Because of the whole Yakuza 7 kerfuffle and its change from an ARPG-ish brawler (hey, it transcends genres, it's Yakuza) to a turn-based approach, I thought that it would be interesting to see what people at this site think more generally about turn-based gaming and what types of turn-based gaming that they do (or don't) enjoy.
The choices that I've given in this poll are really broad, I know, and so if you have some specific examples of games outside of these really broad choices that you enjoy, you should totally talk about them.
For me, my feelings about turn-based gaming can be encapsulated, strangely enough, by my feelings on South Park: The Stick of Truth and its direct sequel, South Park: The Fractured But Whole.
For me, the Eastern style of turn-based gaming typically presents as two groups of characters lined up on opposing sides of the screens, with each character attacking in a certain turn order that might be changed by priority stats and items that change those stats, if the game has them.
As a big fan of plenty of Obsidian's games, I was pretty shocked at how much I hated Stick of Truth. I only bought it, in fairness, because it was given away for free with a copy of TFBW, and so I ended up getting two games for twenty-five dollars (game prices are really great for consumers right now, but that's another thread). I did know that it was what we'd traditionally think of as JRPG-like in its battle style, but I downloaded it and gave it a shot...
...and I genuinely hated the gameplay in this game. I personally find it pretty rote, even on higher levels of enemy competence. I found myself checked out of the battle system halfway through, only having to even remotely pay attention to time my specials properly. In fact, I disliked the game so much that I didn't even bother to fire up TFBW for about four or five months after struggling through this game. I would argue that it's Obsidian's worst-ever release by a long, long, LOOOOOOONG way.
South Park as a turn-based RPG (The Fractured But Whole):
When I did finally play TFBW, I enjoyed it. Part of that is because the try-hard humor in this one is Actually Pretty Funny in spots unlike the first game (Wendy coming up with the superhero name of Call Girl because she uses cell phones as her supergadgets is the sort of adorably clueless thing that an innocent young kid would do, for example).
The other thing, though, is that the gameplay is much better. It's got some light Western SRPG trappings, nothing too complex, but something that's more engaging and that forced me to consider where I was positioning my characters and sometimes whether I'd be willing to accept the trade-off of a successful attack for being in danger of taking damage in a way that SoT never got close to doing. I'd argue that Ubi San Francisco actually saved the series for me and made me interested in a third game that follows up on this sort of turn-based gaming.
I used these games as examples to talk through my own opinion- that turn-based gaming is great when movement around a terrain is involved and terrible when it isn't - and to give an example of what, I think, people generally think of when they hear the words "turn-based gaming" in a broad sense.
But now I ask you: What are your thoughts on turn-based gaming in general, and what aspects or types of turn-based gaming that I missed (like for example, the turn-based games that include attack timers rather than a more static attack order, like Grandia or Child of Light) do you also enjoy or not enjoy?
The choices that I've given in this poll are really broad, I know, and so if you have some specific examples of games outside of these really broad choices that you enjoy, you should totally talk about them.
For me, my feelings about turn-based gaming can be encapsulated, strangely enough, by my feelings on South Park: The Stick of Truth and its direct sequel, South Park: The Fractured But Whole.
South Park as a turn-based RPG (Stick of Truth):
For me, the Eastern style of turn-based gaming typically presents as two groups of characters lined up on opposing sides of the screens, with each character attacking in a certain turn order that might be changed by priority stats and items that change those stats, if the game has them.
As a big fan of plenty of Obsidian's games, I was pretty shocked at how much I hated Stick of Truth. I only bought it, in fairness, because it was given away for free with a copy of TFBW, and so I ended up getting two games for twenty-five dollars (game prices are really great for consumers right now, but that's another thread). I did know that it was what we'd traditionally think of as JRPG-like in its battle style, but I downloaded it and gave it a shot...
...and I genuinely hated the gameplay in this game. I personally find it pretty rote, even on higher levels of enemy competence. I found myself checked out of the battle system halfway through, only having to even remotely pay attention to time my specials properly. In fact, I disliked the game so much that I didn't even bother to fire up TFBW for about four or five months after struggling through this game. I would argue that it's Obsidian's worst-ever release by a long, long, LOOOOOOONG way.
South Park as a turn-based RPG (The Fractured But Whole):
When I did finally play TFBW, I enjoyed it. Part of that is because the try-hard humor in this one is Actually Pretty Funny in spots unlike the first game (Wendy coming up with the superhero name of Call Girl because she uses cell phones as her supergadgets is the sort of adorably clueless thing that an innocent young kid would do, for example).
The other thing, though, is that the gameplay is much better. It's got some light Western SRPG trappings, nothing too complex, but something that's more engaging and that forced me to consider where I was positioning my characters and sometimes whether I'd be willing to accept the trade-off of a successful attack for being in danger of taking damage in a way that SoT never got close to doing. I'd argue that Ubi San Francisco actually saved the series for me and made me interested in a third game that follows up on this sort of turn-based gaming.
I used these games as examples to talk through my own opinion- that turn-based gaming is great when movement around a terrain is involved and terrible when it isn't - and to give an example of what, I think, people generally think of when they hear the words "turn-based gaming" in a broad sense.
But now I ask you: What are your thoughts on turn-based gaming in general, and what aspects or types of turn-based gaming that I missed (like for example, the turn-based games that include attack timers rather than a more static attack order, like Grandia or Child of Light) do you also enjoy or not enjoy?
