Why Grind?

Role playing games have gone a long way. The natural setup for an RPG video game today is a large, expanding, and intriguing world where you are a hero or the villain that determines the fate of the civilians and yourself. One cliché that spans most RPGs is the constant stat-grind. Why do it? Isn’t it getting old to exp-grind for hours and hours before fighting that major boss or does it make the games that embrace it more immersive?   

Japanese RPGs are usually the culprits who still employ stat-grinding into their gameplay. Games like Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger are titles that gamers need to stat-grind in order to progress. These are two classic titles, one of which survived with the times and have changed its formula a bit. Recent titles like Mass Effect and Dragon Age, both massive hits from developers Bioware, have changed the RPG recipe and minimized the stat-grinding ingredient.

The Final Fantasy series started out with stat-grinding. Anything you did, you had to stat-grind five levels to do it. It was simple yet extremely complex with all the commands you gained throughout the game which included magic spells and item-use. If players even attempted to play the game by burning straight through, they would fail miserably. Games like that are made in order for you to fight monster after monster in order to become stronger and persevere to the end where you brought temporary peace to the world. Final Fantasy XIII stream lined the series for audiences they didn’t have before, being the non-hardcore players who just want to get by, but not that much. They still have players needing to stat-grind in order to proceed. The game was a great adventure to partake, but the fighting got tiring and boring after fighting so many enemies.  

Final Fantasy XIII points out one of the major flaws that stat-grinding has being players would soon lose interest in all the fighting because after hundreds of fights in order to progress, the combat system doesn’t seem so fresh anymore. The battle system was very streamlined and very action oriented, which was a departure from what Square Enix produced before, but the battles just seemed to be annoying after 30 hours of fighting in order to defeat the boss which wouldn’t die because you were too low-leveled. When players feel that the meat of your game is becoming too much for them to handle that they want to stop playing, that’s a bad sign, to say the least. This is not true for everybody though. Some people are hardcore RPG gamers who don’t mind spending the extra hour fighting random monsters in order to progress. It just seems like stat-grinding can be such a tedious task for some that it is a waste to make players who want to treed through a title quickly spend their time fighting weak enemies who barely give any benefit to beating them.

Mass Effect did not get rid of stat-grinding but hid it in small side stories that kept its identity as a role playing game with a mixture of action and succeeded immensely. The first Mass Effect was not as action-packed as most action games get, but it was still full of excitement and kept it partially fresh with almost dead simple 3^rd person action shooting. Players could plow through enemies and become a powerful bad-ass. Mass Effect 2 just added to the action as it made moments where gamers really care about their characters and gameplay that grabbed from classic role-playing games while making its own.  The action-packed sequel let gamers once again burn through the title or experience all that Bioware created in the huge universe. The way that they secretly planted stat-grinding was by giving it a coat of story and immersion that gave players enjoyment while not soiling the combat.

Dragon Age: Origins was another Bioware hit that did the same as Mass Effect where it has a Diablo-like feel that gave gamers loot which made them powerful enough that even if he or she was at a low level, they can still progress. Stat-grinding was still available as it allowed gamers to wield more powerful weapons and armor, but it did not hinder your advancement as much as games that surround their gameplay time with grinding for hours in order to overpower a ridiculously difficult boss.  

Stat-grinding can be extremely tedious, annoying, and hindering to a story that is supposed to be epic. It can also be the reason why some games prosper the way that they do and gain the followers that they have. Stat-grinding is for the hardcore who will invest hours of time in order to see the ending that developers want them to see. It is kind of a way that we as people gain fulfillment out of a video game. We spend so much time invested into our characters that when we become the powerful being who saved the world from an evil, we feel a sense of pride that builds from this achievement which only stat-grinding can accomplish.  

 

Sorry!

I haven't been posting any content recently and I would like to apologize.

I've been working pretty hard with my school work so I've abandoned the robo for a few days, but I am back and I will start posting again on Monday!

A Damn Funny List of Sexual Terms I Would of Never Thought Were Sexual

Destructoid's Andrew Kauz has come up with a really funny list of terms and names from a variety of video games that are completely sexual if you think really hard, and some not at all.


 Some of these terms include Sturdy Bone, Sticky White Stuff and Tactical Insertion. I know...and that's just a taste of the list.

Check out the full article here. 

Amazon selling Xbox 360 Elite with Lego Batman, Pure and $50 Amazon Gift Card

Amazon has a great deal for anybody shopping for a brand spanking new Xbox 360.

A $50 Amazon Gift card is received with any purchase of an Xbox 360 Winter Edition which includes Lego Batman and Pure, two great multiplayer games for the family and friends to sit on the couch or room and enjoy.

Check out the deal here.

Torchlight For $5 On Steam

Torchlight, the loot-filled game that has some love on the web, is on sale on Steam for 75% off.

 It is regularly $20, so this is a great deal for anybody who is into good games. Do yourself a favor and pick this title up while it's still cheap. 

Zombie Street Fighter. Enough Said.

Kotaku has posted some pictures of Street Fighter characters like Akuma and Ryu as zombies with a little bit of flare and creepiness if I do say so myself. They have a Resident Evil-vibe illuminating off of their broken flesh.  

If these were available as skins in Super Street Fighter IV; I’d scrounge the money up for a fresh copy.

Screenshot from Kotaku.  

A Robo Overview: Co-Op Gaming

Co-op gaming is a staple in some of the best video games out today. Such titles like Resident Evil 5, the Gears of War and Halo series, and Left 4 Dead 1 & 2 have allowed gamers to enjoy the co-op experience. There are a number of elements that go into a good co-op game that keeps the players wanting more. 

Gears of War is one of those games that made co-op great because it was exciting and easy to control for most gamers. The cover system, which was fresh at the time, allowed flanking and tactical exploitation like a game had never done before. The easy drop in and drop out of the online and offline modes allowed players to interact with their friends, family and people all over the world in ways that the older generations could not do. Even though the story wasn’t something too memorable, it gave co-op gamers a reason to blow crap up and enjoy it together.

 Good co-op games mesh together memorable experiences with entertaining gameplay in order to give gamers the time of their lives. Gears of War 2 and Halo: ODST have their own variation of a “Horde Mode” which puts gamers in the middle of a level and pits them against waves of enemies. The goal of Horde Mode is to survive, and team work is the only way that gamers can progress to the last level. The fun about this kind of gameplay is that it allows gamers to play together and work as a team in order to progress past the waves of enemies that are trying to eliminate you. The upcoming Splinter Cell: Conviction will employ a similar mode called Last Stand which pits spies against 20 waves of enemies, which can lead to hours of fun for any person a fan of the mode and spies.

Besides an excellent cover system and demolishing enemies to bits in harmony, a cooperative experience should be easy to enter and leave, then come back for another enjoyable sitting. The interface for games such as Halo 3 and Gears of War 2 allowed gamers to enter a person’s lobby, play a level or two and then leave. Army of Two also had that fault, the lobby interface was annoying. The way gamers play together has to not annoy the players to the point where they do not want to play anymore, break the game in half and curse out the developers and it also has to feel seamless and smooth as they connect online or offline.

A good co-op game does not need to great story that is coherent and interesting, but it sure helps. When two players can make a comment, good or bad, about a game, it should be something that makes them bond and think in ways they’ve never thought before. It is one of the ways that helps people bond together to better enjoy the experience they are having together. Gears of War 2’s story is not a gold standard, but it is sort of easy to follow, or at least explain. Halo’s four player co-op allowed players to watch as Master Chief and his alien allies destroyed another ancient artifact that could destroy the world. It gave gamers something to talk about.

 One thing which should be in every game, but especially in co-op games, are random events that create excitement. When someone destroys a giant enemies with four rockets at the same time is something that gamers can talk about together and freak out about. These extraordinary events are something that a developer cannot create, but the players create themselves with a little bit of luck.  

Some developers have tried to build their whole video game around co-op, like Gears of War and Army of Two, and have succeeded and failed in some ways. Army of Two succeeded in showing gamers that they can work together to get the job done by allowing the characters to interact with the world together. It also added elements like aggro and back-to-back shooting to add tactical advantages that co-op players can use. The controls made it a little more difficult to convey that.

 Sites like Ars Technica and Co-Optimus allows gamers to interact in order to setup co-op games. Co-Optimus has some great features like allowing gamers to find games they have and match themselves with other people who are looking for people to play with. Have Crackdown and want to fight crime with another Crackdown player? Co-Optimus has people who will play with you. It is a community that wants to share and expand across the computer partners in single player games.  

Sharing an experience with somebody is just a great feeling whether it is sitting on the same couch or a different couch across town. Co-op gaming allows relationships to be created and to expand. It feeds the gamers need to share with others in ways they normally can’t in real life.

 Here is the message: Play together people!