Replayability of RPGs

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Crawl and 1OOO

Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 10475

(03/25/06 2:52 AM)

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The Fuzzy Physicist
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I've read some old posts where people were arguing about whether RPGs were replayable.

I guess a person might theoritically say that RPGs are completely unplayable for various reasons (you already know how the story turns out, you already know the solutions to all the puzzles, etc.), but I don't think anyone was arguing that point. The issue seemed to be based on RPGs' length.

I think there might have been a difference in terms. I think RPGs are replayable, insofar as I have replayed some of my favorite RPGs many times, enjoyed doing so, and would enjoy replaying them again.

BUT... I would also say that RPGs ARE less replayable than other games. I don't believe that I will EVER put enough time into an RPG that would rival the amount of time I've played, say, Super Mario Bros. 3. Knowing that I might need to put a month's commitment into replay a game might damper my enthusiasm to replay it, even if I'd enjoy it.

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Ultimate Chicken

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 583

(03/25/06 5:03 AM)

Radioactive Poultry

I've seen replayable RPGs that essentially allow you many paths (and story ones too) through the game, depending on alignment, class, or skills you decide to gain. Baldur's Gate 2 is VERY replayable, especially after you install Throne of Baal. There are good, evil and sit-on-the-fence paths, as well as perhaps multiple classes to choose from with their own quest/subquest paths. It's a far cry from the likes of linear ones like Final Fantasy.

Biggest plus: it's a looooong game in the first place. Sure to entertain for years, perhaps, even if you don't explore every nook and cranny and cringe at becoming anything but Lawful Good.

I do not believe games like Mario are replayable since you essentially do the same things over and over again. You might mess a timing here and there but that's it. Now ADDICTIVE, I believe, if it's fun enough for you to keep on coming back for more, even if you have completed the game the same way tens of times. Addictiveness can easily be mistaken for replayability, but is a completely different concept. Bejeweled is an example of an addictive game. Even when the order of jewels is randomized and really counts on your luck, you ARE essentially trying to match jewels over and over again.

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CLOUDBOND007

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 9847

(03/25/06 5:11 AM)

Lunitari Mage
Moderator

Quote:
I've seen replayable RPGs that essentially allow you many paths (and story ones too) through the game, depending on alignment, class, or skills you decide to gain.

Yes, KOTOR and Morrowind fall into this category (Morrowind maybe moreso), and these are the only types of RPG's I'd ever likely replay at this point in my life. Don't think I'd want to waste 20 or 30 hours on doing so if the experience will be almost exactly the same the second time through.

When I was a kid, and finding a new RPG was an extremely rare event, I'd replay even mediocre ones several times just because I liked RPG's that much. But those days are gone, I'm busy now, and there's too many new choices in the genre to waste away my free time on stuff I've seen and done.

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Flying Omelette

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 17126

(03/25/06 9:24 AM)

Shy, my Oni Brass!

I'll just quote the first paragraph of my Inindo review:

Quote:
Inindo has proven to me something that I've known for years: Only great RPGs are fun to replay. RPGs that are just good tend to lose some of their appeal. Although many people say that RPGs, as a genre, don't have much replay value, I've never really agreed with that. I've played and replayed Final Fantasy 4, Final Fantasy 6, Breath of Fire, Chrono Trigger, Earthbound, Arcana and Super Mario RPG many times and have never gotten bored with them. But with other RPGs that have only a few new ideas, it's easy to be so impressed with those ideas the first time you play that you overlook the problems. On a replay, when those ideas are no longer new to you, the flaws begin to stand out.

Quote:
I don't believe that I will EVER put enough time into an RPG that would rival the amount of time I've played, say, Super Mario Bros. 3.

Well, yeah, but you have to remember that time here is relative to the game. One playthrough of Earthbound is probably equal to about 3-10 games of SMB3 in playing hours (depending on how much of the game you do and how much you warp past.)

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Crawl and 1OOO

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 10475

(03/25/06 10:57 AM)

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Quote:
Well, yeah, but you have to remember that time here is relative to the game. One playthrough of Earthbound is probably equal to about 3-10 games of SMB3 in playing hours (depending on how much of the game you do and how much you warp past.)

Yeah, but I'm even taking that into account when I say it's unlikely for RPGs to catch up.

There were times in my life when I might have played action games like Super Mario Bros. 3 or R-Types every day in a week. I've probably replayed them hundreds of times. It's not just that I enjoyed them, hence I replayed them (though that's true, too), but because they were so short and so little a commitment to replay, if I had an hour to spare, I could do something with them.

If I decided to replay even a "short" RPG like Final Fantasy 4, that would basically be what I'd be doing for entertainment that week (or longer).

It seems like lately I've been beating games and then just moving on. Well, our collection has much more than a thousand games in it, and if one were to hope to make any kind of a dent in it, that's the only thing that can be done. Consequently, though, I've replayed games a lot less.

I have to confess, even though I really liked Final Fantasy Tactics, I've only completely played through it once. I liked KOTOR, but I only replayed about a quarter of that game (at the end, when I switched to Dark Side to get the other ending). The RPG I've replayed the most in recent years would be Vagrant Story, which I've replayed something like 4 to 6 times. That could have taken over 100 hours, which, even for only 4 play throughs, is still a lot of time. But, again, I'm sure I've put more time into R-Type nevertheless.

"Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood."
-Orwell

honestgamer

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 310

(03/25/06 12:15 PM)

You're making perfect sense to me, Crawl. I barely have time to play all the games I own one time, let alone on multiple trips through. Role-playing games are cool, but my reasons for buying them have changed somewhat. Though I always bought them because I liked medieval worlds and exploration and invigorating monster battles and puzzles that tested my intellect (things that have been minimized in the genre these days), another reason I got them is that I could only afford a few games a year. Back then, I looked at things in terms of hours the game would remain fresh.

Instead of buying Mega Man X2, for example, I got Ogre Battle. I figured Mega Man X2 could be beaten in a day or two (and then I rented it and did so), while Ogre Battle would last me a few weeks (which it did). My young mind didn't factor in replay value. Though I played through Final Fantasy III on the Super Nintendo three times and probably put in a total of about 150 hours, I know for a fact that I spent several times that with Super Mario Kart.

These days, I'll play through most games only once. Some I won't even finish. It's not even a matter of choice, most of the time. I'm constantly reviewing different games for my site and the magazine I write for now, so going back and playing a game "just for fun" is a bit of a luxury. The game I've done that with most recently is Lumines on the PSP.

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Facilitypro

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 2343

(03/25/06 3:42 PM)

Slow Daddy

Off the top of my head, the only RPGs I can recall playing through multiple times are Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy. I played through Final Fantasy about 3 or 4 times, mainly to try out the different classes. (But I wouldn't have replyed it soley for that reason; it was a greeat game to begin with. I'm not going to play KOTOR again just to see the dark side path, because I disliked the game.)

I Played through Vagrant Story multiple times because it was fairly short but densley packed with challenge and an intersting story. Plus, there's always more to learn about the game's mechanics (e.g., the workshops got more fun as I learned the ropes of forging).

I guess it's a matter of taste, as I'm sure there are people out there who've played all the FF games 5 times each.

Not that I'd care to meet them.

As far as time goes, I've put hundreds of hours into many action games, so I can't say I'd not want to play RPG's for the time commitment. But again, my favorite action games are those that can still offer a challenge after I've beaten them several times over, so it's not like you "essentially do the same things over and over again."

There are just as many things to do with lots of action games as many RPGs (somtimes more). I can play R-Type Delta on easy, then normal, then hard, then with a different ship, then get the elite notes, etc.

Iron Ball of Destruction

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 672

(03/26/06 7:27 AM)

Well, many RPGs these days are long, lumbering time-consuming story-centered interactive movies. I'm lucky to be paitent to sit thruogh these things once. Older RPGs, on the other hand, tend to be shorter, very little time spent on a story you've already seen, and are often less linear. For example, I've played the first 4 Final Fantasies at least 5 times each (yes, even the allegedly crappy second one), and I can envision myself playing through them again.

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honestgamer

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 310

(03/26/06 9:58 PM)

That's a good reason to not let your RPGs rely too heavily on plot, if you're the developer. I remember old games like Dragon Warrior IV and Ogre Battle. Though they had involving plots, it was never crammed down your throat and you could enjoy the game without sitting through line after line of tedious dialogue. Dungeons weren't designed just to get you from one plot point to another, either. They were designed to be cool in and of themselves. That's why I find it so easy to play through the old Dragon Warrior games. Well, except the first one. ;-)

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Crawl and 1OOO

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 10475

(03/27/06 12:34 AM)

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The Fuzzy Physicist
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Quote:
As far as time goes, I've put hundreds of hours into many action games, so I can't say I'd not want to play RPG's for the time commitment.

Yeah, but again, looking at TOTAL time ignores that action games have tasks that are "compartmentalized".

A person could, for example, play a stage of an action game for ten minutes every morning to try to beat their score. But over time, that ten minutes could add up.

But there's little in an RPG that could be done in ten minutes.

I think there's a bigger issue with games that require you to put in huge continuous blocks of time.

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James FP

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 2890

(03/27/06 2:12 PM)

Schmendrick's Nose
Moderator

That's why I think RPGs should give you something to make a replay more worthwhile. Different story paths, or interchangeable party members, for example. That's why I've replayed Final Fantasy 1 and Ogre Battle more than any other RPGs.

CRAWLand1000

...

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Posts: 3474

(03/27/06 2:47 PM)

The Fuzzy Physicist
Administrator

Somehow, I also don't think that further playing of a game, if you're doing something new with it, even after you've beaten it, should count as "replaying" it.

That's really just extending the game.

When I first beat Final Fantasy 7, I put it away for a year or so. Then I dug it out again and beat the Weapons. That was NOT replaying the game, imo.

Of course, that raises the issue of where the line should be drawn, when it comes to doing "new" things? I'd say replaying Final Fantasy 1 with a brand-new-to-you party is indeed replaying the game.

But, say, earning a cheat in Goldeneye on a stage you've already beaten on all the difficulty levels is not replaying the game, imo. That could be considered to be part of the original experience.

Sometimes I would consider playing a game on a higher difficulty to be something new, and hence not REplaying, but maybe it would depend on the circumstances.

Eventually, there will come a point when you've done just about everything with a game -- not only beaten it, but also done most optional quests for an RPG, or improve your performance for an action game... and after you're done with everything, THEN do you still replay it? That's the question. Not how much optional stuff there is to keep you from repeating yourself to begin with.

CRAWLand1000

Re: ...

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Posts: 3474

(03/27/06 3:11 PM)

The Fuzzy Physicist
Administrator

Quote:
Of course, that raises the issue of where the line should be drawn, when it comes to doing "new" things?

One thing that occured to me was that if the game cares enough about what you did to specifically acknowledge it, then it's something new and hence not a replay.

Examples:

Beating Final Fantasy 1 with a different party -> The game doesn't care what party you use, the ending (and everything else) is the same no matter what -> that is a REplay.

Beating Shinobi on Hard -> beating the game on hard is needed to unlock Super -> this is continuing to play the game, not replaying it.

Even this definition has problems, though.

I'd say that, after you got all the cheats in a Goldeneye stage, that further playing it to improve your times even more would be replaying. But the game sort of acknowledges that by saving your times.

But things like that could specifically be excluded by defining playing for score to be replaying.

"Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood." -Orwell

Oh Sassparilla

Re: ...

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Posts: 465

(03/27/06 6:34 PM)

I don't replay RPGs that often. There are so many of them that I'd rather play a new one if I'm in an RPG mood.

Facilitypro

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 2343

(03/27/06 9:21 PM)

Slow Daddy

Quote:
Beating Shinobi on Hard -> beating the game on hard is needed to unlock Super -> this is continuing to play the game, not replaying it.

For me personally, I don't agree. If I like the game enough to play it again, and have the option to increase the difficulty, it's still replaying the game. The only difference is that my increaseed still may compensate for the increase in difficulty. I wouldn't say that playing Shinobi on Super is "continuing" to play the game.

As for doing things like playing games for 10 minutes at a time, I tend to play for large blocks of time, usually at least an hour or an hour and a half. Thus, I didn't really consider that.

TWEETER911

Re: Replayability of RPGs

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Posts: 4834

(03/27/06 9:27 PM)

Phantom King

Starting from the first area again and going to the end=replay.

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Camira Breen

Re: ...

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Posts: 371

(03/28/06 1:17 PM)

The Baroness

I've mostly only replayed NES RPGs that are really short. Even some of the later ones on that system like the Dragon Warrior games can get quite long, though. I am replaying Ocarina of Time now and I've replayed other Zelda games, but those aren't exactly RPGs. I'm more inclined to replay something if I'm in actual control of it. Actually, that may also be one of the reasons I replayed Magic of Scheherazade a few times because it has more action battles than menu battles, and the menu battles are rather infrequent.

--Pepto-Dash!!

CRAWLand1000

Re: ....

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Posts: 3474

(03/28/06 3:19 PM)

The Fuzzy Physicist
Administrator

I'm just trying to reach some sort of consensus on terms.

Some people say RPGs are "replayable", some say that they are not "replayable", but if "replayable" means something different to everyone, then what are we even talking about?

And "replay things" such as, after you've beaten a game,

-playing it again, beginning to end, like you did the first time

-playing it again, beginning to end, but now on a different difficulty

-playing it again, but taking a different path (for games that allow that)

-not playing beginning to end, but doing something you've never done before

-doing something you've done before, but not playing the whole game beginning to end (such as using a password / save / level select / whatever)

...are all different things, so why should they be described with the same word?

Quote:
For me personally, I don't agree. If I like the game enough to play it again, and have the option to increase the difficulty, it's still replaying the game. The only difference is that my increaseed still may compensate for the increase in difficulty. I wouldn't say that playing Shinobi on Super is "continuing" to play the game.

Maybe this isn't a difference of terms (which I think should at least be *sort of* objective), but of opinion, though.

I know that when I beat Shinobi, I immediately started the game over on Hard. So, Hard was an extension of my original experience with the game.

On the other hand, when I played DMC on Hard, more than a year lapsed between when I first beat it. (But that was literally a replay even in the "I did the exact thing I did before" sense, since I started by replaying Normal).

Gee, I don't know. Everyone here, just at this small little board, approaches (even just the limited subject of) games in such completely different ways that maybe perfect communication just isn't possible.

"Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood." -Orwell

GaveUp

RE: rpgs

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Posts: 126

(03/28/06 3:51 PM)

I guess I'll chime in. Since FF7 I've found RPGs not only to be non-replayable but unplayable for the most part. For me, there are a number of reasons. First is the time aspect. I don't think you need 80-120 or however many hours it takes to play a modern rpg to tell a story. Compound on that the fact that the stories used in rpgs are by and large rehashes of the same plots in other stories and I have even less desire to play. In a way, rpg's since the PS1 have mirrored the D&D campaigns I've played over the past few years. We play the for hours on end, usually 12-16 hour blocks every other week, but we don't get any creative story ... the only thing we really do is power up the characters. For me, this is boring. I don't want an all powerful character. I want first and formost a creative story and interesting characters. Many other complaints I've already mentioned, like the continuous time you need to play an rpg to get anything done. What are there like 1.5 hours of video in the first 2 hours of FFX? That's another rub of mine. The video is not always a good thing to me. It takes part of the imagination away ... like after seeing LOTR reading the books just isn't the same. It makes the experience of playing an RPG much more passive and less engaging for me.

In the past year I've found myself playing all the RPGs I do play on the GBA (only got a gba a year ago). Why? Because they're the "classic style." They're not overly drug out and basically go back to the roots of what a good RPG is. One that comes to mind is Lunar Legends. I had immense fun playing it on the GBA, but when I went back to play the original versions I couldn't get anyway. The video dragged on and turned me off to the game, the knowing the game was so much longer needlessly, and the loading times. Loading times are another thing that drive me nuts with the CD based RPGs. The FF ports, in my opinion, are unplayable because of this alone. A game, properly designed, though, I'd just accept loading times as a nature of the beast type thing and leave it at that.

I guess really I don't understand the big "longer is better" idea. Not an RPG but the 30 hours or so that I needed to play Ninja Gaiden X I thought was a perfect length for that game. The same with the reletively few hours neded to play the original FF or Crystalis, etc. Game companies really need to concentrate on making a good game and not worry about the "this game is too short" when it comes to RPGs. Because of the continuity and style of RPGs I think it is much harder to lengthen the game than say an action game.

Ok so there are some of my scattered brained ideas...chew'm up and spit them out now.

ACC KAIN

Re: RE: rpgs

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Posts: 647

(03/28/06 6:41 PM)

Band on the Run

I think that if you just go into a save file and find an item you missed or fight an optional boss you didn't beat earlier, that shouldn't count as replaying the game. Because you're not even replaying it, you're doing something new that you either forgot, didn't know about, or couldn't do before.

But I think you restart a game from the very beginning and this time try to get everything you missed the first time through, it's still a replay, even if you're doing something slightly new with it.

Difficulty settings are a trickier subject. Sometimes, I think it is replaying, but if the game has a super-easy setting that doesn't even allow you to complete the entire game, then I don't think playing it on a real setting counts as a replay. In this case, the first is more like a warmup.

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da dick

Re: ...

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Posts: 1600

(03/29/06 12:26 PM)

and my bird can sing too!

from my limited knowledge, i would say a RPG would need to have a few of the following things to make it worth replaying:

- it's more of a strategy or simulation game. meaning it allows you the freedom to experiment or try out many ways to beat a level/scenario. but that' s not always the case, so i guess i should be saying "it shouldn't be too linear".

- lots of collectable items/armour/weapon/equipment in general. most of them would have to be useful.

- a decent multi-player element or an MMORPG.

- secret dungeons that which may not require a FAQ to find or beat.

- and of course multiple endings, and subplots which may or may not influence the ending.

ErniePants

Re: ...

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Posts: 513

(03/30/06 12:46 PM)

Omni-Wonder
of the Universe

I thought the obvious answer would be that RPGs are not as replayable as action games, but the more I thought about it, the more complicated the answer really was. RPGs usually take a lot longer, but lately action games have gotten longer, and in fact had started to in the Super NES era with games like Yoshi's Island and DKC2. Action games can also get boring when I've played through them too many times and they're no longer challenging. Generally, I think 3 plays of an action game = 1 play of an RPG.

And for my case, I'm strictly speaking about starting the game over from scratch and going to the end again. Not just taking an old file and doing optional stuff. I count harder difficutlies as a replay only if they're the same as the easier settings but with tougher enemies.

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Agisuro

Re: ...

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Posts: 438

(03/31/06 2:19 PM)

Dark Lich

When I replay RPGs I try to do so by only fighting what enemies I get into battle with by walking to my destinations and not taking specific time out to level up (by walking back and forth in a specific area). That's one way of making the games more challenging on a replay. If I hit an area where I can't get past the enemies or boss without having to take time to level up, I'll probably just give up on the replay. I prefer to use lots of strategy and be on the edge of my toes than wandering around fighting pointlessly.

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