[POLL] WHEN PLAYING INDIE RPGS, WHAT GAME-LENGTH DO YOU LOOK FOR?

Poll

What's your prefered game-length when you look for games on this site? - Results

An Hour or Less
2
4%
1 to 3 Hours
6
13%
3 to 5 Hours
6
13%
5 to 10 Hours
11
24%
10 to 20 Hours
2
4%
20 to 35 Hours
1
2%
More than 35 Hours
5
11%
It varies depending on my mood
12
26%

Posts

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I meant to click "Varies depending on mood" orz.
I agree with a lot of what people said about longer games tending to mean lots of filler. I generally steer clear of games that tout length as their main selling point. Because is it 40 hours of a well developed story or 40 hours of grinding, farming, minigames and/or npc driven sidequests? Unless a game has a mechanic that I am in love with that feels good to just PLAY, I tend to get bored of it since there's no hook for me to rely on in between cutscenes.
Stories that get right to the point appeal to me more as well. So for games like visual novels and dating sims, I tend to like the shorter ones.

Idk maybe I just have crap attention skills. I'd rather finish a game fast and want more than give up halfway because they threw everything in the pot for length-sake.
I feel Red_Nova, slash and Max McGee on this one. The more time I spend playing games, I unconsciously have this thing in the back of my mind going: "You could actually be productive and be making one of these yourself but nooooooo, you're playing somebody else's one and that means you won't ever have a completed game under your own belt." And then I quit the game and open up RPG Maker and stare at it for 10 minutes wondering what the heck I'm supposed to do, and then just watch short YouTube videos so I don't feel so bad about myself (it has the same effect).

In short, if I really want to be productive throughout my day, I have to create a to-do list and stick through it, no matter how hard it is. And for a personality type like that, sticking through a 45+ hour RPG may be rather difficult, except if the game is the best game ever devised.
Ratty524
The 524 is for 524 Stone Crabs
12986
I sort of chose "It varies depending on my mood" because I could care less about hours in any game. The game needs to have what it should have, and what you are doing within the game needs to be enjoyable enough to leave you satisfied by the end of it.

So... I think the answer is "as long as it should be?"
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
Oh, and from a developer perspective: fuck. I don't know. LONG is really hard. Like, it seems like I have to labor for 80+ hours to produce an hour of decent gameplay these days.
It really depends, though. We all know that it's impossible to scale gameplay hours with design hours because before you design the games' hours you have to design the game itself. And honestly, if you have already designed your setting and characters, then new gameplay hours can be potentially faster to design than to play. (actually not if you consider the time spent building the world, system, characters, etc.)

And also, the longer the game, the smaller the difference between dev hours and gameplay hours (in general) because you still have to flesh out a world for both the 2-hour game and the 20-hour game. It really depends on the approach, but 20 equals 10 times 2. However it's not like a 20 hour game will have a setting 10 times as big as the 2 hour one, unless you switch all characters every 2 hours xD

i hope i'm being clear

anyway, I like both long and short games. The game has to be what it wants to be. If it isn't... well, then it's a frustrated project and it probably sucks xD
LouisCyphre
can't make a bad game if you don't finish any games
4523
author=Max McGee
Some Games Recently Classified As Good And Added to my "Videogame Collection":
Dragon's Descendants by Craze

>:( (link)
I prefer short games (an hour or less). Not that I have anything against long(er) games, or that I do not play them, but I just lose interest quickly. Add to the fact that short games tend to have smaller file sizes and, therefore, shorter idle time spent downloading and more time to be allocated on the actual playing.

Also, short games (in theory) are more likely to be well-polished and crafted, since the game was finished before the developer loses interest in working (due to various reasons). The developer has also spent more time and attention on each individual facet in the game, since there aren't that many of them in the first place (as compared to an epic-length game that will have thousands of individual parts that the developer should sort out).

But that's just my theory. Prove me wrong, if felt necessary.
With all the necessary caveats about a good short game being better than a bad long one, not adding unnecessary fluff, etc., I'd say I generally prefer upwards of ten hours. There are a lot of kinds of storylines where I feel like they can't really be conveyed properly in a timespan that you can experience in a single sitting. Not every game has to have that kind of storyline, but my favorite ones generally do.

Different stories are suited to different media, and I feel like a one-hour story isn't usually taking advantage of the medium-specific strengths of video games.
I feel like 5-10 hours is a good point to aim for unless the game is a compelling tour de force. I feel like this seems to be the general guideline recently, 8-10 hours seems like a good amount of time to spend with a game. Granted I feel like RPGs, due to their nature, probably should cater to a little bit more padding, though I'd prefer the filler to enhance the main game and not feel too disconnected.
Even the best game gets boring after 30 hours, but most games here get boring a lot faster, so let's say 20 hours tops. There is no real limit on how short the game can be as they are all free and I won't feel ripped off when it ends after an hour already. Though I guess at least one hour is needed to even get into the game mood.

So my reply would be 1-20 hours.
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
author=LouisCyphre
author=Max McGee
Some Games Recently Classified As Good And Added to my "Videogame Collection":
Dragon's Descendants by Craze
>:( (link)

I am really sorry. I was typing that post in a huge hurry and I actually thought to myself like (hmm was that one Craze & LC or just Craze I think it was just Craze shit I should really check but gotta go!).

so, yeah...

MY BAD DUDE!!
Corfaisus
"It's frustrating because - as much as Corf is otherwise an irredeemable person - his 2k/3 mapping is on point." ~ psy_wombats
7874
author=RyaReisender
Even the best game gets boring after 30 hours


I don't know about that. I played Final Fantasy 9 for over 100 hours because I wanted to get all the abilities and cards.
unity
You're magical to me.
12540
What I love about RMN, as I can ask a fairly simple question like this and learn so many interesting things from everyone's answers! :D You all are the best! <3

author=Max McGee
Some Games Recently Classified As Good And Added to my "Videogame Collection":
Vagabond by Zeuzio
Dragon's Descendants by Craze
Luxaren Allure by unity
I Miss The Sunrise by deltree

And I'm SUPER-HONORED that Luxaren Allure is in this category! I can't even tell you how much :DDDDDD
author=unity
I just wanted to get a general consensus about what sort of length people look for when they download games off of this site. Before I came here, I always wanted to make huge 20, 30, or even 40+ hour RPGs, but that has the drawback of me getting bored with the project or me making a game so big in scope that I could work on it for a decade and not be done. (And thus I have several big incomplete RPG Maker 2000 and XP games lying around XD). It was only relatively recently that I learned the joy of making shorter games.

But today I'm specifically looking for what length you, as a player, like to play, when it comes to RPG Maker and other indie RPG games.


Life gets in the way for me. I'll probably play 1 game at a time that's over 10 hours, while 2 or 3 under 10 hours at the same time.

It's also common these days to break the game into episodes.

In any case 5 to 10 hours is about the most for me. I'll play games longer than that, but I usually reserve those primarily to when I have time off at work.
Cap_H
DIGITAL IDENTITY CRISIS
6625
My problem is, I am hoarder. I have this huge pile of games all over my Steam library, RPG folder, my room. And they are great games and I've never played them. I'm too lazy to download them, knowing I would probably spend hours in them. I know I would enjoy it. I'm just so idle kind of person. I was convincing myself for two days before plaing Pizza's Carpan.
So that kinda is why I am more likely to download shorter game (the shorter the better), but It doesn't mean I don't like long epic adventures. I am crazy for them. I just hasitate to start plaing em.
I don't usually look for length in games because.. it doesn't matter, i'll stop playing a game if it can't keep my interest the next day regardless if it is a 1 hour game or a 40 hours epic (the catch can be interesting gameplay features,genuine interest in the world or characters, even the theme of the game...)

What can really make me decide "nop, not gonna play it" is the download size. You see i forgot to play things over the 300~400mb download size (slow internet connection). The download finish but, since i mostly play 2 hours at night, i'm already focused in another entertaining task, and the downloaded file ends up forgotten along other unlucky took-forever-to-get games.
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