ingaged in the random encounter. And like I said, I actually enjoyed FFX random encounter design, I thought it was probably the best in the series.

I have heard that in FXIII there is some sort of ranking system after every battle, which I hope is a good way to keep me invested in the random battles. That is provided it isn't too easy our routine to get the highest rank.

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I don't necessarily like clones, for instance I felt FFT for the most part you did better with a mixed party than an all clone one. Even when you factor in highly overpowered builds, you are better of with a several variety of a few overpowered builds. When I was setting up my party at the start of FFXII it just felt like I was being shoe-horned into making clones, as diversification didn't offer anything I couldn't do with clones.

EDIT: After reading the last few posts, they should make a Persona/FFT/FFX/FFXII forum for us, as those are the only games we really seem to want to draw examples from

[Bolivar]

Something like FFXII where anyone can be anything isn’t a bad design paradigm, but the fact everyone can be everything kind of smurfs it up.

Most of what you said explains more or less my thoughts on some of XII's decisions, but you might want to trademark this statement.

[Wolf Kanno]

I really have to bump Persona up my to play list so I have a better idea of these concepts you are trying to describe.

YES!!!


Seriously, everyone should play but especially you and Bolivar.

P3 is my fave but judging by your taste in game design I feel you should play P4 (hell, P2 if you can find a copy) instead cause it gives you more control of your characters and how they grow and the story is more of the focus of the game than the high school Sim stuff.

My only issue with P4 is that they kinda dumbed down the combat system a little. In P3 physical attacks are treated like elemental attacks and separated into 3 types being slash/strike/pierce. This allowed more interesting party configurations and better uses of some Personas that could use all three types, as well as made the Main character even more awesome cause he can equip most of the games weapons whereas everyone is stuck using one type.

P4 chose to streamline this and turn all physical attacks into one type so it doesn't matter what kind of a physical attack it was, consequently though, they removed it as a weakness for enemies as well since it basically got dumbed down to the generic default attack which sadly cripples one party member who is actually built for physical abilities as well as a whole chunk of Personas who are built around as pure physical fighters. Despite all this P4 also introduces a bunch of new combat abilites that make gameplay very interesting, my main gripe is that I feel P3's combat is still much more polished and balanced despite P4 giving you more control (you only control your main character in P3 but can give your party members individual orders in combat).

Still, Min/Max is fun and challenging in this game, especially since status spells actually work and can save your ass at times. Teddie alone involves making some of the hardest choices in the game cause most of his abilities are insanely awesome but your restricted to only having 8 skills at a time.

P4 is probably more up your alley but P3 will always be my first love.

In regards to combat being tedious, I think the one thing that separated FFXII from other titles (for me) was the amount of mana regen. I regained more mana than I spent, even on boss fights. I am extremely cheap when it comes to managing resources, so usually what keeps me engaged in battles is trying to budget it so I use the least amount of MP possible. If I don't cast offensive spells I will use too much MP healing, if I use too many I run out, ect... Thus in FFXII I had absolutely no incentive to be engaged in the random encounter. And like I said, I actually enjoyed FFX random encounter design, I thought it was probably the best in the series.

See, XII sorta showed me the revelation that I don't like random encounters when they don't offer challenge and as I've said earlier, I don't feel FF has made a truly challenging games since possibly FFV. I find random encounters to be tedious in all the FFs starting from VI and up to XII. X being the worst offender for me personally cause it forced me to spend more time than five seconds to actually engage enemies that are not worth my time, so I can do tedious crap so I can XP for everyone in my party. XII allowed me to let the A.I. deal with it so I can actually spend more time exploring which is one of my favorite old school RPG elements that has been slowly and painfully removed from modern RPG games. So for me, it was a win/win situation. The Mark Hunts and Boss fights provided the combat that I loved.

I have not had the need to do item management in an FF since probably FFIII and even then I can only safely say their are three games in the series you can do it and its important FFI-III. Starting with IV its not as important except for ethers same with five and once again by VI and up, I feel item management is useless since the games throw items at you and cut the cost of purchasing them to near pennies. In X, I never felt the need to have a healer since monsters were so weak and it was too easy to get through battles without them having a chance to attack (making every battle almost a preemptive strike) not to mention how plentiful Save points were I don't think I ever used items or even Yuna after my first play through. XII doesn't do any better but I actually liked having regenerative MP cause it made my spell casters far more useful and I didn't have to worry about their major weaknesses. Hell I find their dependency on items to be one of the reasons why I don't like using Spell casters in early RPGs.

I have heard that in FXIII there is some sort of ranking system after every battle, which I hope is a good way to keep me invested in the random battles. That is provided it isn't too easy our routine to get the highest rank.

There is a ranking system and it based on damage taken and time to beat as far as I've heard. Better ranks makes the monsters drop better loot. I'm looking forward to it cause it might make combat more enjoyable.

I don't necessarily like clones, for instance I felt FFT for the most part you did better with a mixed party than an all clone one. Even when you factor in highly overpowered builds, you are better of with a several variety of a few overpowered builds. When I was setting up my party at the start of FFXII it just felt like I was being shoe-horned into making clones, as diversification didn't offer anything I couldn't do with clones.

I know too many people who go through FFT and basically make Knight with Duel Wield (Usually a combination of Excalibur/Save The Queen/ and Chaos Sword depending on whether they wanted high attack power or defense but Excalibur was mandatory for its auto-haste and immunity to Holy) and then sub Calculator with Flare and Holy as their only spells. That's all they would ever build and then they would complain about how the game had no real customization because this was the "perfect" set-up. This is kinda what your remarks on XII was reminding me of.

The amusing thing is that the diversity in equipment and how each weapon possesses its own strength and play styles gave me the impression the game wanted you to do job classes. I never felt it shoe horned the player into making clones, quite the opposite actually. I highly doubt there is a "perfect" set-up with clones cause you need specific types of weapons and armor to really max out magic and as for high damage attack power there are multiple builds for that depending on what weapon you want and whether you are going for multi damage, critical hits, or just consistent high damage. Even defensive builds will require you to make choices on what type of equipment you want to use and how you define defensive as either a high stat (Heavy armor) or evasion (Light armor and weapons like guns/knives/ and ninja blades), even choosing between shields/crossbows/and guns can change the set up cause they all carry high evasion and allow you to block enemy attacks.

I feel XII does offer you a min/max paradise, you just need to look beyond your normal train of thought and experiment, much like you would in Tactics.

EDIT: After reading the last few posts, they should make a Persona/FFT/FFX/FFXII forum for us, as those are the only games we really seem to want to draw examples from

I'll ask the other mods, hell just having a Persona forum would make me happy though it wouldn't really make sense in a FF forum but I find the people on these forums who have played Persona have a better head on their shoulders about the series than the ones I meet on actual Persona forums. Go figure. :sweatdrop:

[VeloZer0]

Yeah, that whole high school-sim was the reason it wasn't higher on my list to begin with. Having a game world I don't like is a major cause of me not finishing RPGs, I hear FFX-2 had a good battle system but I couldn't even get an hour into the game. I barely got through KH even though I really enjoyed the game, just because I was grating my teeth every time a Disney character was speaking. (except mickey, having him jump off a roof in a black costume and kill a whole bunch of heartless was pretty cool.)

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I agree that FFV-FFX didn't offer much of a challenge in item management, I thought about addressing this in my post but decided it made my thoughts wander. The thing is, I played these games like it does matter. I barely use items in my play throughs, so in a way it could be considered an artificially added challenge. As I have said before, if I wasn't aiming for overkills and item/mana conservation in FFX I probably would have found it as boring as you did.

I've remarked in other threads how I really didn't like the enviornments created in FFXII (or the whole world or story for that matter), so I'll just say that gambits allowing me to focus more on exploring wasn't a big draw for me.

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The thing about the overpowered set ups you described for FFT was that they were all end game set-ups. Having the end game unbalanced is something I am far more forgiving of than having it unbalanced at the beginning. As I have mentioned previous, it is when I don't have to tweak my party anymore that I lose interest. (I've also thought up a LOT more OP [MMO shorthand for overpowered] setups than the ones you mentioned. I find thinking of builds that surpassed even the traditional OP builds to be an enjoyable pursuit.)

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I found offensive magic to be completely useless in FFXII, with the spell que and all. Whenever I watch a spell being cast all I can think of the 6 auto attacks I could have landed in that time period and done more damage. And couple that with the fact anyone wanting to heal or buff is put into a holding pattern, every time I used magic it was an un-enjoyable experience.

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I feel XII does offer you a min/max paradise, you just need to look beyond your normal train of thought and experiment, much like you would in Tactics.

Much more to say on this, but leaving for work is a higher priority at the moment.

[Bolivar]

Seriously, everyone should play but especially you and Bolivar.

awww, that's so nice!!!

It's been on my list but like VeloZer0, I just don't know about the high school thing man. What if my girlfriend walked in on me playing that, and I specifically use the term "walked in on" because it might be an awkward moment where I would have to explain (not really she's actually into japanesey stuff like that). I think that's a pretty shallow reason so I should at least give it a shot, what's 30 minutes of my time, right?

Actually I'm gonna check if there's a demo up on the PS Store right now b/c I just got a PSP...

[Wolf Kanno]

Yeah, that whole high school-sim was the reason it wasn't higher on my list to begin with. Having a game world I don't like is a major cause of me not finishing RPGs, I hear FFX-2 had a good battle system but I couldn't even get an hour into the game. I barely got through KH even though I really enjoyed the game, just because I was grating my teeth every time a Disney character was speaking. (except mickey, having him jump off a roof in a black costume and kill a whole bunch of heartless was pretty cool.)

I wouldn't knock it til you try it actually. j/k

This is why I would suggest P4 (going into my other minor complaints with the game) cause its story is the main focus and often you actually need to finish story dungeons before the game will let you fully partake of the high school elements. The amusing thing is the HS sim is probably more comical and fun than I feel detracting and often the Social Links you engage in are actually well thought out especially when start to get into some of the minor depth to the SL system.

P4 is not as involved with the SL system like P3 was, but its no less important which is kinda where I start running into faults cause once again I found myself having the storyline interfere with gameplay and mechanics but I can at least forgive the title cause the plot was very good. Overall, P4 was really built around its New Game+ feature whereas P3 has one but it doesn't serve much of a purpose unless your playing the FES version.

I agree that FFV-FFX didn't offer much of a challenge in item management, I thought about addressing this in my post but decided it made my thoughts wander. The thing is, I played these games like it does matter. I barely use items in my play throughs, so in a way it could be considered an artificially added challenge. As I have said before, if I wasn't aiming for overkills and item/mana conservation in FFX I probably would have found it as boring as you did.

So you "handicapped" yourself

I've remarked in other threads how I really didn't like the enviornments created in FFXII (or the whole world or story for that matter), so I'll just say that gambits allowing me to focus more on exploring wasn't a big draw for me.

Been there, done that, I got your T-Shirt I'll simply agree to disagree and just stick to the fact that we have very different tastes in RPGs.

The thing about the overpowered set ups you described for FFT was that they were all end game set-ups. Having the end game unbalanced is something I am far more forgiving of than having it unbalanced at the beginning. As I have mentioned previous, it is when I don't have to tweak my party anymore that I lose interest. (I've also thought up a LOT more OP [MMO shorthand for overpowered] setups than the ones you mentioned. I find thinking of builds that surpassed even the traditional OP builds to be an enjoyable pursuit.)

A) that is not terribly difficult to accomplish that set up especially in the original with the JP trick, with the exception of the equipment but even then, its not like this build isn't terribly overpowered even with sub-par weapons. Considering the high level increase you would get as well, you could easily waltz through the story mode.

B) If you thought up the builds, why not actually pursue them in the game? You say you enjoy experimentation and building powerful set ups for the title but it just seems to me you played the title, got a bad taste in your mouth for it and refuse to play anymore despite still thinking of ways to utilize the system properly. This is kinda confusing cause you basically say there is no need cause its got one perfect set-up but then say you thought of better set-ups and then go on to say how this is how you've always approached FFT? Once again I feel you are not giving XII a fair chance.

I found offensive magic to be completely useless in FFXII, with the spell que and all. Whenever I watch a spell being cast all I can think of the 6 auto attacks I could have landed in that time period and done more damage. And couple that with the fact anyone wanting to heal or buff is put into a holding pattern, every time I used magic it was an un-enjoyable experience.

The funny thing is that I feel the same way about mages in FFT but it doesn't stop me from trying to make them good and have fun with them. Especially since magic has so many factors to deal with, such as Zodiac affinity, weather, equipment, and Faith. There is no point in using them until you get Calculator and even then why waste your time learning the majority of spells when all your really need is Flare and Holy?

The other problem is that a party of Knights is all you really need to get through the game. You don't need to even bother with most of the other classes. Sure there are better builds but Knights are all you really needs cause they have high attack power even at low levels and shields combo with their class specific Reaction command allows them to block most physical attacks, their high HP allows spells to not really be an issue as well most of the abilites high level classes have are either too slow or too weak to deal with. Knights are ridiculously easy to unlock and they just keep getting stronger as you progress. Once you get Running Shoes their is very little the game can throw at you to beat them. Not to mention when Ramza learns his Brave raising ability you can make them even more lethal but you don't even really need that either.

This is of course also ignoring how overpowered half the story characters are who seriously don't even need the job class system to make it through the end of the game.

I also feel you are exaggerating a bit cause most of the spells have fairly decent cast times with exceptions of end game spells like Flare/Holy/Scathe you also forget Magic has the advantage of hitting multiple targets at once and their are enemies that are much more difficult to kill without magic (Elementals anyone?), a well placed fire spell can clear a room of zombies and XII likes to throw full rooms of zombies at you. Granted, XII is not ridiculously hard but its difficulty is a step up from its predecessor.

I feel XII does offer you a min/max paradise, you just need to look beyond your normal train of thought and experiment, much like you would in Tactics.

Much more to say on this, but leaving for work is a higher priority at the moment.

I look forward to it since I basically gave you examples about how FFT suffers from the same pit falls you've been attributing to XII

Seriously, everyone should play but especially you and Bolivar.

awww, that's so nice!!!

It's been on my list but like VeloZer0, I just don't know about the high school thing man. What if my girlfriend walked in on me playing that, and I specifically use the term "walked in on" because it might be an awkward moment where I would have to explain (not really she's actually into japanesey stuff like that). I think that's a pretty shallow reason so I should at least give it a shot, what's 30 minutes of my time, right?

Actually I'm gonna check if there's a demo up on the PS Store right now b/c I just got a PSP...

Its not really that bad and the beauty is that it actually all builds into the combat system cause you raise certain social stats in the HS parts which allow you to get access to different social links, which grant you powerful EXP. boosts to your Personas when you create them in the Velvet room as well as maxing out the Social Links unlocks powerful Personas to use. Almost every game mechanic in this title goes back into the others, its one cohesive system though its not obvious til you are a ways into the game. As I also said, the stories the SL give you builds a better world and P3 is probably one of the few RPGs in recent memory that made me want to save the world.

[VeloZer0]

In regards to handicapping myself in FFX, sure what I was doing was completely optional, but it is a little different as it is encouraged by the game. There is a 0% chance on the first play through that I am spontaneously going to decide 'hey, why don't I try to kill all the monsters by over 50% of their max hp!'. Had I not done something like this the game would be boring, but I see mountains of distinction between a game mechanic like this and something that the game doesn't encourage at all. (I'm not meaning to say the game itself discourages this either.)

A) that is not terribly difficult to accomplish that set up especially in the original with the JP trick, with the exception of the equipment but even then, its not like this build isn't terribly overpowered even with sub-par weapons. Considering the high level increase you would get as well, you could easily waltz through the story mode.

And how many people would know about the JP trick on the first play through? Unless you are researching for guides on how to play the game you would never know about this, and seeing how we are discussing building games for players who interested in experimenting and min/maxing it seems an inappropriate example. (I know there are people who would do this, and my heart cries for them.)

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The beef I was trying to explain with FFXII was that despite the fact that I am always trying to find ways to do things better I never once felt that there was a good reason to change. I tried experimenting with different weapons/magic at points in the game, but every time I just concluded that what it didn't offer anything more than what I was doing. And talking in a hypothetical sense, I think you can agree that even if a game has the most interesting and involved system in the world if you have to play it through, get into an argument with someone on a forum years later, then go back again to finally experience it, it probably isn't the best designed.

Taking FFT as an example once again (dam, I need a better variety of games I idolize ), when I started the game I set up something I thought was good, but as I played I experimented and learned, all in a big vicious cycle that let to me reading through the entire BMG start to finish several play throughs later. Contrast to FFXII where I looked at my options at the start, set it up, experimented as I went and didn't ever feel like there was something I was missing.

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Which brings me to my next point. I REALLY REALLY wanted to like FFXII. The game reeks of production value, the graphics are stunning for the PS2, the voice acting and character modeling all fit excellently with each other, and the fact that it is a numbered FF title to begin with. I was disparately playing through the game hoping for it to get better, I really wanted to enjoy it. This is one of the reasons that I get so upset about the title, if it was just pure bad I could write it off and be done with it, but (to me) the sheer amount of wasted potential was a crime. Anyways the reason I am writing what must appear such a vicious appraisal of FFXII is to convey that as I was playing I wasn't trying to write the game off, I was desperately trying to find something to like about the game. (For the record I'm talking about plot and game play here, even if plot is outside the scope of this discussion.)

Anyways, I don't think we have more to discuss on this, we are just going to keep rehashing our last page of posts in a cyclical fashion, though if you see some angle we haven't explored I am still game for continuing this.

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On to another topic that has been suggested to me through the course of the last page of discussion. How do you make dungeons still feel dangerous? In the old days of FFI it was simple, just have monster encounters who could wipe out your entire party. Understandably having so many game-overs is not a way to move copies, and in order to become more mainstream you can’t really have the player getting the game-over screen too many times.

To me (I am far from an expert and I know others on th board can dissect the history of FF/RPGs with far more expertise than I can.) it seems like the danger of a dungeon came more in the form of resource management. Resource management was probably more important in FFI than later titles, but the threat of death from random encounters was considerably less in later titles, bringing the threat of running out of resources (I’m using this as a generic term for mana/items) to the forefront. In FFIV I never worried about running into a random encounter that would kill me, but I did worry about running into enemy encounters that would cause me to use to many heals or offensive magic to kill. That way there was still an edge to exploring the dungeon. Taking the side path felt like it was an actual risk, not just something to make the dungeon a little less linear. Fast forward, and when was the last time you felt like you were in peril in a dungeon in an FF title?

I feel they really need to bring this feel of danger in exploring a dungeon back. Obviously having to restart the dungeon numerous times keeps you on your toes, but I don’t think will be the financial success SE needs. Resource management appeals to me, but from what I’ve experienced from players in general, not so much to others.

Any thoughts on this?

[Wolf Kanno]

In regards to handicapping myself in FFX, sure what I was doing was completely optional, but it is a little different as it is encouraged by the game. There is a 0% chance on the first play through that I am spontaneously going to decide 'hey, why don't I try to kill all the monsters by over 50% of their max hp!'. Had I not done something like this the game would be boring, but I see mountains of distinction between a game mechanic like this and something that the game doesn't encourage at all. (I'm not meaning to say the game itself discourages this either.)

I would argue its no different from what I was doing with XII by making jobs. I literally looked at the equipment set-up and said to myself "Hey, I can actually do a makeshift FFTactics Thief with this gear... and looking over here I could make a Paladin... Hmm." so I went into the game looking at what if offered and made what I wanted since the game never made any clarification of how to build my party, it just gave me the tools and I ran with it.

A) that is not terribly difficult to accomplish that set up especially in the original with the JP trick, with the exception of the equipment but even then, its not like this build isn't terribly overpowered even with sub-par weapons. Considering the high level increase you would get as well, you could easily waltz through the story mode.

And how many people would know about the JP trick on the first play through? Unless you are researching for guides on how to play the game you would never know about this, and seeing how we are discussing building games for players who interested in experimenting and min/maxing it seems an inappropriate example. (I know there are people who would do this, and my heart cries for them.)

I'm afraid guides are the norm nowadays, even if they didn't buy the official guide they are probably still looking up Gamefaqs or other sites for ways to get the info. The days of games having little nuance secrets that only the dedicated would discover are long gone.

Also, I would say that building the party set up is still not terribly difficult without the JP trick, as long as you stuck to what you absolutely needed, you could still build this party set-up in a few hours. This is the fundamental flaw of Leveling systems, it takes skill to win a battle in other genres but for RPGs all you need to do is level up. This is why I do enjoy games that discourage power leveling by placing level caps, or lowering the EXP gain from enemies as you get higher in levels or just making the level gaps enormous.

Also, I feel anyone who is interested in min/max will eventually turn to a guide anyway cause there are some things that you will never grasp or notice without one. FFTactics is a prime example as I've been playing the game for years and I still learn new things.

The beef I was trying to explain with FFXII was that despite the fact that I am always trying to find ways to do things better I never once felt that there was a good reason to change. I tried experimenting with different weapons/magic at points in the game, but every time I just concluded that what it didn't offer anything more than what I was doing. And talking in a hypothetical sense, I think you can agree that even if a game has the most interesting and involved system in the world if you have to play it through, get into an argument with someone on a forum years later, then go back again to finally experience it, it probably isn't the best designed.

I feel the best reason to change would be simply cause you were not having fun. To be honest, I never said XII has the best system but I feel its one of the better ones in the series, at least from what I was playing before hand.

As for not "enjoying it the first time around" while I would agree it does not make a system "great" I don't feel it makes it "bad" either. VII and X were both huge disappointments for myself but I still at least went back and tried them both out some more and really began to experiment with them more. X unfortunately is far too linear and is difficulty is non-existent so even though I've played three times, I find I dislike the game more each time I play it.

VII was a completely different story and I do have to give a bit of a shout out to Bolivar cause our arguing back and forth on VI and VII's battle systems made me eventually go back and really play with it a few times and I guess I finally got my "eureka" moment cause I do feel VII has a fun combat system if a bit too unbalanced for my taste (my main gripes for the system still stand). A recent playthrough of VIII was creating a similar effect. So yes, while I can agree its not a great system I don't feel it necessarily means you can truly write it off either.

Taking FFT as an example once again (dam, I need a better variety of games I idolize ), when I started the game I set up something I thought was good, but as I played I experimented and learned, all in a big vicious cycle that let to me reading through the entire BMG start to finish several play throughs later. Contrast to FFXII where I looked at my options at the start, set it up, experimented as I went and didn't ever feel like there was something I was missing.

Though your options for min/max are wide in the game and it is what brings me back, I guess the lack of the games storyline difficulty by end game sorta cheapens godhood for me. I've gotten good enough with FFTs system that I actually do have to hold myself back (I had a playthrough where I made Delita a Mastered Knight/ Squire/ Chemist and he was almost finished with Black Mage before I fought Algus). So I usually stick to using generics cause the story characters are too powerful or unbalanced in a lot of cases. Its almost getting to the point where I've been playing with rules about not using Ramza.

So while I discover new things to try and do, I kinda know in the back of my head that its kinda pointless cause the game can't offer anything challenging enough not to mention that FFT does have its fair share of "game breaking" elements (Cid and Balthier anyone?). What ultimately does ruin my min/max joys is when the game offers something that makes it all seem worthless. This goes into my gripe of VI and VII where I would build elaborate set-ups and tell friends about it only to have them retort, "that's cool but I just Quick/Ultima on Kefka or I used KoTR on Sephiroth". Kinda kills the buzz and that is what real game breakers are for me. Just a little side rant I guess.

Which brings me to my next point. I REALLY REALLY wanted to like FFXII. The game reeks of production value, the graphics are stunning for the PS2, the voice acting and character modeling all fit excellently with each other, and the fact that it is a numbered FF title to begin with. I was disparately playing through the game hoping for it to get better, I really wanted to enjoy it. This is one of the reasons that I get so upset about the title, if it was just pure bad I could write it off and be done with it, but (to me) the sheer amount of wasted potential was a crime. Anyways the reason I am writing what must appear such a vicious appraisal of FFXII is to convey that as I was playing I wasn't trying to write the game off, I was desperately trying to find something to like about the game. (For the record I'm talking about plot and game play here, even if plot is outside the scope of this discussion.)

I can't argue, I have similar problems with VII, VIII, and X... well no I've decided X is just bad

Anyways, I don't think we have more to discuss on this, we are just going to keep rehashing our last page of posts in a cyclical fashion, though if you see some angle we haven't explored I am still game for continuing this.

I guess we have derailed the discussion long enough

On to another topic that has been suggested to me through the course of the last page of discussion. How do you make dungeons still feel dangerous? In the old days of FFI it was simple, just have monster encounters who could wipe out your entire party. Understandably having so many game-overs is not a way to move copies, and in order to become more mainstream you can’t really have the player getting the game-over screen too many times.

To me (I am far from an expert and I know others on th board can dissect the history of FF/RPGs with far more expertise than I can.) it seems like the danger of a dungeon came more in the form of resource management. Resource management was probably more important in FFI than later titles, but the threat of death from random encounters was considerably less in later titles, bringing the threat of running out of resources (I’m using this as a generic term for mana/items) to the forefront. In FFIV I never worried about running into a random encounter that would kill me, but I did worry about running into enemy encounters that would cause me to use to many heals or offensive magic to kill. That way there was still an edge to exploring the dungeon. Taking the side path felt like it was an actual risk, not just something to make the dungeon a little less linear. Fast forward, and when was the last time you felt like you were in peril in a dungeon in an FF title?

I feel they really need to bring this feel of danger in exploring a dungeon back. Obviously having to restart the dungeon numerous times keeps you on your toes, but I don’t think will be the financial success SE needs. Resource management appeals to me, but from what I’ve experienced from players in general, not so much to others.

Any thoughts on this?

Dungeon design is terribly tricky and I feel XIII has, if anything, brought this into the forefront of discussions for fans and lines are being drawn.

Item management is fun but it bugs me when its the core challenge aspect like in early FF games or the DQ series. I can't say I don't like it either since there is plenty of this in the Persona/SMT series. MP restoring items are like priceless artifacts that come from another age in those games and due to physical abilites costing HP from your characters, you will burn through items quickly so item management is imperative.

I feel the best way to make a dungeon more challenging would be to enact certain rules upon the player that limit their capabilities. Not counting overall stuff like level caps, I'm thinking more like the Dark Elf cave from FFIV where you suddenly found yourself having to weaken your party in a cave filled with creatures that really require you to have top gear. Its one of the more definitive dungeons for me cause I feel its the point in the game where you suddenly realize the strategy behind the class system in this game. You lose your front line tank and force him to become your squishy healer.

I got a kick out of this with the optional Esper battles as well when they began to enforce rules upon you that limit your options and force your to change your strategies. Losing the ability to use Fight or Magic commands don't seem so bad when you hear it but after experiencing it its another story. Imagine a swamp that has a thick mist that prevents magic from being used and its also poisonous, forcing you to plow through your items and have to manage them carefully. Lets also say you can't where heavy armor or your party will sink as well, forcing your heavy melee characters to take more damage than normal. What if the melee characters followed SMT rules and thus physical special attacks consume HP... Granted this scenario would probably be too much for scrubs and people who only want to play the game for the story but this is at least where I would go with it.

Course the dungeon would still have to be a maze cause it would lose its frightening effect if it were just a simple line.

I would also maybe implement puzzles that change the effects of the dungeon for the player. Most puzzles simply involve opening a way to the next area or getting out of the dungeon but what if your choices changed the nature of the dungeon itself? Trying to take the easy way out makes the enemies much more powerful, your party may be forced to run a lot and lose valuable experience and items and thus the game becomes harder. You could cause an earthquake that transformed a simple dungeon into a massive labyrinth with dead ends but lots of loot and consequently lots of encounter. You could cut down the encounters or make the enemies weaker but this creates multiple new puzzles you must solve to get past the nefarious lair. Of course to make this seamless it will be a combination of factors and you may never know what choices you make will effect the place.

I feel their are multiple ways to do this that remain untapped, but if RPGs continue the trend of "interactive movies" this will never really come to pass.

[VeloZer0]

One thing I do have to add on your concept of dungeon design, a design like that is extremely gimmicky IF it isn't done consistently. I absolutely loath when I've gone half way through the game and I encounter an area that requires a complete shift from what I was doing the whole rest of the game. It just screams "gimick!" to me and makes me lose a whole lot of enthusiasm for the game.

Conversely if the areas are diversified as a general rule and you are constantly having to change your set up/tactics then each new area is an interesting challenge, not some contrived way to break up the monotony.

Woo! Short post.

[Wolf Kanno]

That's where a lot of games fail, they come up with interesting ideas and it either is not as consistent or it somehow backfires and destroys the playability of a game.

I feel it happens a lot in titles that put too much emphasis on the narrative or other non-game related parts, which eventually makes the game design stale in order to tell a stronger story. This is sorta the reason why I advocate combining storytelling with game design instead of treating them as separate entities. The other problem is that I feel often than not, RPG designers feel all they have to do is make a good battle system and then they are done with "gameplay" which I also feel is a very bad way of looking at game design cause I feel RPGs are more than a battle system with a stat based experience system.

The few ideas I suggested above could easily be translated into a scenario to make the changes in the dungeon feel like part of the plot instead of just "this dungeons gimmick".