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How to Improve Random Encounters and Reduce a RPGamer´s Blood Pressure

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Raggie
FAN EDITORIALIST

Random battle encounters are one of the pet peeves of many console RPG players. Many gamers have turned away from the genre simply because they couldn´t take all the battles. Even though I´m a hardcore RPG gamer, I can completely understand their point of view; it´s incredibly annoying that the characters can´t walk for more than a few seconds without getting into yet another boring, repetitive battle. Sometimes it feels like the battles are only on the way, simply hindering your progress. Simply put, random encounters are not *fun*. Games are supposed to be entertainment, but the random encounters are more annoying than entertaining. This is an obvious problem, but since the random encounters makes most of the actual gameplay of RPGs, is there any way to fix this? Methinks there are several solutions.

One must remember that experience points and levels are simple variables that can easily be changed by the programmers of the game. Skies of Arcadia had even more random encounters than most console RPGs. When the game was ported to GameCube, the amount of battles was reduced and the amount of exp recieved from each battle was increased. The gamer had to go though a lot less battles than before, but the characters were just as strong. A very simple, but effective way to reduce a gamer´s blood pressure!

Another simple solution to making the random encounters more bearable is to simply reduce the amount of cinematics. Let´s face it, modern console RPGs have more animation than gameplay. The victory poses and spell animations are nice to watch... for about five times. After that, you just wish you could get right to business. It´s especially annoying to go through long animations in an easy battle, where you spent two seconds on pressing buttons and 30 seconds on watching animations you´ve seen a million times before. Can you say "bored"?

It is also boring to see the same battles in every RPG. Most console RPGs use the same battle system with only small differences. You get easily bored with the battles at the beginning of the game, because you have already went through a countless number of similar battles in previous RPGs. If there´s not much variation in different battles, there should be at least variation between different games!

Random battles are partly so annoying because they don´t really offer any real gameplay value. Most encounters are easily won if you simply press "X" for a few times. The only truly interesting battles are the harder boss battles. So, you could simply reduce the amount of battles, while making the remaining battles more difficult and worth more exp. This way the game takes just as long to beat, but less of that time is spent on pointless button smashing. It´s much more rewarding to win a battle when there was actual challenge.

The players should be more in control of when they battle, and when they don´t. In Chrono Trigger you saw the enemies on screen, so you could either engage in battle, or avoid the enemies. In Final Fantasy VIII you could avoid most random encounters by walking on the road. Of course, the player would still need to go into battle to collect experience, but the battles would feel less annoying if they don´t pop up when you are trying to concentrate on other things. Sometimes you just want to get quickly from place to place, sometimes you might want to solve puzzles in peace. If you can´t win a boss battle or new enemies because you have avoided too many battles, you simply need to go back and level up for a while. You can even have a certain amount of enemies in each place, and once you have killed them all, you can walk around in peace without getting into fights at all. Of course, there would have to be certain places where the enemies regenerate and you can level up if you want. This has been done in PC RPGs before, and it works great.

Speaking of PC RPGs, there are many good ideas that should be adapted to console RPGs. Just like real pen&paper RPGs, PC RPGs reward experience points from many other things besides battle. You can get exp from talking to NPCs, or solving puzzles and optional quests. In some PC RPGs, like Fallout, it´s even possible to play though the entire game without killing anyone! You can talk or sneak away from any situation. This is much harder than the fighting option, but it´s still possible. You can choose to collect exp with side quests, or just go to the field and fight more monsters.

Unfortunately most console RPGs have very little innovation in terms of gameplay. Certain issues are taken for granted by both gamers and game creators. But annoying random encounters are far from a necessity. Even simple changes in the gameplay can both reduce frustration, as well as make a more varied and meaningful gameplay!