Post by Belix on Jan 6, 2012 2:28:26 GMT -5
I have spent a lot of time playing ARPGs (Action RPGs) over the years, and as I play Sacred I am reminded of a trend I notice in these games.
It seems that you can divide the content of these games into three pieces:
1/3rd: Stuff that is relatively ineffective and weak compared to other stuff available, like skills, spells, combat styles. It is either essentially useless from the moment you acquire it, or becomes useless later on no matter how you use it or try to enhance it. These stem from game balance issues, perhaps the designers didn't use it much and never noticed, or were in a hurry and didn't finish tuning it. Occasionally you get stuff here that is overpowered; a player looking for a challenge will learn to avoid it, whereas more casual players may tend to use it regularly.
1/3rd: Stuff that was poorly made and underwhelming to use. Spells with bad sounds, attacks with cheesy animations, weapons and armor that look terrible, and things that just don't feel right or give proper feedback when employed. These are flaws in production values. Sometimes some of this crops up when stuff is unfinished but left unchanged for so long while the designers work on other things that they become accustomed to it and forget to improve it further later.
1/3rd: Stuff that ranges from acceptably to excellently designed. This is the stuff that works well in the game and is fun to utilize. These are the skills, spells and other things that many players tend to end up using, sometimes without realizing it, and then when you play online you see a ton of people using the same stuff.
So far, Sacred does not seem like an exception to this. When I was first deciding on a character to use, I played several characters a few levels into the game and found the Combat Arts for the various characters to be prime examples. I had mixed feelings about a lot of stuff; Battle Mage spells, Seraphim melee moves, etc. For the most part the game seems fairly well balanced, so I found more gripes in the underwhelming category than unbalanced.
Far be it from me to leave this with the possible interpretation that I'm suggesting making a game of this scope and ensuring everything is balanced and top knotch quality is an easy task, though; It isn't. Just about every game on the shelves over the years have had this syndrome, and some especially bad ones had almost no redeeming qualities. All in all Sacred is a nice piece of work and has been quite enjoyable thus far. It's just when I enjoy something, that's when I start finding the things wrong with it and there's that little bit of disappointment -- not with what's there, but that there could of been more, and it could of been better.
I suspect though that everyone feels that way about things they enjoy. You want a good movie to keep going, you want more pages at the end of a good book, and as a gamer with a game you're immersed in, you always hope there's one more dungeon to plunder, one more story arc, one more world to explore. But often all too soon, it is over.
All good things...
It seems that you can divide the content of these games into three pieces:
1/3rd: Stuff that is relatively ineffective and weak compared to other stuff available, like skills, spells, combat styles. It is either essentially useless from the moment you acquire it, or becomes useless later on no matter how you use it or try to enhance it. These stem from game balance issues, perhaps the designers didn't use it much and never noticed, or were in a hurry and didn't finish tuning it. Occasionally you get stuff here that is overpowered; a player looking for a challenge will learn to avoid it, whereas more casual players may tend to use it regularly.
1/3rd: Stuff that was poorly made and underwhelming to use. Spells with bad sounds, attacks with cheesy animations, weapons and armor that look terrible, and things that just don't feel right or give proper feedback when employed. These are flaws in production values. Sometimes some of this crops up when stuff is unfinished but left unchanged for so long while the designers work on other things that they become accustomed to it and forget to improve it further later.
1/3rd: Stuff that ranges from acceptably to excellently designed. This is the stuff that works well in the game and is fun to utilize. These are the skills, spells and other things that many players tend to end up using, sometimes without realizing it, and then when you play online you see a ton of people using the same stuff.
So far, Sacred does not seem like an exception to this. When I was first deciding on a character to use, I played several characters a few levels into the game and found the Combat Arts for the various characters to be prime examples. I had mixed feelings about a lot of stuff; Battle Mage spells, Seraphim melee moves, etc. For the most part the game seems fairly well balanced, so I found more gripes in the underwhelming category than unbalanced.
Far be it from me to leave this with the possible interpretation that I'm suggesting making a game of this scope and ensuring everything is balanced and top knotch quality is an easy task, though; It isn't. Just about every game on the shelves over the years have had this syndrome, and some especially bad ones had almost no redeeming qualities. All in all Sacred is a nice piece of work and has been quite enjoyable thus far. It's just when I enjoy something, that's when I start finding the things wrong with it and there's that little bit of disappointment -- not with what's there, but that there could of been more, and it could of been better.
I suspect though that everyone feels that way about things they enjoy. You want a good movie to keep going, you want more pages at the end of a good book, and as a gamer with a game you're immersed in, you always hope there's one more dungeon to plunder, one more story arc, one more world to explore. But often all too soon, it is over.
All good things...