MERLANDESE'S PROFILE

author=Toaster_Team
Earthbound also had a nice take on weaker enemies where you don't even need to beat them at all.

Not sure how they handled that in Earthbound, but there are a few JRPGs (Paper Mario included) where if there's a "first strike" method in the overworld where you use a field action (like swinging a sword) then weaker enemies will just POOF! Not a bad way to do it if you have a field action in your game.

author=Toaster_Team
I feel like grinding can break a the challenge intended for the game. That's why I personally find adaptive XP to be enticing. Sure you can grind to make things easier... to a point.

It's interesting with your game, because grinding might be the repetition needed to learn the things you want people to learn. But yeah, if I can grind the word "Sunflower" I might be able to breeze through other lessons. (I'm making broad assumptions on how the game works, obviously).

Maybe what you could do is instead of adapting XP so that groups of enemies are "locked" away from being beneficial, you could set a hard cap on how many times you can beat each type of enemy and still get XP.

For example, you can fight 10 Rats until they no longer help you in any way. Maybe the tenth rat gives you a skill, stat boost, or item, to make running out of rats feel better than worse. So now you can't Rat-grind.

Sewer Rats are a bit harder, and the sewer is some place you don't want your player coming back to just to grind, so you set the cap on Sewer Rats to 3.

You can either have something on the results screen telling you how many of each enemy you've killed (Red Jellies 2/5!) or you can have a section for that in an in-menu bestiary.



EDIT: Another thing to note with Adaptive is that even when you get to a certain point, you never stop gaining something minimal. Paper Mario and the early .hack games would at least give you 1 XP if you beat some measly twerp. That's a good idea in general. If the player kills a creature they should get at least something for it. So in the hypothetical system I just suggested, I'd probably drop 1 XP after the max is reached.

author=SgtMettool
3. Yes. Go wild.

This is good advice in general.

You can probably throw whatever you like in there.

-Graffiti
-Degrading papers stick to the wall
-Dirt patches/mounds from unfinished/wore down sewer construction
-Tires (car, bike, etc.)
-Piles of dead gold fish

author=Kaempfer
@Dookie:
Ah, that second link worked. Really great animations, I'd play the heck out of that! I think Dustin's sword could use some colour, though. Walker (heh) has some really nice contrast between his kerchief and coat and shadowy non-body, but Dustin is much more monochromatic. I think that works great as his overworld sprite, but in battle, with the sword added, it's a little too much grey. I don't know how your sprites are handled and maybe it'd be a bonkers amount of work to change it (and maybe his sword changes with equipment?), but I think some rust or something on the blade would give him lots of great contrast.

My vote is purple lichen.

But seriously, not bad advice. My only worry would be that it makes it more noticeable when Dustin does a Lid Toss and the sword quickly disappears and reappears.