Are all games equal? Should they be?

[Mirage]

Again, how flawed the actual system is really depends on who you ask. The same was true for FFVIII, FFX, FFXII, FFXIII...


Like, I was convinced the FFXIII character progression system was objectively terrible, but there were people who actually sincerely enjoyed it, so the problem was really that it just didn't fit into my sensibilities. And apparently your friend who has played many RPGs apparently has a specific taste (as we all do) that prevented him from enjoying both XIII and XV from a design perspective.


That's kind of the whole point that I've recently discovered, mainly as pertains to video games, but also writing literature. People will tell you there are good and bad ways to write, but in the end there's no one recipe on how to make a story work. Some of the best, most influential work has been stuff that has defined the established rules, and yet every online writing community just keeps trying to establish rules of "writing the right way". Same with games, really - so many people are saying stuff needs to be done one way or another, but in the end, everybody's personal experience with that game will differ and due to various variables, someone may consider a system you think is obnectively terrible - fun and complex.

Having a progression system that was literally "press x to become stronger" and nothing else would be outside of established rules too. If you like that, you simply don't like rpgs. if you were writing a story, it'd be like pitching a book as a sci-fi when it in fact took place the 1800s with no fiction related to science, you would also be well outside of established rules. And you'd also be blatantly lying. There comes a point where you're simply not making the game/writing the book you're claiming to make/write. That's of course not saying that no one can like it, just that you're being very dishonest about what you're trying to sell. Surely there will be some part of the audience that is fine with both what they were promised and what they got, even if they were completely different things.

Bringing up FFX and FFXIII as examples is a good opportunity for me though. FFXIII essentially has a sphere grid with a fraction of the complexity of that of FFX, and coincidentally also just a fraction of player choice. FFXV continues the trend with only a fraction of the complexity of the crystarium, and again just a fraction of the player choice the crystarium gave you. This clearly looks like a trend that goes straight to my earlier (admittedly hyperbolic) "press x to get stronger". Who knows, maybe that's what we'll have in FF16?