There doesn't need to be an explicit indicator that literally tells the player "Do dis naow!".
Common sense should be enough if you've been paying attention and aren't just going straight to finding Varia.
Deja vu...
RPGM The Last Sovereign [v0.73.4] [Sierra Lee]
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Common sense should be enough if you've been paying attention and aren't just going straight to finding Varia.
- Feb 4, 2018
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Yes, I agree entirely. I'm not even saying the game is bad. I'm saying that one game design decision is bad. Balancing a part later based on having a character that isn't good design. This is why I call that bit bad game design in what seems like an otherwise good game. Radiant Historia is great, I've played through it on the ds and 3ds. I likely missed her because I was religiously going back everywhere checking for everything and ran out of time. Hoisted by my own petard.
I try to avoid walkthrus my first time through games because it's fun to explore everything without any knowledge. It's not fun missing a main character. And yes, a character in the main party with a bunch of dialogue and scenes later is a main character.
And Deepsea, I noticed that she was mentioned, so I thought I would get the chance to go there. I didn't know I needed to go there right then and I didn't know it was time sensitive.
Also, I do like classic style. I play them all the time. Having a missable character, then proceeding to balance a section based on having that character is by definition bad design. It's objectively true, not an opinion. I'm not insulting snugglepuff's and lolicon's honor by saying that. Lolicon, you've been nice and we just have a difference of opinion, you're great. Snugglepuff on the other hand, you're rude, you're sanctimonious, you're insulting. I think you should go back to your hole where your antisocial personality doesn't insult others for no reason.
- Oct 17, 2017
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saying something is bad doesn't make it bad. and you never build a valid reasoning beyond that statment.
and aka route isn't balanced around having altina. some optional fights are hard as fuck without her, but they are, you know optional as the character they 'required'
no. this is plain false because that definition is applicable to any character in a game. the difference between main and missable as generic the terms are is basically you cannot complete the game with or without them.
and you can for sure complete the game without altina. you will miss some the best outcome, but this is the textbook definition of the optional content, if the optional content don't give you something in returns they are bad designe choices. this for real, tho. and don't exist only better "equipments". one of the best point of this game it's the totally reverse of items progression through the game.
and one of the most common complain about altina is because she is optional she had very little content, and for most of the game basically not impactful in any meaningful way. it's truly a neon sign 6m*3m "i'm an optional character" over her head.
i think she is to easly missable, and the game lack a couple of more timely hint for her recovery, but that is. nothing more.
it's at best some a minor polishing effort. not "a bad designe choice".
saying something don't make it real. and no. the whole game is made it doable by a very underleveled and underequipped party. not all content is daoble in a wrost case scenario. but all the required content is.
and adding a little bit at the end, accusing someone of "simping" it's rude, sanctimonious and insulting.
try to sell their own opinion as factual truth it's extremely arrogant. expecially for someone with a partial and superficial knowledge of the matter.
She not a main character and she is not needed for anything sure having her gives bonus and makes things easier but every section is able to be done without her, she is honestly less important that the Orc side characters who 4/7 can be missed and she is treated exactly the same as Stark(one of said missabile orcs)
Also no it is not objectively true, it is fine design, but you should feel happy if I remember right this is one of the things getting changed after the 1.0( so that people who don't go everywhere miss Altina) then again even if go for her she can still just leave if you don't double talk to her at some point or just make her not have much personality at all
there is no running out of time in that section just not getting as good rewards for being efficient with time(most likely you rushed the main story and missed her and so the game went clearly not interested in her same thing it does with stark) in fact going to get her prevents you from getting the best result on the travel timer straight up(just her and more the fortress forces are worth that downgrade of rewards though almost anything does that since the mandatory going to the forest for Varia and the other two time uses is 15 days and lower than 16 is needed for best result, 16 to 29(24 for best result for a thing in Simon rote) is the result people aim for)
basically a trade of 4 hidden stats for party member, stark and more army
Also no it is not objectively true, it is fine design, but you should feel happy if I remember right this is one of the things getting changed after the 1.0( so that people who don't go everywhere miss Altina) then again even if go for her she can still just leave if you don't double talk to her at some point or just make her not have much personality at all
there is no running out of time in that section just not getting as good rewards for being efficient with time(most likely you rushed the main story and missed her and so the game went clearly not interested in her same thing it does with stark) in fact going to get her prevents you from getting the best result on the travel timer straight up(just her and more the fortress forces are worth that downgrade of rewards though almost anything does that since the mandatory going to the forest for Varia and the other two time uses is 15 days and lower than 16 is needed for best result, 16 to 29(24 for best result for a thing in Simon rote) is the result people aim for)
basically a trade of 4 hidden stats for party member, stark and more army
- Feb 4, 2018
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They were incredibly rude first, I responded in kind. And my opinion was that it was a good game with at least one really stupidly bad game design choice.
Balancing things based on having a character that is easily missable is poor design. It's not an opinion, it's just a fact. I understand that you like being able to easily miss a character for some reason, but it's poor game design. I can't fathom thinking it's good design the way it's implemented in this case. It's not a deal breaker or anything, but I was just commenting on it because it made me feel bad. Apparently this means I'm a stupid, spoiled, whiny, casual and throwing a virtual tantrum and without integrity(all according to snugglepuff).
Good design would be giving you the choice of saving her or not. A direct choice on whether to do one thing or another. You should know you will be missing out on her by choosing to do something else, as it is you do not know until the game difficulty goes from 3 to 7 and you wonder why. Then some quest text alludes to having to choose who to give an item to but automatically chooses one person because the other isn't in your party, so you wonder why the text even says that. Not to mention that particular fight you have to wait for the enemy to miss or you to evade to even be able to attack because otherwise you have to use healing potions or revive every single turn. So you eventually look up the walkthrough and find out you've missed a character in your party that you'd like to have, that will have story ramifications through the whole game and gameplay ramifications. It wasn't made obvious that you missed them, despite going all over and attempting to not miss anything it still happened. I'm pretty sure I can continue on and continue enjoying the game without her, but I'm not going to without that character. I do not want to miss a character that will have interactions with the whole cast and be a part of the whole game. The reason I feel so stung by it is because I was loving the game and missing out feels fucking bad. It's a viscerally bad design choice that feels bad for the player if they missed it. And it's not like it's a sudden thing, you don't actually realize you missed out till hours and hours later so you've already saved over where you could go back. I had no idea, none, that I fully missed her.
Anyway, I'm not going to post any more in this thread. I don't feel welcome at all and I don't believe it will get better. So enjoy the game. I won't be touching it again until later and not without a gamefaqs-esque walkthru.
Without getting into the whole "who was mean to who", "skill issue", and "you are supposed to need a guide" arguments, it is bad design that the timed-section automatically ends after doing Varia and the Impaler's quests.
The whole trip back to Feroholm region is for the purpose of making general and undefined "preparations" and tying off any remaining loose-ends. There's no narrative reason as to why revisiting Feroholm, which only moves the story forwards by randomly finding Wynn's letter and also randomly stumbling upon the Impaler, should be treated as a "essential task" while dealing with the Withered Fortress and rescuing Altina shouldn't.
The problem is not that Altina is optional, but rather that she can be missed simply by doing things in the "wrong order" when the game does not give any reason to believe the order in which you do those things should matter at all.
You can make the argument a "thorough" player would have just reloaded their save to check out the locations they missed and searched for Altina once the game automatically ended the timed-section, but to me that's a fairly unreasonable expectation and just inviting problems. "Oh you had no way of knowing that you did things in the wrong order, but you did, so just load a save back and replay at least 1 quest to fix this issue you were at no fault for" is not good game design.
Simply adding a "shiny spot" on the map where you can have Simon interact with it and do a little confirmation prompt with something like "are we certain we have done everything we should concern ourselves with in the Feroholm region before moving on?" would be a sufficient patch imo. You can keep Altina optional without inviting the player into a mistake they couldn't be aware of.
Don't think this should be such a controversial take since I believe the dev herself has said that Altina's recruitment and the timed-section is one of the few bits of the game she might want to fix a little bit on the final polishing of the game.
The whole trip back to Feroholm region is for the purpose of making general and undefined "preparations" and tying off any remaining loose-ends. There's no narrative reason as to why revisiting Feroholm, which only moves the story forwards by randomly finding Wynn's letter and also randomly stumbling upon the Impaler, should be treated as a "essential task" while dealing with the Withered Fortress and rescuing Altina shouldn't.
The problem is not that Altina is optional, but rather that she can be missed simply by doing things in the "wrong order" when the game does not give any reason to believe the order in which you do those things should matter at all.
You can make the argument a "thorough" player would have just reloaded their save to check out the locations they missed and searched for Altina once the game automatically ended the timed-section, but to me that's a fairly unreasonable expectation and just inviting problems. "Oh you had no way of knowing that you did things in the wrong order, but you did, so just load a save back and replay at least 1 quest to fix this issue you were at no fault for" is not good game design.
Simply adding a "shiny spot" on the map where you can have Simon interact with it and do a little confirmation prompt with something like "are we certain we have done everything we should concern ourselves with in the Feroholm region before moving on?" would be a sufficient patch imo. You can keep Altina optional without inviting the player into a mistake they couldn't be aware of.
Don't think this should be such a controversial take since I believe the dev herself has said that Altina's recruitment and the timed-section is one of the few bits of the game she might want to fix a little bit on the final polishing of the game.
- Feb 21, 2018
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I'm gonna assume that you are talking about the succubus village during the 1st gathering on Yarra's route (and not the one during third Arclentian war)
During the free time phase (non event days/night time) you have to get into the underground tunnels for the maids.
To get to the underground passages you need to talk to the maids (talking to Hadi the helper also gives points on different days) (they can be found around the halls complaining about work on different days due to events and whims of the incubi, each talk that has Yarra involved gives you 1 point, you need at least 5 to enter the tunnels)
Once you are inside the tunnels you need to walk to the 4th corridor (from the left side, 2nd if you are on the right side for some reason) You will know when you got the correct one because Yarra will tell you that the corridor is iffy, walk towards the "end" of it and hit a wall, once you are there you gonna have to spend the whole day/night working on the damned illusion.
After selecting "yes" to work on the illusion and seeing a black screen (transition) you will be transported to said village.
Do mind that going there will waste a whole day/night free time phase.
Suggested day for going there would be day 6 (not at night as it allows you to fight an optional boss, caution is advised as its very hard for just 2 succubi and 1 orc) (day 5 if you want the warning message from said elite)
- Oct 17, 2017
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no, they weren't rude. you start the "rudeness". and said "stupid" in face of all evidence provided it's incredibly rude.
repeat a thing the n-th time don't make it more true compared the first.
- first you should start to read the fucking replies to your posts.
- secondo no mandatory fight in aka's route is balanced over 3 party memebres, there are two or three very hard optional fights you should, but not need, have here (one of them is pure xp and nothing more, i add).
- third stop repeat false and disproved claim as facts, because they aren't.
you don't have the character in party, you litteraly don't know her impact, both in fluff and crunch. so your nonsense it's at best speculative. you keeping whining about the absolute need of a missable charactetr to complete a section it doesn't is whiny e spoiled. and you just double it down ignoring anything is written in the reply to yours posts.
(1) the choice is here. when you find her you can leave here where she is. and forget it.
(2) the game never go from 3 to 7 (i suppose out of 10, because out of 1000 will be nothing) in mandatory content. only optional content will be harder, as the spider house or the hidden port, and to complete optional content usualy is required some optional prerequisite. it's basically textbook definition of challenging content in rpg.
(3) there isn't in the whole game a situation like that, what nonsense you are talking?
(4) if you don't understand the combat system isn't a problem of the combat system, but yours. i never, ever, used a consumables in the whole game {only orc section aside, because they don't have healing ability}, and i'm not talking consumables in combat, but consumables period. if you keeping dying it's because you don't know how fight, or you are so horrendously underleveled and underequipped. before accusing the game of shortcoming, start to check your shortcoming. and you will sound a less whiny e spoiled
(5) great, you finally find the textbook definition of optional content. yes, it's how this thing works in the real (gaming) world. expecially in old school c/j RPG. in the time even doing the quest in particular order you can gain or miss characters. without any compensation if you miss it. [take the recent BG3 for example]
(6) if you where thoroughly you will never miss her, because a mountain with a road it's a significative indicator. you can miss it, but it's you missing an hint, not the game not giving it to it {and i think the hint it's to subtle, and some more strong clue should be given the time you can go and pick her, but it's lightyear away from your position}
(7) add a [optional] character and don't make her interact with any other character of the game, that, will be a huge fucking bad design choice. if you add something, you must make it count, and not only in a mechanical level.
(8) you keep repeat it, but it's false as the first time. you never hear of things like "the true ending" you can unlock only if you do a series of action over the dozens if not hundreds hours of gameplay? and missing even one of it, at the start, mean you need to restart from the beginning? it was a very common occurence of the jrpg genere
prime directive of rpg genere, doing the main quest after all the side quests are done. you will never know when a section of the story and map will be blocked.
this is a very common occurence in the c/j RPG genere. expecially in older one. i cannot said to agree with, expecially if no hint o deducibile logic order can be made. but exist.
it's to blatant. just the first time you eneter in the feroholm region map simon said something about altina still in the keep and the general location of it. it's well enough.
but for totally different reason.
optional character, expecially with alternate "version" create a huge overhead of works. you need to take in account all the possibile permutation and because you can miss her, she will cannot have any prominent role in any section. or people missing her will be cut out of it.
in the game there are only two character with "alternative version" and one of them is optional, you find both of them at the same time in the story [earlier on].
nowere in the game you will find again a optional character [orc aside, but their sections are very limited in scope and size] or a possibile alternative between two. they will make an absurd amount of works for a single dev.
- Feb 4, 2018
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I was done, but this is so fucking aggressive that I can't abstain from replying.
Seriously, you're a toxic individual, so is snugglepuff. I consider it bad fucking design. I think by definition it is. You clearly don't. Instead of talking about it, you two chucklefucks keep insulting me. I read every single reply. You clearly never read a single thing I wrote except to attempt to tear me down.
I think it's stupidly bad design in one instance because the order I randomly did things caused me to miss an entire character. To ME, that is fucking stupid. I think it's objectively bad design. Such bad design that it made me feel terrible playing the game that I was loving before hand.
I think that you and Snugglepuff are incredibly over defensive for your favorite game. Both of you are full on attacking me because I have a difference of opinion to you. Guess what, neither of your opinions are fact either. At least I gave my reasons for why I think it's bad design, and I think they're good ones. Certainly much better than yours.
I was attempting to do the the OPTIONAL quest with the magic cult in Aka's route, I succeeded, but it was MUCH MUCH MUCH harder than everything else in the game so far. Went from a 3 diffculty the entire game to a 7. I needed to use potions except when random chance let me attack or both of my characters would die, because I was lacking the third member of the party the game was designed around. This is why I call it bad design so definitively, there's no metric by which I can call that good design.
As for focusing on the main instead of the side quest, I THOUGHT THAT GETTING THE CHARACTER WAS NECESSARY TO CONTINUING THE MAIN FUCKING QUEST, THAT IS WHY I DID OTHER THINGS FIRST. Would you like to know why I thought that? Here's the answer, I didn't think the game would be so silly as to allow you to continue on without giving a prompt or something like that. Why is it so controversial to you two? When I was noticed by the other kings, I thought that was part of the game designed to feel like a surprise in the gameplay route that had become a bit too by the numbers. I didn't think that there was a hidden timer and if you do things in the wrong order you would miss characters. That isn't a mistake on my part, the game doesn't give you obvious enough signals to tell you that. But you two stalwarts of the rpg genre perfectly saw that and had no issues. So clearly you're right and I'm wrong. I am clearly an idiot who has rarely if ever played rpgs, and the only reason I'm having problems is because I made constant obvious mistakes.
All I wanted was discussion on something I saw as a pretty annoying issue. It might be minor to you, but it was not minor to me. The interactions between characters is what I love most in this game, it reminded me of some of my favorite games ever(Lunar on the sega cd and psx, silver star and eternal blue mainly). Missing out on the character due to what I see as bad design is a big deal to me. But fuck me, I just wanted to enjoy the game. How dare I not perfectly figure everything out without a walkthrough, it makes me a goddamn moron according to you two.
The problem still is that you don't have much reason to think rescuing Altina would be optional while hunting Varia and visiting Feroholm would be mandatory. The "wrong order" problem will still happen.
The "shiny spot with a confirmation prompt" design is used a lot later in the game, specially in the 3AW. It wouldn't be out of place and would be the least intrusive fix that wouldn't require any story rewrites imo. Could even make it so the "shiny spot" only shows up after the mandatory tasks are completed if you think it would be too blatant for it to be visible right away.
- Nov 3, 2019
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Jesus christ, why can't you understand that theso-called "bad design decision" IS an integral, deliberate, vital feature of a classic RPG game. And that you probably ain't a fan of the classic RPG game structure.
TLS is a classic RPG game. And ya need a walkthrough for a classic RPG game. Simple as pie. And if ya need proof, look at Chronos Trigger. Look at Radiant Historia.
It's kinda like going to a vegan restaurant and bitching they don't serve meat. It ain't that the restaurant made a bad menu choice, it IS the whole point of the restaurant.
If ya want meat, ya go to a non-vegan restaurant. Simple as pie.
IMHO, you're being rude here because you're saying labeling all classic RPG games as simply "bad design decision" instead of acknowledging that there are tastes and preferences different from your own.
Pls be more civil, more nice, more open-hearted and accepting by simply saying that TLS game design is not your cup of tea
And for the record, that's completely fine. We all have our likes and dislikes. We sometimes play games that blend our likes and dislikes, because the likeable aspects outweigh the dislikable aspect. What's not fine is saying that "whatever I dislike is bad." That's just childish.
- Sep 22, 2017
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In regards to this debate of taste issue vs design issue I agree that TLS is very much a matter of taste.
I mean it's not like it locks a major characterization scene behind speed-running while simultaneously having unique collectibles as extremely low chance monster drops that take hours to farm for and are from enemies that stop spawning after story progression. So 2 already very iffy design choices that require contradictory playthroughs with no NG+ in sight. IMO ACTUAL bad design in a mostly great installment from a franchise I love. (coughSuikoden2cough)
I mean it's not like it locks a major characterization scene behind speed-running while simultaneously having unique collectibles as extremely low chance monster drops that take hours to farm for and are from enemies that stop spawning after story progression. So 2 already very iffy design choices that require contradictory playthroughs with no NG+ in sight. IMO ACTUAL bad design in a mostly great installment from a franchise I love. (coughSuikoden2cough)
I think point-of-no-return warnings rather than shiny spots are welcome for moments like this much like the one before leaving ch1 in BG3. That said, "could use some QoL" =/= "outright bad game design".
Eh. Jumping timelines whenever hitting a roadblock was still very simple without a guide. Could be misremembering but wasn't every moment that would matter later automatically marked in a log or maybe on the timeline map itself?
If anything, a character being missable just makes them more satisfyingl to get. Besides, I'll take missable over mutually-exclusive any day. Especially the way the Star Ocean series does it with the completely arbitrary party limit that has no in-universe reason to be a thing.
Pls say JRPG next time. Cause Stonekeep, as example, is classic RPG too. And it`s don`t have any of this "walkthrough" problems.
What's the oldest CRPG (non-JRPG) you've played without a walkthrough, and then again with one to see what you missed out on?
SW: KotOR II. In case of jedi trainigs. In older games, especialy dungeon crawlers, S/L is enough.
S/L?
KoTOR II was a good game (Obsidian got screwed by Lucas Arts during development), but if that's your standard for western vs Japanese CRPGs and missable stuff (you have to actively try to miss something in KoTOR/KoTOR2) then you need to go back to 2000 and earlier.
Keeping it Obsidian related, the first two Fallout games (the good old days of Black Isle)... Ridiculous amount of things/characters you can miss in them, and that's not even including the random encounters.
Then there's the first two Baldur's Gate (Baldur's Gate 3 lives up to and exceeds them in quality and missable things/characters too) games and Neverwinter Nights, the Ultima games (do not play Ultima IX...) both Icewind Dale games, Temple of Elemental Evil. There's tons more that I'm not going to list because I honestly can't remember all of the ones I played previously. Largely because I gave up getting them to work properly on Windows 7 and over.
The further back you go, the more familiar this game will become by comparison to some people's complaint of "bad design choice" and "needing" a walkthrough and the misconception of it being a specifically JRPG thing.
Only in first game. Second has bad feature, to get jedi upgrade for companion you need to bring him to right planet and to right set of encounters and make a right choices. That sometimes goes against your side choice, and this is needed to, cause advanced class. This one single feature transform nonlinear RPG to kinetic novel. if you plan to use it actively. Dark side Mira has similar problems.
Fallouts far simplier than that. You can miss something only if you lazy. Same for most of western games, they have clear choices, acceptable exploration. If you play the game and don`t rush to complete it, you can find everything.
Outside of the randomised and destructible loot in II, you do have to try and miss things (so long as it's not bug related).
I played that game to death, male & female versions of each class/advanced class, and I never came across anything that could be missed on a first-time playthrough (with minimal bug/glitch interference after the first patch).
Oh no it's really, really not.
I specified which Fallout games for a reason, given that according to you the oldest CRPG you played without a walkthrough for your first time was KoTOR 2... That came out seven years after the first Fallout.
In KoTOR 1 and 2, yes.
They were made for broader audience appeal outside of the traditional RPG audience, and already after CRPGs had begun being dumbed down/over-simplified.
You can miss things in Fallout 1 if you're too fast... Or too slow. You can miss things for saying the wrong/right thing in a conversation or even failing skill-checks. Similar happens in Fallout 2. Even passive effects such as earned perks/penalties affect things that you couldn't possibly know about in a first or second playthrough without having a walkthrough.
You miss important character conversations in Baldur's Gate 2 if you get through the game too quickly, because they're tied to both where/when in the game you are and a real-world time played mechanic.
Western RPGs used to have plenty you could miss out on based on mutliple factors beyond just simple laziness, but they became more and more "dumbed down" to the point that people believe laziness was the only way to miss things.
In fact, one of the best examples of the old "ticking-clock" hidden mechanic was in The Elder Scrolls: Daggerfall, where you could be locked out of completing the main quest entirely if you took too long to meet someone.
It's really only been in the last five or so years with the likes of Cyberpunk and Baldur's Gate 3 that the role-playing experience has opened back up to something more like what it used to be over twenty years ago in western RPGs, including time sensitive/related missions and penalties and penalties for not thinking "outside the box".
Only if the game's been designed in such a way as to allow it... Which I've more than established wasn't always the case and have already given reasons previously ( as to why.
In regards to this game though, and recent "conversation", missing one optional character because you need a walkthrough to hold your hand to get them, is not something new to western RPGs.
It`s hardly can be considered as missed. So long there is a check you already know that something is here. And if you fail you can reload, buff yourself up, comeback later and so on. Pretty straitforward, true or false, and you have a bunch of options to make things your way. You don`t need any external info for that.
KotOR II is more messy. Encounters has multiple influence shifts, side shifts, and even if your know that your want it`s not always know how. Also it`s don`t show exact numbers. You can go through without external information, but you will need a (party number)*(choices number) saves after each major encounter. Which is multiplies by next encounter. It`s all more like testing than playing.
But all of this is light inconveniences comparing to typical JRPG hidden True End and other similar things. You can’t even say there are cultural differences here. Even the japanese themselves are not always able to complete such games. Without help.