esper At what point does a strategy game become too complicated? (08:58)
Kinda surprised there’s no mention of Final Fantasy Tactics, which is one of the most overstuffed shite sundaes I’ve ever tried to play. As a huge Fire Emblem fan - like, beaten them all on Maddening/Lunatic, have written guides on Serenes Forest-levels dedicated to that series - I was so looking forward to playing FFT since it got a lot of FE fans into strategy games and because I’m a huge fan of the mainline FF games. But wow I had a miserable time. Xenoblade Chronicles is probably the closest comparison I can make, a game that has a lot of mechanics but does not have good mechanics. I don’t want to get too bogged down in specifics but things like the “bravery” and “faith” mechanics are just sprinkled on without adding much of anything to the game and are weirdly tied to things they shouldn’t be tied to (e.g. steal success rate?** leaving to join a convent???).
Also, FFT is hurt significantly by not having FE’s player base. FE’s player base (almost to a detrimental degree) is focused on efficiency. FE fans will typically advocate for low-investment, simple strategies and are usually good about helping newer players. On the other hand, you have FFT, where every single guide is like “Part 1, Chapter 3: By this point, Ramza should have mastered the Ninja class and should be dual-wielding” not taking into account that that is an endgame strategy that would take 5+ hours of grinding to have by that point of the game… And like, who are those guides even for? If you’ve already grinded for 5+ hours then why would you even need any more help with that game. Unfortunately, a lot of RPG strategy guides are like that…
**I misremembered - it’s tied to an ability called treasure hunter, not stealing, but it also should not be tied to that
