KYLAILA'S PROFILE

author=Aegix_Drakan
If you MUST use random encounters, do it Etrian Odyssey style.

Have a little icon in the corner of the screen to show you when you're getting close to getting into a random encounter (Blue = safe, Yellow = Encounter soon, Red = It's coming in about 4 steps). That'll give the player some indication that a battle is coming, and it won't feel as jarring.

Yeah, there are quite a few RPGs working like that, and it works fairly well.

As for me .. I don't have problems with random encounters. None at all. I have problems with slow battles. Custom animations and animations in general are a nice thing and all, but I prefer fast-paced action over any of that any time.
Having some nice battle music (that suits the game!) makes is much more worthwhile as well.

The more important thing is, do these battles serve any purpose other than lengthening the game?
Music alone can do a huge deal. One of the reasons I love the battle themes of the dungeon-crawler Nocturne (or SMT III) so much is because they tell you all about your battles. The normal battle themes are a mix of relaxing and pumping, they really say "same business as usual", are catchy and have variations. Which is exactly what battle is in a demon-infested world.
Whereas the boss battles are much more simplistic (which you don't even realize ingame as you are concentrating), more "serious" and with focus on pure battle.
Battles can be quite fun, or just tedious. If you focus on survival, random encounters are commonly used.
But for many exploration-based RPGs the problem is not that there are random encounters, it is that these random encounters serve no purpose other than filling time.

I actually really love pure humorous games .. only there aren't many with humour I can actually laugh about. So it comes down to anything is fine, as long as it is done fairly well.
But variation is the key anyhow.

And oh boy .. how I LOVE the Portal humour.

"The power of dreams is only granted to the chosen ones" is it written in the legends. Oh, was this a mistake! karins_soulkeeper was chosen, but not prepared for what the power of wishing could change in the world. There are times, when, in the fury of anger, in the sea of loss and in the depths of depression, you no longer know whether you wish for it, or whether you are made to wish.

At such a time it was, that karins_soulkeeper went out. Shortly after he received the power of wanting, he imagined trying it out. What would happen if he wished for a lightning to strike this tree before him?
But before he could finish this thought, a rattling, screaming fire gleamed before him! Followed by the roaring of thunder. Karins_soulkeeper shivered, he did not wish for that! He had thought it. He had not wished it, had he? It is a mere coincidence, it must be! Soothed by that, a lightning is not that unnatural, and he went back to his home.

At home, his parents greeted him. That is to say, they worried and got frustrating with him hanging out all alone all the time. "It is dangerous!" they said, for they knew the power could be abused by others. "Oh .. shut up." And it was done. They were mute. Soon, they were crippled, begging to have an end to their misery.

Karins_soulkeeper fled, leaving them to their fate. He was scared of his wishes, and they became weirder and weirder. Everything annoyed him. The birds died, the grass turned purple, red, rainbow-colored, until it was reduced to ashes. Buildings appeared, collapsed, humans were mutilated, not capable of speaking to him. Those who were still conscious, feared what might happen next.. for this little town angered karins_soulkeeper.

So he went on to a journey, to find someone to take this curse off him. But his nerve grew weaker by the minute. Where he went, he left a field of destruction, people stopped washing their hands after they left the restroom ... All fish died, the sea became lava, the wheather was changing by the minute, the animals screamed, cried, begged, but were mutilated beyond recognition. Some turned into plushies, some into erotic figurines. Cities became pinpalls, countries huge floating balloons.

At last, meteors struck earth .. bringing new creatures to its face. But not for long, for they died miserably in the destroyed, burning fields of what remained of our planet.
However .. an idea sprouted in karins_soulkeeper. It was the most conscious wish of it all : a space ship. And so he continues .. until time and space is bent to his will; destroyed.

I wish for me to be at good health