Opinions on balancing RPG games.

[Sonic Angel Knight]

First of all if i may be honest, I'm not the best rpg fan, for those games I have a very harsh criticism of more than any other genre, even sim games, but i don't play those really. So I been trying to play a few recently and i got into some troubles over difficulty spiking as some may consider it. Difficulty spike is a term known when playing a game that you become comfortable with for a period of time and suddenly become very challenging and uncomfortable all of a sudden. Is very sharp rise in challenge for the player, being frustrating or tedious for the player to wanna continue.

Any game can be like this for any reason, one example is super mario bros, the lost levels, either the whole game compared to the original first one or just stage 7-3 with the wind blowing, and the green trampolines that make you jump higher than the screen and very limited platforms to land on. Some people enjoy facing challenges like this and some don't. However to me, some rpg games handle it unfairly and some don't at all.

All i wanna know is what are some opinions, this only applies to turn based rpg games Like Final fantasy, Breath of fire, and Fire emblem, not action based ones like Kingdom hearts, secret of mana, that have real time battle systems.

1. How would you balance existing rpg based games? (Not speaking about the story/plot travel, side quest or objective based parts. I'm talking about stuff like character stats, equipment and item stats and effectiveness and exp accumulation, level up stat growth, and enemy stats/level/exp system)
2. If you was to make your own rpg, how would you make it? (Just be honest, if you wanted to make one would you make it hard intentionally, easy, somewhere in the middle, or have a selection of difficulty, or something.)
3. What are some rpg games you think doesn't balance itself correctly? (doesn't have to be your favorite one, just one you played and think had some problems.)
4. What are some rpg games you think does balance fairly? (Can be anything gameplay wise)

I think i have a bit more questions but i will add if i can think of some. My example of a well balanced rpg is Mario and Luigi series, super star saga is a good example as the game allow player to attack and reward extra damage if you attack properly then defend without taking damage, so if you get hit is cause you didn't defend yourself properly. Plenty of other examples of good and bad rpg balance.

 

[FAST6191]

I am not a fan of grinding. Some are but I am really not. I do occasionally like playing a few battles to zone out to but I would rather not have to deal with the experience or whatever from that getting in the way, the way I would solve that but not lead to empty play is have such things yield things that maybe change the game/allow a different play style but (term wise I believe that is called incomparables). At the same time I truly dislike the scaled enemies in some Elder Scrolls games, though that is more an example of a badly done system as the concept could work.
I would rather have difficulty come from a mastery of the system -- reading cues, planning ahead, combining moves, sorting a good loadout... basically think chess and then go a bit further. I normally do not make much distinction between turn based and real time -- the latter having a pause button if I go take a leak where the former I can leave running, to say nothing of the lines being exceptionally blurred these days. For my hypothetical one though it would be done such that playing as fast as you can get through the menus for the harder stuff would mean you are very good.

 

[Sonic Angel Knight]

Well there is example of good and fair balance of rpg games like again Mario & Luigi series where losing is based on your ability to defend properly against enemies attacks. Instead of being forced to get stronger to defeat enemies who can one hit kill cause there is no option for avoid damage other than having higher defense, or can't attack cause you're not strong enough. Example of this is probably Xenoblade chronicles. Yes the game is basically the pure system of having to get higher level than enemies do to get ahead in the game but because is the only way to advance as from what i experience, is not bad to me cause there still a method of strategy involved if you don't wish to take the super buff overpower level route. Still it remains fair cause it may have that specific system with the levels, the game is only as hard as you want it to be cause of that.

Poor example of that system is maybe Final fantasy 4, where the difficulty still is hard even with higher levels. For example being on maxed level 99 still have struggle for enemies that should be easier, cause their stats or attacks are unfair, such as taking little damage when having huge HP, counters for almost every kind of attack, multiple attacks in one turn, one hit ko or just many status effects that damages all party members at once. While a enemy like that is kind of unfair since you figured it be easy considering the characters are as strong as possible, is really a pain. As much as i hate fighting in a game since is mostly the same kind of fights all the time (No matter who you are fighting) doing it repeatedly isn't fun, especially if the goal is for exp to level up, and the only kinds of enemies you can defeat don't give you a lot of exp anyway.

 

[crimsonedge11]

I don't mind grinding a little bit, but in recent years, they've taken grinding in offline RPGs to near Korean MMORPG levels of grinding and I absolutely do not approve of this. What's wrong with a 40-60hr game for full completion? Why do they have to drag this out for hundreds of hours?

For example, FFXV was too grindy for me. Once I figured out how grindy the game was, I just decided to rush the game and complete it ASAP, and not touch any of the side content. Took about 30 hours. And I wasn't in a super rush or anything. I have no intentions on touching that game again. Like the hunts for example. they made you grab only 1 hunt at a time, and couldn't multi-task several hunts in a general area, and knock a bunch out in one swoop. This alone would have added more than a dozen hours onto the game for anyone going for full completion. It's stuff like this that I absolutely hate in RPGs.

Your average RPG these days, most of the game is a joke, challenge wise, and then they throw in a couple post game bosses that have stats so high they require you grind a bit before you can even take them on, etc.