|
For the longest time games don't bring me happiness. I keep chasing the past, wanting to experience the same highs. I hate how toxic and jaded video games make me feel. I found a Youtube channel called Game Quitters full of stories of people with similar stories and a shared history in how gaming destroyed our personal relationships or just overall unhappy. Some are addicted to games and literally can't stop. Others, like me, have kind of quit but still crave games. It's really hard. This isn't a judgement on gaming or those that enjoy playing them. It's for people with unhealthy tendencies that come from game consumption and are trying to get out of that. The Game Quitters YouTube channel has a lot of good videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Obv3RM8umAA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOzXp4TP0Vk This video in particular resonated with me although it's not affiliated with Game Quitters. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7tiuyBeXhc My story: I grew up loving RPGs. I loved deep mechanically and artistic game experiences, most especially in the form of RPGs (jrpgs especially). I haven't been happy with them in a long time yet I keep seeking them out, aiming for the same high I got from them when I was young. I can't compartmentalize that games are different now and mostly try to seek an entire different audience than when I was an active gamer. It makes me feel like an awful and toxic person. The height of my game addiction was 2000-2010. In that period, on my favorite system to play - the Playstation 2 - I acquired off 120 game for that console. Relationships, goals, and dreams became stagnate as I wallowed in these fictional worlds. When I finally broke out of it I still lamented that I don't find games fun anymore, yet I still keep buying them. Even now I eventually plan on buying a Playstation 5 for Resident Evil 8 and Guilty Gear Strive. I'm not sure how far I want to take it. I realize that games don't bring me happiness anymore but I still long for them. I'm really scared to let go because of who I was, or what I valued, or the things I enjoyed. That's the most scary part. A part of me says,"I don't have to quit gaming entirely. I can still enjoy them now and then" but when I play something like Bravely Default II's demo something within me becomes awful and toxic. An example of me clinging to the past and being an elitist dick while I do it would be here. I don't know how to stop or let go and I keep clinging to it. I don't enjoy being that person. It's like even though I can admit that I've moved on, I can't fully let it go as if I'm an alcoholic that doesn't drink every day but still opines for hard liquor on the rocks. Anyone else struggle with quitting? What do you do when games aren't fun to you anymore but you have a hard time saying bye? Why do some of us continue to chase such a pointless ghost? What are your experiences and what wisdom can you share?
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2021 18:59
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 19, 2024 22:31 |
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:My story: I grew up loving RPGs. I loved deep mechanically and artistic game experiences, most especially in the form of RPGs (jrpgs especially). I haven't been happy with them in a long time yet I keep seeking them out, aiming for the same high I got from them when I was young. I can't compartmentalize that games are different now and mostly try to seek an entire different audience than when I was an active gamer. Jupiter Jazz posted:Even now I eventually plan on buying a Playstation 5 for Resident Evil 8 and Guilty Gear Strive. Jupiter Jazz posted:What do you do when games aren't fun to you anymore but you have a hard time saying bye?
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 10:29
|
|
|
Tiggum basically nails it. Nothing wrong with gaming, collecting train sets or anything else. I know lots of successful gamers and lots that aren't. The ones that haven't done great in life - the gaming is usually part of an issue with various mental health problems, they usually have terrible eating habits, poor hygeine, live in disgusting pigsty homes, etc etc etc. Anyway the videos you posted are dumb "The Video Game Industry Doesn't You To See This" lmao the video game industry doesn't want people criticizing actually predatory poo poo like lootboxes and gacha games(Edit: and criticism about how they treat their employees, workers organizing, unionization) and they want regulation to stay far the gently caress away from those kinds of things, under no circumstances are they worried about some dingleberry moralizing about how gaming is a waste of time. this isnt like smoking where they argued it had health benefits and tried to cover it, who the gently caress is claiming video games are good for you outside of that Brain Age game and various fitness programs? TheDiceMustRoll fucked around with this message at 10:51 on Feb 11, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 10:44
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:For the longest time games don't bring me happiness. I keep chasing the past, wanting to experience the same highs. I hate how toxic and jaded video games make me feel. I found a Youtube channel called Game Quitters full of stories of people with similar stories and a shared history in how gaming destroyed our personal relationships or just overall unhappy. Some are addicted to games and literally can't stop. Others, like me, have kind of quit but still crave games. It's really hard. Most of these people they have on GameQuitters usually have undiagnosed mental health issues or using gaming as a distraction from the real issues in their life. They just use video games as a convenient scapegoat. If you are not finding games enjoyable, take a break and pursue another hobby. Your interests and tastes change from when you are 12 year olds so you will feel jaded if you are trying to capture that feeling again. If you are not able to find joy in anything that you are doing, then please seek professional help as it is a major sign of depression.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 17:18
|
|
|
As I've gotten older (I'm turning 35 this year, gently caress) and video games have stopped being the only thing I do with my free time, I've found that I've just started to really carefully curate which games I give my time to. What I've noticed lately is that I really enjoy almost every game I play, and while part of that has just been me chilling out a whole lot, a larger part is probably just that I'm pickier about what I start playing in the first place. The result is that I spend less time playing games than I used to, but the time that I do spend, I enjoy a lot. I'm not really sure how applicable that is to anyone else, admittedly, but as a "how I kept enjoying video games into my 30s" narrative maybe someone else can relate. Video games can be a healthy hobby. They can also be a really unhealthy one. It depends entirely on the person. For some people--certainly for me, when I was younger--video games can be a gigantic time-eating addiction that causes other parts of your life to suffer. Some people have a really hard time breaking out of that without going cold turkey, which I suspect is the case for a lot of "Game Quitters" (though I haven't actually watched the videos myself, admittedly). It's an easy thing to throw yourself into if there are other problems in your life, and there are always more games, and more addictive games, for you to sink deeper and deeper into it while ignoring the things that are actually making you unhappy. I've been there. Jupiter Jazz posted:Why do some of us continue to chase such a pointless ghost? One thing that can make it hard to quit playing games even if you're not having fun anymore is that it's one of those hobbies that can start to feel like part of your identity. If you stop enjoying games but you feel like playing games is part of who you are, you can start to feel like something is wrong with you for not enjoying that hobby anymore. When in reality, it's perfectly normal to lose interest in a hobby and move on, and maybe come back later, or maybe not. I'm not a mental health professional, but if you feel like you're not supposed to stop playing games on some level, that could be part of what's going on. You view it as a part of yourself, rather than one of the things you do that maybe you don't need to do anymore. Harrow fucked around with this message at 17:47 on Feb 11, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 17:43
|
|
|
Yeah, there's a big difference between "I am using gaming to treat my mental health issues" and "I am not satisfied with how I utilize my free time." With regards to the latter, I've had multiple epiphanies over the course of my life in regards to the media I enjoy. Last teens/very early 20s, I realize I wasn't enjoying reading anymore-- but it wasn't because I don't enjoy reading, it was because I was still reading what I liked as a teenager (mostly fat fantasy novels) that I realized were a boring waste of time. I expanded my reading horizons and instituted a rule of 'if it doesn't grab me in 50 pages, give up.' Same thing happened with movies in my early-mid 20s... I was watching poo poo just because my friends liked or it because it was similar to things I used to watch. I don't know why it took until my 30s for the same thing to happen with games, but it did. I realized I was playing games because they were tied to titles or genres I liked years back but now were a complete waste of time. JRPGs are a good example-- I loved them on SNES-PS1, but now I rarely touch them. They're a billion hours of useless and repetitive dialogue. So like the 50 pages of a book, after I start a game, I check with myself if I'm actually enjoying it and think it's worth my time. If there's any indecision, I play a bit more. If I'm still not sure, that means quit. The modern internet heightened this sense of FOMO about quitting lovely games, which doesn't help people struggling in the first place. If you're have difficulty, posting on this very forum is probably bad for you.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 17:56
|
|
|
Making any hobby a part of your identity is dangerous because it's shallow. Gaming is a big part of my life, but it only relates to who I am as a person by one of the things I use to connect with people. And like any hobby, using it as a cover to try to fill the gaps of an unsatisfied life is also dangerous because undealt with issues do not generally improve over time, they fester. I have friends who do this with things like weed, television, food. Things which provide distraction can be a part of an otherwise healthy life because hobbies are pretty vital! But only when they don't take you away from the things that are necessary to take care of. Not that it's as simple as 'just do it' but centering the problem around video games I think obfuscates dealing with the root cause.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 18:09
|
|
|
op sounds like you're going about the idea half-cocked you should know if you get collectors editions/steelbooks it makes games way better and the game quitters youtube channel doesn't want you to know that
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 18:39
|
|
|
ultrachrist posted:The modern internet heightened this sense of FOMO about quitting lovely games, which doesn't help people struggling in the first place. If you're have difficulty, posting on this very forum is probably bad for you. FOMO has absolutely kept me playing games longer than I should, or gotten me to start playing games I really shouldn't have bothered with. Probably at least 50% of the time I spent playing Destiny a couple years ago was because of FOMO--this weird, nagging sense that this game was something that I would should play, that I would regret not playing, even though in reality was just a decent game I had a bit of fun with and should've moved on from at that point. Jupiter Jazz posted:My story: I grew up loving RPGs. I loved deep mechanically and artistic game experiences, most especially in the form of RPGs (jrpgs especially). I took some time to think and my advice would be: take a break. Don't buy that PS5. Don't buy or play any more RPGs for a while. Just take a break. If having gaming consoles around is too much temptation, pack them up and store them somewhere out of sight (unless someone else in your household uses them). Hell, back when I was in grad school I wasn't really into games for a while so I just sold my Wii and 360 and didn't have a gaming system around at all for a couple years. Then just do other things you enjoy and wait and see if the desire to play games comes back when they're not at your fingertips. The kinds of games you say you want--deep, artistic experiences that stick with you--they'll stand the test of time. They'll be there when you want them, whether it's this year or next or in five years or ten. If next year rolls around and you go, "Oh yeah, I really want to play Resident Evil 8," that PS5 will be a lot easier to get a hold of, and RE8 will be there ready for you to play it. You aren't who you used to be and that's okay. Maybe your life as it is now still has room for games, maybe the same ones or different ones, maybe it doesn't fit them at all, but either way, that's okay.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2021 18:41
|
|
|
All these arguments I've changed, but I didn't. I played some jrpgs for the first time recently: Earthbound, Super Mario RPG, Paper Pario. I figured I too, grew out of the genre, but I loved them for all the reasons I love the genre. The genre is completely different now. Final Fantasy wants to be a loving action rpg. If you showed me FFXVI's trailer to me 20 years ago and said that was Final Fantasy I wouldn't believe you. I'm also tired of the stagnancy. In my opinion, the Japanese RPG genre was at one point, one of the gamings most diverse flavors. There's a wide girth between something like Valkyrie Profile 2 and Shn Megami Tensei III: Nocturne and yet they came out within months of each other. Breath of Fire V: Dragon Quarter is an rpg where you're timed. Each and every turn adds to that time. Your saves are limited and you have to take advantage of every resource. Suikoden is a game where you recruit 108 characters and involve them in a multi-continent epic series. Persona 3 at release was a marvel, a blending of the sim and rpg genres that formed something really unique at the time. Now Atlus is milking the same formula. Bravely Default is more FFV rebaked. Indie jrpgs fellate over Chrono Trigger and FFVI. This at one point a genre that was full of ideas and different approaches but increasingly has fallen to stagnancy. What was the last forward pushing jrpg? In my experience, probably The World Ends With You, Dark Souls. I hear great things about Nier Automata and Scarlet Grace. Finally, I hate the endless bloat. Hours and hours of characters yapping. I'm not saying the genre didn't used to have its share of bloat or blabber games (Xenosaga comes to mind, Suikoden V's intro is 8 hours long) but they were the exceptions, which made them stand out. Now any time I play a modern jrpg it's full of chit chat, endless dialogue, won't shut the gently caress up and let me play the goddamn game. I really enjoyed the palette of the jrpg genre: how you'd have a gameplay focused game like SMT, story-based games like FF, and others that were a neat mix. When was the last time there was a strategy rpg with an extremely good story? I like Fire Emblem games, but so far (haven't played 4 or 5 which look great) I'm not impressed with the stories compared to Tactics Ogre or FFT. Then I played Earthbound about a year ago on my SNES Classic and it was so refreshing. No hand holding. No stupid action RPG dog poo poo. Resource management. gently caress yes. Unique systems. I haven't changed a bit. My tastes are still squarely where they used to be. It's games that changed. In their higher budgets they are demanded to cater to every single player under the sun. So now, Dragon Quest requires less resource management to get by. Final Fantasy needs to be action based to reel in a new generation. Imagine if Blizzard made a Starcraft III and made it turn based because Civilization games are so popular. Turn based strategy games are good, and MOBAs can be cool but your true love is RTS. And now Blizzard went and spit on it. Then you go on the internet and want to talk about it and people say,"nah, you've just changed." Thank gently caress for From Software. And now people are demanding they put easy modes in their games. But if From caters to them and puts in an easy mode, they'll cater to the next thing, and then the next thing, until they're no longer making cool dungeon crawlers but a waifu simulator. I bet you SMTV will be a shell of its former self. Just you watch. They'll do everything to appeal to the Persona fans. The series' famous minimal storytelling will probably be filled with hour long cutscenes and hand holding. People who don't know how to play rpgs will bitch about how you have to grind, without learning about basic resource/item management and risk/reward. Can't loving wait. I got Fire Emblem 1 on my Switch and holy poo poo what a baller of a game. Almost no cutscenes, no tutorials, just let's me figure out poo poo and deal with consequences. gently caress yes. I didn't change a lick. The genre just decided to become utter balls to appeal to people that don't even like them or really, really, REALLY like anime girls. Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 03:59 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 03:43
|
|
|
Double post. Honestly, if I could diagnose, I'd say jrpgs are currently going through what wrpgs went through about two generations ago: a genre steeped in depth decided to gently caress off and appeal to every one and every thing. So you ended up with games like Mass Effect or Fallout 3/Skyrim, which while appealing to a wider audience, loses the depth that made the previous games so cool. Mass Effect 2 basically said "gently caress this rpg poo poo and let's go full TPS" and barely has any level up options or options to speak of. Dialogue choices get reduced to a nice option, a mean option, and a sarcastic one. A genre that used to explore in-depth morality becomes more interested in black and white. In Fallout 4, you can take out the most powerful enemy with the most powerful weapon within minutes of starting up the game. These are barely RPGs now. Titles like Falloout: New Vegas became exceptions. The genre got more popular for sure, but a lot was lost in the process. Japanese rpgs are at that point now. They're far more popular than they've probably ever been, and yet... There's hope in that wrpgs have, in a way, bounced back. There's more games that befit the old traditions of the genre now with unique vision and forward thinking principles. It just took a long time to get there. Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 04:23 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 04:21
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:All these arguments I've changed, but I didn't. I played some jrpgs for the first time recently: Earthbound, Super Mario RPG, Paper Pario. I figured I too, grew out of the genre, but I loved them for all the reasons I love the genre. You're complaining about things changing too much and being too stagnant within a single paragraph. You're complaining about things a game company might do in the future if they first do another thing. The problem is not the games. I don't know if you just wish you were a child again or if you've got some other issues, but the problem is you. Stop playing games you don't like. If there are games you do like, play those. Or don't. Just stop doing things that make you unhappy. If you're not enjoying a game, stop playing it. Delete it. Throw it away. If you're not enjoying any games, find a new hobby. If you're not enjoying anything, see a therapist.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 04:22
|
|
|
It sounds like you're addicted to games. In college, I had two friends who skipped finals to play Everquest. They were addicted. If you can't put down a game for something- anything- else, then it's a problem. It doesn't matter if you love games or hate them, it's the fact that you can't stop yourself from playing them. Honestly, uninstall everything and see how you feel. Unplug consoles. See what you're doing instead, and whether you like that better. I have to do it from time to time when I'm filling all my spare time with games because it's "easy" to start one up. Make it harder and that might help give you a break.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 04:22
|
|
|
Tiggum posted:Do you seriously think your tastes and expectations haven't changed since you were a child? I guarantee you, games like the ones you used to play still exist, you just don't like them because they don't have that shield of nostalgia that prevents you from seeing the flaws in the old ones. I also mentioned games I have zero nostalgia for and yet loved in that post. You are being reductive. I didn't play Earthbound or Mario RPG before getting my SNES Classic and they're great games. Earthbound in particular is one of the best RPGs I've played. I want to play jrpgs with new ideas but also treat the player with respect. These two things are not contradictions.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 04:26
|
|
|
Glass of Milk posted:It sounds like you're addicted to games. I'm not really addicted to games. I went like 3-4 months recently without playing them. I don't even have my arcade stick and I don't have a tv or PS4 with me. My problem is I'm so loving jaded that I can't go to the genres I used to love. When I play older games I'm more happy. I loving hate feeling like this over over what's supposed to be fun, though. To be honest, I've found the most fun in the past few years just playing fighting games. There you can gain in-person community (not now due to Covid), deep gameplay, cool music, and even cooler moves. I treat the fighting games I play like an rpg of old, and treat the characters I play in that manner. I like dissecting the character down to parts and playing with them. I shouldn't feel such negative emotions towards video games because they're just loving video games, but I do. The screed up above is precisely why I'm consider quitting. Who the hell gets that emotional about video games? I hate the attachment I have towards the RPG genre. For a long time it was my favorite genre. It's the attachment I'm having trouble dealing with, not so much addiction. Anyone with sense would see that if my grievances are genuine (and they are) that it should be time to let it go. But I can't. It's not healthy and my rant hinges on a particular elitism. I don't enjoy feeling that way but it's how I feel. I think it's time to replay Earthbound when I get the chance. 
Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 05:42
|
|
|
Sometimes when you’re trying to kick an addiction it’s kind of a necessary mental step to villainize whatever bad habit you’re dropping so that there’s no conflicted feelings there. Maybe with time you’ll develop a more nuanced perspective and be able to see your own role in it, maybe not, but in that moment it’s more important to associate all negative emotions with that thing in order to make a clean break. It sounds like that’s what you’re going through right now, and you’re in the stages of purging any unwelcome positivity toward video games, saying they’re all bad now, or were never all that good in the first place. Despite the perhaps somewhat predictable antagonism you’ve received itt I say more power to you and good luck. Trying to change yourself is hard and sometimes you have to draw these ultimatums in your mind to avoid falling back into the comfort of old habits. I definitely know what that’s like.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 06:08
|
|
|
My gaming PC died in August 2018 and I decided to not replace it. I spent the next 6 months with no computer at all which was rad, I got really into making art and that's now a serious hobby and I find myself playing games less. I bought a non-gaming laptop 6 months later and sort of regret having a computer again but it's a necessity these days. When I am bored of games I walk away from the computer and make myself draw or write for 15 minutes but that 15 minutes usually turns into a few hours In addiction there is a difference between abuse and dependence and what you're describing might not be dependence OP but it does sound like abuse of the drug of gaming to try and seek greater heights and then getting upset when it's not as fulfilling as it used to be (a tolerance, as it were) I grew up ina moderately abusive household where my only outlet/escape was playing games all day so I definitely had an addiction issue and felt like garbage for a week or two after my gaming PC died but it went away a lot quicker than I thought. Quitting gaming as someone dependent/abusing gaming as an escape mechanism is a tough hurdle and depending on how deep it has its claws in you may require professional help but I promise you that if you sit in your home with nothing to do and no devices to occupy you for a week or two, you will get bored enough to find non-electronic ways to occupy yourself, and you will, at least for a time, stop thinking about games or RPGs or how attached you are to them. Also read (or re-read) the short This is Water while you're at it, it really helped me frame the importance of entertainment in my mind and ultimately detach from feeling like "being entertained" is a necessary or even always-good part of life. deep dish peat moss fucked around with this message at 06:32 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 06:11
|
|
|
The word nostalgia is a loving pox. OP: I think in the making of Pillars of Eternity they mentioned that they have to make the game as you remember, not as they were. When making WoW Classic Blizzard kept a lot of QoL changes that went unnoticed by the majority of players and even some of the private server grognards rolled with them - that's because, in remembering the original vanilla campaign, your fond memories usually filter the bad UX. Some do remember, but if you don't remember them, then there's no advantage to removing the in-game clock, or a bunch of interface improvements here. Because they're not part of the game as you remember. A similar case to "what you wanted doesn't exist anymore because you changed" was made when D3 was released, and people who got dissatisfied with it not being - I remember it was put as virtual crack - were told it's because they can't relive D2 anymore. No, that's bullshit, it's just the game that was bad. PoE came out later and it provided the exact experience a lot of people were looking for, and while PoE is extremely hit-or-miss, I've been playing that game for nearly 10 years and it's exact what I wanted D3 to be and it wasn't, even if I do like D3: RoS as something to play like, once every two years. Shortly before D3 was released a friend of mine in his late 20s and an actual contempt for Blizzard played Diablo 1 for the first time and thought it was a masterpiece. Then he played D2 and hated it. I think D1 offers an experience that's more or less timeless as it's heavily based on its environmental aspect, and roguelike aspects that are trendy, while D2 got superseded by every game that iterated massively upon it, and so it doesn't offer much anymore if you didn't play it at the time or you're not huge into D2 mods. But for JRPGs, I think a mix of everything bad settles in. I'm surprised Undertale hasn't been mentioned yet, as it's fairly modern, and it was well received. The JRPGs you played were probably weird games that have no space. Each Final Fantasy is so different from each other people argue like dorks over them. Legend of Legaia is a bizarre, slow game with a strange combo system. Suikoden 2 is a game with 100-something characters with a bunch of really striking imagery, soundtrack, and memorable scenes in a politically-charged story that will be spoiled by having a vampire called Neclord. Star Ocean 2 has so many sexist tropes the game was criticized in the loving 90s. Almost every Square non-FF JRPG was... not exactly polished, Threads of Fate, Brave Fencer Musashi, these games don't really hold up unless you're a hardcore fan. And even Vagrant Story, a game that has finally been getting merit in recent times for just how good it was, requires something that you might not have in your 30s: Patience, spare time, and a willingness to immerse yourself in confusing, obtuse systems. Turn-based JRPGs of course are a very fun type of game, have always been as Pokemon shows, and that's why a lot of those games have been massively turned to Gacha games. Mainline JRPGs are action games not because action games sell well (I mean, they do), but because that's expected from their production values, Dissidia Opera Omnia is probably raking a shitload of money and is a very traditional game like the ones you remember, it just... isn't also. It's not story centric, it doesn't have a beginning and an ending as a single player campaign, it's Gacha. And even if the genre existed as it was, being burned is a thing. You might just be burned from the hobby. From what you say, you spent a long, long time with it - my friend, you may just be burned from it. Your best bet is enjoy the burn, go do something else, and maybe in 5-10 years the cycle of recycling old ideas may have reached your favorite PS2 games, and, if you're lucky, they'll be made as you remember them, not as they were. And in that vein, kudos to all the people who made Mario 64 for making it essentially immortal across like 3 generations because hot drat if there's one game that transcends trends, space and time that's it. Elentor fucked around with this message at 06:33 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 06:30
|
|
|
Hm, I came to a conclusion while articulating points in this post that it's not even about the genre. It's about method. The main point of my ire actually seems to be time sinks. A lot of my complaints extend past RPGs and towards things like Animal Crossing New Horizons as well. You don't get all of your basic Animal Crossing tools within the first week in Animal Crossing New Horizons, because they greatly want you to keep playing so you keep unlocking poo poo. They're doing it to make these games more addictive but I just get frustrated at how loving slow they are. It takes days just to get a clothing shop in ACNH and that's basic rear end Animal Crossing. It's the modern design etiquette to make things "as a service" or to make things more addictive and time sinks by design so they can compete for your time. This comes at expense of the game for me because they're drawing it out just so you can put more time in, but more time equals more money, and I can see through the magic trick. So maybe it's not even RPGs I have a problem with. It's the way modern games utilize the players time. For years FF fans told me to play FFXIV. So I did. I like it but it's a massive loving time sink. After the announcement of the upcoming expansion I decided that, rather than sign back up for FFXIV, I'll just watch the cutscenes on YouTube. Knowing this could be the decider in how I enjoy future games. deep dish peat moss posted:
That makes sense. But since I don't have a dependence it doesn't feel like an addiction. Elentor posted:The word nostalgia is a loving pox. I played Undertale. I liked the ideas but felt the overall execution to be fairly atrocious, particularly the battle system, which hinges far too much on knowledge (bullet patterns;etc.). The final boss in particular is fairly ridiculous to me. It's an okay game with some neat ideas and that's it. I don't have an issue with any of the things you brought up against jrpgs. Further, I struggle with what your overall point you're even trying to make. Harrow posted:
ultrachrist posted:Yeah, there's a big difference between "I am using gaming to treat my mental health issues" and "I am not satisfied with how I utilize my free time." These are two very good posts. I still like video games. Last night I played Mario 35 and had a blast. Played for 20 minutes and then put it up. No big deal. What really brings happiness to me for my gaming diet are good platformers and fighting games. In your JRPG example, you said you gave those up and apply the 50 pages rule. That's a good idea. But then there's the problem of gamers. I played Dragon Quest XI and thought it was dog poo poo so I quit and put it in its case. But the *gamers* will try to guilt trip you. "Oh you've only played 20 hours. LOL. Look at this loser judging a game after playing it for *only* 20 hours." They're loving weird. So they want you to put even more time in to prove that the game isn't doo doo. Same thing with Persona 5. I quit that game in the second or third dungeon and I used to be a massive SMT/Persona fan. Then there's The Witcher 3. Hours spent exploring some bland world, and then I zoom out on the map and it just keeps going and going. I quit within 10. Once again I get guilt tripped and was accused of playing it in "bad faith".  So when I guilt tripped I truly start to think there's something wrong with *me*, so then people throw a bunch of games I should play at my face and then the rabbithole happens again. Right now Nier: Automata and some other rpgs are on the list. I doubt they're as good as they are. I don't know what to do with the RPG genre. I can still like a modern rpg (I really loved FFVII Remake). The negative emotions seem to come out when I play rpgs rather than games themselves.Yet at the same time I don't dislike them. As said, I've played Earthbound, Mario RPG, Paper Mario, and Fire Emblem 1 for the first time in the last few months-years and really enjoyed them. I replayed Xenogears and still loved it. I feel like these games aren't too time consuming like today's rpgs. Despite being a long game Xenogears gets to the point fast. Dungeons are nice and sweet. It doesn't overstay its welcome. And then I play Persona 5 and it's endless repetitive chit chat. I think I may have to make a cut off for any modern RPG. This turns itself into a massive point of contention: I truly hate gamers. "LOL, you've "only" played 20 hours","buy this, buy that" mindset. I'm perplexed at how much gamers truly consume. It feels endless and even I'm part of it. exquisite tea posted:Sometimes when you’re trying to kick an addiction it’s kind of a necessary mental step to villainize whatever bad habit you’re dropping so that there’s no conflicted feelings there. Maybe with time you’ll develop a more nuanced perspective and be able to see your own role in it, maybe not, but in that moment it’s more important to associate all negative emotions with that thing in order to make a clean break. It sounds like that’s what you’re going through right now, and you’re in the stages of purging any unwelcome positivity toward video games, saying they’re all bad now, or were never all that good in the first place. Despite the perhaps somewhat predictable antagonism you’ve received itt I say more power to you and good luck. Trying to change yourself is hard and sometimes you have to draw these ultimatums in your mind to avoid falling back into the comfort of old habits. I definitely know what that’s like. Thanks. Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 15:18 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 14:15
|
|
|
My point is that as you said these games don't exist anymore. I'm agreeing with you. Whether you still like elements from the 90s/early 00s or not, these games don't exist. FF16 exists. It's frustrating, yes, I'm with you in it, but if you're just not having fun with the current crop it's better to leave it be. You want to quit games and comment you're struggling with quitting. You have negative feelings towards them. I think I made my point pretty straightforward:quote:Your best bet is enjoy the burn, go do something else, and maybe in 5-10 years the cycle of recycling old ideas may have reached your favorite PS2 games, and, if you're lucky, they'll be made as you remember them, not as they were. If the latter doesn't even bother you, then more power to you, but you seem torn between wanting to force yourself into continuing a hobby that "gives you bad feelings" and quitting games, as per the name of the thread. I miss the same things that you do, but I can't magically bring them back. Actually I lie, I can, and they're kinda lovely and called Form1.cs. Stop playing games that give you a sour taste. As you said, if there are markers that you identified, use them to skip games that don't suit you anymore and move on to the others that you do. We don't have a lot of choice in this matter. FF14 for example, as you said, is long, and might not fit: quote:requires something that you might not have in your 30s: Patience, spare time, and a willingness to immerse yourself in confusing, obtuse systems. Skipping long bullshit games and just watching the cinematics is a good move, also funnily enough also did that to FF14 because I absolutely do not have the patience to play through the rest of it. Elentor fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 15:45
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:In your JRPG example, you said you gave those up and apply the 50 pages rule. That's a good idea. But then there's the problem of gamers. I played Dragon Quest XI and thought it was dog poo poo so I quit and put it in its case. But the *gamers* will try to guilt trip you. "Oh you've only played 20 hours. LOL. Look at this loser judging a game after playing it for *only* 20 hours." They're loving weird. So they want you to put even more time in to prove that the game isn't doo doo. Same thing with Persona 5. I quit that game in the second or third dungeon and I used to be a massive SMT/Persona fan. Then there's The Witcher 3. Hours spent exploring some bland world, and then I zoom out on the map and it just keeps going and going. I quit within 10. Once again I get guilt tripped and was accused of playing it in "bad faith". As a preface, I'm not here to convince you to like things you don't like. There's lots of games I don't like that other people love, so I get it. If extremely dialogue-heavy RPGs aren't your thing, they aren't your thing, and that's completely cool. I think I'm having a hard time giving advice because part of what's going on is that you're assuming that your personal taste, which favors old-school JRPGs, is necessarily a more mature, more highbrow taste. JRPGs these days ain't what they used to be, and to you that's because they've been dumbed down and homogenized to appeal to a foolish mass market, at the cost of both narrative and mechanical depth. I've been playing JRPGs for around 30 years now and I can tell you I don't think that's actually true. Take Persona 5, for example. It is, no doubt, a narrative and dialogue-heavy game. It's plot- and character-driven, rather than exploration-driven. And it has real pacing and story issues, I'm never gonna deny that. (My post history here is pretty solid proof that I am by far more critical of games that I love than games I only have a passing interest in.) But it also has a lot going for it mechanically. Its combat system has more depth and customization than most JRPGs on the SNES could dream of. The life simulator aspects have a bunch of new twists and little tricks to optimize that reward careful play. And Persona 5 also goes out of its way to tie the life sim and dungeon crawling together even more than Persona 3 and 4, by having your confidants (the social link system) all provide benefits beyond just bonus EXP when you fuse personas. It's not Atlus milking the Persona 3 formula--it's a sequel that expands, iterates, and refines. If that's Atlus milking a formula, then boy, Square-Enix has been milking that Dragon Quest formula for decades. (I don't think that's true, I'm just trying to make a sarcastic point.) One thing I do think is very true about what you're saying is that plot- and character-driven JRPGs have largely supplanted more exploration-driven ones. I wouldn't be too surprised if that's just because other genres now have the budgets and technology to play that role better than JRPGs have. But I don't think that means modern RPGs are dumbed down or watered down or even homogenized--they're every bit as deep and interesting as they ever were. They've just evolved into a different beast. Your enjoyment of Final Fantasy VII Remake I think suggests you're in a similar boat to where I am. Like I said in my first post: I like most games I play these days because I'm a lot more picky about what I start playing in the first place. (I also loved FF7 Remake. It was my favorite game I played in 2020 pretty comfortably.) At the same time, I think exquisite tea's post is pretty spot-on--if you want to quit gaming it might help to instead think of it as gaming having quit you. I've been there, too. Like I said before, I largely quit gaming for a couple years around when I was in grad school, not because it was eating up too much time, but because I just wasn't interested in the games that were coming out. I sold off my Wii and my 360 and just did other things with my free time. I didn't have any gaming consoles until I bought a 3DS and had a great time with Etrian Odyssey IV and SMTIV. Maybe it's worth it to take a break for a while or just be pickier about what games you even start playing in the first place. These days it's easier than ever to get an idea of what a game's all about before you buy it, through YouTube videos or forum threads or things like that. I almost always watch a bunch of videos and read a bunch of people's impressions of a game before I buy it at this point, and it helps me recognize when a game that looks good on the surface--something I might have picked up in a store 15 years ago because it looked neat--is something I'd have ended up getting bored with and dropping.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 15:48
|
|
|
Harrow posted:As a preface, I'm not here to convince you to like things you don't like. There's lots of games I don't like that other people love, so I get it. If extremely dialogue-heavy RPGs aren't your thing, they aren't your thing, and that's completely cool. I respectfully disagree. It's barely a sim now. A sim must have negative consequences. Not putting fire departments in Sim City will result in fires in your city. In Persona 3 you can get tired if you're out all night crawling. So now you have to risk between dungeon crawling the next day while tired (which will make you weaker) to beat the deadline or just resting instead. This results in choices and risk/reward. P5 has no such life sim management tied to its RPG mechanics so yes, it is a dumbing down for the masses. Yes, P4 started it by removing the tired status effect, but P5 makes it even worse by limiting your days. At one point you can't even leave your house without a cat interrupting and telling you can't. It's a far more limited experience and not a better product. it's not that I think the games I like are highbrow, I just think they're better and not as dumbed down because people can't handle negative status effects like that and always want to be in control of the game. It's barely a jrpg now with choices and consequences. It's a loving VN. quote:One thing I do think is very true about what you're saying is that plot- and character-driven JRPGs have largely supplanted more exploration-driven ones. I wouldn't be too surprised if that's just because other genres now have the budgets and technology to play that role better than JRPGs have. But I don't think that means modern RPGs are dumbed down or watered down or even homogenized--they're every bit as deep and interesting as they ever were. They've just evolved into a different beast. How is it as deep and rewarding as they once were if you agree character driven jrpgs have supplanted gameplay focused ones? quote:At the same time, I think exquisite tea's post is pretty spot-on--if you want to quit gaming it might help to instead think of it as gaming having quit you. I've been there, too. Like I said before, I largely quit gaming for a couple years around when I was in grad school, not because it was eating up too much time, but because I just wasn't interested in the games that were coming out. I sold off my Wii and my 360 and just did other things with my free time. I didn't have any gaming consoles until I bought a 3DS and had a great time with Etrian Odyssey IV and SMTIV. I took a break for 3 years and didn't buy any games in that time period. I have taken multiple breaks and the problem persists. It's something breaks can't fix. It's how different my taste is and where modern games have gone. I could research more and watch more videos, but I also like to experience things for myself. Elentor posted:My point is that as you said these games don't exist anymore. I'm agreeing with you. Whether you still like elements from the 90s/early 00s or not, these games don't exist. FF16 exists. It's frustrating, yes, I'm with you in it, but if you're just not having fun with the current crop it's better to leave it be. You want to quit games and comment you're struggling with quitting. You have negative feelings towards them. I think I made my point pretty straightforward: Sounds good to me regarding minding time. What Harrow said about perceiving that the games have quit me is true. That strikes to the heart of it. I can't comprehend that something I loved for so long has deemed me replaceable and irrelevant. It hurts when it shouldn't. It's a stupid product. It shouldn't hurt but it does. I defended Jrpgs on the internet for years. Remember ten years ago when game writers and western developers were saying Japanese games are trash and inherently bad which stank of racism? I stuck with them. And what prize do I get? Japanese games appealing to the very people that called them poo poo. I guess perceiving them as having quit me makes it easier for me to let go. It still sucks though. This is the most defeating part. quote:My point is that as you said these games don't exist anymore. I'm agreeing with you. Whether you still like elements from the 90s/early 00s or not, these games don't exist. FF16 exists. It's frustrating, yes, I'm with you in it, but if you're just not having fun with the current crop it's better to leave it be. It's like the Grandpa Simpson quote distilled and I can't believe it finally happened. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGrfhsxxmdE Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 16:43 on Feb 12, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 16:34
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:I respectfully disagree. It's barely a sim now. A sim must have negative consequences. Not putting fire departments in Sim City will result in fires in your city. In Persona 3 you can get tired if you're out all night crawling. So now you have to risk between dungeon crawling the next day while tired (which will make you weaker) to beat the deadline or just resting instead. This results in choices and risk/reward. P5 has no such life sim management tied to its RPG mechanics so yes, it is a dumbing down for the masses. Yes, P4 started it by removing the tired status effect, but P5 makes it even worse by limiting your days. At one point you can't even leave your house without a cat interrupting and telling you can't. It's a far more limited experience and not a better product. it's not that I think the games I like are highbrow, I just think they're better and not as dumbed down because people can't handle negative status effects like that and always want to be in control of the game. It's barely a jrpg now with choices and consequences. It's a loving VN. Ultimately I don't think the point of this thread is to discuss game design, though I do want to point out that giving the social side of the game more tangible, more impactful rewards is also a way to increase the importance of playing that side of the game well. Missing out on valuable rewards is as much a negative consequence as having something taken away temporarily. I also want to point out that Persona 3 and 4 frequently take control away from you as well--it's not a new thing for Persona 5. I think people noticed it more in Persona 5 because the "you're tired, you should go to bed" came from a character external to the protagonist. In 3 and 4, it's the protagonist's own thoughts going "I'm tired, I should just go to bed," and not a cartoon cat voicing that. (FWIW though I agree that taking control away from the player like that is bad, and I think Atlus does, too, since they drastically cut down on those moments in the Persona 5 Royal rerelease.) Jupiter Jazz posted:How is it as deep and rewarding as they once were if you agree character driven jrpgs have supplanted gameplay focused ones? I think this mischaracterizes what I said. I said that narrative- and character-driven JRPGs have largely supplanted exploration-focused JRPGs. The gameplay is still there and in some cases more mechanically complex than ever. It's just that now, the more linear JRPGs more often just tell you where to go rather than having a right destination that they trust you to find on your own, and also that the time that you spend outside of combat has more dialogue and character focus than older games. That doesn't mean they lack gameplay quantity, quality, or depth--it just means that their focus is different. Exploration-focused JRPGs still exist, though they do tend to be made on a smaller scale these days. I personally really hope the Etrian Odyssey series didn't die with the 3DS, I love those games. SMTV is on the way and I think it's really premature to just assume that it's going to be a Persona game in SMT's clothes, especially after SMTIV was really good and its own distinct thing. Bug Fables is a fantastic throwback to older Paper Mario. In the realm of western RPGs, have you played Wasteland 2/3 or Disco Elysium? (Of note is that Disco Elysium entirely lacks a discrete combat system and instead puts a lot of mechanical complexity into its skill and dialogue systems, which I absolutely adored.) Jupiter Jazz posted:I could research more and watch more videos, but I also like to experience things for myself. Entirely fair. All I can really do is tell you what works for me in helping me find games I'll enjoy rather than spending my time and money on things I ultimately end up not being into.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 17:37
|
|
|
There's a lot of dumb ideas that usually come from bad lessons we get as kids. "It's bad to quit something" leads to people feeling pointless guilt over uncompleted games. I had this same issue until my fiance asked me, rather seriously. "You had a miserable time playing X and said it was literally the worst time you have ever had playing a video game in your life, and it's 8 hours long. You love Y and you've beaten it seven times, and it's a 60 hour game." so I replied with "yes, your point?" and their response was "So why is it a problem you didnt beat X when the developers of game X couldnt make a game as fun as game Y?" I promptly uninstalled my backlogged games because I'm never going to finish them. They loving sucked. Now I'm loving around in Skyrim, a game I actually liked.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2021 21:46
|
|
|
I'm sort of freed of the tyranny of having a backlog by being blessed by really kinda not being interested in single-player games at all, or console games of any kind, or party games, or board games, or card games, and definitely not mobile games, or MMOs. I have reached true nirvana. Now if you will excuse me, I have a skin quest to grind on League of Legends.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 01:39
|
|
|
Harrow posted:Ultimately I don't think the point of this thread is to discuss game design, though I do want to point out that giving the social side of the game more tangible, more impactful rewards is also a way to increase the importance of playing that side of the game well. Missing out on valuable rewards is as much a negative consequence as having something taken away temporarily. Fair, but it's only the social side. It's only done to appease the people that want more story or more story implementation. Atlus has made a cash cow out of their characters and notice the sim part is only about characters. Not ramifications. Not negative effects. Not consequences. It's only the social side so they can sell more crap and appease to more otaku who couldn't give two shits about RPG gameplay, which reinforces my point. So now they have even more to bank off for the next Persona dancing game. quote:I also want to point out that Persona 3 and 4 frequently take control away from you as well--it's not a new thing for Persona 5. I think people noticed it more in Persona 5 because the "you're tired, you should go to bed" came from a character external to the protagonist. In 3 and 4, it's the protagonist's own thoughts going "I'm tired, I should just go to bed," and not a cartoon cat voicing that. (FWIW though I agree that taking control away from the player like that is bad, and I think Atlus does, too, since they drastically cut down on those moments in the Persona 5 Royal rerelease.) Persona 3 and particularly 4 (with all those drat meet ups) definitely reiterated known information but not nearly as much. Telling the player they're being limited also makes a massive distinction. P3 is also far more hands off. I haven't played P5 Royal. Please expound? Because I find the original almost unplayable. If they're more hands off in P5R I may give the game another shot. Waiting nearly ten years for Persona 5 and quitting on the second or third dungeon makes it easily my most disappointing game of the generation and makes me even more bitter. How are the Slinks in P5? I don't remember any exception this cool Pharmacy lady. Are they on the darker/sad side like in P3 or more happy go lucky P4? I loved the variety in 3 that really nailed a lot about the "momento mori" theme. So you'd have slinks involving a teacher that lives her life on an MMO and immaturely develops a crush on the player or someone literally dying from a terminal illness and learning how to deal with their fate. quote:I think this mischaracterizes what I said. I said that narrative- and character-driven JRPGs have largely supplanted exploration-focused JRPGs. The gameplay is still there and in some cases more mechanically complex than ever. It's just that now, the more linear JRPGs more often just tell you where to go rather than having a right destination that they trust you to find on your own, and also that the time that you spend outside of combat has more dialogue and character focus than older games. That doesn't mean they lack gameplay quantity, quality, or depth--it just means that their focus is different. I don't like this focus. I hate when games tell me what to do and I hate over emphasized dialogue. I also cynically think the focus is different because they really want to sell more merch. The amount of dialogue and story in modern jrpgs is frankly ridiculous. quote:Exploration-focused JRPGs still exist, though they do tend to be made on a smaller scale these days. I personally really hope the Etrian Odyssey series didn't die with the 3DS, I love those games. SMTV is on the way and I think it's really premature to just assume that it's going to be a Persona game in SMT's clothes, especially after SMTIV was really good and its own distinct thing. Bug Fables is a fantastic throwback to older Paper Mario. They exist but they're far more rare, which is a symptom of the fact that budgets are higher. Atlus went from how many ps2 and ds games to taking almost ten years to make Persona 5. With that kind of investment who in the gently caress would invest in unique stuff like Vagrant Story or some dungeon crawler? I have zero confidence in SMTV. I remember when SMTIII came out and you had a bunch of hardcore FF fans say,"there's no story". Ten years later, people are jacking off Dark Souls' minimal storytelling. Funny. Will Atlus make it traditional SMT with minimalized story? gently caress no they won't. They have no reason to when they have the Persona fanbase wanting more. Nice suggestions, though. I haven't played any of those games but they look great. Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 02:38 on Feb 13, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 02:17
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:It's only the social side so they can sell more crap and appease to more otaku who couldn't give two shits about RPG gameplay, which reinforces my point. So now they have even more to bank off for the next Persona dancing game. Saying the game is for people who "couldn't give two shits about RPG gameplay" is baffling to me, especially when Persona 5's combat and dungeon design are miles ahead of what Persona 3 and 4 had. It is more complex, more customizable, and also more fast and fluid than either of the games that came before. That's what I don't really understand about what you're saying. Once again, I don't expect you to replay the game and like it--I know you don't like games with long dialogue-heavy cutscenes and no matter what else Persona 5 offers, it is absolutely one of those--I just think you're making assumptions about games that fit your "it's all dumbed down to appeal to idiots" and the assumptions you're making aren't actually true. Do big-budget JRPGs tend to be a lot more story- and dialogue-heavy now? Yeah. And to reiterate, I am not expecting to convince you to like that. I know you don't and aren't going to. But that shift absolutely did not come at the cost of gameplay depth and your insistence that it did is just factually untrue. Jupiter Jazz posted:They exist but they're far more rare, which is a symptom of the fact that budgets are higher. Atlus went from how many ps2 and ds games to taking almost ten years to make Persona 5. With that kind of investment who in the gently caress would invest in unique stuff like Vagrant Story or some dungeon crawler? Yeah, that's true across pretty much the whole industry. Take a look at how many games, say, EA released per year back on the PS2 compared to now. Every big developer or publisher is releasing fewer, bigger games every year. It's sort of a mixed bag, really. On the one hand, we see developers taking fewer risks with their big properties, which is a real shame. On the other, we see a lot less awful movie/TV tie-in shovelware (they're still being made, they just go straight to mobile). That's why I mentioned that those games do still exist, just largely not in the big-budget realm. These days, JRPGs are much more rare in the AAA budget space to begin with, and turn-based ones even more so. One of the reasons Yakuza: Like a Dragon felt like such a big deal to me is that it's a pretty big-budget turn-based JRPG from a series that is just now becoming turn-based. It made for a pretty exciting and fun game, and it was a huge risk to take an open-world action series and pivot it into a Dragon Quest homage turn-based game. If I had to guess, the kinds of JRPGs you're looking for are going to continue to exist on platforms like PC and Switch, and largely either as lower-budget titles from bigger developers (like Atlus's Etrian Odyssey series) or as indie titles (things like Bug Fables).
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 02:37
|
|
|
Read my edit, Harrow. Check the questions I asked about P5 Royal.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 02:44
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:Read my edit, Harrow. Check the questions I asked about P5 Royal. So, Persona 5 Royal is still very, very dialogue-heavy. That part hasn't changed and if anything has increased. So just be forewarned on that part. They've added a few more scenes and just sorta hangout-focused scenes along the way. While I think it is an improved Persona 5 and has more freedom and customization along the way, I also don't think it'd totally turn your opinion on the game around. Nothing has really been removed, only added to. If you didn't like what was there already, the additions probably aren't going to totally change your mind. That said, I'll answer any questions. Jupiter Jazz posted:I haven't played P5 Royal. Please expound? Because I find the original almost unplayable. If they're more hands off in P5R I may give the game another shot. Morgana makes you go to sleep much, much more rarely. It still happens a few times but now most of the nights when he made you go to bed, you instead get a free night to work on your social stats and things like that. The dungeons have all been redesigned, some slightly and some greatly. It won't matter to you much since you didn't get to the last couple dungeons, but a couple of the dungeons towards the end were real unfun slogs in the original and have been redesigned to be a lot better-paced and more fun. They also have collectibles called Will Seeds that reward exploration and give you a powerful accessory if you get all of them in a dungeon, though they're never all that hard to find. The combat made two pretty big improvements. First, the Baton Pass mechanic is unlocked from the start, rather than requiring you to rank up a party member's confidant to unlock it for them. This has the benefit of making it a lot easier to use a new party member in the dungeon where you first recruit them without arbitrarily having one person in your group who can't Baton Pass. They also expanded the Technical system, which is about setting up combos where you inflict a status ailment, then use an attack of a specific element to sort of "detonate" the status ailment for a lot of bonus damage. Later in the game, fewer enemies have weaknesses, so Technicals become the way to deal with them. Both the Baton Pass and Technical systems can be ranked up by doing things on the social side--Baton Pass by playing darts with your party members to improve your teamwork, and Technicals do bonus damage if you get really good at billiards. I will say that these changes do increase the player's power and the game is easier than vanilla Persona 5. Definitely play on Hard mode if you want the game to fight back at all. Merciless mode is interesting, but ultimately it might be easier than Hard mode, because it massively increases how much damage hitting a weakness or getting a Technical does. This can really gently caress you over if it's done to you, but it also lets you just annihilate enemies if you play well. Merciless does decrease the EXP and money you get in battle but ultimately Hard is probably harder than Merciless, which is counterintuitive. Persona fusion has some more going on now, too. Personas have "traits" now, which are special passive skills that can have pretty big effects, and passing on traits can be pretty important to make strong personas. Your party members' personas have traits as well that can reward putting more thought into team composition, since there are some pretty powerful synergies that can happen. (Ryuji and Yusuke together are a very, very powerful team.) Jupiter Jazz posted:How are the Slinks in P5? I don't remember any exception this cool Pharmacy lady. Are they on the darker/sad side like in P3 or more happy go lucky P4? I loved the variety in 3 that really nailed a lot about the "momento mori" theme. So you'd have slinks involving a teacher that lives her life on an MMO and immaturely develops a crush on the player or someone literally dying from a terminal illness and learning how to deal with their fate. So thematically, Persona 5's social links (called confidants) are more about people who have made mistakes and/or who have been really screwed over (or in a lot of cases are actively being screwed over). It's tied in pretty well with the game's themes. They're not somber like Persona 3's, because that's not really Persona 5's theme, but they definitely deal with characters in really tough situations a lot of the time. One thing that stands out is that because the protagonist is seen as a delinquent, you don't have any classmate social links (aside from your party members). Instead, the social links are largely people from around the city, weird sketchy adults, that sort of thing. Mechanically-speaking, Persona 5's confidants all have gameplay benefits beyond the persona fusion EXP bonus that Persona 3 and 4 had. They all give you passive benefits that either help you in combat or dungeon crawling, or help you with time management outside of combat. They also frequently require some dungeon crawling to max out--a lot of the confidants have a side quest towards the end where you need to go into Mementos and do some vigilante justice to help out your confidant buddy before you can rank up again. Harrow fucked around with this message at 03:04 on Feb 13, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 02:59
|
|
|
Harrow posted:Saying the game is for people who "couldn't give two shits about RPG gameplay" is baffling to me, especially when Persona 5's combat and dungeon design are miles ahead of what Persona 3 and 4 had. It is more complex, more customizable, and also more fast and fluid than either of the games that came before. That's what I don't really understand about what you're saying. Once again, I don't expect you to replay the game and like it--I know you don't like games with long dialogue-heavy cutscenes and no matter what else Persona 5 offers, it is absolutely one of those--I just think you're making assumptions about games that fit your "it's all dumbed down to appeal to idiots" and the assumptions you're making aren't actually true. Is the dungeon design actually good? Of the dungeons I played it was okay. Not even DDS quality, which is kind of what I expected if they're going to make actual dungeons rather than the random ones. From what I remember, it was mostly doing fancy crap like hiding behind shelves and jumping on chandeliers. The dungeons were very linear because you're sneaking in and are limited to a specific entrance. It was kind of just okay. Over the summer I popped in DDS1 for a whirl and did the first three dungeons. Pretty fun stuff to me, even if it's not SMTII or III (but honestly, what is?). And DDS is supposed to be linear FFX-like. And in my experience, some games definitely have traded it. Let's take Dragon Quest. It used to be, before heading off on an adventure you had to make choices then save at the priest. You can't save on the road (besides a quick save) and had to make sure your adjustments and decisions were good. Now DQ has save points on the world map. I really, really like the loop of making a decision and doing it all in one swoop. It's fun as gently caress to me. But now we've got save points on the world map. You can't even use the forge at any time like the alchemy pot. DQXI itself has far more story than any DQ I've ever played and it includes these design decisions. From where I'm standing, yes, it was done to bring in more players. Defenders like to make excuses. "There was a dungeon with a save point in DQV! HA!" as if this gotcha proves the rule - it doesn't. The fact they've managed to get to even DQ, one of the most conservative franchises out there says it all, really. quote:Yeah, that's true across pretty much the whole industry. Take a look at how many games, say, EA released per year back on the PS2 compared to now. Every big developer or publisher is releasing fewer, bigger games every year. It's sort of a mixed bag, really. On the one hand, we see developers taking fewer risks with their big properties, which is a real shame. On the other, we see a lot less awful movie/TV tie-in shovelware (they're still being made, they just go straight to mobile). I don't expect any AAA jrpg besides Final Fantasy. Yakuza 7 looks good. It's nice to see them do something different with the franchise after nearly 20 years. For the longest the games were the Japanese equivalent of Assassin's Creed. Once you've played one Yakuza, you've played them all. But 7 looks refreshing to this old Yak fan. It helps that I heart DQ. I'll check it out when it's on sale. Honestly it looks like the most refreshing looking jrpg in years. Harrow posted:P5Royal talk Sounds good, especially the part about the Confidants. I like the idea of sketchy/underground/lost fragments of society. Jupiter Jazz fucked around with this message at 03:17 on Feb 13, 2021 |
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 03:12
|
|
|
Current jrpgs that interest me: - Shiren The Wanderer Switch - Alliance Alive Switch - Yakuza 7 - Scarlet Grace - Nier Automata - Labyrinth of Refrain - Octopath Traveler (seems Saga esque?) - SaGa Frontier HD Currently playing SaGa 1 Switch. Pretty good and not time consuming in any way. I play in twenty minute sessions. Also, don't make the mistake of thinking I'm adverse to story oriented rpgs. I'm an RPG player. I like stories. The problem with modern ones is there's almost no balance to the point where it's completely too much.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 03:31
|
|
|
I think you'll enjoy Yakuza 7, especially if you're already both a Dragon Quest and a Yakuza fan. I had a great time with it. I'm also really looking forward to the SaGa Frontier HD rerelease. I loved SaGa Frontier back in the day and I'm very ready to play it again, and with a new eighth character, too.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 03:37
|
|
|
Harrow posted:I think you'll enjoy Yakuza 7, especially if you're already both a Dragon Quest and a Yakuza fan. I had a great time with it. Did you get Romancing SaGa 3?  It's good poo poo. Just need to pressure SE to release Live A Live and Bahamut Lagoon and think all the sins from that era will be washed away.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 03:46
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:Did you get Romancing SaGa 3? Not yet but it's on my list. I haven't played a Romancing SaGa game since Minstrel Song but I had a great time with that one. Apparently a brand new fan translation of Bahamut Lagoon just came out like last week which I hear is pretty great.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 03:49
|
|
|
Is Fire Emblem Three Houses good
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 05:26
|
|
|
Jupiter Jazz posted:Current jrpgs that interest me: Of the ones I've played: Octopath Traveler: Extremely dull and grindy. The party has almost no interactions between each other, and characters seem to only have lines during their chapters. Combat is kinda neat, but as you have to setup breaking enemy armor to really put the hurt to them. But its pretty punishing if you don't have the right group for an encounter. Unique look and excellent music though. Nier Automata: Its an action rpg that sometimes is a bullet hell shooter. RPG elements are pretty light, as its mostly a character action game. What it excels at is being an interesting story with sad robots. As a warning, the beginning of the game is terrible, as you have to complete the first section with no checkpoints, if you fail, its back to the menu. Its easy to cheese the boss with dodging, but its worth mentioning. Also, the music is goddamn incredible. Yakuza 7: It really is Dragon Quest dropped onto Yakuza. If it wasn't for the combat, it would be another Yakuza game really. The combat is a bit rough at times, as characters move around on their own, and its pretty hard to figure out where AOE attacks will land. Reviewers mention its grindy near the end, and I can see it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2021 06:53
|
|
|
I don't think I've had to grind in any RPG except maybe Dragon Quest 1, and arguably 2, for NES. I loving hate grinding. I doubt I'll have to grind, but if Octopath has new ideas I may like it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2021 22:34
|
|
|
Yakuza 7's endgame grind is technically there but it's also not as bad as reviewers make it sound. With minimal details, towards the end of the game there are two moments where boss levels leap up more than you'd naturally level up by the time you get to them. However, both times, the game very explicitly points you to a thing that you can run through once (which is pretty quick in both cases) and be strong enough to continue the story. The first time, it's a battle arena sidequest that also gives really good gear. The second time, it's an optional dungeon full of the game's equivalent of metal slimes. I wouldn't say the game has no grind--both of those are, fundamentally, "take time and grind some levels" activities--but they're both quick and one of them is a sidequest you probably want to do at some point anyway. That said, it's easy to imagine a player getting to a boss 15-20 levels higher than them, getting owned, and thinking they have to go grind for hours because they didn't realize the battle arena they were briefly introduced to would shower them with EXP.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2021 22:38
|
|
|
Harrow posted:Yakuza 7's endgame grind is technically there but it's also not as bad as reviewers make it sound. I honestly don't trust reviewers and RPG grinds. I also don't trust most players when it comes to RPG mechanics. For fun, I often like to go to Gfaqs and compare my level to where a guide suggests you should be. Almost universally they're 10-15 levels above me. I hated grinding as a teenager and just taught myself how to play RPGs instead of beating my head against the wall repeatedly.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2021 22:48
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 19, 2024 22:31 |
|
|
I appreciate this thread about quitting jrpgs that quickly devolved into just talking about jrpgs
|
|
#
?
Feb 27, 2021 05:38
|
|