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Rhyme
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@LockeZ: I think our definition of work is a little different. There's putting in effort and there's feeling like you're completely bored and annoyed and just want the game to end because dear god this game is so fucking tedious why am I being made to jump through all these hoops just to get the fucking item I need to get to the last boss? wtf, why are you making me spend 20 hours on grinding just because you can't make a game challenging without making me bored to fuck and back? :/
When I say work, what I mean isn't challenge. I mean menial boredom. I mean grinding the same fucking battles for a pittance of exp in order to get up one level out of ten, even though I've fought every fucking battle in this game. I mean having to get that one rare drop from that obnoxiously designed enemy just to move on to the next stage. Boring shit that pads out a game for no reason and adds no challenge at all.
If your game is built around doing x for x time - outside of the normal interactions that happen normally - then you have an issue. There's a huge difference between fighting a boss three times because it has multiple changes in it's AI and is a legit terror to beat on any level, and having to grind an extra 20 levels just to be able to go toe to toe against your boss because you gave it 2000000 extra HP for the sake of 'challenge'. If your idea of challenge is 'up the stats' then there's a fucking issue there that needs addressing. No boss should ever just be a case of 'this monster... but with bigger numbers'.
The challenge should be in figuring out the 'puzzle' of the monster, reacting to what it does with it's turn and finding the way forward through the fight, not 'get bigger numbers because that will make bigger numbers'.
If a boss can be beaten by just* bigger numbers, I say it's a shitty boss and you're a shitty designer (no offence).
*Figured I'd need to bold that because people on this site can't read.
I actually have a really good example of this kind of game from last years IGMC. There was a neat looking game called Attack on Playtime. Cute graphics, interesting idea and the battle system was fresh and interesting... to start with. However, all you did was fight. And fight. And fight. And fight. And fight. Over and over and over again.
Here, let me post the notes I wrote for it - it'll give a really good idea of what I mean:
ATTACK ON TIDY! PLAYTIME'S OVER
Presentation
- Amost all custom art that is cute and fits together well
- Sound is RTP music and default sound effects
- Window is default, too
- No spelling/grammar/etc issues
- Characters are pretty well-written for what there is of dialogue
Gameplay
- Battles are DBS with the addition of a timed attack/defence bonus.
- I was told I learned Star Fall after a battle only to not have the spell appear.
- Menu could have been pared down to only the necessary parts. Certain areas weren't used (Equipment) or needed (Detailed Status).
- There was minor lag during battles - probably due to the timed bonus script.
- Battles were well balanced for the most part but required insane amounts of grinding to eventually beat. Some monsters would wipe the floor with you even if you were at the level to beat them.
Fun factor
- While the general idea was neat, the game suffered from too many battles without allowing for any customisation of any kind. It was an endless repeat of battling with none of the fun that comes with grinding (finding loot, gaining money to purchase new items/etc, no character customisation).
- It was mindless, repetitive and boring. Extremely boring. There was nothing to look forward to except more battles. I'd hoped that when going to the houses in the playsets you'd be able to perhaps purchase items or find upgrades or interact in any way but no. More battles.
- It replicates the tedium of cleaning quite well.
- While initially the timed bonuses seemed to be a neat addition, eventually it was easier to just use your skills and count on criticals (which occured fairly often without the timed bonuses as it was) to kill of most enemies.
- Cutting down the amount of battles by increasing EXP gain and balancing higher teir enemies a bit more so that you wouldn't have to grind mindlessly would have been a good idea.
- Seriously, I was 40 minutes in and I still couldn't kill banana peels without worry that one or two of my characters were going to get one-shot KO'd, even with bonus defence.
I would have rather cleaned my room than played that game for any longer. I believe it got very low points from another judge. Very very low points. Because dear god, the tedium.
When I say work, what I mean isn't challenge. I mean menial boredom. I mean grinding the same fucking battles for a pittance of exp in order to get up one level out of ten, even though I've fought every fucking battle in this game. I mean having to get that one rare drop from that obnoxiously designed enemy just to move on to the next stage. Boring shit that pads out a game for no reason and adds no challenge at all.
If your game is built around doing x for x time - outside of the normal interactions that happen normally - then you have an issue. There's a huge difference between fighting a boss three times because it has multiple changes in it's AI and is a legit terror to beat on any level, and having to grind an extra 20 levels just to be able to go toe to toe against your boss because you gave it 2000000 extra HP for the sake of 'challenge'. If your idea of challenge is 'up the stats' then there's a fucking issue there that needs addressing. No boss should ever just be a case of 'this monster... but with bigger numbers'.
The challenge should be in figuring out the 'puzzle' of the monster, reacting to what it does with it's turn and finding the way forward through the fight, not 'get bigger numbers because that will make bigger numbers'.
If a boss can be beaten by just* bigger numbers, I say it's a shitty boss and you're a shitty designer (no offence).
*Figured I'd need to bold that because people on this site can't read.
I actually have a really good example of this kind of game from last years IGMC. There was a neat looking game called Attack on Playtime. Cute graphics, interesting idea and the battle system was fresh and interesting... to start with. However, all you did was fight. And fight. And fight. And fight. And fight. Over and over and over again.
Here, let me post the notes I wrote for it - it'll give a really good idea of what I mean:
ATTACK ON TIDY! PLAYTIME'S OVER
Presentation
- Amost all custom art that is cute and fits together well
- Sound is RTP music and default sound effects
- Window is default, too
- No spelling/grammar/etc issues
- Characters are pretty well-written for what there is of dialogue
Gameplay
- Battles are DBS with the addition of a timed attack/defence bonus.
- I was told I learned Star Fall after a battle only to not have the spell appear.
- Menu could have been pared down to only the necessary parts. Certain areas weren't used (Equipment) or needed (Detailed Status).
- There was minor lag during battles - probably due to the timed bonus script.
- Battles were well balanced for the most part but required insane amounts of grinding to eventually beat. Some monsters would wipe the floor with you even if you were at the level to beat them.
Fun factor
- While the general idea was neat, the game suffered from too many battles without allowing for any customisation of any kind. It was an endless repeat of battling with none of the fun that comes with grinding (finding loot, gaining money to purchase new items/etc, no character customisation).
- It was mindless, repetitive and boring. Extremely boring. There was nothing to look forward to except more battles. I'd hoped that when going to the houses in the playsets you'd be able to perhaps purchase items or find upgrades or interact in any way but no. More battles.
- It replicates the tedium of cleaning quite well.
- While initially the timed bonuses seemed to be a neat addition, eventually it was easier to just use your skills and count on criticals (which occured fairly often without the timed bonuses as it was) to kill of most enemies.
- Cutting down the amount of battles by increasing EXP gain and balancing higher teir enemies a bit more so that you wouldn't have to grind mindlessly would have been a good idea.
- Seriously, I was 40 minutes in and I still couldn't kill banana peels without worry that one or two of my characters were going to get one-shot KO'd, even with bonus defence.
I would have rather cleaned my room than played that game for any longer. I believe it got very low points from another judge. Very very low points. Because dear god, the tedium.
I don't really agree that an idea that only can sustain its fun for 4 hours is shallow - or at least, it's not shallow in a bad way. There's hundreds of short stories that would never work as a trilogy, but they're still very, very good and well worth reading.
There are some gameplay ideas and plots that will never pan out past a couple hours, but they're still enjoyable for that short time, so why not make 'em?
Anyway, I've said it already in this topic, but I prefer short games nowadays. It's probably the main reason I've been so into roguelikes recently. Short turnaround and play sessions while still constantly exploring new things in the same core gameplay.
Re: LockeZ and Challenge: Yea, I agree players should have to "work" to earn victory in a traditional game, but if that work is boring and mindless (see: grinding, see: many traditional RPGs) then it's not going to be enjoyable and the game will suffer. At least with repeat-heavy games like Diablo, the game has been designed entirely around fighting the same stuff over and over, so it's (usually) pretty enjoyable and less "grindy". Or, maybe it's better to say that the grind is the point.
There are some gameplay ideas and plots that will never pan out past a couple hours, but they're still enjoyable for that short time, so why not make 'em?
Anyway, I've said it already in this topic, but I prefer short games nowadays. It's probably the main reason I've been so into roguelikes recently. Short turnaround and play sessions while still constantly exploring new things in the same core gameplay.
Re: LockeZ and Challenge: Yea, I agree players should have to "work" to earn victory in a traditional game, but if that work is boring and mindless (see: grinding, see: many traditional RPGs) then it's not going to be enjoyable and the game will suffer. At least with repeat-heavy games like Diablo, the game has been designed entirely around fighting the same stuff over and over, so it's (usually) pretty enjoyable and less "grindy". Or, maybe it's better to say that the grind is the point.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Short stories are for writers who suck too much to finish a novel.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
To be honest out of the hundreds of RPGs I've played, there probably haven't been more than a dozen that I lost interest in due to getting bored with them over time, feeling like they were going on too long, or feeling like they got too samey.
It has happened though. Games that are just totally endless like Skyrim and Disgaea and MMORPGs, of course, though I'm not sure those actually count. Also occasionally in really grindy dungeon crawlers. I can only explore so many floors of an Etrian Odyssey game before I start wanting to kill myself, even though I love the combat and bosses and team-planning strategy so much. The resource-management gameplay is interesting on its own, but it relies on a lot of very repetitious battles to function - without that intimate familiarity the player gets with the enemies, it would be impossible to make good plans. But the side-effect is that most of the battles really suck.
I also quit out of boredom in SMT: Strange Journey when the game spent fifteen solid hours psyching me up for my escape from a prison dimension, and then upon completing that objective, it turned out there was a second layer and I had to go through another fifteen hours of the same kinds of dungeons. God, what a let-down. It was mostly the story's fault, not the gameplay's. The gameplay was pretty samey too, though. Just one solid unending dungeon crawl, very much devoid of the hills and valleys of good pacing.
It happens WAY more often when playing non-RPGs, since a lot of the more subtle differences from one dungeon/enemy to the next get lost on me. When I'm playing an RPG, I can tell that enemies are summoning allies more quickly or have become vulnerable to certain ailments or become stunned when hit by a certain element or whatever the hell is going on. If one enemy has 25% more HP than another, I'm familiar enough with all of my skills for that to feel like it makes the fight meaningfully different, encouraging me to use more buffs and ailments on the higher HP enemy, and changing my long-term planning for things like MP usage and cooldowns. But if I'm playing an action game it's just like, "Well, this is almost the same fight as before except there are different walls and platforms, but whatever, let me try doing the same thing I did last time except I'll probably take damage this time."
It has happened though. Games that are just totally endless like Skyrim and Disgaea and MMORPGs, of course, though I'm not sure those actually count. Also occasionally in really grindy dungeon crawlers. I can only explore so many floors of an Etrian Odyssey game before I start wanting to kill myself, even though I love the combat and bosses and team-planning strategy so much. The resource-management gameplay is interesting on its own, but it relies on a lot of very repetitious battles to function - without that intimate familiarity the player gets with the enemies, it would be impossible to make good plans. But the side-effect is that most of the battles really suck.
I also quit out of boredom in SMT: Strange Journey when the game spent fifteen solid hours psyching me up for my escape from a prison dimension, and then upon completing that objective, it turned out there was a second layer and I had to go through another fifteen hours of the same kinds of dungeons. God, what a let-down. It was mostly the story's fault, not the gameplay's. The gameplay was pretty samey too, though. Just one solid unending dungeon crawl, very much devoid of the hills and valleys of good pacing.
It happens WAY more often when playing non-RPGs, since a lot of the more subtle differences from one dungeon/enemy to the next get lost on me. When I'm playing an RPG, I can tell that enemies are summoning allies more quickly or have become vulnerable to certain ailments or become stunned when hit by a certain element or whatever the hell is going on. If one enemy has 25% more HP than another, I'm familiar enough with all of my skills for that to feel like it makes the fight meaningfully different, encouraging me to use more buffs and ailments on the higher HP enemy, and changing my long-term planning for things like MP usage and cooldowns. But if I'm playing an action game it's just like, "Well, this is almost the same fight as before except there are different walls and platforms, but whatever, let me try doing the same thing I did last time except I'll probably take damage this time."
Housekeeping
3571
author=Sooz
I have literally NEVER seen that argued. I have, quite often, seen the opposite view. Like, where are y'all seeing these people with the idea that every game needs to be under five hours?
From this topic:
author=Darken
I honestly want more games to just be 5 hours in length, yes, even RPGs.
author=slash
I'm very much of the opinion that a game should only be as long as it needs to be... or even shorter, honestly. Maybe it makes sense for kids with lots of summer breaks and free weekends, but as the semi-responsible psuedo-adult that I am, I don't have a lot of free time to play games! A game that lasts >24 hours might take me a month straight to play. I've had the new Zelda game for 3DS sitting around my place since April! I know it's gonna be good when I play it, but I don't have time!
These kinds of arguments only come up occasionally on RMN, which isn't surprising since we're all a bunch of RPG nerds. It's weird that they come up at all, though, and I've seen this stuff--especially slash's argument--around the internet a lot lately.
I think that the growing age of the average gamer mixed with the sheer amount of games being produced makes many gamers feel like a shorter experience is preferable. Another factor might be the rise of MMOs and games like Call of Duty, where gamers dump a huge amount of time into games with online play and then only a little bit of time on other games.
author=Rhyme
The trick is always to make it feel like it's somehow the player's fault that they lost!
This is all I meant.
Also. I really don't see the problem with short stories. You don't need an epic saga to tell a good tale with lovable characters, a memorable world, and an engaging plot. Novellas can be great, too!
LightningLord2
230
author=Liberty
I actually have a really good example of this kind of game from last years IGMC. There was a neat looking game called Attack on Playtime. Cute graphics, interesting idea and the battle system was fresh and interesting... to start with. However, all you did was fight. And fight. And fight. And fight. And fight. Over and over and over again.
Here, let me post the notes I wrote for it - it'll give a really good idea of what I mean:
ATTACK ON TIDY! PLAYTIME'S OVER
Presentation
- Amost all custom art that is cute and fits together well
- Sound is RTP music and default sound effects
- Window is default, too
- No spelling/grammar/etc issues
- Characters are pretty well-written for what there is of dialogue
Gameplay
- Battles are DBS with the addition of a timed attack/defence bonus.
- I was told I learned Star Fall after a battle only to not have the spell appear.
- Menu could have been pared down to only the necessary parts. Certain areas weren't used (Equipment) or needed (Detailed Status).
- There was minor lag during battles - probably due to the timed bonus script.
- Battles were well balanced for the most part but required insane amounts of grinding to eventually beat. Some monsters would wipe the floor with you even if you were at the level to beat them.
Fun factor
- While the general idea was neat, the game suffered from too many battles without allowing for any customisation of any kind. It was an endless repeat of battling with none of the fun that comes with grinding (finding loot, gaining money to purchase new items/etc, no character customisation).
- It was mindless, repetitive and boring. Extremely boring. There was nothing to look forward to except more battles. I'd hoped that when going to the houses in the playsets you'd be able to perhaps purchase items or find upgrades or interact in any way but no. More battles.
- It replicates the tedium of cleaning quite well.
- While initially the timed bonuses seemed to be a neat addition, eventually it was easier to just use your skills and count on criticals (which occured fairly often without the timed bonuses as it was) to kill of most enemies.
- Cutting down the amount of battles by increasing EXP gain and balancing higher teir enemies a bit more so that you wouldn't have to grind mindlessly would have been a good idea.
- Seriously, I was 40 minutes in and I still couldn't kill banana peels without worry that one or two of my characters were going to get one-shot KO'd, even with bonus defence.
I would have rather cleaned my room than played that game for any longer. I believe it got very low points from another judge. Very very low points. Because dear god, the tedium.
Yeah, it's one of those games that fail to parody an idea by simply repeating the thing instead of critisizing/deconstructing/spoofing it.
Sooz
They told me I was mad when I said I was going to create a spidertable. Who’s laughing now!!!
5354
author=Housekeepingauthor=SoozFrom this topic:
I have literally NEVER seen that argued. I have, quite often, seen the opposite view. Like, where are y'all seeing these people with the idea that every game needs to be under five hours?
author=Darken
I honestly want more games to just be 5 hours in length, yes, even RPGs.
author=slash
I'm very much of the opinion that a game should only be as long as it needs to be... or even shorter, honestly. Maybe it makes sense for kids with lots of summer breaks and free weekends, but as the semi-responsible psuedo-adult that I am, I don't have a lot of free time to play games! A game that lasts >24 hours might take me a month straight to play. I've had the new Zelda game for 3DS sitting around my place since April! I know it's gonna be good when I play it, but I don't have time!
"I wish there were more of Thing" =/= "I wish there were only Thing"
avaraa
11
I generally feel like the perfect game length is about 6-8 hours max, maybe an hour per "level" or "dungeon?" If a game is too long I find myself losing interest about halfway through--I'm a busy person so I feel guilty if I log too much time into a game! Keep it simple!
I just make a game the length that feels right. P:A should be about three hours in length when it's finally complete, now granted that's piddely, though when you take into account it is a shooter and not an RPG that's actually pretty substantial.
Like intelligence has only 2 hours worth of gameplay in it's first act (release) but it would feel drawn out if that wasn't the case.
Like intelligence has only 2 hours worth of gameplay in it's first act (release) but it would feel drawn out if that wasn't the case.
Housekeeping
3571
You're right, Sooz, now that I think of it, I've never seen anyone use the specific wording, "All games must be under five hours."
On this day, Sooz sheathes her broadsword in the scabbard adorning her back. Blood soaks her coat, sewn from the furs of The Great Beasts. Beneath her, countless words of discourse lie weak and defeated. She raises the war horn to her lips. The sweet trumpet of victory sounds across the battlefield.
On this day, Sooz sheathes her broadsword in the scabbard adorning her back. Blood soaks her coat, sewn from the furs of The Great Beasts. Beneath her, countless words of discourse lie weak and defeated. She raises the war horn to her lips. The sweet trumpet of victory sounds across the battlefield.
Sooz
They told me I was mad when I said I was going to create a spidertable. Who’s laughing now!!!
5354
I'm just saying, in the discussions I have seen, there seem to be a lot more people with the idea that a game has to be long to be worth anything than people holding the opposite opinion, which you seemed to imply.
Housekeeping
3571
I think that used to be the standard opinion, Sooz, but I'm seeing a shift in thought; I'm probably selectively reading so it seems like this shift is bigger than it is since I personally love big honkin' RPGs, but, like I said earlier, I think that makes a lot of sense considering the sheer amount of games that we have available as opposed to when I was a kid and I just had a super nintendo and whatever games they had in stock at FunCo Land.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
In the free indie game community, you will see a lot more people than anywhere else looking for short games. "I don't have the time for long games," they'll say. The fact that there's no dollars-to-time equation to think about is surely part of the equation. In part, I kinda think that they just expect the games to be bad and don't want to have to invest in them. But it's also that they come looking for cheap shitty little indie games specifically because they want something to do for the afternoon. Major publishers just don't make games for the "game to play for an hour or two this afternoon and never again" market, we're the only ones who do that. So of course we hear more from those people.
To me, the best course of action is to have your ideas expanded enough so it fits whatever length you make the game. Don't make the game overstay its welcome, but don't leave a bunch of unwasted potential, either.
That's my personal viewpoint.
That's my personal viewpoint.
I don't have much to contribute to this topic, but I will say this, and you guys can juggle this into the discussion as you will.
I have heard the 'as I get older I don't have time for long games anymore' argument, and that still hasn't happened to me yet.
I am 27 years old, I have a full time military career, which basically means a 'work week' for me is 40-60+ hours (at least), a relationship, a social life, and a myriad of hobbies and interests other than video games. It fluctuates, but I am usually pretty fucking busy. I am probably about as busy as a person can be who doesn't have children. I enjoy games of all time demands, long and short.
I also have 300+ hours logged into Dragon Age Inquisition and I love every second of it.
I have heard the 'as I get older I don't have time for long games anymore' argument, and that still hasn't happened to me yet.
I am 27 years old, I have a full time military career, which basically means a 'work week' for me is 40-60+ hours (at least), a relationship, a social life, and a myriad of hobbies and interests other than video games. It fluctuates, but I am usually pretty fucking busy. I am probably about as busy as a person can be who doesn't have children. I enjoy games of all time demands, long and short.
I also have 300+ hours logged into Dragon Age Inquisition and I love every second of it.
Darken
3952
author=Feldschlacht IV
I don't have much to contribute to this topic, but I will say this, and you guys can juggle this into the discussion as you will.
I have heard the 'as I get older I don't have time for long games anymore' argument, and that still hasn't happened to me yet.
Honestly it's the opposite for me. Ever since I was a kid I was never one to really see the ending to games. Probably because I never had money to buy my own so I'd just play PC demos or maybe rent something for a limited time. It just became a habit to "try" a lot of games. The only games I've really beaten were ones with an interesting enough story to hook me through (Metal Gear Solid, A Blurred Line, Nier to name a few).
Now as an adult I have the same problem despite having money to spend, so I end up buying a ton of games I never even get around to trying. Blame steam sales I guess.
