The Death of the RPG · Apr 10, 05:56 AM by Amberlee
I’m about to go on a rant here about console games that have the term RPG tacked onto them. Call me a bitter old cow that used to roll dice or logon to a text based MUD to do my Role Play, but the games today are not RPGs and I’m getting damn tired of that term being used for things that are, in all honesty, interactive movies.
When I have played a game for upwards of 70 hours and spent more than 2/3 of that time watching story cut scenes or having the system load the next map up every twenty to thirty seconds because the graphics are so pretty and intensive that I can’t just run around the world and hack things to my heart’s content it is no longer a role play game. When there is only one way for the game to end (and I’m not talking about super secret endings that get tacked on to the end of the end of the end but actual different resolutions to the story line) it is no longer a role play game. When the computer selects my party for me and won’t let me ditch or change people at will, I don’t consider that to be much of a RPG anymore. Just because you have to run around and kill things that have some kind of fantasy association, wield something, and have HP, MP, and abilities or potions doesn’t automatically mean that the game is ROLE PLAY.
In specific, I’m bitching about the new Kingdom Hearts. I’m not going to spoil you folks on detail but I’ll tell you that I agree with IGN and other that say, “well, it’s nice to look at but if you’re looking for interesting game play look somewhere else.” I think IGN giving it a 7.5 on that front was pretty generous. Only one boss fight is optional. There is only one way for the story to end. I spent at least 35-40 hours just WATCHING CHARACTERS TALK.
Look, if Disney and Sqeenix wanted to put out a movie of KH I would have been happy to watch it. I also would have wasted less of my life and gotten better graphics out of it. That’s not to say that KH isn’t pretty—it is—but it is, without a doubt, an interactive movie. You can’t friendly fire your party members. You can walk off a cliff and die. You can’t turn evil. You can’t make decisions along the way of the story that will change the ending or cause you to not get certain bosses instead of others. You have to keep certain party members and are forced to take others at different points no matter what you think of it.
As much as I hated the fanservice of the “dress spheres” in FFX-2, it was a far superior RPG to KH-2. If you wanted all the “jobs” and outfits you had to play the game through AT LEAST twice. With all the job classes it meant loads of work to get all of your skills powered up to the max. There were three different dungeons that were optional that not only gave you great fights and good places to level up but also gave you additional story that had nothing to do with the “main plot” but was darn interesting. You could finish FFX-2 with only 43% of the story line complete if you just wanted to get to the end. The secrets and minigames were harder, more interesting, and had better payoffs. I had MONTHS of gameplay out of FFX-2. That’s a good value for your money!
While KH-2 has made improvements in several areas over the original, and gives plenty of fanservice for us Square fans that love our Final Fantasy folk, the game itself is a bust as an RPG. I have about 80 hours of play time in and only have of that was play. In addition, I have no desire to play it again. I have Sora at level 99, I have every special weapon. I have all the special armor. I have killed everything I can kill and gotten to see every cut scene there is. All I can do is ask myself why I bothered other than a couple of FF fanservice moments that covered, at best 2 hours of combined cutscene and gameplay time.
I am sick of games that take the easy way out made by companies that know better. I know that KH is probably directed at a “younger” bunch of people because of the Disney name but that’s no excuse for this. If I wanted to watch a movie I would go to the theater and pay 7.50 for a ticket.
