Quote:Original post by Alpha_ProgDes
Okay. So in most Action or Adventure games that's already the case. You scroll through kick the crap out of people and/or solve a few puzzles and you're done. But in RPGs, it's a little different, obviously. So for a RPG (and if this has been done before... my bad), how about just making me as strong or slightly stronger than every one else? I start out with all the bad ass magic, good weapons, and great items.
So where's the leveling up? Well actually you level up in real time. As in you, the real person, not the character. You have enemies. In an one-on-one, you can take them easy. 5 on 1, not so much. Mindless brawling will get you a restart back into town. You have study your enemy, find patterns, use them against each other even. You have a set of moves you can use. And they're all at your disposal from the start. Now you have to figure out which moves are effective and which aren't against your enemies. Same goes for your magic.
Your job as the character is to be crafty, clever, and actually move the story along. You actually play your role. Thief, mage, warrior, bandit, whatever.
....Actually this needs more fleshing out.... hmmm
Why not play competitive multiplayer games? They are like you described, only taken to the extreme. You are exactly as strong as the other players, and you really have to be clever/better to win---there is no other way, because you are facing other humans. I mean if you
really want to be clever, you have to play other humans. AI can always be exploited in some way. And, why not? You are probably online all the time nowadays.
I can no longer (for quite a while now) play singleplayer or non-competitive games. I literally don't think any non-competitive game is fun (OK, with one exception, WoW, because of leveling up, but that's more like a drug). I think there are two reasons I find competitive games so much more fun.
1) Mind games---you can trick your human opponents, but you can't deceive a computer in the same way. For example: I cleverly don't pick up this weapon when I'm playing Quake, tricking my opponent into thinking that I'm probably not around; doesn't work against computers. Maybe there is some AI that allows
that specifically, but that's really beside the point. In competitive games, all kinds of subtle things matter, and it doesn't matter that AIs can be "good" or "challenging" because you can't play mind games with them.
2) In a single-player game, once you get good, the AI will stop challenging you, and it's not fun anymore. But with online games, you can always find better opponents, unless you are at the very top, and it will be challenging anyway. That's why StarCraft, Counter-Strike and Quake have been around for so long. Not only that, the same people have been playing them all this time. I've been playing Counter-Strike for 10 years, and it doesn't stop being fun. And you don't have to buy new games :)
Extra reading material:
Playing to WinQuote:Original post by Ravyne
Quote:Original post by Doctor Shinobi
The whole concept of improving your character is one of the things that make RPGs fun. spending 20 hours on an RPG where i am as strong in the beginning as i'd be in the end would most likely be boring.
Its not the act of leveling up that's fun though -- its mostly the reward, and the only reason you have for doing it is to get that new spell and a handful more hitpoints so you can do the whole thing over again against slightly stronger enemies.
I don't agree---it is the leveling up that's fun, not the reward; at least for me, and I think for others too. I don't think people are that different when it comes to this. I have multiple times hit the max-level in WoW for example, and just right at that moment thought "Ok, this sucks, nothing more to do." Although along the way I have of course thought "Oh, the grind! I just wish I hit the next level!" But then when I hit the last level, it's not fun anymore. Even though people don't think of grinding as fun, I think that they actually DO think it's fun, they just don't like to admit it. That's mostly what MMORPGs are about. It would be pretty stupid to play MMORPGs if you thought grinding was boring.
[Edited by - tufflax on June 24, 2010 12:31:20 PM]