|
Instead of constantly yelling about how the mechanics are ~objectively bad~ maybe you should define what that entails, instead of hiding behind the word objectively.
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 00:30
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 23, 2024 07:46 |
|
|
please do not post sentences in which the words 'applicable', 'objective' and 'measures' are used consecutively
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 00:32
|
|
|
Boten Anna posted:I'm not talking about liking, I'm talking about whether the mechanics are actually well designed and good by applicable objective measures. People like things that are bad all the time, that's fine. I like a ton of things that are bad, many of which are Square Enix titles. here something objective: you're a terrible poster
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 00:37
|
|
|
The RPG stuff in Theatrhythm is cool because you can care as much or as little about it as you want, and that's the best way to go for a game in that genre.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 00:39
|
|
|
I'm trying to not write a goddamned thesis on this, especially an exhaustive teardown of what is horribly wrong with Theatrythm 1, as it would be a lot of work to only be met with BUT I LIKED THIS GARBAGE GAME gently caress YOU and completely miss the point whereas so far I can get the same result by posting the conclusion so why bother. Any system has objective measures, and there are objective measures even for creative works and art, they're just not always or even usually relevant, and are a separate thing from how enjoyable anyone might find anything. There are more for art that has a lot of technical elements, like architecture, game system design, or pretty much any kind of engineering. Many Square Enix games of today and yesteryear contain the game system design equivalent of load-bearing drywall. Some people, maybe even famously so, are perfectly happy living in a dwelling that is likely to collapse on them at any minute because of an objectively bad decision to install load-bearing drywall. Similarly but much less hazardously, many people will still play a game with horrific unlock grinds, nonsensical and obtuse systems, or require a slow round trip server request for every single menu selection, and still enjoy themselves. That is what I mean by objective measures. I mean things that are just badly designed with poor or no justification for them to be that way. The kinds of things an actual, good academic program about game system design would hold up as a bad example. Whether or not you or me or anyone enjoyed something in spite of those elements is a separate thing entirely.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 00:57
|
|
|
That is one hell of a buzzword filibuster.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:01
|
|
|
That's nice but you still haven't told us what's actually wrong with any of these games. We're not asking for your goddamn thesis, we just want "the RPG elements are shallow and might as well not even exist". That's a totally fair assessment! It also doesn't matter because it's a goddamn rhythm game and RPG elements that you're free to ignore, but lets you go crazy with stupid bullshit if you really want to are a good thing, not a bad one.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:01
|
|
|
Also, saying that you *could* write a thesis but nobody would get the sheer brilliance of it and would disagree with you is condescending as gently caress.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:02
|
|
|
The only thing I'm convinced of right now is that "objective" is usually a really bad term to throw around in the wrong hands.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:03
|
|
|
we said to make an argument as to why ffxiii has objectively bad mechanics, not define objective you dummy
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:04
|
|
|
Every game is objectively the worst game in the series.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:15
|
|
|
Asks question based entirely on subjective opinion. Gets answer that disagrees with already decided viewpoint. "I DO NOT BELIEVE THAT YOU HOLD AN OPINION THAT IS ENTIRELY BASED ON YOUR OWN TASTE IN VIDEO GAMES!!!" Amazing. I liked Theatrhythm, and most likely would have liked it even if it was an entirely new IP, so long as the music was good. The RPG stuff is perfectly ignorable, which I know because that's exactly what I did.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:18
|
|
|
Boten Anna posted:Again, XIII has flat out bad mechanics whether or not you or anyone personally enjoyed them. Actually no. FFXIII's core mechanics were some of the strongest in the franchise. Like I'm perfectly willing to defend this not as a stockholmes syndrome but because they actually are. The things that drag it down are things like the poor pacing and dungeon/story design. The core mechanics are really well designed. Like you're not only wrong, you're hilariously wrong, and can't actually defend what you're talking about. FFXIII has a lot of problems but the core mechanics are actually absurdly tightly designed.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:24
|
|
|
Artix posted:That's nice but you still haven't told us what's actually wrong with any of these games. We're not asking for your goddamn thesis, we just want "the RPG elements are shallow and might as well not even exist". That's a totally fair assessment! It also doesn't matter because it's a goddamn rhythm game and RPG elements that you're free to ignore, but lets you go crazy with stupid bullshit if you really want to are a good thing, not a bad one. I have provided examples though? Here's a few things about Theatrhythm off the top of my head that are very bad design: * You have to play every single song on Easy to unlock the whole game (and if I recall, to access DLC or make it even relevant) which is tedious and mind-numbing and takes several hours * The RPG elements don't make much sense, with many decisions boiling down to choosing between different options you have no real control over * The only good thing to grind to unlock a good chunk of hte game's content is the Chaos shrine, but DLC never appears in the Chaos Shrine. Neither do the EMS (movie) stages, or several other regular songs, and there's only one difficulty which is harder than normal and easier than hard usually; it's way too inflexible and limited for as much as you need to play it to access game content * Speaking of the EMS stages, there are a lot of good songs that are EMS but only appear in the game mode where you select one song at a time, which has the worst rewards * You cannot get a perfect score unless you unequip everything, which is a tedious and manual process, and there are no gearsets * I have played well over 100 hours and am not even close to unlocking all the characters. This is also what I mean by the Chaos Shrine being the only thing worth grinding, as it's about the only way to unlock characters sometime before the heat death of the universe, yet does not let you experience the full breadth of the content in the game, nor any additional content you paid for (and from a business standpoint, it's totally hosed up to basically make the additional add-on sales force you to play the least rewarding game mode instead of having it enhance the more rewarding parts) * This one is more opinion, but the separation of BMS/FMS abilities and the weird sacrifices and choices you have to make to balance the two (especially for Chaos Shrine grinding) is just not very fun or good, especially if you are trying to level a bunch of people more than build an optimal party where you don't always have good control over who you can take that specializes in what (nor is this always clear on a character you haven't levelled yet) * In order to fill the critical meter on a given stage you have to purposefully gently caress up summoning then get perfects on the non-summon part which is just really weird and not fun at all Also if anyone's response to this is "but Anna you talk about unlocks and Chaos shrine grinding and optimum rewards don't you know you can just blaze it and not care about game systems and just play songs and gently caress the rewards or optimum grinding" that's cool and all and that's certainly how many people validly play(ed), but it's still poor design to make you chose between "actually having fun playing the game" and "making progress and unlocking content in the game" especially in a casual tap-to-Final-Fantasy-songs title. ImpAtom posted:Actually no. FFXIII's core mechanics were some of the strongest in the franchise. Like I'm perfectly willing to defend this not as a stockholmes syndrome but because they actually are. The things that drag it down are things like the poor pacing and dungeon/story design. The core mechanics are really well designed. To you and everyone focusing on XIII, I did not play enough of it to really be able to REALLY tear into what it did wrong, unlike Theatrhythm, and stating its poorly designed comes more from that SE outright admitted that the gameplay elements were a tacked-on afterthought. That said, some of the problems with it are a ranking system that makes no sense and has no rewards or relevance, a weird levelling system, the whole "50 hour long tutorial" thing, (arguably) the 100 hour long corridor game structure, and overexplaining mechanics while simultaneously not really telling you anything relevant about them to help you play well or really understand them ("press X to jump! great! do that 99 more times! great! now step 2 use all your abilities in the correct order for a 27 hit combo! good luck rear end in a top hat!") Boten Anna fucked around with this message at 01:34 on May 23, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:25
|
|
|
FF13's combat system is seriously best-in-series good and just about the only redeeming feature of the whole fiasco. Objectively so.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:28
|
|
|
FF13 is pretty tightly balanced, but it takes a long time before the game actually lets you do anything with them. It takes forever to get a proper three-person party or to need to use SYN/SAB/SEN regularly. Plus the actual character progression is lacking considering you'll usually max out in every role up to the set limit, making which role you focus on first pretty pointless. Random encounters are only slightly more involved than the usual "spam fight until dead" stuff of the previous games. It has good mechanics, but the game itself doesn't really do enough to take advantage of them. 13-2 does a better job at it, but is also so poorly designed that the difficulty balance is all over the loving place.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:34
|
|
|
The word objectively has stopped sounding like a word for me. Awb-jecht-iv-lee. What is this string of syllables you keep typing out?
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:34
|
|
|
Well right off the bat, the RPG elements of Theatrhythm are barely relevant in the first place and just serve as a cute backdrop to the nostalgia-fueled fun little rhythm game. I doubt anyone plays it for the riveting story. Plus your complaint about BMS/FMS abilities still applies to Curtain Call. As for XIII's battle system, my main complaints about it are a Game Over if your party leader dies, and them still not managing to find a good balance for summons (overpowered like in X, or useless like in XII?), but aside from that it's a very solid system (when you get access to all its elements) and is pretty good at making all six characters unique and usable.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:37
|
|
|
Boten Anna posted:To you and everyone focusing on XIII, I did not play enough of it to really be able to REALLY tear into what it did wrong, unlike Theatrhythm, and stating its poorly designed comes more from that SE outright admitted that the gameplay elements were a tacked-on afterthought. That said, some of the problems with it are a ranking system that makes no sense and has no rewards or relevance, a weird levelling system, the whole "50 hour long tutorial" thing, (arguably) the 100 hour long corridor game structure, and overexplaining mechanics while simultaneously not really telling you anything relevant about them to help you play well or really understand them ("press X to jump! great! do that 99 more times! great! now step 2 use all your abilities in the correct order for a 27 hit combo! good luck rear end in a top hat!") So you didn't actually play the game and are ranting about how it's poorly designed rather than actually discussing the game, while telling everyone who disagrees with you they're suffering from Stockholme's Syndrome. If you don't actually have a good grasp over the mechanics maybe you should avoid making those kinds of statements. Also some of the things you stated are like objectively wrong. The ranking system isn't 100% perfect but it actually has a pretty coherent set of parameters. It has rewards (it influences drop rate and if you do poorly it offers handicap items.) FFXIII unarguably had structural issues but the actual core combat mechanics are pretty drat solid, even if they are the result of paring FF down to its bare essentials. ApplesandOranges posted:As for XIII's battle system, my main complaints about it are a Game Over if your party leader dies, and them still not managing to find a good balance for summons (overpowered like in X, or useless like in XII?), but aside from that it's a very solid system (when you get access to all its elements) and is pretty good at making all six characters unique and usable. Honestly, summon monsters are a complete monster to find a balance for. I don't think they've ever been balanced well in the history of the franchise. They're either too strong or too weak. FFXIII (and FFXV) both seem to want to translate them to 'get out of trouble' buttons which is understandable but also makes them worthless for regular combat. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 01:44 on May 23, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:38
|
|
|
Again, I'm not looking for justifications as to how anyone enjoyed something despite its flaws, nor am I attacking Final Fantasy or anyone who likes it. You can be a fan of something and still be critical of it. I get it, I've always loved Final Fantasy games, I still do, and I have a barrage of defenses as to why I enjoyed particular games or elements despite its flaws, but SE has never been spectacular at game design or balance. If anything they're great at making stuff that breaks in really fun yet completely unintentional ways. My point was, and remains, that SE as a company does not place high value on game system or mechanics design and they would vastly improve as a profitable company and their titles would be way more compelling to people other than assholes like me that buy anything that says "Final Fantasy" on it if they started dedicating some resources toward that, especially since it'd be way less expensive and time consuming than what they put into CGs and graphics engines, and simultaneously make what they output graphically much more compelling, engaging, and profitable.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:50
|
|
|
Just keep digging, man.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:54
|
|
|
ImpAtom posted:The ranking system isn't 100% perfect but it actually has a pretty coherent set of parameters. It has rewards (it influences drop rate and if you do poorly it offers handicap items.) It gets messed up though in how most drops end up being not very useful in upgrading weapons or making gil, while the shrouds end up being pretty useful for tougher fights and hunts. The idea is alright but the inventory system is pretty crap in general and they would've done better by making only a few upgrade items that influenced different things and instead focused on adding a bit more variety on consumables or money-bringing items. It reminds of Legend of Mana where there's a ton of various items that are only useful for upgrading, but most of them are completely useless because you only need a ton of a few items to make optimal equipment.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:57
|
|
|
Boten Anna posted:Again, I'm not looking for justifications as to how anyone enjoyed something despite its flaws, nor am I attacking Final Fantasy or anyone who likes it. You can be a fan of something and still be critical of it. I get it, I've always loved Final Fantasy games, I still do, and I have a barrage of defenses as to why I enjoyed particular games or elements despite its flaws, but SE has never been spectacular at game design or balance. If anything they're great at making stuff that breaks in really fun yet completely unintentional ways. You have a really weird idea regarding how their games would make more money.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 01:58
|
|
|
Boten Anna posted:Again, I'm not looking for justifications as to how anyone enjoyed something despite its flaws, nor am I attacking Final Fantasy or anyone who likes it. You can be a fan of something and still be critical of it. I get it, I've always loved Final Fantasy games, I still do, and I have a barrage of defenses as to why I enjoyed particular games or elements despite its flaws, but SE has never been spectacular at game design or balance. If anything they're great at making stuff that breaks in really fun yet completely unintentional ways. Deliberately ignoring everyones arguments to show how cool and above it all you are, is actually having the opposite effect
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:00
|
|
|
XIV is a great example that gamers aren't dumb enough to snap up anything just because it has a franchise title and if you don't do things right, you will get backlash for it. And they stepped it up and made it an honestly good game. Both people who make games and the people who play them are smarter than you think. You'll also have to give SE credit for having done over twenty different games with differing elements in the battle system every time. They could have just slapped on fresh coats of paint on the story and characters and called it a day like in a lot of series, but daring to make completely different games every time has been a risky maneuver - in fact, the brand actually helps both them and us as it draws attention to a lot of decent games that might otherwise just be cult classics, plus people today aren't afraid to rip into flaws on the internet.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:00
|
|
|
MrAristocrates posted:Just keep digging, man. Why is it so hard for some people to accept the fact that they are wrong. Anyway, hope you all checked out the FFV: Four Job Fiesta thread, it's coming up soon and I can't wait to get Monk/Red Mage/Geomancer/Dancer and slog my way through the game.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:08
|
|
|
Boten Anna posted:You can be a fan of something and still be critical of it. I Yes, and I am critical as gently caress of Final Fantasy games. I am not saying FFXIII has strong core mechanics because I enjoyed it despite its flaws. I'm saying it had strong core mechanics because it had strong core mechanics. Most of the Final Fantasy franchise has core combat mechanics which range from serviceable to awful and in many places the franchise as a whole has lagged behind many other RPG franchises. I wouldn't put a single Final Fantasy system in my top 10 RPG combat systems on the market. Trying to go "Look, you don't get it, you can like something and be critical of it" is true. You're just not miraculously above it by pointing this out. Like, poo poo, I will discuss FF combat systems for days because I am a giant nerdy nerd who enjoys RPG mechanics for their own sake even divorced of the story context. If you want to actually discuss the gameplay design decisions of FF games go for it. Just don't point to a game you haven't played and make blanket statements about the people who disagree with you on it. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 02:28 on May 23, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:20
|
|
|
ImpAtom posted:Yes, and I am critical as gently caress of Final Fantasy games. I am not saying FFXIII has strong core mechanics because I enjoyed it despite its flaws. I'm saying it had strong core mechanics because it had strong core mechanics. Most of the Final Fantasy franchise has core combat mechanics which range from serviceable to awful and in many places the franchise as a whole has lagged behind many other RPG franchises. I wouldn't put a single Final Fantasy system in my top 10 RPG combat systems on the market. Trying to go "Look, you don't get it, you can like something and be critical of it" is true. You're just not miraculously above it by pointing this out. I do, because I like XIII. I think the one weird bit of their ranking was using low rankings to dole out better items with the idea that struggling players could use the help. It's my understanding that this actually made some really good drops require you to beat enemies real slow to actually get them. I wonder if anyone ever sat down and did the math to see if it was better to get a higher amount of lower % chances or fewer amounts of higher % chances, because I'm a loser and also think that stuff is cool.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:40
|
|
|
ApplesandOranges posted:XIV is a great example that gamers aren't dumb enough to snap up anything just because it has a franchise title and if you don't do things right, you will get backlash for it. And they stepped it up and made it an honestly good game. This is exactly my point. When they completely gently caress up game mechanics and systems, it is hugely costly for them both literally and in opportunity cost, and negatively impacts the value of their IP. quote:Both people who make games and the people who play them are smarter than you think. That they experiment is good, that they seem like they kind of throw things at the wall once the graphics are nearly done and go with whatever's there at the deadline instead of having someone or a team that has a clear overall idea at the start where they're going with the game system and mechanics and spends time iterating on the details and thinking through the whole system and having that inform graphical asset creation in the first place is not good. Basically all I'm saying is it would really do them well if they didn't have to push out an embarrassing flop to fix their game mechanics and systems (as in XIII and XIV) and instead released titles that weren't fundamentally broken in the first place. It reflects poorly on their games and their IPs and is actually causing problems with their profit margins. In general, I don't understand how this point is so contentious. I also don't know how many more ways I can restate my point and emphasize that this is not a statement on whether anyone is "wrong" for liking any Final Fantasy game. My apologies if I have not articulated some of my points well enough to where they were initially misunderstood, but I've elaborated on it enough by now that what I'm saying should be clear.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:41
|
|
|
YIKES Stay Gooned posted:I do, because I like XIII. I think the one weird bit of their ranking was using low rankings to dole out better items with the idea that struggling players could use the help. It's my understanding that this actually made some really good drops require you to beat enemies real slow to actually get them. I wonder if anyone ever sat down and did the math to see if it was better to get a higher amount of lower % chances or fewer amounts of higher % chances, because I'm a loser and also think that stuff is cool. Nope. There's nothing you get that requires you to beat enemies slow. The way it works is like this: 5 stars increases your TP recover by 8 and multiplies your rare drop rate by 5 while having your chance at a Shroud drop at whatever the default is. 3 star is normal for all 0 star means you gain 1/8th the TP, can not get the rare drop at all, but have a 8x chance to get a shroud. Unless you are shroud farming (and you can buy shrouds from shops so you only shroud farm for low-level games) you ALWAYS want a high score. Boten Anna posted:In general, I don't understand how this point is so contentious. I also don't know how many more ways I can restate my point and emphasize that this is not a statement on whether anyone is "wrong" for liking any Final Fantasy game. My apologies if I have not articulated some of my points well enough to where they were initially misunderstood, but I've elaborated on it enough by now that what I'm saying should be clear. You made your point. The thing your refuse to acknowledge is that you made a claim about a game you didn't understand and tried to claim that you were objectively right despite not actually having an understanding of what you were talking about. Like seriously you repeatedly go "I haven't played these games but I'm right about them anyway." ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 02:48 on May 23, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:45
|
|
|
Your point is that... when there are flaws in games that are released, it hurts them? And they should counteract this by just releasing perfect games to begin with? I mean yeah, I don't think they would mind if they can just release perfect games either. That's why more game companies these days actively encourage feedback. There isn't some kind of magic formula to make a successful game. Yes, there are guidelines and good writers/developers go a long way, but there's also the challenge of making something innovative (wouldn't want someone complaining that your battle system is just a rip-off from Popular Game #45) while well-balanced. We're not 'forgiving' games for having what you might think are flaws in the system, we're recognizing systems when there are triumphs. I mean this is a thread on the internet, you really think people won't point out flaws when they exist?
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:51
|
|
|
What's going on h...
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:52
|
|
|
ApplesandOranges posted:Your point is that... when there are flaws in games that are released, it hurts them? And they should counteract this by just releasing perfect games to begin with? I think it's also worth pointing out that FFXIII's basic design is not necessarily 'objectively wrong.' (This is why trying to claim objective game design is silly. It doesn't boil down to easily objectively right or wrong) There's a reasonable defense to be levied from a game design perspective for a lot of FFXIII's design. What it failed to do what present those elements in an engaging way. FFX shares a number of gameplay design elements with FFXIII but it managed to present them more coherently so it isn't even like we don't have a strong example of what FFXIII wanted to be. (Nor is FFX without flaws but that's neither here nor there.)
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 02:58
|
|
|
ImpAtom posted:Nope. There's nothing you get that requires you to beat enemies slow. Oh it's just shrouds. Cool.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:00
|
|
|
Where the hell is Lightning Returns for PC, Square.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:00
|
|
|
XIII had a good combat system (I haven't played the others) but everything else about the game made it apparent Square had no idea what they were doing when making the game, and I don't think that should be their standard. In fact I'm convinced the battle system was good entirely by accident.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:01
|
|
|
"Well, you see Ellie, we've gotta make a filibuster in the "Wtf are you talking about Joel." "Now you may not know what a filibuster is..."
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:02
|
|
|
Momomo posted:XIII had a good combat system (I haven't played the others) but everything else about the game made it apparent Square had no idea what they were doing when making the game, and I don't think that should be their standard. In fact I'm convinced the battle system was good entirely by accident. I don't think it's good by accident. Toshiro Tsuchida was the battle director and actually has some chops. (he also left S-E after FFXIII so...)
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:04
|
|
|
Lightning Returns... Fast & Furious
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:08
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 23, 2024 07:46 |
|
|
Is Final Fantasy 12 goon approved? That was my favorite recent one. It had some bad design choices but the art direction was cool and I enjoyed the combat.
|
|
#
?
May 23, 2015 03:08
|
|
