REBUTTAL TO: Tradition, Tradition: On Job Systems
After reading Jeffrey Cottrell's latest editorial on traditional RPG job systems and the need for micromanagement to defeat bosses in old-school games, I felt compelled to write in about an eye-opening experience of mine that I'll never forget. I actually first got into RPGs during the 16-bit era's Final Fantasy games, so I'm probably not old-school enough to fully appreciate the games that Jeffrey was talking about. However, about three years ago, I played an RPG that was radically different from anything that I was used to, and I think it gave me a better appreciation for games with really hard bosses that require lots of prior micromanagement on your part. I'm sure that you must have at least heard of Bioware's Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (KotOR) by now.
Prior to playing KotOR, all of the RPGs that I had played were of the typical console variety. In many of those games, you could level your character or party up to tremendous heights if you level grind enough. For the games that didn't allow much or any manual micromanagement of your characters' status development, level grinding is all that you could do if you were faced with a difficult boss. And even most of the games that do allow character customization didn't require a lot of work on my part, as even a poorly-customized party could still win with high enough levels. Sure, a well-customized party lets you progress more quickly through a game, but even if you suck at character customizing (which I did), it wasn't anything that a couple hours of level grinding couldn't fix. It was the expectation of this kind of leeway in RPGs that led to my downfall in my first run through KotOR.
First of all, know that the level cap in KotOR is level 20. Yes, that's it. No reaching level 200, or 99, or even 50 here. You only have 20 levels to customize your character into a fighting machine, and that's it. Furthermore, since this game limits the amount of enemies that you can fight in a given area, it was impossible to level-grind at ANY point in the game, so it was impossible to be over-leveled in any fight. If you couldn't customize your character well enough early on, every boss fight would be a challenge. I was completely unprepared for this kind of game, expecting every RPG to let me level high and fight as many random enemies as heart desires. So by the time I reached the final boss, Darth Malak, my character literally couldn't win again him. No matter how many times I reloaded my file and no matter what I tried, my luck wouldn't change. When he handed me my %*# for about the fiftieth time, I finally wised up to how hopeless this file was. How did this all happen? A little explanation is in order, and know now that it was NOT the fault of the game.
Just one look at my learned feats and spells list reveals the immediate problem: I knew only first- or second-tiers of each one, mostly first-tiers. See, at the beginning of the game, I couldn't decide which feats and spells to learn, as they all looked so cool (Force Lightning? Hell yes), and I could only learn one of each per level, or every few levels. So I figured that, like in my other RPGs, I could be a jack-of-all-trades character and eventually learn everything that I could learn. I started out learning every tier-one level of each feat and spell, becoming a jack-of-all-novice-trade. After all, I could just level grind high enough to master all the higher tiers later on, right?
Boy, was I wrong. Imagine taking on the final boss in a Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy game with only the most basic healing and fire spells or something, and you can kind of understand the situation that I was in with Malak. Since Malak's saving throws were so high, he was immune to almost everything that I tried on him, and what little combat feats that I could hit him with did so little damage or had such high penalties that they were nigh useless as well. The fact that I distributed my Attribute Points poorly early in the game didn't help either. Again, I thought that I could be a jack-of-all-trades and distributed the points evenly (even in Intelligence, which doesn't help in combat AT ALL). So in the end, I was a master of no trade whatsoever, and sucked at everything that I did know. I was downright horrified when I reached level 20 and found out that it was already the maximum level, and that everything that I learned up to that point was all that I could use in the final battle, no matter how puny it was left at. When I realized that I just couldn't beat the game, with great difficulty, I decided to restart the game again and abandon this 60+ hour file.
But I wasn't going in unprepared this time. Before starting my new file, I did a metric ton of research. I learned all the algorithms and intricacies of D&D's 3rd Edition rule set, learning the benefits of each feat and spell, and for which class combinations they are the most useful. I learned to distribute my Attribute Points in a way to take advantage of my chosen classes' strengths and minimizing weaknesses as best I could, and did the same with my feat- and spell-learning choices, jotting down notes and charts on spreadsheets (in short, I became a D&D nerd). Because I already played through the game once, I had a good idea of what challenges to prepare and customize for. This is definitely one game where it is better to be a master-of-a-few rather than a novice-of-all. I even had to decide which of my 20 levels to spend as a non-Jedi class, and which levels to spend as a Jedi-class character in order to get the most out of my strategy; the game even gives you that option, and your decision matters a lot. I even took the time to research my party members, and learned how to develop each of them so that they complemented my character's development. This game is all about giving the player all this freedom and options in character customization, and the ability to strategize and plot out one's desired character. Customizing a poor character is very possible to uninformed players like me at first.
It should go without saying that this was a very different experience for me compared to my other RPGs, as I never had to do anything like this before. In my second play-through, I was overjoyed at how much easier the enemies and bosses were, now that I used my knowledge of the battle system and algorithms of the game to strategize. And although it was still a challenge, I was finally able to beat Malak! Let me tell you, that kind of revenge is of the sweetest kind. Even now I still play through the game multiple times, each time with different classes, customizations, and strategies, and finding new ways to fight Malak.
This is one of those RPG experiences that I'll always cherish, as it introduced me to a world of RPGs that I never knew existed. This level and type of challenge was something that was completely new to me before KotOR. All my other RPGs are really easy compared to it. Even the hardest of these other RPGs still allowed me to level up to a point where I could overpower a final boss with ease, the maximum level being overkill. In KotOR, even if you developed an effective and powerful character, Malak will never, ever be easy. Upon reaching the max level, you'll only be at the point where you can MATCH Malak, not overpower him. Beating Malak will always require you to fight with skill. This game was truly designed to REQUIRE strategy and skill in order to overcome. Sure, skill could help in my other RPGs too, but none of them REQUIRE it, preferring to give the option to power-level instead. It's the level of difficulty that I found so refreshing in KotOR. But as Jeffrey said, it's not for everyone; especially those who can't stand the idea of having to restart a game if too many mistakes make it impossible to beat, often labeling such games as "unforgiving." Considering how I was weaned on the easier, more forgiving RPGs, I never thought that I would find myself loving the kind like KotOR, but here I am. I think that this goes to show that anyone can learn to love hard games.
Then I think back to Jeffrey's editorial, and I wonder if these games with vast customization options, hard final bosses, and low level caps are an "old-school" school thing. Obviously, KotOR is not an old-school game, being released in 2003. I just wonder if its style of role-playing is supposed to be a throwback to the old days. Or maybe this style of play is typical of PC RPGs, which I don't have much experience in. I was recently told that Bioware's own Jade Empire and many MMORPGs are like this, so maybe it is a PC thing after all. I don't know what the answer is, having not played many old-school or PC RPGs. But what I do know is that I now would love to welcome more of these games into my library.
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