Slow build up or jump into the action?

[Skyblade]

SMT IV rewards you for sticking with it, which is really the definition of slow-paced Seriously, that medieval kingdom? (SPOILER)Pretty soon you find out it's on top of modern Tokyo, which is where the game proper actually begins, which is a good eight hours in.

Does that eight hours include the resetting after deaths and the exploration of miles of repetitive dungeon? Or is it actually about thirty hours in that it starts to explain what's going on?

We are talking about pacing of the action here. And both Nocturne and SMT IV threw me into the action so fast (and the action was of such annoying difficulty), that I never cared enough to bother with the rest of the game.

This is the problem with jumping right into the action. If there's too much action (and especially if the action is too hard), then it becomes a block to the rest of the story. And if that action comes BEFORE the story, then the player has absolutely no reason to continue.

"Oh, hey, there's all the awesome story, you just have to wade through twenty hours of boring, repetitive, and difficult combat to get to it!"

Sorry, I'm not going to take the game's word for it. If it introduces me to the world first, if it lets me see what's going on, gives me a reason to engage it, then it gives me a reason to fight for it. I'll press on and engage the combat because I WANT to. Because I care about the world, the NPCs, the story, etcetera. I WANT to see how things turn out, and I press through because of this.

This is where SMT fails. It just tells you what to do, without giving the player any actual motivation to do it. Because it doesn't take the time to set that motivation up. It just goes: Here's the dungeon. Go to it, and I'll get back to you in thirty hours.

I can't even think of an SMT game that starts you in the action. The franchise is kind of known for being slow builds with Nocturne probably being fastest turnaround and even then, it's not like you jump into fighting demons after you press start. You probably get into your first actual battle fifteen minutes into the game after being introduced to the whole human cast. Persona is even slower in the beginning sections.

You're introduced to them, in a "hello, this is such-and-such" type manner. You don't get to really KNOW them. Then you're in a dungeon for an hour and a half and you die five times and you just give up and forget about it because you have no connection to the characters or world, and don't care enough to finish.

Maybe that's just me, but both Nocturne and SMT IV got that reaction out of me. I didn't actually KNOW the characters, and I didn't have any reason to care about getting them to the end of the dungeon. I didn't learn enough about the world to care about saving it. It wasn't worth the trouble. Too much action early on, without setting up what it needed to make me want to finish, and the stupid difficulty just made it all worse.

The slow start of the Persona games actually helped. You're introduced to all the characters in a way that lets you see their personality, actually start to care about them as characters, and engage with the world before being forced to fight for your life. What's more, since the games are based in our world, you already have a reason to care about it. Unlike SMT IV, which is set in some strange pseudo medieval world, from what I could tell, that I didn't care about at all. Or Nocturne, in which our world is destroyed in the first fifteen seconds, so you're thrust into a blasted hellscape that gives you nothing to care about or fight for.

Okay, couple points here.
A) SMT is not exactly a character driven franchise. In fact in the case of Nocturne, there are probably only two sympathetic figures in the whole plot. Your homeroom teacher (whose the key to getting the "happy" ending if you play your cards right) and the Manikins. The rest of those opening characters are not figures to feel bad for. You do because bad things happen to them as the story progresses which feeds their psychosis but they all represent a possible choice you can make. SMT has always been less about gripping character stories (though the series does have some even if they are rarely the focus and more subtle than the usual JRPG fare) and more about the concepts and ideologies that it explores. Nocturne asks what ideology would you rebuild the world with, and how far would one be willing to make their ideal world a reality. SMTIV explores the dangers of ignorance and the consequences of ones choices. The games do a bit more to make you an active participant in the proceedings rather than a semi-active observer of other characters making these choices. They have great stories, they are just not given to the player in the conventional manner most players are use to. You need to approach them less like FF and DQ and more like Elder Scrolls and Dark Souls.

There's a reason why, despite owning Dark Souls, I never actually turned the game on. I need more reason to play a game than "oh, there's a lot of depth if you slog through thousands of hours of difficult gameplay". There's also a reason why I gave up on Skyrim after the first fifteen minutes. It thrust me into a world I didn't care about, gave me little to no background, and expected me to engage with it despite incredibly tedious mechanics (seriously, it's like fifteen minutes of walking with nothing interesting going on just to get to your second quest location), and nothing happening except incredibly boring combat.

It's not an approach to game design that at all appeals to me.

B) You're focusing too much on the old world, the new world is about exploring and learning what is going on. You're not really in the wastelands of destroyed earth, you're in a parallel world made of remnants of old Tokyo but ultimately you're in an egg. You don't really begin to understand what is going on until you reach the second actual "dungeon". I kind of feel like you gave up in frustration before really scratching the surface of the games.

Yes, I did give up in frustration before scratching the surface. Because the game didn't make me care.

There were some frustrating boss fights and sections in Persona (especially the boss of Heaven in Persona 4 when I was rushing through massively under leveled). But I wanted to work through those fights because I cared enough to see them through. The fights were tough, but I wanted to see what came next, where things went, so I worked at them until I overcame them.

Shin Megami Tensei isn't willing to take the time to properly set up the motivation for the player. So I quit. There are plenty of other games I can play without needing to waste my time with combat I don't enjoy for characters and situations I care nothing about.

C. You actually get quite a bit of build up with the Eastern Kingdom of Mikado in SMTIV. Talking to the residents reveals a lot about the world and the other characters actually travel with you like a party so you do get their input as the story progresses. Frankly Jonathon, Walter, and Isabeau are easily the most sympathetic companions you'll get in the franchise and it can be pretty heart wrenching to watch their fates unfold as the truth about Naraku and the true form of the world begins to slowly tear the group apart on ideological issues. Also, SMTIV will almost never give you a straight answer. At no point does the game ever really stop you to sit you down and explain cohesively what is actually going on, instead you have to piece together everything by talking to NPCs and exploring all the ending paths. Honestly SMTIV's plot is pretty rocking and SMTIII does a similar thing as well.

I don't know. I talk to everyone in every town every opportunity I get (I literally talk to every NPC every single day in Persona, for example). I spoke to about fifteen characters, tops, before I wound up in the first dungeon in SMT IV, and just as few in Nocturne.

On the other hand, a game like Suikoden V does start you in the middle of a mission but the actual plot and story doesn't really kick off until 10 to 15 hours later after fully immersing yourself in the whole political dynamics of Falena.

It doesn't need plot and story if it gives you a reason to care about its characters and fight for them. Though at this point, it just sounds like I should avoid playing Suikoden.

Actually it just takes the game a while to explain why you should care. The first 10 hours is basically introducing all of the characters, the kingdoms politics, and setting up the situation that will kick start the actual main part of the game where you're recruiting people and fighting your war. It's probably the worse offender in the franchise but frankly the game needs it because the politics get complicated, so it needs the drawn out opening to help the player immerse themselves in the world and care about the characters. It's actually a fantastic series if you ask me.

If it expects me to do a bunch of boring combat before I actually get to a situation I care about, then I'm going to skip it. The tediousness and the difficulty isn't worth the eventual payoff years down the line. If the game can't give me a reason to care about the fighting, the fighting had either be damned enjoyable, easy as hell (so that you can get through it quickly), or a very, VERY small part of the game.

SMT fails on all of these counts. Combat is boring. Combat is difficult. And Combat is 90% of the early game. If Suikoden is anything like that, I'm fine not playing it.