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Mariano Cavallero Forager is a fun game, I've been playing it for the last few days, most of the game is about progression, combination of levels and islands and everything on them. However there's one issue I have with the level progression, I now have had a few times that I leveled up, spend the point on something, and then realized I can't do anything with it because I'm missing another level up somewhere else on the grid that allows me to make a product to even get what I just unlocked. It's nice to have a dynamic way to progress with the level ups, but I feel like if you unlock something that requires you to have e.g. leather to make use of it, you shouldn't be able to unlock it yet as it will feel like it's wasted. (and one minor thing if you read this, key bind rbm, sell all/move all isn't in keybinds) Other than that, it's a fun game and I'm enjoying it.
Some (most?) games have more than one progression system. Hollow Knight has all three, with upgrades (nail, health, soul, spell) being direct, new abilities being independent, and charms being customizable.
John Doe I think you hit direct and customizable right on the nail, but the abilities also help you progress to new areas, thus are also direct upgrades.
@@jetajiranuntarat Though they are required to progress, the order you obtain them is customizable. Not to mention, the majority are skippable. In a normal playthrough you only need Mantis Claw, Dream Nail, Vengeful Spirit, and Crystal Heart to beat the game. In low% speedruns, people skip Crystal Heart using a glitch; bringing it down to only 3 required items. Anything besides those items would just be customizing a playthrough.
@@Tymbee Good catch. That's a fair point. When I was commenting, I was already thinking of the ability upgrades and how they're not exactly necessary for game completion, but I mainly commented on OP's categorization of the abilities as being independent, so I didn't feel like making a detailed distinction between different abilities. Good thing you're here to cover all the bases lol.
Yeah, I was going to say that he uses the leveling system in Pokemon as an example of direct, but the variety of Pokemon could used as an example of either indirect or customizable.
I love the thing where you start a video from the 1st second and I don't have to listen to 3 minutes of sub and smash that like button. Great job as always, keep it up :D
I've found that corner of youtube where I literally never hear that shit. I've avoided every clickbaiter and poptuber for years and freakin' years, yet still have been able to find new and plenty of content on the site. I only know it's a thing because of the memes, honestly.
Wait, actually being conscious about the media we consume? And what's more, not financially supporting companies that engage in unethical behavior??? Voting with your wallet?! Lunacy
Oh how naive. You can not be buying the F2P junk and still be supporting it. Ever heard of F2P whales? If you feel like the game is unethical in how it charges money, don't play the game at all.
@@GKCanman I agree, if one is conscious about the media they consume, they'll probably realize that games are benefitted from free players too, which is why my 8 year boycott of EA has included not touching the free/free-weekend games. I understand name calling if someone disagrees with you, sure it's still immature, but I don't think I understand why you'd engage in that if no one has said anything that contradicts your beliefs.
@@Ouvii Sorry, i probably came across more insulting than intended. I just find the whole concept of voting with your wallet to be largely naive, not you specifically. If a game starts aggressively pushing gambling mechanics in their game and the developers gave a line like "if you don't like it don't buy it, vote with your wallet," then i'd be rightly pissed. I'm certain you would be too, but when games are services now you can pull some really nasty bait and switches on people.
@@GKCanman yeah, i agree with you, but until we finally get our torches and pitchforks and burn ea headquarters down. "voting with our wallets" and making clever yt videos educating people is kinda the only thing we can do. and don't get me wrong. when we get our torches and pitchforks, i'm first in line, but for now it doesn't seem realistic. (GAMERS RISE UP!! (pls don't kill me xD))
I love DICs, I want them in all my games. Finding out what DIC fits into your game is a challenge I know all too well. When I write my own games I like to fit in a little taste testing of all kinds of DICs, to see which kind goes well with it.
Beyond Good and Evil has a really great progression system of movement (for your vehicles). Going from a rinky-dink hovercraft, to a rinky-dink hovercraft that actually works, then can boost, then can hop, and eventually hook up to a flying ship, which itself can then be upgraded to fly into space. Hopefully BGE2 is able to continue that system in a way that doesn't feel cheap, though it's Ubisoft, so there will probably be character levels and perks as well...
Something about Skyrim's level progression system always struck me as wrong. It's the same problem as the one you mentioned Destinty 2 having, that enemies level up the same as you do, wherever you are. So you don't feel like you're getting more powerful. Sometimes you can end up feeling like leveling up is making you weaker instead!
I think another reason we’re getting so bored is the focus on _incremental_ progression specifically. In GMTK’s episode on balance, Mark Brown notes that you want to make differences really stark, really shine, so that your selection doesn’t feel monotonous. ‘Shoot baddy w/ boolet, deal 2% more damage & .03% more status chance’ doesn’t accomplish that. You use the same option the same way for a sprinkle more payoff, which you’ll soon stop noticing. Especially in your enemy scaling examples. If advancement on all three paths felt like real _change,_ it would have more staying power.
I really like the way you tackle problems with design, it's really neat to watch someone organize stuff originally and commit to it to discover the truths that can be told by a single perspective. Also adding that purpose of creating positive and effective dialogue to improve the state of games in general. I really like it.
(In your description, you forgot to include "Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales" which you show at 11:40 after Gungeon a second time! Just so you know! I think it would be listed after Hitman 2 in your list.)
That similar ratio of my strength to the opponents' strength is one of my pet peeves. Though I've seen some interesting things done with things that are now too low-level to be worth your time. Earthbound, for example, skips low-level combat entirely (LOVE THAT!). City of Heroes, I started out as a tiny hero, and in the very first town I saw a lady getting mugged. This guy's fighting for her purse as a couple of his friends egg him on. I rush up going "I'll help you, lady!" and realize that they're way too high for me to take (the color code). "Um... somebody else will help you, lady!" (run away) I looked forward to a future in which I'd be powerful enough to take them out, thus fulfilling my heroing dreams. Then I came back through that area some levels later, and realized that they were all too weak for my. "Um... somebody else will be along, lady! Sorry, got things to do, bigger fish to fry--" (I do love that the devs added NPCs who chat about "Did you hear that Jim actually got that lady's purse?" kinda meta content. Given how they'll play tug-of-war for hours without getting anywhere.)
Big props for using footage from Sunless Skies! It's one of the best games I have played in many years, but few people seem to even be aware of its existence!
Excellent video! Seems like you took a sociological approach to figuring out how the progression system works. Must have taken a long time. And you also have all the games you showed in the description. I love it! I think a found a new awesome channel
this... is absolutely brilliant!!! why arent your channel popular mate!! you are soooo under rated. such a wonderful review for game systems. more power to your channel mate.
Great video as always! I wasn't expecting you to mention a game like Destiny 2 but since you did and I'm already here then I might as well correct you on a couple of things. First, while it's true that the enemies scale with you after some point this only starts happening after you are like 50 levels above them (sounds like a lot but it's the equivalent to like 5 WoW levels) so there is a bit of progression there. And second, I think the community that plays that game would agree that the real progression comes more from getting the best weapons than from reaching higher levels and you can even see that on your video where you started with only a small pistol and then next you were using a much cooler smg that chained lighting to all nearby enemies when you fired it and even that is barely a mid tier weapon right now. Honestly, I don't even know why I felt the need to ramble about that, it's just a game that I enjoy maybe a bit too much. Again, great video as always.
After 10 years of esports, I am unable to enjoy leveling systems anymore. It's not like I don't care for the power fantasy, but a game is just more interesting to me if it's about me getting better at it than if it's about my character getting better at it. If a player can beat the game's final boss at level 1 by being smart and badass, I find it cool. If an absolute idiot can beat the game by accident, by simply grinding long enough, I find it boring. The Witcher 3 is a prime example of this. I remember exiting White Orchard for the first time, and getting to Velen. I explored for a while, because open worlds are cool. And then I ran into a bunch of deserters. At that point in the story, Geralt was a mutant with superhuman senses and reactions, with a hundred years worth of battle experiences, a few thousand kills to his name, and the sharpest swords this side of the Yaruga. At that point of the story, the deserters were drunk and had clubs and wooly shirts. But because the game decided Geralt was level 3, and the drunkards were level 10, it took me 20 sword blows to kill each deserter. Throughout this 5 minutes long fight, one of them managed to hit me, instantly reducing me to a couple hit points. There was nothing more immersion breaking than this. In this instance, the game failed to deliver on being a roleplaying game, and a system originally designed to make the game feel more rewarding made it feel shitty instead. What's worse? A couple hours of gameplay later, Geralt went into the crypt of some random idiot a thousand times less badass than he, found a rusty piece of iron... And it was twice as good as his Witcher's sword. To this day, I've yet to finish that game, and not for a lack of trying to enjoy it. I tried lowering the difficulty, so that enemies wouldn't be bullet sponges... But the way difficulty is coded in that game makes it so enemies also become idiots as the game's difficulty setting is lowered: they stop using their shield, attack less often, etc... I tried using mods to start the game at level 15... But at that point Geralt is so strong he has the Superman problem of not ever being in true danger instead. What I want to see... What I REALLY want to see... Is a game where instead of a difficulty slider, you'd get difficulty sliderS, plural. I wanna get a slider for enemy health, another for enemy damage, another for enemy AI, another for loot drop chance, etc... I want a game to trust me when I tell it that I know the kind of experience I'm looking for. I've recently started getting into tabletop rpgs - D&D, mutants and masterminds, etc... And the thing that makes those games great, is that you get to tell the game master what kind of experience you're looking for. I can tell my game master that I'm perfectly happy playing an entire adventure without leveling up or finding a single magic item if I want to. Because it's so free-form, they can change the rules, cater the experience to the players at the table.
Ark survival evolved (while being a mmo) has that if you play single player or on an unoficial server. I too think that this should be a standard, just like mouse sensibility, keybindings etc
I agree full-heartedly. In a videogame, we don't need to see the character grow stronger to feel growth, we the player can get better instead. That doesn't mean the game can't have a progression system, but that the system should open more options, not make existing ones better. That's why I love games like Rayman 3, though there is some progression through getting more health and such (if I recall correctly, been quite a few years), the main progression is in unlocking new types of power-up suits, and learning to use them effectively. Beating the final boss doesn't require you to have bigger stats than at the beginning, but does require you to have properly mastered all the different elements of the game, that have gradually unlocked throughout your playthrough. THAT is what a progression system should aim to do. Not just increase some number.
@@oddyslay I also enjoyed rayman and like those skill+"new tech" systems. Although platformers are a very distinct genre than RPG's. I think that RPG's can have some kind of stat boosting progression. This progression is much more interesting if it comes with traits, for example in most elder scrolls games being a vampire comes with pros and cons. You get stat boosts, better ilusion etc. but you are weak to fire and the sun lowers your stats or straight up kills you. Another example could be being able to shoot and reload 10% faster but have your aim kind of move so your accuracy is lowered.
@@OrionJunqueras I think it is doable to make a good RPG with no stat progression. But it is certainly easier to make one with stat progression, so I don't expect or even necessarily want the change to happen. But I do wish for a return to the times when your choices mattered. For instance, if you compare perks from the original fallouts, and Fallout 4, gone are the interesting perks like "animals are no longer hostile", replaced almost in entirety by perks like "do 10% more damage".
The game Tyranny is the perfect example of how to not do a level progression system. It has a similar system to Skyrim where you gain skill points based on how much you use said skills, and can buy them from trainers and when you pass a certain xp threshold you level up and can choose attributes. The issue is that many of the skills are just useless for particular builds and due to the level scaling it means that improving those skills and thus leveling up actually makes you weaker instead of stronger since the enemies also scale in levels and they don't have this issue. Thankfully Tyranny has an option to artificially not gain xp in certain skills even if you use them, which fixes this issue for the players that know about it but is backwards game design to say the least.
I'm scarred from the word rimjob and will never hear rim right again for the rest of my life. thanks internet. probably one of the few times it's truly managed to scar me mentally.
Y'know...most Fire Emblem games don't actually have finite experience if you think about it. The arena features in many of the games, and provides a source of infinite gold and exp. It comes at the risk of losing your units, but you can use it to your hearts' content. Additionally, four games have random encounters to grind, as well as Awakening and Fates' exp DLC
I think another aspect that could have also been mentioned about progression is that they are often used for giving a sense of achievement as well as a "tangible" result to make us think that the time and effort investment we have put in has born fruit. A good angle that could have been discussed is also why a lot of the current "AAA" game titles almost by default have some sort of cookie-cutter progression structure: it serves as cheap filler or padding in lieu of more well crafted content. BTW been enjoying your work. I would very much like to see you make a video on 'Why people play games' and the different ways games are made to fulfill that reason. I think that'd be a good topic to cover and I'd very much like to see your angle of it. Keep up the good work!
ChronoCross gets a lot of flack for being related to Chrono Trigger, but holy hell does that game have replayability off of it's progression systems alone. Not only can you customize the character playstyles, but you can't get all of the characters in a single playthrough. There are no "I picked the wrong choice" moments, because you don't even know they exist until you stumble upon them. Simply choosing differently on another playthrough will progress you in a completely different way, and I find it incredibly beautiful.
It will be in a lootbox that costs $$. Don't worry, it's just cosmetics. It might LOOK like you're firing guns with a gun, but those are actually just normal bullets that LOOKS like guns.
I really love it when you use the RimWorld Soundtrack. It's so relaxing and probably a key reason why I invest hours on end into it. Also great video as always! And I really need to take a look at forager.
I kinda disagree about every gaming having a progression system. If we're being technical enough to call "progressing through a level" a progression system, at which point it starts being a bit meaningless of a term altogether, there are several with none. Does life have a progression system merely because as time goes on, stuff happens? Does "cleaning" have a progression system, because as I clean, stuff gets cleaner, and therefore I am progressing? I'd say no, and honestly, if you'd say yes, there is no point at all in using the phrase. If everything is a progression system, then nothing is. But that aside, there are many games without an *overarching* progression system. For instance something as simple as Dota 2, no matter how many games you play, there is no change to the game for doing so. You can buy cosmetics, but not earn them, and a money-bought cosmetics change is not, in my opinion at least, progression. Though that said, the Dota 2 battle-pass system connected to the international, could fairly be called a progression system, so I suppose you could say dota has one, but only for 1-2 months a year. I'd also argue that games where the only progression, is in unlocking new levels/stages/missions and advancing the story, are inherently different from those with character levels and ability unlocks. Games like Halo, where the gameplay and the character you control stays the exact same for the entire game, no powerups of any sort, aside from weapons and vehicles, which are static, temporary parts of each mission and not at all the same thing as a standard progression system. I do not see the need for there to be a system that shows you your growth, one-shotting level 1 enemies because I am now level 50 is not at all satisfying to me. Being able to easily handle the enemies on level one, because I, as a player, have gotten good enough to beat level 10, is all I need. In many games, character progression is an obstacle to player growth. Even in games like Dark Souls, which prides itself on being for "those that like hard games", the satisfaction of being easily able to handle enemies that once troubled you is diluted to the point of bitterness, by the fact that it is not a simple result of you getting better, but also of your stats increasing, and your equipment being better. I'd argue that Dark Souls could drop its level and weapon upgrade system altogether, and be a better game for it. TL:DR: Progression is inherent to everything, including all games. A progression system is not.
I love how this video is entertaining, informative, and a great source of recommendations for great indie games. Also, big props to you for praising classic Fire Emblem.
This right here is one thing I love about breath of the wild. It doesn't have experience points, but it does have all three types of progression. Activating towers works as an independent upgrade that makes navigation easier and gives more fast travel locations to glide from, getting spirit orbs is both a direct upgrade and customizable because you choose hearts or stamina, and upgrading inventory space lets you hold more weapons to choose from, so you can have a freezing stick a lightning sword and five hammers all at once.
Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker and 5 have very interesting progression systems. In order to get better guns and even weirder guns, you need to capture personnel that have R&D skill. The more you have, the cooler guns you can get. There are other things attached to different skills that enemy soldiers have, but it all works in the end.
At some point we can bend the definition of "Progression System" so much that it can apply to every action Especially since the very bottom-line definition of it is merely change So therefore i can say the act of breathing is a progression system, one that never ends until we die (To help make it easier, think of inhaling as the leveling up portion of skyrim, and the exhaling when you make a skill legendary, it resets, allowing you to breathe in again) So is eating, plants growing, predators hunting, people talking Or pretty much everything scout said in that one popular line "Grass grows, birds fly, sun shines, and brotha, I hurt people!" Games are merely mimicry of the forces of nature, or more accurately, the forces and laws of our very universe
7:39 How can you compare getting random cards in a card game to lootboxes in Overwatch? By getting more cards in Hearthstone you actually progress somewhat and may become stronger. In Overwatch the lootboxes unlock entirely cosmetic things, they don't make progress in any way
customizeable system is like minecraft you choose when to get iron- then diamonds, where to get said iron and diamonds, when to fight the big bad, when to build a house, if you build a house, literally anything! and mods increase this customizeableness much more with mods like draconic evolution adding things that arent required to kill its final boss, but can anyway, with astral sorcery having a skill tree disc and another way to defend against draconics boss
This has the same expansion direction you would find in Marketing; yes, that kind of selling. Vertical expansion; more niche needs, for example; soap, which can be divided into personal care, shampoo, and body wash, then into even more specific needs, such as dandruff control, oil control, etc. Horizontal expansion; target marketing, which is how many needs or customers you can cater too. The broadest example is market expansion, ie. American, European, Asian, Australian market where the cause and needs can be slightly different by geography. The full blown marketing tree is one hell of a grid of vertical and horizontal expansions, if you look at what the companies and their products (ie. giant conglomerates). The coincidence in the gaming industry is not an uncanny as it seems.
I'm sorry but for God of War you said "It helped their journey without strealing the limelight" You didn't specify exactly what it did to not get in the way of the travel. You're still going through menus, you're still managing armor and weapon stats and youre still unlocking skills through trees, forcing you to start gimped just so you can artificially gain the new abilities in an obtrusive mechanical fashion through EXP. If anything I think it did steal the limelight by only making enemies at higher level even more annoying to fight because of the value differences, and it takes away from the core game design of using your abilities by making you manage extra things just so you have access to all your things and not spend an eternity trying to defeat a foe because youre not doing optimal amounts of damage. I love your videos dude, but unless you're going to elaborate, you can't just say something out of the blue like that without backing up the point
Random fact at 12:50 where you joked about giant birds beating a dragon. In Buddhist mythology there are giant birds called garudas that kill these large snake creatures called Naga's that are very similar to Chinese dragons. The reason I bring this up is because a Chinese manhua named journey to the west, which is based off of the original Chinese story, took inspiration from this and has giant birds which are specially adapted to hunt and kill dragons. Yeah the more you know
I always loved the sphere grid from the original Final Fantasy X. It seems like a mixture of mostly direct but a little bit of customizable, to use your words. It may seem a little boring now, but I'll be damned if I didn't get extremely excited every time I could see I was about to get 200 extra max hp. That, and it was really cool to see the aeons grow stronger alongside Yuna.
I've just gotten into Forager myself. That game has some kind of mainline connection to my brain - once I start playing, I'm absolutely hooked for the next five hours. Every time I think about stopping, I just tell myself, "One more level, one more piece of gear, one more island..."
Hey AOG please consider actually playing roguelikes when you want to refer to their progression system I can assure you, that progression system is just a Enter The Gungeon thing, and not a roguelike staple
My personal favourite must surely be Kingdom Hearts 2. It has a fantastical scaling system that truly makes you feel stronger when you level up, but you can still be level 1 and kick asses in a very similar way than if you had leveled up simply because all the important abilities are gained as a reward for completing story events or optional stuff. Leveling up only gives you very Quality-of-Life-focused abilities and stats, but you can still easily play without those. It's great.
@@Tymbee doesn't have to be ASCII, but yeah you could call me an enthusiast for 'traditional' Roguelikes (don't like calling them traditional, since there are ones that are still innovating with new mechanics etc within the framework of Rogue, and so calling them traditional doesn't make a whole lot of sense - for games that are innovating, look at some of this year's 7DRLs such as Inner Life, and Quinta Essentia. Also Cogmind is another good example)
@@VikingSchism I gotcha. You might like Dungeons of Dredmor, if you haven't played it already. I don't know if it's super innovative, but it's definitely a worth playing.
What's good about progression systems is that it gradually expands the game, ideally as your mastery of existing systems solidify, so that the gameplay experience gets more and more complicated and interesting. And then, ideally, the challenges get more and more complicated thus demanding the player syncretize their understanding of the various systems to form a cohesive gestalt of systems. In a very real way, this is what discoverable user interfaces are also all about. Everything else about progression? Padding. Bad, bad padding. If the progression system isn't in service of making the start of the game simple and helping establish mastery as you go on, it's not there to respect your time, it's there because the developer thought the game should be longer or have "more content".
I had an interesting progression experience in Plants vs. Zombies 2, the mobile deck builder. In PvZ 2 you purchase booster packs with in-game currency. They also offer bargain deals, like buy-10-get-1-free. Being a savvy investor, I decided to save my in-game currency for the best deal, which was for buying 50 boosters. So I played a bunch of matches, slowly earning money towards the big score. Finally, I had enough for 50 packs. I clicked Buy, watched the new cards fly by, started building some new decks ... and stopped. It was too much - the explosion of new options left me paralyzed with indecision. I closed the game and haven't gone back since.
I actually stopped competitive games because I was not seeing myself progressing as when you rank up you ever lose, or know have a hard game because you're always with other people at your level
@@1996Pinocchio No, no. I'm being facetious. I'm in the same boat as Adam when I didn't realize all games have progression systems. I've been wracking my brain trying to find a counterexample, but I just can't think of anything. It'd be an interesting design challenge.
xenoblade 2 has my favorite progression system so far. basically your team is made of 3 drivers + 9 blades. the drivers progress by leveling up, increasing their weapons' cooldown skills (there are many to choose from + level up), unlocking their affinity/skill chart, + getting better accessories that better suit your play style. blades on the other hand progress by changing their weapon stats with usable items, unlocking their affinity charts (which comes with unique backstory side quests), + equipping better accessories from them which come from a different pool than the driver accessories. altogether, it's complex but it provides progress on so many levels that it's addicting to build all new teams of blades to try lots of different synergies out.
@@jhon1406 I’d agree that the villains were far better in 2 than 3, but overall I did actually enjoy 3’s story more. It’s kind of hard to describe, but the feelings it gave me are one of a kind. (Especially during chapter 5&6)
i think the pokemon analogy only really works for the exp you get after every battle. pokemon has more customization, which of the hundreds of pokemon do you want, what moves do you want to give it etc
I feel like scaling NPC's in games should be done (if done at all) by either increasing the difficulty settings of the enemy A.I. making them smarter, more cautious or more aggressive depending on type of game and type of enemy and so forth so that it feels like you're actually facing more elite troops not just taking longer to kill everything and/or by increasing the numbers you face so that you can still feel badass because you took out so many compared to earlier in the game where you could only face like 4 or 5 enemies without dying compared to the 20 you just took on but the difficulty of the game will still increase by the same amount by adding an equivalent number of more enemies in. That has it's own problems though. I mean at end game you could be fighting like 400 dudes at once if the power levels weren't kept in check. Ideally though, enemies that used to be difficult should either be much easier or at least easier by a noticeable margin with enemies you couldn't scratch becoming able to be dealt with and new enemy types introduced, like for example, in a first person shooter, you're facing the rookies but later on taking on special forces, S.A.S type squads, Navy Seals etc. that might not necessarily take much more hits to take down but pull off much more advanced flanking manoeuvres, covering fire so their buddies can move up, uses of tear gas, flash bangs, etc. And could even have moments in the game where at the beginning you were a new recruit and a story moment gives you the option to let a man you captured go free or kill him but because he was like 17 and a new recruit, you let him go. Later on then, when you're a special forces guy taking on special forces, you see him amongst them, killing your friends. Could even have a nemesis system type thing like in Shadow of Mordor only reigned in quite a bit.
Clips from one of the games caught my eye, so I focused all my google fu to discover that it was Pathway (thanks for including the list under Show More). Shame about the majority of user reviews. I would have really enjoyed an XCOM-like adventure along the lines of what Pathway seems to be doing, but for now I'll just try to remember that it's out there, and hopefully it will get the balance changes people seem to feel it needs. Thank you, Adam, great video.
The only game I've played where the numbers don't feel useless is Final Fantasy III the DS port. You don't start off dealing hundred or thousands of damage, you start with about 5dmg and have low health so when the numbers go up you feel that 5000dmg do so much damage without it just being a "high" number
Progression systems are part of a game. The difference is how does the dev apply it. Can be like levels, abilities, items, zones, difficulty, real time passed, time played, story, tasks done, enemies defeated, game-numbered experience, real ecperience, performance, difficulty selection, gamemode, maps, extra challenges, and sometimes even "luck". I don't want to count microtransactions or DLCs because it is not what a dev do, it is what a bad person do, better known as "Big Studio CEO", but sometimes it can be.
I feel like roguelikes and - lites are totally different in terms of so much and especially progression and an independent progression system really makes sense. But usually, I want to get better and grow so that's why I don't enjoy independence in progression and rather direct or customizable
Infinite scaling rubs me the wrong way. There is no reason my level X character shouldn't be able to one shot a skeever. Sure, at level 1 when I can barely hold a sword, that makes sense. But if I can kill a dragon, I should be able to one shot a skeever. No questions asked. Basic grunt enemies need to slowly be cycled out of the enemy pools as you progress, or at least multiply how many of them there are, like goblins in DnD. Sure, at level 1 you may take on like 5 goblins, but at level 10 you should have many more at a time, not goblins that are progressively beefier for no reason.
This is an interesting video and analysis on Progression Systems. Not sure which progression system I prefer the most though. Once it gets harder to reach the next level of choice I tend to lose interesting if the reward is not interesting. Granted if the reward system is too good I tend to get addicted instead and have a harder time taking breaks from it.
Want to follow someone on twitter who almost never engages with that trashfire of a website? Boy do I have the account for you! twitter.com/Thefearalcarrot
Want to give me money so I can buy more swet, sweet cocai- I mean make more fun videos? www.patreon.com/ArchitectofGames
bowser was catty in 3d world
he was chatty in odyssey
good job with the video btw
The "You Saw" list is amazingly helpful. Thank you!
The ending screen is terraria reworked! Nice.
Since your video quality hasn't let us down so far, and can apparently only get better with time, then feel free to take as much time as you'd like. 👀
man even when your plugging your hilarious :)
Hey, Forager dev here. I can confirm I was going for the DIC
I'm happy I managed to do your great game justice!
Bruuh XD
Mariano Cavallero Forager is a fun game, I've been playing it for the last few days, most of the game is about progression, combination of levels and islands and everything on them.
However there's one issue I have with the level progression, I now have had a few times that I leveled up, spend the point on something, and then realized I can't do anything with it because I'm missing another level up somewhere else on the grid that allows me to make a product to even get what I just unlocked.
It's nice to have a dynamic way to progress with the level ups, but I feel like if you unlock something that requires you to have e.g. leather to make use of it, you shouldn't be able to unlock it yet as it will feel like it's wasted.
(and one minor thing if you read this, key bind rbm, sell all/move all isn't in keybinds)
Other than that, it's a fun game and I'm enjoying it.
thanks to the video and your comment i went and downloaded your game immediately
I'll be getting it for the switch, thanks for making a port! :-)
Some (most?) games have more than one progression system. Hollow Knight has all three, with upgrades (nail, health, soul, spell) being direct, new abilities being independent, and charms being customizable.
John Doe I think you hit direct and customizable right on the nail, but the abilities also help you progress to new areas, thus are also direct upgrades.
@@jetajiranuntarat Though they are required to progress, the order you obtain them is customizable. Not to mention, the majority are skippable. In a normal playthrough you only need Mantis Claw, Dream Nail, Vengeful Spirit, and Crystal Heart to beat the game. In low% speedruns, people skip Crystal Heart using a glitch; bringing it down to only 3 required items. Anything besides those items would just be customizing a playthrough.
@@Tymbee Good catch. That's a fair point. When I was commenting, I was already thinking of the ability upgrades and how they're not exactly necessary for game completion, but I mainly commented on OP's categorization of the abilities as being independent, so I didn't feel like making a detailed distinction between different abilities. Good thing you're here to cover all the bases lol.
Hollow Knight is amazing
Yeah, I was going to say that he uses the leveling system in Pokemon as an example of direct, but the variety of Pokemon could used as an example of either indirect or customizable.
I love the thing where you start a video from the 1st second and I don't have to listen to 3 minutes of sub and smash that like button. Great job as always, keep it up :D
It's getting ridiculous how hard some people try lol
MCGamerCZ's ''Warframe - Ceramic Dagger - Is It ANY GOOD ?!?'' is a pretty good parody
its ya boi here reminding you to dingle that bell
I've found that corner of youtube where I literally never hear that shit. I've avoided every clickbaiter and poptuber for years and freakin' years, yet still have been able to find new and plenty of content on the site. I only know it's a thing because of the memes, honestly.
Like that smash button!
@@ArchitectofGames lol
Game designers always chasing after that D.I.C.
*D.I.C.(k)
Aw I love me some D.I.C(k)
Ahhhh mods
You and Adam has just made game designers look gay to me
But you also made me laugh
So that's nice
Lmao
Dick?
Did you actually make a pun using warframe game paly "Over the last Tenno so years" . Brilliant
;D
Wait, actually being conscious about the media we consume? And what's more, not financially supporting companies that engage in unethical behavior??? Voting with your wallet?!
Lunacy
Oh how naive. You can not be buying the F2P junk and still be supporting it. Ever heard of F2P whales? If you feel like the game is unethical in how it charges money, don't play the game at all.
@@GKCanman I agree, if one is conscious about the media they consume, they'll probably realize that games are benefitted from free players too, which is why my 8 year boycott of EA has included not touching the free/free-weekend games.
I understand name calling if someone disagrees with you, sure it's still immature, but I don't think I understand why you'd engage in that if no one has said anything that contradicts your beliefs.
@@Ouvii Sorry, i probably came across more insulting than intended. I just find the whole concept of voting with your wallet to be largely naive, not you specifically. If a game starts aggressively pushing gambling mechanics in their game and the developers gave a line like "if you don't like it don't buy it, vote with your wallet," then i'd be rightly pissed. I'm certain you would be too, but when games are services now you can pull some really nasty bait and switches on people.
@@GKCanman yeah, i agree with you, but until we finally get our torches and pitchforks and burn ea headquarters down. "voting with our wallets" and making clever yt videos educating people is kinda the only thing we can do. and don't get me wrong. when we get our torches and pitchforks, i'm first in line, but for now it doesn't seem realistic.
(GAMERS RISE UP!! (pls don't kill me xD))
This, the non paying players are content for the whale. We are the NPC mobs but they don't have to do any work on our ai
I love DICs, I want them in all my games. Finding out what DIC fits into your game is a challenge I know all too well. When I write my own games I like to fit in a little taste testing of all kinds of DICs, to see which kind goes well with it.
0:07 "over the last Tenno so years..." You really Framed that one well. Bravo, sir. Bravo.
Adam *Shows Warframe*
"In the last Tenno so years..."
Me: Ayy i see what ya did there
(Yes ik that wasn't intentional, just poking a bit of fun)
Nice.
I didn't even notice lol
I was gonna write that
Why are you everywhere
Sorry I am very much questioning the Turtles!
DO NOT QUESTION THE TURTLES
the turtles are fairly normal for a Rimworld run. Hell, almost had a colony die to turtles... that was a thing.
it is okay, the turtles are inside of you either way.
@@ArchitectofGames What mod for THOSE turtles?
It always warms my heart when I see Battle for Wesnoth somewhere.
That game is not appreciated enough.
I love that Todd Howard joke at the end lol. Nice video as always!
Warrame: 2013 in the description should be Warframe: 2013
we need more upvotes here so he fixes this.
Mathew Perkins who actually cares?
@@crabosity forgot my life at the end there
it got fixed
Man I love your videos. How much? Enough to stick around to hear your patrons' names.
13:38 The Battle for Wesnoth. Damn this brings back so many good memories
Fantastic video. One of my favorites of yours, can't wait till it becomes public so I can share with friends
It's public now.
Because I can watch it :-)
Beyond Good and Evil has a really great progression system of movement (for your vehicles). Going from a rinky-dink hovercraft, to a rinky-dink hovercraft that actually works, then can boost, then can hop, and eventually hook up to a flying ship, which itself can then be upgraded to fly into space.
Hopefully BGE2 is able to continue that system in a way that doesn't feel cheap, though it's Ubisoft, so there will probably be character levels and perks as well...
Rimworld's progression system is you progressing towards the day Randy decides to destroy your colony.
Something about Skyrim's level progression system always struck me as wrong. It's the same problem as the one you mentioned Destinty 2 having, that enemies level up the same as you do, wherever you are. So you don't feel like you're getting more powerful. Sometimes you can end up feeling like leveling up is making you weaker instead!
Props for reminding me of Battle For Wesnoth. What a great game!
I think another reason we’re getting so bored is the focus on _incremental_ progression specifically. In GMTK’s episode on balance, Mark Brown notes that you want to make differences really stark, really shine, so that your selection doesn’t feel monotonous. ‘Shoot baddy w/ boolet, deal 2% more damage & .03% more status chance’ doesn’t accomplish that. You use the same option the same way for a sprinkle more payoff, which you’ll soon stop noticing. Especially in your enemy scaling examples.
If advancement on all three paths felt like real _change,_ it would have more staying power.
I really like the way you tackle problems with design, it's really neat to watch someone organize stuff originally and commit to it to discover the truths that can be told by a single perspective. Also adding that purpose of creating positive and effective dialogue to improve the state of games in general. I really like it.
(In your description, you forgot to include "Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales" which you show at 11:40 after Gungeon a second time! Just so you know! I think it would be listed after Hitman 2 in your list.)
That similar ratio of my strength to the opponents' strength is one of my pet peeves. Though I've seen some interesting things done with things that are now too low-level to be worth your time. Earthbound, for example, skips low-level combat entirely (LOVE THAT!).
City of Heroes, I started out as a tiny hero, and in the very first town I saw a lady getting mugged. This guy's fighting for her purse as a couple of his friends egg him on. I rush up going "I'll help you, lady!" and realize that they're way too high for me to take (the color code). "Um... somebody else will help you, lady!" (run away) I looked forward to a future in which I'd be powerful enough to take them out, thus fulfilling my heroing dreams.
Then I came back through that area some levels later, and realized that they were all too weak for my. "Um... somebody else will be along, lady! Sorry, got things to do, bigger fish to fry--"
(I do love that the devs added NPCs who chat about "Did you hear that Jim actually got that lady's purse?" kinda meta content. Given how they'll play tug-of-war for hours without getting anywhere.)
"Over the last Tenno so years..." You are either sneaky or I'm coniditioned by WF.
Big props for using footage from Sunless Skies! It's one of the best games I have played in many years, but few people seem to even be aware of its existence!
Excellent video! Seems like you took a sociological approach to figuring out how the progression system works. Must have taken a long time. And you also have all the games you showed in the description. I love it! I think a found a new awesome channel
this... is absolutely brilliant!!! why arent your channel popular mate!! you are soooo under rated. such a wonderful review for game systems. more power to your channel mate.
Great video as always! I wasn't expecting you to mention a game like Destiny 2 but since you did and I'm already here then I might as well correct you on a couple of things. First, while it's true that the enemies scale with you after some point this only starts happening after you are like 50 levels above them (sounds like a lot but it's the equivalent to like 5 WoW levels) so there is a bit of progression there. And second, I think the community that plays that game would agree that the real progression comes more from getting the best weapons than from reaching higher levels and you can even see that on your video where you started with only a small pistol and then next you were using a much cooler smg that chained lighting to all nearby enemies when you fired it and even that is barely a mid tier weapon right now.
Honestly, I don't even know why I felt the need to ramble about that, it's just a game that I enjoy maybe a bit too much. Again, great video as always.
After 10 years of esports, I am unable to enjoy leveling systems anymore. It's not like I don't care for the power fantasy, but a game is just more interesting to me if it's about me getting better at it than if it's about my character getting better at it. If a player can beat the game's final boss at level 1 by being smart and badass, I find it cool. If an absolute idiot can beat the game by accident, by simply grinding long enough, I find it boring.
The Witcher 3 is a prime example of this. I remember exiting White Orchard for the first time, and getting to Velen. I explored for a while, because open worlds are cool. And then I ran into a bunch of deserters.
At that point in the story, Geralt was a mutant with superhuman senses and reactions, with a hundred years worth of battle experiences, a few thousand kills to his name, and the sharpest swords this side of the Yaruga.
At that point of the story, the deserters were drunk and had clubs and wooly shirts.
But because the game decided Geralt was level 3, and the drunkards were level 10, it took me 20 sword blows to kill each deserter. Throughout this 5 minutes long fight, one of them managed to hit me, instantly reducing me to a couple hit points.
There was nothing more immersion breaking than this. In this instance, the game failed to deliver on being a roleplaying game, and a system originally designed to make the game feel more rewarding made it feel shitty instead.
What's worse? A couple hours of gameplay later, Geralt went into the crypt of some random idiot a thousand times less badass than he, found a rusty piece of iron... And it was twice as good as his Witcher's sword.
To this day, I've yet to finish that game, and not for a lack of trying to enjoy it. I tried lowering the difficulty, so that enemies wouldn't be bullet sponges... But the way difficulty is coded in that game makes it so enemies also become idiots as the game's difficulty setting is lowered: they stop using their shield, attack less often, etc... I tried using mods to start the game at level 15... But at that point Geralt is so strong he has the Superman problem of not ever being in true danger instead.
What I want to see... What I REALLY want to see... Is a game where instead of a difficulty slider, you'd get difficulty sliderS, plural. I wanna get a slider for enemy health, another for enemy damage, another for enemy AI, another for loot drop chance, etc... I want a game to trust me when I tell it that I know the kind of experience I'm looking for.
I've recently started getting into tabletop rpgs - D&D, mutants and masterminds, etc... And the thing that makes those games great, is that you get to tell the game master what kind of experience you're looking for. I can tell my game master that I'm perfectly happy playing an entire adventure without leveling up or finding a single magic item if I want to. Because it's so free-form, they can change the rules, cater the experience to the players at the table.
Ark survival evolved (while being a mmo) has that if you play single player or on an unoficial server. I too think that this should be a standard, just like mouse sensibility, keybindings etc
Bullet sponges deserve to be eradicated from the existence of mankind.
I agree full-heartedly. In a videogame, we don't need to see the character grow stronger to feel growth, we the player can get better instead. That doesn't mean the game can't have a progression system, but that the system should open more options, not make existing ones better. That's why I love games like Rayman 3, though there is some progression through getting more health and such (if I recall correctly, been quite a few years), the main progression is in unlocking new types of power-up suits, and learning to use them effectively. Beating the final boss doesn't require you to have bigger stats than at the beginning, but does require you to have properly mastered all the different elements of the game, that have gradually unlocked throughout your playthrough. THAT is what a progression system should aim to do. Not just increase some number.
@@oddyslay I also enjoyed rayman and like those skill+"new tech" systems. Although platformers are a very distinct genre than RPG's. I think that RPG's can have some kind of stat boosting progression. This progression is much more interesting if it comes with traits, for example in most elder scrolls games being a vampire comes with pros and cons. You get stat boosts, better ilusion etc. but you are weak to fire and the sun lowers your stats or straight up kills you. Another example could be being able to shoot and reload 10% faster but have your aim kind of move so your accuracy is lowered.
@@OrionJunqueras I think it is doable to make a good RPG with no stat progression. But it is certainly easier to make one with stat progression, so I don't expect or even necessarily want the change to happen. But I do wish for a return to the times when your choices mattered. For instance, if you compare perks from the original fallouts, and Fallout 4, gone are the interesting perks like "animals are no longer hostile", replaced almost in entirety by perks like "do 10% more damage".
The game Tyranny is the perfect example of how to not do a level progression system. It has a similar system to Skyrim where you gain skill points based on how much you use said skills, and can buy them from trainers and when you pass a certain xp threshold you level up and can choose attributes. The issue is that many of the skills are just useless for particular builds and due to the level scaling it means that improving those skills and thus leveling up actually makes you weaker instead of stronger since the enemies also scale in levels and they don't have this issue. Thankfully Tyranny has an option to artificially not gain xp in certain skills even if you use them, which fixes this issue for the players that know about it but is backwards game design to say the least.
*Hears Rimworld music*
Wait what
*Talks bout Rimworld*
Yeeeee boi
I'm scarred from the word rimjob and will never hear rim right again for the rest of my life. thanks internet. probably one of the few times it's truly managed to scar me mentally.
@@dddmemaybe But it feels so good
Y'know...most Fire Emblem games don't actually have finite experience if you think about it. The arena features in many of the games, and provides a source of infinite gold and exp. It comes at the risk of losing your units, but you can use it to your hearts' content. Additionally, four games have random encounters to grind, as well as Awakening and Fates' exp DLC
Wooh pedants rejoice, he said Kristensen! Great video.
I think another aspect that could have also been mentioned about progression is that they are often used for giving a sense of achievement as well as a "tangible" result to make us think that the time and effort investment we have put in has born fruit.
A good angle that could have been discussed is also why a lot of the current "AAA" game titles almost by default have some sort of cookie-cutter progression structure: it serves as cheap filler or padding in lieu of more well crafted content.
BTW been enjoying your work. I would very much like to see you make a video on 'Why people play games' and the different ways games are made to fulfill that reason. I think that'd be a good topic to cover and I'd very much like to see your angle of it.
Keep up the good work!
ChronoCross gets a lot of flack for being related to Chrono Trigger, but holy hell does that game have replayability off of it's progression systems alone. Not only can you customize the character playstyles, but you can't get all of the characters in a single playthrough. There are no "I picked the wrong choice" moments, because you don't even know they exist until you stumble upon them. Simply choosing differently on another playthrough will progress you in a completely different way, and I find it incredibly beautiful.
A gun that fires guns...my life is complete. If only this could make its way into borderlands I might need new pants
It will be in a lootbox that costs $$. Don't worry, it's just cosmetics. It might LOOK like you're firing guns with a gun, but those are actually just normal bullets that LOOKS like guns.
I really love it when you use the RimWorld Soundtrack. It's so relaxing and probably a key reason why I invest hours on end into it.
Also great video as always! And I really need to take a look at forager.
Remember when about 1,900 words ago is such an underrated transition
I kinda disagree about every gaming having a progression system. If we're being technical enough to call "progressing through a level" a progression system, at which point it starts being a bit meaningless of a term altogether, there are several with none. Does life have a progression system merely because as time goes on, stuff happens? Does "cleaning" have a progression system, because as I clean, stuff gets cleaner, and therefore I am progressing? I'd say no, and honestly, if you'd say yes, there is no point at all in using the phrase. If everything is a progression system, then nothing is. But that aside, there are many games without an *overarching* progression system. For instance something as simple as Dota 2, no matter how many games you play, there is no change to the game for doing so. You can buy cosmetics, but not earn them, and a money-bought cosmetics change is not, in my opinion at least, progression. Though that said, the Dota 2 battle-pass system connected to the international, could fairly be called a progression system, so I suppose you could say dota has one, but only for 1-2 months a year.
I'd also argue that games where the only progression, is in unlocking new levels/stages/missions and advancing the story, are inherently different from those with character levels and ability unlocks. Games like Halo, where the gameplay and the character you control stays the exact same for the entire game, no powerups of any sort, aside from weapons and vehicles, which are static, temporary parts of each mission and not at all the same thing as a standard progression system.
I do not see the need for there to be a system that shows you your growth, one-shotting level 1 enemies because I am now level 50 is not at all satisfying to me. Being able to easily handle the enemies on level one, because I, as a player, have gotten good enough to beat level 10, is all I need. In many games, character progression is an obstacle to player growth. Even in games like Dark Souls, which prides itself on being for "those that like hard games", the satisfaction of being easily able to handle enemies that once troubled you is diluted to the point of bitterness, by the fact that it is not a simple result of you getting better, but also of your stats increasing, and your equipment being better. I'd argue that Dark Souls could drop its level and weapon upgrade system altogether, and be a better game for it.
TL:DR: Progression is inherent to everything, including all games. A progression system is not.
"Character progression is an obstacle to player progression." I like dat. Dat's good way to put it.
I agree, it's exactly what bugged me about this video
I love how this video is entertaining, informative, and a great source of recommendations for great indie games.
Also, big props to you for praising classic Fire Emblem.
Battle for Wesnoth!!! Love this game :D
This right here is one thing I love about breath of the wild. It doesn't have experience points, but it does have all three types of progression. Activating towers works as an independent upgrade that makes navigation easier and gives more fast travel locations to glide from, getting spirit orbs is both a direct upgrade and customizable because you choose hearts or stamina, and upgrading inventory space lets you hold more weapons to choose from, so you can have a freezing stick a lightning sword and five hammers all at once.
A steep commitment of one hour (!) after dying would make a hardcore rogue-like player tear up a little. Great vid, man
I appreciate a good pun, but I appreciate descriptive, informative, concise (DIC) use of language even more.
Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker and 5 have very interesting progression systems. In order to get better guns and even weirder guns, you need to capture personnel that have R&D skill. The more you have, the cooler guns you can get. There are other things attached to different skills that enemy soldiers have, but it all works in the end.
"hours of farming argon crystal"
i felt that that
the warframe player reading this comment felt that
everyone felt that
At some point we can bend the definition of "Progression System" so much that it can apply to every action
Especially since the very bottom-line definition of it is merely change
So therefore i can say the act of breathing is a progression system, one that never ends until we die (To help make it easier, think of inhaling as the leveling up portion of skyrim, and the exhaling when you make a skill legendary, it resets, allowing you to breathe in again)
So is eating, plants growing, predators hunting, people talking
Or pretty much everything scout said in that one popular line
"Grass grows, birds fly, sun shines, and brotha, I hurt people!"
Games are merely mimicry of the forces of nature, or more accurately, the forces and laws of our very universe
LV --> LOVE --> Level Of ViolencE
Not every game is undertale.
dude. your going about this and that about progression systems just made me FINALLY click on how to fucking navigate the world i coded. thank you.
7:39 How can you compare getting random cards in a card game to lootboxes in Overwatch?
By getting more cards in Hearthstone you actually progress somewhat and may become stronger. In Overwatch the lootboxes unlock entirely cosmetic things, they don't make progress in any way
Ah, but it still FEELS like progression. And that's really all that counts
customizeable system is like minecraft
you choose when to get iron- then diamonds, where to get said iron and diamonds, when to fight the big bad, when to build a house, if you build a house, literally anything!
and mods increase this customizeableness much more with mods like draconic evolution adding things that arent required to kill its final boss, but can anyway, with astral sorcery having a skill tree disc and another way to defend against draconics boss
This has the same expansion direction you would find in Marketing; yes, that kind of selling.
Vertical expansion; more niche needs, for example; soap, which can be divided into personal care, shampoo, and body wash, then into even more specific needs, such as dandruff control, oil control, etc.
Horizontal expansion; target marketing, which is how many needs or customers you can cater too. The broadest example is market expansion, ie. American, European, Asian, Australian market where the cause and needs can be slightly different by geography.
The full blown marketing tree is one hell of a grid of vertical and horizontal expansions, if you look at what the companies and their products (ie. giant conglomerates).
The coincidence in the gaming industry is not an uncanny as it seems.
The Rimworld Soundtrack. Didnt hear a word you say, because of all the colony flashbacks i got. This gane was awesome
another good exampleof indirect progression would be hyperlight drifter, where you just get a bigger 'toolbox'
I'm sorry but for God of War you said "It helped their journey without strealing the limelight"
You didn't specify exactly what it did to not get in the way of the travel.
You're still going through menus, you're still managing armor and weapon stats and youre still unlocking skills through trees, forcing you to start gimped just so you can artificially gain the new abilities in an obtrusive mechanical fashion through EXP. If anything I think it did steal the limelight by only making enemies at higher level even more annoying to fight because of the value differences, and it takes away from the core game design of using your abilities by making you manage extra things just so you have access to all your things and not spend an eternity trying to defeat a foe because youre not doing optimal amounts of damage.
I love your videos dude, but unless you're going to elaborate, you can't just say something out of the blue like that without backing up the point
Random fact at 12:50 where you joked about giant birds beating a dragon. In Buddhist mythology there are giant birds called garudas that kill these large snake creatures called Naga's that are very similar to Chinese dragons. The reason I bring this up is because a Chinese manhua named journey to the west, which is based off of the original Chinese story, took inspiration from this and has giant birds which are specially adapted to hunt and kill dragons. Yeah the more you know
Adam Millard: literally says "Dick"
TH-cam: Monitize him
PewDiePie: Sneezes too hard
TH-cam: DEMONITIZED
Progression systems are great for skinner-boxing your consumer base too.
Used FE9 to demonstrate FE (and mentioned FE at all for that matter)? Truly a person of culture. I'd like the vid 12 more times if I could,
I always loved the sphere grid from the original Final Fantasy X. It seems like a mixture of mostly direct but a little bit of customizable, to use your words. It may seem a little boring now, but I'll be damned if I didn't get extremely excited every time I could see I was about to get 200 extra max hp. That, and it was really cool to see the aeons grow stronger alongside Yuna.
I've just gotten into Forager myself. That game has some kind of mainline connection to my brain - once I start playing, I'm absolutely hooked for the next five hours. Every time I think about stopping, I just tell myself, "One more level, one more piece of gear, one more island..."
Hey AOG
please consider actually playing roguelikes when you want to refer to their progression system
I can assure you, that progression system is just a Enter The Gungeon thing, and not a roguelike staple
Seriously amazed by the number of games you covered in this one. Much awesome
Listening to this while programming games is so eye-opening :D Keep up the good work
My personal favourite must surely be Kingdom Hearts 2. It has a fantastical scaling system that truly makes you feel stronger when you level up, but you can still be level 1 and kick asses in a very similar way than if you had leveled up simply because all the important abilities are gained as a reward for completing story events or optional stuff. Leveling up only gives you very Quality-of-Life-focused abilities and stats, but you can still easily play without those. It's great.
I still cringe every time people call games like Gungeon a Roguelike ;_;
An ASCII enthusiast, eh?
@@Tymbee doesn't have to be ASCII, but yeah you could call me an enthusiast for 'traditional' Roguelikes (don't like calling them traditional, since there are ones that are still innovating with new mechanics etc within the framework of Rogue, and so calling them traditional doesn't make a whole lot of sense - for games that are innovating, look at some of this year's 7DRLs such as Inner Life, and Quinta Essentia. Also Cogmind is another good example)
@@VikingSchism I gotcha. You might like Dungeons of Dredmor, if you haven't played it already. I don't know if it's super innovative, but it's definitely a worth playing.
- Wait, it's all progression systems?
- Always has been.
I saw that sneaky Battle for Wesnoth clip in there, you can't hide it from me!
What's good about progression systems is that it gradually expands the game, ideally as your mastery of existing systems solidify, so that the gameplay experience gets more and more complicated and interesting. And then, ideally, the challenges get more and more complicated thus demanding the player syncretize their understanding of the various systems to form a cohesive gestalt of systems. In a very real way, this is what discoverable user interfaces are also all about.
Everything else about progression? Padding. Bad, bad padding. If the progression system isn't in service of making the start of the game simple and helping establish mastery as you go on, it's not there to respect your time, it's there because the developer thought the game should be longer or have "more content".
I had an interesting progression experience in Plants vs. Zombies 2, the mobile deck builder. In PvZ 2 you purchase booster packs with in-game currency. They also offer bargain deals, like buy-10-get-1-free.
Being a savvy investor, I decided to save my in-game currency for the best deal, which was for buying 50 boosters. So I played a bunch of matches, slowly earning money towards the big score.
Finally, I had enough for 50 packs. I clicked Buy, watched the new cards fly by, started building some new decks ... and stopped. It was too much - the explosion of new options left me paralyzed with indecision. I closed the game and haven't gone back since.
It’s fun when you get way stronger and then go to an older challenge that you never did because it was to hard but then you destroy it easily.
13:48 I've been waiting many years for people to join me in this...
I actually stopped competitive games because I was not seeing myself progressing as when you rank up you ever lose, or know have a hard game because you're always with other people at your level
Well that was really nice to watch. I think that's something I've been struggling with in making my games. Progression systems.
I hate new perspective! Now I can't think of any interesting games that don't have progression systems no matter how hard I try.
Damn you Adam!
What's the problem about it? Don't you like to progress?
@@1996Pinocchio No, no. I'm being facetious. I'm in the same boat as Adam when I didn't realize all games have progression systems. I've been wracking my brain trying to find a counterexample, but I just can't think of anything.
It'd be an interesting design challenge.
So glad to see Risk of Rain 2 included, great pick!
13:35 woah I didn't realize Wesnoth had gotten new scorpion sprites
13:38 Battle for Wesnoth? Nice, it's so rare to see people play this amazing (100% free) game.
Wow even I felt the diss at Todd in the end. Sneaky but true.
xenoblade 2 has my favorite progression system so far. basically your team is made of 3 drivers + 9 blades. the drivers progress by leveling up, increasing their weapons' cooldown skills (there are many to choose from + level up), unlocking their affinity/skill chart, + getting better accessories that better suit your play style. blades on the other hand progress by changing their weapon stats with usable items, unlocking their affinity charts (which comes with unique backstory side quests), + equipping better accessories from them which come from a different pool than the driver accessories. altogether, it's complex but it provides progress on so many levels that it's addicting to build all new teams of blades to try lots of different synergies out.
They made it even more addicting in Xenoblade 3 somehow
@@Sherolox I feel like 2 was still better than 3 but comparing xenoblade games is just comparing 10/10s with each other
@@jhon1406
I’d agree that the villains were far better in 2 than 3, but overall I did actually enjoy 3’s story more.
It’s kind of hard to describe, but the feelings it gave me are one of a kind.
(Especially during chapter 5&6)
i think the pokemon analogy only really works for the exp you get after every battle. pokemon has more customization, which of the hundreds of pokemon do you want, what moves do you want to give it etc
Nice advert for Forager :'D
had to get here through a reccomended video, did not show up in sub feed. good content though, this is what i want.
I feel like scaling NPC's in games should be done (if done at all) by either increasing the difficulty settings of the enemy A.I. making them smarter, more cautious or more aggressive depending on type of game and type of enemy and so forth so that it feels like you're actually facing more elite troops not just taking longer to kill everything and/or by increasing the numbers you face so that you can still feel badass because you took out so many compared to earlier in the game where you could only face like 4 or 5 enemies without dying compared to the 20 you just took on but the difficulty of the game will still increase by the same amount by adding an equivalent number of more enemies in. That has it's own problems though. I mean at end game you could be fighting like 400 dudes at once if the power levels weren't kept in check.
Ideally though, enemies that used to be difficult should either be much easier or at least easier by a noticeable margin with enemies you couldn't scratch becoming able to be dealt with and new enemy types introduced, like for example, in a first person shooter, you're facing the rookies but later on taking on special forces, S.A.S type squads, Navy Seals etc. that might not necessarily take much more hits to take down but pull off much more advanced flanking manoeuvres, covering fire so their buddies can move up, uses of tear gas, flash bangs, etc. And could even have moments in the game where at the beginning you were a new recruit and a story moment gives you the option to let a man you captured go free or kill him but because he was like 17 and a new recruit, you let him go. Later on then, when you're a special forces guy taking on special forces, you see him amongst them, killing your friends. Could even have a nemesis system type thing like in Shadow of Mordor only reigned in quite a bit.
0:09 ‘Tenno’ so years
0:11 FINALLY WARFRAME!
Also Magic: Arena, Apex, Pokémon, and forager? Did you get into my computer?
Clips from one of the games caught my eye, so I focused all my google fu to discover that it was Pathway (thanks for including the list under Show More). Shame about the majority of user reviews. I would have really enjoyed an XCOM-like adventure along the lines of what Pathway seems to be doing, but for now I'll just try to remember that it's out there, and hopefully it will get the balance changes people seem to feel it needs. Thank you, Adam, great video.
Yeah I really wanted to like Pathway more than I did, there's certainly the potential for a great game in there somewhere
The only game I've played where the numbers don't feel useless is Final Fantasy III the DS port. You don't start off dealing hundred or thousands of damage, you start with about 5dmg and have low health so when the numbers go up you feel that 5000dmg do so much damage without it just being a "high" number
Progression systems are part of a game. The difference is how does the dev apply it. Can be like levels, abilities, items, zones, difficulty, real time passed, time played, story, tasks done, enemies defeated, game-numbered experience, real ecperience, performance, difficulty selection, gamemode, maps, extra challenges, and sometimes even "luck".
I don't want to count microtransactions or DLCs because it is not what a dev do, it is what a bad person do, better known as "Big Studio CEO", but sometimes it can be.
Was.. Was that Battle for Wesnoth? I played that so much growing up.
Same, I felt like, What the hell that game is still out there?
It was! I love that game!
I feel like roguelikes and - lites are totally different in terms of so much and especially progression and an independent progression system really makes sense. But usually, I want to get better and grow so that's why I don't enjoy independence in progression and rather direct or customizable
Let's add DIC to the DICtionary
0:08 "Over the last Tenno so years..." shows clip of Warframe XD
If I'm not mistaken Don't starve has like a game+ mod where you get a lot of starting equipment
Infinite scaling rubs me the wrong way. There is no reason my level X character shouldn't be able to one shot a skeever. Sure, at level 1 when I can barely hold a sword, that makes sense. But if I can kill a dragon, I should be able to one shot a skeever. No questions asked. Basic grunt enemies need to slowly be cycled out of the enemy pools as you progress, or at least multiply how many of them there are, like goblins in DnD. Sure, at level 1 you may take on like 5 goblins, but at level 10 you should have many more at a time, not goblins that are progressively beefier for no reason.
This is an interesting video and analysis on Progression Systems. Not sure which progression system I prefer the most though. Once it gets harder to reach the next level of choice I tend to lose interesting if the reward is not interesting. Granted if the reward system is too good I tend to get addicted instead and have a harder time taking breaks from it.
He invoked the rimworld turtles... We are all done for
00:07 over the last TENNO so years