Common problems of the RPG genre

[Ryner]

Let's play game designer. When thinking of RPGs, whether user-created or professionally made, what are some issues you often see coming up that make you think "there must be a better way to do this"? Also, do you have an idea of a solution or know of a game that did it better?

Maybe by starting a discussion on the topic we can help each other to improve our projects by calling out these issues and finding ways to avoid them.

One example off the top of my head: Unless they're strictly needed to survive, buff and utility abilities are underused because they're simply not preferable when compared to a direct action like attacking or healing. The wasted turn is often not worth it.

My take: I don't like the idea of being able to cast buffs outside of battle, because then you end up going to your menu after every combat and recasting each spell. Instead I think it'd be better if these abilities were part of a chain attack. For example, in the project I'm working on now many buff and utility abilities also have a minor attack connected to them. The character does both the attack and the buff spell in the same turn. This way the player has additional incentive to use these abilities because he also gets the immediate response of damaging an enemy.

Anyone else have an example of things that could be done better?

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

Yes. Shut the shopkeepers up. I just wanna walk in, buy my stuff, walk out.

Also, if somebody's about to leave my party, don't take my equipment with them. I might save them for someone else.

Putting new equipment from the previous town into the next dungeon. Great, I just wasted my money. How about you give equipment from the next town, instead?

Limited inventory space. 'Nuff said.

Prevented backtracking. I don't care whether it's because of the story, or because I reached Disk 4. If you're going to stop me from going there later, don't put anything important in there.

Long cutscenes before bosses. If I lose, don't force me through that cutscene again.

Low MP, high MP costs. There's a reason why I don't normally use spells through dungeons. I just wanna save my MP for the boss at the end. I'd use my spells more often if I didn't have to use three Ethers along the way.

When final dungeons pit you against enemies that are so powerful that you have to take the time to heal after every battle. Similarily, bosses that are so powerful that the only thing your healer can do is heal every friggin' turn. That's not difficult, that's boring.

Speaking of healers and mages, why should they have such pitiful physical attack power? If I don't want to cast a spell that turn, they're useless.

Status attacks need to be more useful. How about making them more likely to work against enemies? In fact, just to make it more worthwhile, have the spell target all enemies.

If I have to spend more than ten minutes grinding for money to afford the newest equipment, congratulations, you just bored me to death.

Battles need to reach arcade speed. I don't need a text box telling me that a character attacked, and then proceed to tell me that the enemy took damage in the most long-winded way possible. Just show the character attacking and have a number pop up over the enemy's head. Also, unrealistic as it may be, when a character attacks, they should just rush the enemy at supersonic speed. (Though it was humorous watching FFX members trudge towards the enemies while under the effect of haste.) Lastly, it should not take more than half a second to go from one menu to the next. I'm looking at you, RPG Maker 3.

Let's see... did I miss anything?

[Shard]

As for shops...

The ability to compare shop equipment with what you're wearing is critical, and if you can give me the ability to equip/un-equip right there in the shop menu without having to back out and open up my main menu then enter the shop menu again to sell off stuff, then you're a god among men.


Also, having Dragon Age: Origins in mind, if we could cut back on these nested menus that would speed up gameplay a ton.


I agree that buffs/de-buffs and status effects are under-utilized. I think this is mostly a balance issue. They're not effective enough to warrant using them in the average RPG battle. If they're not useful, take them out, or look at Persona 3 & 4 for a series that handles it right. The buff-attack combo Ryner mentioned is only useful if the enemy you're facing poses a threat that's going to last a few turns. If you can tear down that enemy with normal attacks before it does anything to you (FFX), then you're going to go with the power shot regardless.

Edit: Oh, and if you're going the silent protagonist route, let me swap out the main character with other party members at my leisure. I promise to suspend my disbelief when your gorgeous cutscene shows the main character. If Chrono Trigger could do it, why can't everyone else?

[Leish]

Low MP, high MP costs. There's a reason why I don't normally use spells through dungeons. I just wanna save my MP for the boss at the end. I'd use my spells more often if I didn't have to use three Ethers along the way.

I completely agree with this. I hate having to reserve my MP for the boss fights. I find a lot of RPGs make MP restorers either super rare or super expensive. Some don't even have them in the shops.

I think Devil Summoner 2 did a great job solving this problem - if you magic attack an enemy with their weakness, you get MP back. It encourages you to use magic during minor battles, but wisely. The game's not turn-based, though, so the system might not work out as well in that type of battle system. Persona 3 and 4 also had a good way of encouraging players to use magic; if all of the enemies are "stunned," which attacking their weakness with magic would do, all of your characters attack all of the enemies at once.

I think we as RPG Maker users should find a way to allow the player to use magic during minor battles and not have it screw them over later. I mean, not allow a player to just use magic all the time, but at least once each battle without being screwed over.

Edit: Just as I posted, I thought of another one - thoughtless yet long puzzles.

I think to the lever puzzle in that one The Spiteful Dead LP I watched (though I'm not sure if I remember correctly since I was playing it in the background) where there were x amount of levers, and their combination of flipped up or down would unlock a door on a different level. The doors had which levels needed to be switched up and down for it to open, so all you would have to do is write down on a piece of paper what the levels had to be switched to for each door and do it. No thought involved, but a pain in the ass. Even if I'm not remembering that right, there are a lot of professional RPGs that pull that **** all the time. If you're going to make puzzles, make them thought provoking, but not game-distractingly hard, and not a mindless hassle.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

To be fair, you didn't really have to write them down (unless your memory's worse than mine). Just check the door, flip the proper switches in the next room, return. Would've been worse if there were random battles to contend with.

[Ryner]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

I really, really think you should just go ahead and have the characters HP/MP/Status completely healed automatically after every battle. 99% of the time your players are going to do it anyway, so why not just save them the trouble?

And why shouldn't the players be able to use magic all the time? You gave them spells for a reason, let your players use them.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

I really, really think you should just go ahead and have the characters HP/MP/Status completely healed automatically after every battle. 99% of the time your players are going to do it anyway, so why not just save them the trouble?

On that note, I love it when RPGs refill your health after a level-up or a boss fight.

[Leish]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

To be fair, you didn't really have to write them down (unless your memory's worse than mine). Just check the door, flip the proper switches in the next room, return. Would've been worse if there were random battles to contend with.

That still sounds unfun and a waste of time.

I really, really think you should just go ahead and have the characters HP/MP/Status completely healed automatically after every battle. 99% of the time your players are going to do it anyway, so why not just save them the trouble?

And why shouldn't the players be able to use magic all the time? You gave them spells for a reason, let your players use them.

If the battles were difficult enough that you had a real good chance of getting a game over unless you played smart, then I think autoheal after every battle would be nice. Otherwise, the game might be too easy. Concerning the magic, I think the player should be encouraged to use a combination of magic and weapons every battle, not just spam one or the other. Limiting how many times a player could use magic, using one method or another, is one way to do that.

[Red Dragon]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

My take: I don't like the idea of being able to cast buffs outside of battle, because then you end up going to your menu after every combat and recasting each spell. Instead I think it'd be better if these abilities were part of a chain attack. For example, in the project I'm working on now many buff and utility abilities also have a minor attack connected to them. The character does both the attack and the buff spell in the same turn. This way the player has additional incentive to use these abilities because he also gets the immediate response of damaging an enemy.

Although the game wasn't groundbreaking I liked what Ar Tonelico did with the idea. There were 3 "main" fighters and 1 "utility" She had attack spells as well, but you could have her maintain a buffing "aura" that would just get better and better as the battle went on.

Or what a lot of games do and have a "bard" class that can still attack yet somehow sing and buff everyone at the same time.

The ability to compare shop equipment with what you're wearing is critical, and if you can give me the ability to equip/un-equip right there in the shop menu without having to back out and open up my main menu then enter the shop menu again to sell off stuff, then you're a god among men.


Also, having Dragon Age: Origins in mind, if we could cut back on these nested menus that would speed up gameplay a ton.

Although I know it's a RPGM topic DA:O does do that if you mouse over the item

In terms of "traditional" JRPGs theres just the whole mess that most people aren't really willing to get through. Random Battles, stupid menus, cliche' storylines, dumb characters, etc.

[Perversion]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

Except for the nested menus Shard mentioned above (which I really don't even mind in the slightest), I really enjoy the battle setup in Dragon Age: Origins, and think that it does a lot of things right. Granted, this is a "real time" RPG, but when I initially made my elven mage character, I decided to make her specialize in buffs and debuffs, with a few offensive spells thrown in the mix. This actually worked out to my benefit in terms of how I wanted to play the game anyway, as I could constantly pause and play the game more tactically instead of just slinging spells. In this regard, the buffs/debuffs and status effects come in very handy. It's nice being able to have my main character play the support role, and tactically manage the encounters.


On topic, though, yeah, being able to compare/equip/etc in a shop is a definite plus.

As for grinding, unless you are a game called FFTA or Etrian Odyssey, most grinding is a boring chore. As are most puzzles, as has been alluded to above.


Biggest cliché in any RPG, and one that most RPGs could not be made without is the fetch quest. Be it a quest among townspeople, or a "go get x from this cave" setup, a fetch quest is still a fetch quest. No matter how inventive the trappings, I still am taken out of the moment when I realize, "Yeah...here's a fetch quest." Sadly, it seems as if it would be very difficult for an RPG to remain an RPG (levelling, battling, etc) without these. Not sure what could be used to replace them, if anything.

[orius]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

Yes. Shut the shopkeepers up. I just wanna walk in, buy my stuff, walk out.

Yeah I hate when the shopkeeper wants to tell me the story of his life when I want to buy some potions or whatever. Yeah it gives them more personality, but really who cares? They're just vending machines. Hell, once you know where to go, there's little reason to talk to any NPC unless the game forces you to talk to them, and that too is annoying.

Also, if somebody's about to leave my party, don't take my equipment with them. I might save them for someone else.

That's kind of annoying too, though I can see the story logic behind it.

Putting new equipment from the previous town into the next dungeon. Great, I just wasted my money. How about you give equipment from the next town, instead?

Not just that, but cheap treasure chests too that have stuff like healing items from the beginning of the game that are dirt cheap and common as hell, or tiny amounts of cash.

Limited inventory space. 'Nuff said.

That and high drop rates of said items. So, I can only carry 20 of this item in said game, and the monsters in the dungeon churn them out on a regular basis. And oh yeah, I don't really need to use the item much either. Bad enough when the item is a cheap piece of junk so you're not missing anything, but worse when you could make a decent profit selling off the extras.

Another bad aspect is when you need stuff like status healing items, but can only carry so many like 20, and you get slammed repeatedly with the status from the monsters. Really fun in a situation like when you buy 20 antidotes and get massively poisoned so you're out after 4 or 5 encounters. Then the boss also posions with a higher success rate and you're screwed.

Prevented backtracking. I don't care whether it's because of the story, or because I reached Disk 4. If you're going to stop me from going there later, don't put anything important in there.

The real complaint here is missables. I really hate missables, especially when thhe game is a lot harder when you miss the missable.

Long cutscenes before bosses. If I lose, don't force me through that cutscene again.

Or have a cutscene skip option.

Low MP, high MP costs. There's a reason why I don't normally use spells through dungeons. I just wanna save my MP for the boss at the end. I'd use my spells more often if I didn't have to use three Ethers along the way.

That sucks ass bad. If a character is supposed to be a caster, and rely on spell use, I hate when the MP is pitifully low. Because then the caster is useless if you want to save up the magic power.

When final dungeons pit you against enemies that are so powerful that you have to take the time to heal after every battle. Similarily, bosses that are so powerful that the only thing your healer can do is heal every friggin' turn. That's not difficult, that's boring.

Also potentially dangerous, since the healer often has a low defense. So if the healer gets hit too much, she's dead and can't heal, cure, or revive the party. Made even worse when the healer has the Escape from Dungeon and Warp Back to Town spells.

Speaking of healers and mages, why should they have such pitiful physical attack power? If I don't want to cast a spell that turn, they're useless.

Game balance. A character that's good at everything is just too powerful. So we've got the standard RPG character roles. When you've got a party, it's good to have some variation with the members' abilities, so you've got the Tank who's good at damage, the Healer, the Nuker Mage, and then varous other roles, usually speedy characters, ranged attackers, jacks of all trades, etc. If the character is going to be good at everything, then you might as well have a solo adventure.

But like you said above, the problem is with idiotically limited mana pools. The wizard is supposed to rely on magic, not weapons, so let him cast the spells more freely. Balance the magic so it's not overpowering. This is a case that goes back to tabletop games. Speaking of tabletop games, I don't know what's with the Healers. They're clearly inspired by D&D clerics, but the D&D cleric is anything but weak. They're decent in fights, they can use the best armor, and in the 3rd edition, they were arguably the most powerful class, or at least seriously contended with the wizard for that title. It seems strange that RPGs copied so much from tabletop games, but made the cleric into the dinky little white mage.

Status attacks need to be more useful. How about making them more likely to work against enemies? In fact, just to make it more worthwhile, have the spell target all enemies.

I'm not going to get into how useless status spells are because we all know how bad they are. I like when statuses either are combined with damage, or can be added to a weapon. At least now, even if the status doesn't work, you haven't completely wasted a turn.

If I have to spend more than ten minutes grinding for money to afford the newest equipment, congratulations, you just bored me to death.

Yeah, money grinding sucks.

Battles need to reach arcade speed. I don't need a text box telling me that a character attacked, and then proceed to tell me that the enemy took damage in the most long-winded way possible. Just show the character attacking and have a number pop up over the enemy's head.

I'd expand that to get rid of slow-scrolling text. Why, oh why do we need only one or two letters every second, when you can just have whole sentences appear at once? It's not like the processors are slow like they were back in the 80's and I certainly don't find it quaint and charming.

Also, unrealistic as it may be, when a character attacks, they should just rush the enemy at supersonic speed.

The whole traditional Red Rover approach of RPG combat is kind of outdated too. Again, it made more sense on the (S)NES and contemporary consoles. These days, it just looks silly. I think the FFXII approach to combat was an improvement. Also, Western RPGs since Fallout and Baldur's Gate have pretty much dropped the old turn-based stuff in favor of real-time systems which is a bit better.

If the battles were difficult enough that you had a real good chance of getting a game over unless you played smart, then I think autoheal after every battle would be nice. Otherwise, the game might be too easy. Concerning the magic, I think the player should be encouraged to use a combination of magic and weapons every battle, not just spam one or the other. Limiting how many times a player could use magic, using one method or another, is one way to do that.

Autohealing does make things too easy. And battles are at least entertaining when the use of spells and attacks are balanced out instead of just spamming attacks.

Biggest cliché in any RPG, and one that most RPGs could not be made without is the fetch quest. Be it a quest among townspeople, or a "go get x from this cave" setup, a fetch quest is still a fetch quest. No matter how inventive the trappings, I still am taken out of the moment when I realize, "Yeah...here's a fetch quest." Sadly, it seems as if it would be very difficult for an RPG to remain an RPG (levelling, battling, etc) without these. Not sure what could be used to replace them, if anything.

Yeah, the hoary old fetch quest. But you're right, they're hard to replace, because they're the adventure hooks. I've wrestled with this myself in game design, and I can't figure out how to motivate the player without these damn things. I suppose it's part of the limitations of electronic RPGs, in a tabletop game, instead of taking up fetch quests, you could just hang out in the tavern and troll for adventure hooks. Though even tabletop games have the ability to use the fetch quest.

The fetch quest is ridiculouly easy to spot, but I can tolerate it because of the way RPGs are structured. What annoys me are the Broken Bridge Fetch Quests, now those are lame ass.

You know what I consider a problem? The inability to review cutscenes from earlier in the game that had important plot notes. Unlike a book or a video, you can't just go back and look at something again in a game. So the writers drop some obscure clue to the overall plot early in the game, and when it beomes important 30 hours in, you've forgotten it because it's importance wasn't clear originally, and you're also busy trying to master the game system itself. I mean, it's shouldn't be that hard to code the ability to rewatch cutscenes into the game.

[Ryner]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

Continuing on the subject of auto healing after a battle: If your battles are difficult enough that your players will be constantly near death, they're going to make sure they're at full HP/MP after every combat anyway, so making them do it manually is stupid. If your individual battles before a boss aren't difficult, then the only reason you could think auto healing makes things too easy is if you're counting on your players party to be slowly whittled down by a stream of mindless random battles. And if that's your form of challenge you're failing big time as a designer.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

Oh, yeah, I forgot about fetch quests. I don't mind them, so long as they're relevant to the plot, and actually interesting. Basically, the only fetch quests I don't like are filler quests that really hold no importance to the plot and serve no purpose other than to stall, especially if they involve wandering around a dungeon collecting a bunch of a specific item. Worst-case scenario, it's the mushroom quest from fu-ma. Second worst-case scenario (it's a close choice), it's Triforce collecting in Zelda: Wind Waker.

A respectable fetch quest for me would be if I had to go into a dungeon for a specific item, and the dungeon wasn't some mini-dungeon of un-importance. A boss guarding that item would be a plus.

An entire game that's a fetch quest (especialy Zelda and the Mario RPGs), that's fine. It's still a full quest.

Speaking of healers and mages, why should they have such pitiful physical attack power? If I don't want to cast a spell that turn, they're useless.

Game balance. A character that's good at everything is just too powerful.

I can understand that, but when my attacker is dealing 500 damage and my mages are causing 50, that's just annoying. They might as well have not even attacked. If it were more like the mages deals 200-300 damage for the attacker's 500, then that would be acceptable.

The whole traditional Red Rover approach of RPG combat is kind of outdated too.

Now that, I want them to keep. Final Fantasy 12 didn't feel like Final Fantasy when battles took place in real time on the field map. Gimme my swirly screen transition and Red Rover back. :P (I'd go into more of a rant of what I think of the direction the FF games have taken, but that is a discussion for another web site.)

What annoys me are the Broken Bridge Fetch Quests, now those are lame ass.

<_<

You know what I consider a problem? The inability to review cutscenes from earlier in the game that had important plot notes. Unlike a book or a video, you can't just go back and look at something again in a game. So the writers drop some obscure clue to the overall plot early in the game, and when it beomes important 30 hours in, you've forgotten it because it's importance wasn't clear originally, and you're also busy trying to master the game system itself. I mean, it's shouldn't be that hard to code the ability to rewatch cutscenes into the game.

I will admit the ability to review cutscenes when you need to be reminded where to go next is important, but when it comes to foreshadowing, I don't see reviewing cutscenes as necessary. If the game was good enough, I'll eventually replay it, spot the foreshadowing and references I missed the first time through, and get more enjoyment out of it as a result.

If your individual battles before a boss aren't difficult, then the only reason you could think auto healing makes things too easy is if you're counting on your players party to be slowly whittled down by a stream of mindless random battles. And if that's your form of challenge you're failing big time as a designer.

Isn't whittling how it's normally done, though? I myself would take whittling down over every random encounter feeling like a boss fight. Those random boss encounters are why I run from every battle in the final dungeons of Final Fantasy games.

[Kefka Jr.]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

It's a lot of fun to think about alternatives in terms of combat, but what it always comes back to is the story. The cool thing about games is that you can convey a story in a lot of ways, not just in descriptive text or dialog. To me, battles are the most interesting medium for the drama of a story.

Difficulty is important, but a designer is also a director - tone is important, too. What does this battle in this particular part of the game do for the story of the game as a whole? The answer usually is that all this fighting represents the struggle of the characters, both physically and emotionally: and that struggle should mount with the expectation of the boss. It's my opinion that smaller encounters in a dungeon shouldn't just prepare you for the boss fight statistically, but psychologically as well. The player should have some kind of anticipation about it; they should either dread what might be their greatest challenge yet, our welcome the opportunity to lay the smack down on the one whom might deserve it.

And boss fights are the perfect opportunity to turn things on their head. I am always the most enthralled by a fight when the tactics that have been working for me so far have no effect at all on the boss. That's when my heart skips and I think, "Well NOW what?!" This is accompanied by an equal sense of accomplishment when I DO solve the puzzle.

RPGs as a whole rely on a set of rules that are established early on in the game and maintained throughout. That's fine, because that's what makes it so exciting when the player reaches a point where the rules no longer apply. Some games, like Earthbound or even Crisis Core, have at least one encounter that defies all preset expectations. Those are the moments that I play for. But I'd like to think that I don't have to wait for the end of the game to get to them.

[Big Rick Cook]

Re: Common problems of the RPG genre

Isn't whittling how it's normally done, though? I myself would take whittling down over every random encounter feeling like a boss fight. Those random boss encounters are why I run from every battle in the final dungeons of Final Fantasy games.

The idea of random encounters is itself a dated concept. Having a random battle happen 25 times in a single dungeon, in which you invariably fight the same 4 enemies in various configurations, is supremely boring after about 8 fights. I'd like to see a completely repeated encounter happen maybe one time during a dungeon after the initial encounter, but really, fighting the exact same enemy in the exact same circumstance in a JRPG style scenario is just boring.

Striking a balance between the challenge of getting to the boss and the time spent getting there (or the next town, or the person who's injured deep inside the cave - whatever goal in mind), should be about unique encounters and challenges, not a variable but random encounter rate that never goes away or changes as you progress through a dungeon. A final dungeon should have difficult encounters, but not a never-ending stream of the same 5 or 6 configurations of enemies.