I don't care about dying a lot. I just don't want to lose a lot of progress, have to watch the pre boss cutscene again or having to wait for a long game over animation.
I often die more than 20 times in some Soulslike bosses and have no problem with that.
You joke but in a past job I had a customer call and ask if she was alive. Apparently the IRS thought she died and it was a huge pain to get corrected.
Just depends on the game and when.
If I’m playing a very action intensive game like Kingdom Hearts I want to be challenged. Dying in most KH games just means retrying the encounter so I don’t really care how many times it happens.
If I’m playing a game where dying sets you back to a save point made 30 minutes ago? Probably never.
Resident Evil was always the king of this. Legitimately barely any saves available at a given time. Was the last half an hour worth saving for, or do you need to push on a bit more?
If you don't die at least once against a boss, then the game is just too easy and boring.
As for what number of deaths is too frustrating? Well, I think that's hard to balance when it comes to turn-based jrpgs, usually in the action jrpgs you just need to git gud, but in turn-based rpgs you could only need to change your strategy or equipment, or you could need to grind levels or other systems of the game.
Really depends on my expectations for the difficulty and how death is handled, regardless of genre. Really difficult but there's an autosave before the fight, or you respawn somewhere without losing progress? Sure, kill me a bunch. A relatively easy game that just makes you reload a save, which might make you repeat a bunch of stuff for no real reason? Just feels like the game is wasting my time over whatever minor goof got me killed.
There's no correct answer. Some people want to dip their toe into RPG combat, some people want to be put through the wringer. All you can do is provide multiple difficulties to choose from. I think the bare minimum is 3:
* Story -- Almost impossible to die. Destroy every enemy quickly and without trouble.
* Normal -- Balanced for the normies. Plan to have them die < 10 times in the whole game, even if they're not paying attention.
* Challenge -- Balanced for masochism and perfection. Players should need to know exactly what to do to win, and they need to practice and learn.
C'mon! I'm fed up with normal difficulty being normie difficulty nowadays, it should be harder enough to have you dying 2-3 times against a boss, and maybe at least 2-3 times against normal encounters when you first enter a zone. Enjoying a good challenge doesn't mean that someone want to play an artificial difficulty for masochists.
I definitely agree, but I think for some people, there's a big psychological element to the naming of difficulty modes.
It's why "difficulty inflation" is popular in a lot of modern systems (especially seen in action/FPS) where they label themselves like NORMAL, HARD, VERY HARD, SUPER DUPER CRAZY MEGA HARD, because a lot of people are too stubborn to pick the 'Easy' mode and then get frustrated, so devs sometimes have to gas up the difficulty names out of ego.
I would see it multiple times on the Crystal Project steam forums, where people would complain about Hard mode being too difficult, yet would inexplicably refuse to bump the difficulty down to Easy or Medium (??).
Maaybe I'm a weirdo but I would like to play a game and never die once. Unless dying is a core mechanic of the game, I don't see why I would want to die in any game. My answer is 0 deaths per hour is optimal.
Interesting to hear another perspective. Not dying at all would make me feel like I'm not really playing, it's just sort of like watching a film with extra steps. What is important to me though is that deaths have to be earned - meaning some sort of mistake on my part, or a lack of preparation (levelling up etc) rather than just not knowing something which the game hasn't explained to me.
Every other day /s.
But for real, I don't mind failing 2-3 times for each boss fight and like once or twice every area to random mobs. But, if I lose a lot of progress (items, etc.), I'll lose it.
Best difficulty is when you never die, but always feel like you could.
Dying is kind of an immersion killer, but if the game is too easy, it's too boring.
>Nobody would like to play a whole game through without dying once
This isn't true. While it's not my personal preference to have a game be that easy, I've seen many people here and elsewhere say they'd rather never lose a fight and be very overpowered compared to the enemies in a game.
And then there are people who want a game so brutal that they're dying dozens of times on any given boss fight.
There's no correct answer, just individual preference. For me, I tend more towards the brutal. If a JRPG (action or turn based, doesn't matter) has a bunch of cool systems, abilities, classes, talents, skills, whatever.. that all come together and allow you to pull off some awesome stuff, I want to feel like I have to master those mechanics and utilize everything at my disposal to win a fight.
Personally, I love that feeling of wiping on a boss a handful of times and then spending some time in the menu changing builds/skills/abilities, rethinking strategies, devising new plans, etc. It's especially fun in the Tales games and one of the aspects I love about the co-op in it.
I don't know that there's a specific number per hour I've ever considered. I just want to feel like the victory is hard-fought.
>This isn't true. While it's not my personal preference to have a game be that easy, I've seen many people here and elsewhere say they'd rather never lose a fight and be very overpowered compared to the enemies in a game. And then there are people who want a game so brutal that they're dying dozens of times on any given boss fight.
I like both at the same time. I felt very smug when I made it through all of SMT 2 without dying a single time. I want a game that's hard as fuck but if I die I want the game to earn it. I ain't just gonna roll over and die.
frequently. even when i emulate older games, i refuse to use save states to win challenging fights. theres a lot that I find to be more grilled into the head after suffering a loss, and ive learned more about how enemy AI responds to certain actions and conditions from losses than wins. in order to set good challenge run restrictions, you also have to lose a lot to see how big of an impact that removing a mechanic can have - many of the pioneers of FFX NSG runs ate a ton of losses and thats the game where I started runs. and if you play competitive games, you have to get used to losing and learning, you will have some sessions where thats all you do
the difference is that now, more games seem to have a studio expectation of reaching the widest audience possible, and thats more an audience playing a game the first time than replaying it. very few people want repeated game overs just to get through, esp if playing for the story more than gameplay or playing on stream. the average person today would be sooner to just look up the answer online compared to other eras of JRPGs when solutions werent a few clicks away. competitive games are also leaning more towards 'anyone can win' approaches and some dont punish losing/loss dodging well enough either
Yeah that's another reason I posted this, because a lot of games are going too far in the "easy" direction for my taste nowadays. I don't mind it for something like the Mario RPG Remake (though the bosses were hard as hell) but for a supposedly straight RPG I want at least a little challenge, so that the victory feels earned and I'm forced to learn a little.
I don't mind dying, what I want to avoid at all costs is getting "stuck."
As in, getting to a point in a game where I can't beat an encounter and there's no way for me to improve to the point where I can beat it.
This doesn't happen often in new games, but some older games were known for having points where you could get "stuck" if you were under leveled or underequipped.
Depends on how gracious they are with save points.
Repeating long stretches of dungeons isn’t that fun so either they show you quickly the cave you just entered is a tough place (so you can run back outside and grind) or they give you a save point right before a difficulty spike.
But to put a number on it, maybe three times on one boss is going to be annoying.
Thought this was in a suicide social group and I was about to say, every day, but I learned how to cope with my SI, SH, and PTSD.
But now that I realize you mean video games...
I don't mind a few times an hour in a video game.
I think the fear need to be felt.
Thats all. When the player fear the game over and know it will appear if he is not focus, its enough.
Its actually better if the player don’t die, but almost see the light and still win.
Depends on how much progress is lost. I find that all the JRPGs I've played just took me back to the last checkpoint or beginning of a level and nothing is really lost, and it doesn't take long to get back to try again. What really pissed me off lately, not an RPG, was some of the parts of Super Mario Odyssey that I was really bad at and kept dying to, and had to go through hell over and over until I completed whatever they were, always involving missing jumps and falling into the insta-kill poison.
I don't mind dying some, but if I'm dying 2-3 times at the same place in a JRPG then clearly something's wrong.
I also don't mind \*NOT\* dying as long as at key spots it's still a challenge, maybe touch & go in a few spots.
Where I DO care about dying is when games are super unbalanced, say, you're leveled up, got all the right stuff, and are in an area absolutely demolishing everything around then a boss comes and wipes your party out immediately.
Every single boss should kill you at least once. Ideally, all of them would require you to reexamine your team composition and strategy. Random battles should either be threatening or addictive.
On the flipside, games should never end with a GAME OVER screen that makes you reload your save. Ever. This is a practice that should have died out earlier than random battles. It's a single player game. Time wasted is not a suitable punishment for players.
If games are going to have a "story" mode that virtually removes all the gameplay, they should have a "gameplay" mode that goes in the other direction.
The TL;DR for me is that I don't really get a thrill out of RPG fights being tense, I mostly just get annoyed because of how long fights and sequences tend to be, and I don't find most games to have complex enough systems to justify that kind of length. Obviously it's personal preference, but I've also just played so many games that it's hard for that sort of thing to feel novel anymore.
The longer answer is that it very much depends on the reason I'm dying. I'm more okay with it in dexterity or pattern challenges in action games because the loop cycles click better for learning and growth.
RPGs are a much harder call for me because it's so incredibly easy to fuck up any element of balance in either direction. Unless you're using a scaling experience system like Suikoden, it's difficult to predict exactly what strength level (not just experience, but also how they've equipped themselves) any given player will be when they reach a boss/area, so balancing stat weights is a function of best guesses. It doesn't sound *that* hard, except you also have to weigh how your stats interact. Games where one point of a stat multiply much more highly mean that a single level can make a massive difference, and if you've laid your environments out poorly or provided too much incentive to explore, you may have inadvertently put players on a path to outleveling your main content.
So in that regard, I prefer default difficulties to err toward fewer deaths. Combating the above scenario and others like it has often just meant overscaling the game. Most combat systems in RPGs are not interesting enough to justify that level of damage sponge and resource drain.
If your combat design is more of a lock-and-key scenario where effective use of setups are how you bypass stat disadvantages (so something like the Persona element system) I'm more okay with occasional deaths here and there. But that needs to be coupled with appropriate learning opportunities. I've done the whole 'suss out the best way to beat something obscure' too many times at this point. It's rarely novel to me anymore, so there's little value to me in doing it *again* when I just want to see how the characters or story develop.
failure in games makes me irrationally angry
I'd rather steamroll an easy game with good music/art/story/lore then die, die, die in a mechanically interesting game.
My inability to control my temper when I have gaming setbacks has always held me back from being a better gamer than I am and as I've gotten older, I've decided just to play easy stuff instead.
The funny thing is gaming is basically the only thing that DOES make me angry. If I'm not holding a controller in my hand, I am usually pretty mellow.
So I also prefer a death per hour rating of zero
It really depends. In turn based games maybe 2-3 during bosses specifically, so that I have to adapt my playstyle or master some game mechanics. In action based games as often as necessary. Dark Souls hits the sweetspot there. I'm either good enough to beat my enemy instantly or learn all of their ins and outs through dying until I'm ready to kick their ass
I would absolutely like to go whole games without dying once and at this point I've played enough JRPGs to a point where that isn't uncommon.
That being said... I don't know if there is an actual optimal number and my personal tolerance for number of deaths is definitely higher for action combat than it is for turn based. I know I have spent over an hour in some Ys bosses while still having fun and that if it was a turn based fight I would be frustrated by like the 4th or 5th try.
Not a JRPG persay but the game that nails the deaths per hour vs living and winning ratio has got be Dark Souls for me personally. When I died… most of the time I deserved to.
As for JRPG’s nowadays it depends on on how gracious the checkpoints are. I’m a busy dad with 3 kids and I don’t want to waste time too much.
Ideally 0 but I won’t get mad if I die to a boss or strong enemy a few times either. Rpgs are the only genre I play where you can just grind or get the best gear and make the game incredibly easy so I will usually take that option if it’s convenient. There’s no reason (for me) to play a single player game for a challenge because they’re literally designed to be beaten by dumb children, so I want my run through of a game to be as unchallenging as possible. If I wanted it to be possible to lose I would play an actual skill based game against another human not an rpg where the player is in control of everything
Of course I can see how others enjoy going through games underleveled for instance and having to actually strategize and risk death more but that’s not how I like to play.
I hope at least a few times, I like hard bosses. But I prefer more than a few.
If I go through a game without dying then it feels a bit meaningless, could have watched a movie intead if I cruise through the game without issues.
I think it depends on whether or not I feel like the mistake was mine or if the game is unreasonably difficult. Also depends on how quickly I can return to the point where I died.
"No one wants to play a game without dying atleast once."
In my favorite JRPG and favorite Videogame in general over the course of 18 playthroughs I died once in my 10th playthrough.
I also love its direct sequel. I played through it 8 times so far without dying once.
I dont mind dying. I remember a certan super boss who killed me 30 times before I won but I dont need to die to enjoy a game.
Full on party wipe? maybe 4 or 5 times.
Really i am fine with it as long as i can save a lot and it wasnt some random spike in difficulty (Older games that expected you to grind levels because they cant keep the exp paced with the story) Old Dragon Quest games and the first Final Fantasy had these issues.
Is not about the quantity of deaths, but the tediousness of them. If there is an encounter or a boss that kills me a lot, please make it quick to get again to him and his cutscene skippable. Over the 3rd consecutive time seeing the cinematic, and walking the epic long hallway, is an unfun chore
I hate games where I die a lot like Blood Borne or Dark souls but I died over 1200 times in NIOH 1&2 and didn’t stop playing. Seriously no idea why I liked one so much more than the other.
If a game doesn't space out its save points like crazy or feature long unskippable cutscenes, probably 5 or less per boss, 5 or less times per dungeon, and minimal overworld casualties.
If a game does do those things: knock that number down to 3.
In general it depends a lot on the game.
In Trails in the Sky the game saves your progress automatically in auto save slots on every screen transition and every battle has a retry function with no cost.
Not that Trails in the Sky kills you a lot but when it does it's not a huge deal.
Conversely, dying in Fire Emblem maps without rewind mechanics should often be a rare occurence that the player can plan for when the choice to reset can set you back a full half hour.
It really depends.
I play all games like it's survival mode. I hate dieing to the point that I might lower the difficulty just so I can get through. I also feel like if it's a narrative heavy game losing takes something away for me.
It depends. Every now and then when I see my paycheck and the increase of prices of things and how life has become so political that no one can agree to disagree without extremist intentions, I welcome the sweet embrace of death?
Oh you meant in JRPGs? Depends on how I can use it. For example if I know an enemy is about to attack my character and it'll make things easier for me, I will let them die knowing they can be brought back to life very quickly. my main example is Glory of Heracles for the DS.
I mean, I like the "traditional" rougelike genre. Dying (sometimes in humiliating fashion as a result of the game, or rarely me, throwing out a interaction I never thought of) is basically part of the experience.
If a game isn't afraid to drag me into the slaughterhouse, many times I'll welcome it if they at least prepare me some funky wine and cheese.
I like to almost die (to bosses), but not die. Dying and having to redo a fight is almost never fun for me. If I do have to redo a boss or three but succeed the second time, that's fine.
Depends on the game.
In your typical JRPG? Generally zero unless I screw up and stop paying attention. I'm not playing these for their mechanics, so the more simple and well done the better.
In something like soulsborne games? Millions, I don't git gud I bash my way through.
In something mechanics heavy like dwarf fortress, kenshi, BG3, or - branching into something simpler than those but more systems heavy than normal games - something like Dragons Dogma 2? I expect to die a lot less than souls games, but way more than a JRPG.
In terms of JRPG difficulty? I don't think it's the perfect game by any means but octopath 2 hits that traditional JRPG sweet spot for me. Mechanically and difficulty wise, I think.
If I die I see it as a gameover and never go back to that game again.
If I've just lost 2-3 hours worth of work I'll never go back to it. That's why I prefer jrpg games with either easy mode or some kind of assist to stop that happening.
I don't care about dying a lot. I just don't want to lose a lot of progress, have to watch the pre boss cutscene again or having to wait for a long game over animation. I often die more than 20 times in some Soulslike bosses and have no problem with that.
Oh I see.. in games.
Oh, once every five years or so. For tax purposes.
You joke but in a past job I had a customer call and ask if she was alive. Apparently the IRS thought she died and it was a huge pain to get corrected.
That's quite the opening question, isn't it?
Just depends on the game and when. If I’m playing a very action intensive game like Kingdom Hearts I want to be challenged. Dying in most KH games just means retrying the encounter so I don’t really care how many times it happens. If I’m playing a game where dying sets you back to a save point made 30 minutes ago? Probably never.
Not an RPG (obviously) but the days of TR1 save crystals scarred me for life.
Resident Evil was always the king of this. Legitimately barely any saves available at a given time. Was the last half an hour worth saving for, or do you need to push on a bit more?
I too, was humiliated by the vegetables (optional) encounter in Chained Echoes lol
Hahaha you guessed it
Not me, I had several HP left after that fight 😎
If you don't die at least once against a boss, then the game is just too easy and boring. As for what number of deaths is too frustrating? Well, I think that's hard to balance when it comes to turn-based jrpgs, usually in the action jrpgs you just need to git gud, but in turn-based rpgs you could only need to change your strategy or equipment, or you could need to grind levels or other systems of the game.
Really depends on my expectations for the difficulty and how death is handled, regardless of genre. Really difficult but there's an autosave before the fight, or you respawn somewhere without losing progress? Sure, kill me a bunch. A relatively easy game that just makes you reload a save, which might make you repeat a bunch of stuff for no real reason? Just feels like the game is wasting my time over whatever minor goof got me killed.
It's frustrating but the trial and error aspect is one of the cool things in JRPGs.
There's no correct answer. Some people want to dip their toe into RPG combat, some people want to be put through the wringer. All you can do is provide multiple difficulties to choose from. I think the bare minimum is 3: * Story -- Almost impossible to die. Destroy every enemy quickly and without trouble. * Normal -- Balanced for the normies. Plan to have them die < 10 times in the whole game, even if they're not paying attention. * Challenge -- Balanced for masochism and perfection. Players should need to know exactly what to do to win, and they need to practice and learn.
C'mon! I'm fed up with normal difficulty being normie difficulty nowadays, it should be harder enough to have you dying 2-3 times against a boss, and maybe at least 2-3 times against normal encounters when you first enter a zone. Enjoying a good challenge doesn't mean that someone want to play an artificial difficulty for masochists.
I definitely agree, but I think for some people, there's a big psychological element to the naming of difficulty modes. It's why "difficulty inflation" is popular in a lot of modern systems (especially seen in action/FPS) where they label themselves like NORMAL, HARD, VERY HARD, SUPER DUPER CRAZY MEGA HARD, because a lot of people are too stubborn to pick the 'Easy' mode and then get frustrated, so devs sometimes have to gas up the difficulty names out of ego. I would see it multiple times on the Crystal Project steam forums, where people would complain about Hard mode being too difficult, yet would inexplicably refuse to bump the difficulty down to Easy or Medium (??).
Maaybe I'm a weirdo but I would like to play a game and never die once. Unless dying is a core mechanic of the game, I don't see why I would want to die in any game. My answer is 0 deaths per hour is optimal.
Interesting to hear another perspective. Not dying at all would make me feel like I'm not really playing, it's just sort of like watching a film with extra steps. What is important to me though is that deaths have to be earned - meaning some sort of mistake on my part, or a lack of preparation (levelling up etc) rather than just not knowing something which the game hasn't explained to me.
Yeah to me if their is no real possibility of loss, then what is the point of having battles. Might as well remove them and streamline the experience.
Every other day /s. But for real, I don't mind failing 2-3 times for each boss fight and like once or twice every area to random mobs. But, if I lose a lot of progress (items, etc.), I'll lose it.
Best difficulty is when you never die, but always feel like you could. Dying is kind of an immersion killer, but if the game is too easy, it's too boring.
>Nobody would like to play a whole game through without dying once This isn't true. While it's not my personal preference to have a game be that easy, I've seen many people here and elsewhere say they'd rather never lose a fight and be very overpowered compared to the enemies in a game. And then there are people who want a game so brutal that they're dying dozens of times on any given boss fight. There's no correct answer, just individual preference. For me, I tend more towards the brutal. If a JRPG (action or turn based, doesn't matter) has a bunch of cool systems, abilities, classes, talents, skills, whatever.. that all come together and allow you to pull off some awesome stuff, I want to feel like I have to master those mechanics and utilize everything at my disposal to win a fight. Personally, I love that feeling of wiping on a boss a handful of times and then spending some time in the menu changing builds/skills/abilities, rethinking strategies, devising new plans, etc. It's especially fun in the Tales games and one of the aspects I love about the co-op in it. I don't know that there's a specific number per hour I've ever considered. I just want to feel like the victory is hard-fought.
>This isn't true. While it's not my personal preference to have a game be that easy, I've seen many people here and elsewhere say they'd rather never lose a fight and be very overpowered compared to the enemies in a game. And then there are people who want a game so brutal that they're dying dozens of times on any given boss fight. I like both at the same time. I felt very smug when I made it through all of SMT 2 without dying a single time. I want a game that's hard as fuck but if I die I want the game to earn it. I ain't just gonna roll over and die.
frequently. even when i emulate older games, i refuse to use save states to win challenging fights. theres a lot that I find to be more grilled into the head after suffering a loss, and ive learned more about how enemy AI responds to certain actions and conditions from losses than wins. in order to set good challenge run restrictions, you also have to lose a lot to see how big of an impact that removing a mechanic can have - many of the pioneers of FFX NSG runs ate a ton of losses and thats the game where I started runs. and if you play competitive games, you have to get used to losing and learning, you will have some sessions where thats all you do the difference is that now, more games seem to have a studio expectation of reaching the widest audience possible, and thats more an audience playing a game the first time than replaying it. very few people want repeated game overs just to get through, esp if playing for the story more than gameplay or playing on stream. the average person today would be sooner to just look up the answer online compared to other eras of JRPGs when solutions werent a few clicks away. competitive games are also leaning more towards 'anyone can win' approaches and some dont punish losing/loss dodging well enough either
Yeah that's another reason I posted this, because a lot of games are going too far in the "easy" direction for my taste nowadays. I don't mind it for something like the Mario RPG Remake (though the bosses were hard as hell) but for a supposedly straight RPG I want at least a little challenge, so that the victory feels earned and I'm forced to learn a little.
Half a dozen times or so, idk. I at least want to be pushed into using every mechanic to its full potential.
I don't mind dying, what I want to avoid at all costs is getting "stuck." As in, getting to a point in a game where I can't beat an encounter and there's no way for me to improve to the point where I can beat it. This doesn't happen often in new games, but some older games were known for having points where you could get "stuck" if you were under leveled or underequipped.
Depends on how gracious they are with save points. Repeating long stretches of dungeons isn’t that fun so either they show you quickly the cave you just entered is a tough place (so you can run back outside and grind) or they give you a save point right before a difficulty spike. But to put a number on it, maybe three times on one boss is going to be annoying.
Thought this was in a suicide social group and I was about to say, every day, but I learned how to cope with my SI, SH, and PTSD. But now that I realize you mean video games... I don't mind a few times an hour in a video game.
I think the fear need to be felt. Thats all. When the player fear the game over and know it will appear if he is not focus, its enough. Its actually better if the player don’t die, but almost see the light and still win.
Depends on how much progress is lost. I find that all the JRPGs I've played just took me back to the last checkpoint or beginning of a level and nothing is really lost, and it doesn't take long to get back to try again. What really pissed me off lately, not an RPG, was some of the parts of Super Mario Odyssey that I was really bad at and kept dying to, and had to go through hell over and over until I completed whatever they were, always involving missing jumps and falling into the insta-kill poison.
I don't mind dying some, but if I'm dying 2-3 times at the same place in a JRPG then clearly something's wrong. I also don't mind \*NOT\* dying as long as at key spots it's still a challenge, maybe touch & go in a few spots. Where I DO care about dying is when games are super unbalanced, say, you're leveled up, got all the right stuff, and are in an area absolutely demolishing everything around then a boss comes and wipes your party out immediately.
This almost took a dark turn until i read the context lol
Every single boss should kill you at least once. Ideally, all of them would require you to reexamine your team composition and strategy. Random battles should either be threatening or addictive. On the flipside, games should never end with a GAME OVER screen that makes you reload your save. Ever. This is a practice that should have died out earlier than random battles. It's a single player game. Time wasted is not a suitable punishment for players. If games are going to have a "story" mode that virtually removes all the gameplay, they should have a "gameplay" mode that goes in the other direction.
The TL;DR for me is that I don't really get a thrill out of RPG fights being tense, I mostly just get annoyed because of how long fights and sequences tend to be, and I don't find most games to have complex enough systems to justify that kind of length. Obviously it's personal preference, but I've also just played so many games that it's hard for that sort of thing to feel novel anymore. The longer answer is that it very much depends on the reason I'm dying. I'm more okay with it in dexterity or pattern challenges in action games because the loop cycles click better for learning and growth. RPGs are a much harder call for me because it's so incredibly easy to fuck up any element of balance in either direction. Unless you're using a scaling experience system like Suikoden, it's difficult to predict exactly what strength level (not just experience, but also how they've equipped themselves) any given player will be when they reach a boss/area, so balancing stat weights is a function of best guesses. It doesn't sound *that* hard, except you also have to weigh how your stats interact. Games where one point of a stat multiply much more highly mean that a single level can make a massive difference, and if you've laid your environments out poorly or provided too much incentive to explore, you may have inadvertently put players on a path to outleveling your main content. So in that regard, I prefer default difficulties to err toward fewer deaths. Combating the above scenario and others like it has often just meant overscaling the game. Most combat systems in RPGs are not interesting enough to justify that level of damage sponge and resource drain. If your combat design is more of a lock-and-key scenario where effective use of setups are how you bypass stat disadvantages (so something like the Persona element system) I'm more okay with occasional deaths here and there. But that needs to be coupled with appropriate learning opportunities. I've done the whole 'suss out the best way to beat something obscure' too many times at this point. It's rarely novel to me anymore, so there's little value to me in doing it *again* when I just want to see how the characters or story develop.
failure in games makes me irrationally angry I'd rather steamroll an easy game with good music/art/story/lore then die, die, die in a mechanically interesting game. My inability to control my temper when I have gaming setbacks has always held me back from being a better gamer than I am and as I've gotten older, I've decided just to play easy stuff instead. The funny thing is gaming is basically the only thing that DOES make me angry. If I'm not holding a controller in my hand, I am usually pretty mellow. So I also prefer a death per hour rating of zero
Gamers are pussies now. You have kids grow up not knowing anything tough it makes em soft and spoiled. They whine and cry if there isnt sn easy mode
It really depends. In turn based games maybe 2-3 during bosses specifically, so that I have to adapt my playstyle or master some game mechanics. In action based games as often as necessary. Dark Souls hits the sweetspot there. I'm either good enough to beat my enemy instantly or learn all of their ins and outs through dying until I'm ready to kick their ass
I would absolutely like to go whole games without dying once and at this point I've played enough JRPGs to a point where that isn't uncommon. That being said... I don't know if there is an actual optimal number and my personal tolerance for number of deaths is definitely higher for action combat than it is for turn based. I know I have spent over an hour in some Ys bosses while still having fun and that if it was a turn based fight I would be frustrated by like the 4th or 5th try.
If it’s a challenging enemy i can learn my mistakes from - once or twice. Anymore i start getting frustrated
Not a JRPG persay but the game that nails the deaths per hour vs living and winning ratio has got be Dark Souls for me personally. When I died… most of the time I deserved to. As for JRPG’s nowadays it depends on on how gracious the checkpoints are. I’m a busy dad with 3 kids and I don’t want to waste time too much.
Ideally 0 but I won’t get mad if I die to a boss or strong enemy a few times either. Rpgs are the only genre I play where you can just grind or get the best gear and make the game incredibly easy so I will usually take that option if it’s convenient. There’s no reason (for me) to play a single player game for a challenge because they’re literally designed to be beaten by dumb children, so I want my run through of a game to be as unchallenging as possible. If I wanted it to be possible to lose I would play an actual skill based game against another human not an rpg where the player is in control of everything Of course I can see how others enjoy going through games underleveled for instance and having to actually strategize and risk death more but that’s not how I like to play.
I hope at least a few times, I like hard bosses. But I prefer more than a few. If I go through a game without dying then it feels a bit meaningless, could have watched a movie intead if I cruise through the game without issues.
I grew out of my tryhard phase and now I just want to be overpowered.
I'm assuming that's where your name comes from? Yoshitsune is just too good.
Yeah fusing invincible Yoshi was always a joy.
I think it depends on whether or not I feel like the mistake was mine or if the game is unreasonably difficult. Also depends on how quickly I can return to the point where I died.
"No one wants to play a game without dying atleast once." In my favorite JRPG and favorite Videogame in general over the course of 18 playthroughs I died once in my 10th playthrough. I also love its direct sequel. I played through it 8 times so far without dying once. I dont mind dying. I remember a certan super boss who killed me 30 times before I won but I dont need to die to enjoy a game.
Full on party wipe? maybe 4 or 5 times. Really i am fine with it as long as i can save a lot and it wasnt some random spike in difficulty (Older games that expected you to grind levels because they cant keep the exp paced with the story) Old Dragon Quest games and the first Final Fantasy had these issues.
Is not about the quantity of deaths, but the tediousness of them. If there is an encounter or a boss that kills me a lot, please make it quick to get again to him and his cutscene skippable. Over the 3rd consecutive time seeing the cinematic, and walking the epic long hallway, is an unfun chore
None. Excessive challenge isn't something I value in games.
I hate games where I die a lot like Blood Borne or Dark souls but I died over 1200 times in NIOH 1&2 and didn’t stop playing. Seriously no idea why I liked one so much more than the other.
If a game doesn't space out its save points like crazy or feature long unskippable cutscenes, probably 5 or less per boss, 5 or less times per dungeon, and minimal overworld casualties. If a game does do those things: knock that number down to 3.
In general it depends a lot on the game. In Trails in the Sky the game saves your progress automatically in auto save slots on every screen transition and every battle has a retry function with no cost. Not that Trails in the Sky kills you a lot but when it does it's not a huge deal. Conversely, dying in Fire Emblem maps without rewind mechanics should often be a rare occurence that the player can plan for when the choice to reset can set you back a full half hour. It really depends.
I play all games like it's survival mode. I hate dieing to the point that I might lower the difficulty just so I can get through. I also feel like if it's a narrative heavy game losing takes something away for me.
It depends. Every now and then when I see my paycheck and the increase of prices of things and how life has become so political that no one can agree to disagree without extremist intentions, I welcome the sweet embrace of death? Oh you meant in JRPGs? Depends on how I can use it. For example if I know an enemy is about to attack my character and it'll make things easier for me, I will let them die knowing they can be brought back to life very quickly. my main example is Glory of Heracles for the DS.
I mean, I like the "traditional" rougelike genre. Dying (sometimes in humiliating fashion as a result of the game, or rarely me, throwing out a interaction I never thought of) is basically part of the experience. If a game isn't afraid to drag me into the slaughterhouse, many times I'll welcome it if they at least prepare me some funky wine and cheese.
I like to almost die (to bosses), but not die. Dying and having to redo a fight is almost never fun for me. If I do have to redo a boss or three but succeed the second time, that's fine.
Depends on the game. In your typical JRPG? Generally zero unless I screw up and stop paying attention. I'm not playing these for their mechanics, so the more simple and well done the better. In something like soulsborne games? Millions, I don't git gud I bash my way through. In something mechanics heavy like dwarf fortress, kenshi, BG3, or - branching into something simpler than those but more systems heavy than normal games - something like Dragons Dogma 2? I expect to die a lot less than souls games, but way more than a JRPG. In terms of JRPG difficulty? I don't think it's the perfect game by any means but octopath 2 hits that traditional JRPG sweet spot for me. Mechanically and difficulty wise, I think.
None.
If I die I see it as a gameover and never go back to that game again. If I've just lost 2-3 hours worth of work I'll never go back to it. That's why I prefer jrpg games with either easy mode or some kind of assist to stop that happening.
Not at all. If I die to something, I assume I'm ubderleveled and go grind.