What is wrong with Turn-Based Combat?

[Skyblade]

Since the announcement of the change to Final Fantasy VII Remake's battle system, I've found myself asking this question over and over, and I've finally found it crystallized in Jim Sterling's recent broadcast.



Can someone tell me, what is wrong with Turn-Based combat? What made these games the utter pariah that they are today? What makes companies like Square ignore the empirical evidence of releases like Bravely Default shattering all sales expectations? And why can't Square actually REMAKE a game without ruining the battle system that helped make it great in the first place?

[Fynn]

It's not that it doesn't work, it's that real time is easier to process for people, which is why the mainstream puts pressure on action based combat.

Bravely Default did good... for a handheld game that was expected to be extremely niche. It had far from the cultural influence games like The Witcher and other RPGs had. Literally no one aside from old school RPG and anime fans played it. It was a love letter towards us. Whereas FFVII:R is means to reach a wide audience.

Compare this to movies, where slow, thoughtful, subtle independent titles can be more poignant and even rewarding from what has mass appeal, but in the past, slower movies WERE part of the mainstream.

Short answer: times are changing. Does that mean there's something wrong with turn based combat? Hell no. I want it there just like any other person. But the mainstream has little patience for that now that all games in it are so action-centered.

I'm actually okay with this, unless someone comes up to say turn based systems need to die and FF needs to quit making them. Yeah, let's just make all the games the same, because things that are different are inherently inferior and diversity should be eliminated

On that note, I'm still in the "yay" camp when it comes to the remake as I'm really curious what they'll make it work like. I usually prefer for remakes to do things differently because really, when will you try different things for a game if not in a remake?

[Pumpkin]

I prefer turn-based, personally, but both are fine I guess. It's probably a more accessible thing like Fynn mentioned. I do miss turn-based though as it seems to be in less and less games

[Shauna]

Nothing. The AAA game industry thinks there is though, so that's all that matters to them.

[fat_moogle]

There's nothing wrong with it, but it could be seen as a little slow. Why else would Square Enix launch Final Fantasy VII on PS4 with the 3 X speed? I've just literally started playing the game with this setting.

[Zeldy]

As a Nintendo gamer born and bred, I enjoyed the turn-based combat on FF7 as it was different and it set playstation apart, to me.

edit - i mean pre-paper mario ofc.

I'm disappointed they're ruining FF7 in that way. A game so perfect - it doesn't even require any work, I'll take the box hands over HD graphics any day.

[Fox]

But the mainstream has little patience for that now that all games in it are so action-centered.

That was kinda Hatsune Miku's point though - where's the evidence for that?

Imagine if someone said: "Well, Call of Duty is still selling millions every year, but we've had first person shooting since Wolfenstein 3D, and it's therefore a dated mechanic that we need to stop using because the mainstream are sick of it".

Think back to Final Fantasy X. Very popular game, sold a lot, beloved to this very day. And that was the opposite of getting more realtime, that took away the ATB and slowed the pace. It was great and there was no issue with it as far as I can tell. X-2 then reintroduced the ATB in a very creative way, and pretty much the only thing consistently praised about that game is the battle system. Then... they just sort of stopped. And I can't figure it out. I can't see that crossover point where the 'mainstream' started being sick of mechanics that they've been perfectly happy with for nigh on twenty years.

[Skyblade]

But the mainstream has little patience for that now that all games in it are so action-centered.

That was kinda Hatsune Miku's point though - where's the evidence for that?

Imagine if someone said: "Well, Call of Duty is still selling millions every year, but we've had first person shooting since Wolfenstein 3D, and it's therefore a dated mechanic that we need to stop using because the mainstream are sick of it".

Think back to Final Fantasy X. Very popular game, sold a lot, beloved to this very day. And that was the opposite of getting more realtime, that took away the ATB and slowed the pace. It was great and there was no issue with it as far as I can tell. X-2 then reintroduced the ATB in a very creative way, and pretty much the only thing consistently praised about that game is the battle system. Then... they just sort of stopped. And I can't figure it out. I can't see that crossover point where the 'mainstream' started being sick of mechanics that they've been perfectly happy with for nigh on twenty years.

"Adventure games are dead, the genre has been incorporated into others and will never be successful again!"

Then Telltale makes millions off of an abandoned genre that the mainstream ignored.

It's not as though the original PlayStation was over saturated with turn based games. Most of the titles for the system were action games, exactly the way the current console lineup is. But then FFVII came out with a turn based system, and became a gaming icon.

But now Square is abandoning a system that has proven wildly successful every time they've used it, and doing so on the one game that could benefit most from a turn-based approach. A remake of the game that showed the world how good slowing things down could be.

[Fynn]

But the mainstream has little patience for that now that all games in it are so action-centered.

That was kinda Hatsune Miku's point though - where's the evidence for that?

Imagine if someone said: "Well, Call of Duty is still selling millions every year, but we've had first person shooting since Wolfenstein 3D, and it's therefore a dated mechanic that we need to stop using because the mainstream are sick of it".

Think back to Final Fantasy X. Very popular game, sold a lot, beloved to this very day. And that was the opposite of getting more realtime, that took away the ATB and slowed the pace. It was great and there was no issue with it as far as I can tell. X-2 then reintroduced the ATB in a very creative way, and pretty much the only thing consistently praised about that game is the battle system. Then... they just sort of stopped. And I can't figure it out. I can't see that crossover point where the 'mainstream' started being sick of mechanics that they've been perfectly happy with for nigh on twenty years.

I know it's bizarre, but at some point it just happened. I think at a time there were five EoFF newbies in a row that would begin their posting with a thread about how the turn-based systems are holding back FF. It's pretty weird.

So it's no wonder SE wants to do it that way since the remake is damage control for if FFXV does poorly (we all know it) so they just want to be sure they get the most money possible.

[Skyblade]

But the mainstream has little patience for that now that all games in it are so action-centered.

That was kinda Hatsune Miku's point though - where's the evidence for that?

Imagine if someone said: "Well, Call of Duty is still selling millions every year, but we've had first person shooting since Wolfenstein 3D, and it's therefore a dated mechanic that we need to stop using because the mainstream are sick of it".

Think back to Final Fantasy X. Very popular game, sold a lot, beloved to this very day. And that was the opposite of getting more realtime, that took away the ATB and slowed the pace. It was great and there was no issue with it as far as I can tell. X-2 then reintroduced the ATB in a very creative way, and pretty much the only thing consistently praised about that game is the battle system. Then... they just sort of stopped. And I can't figure it out. I can't see that crossover point where the 'mainstream' started being sick of mechanics that they've been perfectly happy with for nigh on twenty years.

I know it's bizarre, but at some point it just happened. I think at a time there were five EoFF newbies in a row that would begin their posting with a thread about how the turn-based systems are holding back FF. It's pretty weird.

So it's no wonder SE wants to do it that way since the remake is damage control for if FFXV does poorly (we all know it) so they just want to be sure they get the most money possible.

Wouldn't it make more sense for the backup to be a game that plays differently?

[Scotty_ffgamer]

Do we even know that VII isn't more atb based yet? Something like XII with the free roaming, though a little quicker paced.

[Shauna]

I know it's bizarre, but at some point it just happened. I think at a time there were five EoFF newbies in a row that would begin their posting with a thread about how the turn-based systems are holding back FF. It's pretty weird.

Are these people just parroting what the industry is telling them, though? Because if that's the hot new trend of people on the internet, then you'll hear it from everyone.

[Wolf Kanno]

Fans have been whining about turn based combat since FFVII and probably before that when the genre was still niche. FFX's combat was also criticized for being slow, which is why X-2 brought back ATB and sped it up to make it faster. Even Hiroyuki Ito has said that ATB was a just a means to an end and believes that action elements will eventually overtake the genre as a natural evolution. This is not to say ATB/Turn Base is dead, just that it was probably going to become niche eventually.

For some fans, with the advent of more realistic graphics, the idea of people standing around waiting for their turn to look silly, especially as graphics and visuals get better. It just takes people out of the immersion which is something gamers have been saying since VII took the graphical leap to 3D. Another factor to remember is that the current generation of gamers didn't really grow up with such a system like many of us did. Such systems have been slowly fazed out of the genre for the last 15 odd years and its been ages since we saw a true Turn Base title that was universally popular. Lots of niche love but not something on VII's scale. The advent of the new generation of WRPG that focuses more on exploration and utilizes real time combat has also meant that while some of us have no real issues with ATB/Turn Based combat, that style of gaming is not what a percentage of the demographic grew up on. Another issue here is that in the last few years lack of strong RPG games that feature this style of combat on console, the genre and the old ways of doing things have flourished on handhelds which has created a new stigma that Turn Base combat is fine, but only works on lower tech titles and could never really work on a modern console system like it used to. Had a long argument with a friend about this when he said that while he enjoyed something like Bravery Default, he couldn't really see it working as a high end AAA title on console. He basically said Turn Base is for handhelds and Action-RPGs are for consoles. While I disagreed, it's difficult to get a word in when arguing with him.

I pretty much knew with most of Squenix's trends lately that the VII remake would have a more Action-RPG style to it. I'm sure it will be a cross between Crisis Core with some elements of ATB involved, but it will feel closer to KH than classic FF. I feel Bravery Default is what launched SE into making Tokyo RPG Factory and if you really want to see ATB make it back to console, it will come down to how those games work out on the PS4 compared to the Vita, as well as World of Final Fantasy. It's interesting how SE is trying to make their new generation of games for both console and handheld. I'm not sure if its just them covering their bases dealing with Japanese and Western tastes on gaming preference, but I'm sure they are looking at it closely.

[maybee]

Alot of the younger generation seem to prefer action based rpgs because they're just quicker and they're less complicated, and they have grown up with games like Kingdom Hearts and Crisis Core and just prefer that system- Square could be just aiming towards the teens and tweens because they're going to be the ones able to buy the games and play them the most and won't be affected by things like work, babies, married life etc.

Not to mention it's the younger ones who have been complaining about FF VII's graphics and refusing to play the OG because of the graphics, while adults don't mind/ could care less- so Square might as well try and aim for the younger fanbases, while throw the oldies a bone now and again.

TL;DR- We are old grandpa's and grandma's and times are changing.

[Depression Moon]

Wolf Kanno is Pokemon not popular anymore?

I know Pokemon isn't as popular with people my little brother's age, but the anime is still ongoing so I figure maybe?