FFXIII-2

[Hyan]

If they let me do something within the boundaries of the game, I will do it. Why should I limit myself artificially if I don't have to?

It's bullshit. If there were locked difficulties I could choose from things would be different, but right now it just depends on whether I feel like making my own rules for the game or not. That's not my fucking job to do.

There's always a choice to make any piss-easy game harder by applying some bullshit made-up rules to them. That's no excuse for the devs making them easy. It's like you can't ever criticize a game for being easy with your logic. Why are there even difficulties to choose from in the first place? Just make the game play on "easy" mode all the time and tell the players to make it harder for themselves if they feel like it.

[Kiarax]

I guarantee the game is perfectly balanced for just playing through normally. If you choose to grind and overlevel that's up to you, but you're fucking retarded if you think that's a flaw in the game and not something you're choosing to do yourself.

[Hyan]

If you choose to grind and overlevel that's up to you, but you're fucking retarded if you think that's a flaw in the game and not something you're choosing to do yourself.

I play the game within the boundaries the developers let me. That doesn't make me a retard. I'm not the one making the game here. I don't want to make one. I want to play a game made by others, the way they intend me to play it. Not a game I build for myself just the way I like it, disregarding what the devs let me do. That's just silly as fuck.

Good argument there though, champ. So it's really true. You think games can't be criticized for being too easy. That's retarded if something around here is.

[Kiarax]

I hate ridiculously easy games as much as the next guy, but you're making a game easy by choice and then blaming the developers. Sure, it's great when you get the rare gem that comes out that's aimed at people who want a hard as balls game à la Demon's Souls and the like. But gaming (especially something as popular as FF) has to cater to far more, and unfortunately people like us are in the minority. That's why they give you a reasonable amount of choice. The game is gonna be as hard as you want it to be, if you choose to grind and dump all your crystarium points to level up, you're essentially choosing Easy mode and then complaining the game isn't as hard as you want it to be. You can prattle on about how it's the developers fault all you like, but you are the only person at fault here and apparently you're completely delusional in thinking otherwise too. Anyway, I'm done, feel free to try and refute that and make yourself look even sillier. There's no further need for this carry on.

[Hyan]

I hate ridiculously easy games as much as the next guy, but you're making a game easy by choice and then blaming the developers.

The developers make the game easy by giving me the choice to do things in a way that make it easy. Don't blame me for doing things the developers let me do, fuck. According to you, ridiculously easy games dont exist. You are always making the game easy by choice (according to you) because you play it in an easy way (that is allowed by the devs). You don't have to do that, but you do it because it'd be retarded not to.

Hard mode with fixed Crystarium would essentially fix everything. But now we're not even getting that. We are getting an easier game for a franchise that's already pretty easy as it is. They didn't have to make it even easier.

Anyway, I'm done, feel free to try and refute that and make yourself look even sillier.

You basically backtracked to "they need to make it easy to cater to more ppl dude"-argument to save face, but fuck if I'm not already aware of the fact. Doesn't make anything I say less true. Implementing "hard" difficulty would be such a slap in the face for that demographic I'm sure.

You didn't even try to deny my claim. "You can't blame the game for being too easy if you make it that way by doing exactly what the devs let you do". You are really full of shit. I'm not a developer, I'm a gamer. "That's up to you dude" is not a valid answer. That's up to the developers designing the game.

[vadre]

Yeah, it's really not forcing you to do it. You feeling obligated to because it's an option isn't the same thing as it the game being too easy for the average play through.

Hell I wouldn't mind if you're pushed to do side content to be strong enough for the main stuff. We already know encounters like Atlus will give you the option to fight head on (and lose if you're not strong enough), so i think there'll be options for everyone.

[Xno Kappa]

NSG games in FFX were fun as hell. Just saying, no one is holding a gun to your head to max out everything.

[Draylo]

Most of those challenges were spam phoenix down zombie mode, not really my cup of tea.

[Tyrath]

You don't have to do that, but you do it because it'd be retarded not to.

...or not?

Is it more retarded to force yourself to do everything thats there or to force yourself to do something that makes the game less fun for you? The fact that the game lets you do something is an arbitrary criteria. If you try to do so, you can accomplish a lot of things in a game via cheats also. It shouldn't be a question of what the developers let you do, but more a question of what is more fun for you. If something makes the game too easy or too hard for you, don't fucking do it. What a game developer is giving you is options, and it's up to you to use them in the best way that will make it enjoyable for you.

[Hyan]

What a game developer is giving you is options, and it's up to you to use them in the best way that will make it enjoyable for you.

No. What the game developer is not doing is his fucking job, and just tossing the ball at me (AND I DON'T WANT IT).

Their job is to make the game. My job is to play the damn game. That's what's more fun for me.

And it's not really "forcing" anything, because overall I might still like the game and play it even with its shortcomings (that's so retarded isn't it?). It doesn't have to be a perfect experience, but I'd still rather not have the shortcomings there.

[Alkar]

Considering the replayability of the title I'd say there's a chance that monsters will "level up" with you like in VIII. I think that would preserve the challenge even if you grind.

[Elrina]

I hated the scaling mobs in VIII. Scaling mobs, at least to me, tends to make me feel like it's pointless leveling up at all.

Hyan, there have been people doing low level/bare minimum runs of RPGs for as long as I can remember (probably as long as there have been RPGs, at least since SNES) to increase difficulty artificially. I realize you don't really want to have to, but the option and ability is there, and the devs know that the audience who does so is there.

Some people like the ability to grind out early if they want, even if it does end up make the game easier, and at least this way both groups have the ability to play how they want to. If it was all limited to a base line like in XIII, it would only cater to the one side.

That said, I don't see anything wrong with a Hard mode difficulty setting like you suggested earlier. I wouldn't want anything in-game unlockable from it, like secret endings or whatever (trophies/achievements should be enough), but I don't see the problem with it for people that simply want to ensure more finely tuned/difficult encounters by the devs.

I can back wanting a Hard difficulty setting, as long as it's a difficulty setting (I wouldn't play it my first time through, but I definitely would my second), but arguing that the entire game should be restricted the way XIII was ignores all the people who enjoy grinding early and don't like being restricted. XIII-2 is going to be a lot more open than XIII was, so the necessity to keep it restricted and finely balanced isn't there since the story isn't running parallel to character progression again.

[Charismatic]

Most of those challenges were spam phoenix down zombie mode

...not really.


Also, in terms of scaling enemies... not only do they make leveling pointless, in many games with level scaling it is actually detrimental because while you level, your equipment and static bonuses do not level with you. They become relatively weaker. In other words, +5STR is +5STR no matter what but it's a larger % boost when stats are lower therefore your equipment becomes relatively worse as you level.

Level scaling does 'preserve the challenge' in many games, but of times it also makes the game harder if you overlevel which is okay for me aside from the fact that I don't like to grind. It's generally easier to keep my level low than to kill for ages to make the game rougher.
In some games it's not quite like this but either way I've never seen level scaling done without its drawbacks so eh

[Hyan]

If it was all limited to a base line like in XIII, it would only cater to the one side.

It only caters to one side either way.

Realize that I'm not the kind of guy to develop the game for them. It's all kinds of bullshit because let's face it, with that mindset 'difficulty' becomes a meaningless concept. There are no "too easy" games, there can only be "too hard" games. What's the point of different levels of difficulty in any game anymore? I am aware of the people who make up their own rules, the mod communities that fix Bethesda's shortcomings and whatever. That should not be expected of everyone who want a difficult/challenging experience.

On the other hand we have another genre(MMO's) where any and every sort of customization is being sacrificed for the altar of difficulty and balance, the holy grail. These concepts do not suddenly apply there anymore. What's the excuse? I want to know!

[Alkar]

What made leveling pointless in FFVIII were Triple Triad and the Junction system.

[Correction]

What made leveling pointless in FFVIII were Triple Triad and the Junction system.

Not to mention that even if you didn't grind most of FFVIII's battles were stupidly easy. Are we really having a discussion about the difficulty of final fantasy games? In 2011?

[Draylo]

...not really.

Yeah they are totally not doing that. Most challenge games are like that, you just spam meds out the ass/abuse elemental properties or some other quirk that lets you win. Not really that much fun considering you have to skip every random encounter unless you find some tedious way to restrict your exp gain.

[Spira]

i actually loved FFVIIIs battle system. It worked for me. Leveling does almost nothing for you, but it can if you know how to use it. Essentially the game gives you the flexibility to do a lot of things through Junctioning, but at the same time, there are trade-offs in terms of using too much stocked magic and the rare situation of over-reliance which may kill you (that only being Ultimecia cos of the blow away thing). In VIII, anyone who wanted to make the game more challenging could go about either grinding exp for nothing, or not junctioning. but in other words players aren't required to grind to progress. however, the games difficulty pretty much hinged on whether you knew how to junction well or not.

I'm personally the kind of player who kinda likes to breeze through my games through a little effort on my part. It didn't bother me so much that the Crystarium set an upper limit at various chapters, because with the way CP progression worked you would take ages just to move along anyway. What I felt it was meant to do was to kinda preserve a decent level of difficulty for the final boss (for the first time in particular), but only because going into end-game side content would take you way above that level. On the flipside, you had to seriously grind like mad in XIII just to cap at your current tier (except in the first few chapters) and it typically wasn't worth the time since later mobs give more CP anyway. In that sense XIII really didn't have much of a "so easy its a joke" mode that you can kinda get with some other games - but the game plays itself for you already.. so maybe thats a sort of trade-off.

i kinda like being slightly overpowered when I play my FFs, and to be honest, grinding the Crystarium within its current limits isn't what makes the game easy or not. It's moreso about managing paradigms.. so you can't exactly judge the difficulty that way. It's way more skill/strategy-based than your typical FF. I believe XIII-2 will work in a similar fashion, except that since you can go about replaying chapters and whatnot, there's no reason that they block progression to certain chapters because you won't simply be doing meaningless grinding (lets face it, if you did grind in 9 chapters of XIII, it would have been through running around killing a circuit of mobs alone. there simply isn't anything else to do in those chapters)

[Spira]

Yeah they are totally not doing that. Most challenge games are like that, you just spam meds out the ass/abuse elemental properties or some other quirk that lets you win. Not really that much fun considering you have to skip every random encounter unless you find some tedious way to restrict your exp gain.

devs kinda know this so some games come with something like that way early in the game. iirc Crisis Core FF7 has it in the very first chapter of the game.. like before you set off or something..

i think those low exp challenges are kinda lame, but some people just love to make things hard for themselves I guess.

[Charismatic]

Yeah they are totally not doing that. Most challenge games are like that, you just spam meds out the ass/abuse elemental properties or some other quirk that lets you win. Not really that much fun considering you have to skip every random encounter unless you find some tedious way to restrict your exp gain.

As someone who ACTUALLY PLAYS CHALLENGE RUNS, I can tell you that no... most are not like that. You quite literally don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Because some people play that way does not mean that's what is often required.
In fact, in the case of FFIX (game is so easy) for most of the damned game you can own the hell out of everything because there's several attacks that you can learn fairly early that do way too much damage like Quina's Limit Glove, etc.

And yes, I am talking about staying at Lv1.