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I've noticed some disturbing trends in the Role Playing
Game market in the past few years. Writers used to
create epic stories of good versus evil, tales of
mysterious heros showing up to prevent Armageddon
or the domination of evil. As the player you take
on the role of a group of warriors, freedom fighters,
or magicians who's power and knowledge grow throughout
the course of the game. But now all of that is starting
to seem secondary to the development of side-quests,
inclusion of large numbers of party members, and mini-games.
Lets explore each of these occurrences.
The Side Quest
Side-quests are simply quests that deviate from the
main quest of the game. Maybe there is a person in
a village who is sick and needs a particular herb
to heal them. Or someone collects rare items and if
you happen to find any, give them to that person for
a reward. Any of these tasks don't need to be completed
in order to rid the world of evil but they may earn
you extra items that will help you. Usually clues
for these quests are derived from game citizens telling
you that something is located to the north, or that
there is a super strong ore called Adamant located
in a volcano. It's very helpful when trying to find
things when people are clear and helpful.
| Fast-forward
to today and you will see the rampant explosion
of side-quests. What was once a cool idea has
now become a race to see which franchise can include
the most side-quests in their games. To make matters
worse the competition has lead to inclusion of
bizarre, confusing and even stupid quests that
have nothing to do with the actual game. Searching
in a cave for some rare ore that the blacksmith
needs to make you an ultimate weapon just makes
too much sense. Now to get an ultimate weapon
you need to need take a few hours or days to learn
how to ride a giant emu. |
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Sub sequentially you will need to race said emu against
another rider while collecting balloons and dodging
giant sea gulls. After that you need to find the other
pieces of your mystical weapon and give them to the
"special" tree in the forest that will combine them
for you. But, here is the stupid part. How do you
find out about all of this? YOU DON'T! The most information
you'll ever get is if you want to run around pushing
the action button in front of every possible part
of the game's play area and then re-visit every local
in the world after any event takes place. You never
know, getting a dog to smell a medallion will finally
make the chief of cave dwellers change his mind and
give you permission to enter the tomb. Either that
or the answer is right in front of you. People will
tell you "the moon looks strange tonight." meaning
go to the invisible castle in the northwest forest
to find a person who is even more vague than I am.
It makes no sense. However the one in 1000 people
that accidentally stumble upon the secret castle now
has the Internet to share findings with everyone else.
Sometimes ignorance IS bliss.
Another thing about side-quests: what the hell is
the villain doing while you try to commit genocide
against every creature in the game. It sure is nice
of him/her/it to just sit there, thumb in ass, waiting
for you to come waltzing through the door with your
newly acquired ultimate weapons that make the battle
so easy he dies in one hit.
No wonder they can guarantee 1000 hours of gameplay.
Because that's how much time you need to figure out
any of this foolishness.
Party Members
The typical party in any console RPG consists of
three to five active members depending on the game.
That means that you can only have three to five people
battling enemies on a regular basis. Final Fantasy
I and Final Fantasy II/IV had many party members but
you only had four or five members respectively with
you at any one time. However in Final Fantasy III/VI
you could find a whopping twenty party members total
but could only use four at any one time. What do the
other characters do while the four of you are out
battling against world domination? They sit and wait
on the boat/airship or fester in the eternal void
of loser party members along with Cait Sith, Umaro,
and Grobyc.
sixteen characters you
really
won't care about.
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If you don't recognize any of those names then
you obviously didn't complete enough side-quests
to find them. Ok, maybe people's likes and dislikes
draw them to certain party members versus others
but having that many useless people running around
is just stupid. By the time you get to the end
of the game all unused party members are now so
weak they can't lift the "+3 sword of kick ass"
that you bought for them. |
I yearn for the days of Final Fantasy II/IV where
the story incorporated party members that actually
had their own agenda instead of following you around
like a lost puppy hoping to get some experience and
maybe a weapon or two. Play FFII if you would like
to see the true art of character integration with
storyline.
Mini Games
A game inside of a game, I'm not exactly sure when
these started to appear but in the console RPG world
you will eventually find a fair, festival, facility,
or lone carney that wants you to take part in a game.
Games can range from shooting arrows at moving targets
all the way up to full-fledged sporting events. As
with side-quests, mini-games are strictly there because
someone lacked the creativity and patience to create
a proper hiding place for weapons of mass destruction.
Of course it makes sense that the all-powerful sword
that you can use to save the world is kept by a guy
who insists that you play (and win) his shooting game
even as the world is rampaged by evil. I'm sure there
are more noble things for your characters to be doing
when giant meteor is heading for earth than spend
the next 38 hours in the Golden Saucer playing games.
The meteor will be in the same spot when I get back.
I just want to play a full length RPG. If I wanted
to play mini games I would buy "100,000 versions of
solitaire" CD from computer game discount section
at Wal-Mart.
With mini-games, side-quests, and more party members
than mosquitoes in the Midwest, RPG games are becoming
more gimmicky than the fulfilling games of yesteryear.
If a movie came out with half the extras as today's
RPG it would be like watching a movie broadcast on
TV with extra commercial interruptions. So here I
am in the vast soap box laden internet to voice my
opinion about crap that I can't possibly change.
-wileee
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