EGADS! AN RPG RELATED TOPIC BY IGA~! WHAT THE FUCK!?
Okay, after you recover from the initial shock, I’d like to talk about levelling.
I know we’ve heard a lot of opinions on levelling before and how it made games too easy/too hard, depending on which game you play and the amount of levelling you do.
What spawned this was Phantom Brave. Episode 5, 4th and Final stage.
Yes, I was getting pwned by Zombies. However, in a tactical/strategy RPG like Phantom Brave, is there really a need for levelling? I know the attacks are cool and quirky, that the free-roaming system is enjoyable (I wuv wuv the game, seriously), but quite frankly, the tedious levelling is seriously starting to piss me off. Not enough for me to not continue, but it’s bad that inbetween each episode you have to complete a new dungeon and recruit 2-3 new characters just so you can actually survive. You also need to put those characters to the same level as your Marona, otherwise, you’re so fucked.
I used to think that games were too easy, but levelling sucks the enjoyment out of a game. I can understand that you might want to level to do the special quests in an RPG, but to get through the normal story, why should I have to waste 20 hours of my time getting my characters to a barely passable level.
But still, if to return to Phantom Brave, the sheer fact that you can fight with a trolley is reason enough to continue to play the game.
Hard? HARD?! Levelling should be <i>fun</i>, like in Tales of Phantasia/Eternia/Symphonia and Secret of Mana 2 and Terranigma Who the hell cares how hard it is
Levelling in Symphonia isn’t fun. Mashing random buttons for combos isn’t my idea of fun. SoM 2 was complete and pure shit, I couldn’t find the strength to finish it for some reason, and Terra, well, you had no good levelling spots (much like PB BTW, okay, so there’s that place where every monster’s got x7 protection and x7 exp, but that’s nothing compared to the Succubi Map in Disgaea).
Levelling SHOULD be fun, no game does it right however.
It’s really up to the game. Sometimes levelling is an option and sometimes it’s must. Terranigma sucked a little on the leveling part because one or two levels determined whether you did 1 or 100 damage points (I still have nightmares about Bloody Mary).
And not only leveling can turn tedious, having to draw magic in FFVIII or Xenogears’ Deathblow learning systems were real bitches.
And yes, overleveling can suck the fun out of a game. But huge ass dungeons aren’t fun either, especially when you have to think your moves carefully on every fight because you aren’t strong enough to just press attack constantly and get it over with.
Okay, I know I’m a godamn broken record, but get thee to Nethack. Leveling makes the game harder since strongermonsters spawn as you go up in levels, some people try to actively keep their levels low.
<b>I. Hate. Bloody. Mary.</b>
Took me like an hour to beat her. Stupid 1-2 dmg whore crap.
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Anyways, Leveling has always been a part of RPGS, but these days, I honestly cannot be bothered putting the extra time in so I can beat some up coming boss. Doing extra leveling up should not be needed, god damnit. If I was going up against a ‘sekrit’ boss or something, sure, make us level up a bit, but don’t be forcing us to level to survive.
Leveling is hard in Phantom Brave? I can go up more than 20 levels for all my characters, and bring my level 1 people to equal or greater level than the rest of my people in less than an hour and a half. Failure Title+Random Dungeon more than 20-30 levels above you=Confining=+5-10 levels per map.
Also, I went through without leveling anything extra, and I still raped the shit out of the enemies. Fusionists and Titlists are supremely important for success without overleveling.
IMO leveling should occur naturally. ie as you travel from one destination to another there should be enough enimies (that do not stress your charaters enough to create constant life or death situations) to level you up to the apropiate level of where the plot is taking you anyway. FFVIII kind of did this corectly, as all the monsters became reletivly stronger as you do, but it screwed up by making each level 1000 exp. It was impossible to catch up a charater in levels because they all progressed at the same rate.
Firstly, Bloody Mary was quite difficult, but she can be beaten with magic. Probably the only time in the game where it was neccessary.
And secondly, FF8 wasn’t the first 1 to come up with the similar level concept. In The 7th Saga, the other 6 characters will always be near your level [but not the monsters].
Leveling in Tactical RPGS is just stupid. I hate it. I think tactical games should be about (gasp) the tactics. I hate when a tactics game tries to be too RPGy and loses sight of the real reason im playing it, for the basic chess-like fun.
And hoshigami was not a terrible game. Though the way they made you level was just stupid (the tower or whatever). I sort of liked hoshigami because of how you could just requirt as many warriors from the towns as you wanted.
Dunno, I don’t mind leveling up in tactial RPGs, since there always skill based, and Its always cool getting new skills. In Disgea i never minded leveling up. Of course, I only got up to level 80 and beat the game with the good ending. I don’t really want to get to level 9000 just so i can beat up an uber prinny…
I’ve always been a believer in the idea that a game shouldnt be balanced on the side where you need to willingly go and spend a couple hours leveling up just to move on to the next chapter. On the other hand, flying through a game isnt really that great either.
I’ve always strived to see a sort of balanced game where, knowing that you are the hero, will go through challenges yet in the end will be able to win.
Its kinda like D&D, as a general rule of thump (unless your an asshole punk, or the players are being stupid) you dont throw stuff that is too hard at them. You let it be progressive so they enjoy the game while having a sense of danger.
I’d like to see leveling as a sense of character progression where earning skills has more effect on the character itself than just being able to blast Flare 23.2 at “Ubar Evil Demon” to win the game.
But thats wishful thinking I guess, tying in the skills and abilities that characters learn as a main portion of the story is probably too risky for developers.
Stupid developers.
**Side note: Cecil Turning into a Paladin was a GREAT example of what I mean by ability linked to story.
I thought it was incredibly dull and everything about it had been done better in a ton of other Playstation Strategy-rpgs. The magic system was cool to mess around with for about ten minutes I guess.
I’m probably one of the only people who wasn’t too bothered by the the no reviving thing. It made you actually have to think about all of your moves, which gave me something to focus on besides the game’s sucky plot.
and just so my post is somewhat on topic: Yeah, leveling in that game was stupid.
It doesn’t take that long. Just make sure you have 300 Staticians and go Winged Slayer crazy on CoT3. I got to level 2000 in about twenty minutes. Then go the Item World of a really high ranked item (I used Prier’s legendary Arcadia), the enemies there should give you about a level a kill.
Who the hell cares how hard it is 