I hate grind in video games...

If you enjoy the gameplay I don't see why you wouldn't enjoy experiencing more of it rather than playing some 10 hour game with no padding or replayability. Even if it's replayable you'll be done with it in another evening or two. Honestly you just sound like a total normalfag.

On second thought
Yeah, you're a normalfag for sure. I need some sleep for not immediately spotting that.

FUCKING TRY TO READ.

The problem is if game content gets stretched, forced to grind, reused to WAY beyond it's actual content.

Haven't played Darkest Dungeon but in Pokemon you should be strong enough to defeat most gym leaders by simply walking straight to them. In Soul Silver I beat the ice gym leader right after the ghost gym leader, only to realize I just skipped too other people. I thought the game just got a difficulty spike but it turns out I wasn't supposed to go there yet. Still I won on my first try with an underpowered team. Modern Pokemon games just throw exp at you and sometimes you never need to use a Pokemon to get it high leveled. While older RPGs, used to use grinding to pad out the game, RPGs today make the game easy enough to the point you will only grind during post game.

You don't know the difference between grind and padding.

Grind: Performing repetitive tasks in order to better your character mathematically with no skill, be it better stats, more money so you can get better gear, etc.

Padding: Superfluous shit that adds nothing to the game but serves to extend the time playing it, this may require skill. If the things you'd acquire from beating it are cosmetic or don't change much, then it's padding. If it doesn't develop the narrative but down the line 'might' give you something good, it's still padding but you could argue the difference.

So when you say "A game that should be 10 hours long being made to 100 hours, that's grind". What you mean is "I think padding is grinding."

It's called grinding for levels, not padding for levels.

It's shit design and worthless padding, but unless you're getting something out of it other than "it advances the game", like levels, xp, equipment, party members, etc. then it isn't grinding.

Stop trying to be an edgy prick. People are giving you shit because you misunderstood a basic concept and then acted like a complete retard.

I don't want to bring up Pokemon, because I actually loved it as a kid.

It had hundreds of monster, different locations, FUCK you made me repeat myself again.

take note that I haven't played Pokemon, since silver came out.

I at least used to like grinding. Back when I was a kid I used to spend 99% of my spare time playing vidya, and one of my first grindfests was completing FFVII with all character combinations with everyone with all limit breaks and lv.100.

These days time is more limited so I can't as opposed to won't grind any more. Trails in the Sky offered an option to the grind, it would ask to lower the skills/HP of your enemy if you retried a fight more than a few times.

It's a shame that if you started the game with access to every skill and lv.100 stats so you don't have to waste your own time grinding that the game would be completely devoid of fun and would be "walk to the next cutscene while avoiding random encounters". Balancing stat-heavy games must be a nightmare. Unless you do it exactly the way the developers intended, you're either going to be underlevelled and claim it's a grindfest so you can beat stuff or you're going to be overlevelled and complain it's dull and easy.

Man, I never new space invaders and literally every points based arcade game is actually a grind.

WHAT A FUCKING GRIND, UGH!

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holy shit, user, you are so oblivious, it's really cute

The thing here is that you don't need most of those Pokemon to win. Hell in the original Pokemon you can go about just fine with 2 fighting, and a few others for HMs. You went out of your way to get those Pokemon stronger despite never needing to. Because you either enjoyed the gameplay or was addicted for some reason.

That's why you don't get that much freedom to customize your team in Final Fantasy games. In FFX everyone has barely any customization to the point that the game might as well give you your abilities. Instead they let the player unlock them himself to give him the feeling that he has a choice in how he's leveling. That is until he realized the sphere grid is actually one long straight line of abilities with only like 2 branching trees that give a few abilities.

Sure, but that is not related to what I said about Darkest Dungeon.

Funnily enough I found FFX to have the best progression/be the most fun overall. It may well be the case that since it's more restrictive they were better able to balance everything so it feels like the whole game's in that goldilocks zone.

They did offer the free sphere grid for the European/HD editions IIRC, so if you wanted something freeform you could fuck with it later on.

It's the exact opposite of what this thread is about. Arcade games are simply difficult and dependent on player skill unlike RPGs. Good decision making will take you far in an RPG but simply not being strong enough can end you without a doubt unless you're exploiting something.

Arcade games are pure skill. Here you're arguing that constantly playing an arcade game is grinding but what you're doing is getting better yourself. Not making your in game character stronger. A pro can get through all of Metal Slug with 2 quarters to start the game. You can't do the same in a RPG unless you're really exploiting the the system to make low level runs possible.

Maybe you just don't like video games, user.

Arcade games are about jewing you out of money. Player skill is incidental to them gouging you for quarters

this user knows what's up

Yes, yes, all products exist for you to spend money on them. Well done.

You've said nothing about Darkest Dungeon except that a guy played it for 80 hours. In fact that can all be due to constantly having to start over due to RNG and not just him grinding.

gameinternals.com/post/3364162387/straightening-out-final-fantasy-xs-sphere-grid

Never played the international version but don't you only get to go into other's tree during post game? Also it's more of FFX is just very easy and they give you little tools as you go on so it's easy to balance around. I would rather have more freedom with character builds and a tougher enemy selection that counters many builds like in Etrian Odyssey.

What about invoking strategies that involve set ups and defense mechanisms, and strategies that can be used to counter effective strategies? Are these not skills? Do you not have to understand the fundamental concepts involved in building and utilizing these things, and find contingencies that can resist against said counters?
What do you mean by "picking the best number to use"? In modern Pokemon, if you're only picking STAB abilities and hoping for a OHKO, then you're not really playing at high levels, where other opponents will have built teams that focus around specific strategies, like high defense tanks that use passive buffs that are designed to outlast their opponent coupled with moves that deal status ailments that can reduce the enemy's effectiveness and deal chip damage over long periods of time. I don't think you're giving Pokemon a fair shake. Some Final Fantasy titles have their share of strategy as well, I can think of specific examples from a few of the games, but fuck writing an essay.
What about games in which you have control over your character, but also utilize some mathematical abstraction that dictates your damage output? Most action RPGs, and even a lot of hack and slash types, have this sort of abstraction. Obviously, when you're controlling your character in real time, there is an added element of reaction time and execution that you need to understand, but that doesn't mean that the damage calculation abstraction is less important.

I can agree that sometimes grinding can feel tedious, but I think it has its place, providing it is done right. I haven't played many games, outside of shitty MMO types, that make grinding feel especially tedious. Obviously, in most games there is the concept of diminishing returns, and eventually you'll hit a point where your progress naturally slows down as you head towards the level cap/end game, but by the time you reach that point, you'll have likely experienced the majority of the game's content, which will make the grind pointless.

I love Dark Souls, and I think it does grinding right to some degree. For instance, some enemies will drop their outfits. I like changing up my character's appearance, so I don't mind clearing a level in order to collect all the armor pieces and weapons an enemy can drop. The game gives you ways to increase your chances at getting the drops you want (Gold Serpent Ring/Luck stat/Humanity), so it's not too painful, and clearing out enemies will always net you souls, which is a secondary benefit of the grind. On the other hand, the grind for covenant items is so fucking tedious and boring because some of them have low drop rates and can take a long as fucking time to acquire as a result (Dragon Scales, for example).

tl;dr grinding can be fun, it's just a matter of execution.

t. user who didnt watch his video or knows what's darkest dungeon is about

my entire point is that game content being stretched is bad and forceful grinds

maybe I should have made that more clear for the user babbies who think of themselves superior and "love their grind".

This.

It's just watching progress bars going up, with some graphics thrown in and some buttons clicked. Stanley Parable shit. If you really like watching progress bars and big numbers I recommend Idling to Rule the Gods.

You can just buy or pirate Megadimension Nep VII equipment that it far above the ordinary, rendering every boss a joke, and the game's still at least somewhat interesting because you're nepping nep.

Just replayed BoF3 on emu recently and did just that. Same with Persona 3 and 4. Heats up the processor to all hell turboing PS2 emu but in a dungeon where your looking at about 5-6 fights without having to heal and enemies spread out into the level for you to find instead of random encounters, the saved time results speak for themselves.

But the amount of focus on that can vary to great degree.

plenty of atari and other repetitive points based games were never coin operated arcade games user…

I still don't like them, user. :^)

you can't save a it when the game itself is repetitive as shit

There's a fine line with that. Games that are true ARPGs do favor skill with character progression and building than the action interactions, but if the game favors that latter over the former than it's more of an Action Game with some RPG elements than a real RPG.

The difference there also helps dictate how good or bad grinding can be. If the game is more action oriented having some variety in the action mechanics you and enemies use will make it more appealing, while if the game is more of an RPG having more build variety and enemies to counter your builds would make the grind better. While both of those kinds of games would benefit from both of those improvements, their focus on mechanics makes one area more worthwhile than the other.

Please come back when you can form arguments with your own words.

I do, but you all ignore me.

That's why I make a point to not grind in jrpgs and just go with what I'm dealt with. It's much more fun that way.

And I don't play them, because I don't like them.

Warframe is a good example of grind vs farming vs repetative gameplay vs padding.
you can do all 4 of these things in warframe and they are not the same.

Grinding is playing the same level over and over in hopes of getting a rare drop like video related.

Farming is similar, but different. its usually automated to an extent. for example how people used to use greedy mag. or chroma to farm credits, by only playing the first 5 waves and quitting, then replaying.

repetitive gaming is just playing the game or going for the "high score" with no specific objective. (this is how i play warframe) i may play a certain level because something drops there, but i wont play it if its not fun, even if the non-fun way is more efficient. its only a grind when youre doing the easiest/boring thing because its most effective.

padding is when theres a community objective where they tell you to beat a level. then beat it 6 more times to get the next "prize".

those same community objectives also showcase repetitive gameplay when they tell you to get a better score on the same level so you replay it and try at that better score.

Definitely can be a skill, however most of the time you're faced with endless repetitive tasks in order to level up your dudes with little/no strategy required. That's not strategic gameplay, it's just grinding. If you're talking endgame/metagame scenarios, then that's what you're grinding to get to, much like how people would say Pokemon/WoW "really only flourish in endgame", which is to say "You're going to spend hours of your life doing boring shit to make your characters good enough to survive endgame" rather than "You can play when you are good enough".

Basically you will always choose the numerically most advantageous option to you, strategy/skill comes from being able to identify what is most advantageous at that time and understanding trade-offs. The more removed from direct control a game is (in terms of system, not in terms of the game just arbitrarily doing whatever it wants), the closer you get to something where there is mathematically a perfect option. Connect 4 and TicTacToe have been solved, there are mathematically proven ways to beat those games 100%, but you can't ever 'solve' soccer. You can't even accurately predict soccer, even with statistical tracking, and even if you know the statistically best options to you (shooting close is better than shooting far, etc.). It will always be more beneficial to use the gun that shoots the bigger numbers (if that is the only variable regarding the guns), but player movement, accuracy, etc. all make it more about the player's abilities rather than the player just saying "I'm going to press A to cast fire 2, because I ground out 6 levels before this fight so it's better now."

tl;dr - direct human control gives unpredictability and feedback necessary to make something less predictable, whereas turn based games devolve into "I'm picking my best move (for this situation)". Metagaming is slightly different, but only in that it's a step higher in complexity. That's not to say it's 'bad' and there isn't strategy, just to say that getting there takes time and grinding. You can't level 100 a party of 6 mons with perfect evs and natures without insane amounts of grinding.

still tl;dr - Direct action is orders of magnitude more complex than turn based grindfests, which makes them less predictable and harder to strategise.

The can either be fantastic hybrids or complete dogshit with the worst of both worlds depending on the developer and your taste. Some people love Dragon's Dogma and think it's the holy alliance of stat based action gaming, some people think it's a wanky grindfest where player input just makes it take longer.

I said as much above (>>11626976). Grinding can be enjoyable provided the core gameplay itself is actually fun. If all you're doing is wasting time so your character can grow up enough to do what you already could do with your current skill level in a game system you are no longer enjoying specifically because the repetition has destroyed your sense of what fun even is, then it's terrible. I enjoyed Destiny simply because the game felt great to play and it didn't feel like a chore. At first.

Warframe is a shit game.

It's an example of a dev pissing into their own coffee, enjoying the flavor of their own piss, and then serving it to other people, all the while the gradually increasing amount of piss in the system makes the mixture ever more disgusting.

You did not. Your argument in this thread can be summed up as this such:

read this idiot

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I already addressed that.
That fact that you used
should be reason enough to disregard your posts.

it has its fun if you enjoy the combat and level of customization. I enjoy it and for me it was a free game. the people i play with are autistic and have spent insane amounts of money on it.

I've put alot of time into the game because i really enjoy the level of creativity it allows in builds. What other game can i readily and quickly mod weapons and characters for vastly different purposes?

In many RPGs you can do this, but you usually have to build in a direction. in warframe i can just equip different mod cards. i can turn chroma into a melee based tank, or a fast squishy frame that drops an all-powerful sentinel that can hold down a doorway.

i can build a tonkor that deals 200k+ damage but fires slowly and blasts are concentrated, or a grenade launcher that fires 3x3 grenades between reloads, each grenade doing around 10k damage but capable of clearing a room of weaker enemies.

trinity can be a tank, or a medic. or you can cusomize her to be somewhere in between. same with most frames. i have stealth frames, melee frames, AOE frames.

i can see why people wouldnt like it, it has problems. most of them stem from the F2P aspect of it.
but that heavily relies on how you play a game. and alot of people in the community fail to get this. you dont HAVE to get every fucking thing they release. infact most of the absoulte best things are available in the store without any grinding for parts. but people want every shiny trinket and piece of shit in the game like an addiction.

Interesting perspective. So do you think there have been any ARPGs that have managed to strike a fine balance between character progression and real time combat/player input?

All fair points. I see where you're coming from. However, I got the impression that you were trying to imply that turn based strategy, or any type of gameplay that doesn't involve real time combat, doesn't ever require skill. Do you agree with that?

my point is NOT the grind!

wtf

my main and only point is to extend game content way beyond their enjoyment time

grind only comes into this if the game is built around this

JESUS CHRIST

Come on.

thats pretty subjective user.

Bitch get on my level i grinded permanent stat increasing items on Breath of Fire 3 until the main character had 999 on each attribute just because i could
I also put at least 250 hours on every single version of monster hunter i play
And i had the "Salty" title on WoW before they made it easy for everyone, i was the second or third person to get the title on the server

Get your ADHD ass out of here

I like grinding.
If game doesn't have any sort of progression, levels, exp in some form I won't even touch it.
Play mario I guess.

Fuck off.

Good thing I made less subjective points before:

A game becomes very tedious if there is only 8 hours of actual content that gets stretched to 80 hours through being forced to grind, copying game levels and enemies, making you repeat the same kind of quests over and over again, etc.

Bitch, stfu. When I used to play Fable as a kid, I beat the guy in Bowerstone to get my strenght experience up to almost maximum. In addition I go to Oakvale without even touching the mainquest.
Through the use of the hero save and spending money in Avo's temple I can become a max leveled 18 year old hero halfway through the game.

Fuck you, asshole.

respond to this comment then

suck on my balls

Nah, I think there's a great deal of strategy that comes with it, especially when it's increased beyond 1vs1 when you can't move (pokemon) to something like turn-based strategy or turn-based tactics. There's also much less grind in games such as something like… Advance Wars, as an example, than something like Final Fantasy Tactics which places a lot of emphasis on developing characters through jobs and levels. Advance Wars works well without any grind whatsoever, even when it's quite simplistic (simple doesn't mean bad), whereas because FFT depends on character level you can grind to beat a level rather than out-thinking the problem.

These may well be terrible examples. I know Advance Wars can quickly devolve into rock paper scissors/throw the big tank at every problem and that FFTactics, especially advance, can lead to grinding working against the player because progression is tied to story so levelling up hurts in the long run. They're just quick examples for now.

I love both games. I think that maybe "skill" can be conflated with "strategy/strategic-thing". When I think of 'skill' I normally thing of more active processes with the body rather than mental ones, but that may be me being hazy on definition. If I gave the impression that there's no skill then that's my bad, it's just that most turn based games, especially ones that don't allow character movement, can very easily devolve into "grind 5 more levels, use best move on every enemy in every fight" until metagame.

You sound angry.
If gameplay is bad I won't play even if game has progression.
If gameplay is good but game doesn't have progression, I won't touch it, because it would feel like a waste of good game.
If gameplay is good AND there is some sort of progression chances are I will play it for prolonged periods of time.
For example I played for around 100 hours into Way of Samurai 4 when it got released on steam. Despite being locked at 30 fps it has good combat and you can gradually upgrade your sword and unlock accessories for character. I think it's one of the best games ever made.

Dude, I love Advance wars.

But you can't really say it's grindy, except for their shop. I mostly used it to play against other people in my family.

This is more telling than anything else you've said in this thread user.

do you not enjoy mastering something user?

Nah I said Advance Wars had no grind whatsoever, it's a strategy game with no grind (unless you count resource generation that doesn't carry over as grind. I personally don't) that I could compare to Final Fantasy Tactics which can have grind depending on how you want to play it, though I made concessions that FFT can buttfuck you for grinding. The levelling system will get you buffed, but enemies scale with you and better stuff is partially tied to story/sidequests which can only be unlocked with actually doing the game rather than just decapitating Bangaa for hours.

That said, I love FFTA, even grinding pointlessly around the starter areas. One of my favourite games of all time. Tactics games in general are things I love, especially X-Com. And if you're into /tg/, Infinity is the best shit I've ever played.

I think it may be the idea that you've mastered something with nothing to show for it other than limited application of what you've learned. When you've poured 100 hours into a stat-based game then you can look at the bigger number next to your sword, I guess?

I look at games as pastimes (time you enjoyed wasting wasn't wasted), so I stop playing when I stop enjoying it unless I want to see how it ends for whatever reason. If the guy doesn't like the idea of no external reward for time invested, then I guess I can't fault him. His time and money.

Well you're essentially reaction-time, coordination, and other motor skills (those tested by action games) are the only kinds of "skill", when really all sorts of skills exist (social, knowledge, communication, management, strategic, etc).

What is the point of mastering if I don't get something in return?
The only game without progression that I played to the end was Oni.
It is an old action game with good combat. You unlock new moves as you complete stages, but it doesn't depend on you. No matter what you do, how many enemies you kill you will only get the same moves after the same stages. You also can only move forward as replaying stages won't give you anything. You play stage after stage after stage and then the end.
I felt very frustrated, as good combat was wasted on shallow one-time game.

Compare it to Devil May Cry 3. It is also old action game.
But when you complete stage, you unlock harder version of said stage so you can play it again with different enemies, and even the same enemies will fight differently. Not only that but you can earn currency and YOU decide what moves and when to unlock.
Even if you beat the story you still have things to replay and to improve. Unlocking costumes, movements and new harder stages was so much pleasure.
I don't remember if I had more or less than 100 hours in Devil May Cry 3, but no less that 70-80. It was such amazing game. It still is!
I think DMC4 is worse game since there are less things to do and to unlock, but still pretty good.

Level 99 is the max you retards. It also takes roughly ~70 hours total to get all the shit done and do that. And it's a total waste of time in the end because Safer . But 70 hours is a real drop in the bucket compared to the really sick time sinks out there like online RPGs or social life RPGs.

t. someone who just did this shit again

I understand progression and why it's more enjoyable but i also enjoy playing a game, and being able to replay through it from scratch without getting killed the 2nd time around. I can blow through some NES and SNES games like nobody else. i can smash through tetris attack on Hard, the only stat increase is my own.
the "return" on stat based games is more concrete, but its still just as pointless as a useless skill
TBH i was just kind of put off by the "wont touch" part of that statement.

Or you can just stop playing.

Also it's a huge fucking waste of time because the stat bonuses to Safer Sephiroth for each level 99 character don't amount to shit. Low-level is truly the only somewhat rewarding way beat FFVII.

Aye, very true. Just my own slant on the term obscuring the conversation then. Cheers.

The big thing to remember is that progression isn't bad in of itself, it's just a tool, part of the gameplay.

Some games, especially anything with competitive multiplayer, thrive on there being no progression/strict, linear progression/"builds" that can be attained by anyone. The playing field is level, with room for players to decide their own play style that works best for them. Fucking this up is where you get imbalances, which is why MOBA games and Hero-Shooters (Overwatch) will always be imbalanced, the game thrives on it. Compare to standard brown FPS fare and it's usually just complaints that a certain gun is OP, in which case just git-gud with that gun (unless it's no longer fun to play, in which case rebalance the gun).

The issue of progression is that it's a skinner box. You're performing the action to get the next shiny. If you already had the shiny, would you still play the game? Is the core gameplay actually fun and rewarding in its own right, or are you having "just enough fun" to continue to get the next shiny. Some games build around the progression successfully, some don't. Some games are so well made that you'd play them over and over again regardless of progression, some games are just endless progression loops (mobile games).

Arcade design is truly the dankest form of game design. Something that takes a large amount of time to attain mastery but can be replicated in a short amount of time once achieved is far superior to to low-skill grinds that gives up the ghost the moment you've seen everything. Replayability is key.

I never got into arcade. I don't like it.

Closest I got was playing that Hercules game as a little kid. It scared me a bit.

Maybe because the gameplay is fun in its own right?

I hate fucks like you who complain about inane shit

darkest dungeon is a bad game, user

Perhaps you're on the wrong website.

Well and then you play game again with such lovely gameplay and all you get is the same stages, enemies and everything you already saw and did. Where is satisfaction in that? It only brings frustration to me.
If you can replay exact the same thing over and over again and have fun, I can only envy you.

you shouldn't envy people with autism, user

(checked)
I get you, user. I can enjoy games on either end of the spectrum as well as the stuff in between provided they're done right, I just can't fault the guy for not liking something.

I prefer something akin to Majora's Mask or FTL: Gameplay that's built to be replayed several times so it's designed with that in mind. I've played Majora's Mask pretty much once a year for the past decade. Neither of them have reliance on stat development. Things can improve with equipment, but getting that stuff doesn't take long and/or is enjoyable to get. FTL especially, since although MM is now the comfiest game on the planet for me, FTL has that slightly random element that means you're not just playing from rote and have to slightly adapt each time. Great games.

WhereDoYouThinkWeAre.jpg

If the gameplay is dynamic and fun enough to keep someone engaged I don't see the issue. People enjoy doing a thing, so naturally it makes sense they'd want to do more of it. I mean why do people play multiplayer games that don't receive constant updates, or replay games at all for that matter? They just enjoy the act of playing them enough.

Shorter, repetitive games are especially popular among normalfags.

It's okay, OP, you can say Let It Die.

I don't know what the fuck is up with this nigger but you don't need to send heroes to stress relief if you manage stress.
Usually having a hero at 50/30 stress means they're good to go unless it's the Darkest Dungeon or a boss fight.
Getting Heirlooms/gold is not hard if you keep an Antiquarian around and don't stay in the short and apprentice dungeons like a pussyfooting bitch.Hell,even in smaller/easier dungeons you can get 10k easily if you know your shit and resolve exp is pretty easy to come by if you're not a giant faggot and stay in short,low level dungeons.
Lastly,Quirks are vital to your heroes being good or bad,a hero that has "fear of x/-phobe" against an enemy type that he's good against or an area he thrives in he's going to be fucked in ways only trinkets can mitigate,which could be used for actually enchancing another hero instead.

If you want to talk about fucking grind,go for Warframe where going to a single mission over and over to get a new weapong or grind the newest rescource on some dumb shit you have to waste hours on to get while putting the cheapest and most boring shit to negate any easy ways around it.
Whoever thought Nullifiers were a good idea needs to get hanged.

I was talking about grinding.
He has plenty of subgenres to choose from if he doesn like grinding.

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Same here, only time I find it enjoyable is in stuff like Minecraft, where the grinding of resources is kind of the point.

For some people it's therapeutic because it's a simple, easy task.

For other people it's mind-numbing and a waste of time. It's not a challenge to overcome, so it shouldn't be an action to do it, you should just have the materials available.

Jesus fuck user you don't need numbers and unlocks to make gameplay better.

Sounds like you have shit tastes in vidya OP.

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Why?

If you can't comfortably play a game for at least 10 times that long, it's not worth playing.

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