Do Games Rely Too Much on Combat?

[@SSPTarkus]

'Do Games Rely Too Much on Combat?' Yes. They forgot that Conflict doesn't always mean Combat

[@feartheghus]

Gless but fun conflict normally means combat, add tales of fighting monsters instead of the hardships of life or emotions etc. have existed since humans made stories

[@HeavyEyed]

This is something that's been on my mind for a couple years. If a game shoves too much combat in my face I usually put it down and play something else. Combat is definitely a crutch developers lean on too heavily, I think if devs challenged themselves enough some really creative games could be created with some stuff in place of fights.

[@guywithknife]

HeavyEyed I actually feel pretty burnt out on combat and now gravitate towards games with little or now combat. That’s why I like story games like life is strange or games like night in the woods. Hell, the mundane-ness of night in the woods is what sucked me in that I kinda wish they didn’t have the “plot” at all. We have a ton of different movie genre’s that don’t rely on action, wouldn’t it be great if more of this was tried in games too? Beyond just puzzle games, story/walking simulators and platforming puzzles (and the obvious non-violent game genres, of course). There already exist a small number of RPG’s where combat is completely optional, lets have more of those and lets have more games like the last guardian (hell, the rebooted Tomb Raider could have had very little combat and worked quite similarly to The Last Guardian, for example). Or, you could have combat but do it in a different way, like what Shadow of the Collosus did. I think there’s so much potential in non-violent games or combat-lite games that remains unexplored, but for sure its harder for the game designers since combat is an easy crutch that is often used in place of actual design or creativity.

[@Spiderboydk]

Combat is an easy, accessible and tangible way to create tension and stakes in the game. Creating tension with other means would be more challenging for the developers and possibly more demanding of the players, so combat and violence is the easy way out.

[@friendlyfire7509]

I'm 6 years late to this insight apparently. Thank you .

[@VideoGameStoryTime]

Excellent video. I often feel like I play games in spite of combat, rather than because of it. I have to endure endless fights to get to the meaty story I'm craving. So many games use combat as a crutch, and games that avoid featuring combat are more free to try new, more interesting gameplay mechanics.

[@JunkerJames]

I love combat design and such, but one thing that has creeped me out recently, is how a lot of enthusiast games developers aim to ape exactly first person shooter mechanics. No attempt to make it their own, just, going through the motion of making sure all the animations work, and that there's a slightly longer reload if you don't leave a bullet in the chamber... It's like... you're talented enough to do these hard-to-get-right mechanics, and I respect that, but, you could make anything. Anything at all. And you choose to make... just that? It's not just that it's trope-y. It's that it feels blind. It's all about "how do I make this?" and not "why am I making this?". And yeah, if you're going to have combat, make it matter. Just because you *can* rinse the depth out of a well constructed, highly dynamic and interesting mechanic, doesn't mean you should force everyone to plunge the depths (that's something I like in the new Doom, although they're a bit immersion shattering: optional challenge rooms, showing how tight combat can be when it's honed to be, but not making it a total requirement to complete). It's similar to talking about violence in movies, eh? You should absolutely be allowed to do it, but own the responsibility of what you're saying with it. Make it mean something. Empty thrills copied from sempais that you want to notice you are cheap and meaningless... Except... everything in video games is expensive to produce. So it's both expensive /and/ meaningless.

[@CageyVideos]

And yes, that was my mouse cursor on the screen during the Metroid Prime footage. I apologise unreservedly.

[@oscarfriberg7661]

I think one great example is Shadow of the Colossus. Just wandering around the vast empty world could often be more emerging than the actual battles with the colossi, which in turn are some of the best and most memorable battles in any video game. I wish more game developers took note from Sotc.

[@MoonRegolith]

Good stuff. Thankfully, we are now in a renaissance of developers starting to realize the value of exploration within primarily combat focused games. So the answer may continue to come in the form of combat-first titles starting to have less of a singular focus on combat. That's a good thing in my mind, and represents a lot more value for the player.

[@PostMesmeric]

I think combat is in these games because action is a very straight-ahead way to assert player agency. Gamers value overcoming obstacles. It makes us feel accomplished and powerful, and action is the most explicit method of displaying accomplishment. Agency is the key element of the games medium, so that's why I think action is so integral to game design. Solving a puzzle is satisfying, but action is right in your face and says to the player "overcome THIS." Do I think action can be shoehorned into games without any significant benefit to the design? Absolutely. There are games that have done this, but at the same time, I disagree with some of your examples. Metroid in particular would be the one I think needs action to truly fulfill its artistry. Action benefits Samus as a character; it kinda always has, even when considering her influences being media like Alien. Power constructs drive agency, and Samus overcoming a hostile environment with her own power exemplifies who she is, what she represents, and what that representation means to the player. Here combat benefits the game narratively and benefits the player's accomplishment throughout a hostile alien world. Honestly, I think you're overlooking a lot of the benefits combat presents and how closely it ties to the mentality of the player. Removing combat may benefit the narrative, but does it benefit the player? After all, the player is always the most important part of a game.

[@Potato-cp2xh]

Hey there Casey, great video as always. I have one question if I may, what is the music heard at 0:50? is it the OST of The Last Guardian? Keep up the good work, cheers!

[@NotShalune]

A lot of great points, and I'm actually someone invested in exploring more non-combat possibilities of games. But I need to correct you on one point: combat *does* add value to a game. Just not on the consumer end. Let's take the Prince of Persia series (not just the one you focused on) as an example. Your company has already created all the assets for the game, pieces of architecture, enemies, etc. You are tasked with creating exactly 1 level, which you are told should target 1 hour of play time. If you fill this with a lot of combat you can create varied environments, with varying enemies extremely quickly. It should be in a rough ballpark of difficulty, and be beatable. But requires extremely minimal testing on your part. Dedicated testers will do most of that. Otherwise you're done. You created 1 room. Maybe only 1 part of 1 room. Plopped down some preexisting assets, and got a couple minutes of content knocked off your 1 hour for minimal time and thus money invested. Value. Jumping puzzles on the other hand are just that: puzzles. The actual crafting of them must be far more precise, and so takes more time. In addition by their nature, they lead you to traverse far greater areas faster than most games' combat. These areas need to be designed, and made varied to stay visually interesting too. More and more time you need to spend, and the company needs to spend on you, to complete this sequence. This is just one example, but the same holds true for many non-combat mechanics, notably dialogue. There are exceptions, but most options are far more involved to create. And customers do have expectations of price points and play time. Not to mention you need to be able to market games visually. Movie trailers are a good example of how well action works in marketing. This is why so many AAA games feature combat heavily. It's the same reason random generation is so prominent in indies. Both are business considerations of cost of content production vs expected returns.

[@imdamanfool]

from a developer's perspective it is just quicker and easier to design for combat rather than exploration or other gameplay mechanics.

[@Kyleology]

And I heard em say.

[@CageyVideos]

This is the second video in a row you have done this on and I hope you never stop.

[@Redtreegameschannel]

Hate to say it but as a game developer I can attest that those types of games just tend not too sell as well. Another way to look at it is that "Prince or Prussia" and "The Last Guardian" where games at the end of very successful series. The developers after so many successes where given personal room and trust to develop something with out combat. From a purely business stand point it dose not appear to have payed off very well for ether game. As a developer I spend a lot of time reading books on game development and many books don't even bother covering anything outside of combat. Even when you are working with game development tools its often really clear that the game engines have core architecture for making shooting games, fighting games and war games. So if you are trying to make a game without combat you are often fighting your own tool set. That's why games without combat feel like they are missing something because you are really playing a FPS without guns or a war game without combat at a program architecture level. I do think some day you will see a games industry where a lot of games don't have as much combat but people will need to invent new ways to play game and new ways to make games.

[@dedicateddark]

I think VR might make the industry more open to more out there designs. For a normal game it depends on scope, the massive hits are always the action blockbusters, but if you can manage to create some compelling design which can hyped then it is possible to make it work. I think Outlast, Amnesia, Soma etc.. are decent examples of that.

[@Redtreegameschannel]

@Noble Alfred I think That is a really good insight Noble Alfred. It's not clear that the average gamer can shoot, fight and jump in VR while holding their lunch down. So if VR is going to be the "next big thing" that developers want it too be they will need to come up with some none combat oriented games. I will say tho that I don't consider Outlast, Amnesia and Soma as "games without combat". You still spend most of your time "fighting" enemy AI you just sneak around them instead of shooting them. From a program architecture stand point its more or less the same just different game play to solve the same in game problem.

[@dedicateddark]

Daniel Mercier I see. But, then I would like to point you to Oxenfree, Firewatch etc. The games have no combat but they do have conflict. And both of them sold well. Also, games like FEZ still exists, haven't played it myself but the game has no combat I believe and it also did well. But if you are talking about AAA games with no combat then all I can currently think of is Portal, as for mainstream AAA it is impossible to make a multi-million seller game with no combat just like it is impossible to make a multi-million hit movie with no action scenes. I would say its just that the target audience of violence and action is significantly higher than the target audience for depth and intrigue. It's a problem of the audience rather than the medium itself.

[@TheCackling]

What about games like Stardew Valley? That sold pretty well, didn't it?

[@Redtreegameschannel]

+Noble Alfred Indie game developers are starting to do better with none combat games, but they suffer from the problem I mentioned earlier. Firewatch is basically an FPS game without guns and Oxenfree is an adventure game without puzzles. Maybe is just me but I really don't consider games that replace game play with lots of text and dialog choices real games. For my own purposes I consider those works more like interactive media. I don't mean to critique those works its just that with those games the real heavy lifting is in the story and the delivery so I think they have more in common with book's, movies and other traditional media. I do think Protal is a really good example and like the perfect game without combat. It should be praised in the same name of classics like Tetris. Portal fixes everything I am complaining about its an FPS game but instead of a gun it give you a portal gun it replaces what it takes away with compelling game play. The only really sad thing about the game is it was bundled in the Orange Box (one of the combat oriented game collections out there at the time) so its statues as a combat free triumph sort of when under the radar..... even for me LOL

[@Frandelicious1337]

The thing you are missing is that if you want to avoid combat in a game, you have to replace it with something of value, another set o gaming mechanics that have enough depth to keep the player interested. You won't get a good game if you remove combat and all that is left is empty exploration or walking simulators with no lose state, no tension, no stakes, no interesting mechanic to master. But it can be done right. In stealth games, the focus is to avoid combat as much as possible, and the game mechanics reflect that. In a platformer the objective is to have the skill to platform your way out of the level, some games do this without a single enemy on the screen for most of the time (think super meat boy), in a racing game you have to master the mechanics to make a lap as fast as possible, etc. You just gave examples of games that don't even have good combat to start with, for some of those games you could even argue that the whole game isn't good...

[@MegamanSora1]

An interesting issue for sure, one without a simple way to... combat it. B) I think at least one problem is that it's difficult to find ways to add tension to a game without a significant amount of combat. To use Metroid Prime as an example, would the game really have been better or worse if combat was removed? The world as a whole would no longer feel hostile, it would simply feel alien. I don't know that that would make the game better or worse, but it'd certainly make it a significantly different experience. One thing I quite like, in terms of "replacing" combat, is using dialogue and simply using that to tell a story. That, of course, has its own pitfalls as well, not to mention the fact that it's significantly more difficult to realize in a game than combat alone. Well. It's easy if you're simply not caring about interactivity, like in a visual novel, but ideally a game directly about communication would be a bit more involved than those games tend to be.

[@NoiseDay]

If you removed combat but wanted the world to keep feeling hostile, what you would end up with is a horror game instead of an action game. You still have enemies, but you can't engage with them. Or, the atmosphere alone is hostile enough. But then you'd have to introduce a different mechanic to make up for it- stealth, puzzles, etc.

[@KeithBallardA]

Headlander would have almost certainly been better with a reduced enemy count. Later levels just become a cloud of projectiles on the screen, but very little of it is used all that interestingly. The actual "Headlanding" in general felt rather underutilized, though. It's a game that didn't have as many mechanics as it seemed it would.

[@CageyVideos]

Keith Ballard I got super near to the end of Headlander but just couldn't play it anymore. I like the start when it's just a simple exploration game with a cool gimmick, but yeah, they lean on the combat far too much towards the end.

[@ixICocoIxi]

Your patreon link is missing the to make it clickable btw. Great video!

[@nuprahtor]

I spend a good amount of time to remember Pete Rock's tune that is playing during the Metroid Prime footage. Also there's a lot of great tunes I never heard before in your videos, but alas - no music tracks list :c

[@nuprahtor]

Oh my, it's in the end of the video, nevermind then

[@CageyVideos]

I leave a list of the tracks used at the very end of the video.

[@TojekaSteve]

I'd say Furi is a good game to look at here. The best part of it is its combat and that's limited to only 10 unique enemies. Each one is its own special challenge, and because all the craft and effort was put into designing each individual fight, it makes battling an absolute joy that's so much more engaging than if you had to play with the same skills on hordes of rats and bats between each boss.

[@blackdeadtree1]

I think in some cases with metroidvania's, having combat and enemies to fight can give exploration a nice risk factor. As in, exploring a new area or section brings the risk that you might encounter something you cant deal with, or it might leave you in a state where going back to a save point is risky. That said, getting this just right is easier said then done. I do also think combat should be something you can avoid as well using abilities or shortcuts in these types of games. And I think another thing that can make enemies less of a pain is variety, which is something I think a lot of the castlevania games did very well.

[@PaddyMacNasty]

I don't think that Bioshock is a good example. It's a first person shooter, it has to rely on combat. Or are you saying that maybe it shouldn't have been a shooter? Overall though, I definitely agree. Two of my favourite games ever are Portal and Mirror's edge (first one, haven't played the second one yet).

[@scrustle]

I agree that there are definitely games that don't need combat and could probably do better without it. Even though a lot of my favourite games are focused heavily on combat, there are a lot that I like that focus on something else. But I have to say here I don't think the arguments are that strong. The issue here isn't so much that these games are worse because they have combat, but they simply don't have good combat. There's a reason why JRPGs have been having such an identity crisis over the past decade and a half or so. A lot of people really don't like turn-based combat, and find it simplistic and monotonous. Yet the rich stories that these games used to be able to boast are now available in other genres too. JRPGs have been struggling to find their identity, making something that plays and feels somewhat like the old turn-based games, but trying to make something a bit more involving and real-time in an effort to make it seem more interesting. Usually it ends up bad though, and the better games in the genre either stick with the old system, or totally disregard it and go full-on real-time action. In the case of the Metroid games, combat definitely serves a major purpose. A lot of Metroid's mood comes from exploring unknown, hostile areas. Like you're delving in to a place that no one has been to in ages, in no small part because of the extremely hostile environment and denizens. If there were no enemies in Metroid telling you that you're not welcome, the games would lose a lot in their atmosphere. And when you reach the stage where you're powered up and fights are a breeze, that's another important part of the genre. It's the metric that lets you feel how much more powerful you have become since first encountering those enemies. While newer places may still feel alien and dangerous, older areas feel empowering as you've overcome them. Usually in the Prime games you can just walk past enemies too. In the vast majority of cases, of an enemy isn't worth your time to fight, you can just ignore it anyway. I also totally disagree on combat in Bioshock Infinite being unnecessary. Sure, the combat in that game isn't the best designed. It can get kind of dull and tedious on occasions, but having a combat system in that game totally makes sense. The game isn't just about Booker and Elizabeth. It's about the violent, ugly nature of the city of Colombia, hiding underneath it's seemingly idyllic surface. It's about revolution, injustice, and how righteousness can blind people in to being something really horrific. Without combat, Infinite would lose a whole lot. Be much worse.

[@bagandtag4391]

I think it's a mix of: Combatless games don't sell well, they are harder to make and "tradition". These reasons kind of reinforce each other slowly but steadily.

[@ianaruto1]

Perfect example for me is the Pillars of Eternity, so much combat that you just cant avoid and its not even challenging its just time consuming.

[@ZanderEzekial77]

Crackdown was on that Xbox One shelf. Those shopkeepers are jumping the gun a bit methinks.

[@TheNSJaws]

Few points: - Bioshock related issue: Although the combat could feel like a nuisance at times, removing common enemies altogether as you've suggested earlier would ruin the game. It just wouldn't be Bioshock, even more so seeing how far Columbia theme is from Rapture. - Gone home is a walking simulator, though, and a bad one at that. The one that isn't shit for example would be a Firewatch, give it a go if walking sims are your thing and in case you haven't played it. -Every one of these games need to be addresses in case-by-case basis, so I may be back at later date 'n' address 'em.

[@JamesOfTheYear]

100% agree! Would love more exploration games where combat is rare and therefore meaningful and frightening

[@feartheghus]

James Fox play alien isolation

[@JamesOfTheYear]

You know, I tried it and didn't like it. But I haven't seen the movies. I think I'm going to watch at least the first movie and give it another try

[@SpikeTheSpiker]

So lets say you clear a room and now there are no more enemies in that room when you comeback to it. That would lead to a boring section that you would have to backtrack through. Why not (and some games have done this) leave the enemies in this room but give you a new way to traverse through the room via power ups that make traversing through the room interesting from a non combat navigational perspective. That would work around the boring empty room aspect but also remove the combat aspect of it. Also I feel that if Bioshock Infinite craft's it's core player design around combat and using new powers/weapons so removing some of the combat would make the few important battles even more hectic and "fun" but would also remove from the core gameplay which is learning what the weapons and powers do and using them. I personally love Fumito Ueda's approach to game design as his games normally have one focus and remove the distractions, but when distractions do appear they feel fresh and unique so they don't spoil the overall experience.

[@TheNobleBean]

Some of this comes down to the nomenclatures that 'gaming' employs. Every game is an interactive experience but not every interactive experience is a game. When you say 'game' you don't mean 'game' all the time some times you mean 'interactive story thing which sadly doesn't have a good name' so you end up with all this extra meaning that comes with he word 'game'. Example, Gone Home is less of a game than say Call of Duty but even that is less of game than say Chess. But Gone Home is still more of a game than Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones. This creates confusion for everyone, so no one is ever really talking about the same exact thing. Example from outside of games, every Eskimo is an Inuit but not every Inuit is an Eskimo the difference here being we do have a word for Eskimo (and if someone still didn't get the difference its not hard to show them).

[@mantisking4567]

I really like these videos. I would like to make a good game that is an MMO FPS, and these videos give me how to make the most out of almost every aspect like loading screens.

[@Superninfreak]

$60 Games are £40 in the UK? Google is telling me that £40 = $50.20. I'm jealous.

[@CandyCinema]

You used Metroid Prime as an example and then you asked "what purpose does the combat serve?" But you never answered the question. You just assumed that, since it bores you, it has no purpose. But it does! In Metroid games, each room is a puzzle to traverse. Sometimes it's a platforming challenge, sometimes it's combat, sometimes it's a more involved challenge involving switches that open doors or something. But the biggest thing about Metroid is the acquisition of new abilities: new abilities that help Samus in multiple ways to traverse her environment. Some of them make platforming easier, some of them make combat easier, some of them are dynamic and can be used for multiple purposes. After she acquires an item, Samus can navigate those rooms you had previously visited in new ways. The combat that exists in these rooms is there to provide a challenging puzzle when you first encounter it, but each time you revisit that same combat puzzle, Samus will have grown stronger, and the traversal of that room becomes more and more trivial as Samus grows more and more powerful. The reason you're presented with a combat event soon after getting a new item has a purpose too: it is there to show you how you can use your newfound item. Combat in Metroid is one of the most purposeful implementations of combat in any video game, and it's a shame you brought it forward as an example and then didn't even bother to answer the questions you challenged it with.

[@CageyVideos]

CandyCinema How is "lock onto enemy and shoot them till they die" a challenging puzzle? All you have to worry about is colour coordinating your gun with the enemy. I personally would have liked the game more if there was a lot less combat.

[@CandyCinema]

The solution to most rooms in Metroid is in navigating a room. In the early stages, this usually involves combating enemies, but many rooms can have new solutions as Samus upgrades herself: the double jump or the grapple beam lets you solve the puzzle of a room by circumventing the combat. Some rooms have very tough bullet-sponge enemies that give you a 5-minute challenge before you can navigate a room fully. Upon returning with the missiles, you discover that the combat in this room can be over within a minute thanks to the character progression. Sometimes certain enemies halt your progress completely, and you are unable to defeat them until you (a) acquire the morph bombs, and (b) figure out how to kill these enemies using your newfound technology. Metroid games are ALL about showing to the player just how powerful the character is getting with each new upgrade, and just how proficient the player is getting by presenting new challenges. The enemies in Metroid NEVER SCALE. That means that the low-level enemies you encounter in the game's first area will spawn in exactly the same way every other time you visit that room. But each time you visit the room, your new upgrades will show you just how far you've come. It's true in the platforming too, but it's primarily evident in the combat. The purpose of combat in Metroid is to highlight your character's progression. Metroidvanias, when implemented well, are the masters of backtracking. They make backtracking fun and satisfying. The combat is the most effective way of experiencing the best part of Metroidvanias: unique character progression.

[@CageyVideos]

CandyCinema The game is not about combat though. The controls are designed to work against the perceived weakness that console games have with first person games. Hence the lockon. As such the combat isn't a challenge. It's not what draws people to the game. It's not terrible, it's serviceable, but it's not strong enough to be used over and over. As the game went on, unless I was fighting a boss, combat felt like a chore cause I had to do it so much. I agree as far as the double jump and hook shot are concerned, in fact the game would've been better served focusing on traversal rather than combat, which, while also not without it's own fair share of frustration, is a much stronger part of the game. Though these are sentiments I made in my "progression of movement" video, so I'll stop myself there before I juat repeat myself.

[@CandyCinema]

The game is not about combat any more than it is about movement. BOTH of those things are simply tools to emphasize what the game IS about: character growth through upgrades. Each upgrade serves as a way to allow the player more powerful options at traversing terrain or defeating enemies. That is THE PURPOSE of combat. Just because you don't like it, doesn't mean you can make blanket statements like " It's not what draws people to the game" based on your opinion. It's not what draws YOU to the game, but it's unfair to say that about anyone. Maybe I have a friend who likes combat games, but doesn't like platformers. If he hears about a game where you play as a badass bounty hunter from space, you'd better believe the combat is going to draw him into the game! And that's the thing. You could make a "Metroidvania" game without combat, but you couldn't you couldn't make a METROID game without combat. A Metroid game without combat is no longer a game that properly demonstrates its protagonist as a badass outer space bounty hunter. A game more suited to this is something like Toki Toro, where you play as a fat, friendly, bird. It's still a good game, but there's a reason both games exist and both games are good. Combat in Metroid serves a very fulfilling purpose, more so than most games including combat. It's actually included quite sparsely compared to many combat games, and I think that strengthens the combat. I think you'll find that many of the things you said in the video are extremely opinionated, yet you present them as universal facts.

[@CageyVideos]

CandyCinema I don't remember saying that it should be completely removed but rather getting into fight after fight after fight gets very boring very quickly. Oh, and saying "that's just like, your opinion man" is a stones throw away from bringing up hitler in an online forum.

[@NoiseDay]

Came here after seeing footage of a game that gives "Dark Souls but children's cartoon crab." Clearly not my kind of game, but it had me asking what the point was of making a game with a unique world and story if they were going to boil down the mechanics to slash enemies, boss fight, and platforming. This is why I say I'm not a gamer- the games that appeal to the stereotypical gamer bro just don't appeal to me.

[@TheBigBovy]

I think it's more shit design than anything. You can make banal fights tense as if they're tied to resources; especially limited ones. For example; regen'ing health makes that you really just have to win statements; win or lose. With resources it adds way more strategic depth: "Do I use resources to make this an easier fight for keep my more important health resource for later?". As well; if it's piss easy and there's literally no threat you don't care either. You'd struggle to find an action game; let alone a great one that is almost solely combat based and isn't heavily resource based.

[@dedicateddark]

Good point. I think Wind Waker nailed the balance, there are massive gaps b/w each dungeon, the best moments are sailing the seas with no interruptions or running around in town talking to people. The combat there served to strike a balance b/w the puzzles and the exploration. But. .. . . For Prince of Persia Sands of Time, I think the mechanic itself needs to be there, while I know in Sands of Time the combat feels tedius I feel its a pacing issue rather than the combat itself. If you remove combat from that game, the game would be inferior, to me fighting the Prince's father was meaningful, so was simply whacking the vizier at the end. I can agree it could've used less combat but completely removing combat won't work. As for Bioshock infinite, most of the game is built from the ground up for the combat. If you remove the combat completely I feel you will get a completely different game rather than a better game. While I agree with your point on over-reliance on combat I think you are looking at the wrong place. Think of a grand adventure book you read or a movie you watched and does it have combat? The games where you complain about combat need the combat to support its gameplay. One of my fav. games is Tomb Raider Anniversary, the game has little to no combat, but I still feel the need for a combat system because come the climax there is always action, without action or challenge the climax can feel weak. Conflict with characters which takes a wrong turn, increasing tension etc. If the combat system doesn't exist then those last few moments have to be either cutscenes or a contexual quick time event. Now you know from the tell-tale games how they handle those moments and how do you feel. I feel like a puppet, when the characters perform actions which are incapable through the game mechanics I feel wronged. The games you are searching for already exist. The entirety of the point and click adventure genre, (forgive my wording)walking simulators, games like Life is strange, puzzle platformers like limbo, fez, and even games like minecraft, then there are mystery games like Professor Layton, and that lawyer series. And even AAA games like Portal. Also, you missed the one game that could've been used for making a compelling argument for no combat at all in a game. LA Noir, that is one of the few games where I feel the complete removal of the combat system would've made it better. There is a massive difference b/w few combat encounters and completely having no combat system at all.

[@adrixshadow]

It would make them 2 hours long and no one would buy them. Why do we have combat? Because its the most expansive content.

[@Blamwellamum]

That's not true though, is it? I've seen articles make the argument that if it's possible to skip cutscenes that expose the story to the player, there should also be a way to skip combats that don't bring anything to the story. And I tend to agree because they don't always bring something to the story. And for some of us, the story is more important than the challenge. World-building and level design is a more effective way to challenge the player and make the game world feel real. Uncharted 4 is a good game story-wise, but does it feel like a real world with it's hundreds of enemies to kill? No. Is the game better with that very high enemy count? No. So why put so many enemies?

[@adrixshadow]

Gameplay wise the more depth your mechanics have the higher the possibility space and that can be translated into content as challenge and replayabilty. Why is multiplayer games so popular? Because it has infinite content generated by players. Outside of Gameplay you have to painstakingly make every piece of content. Even if you create a game like The Witness ever puzzle and every step has to be crafted and even that has more possibility space then "interactive story games". Procedural storytelling we are nowhere near even beginning to tackle. Most story heavy game you could just watch on youtube and not miss much. That means its a much more limited form of content.

[@QuintaFeira12]

Hell, I disagree with him on Metroid Fusion's random combat spread on the map being an issue. When I'm really in a rush with no intention to stop for it... I ignore the enemies. Because those games actually do let you do this, you can just bypass them with rare exceptions.

[@misterkelly224]

But... we see those 2 hour games, and people do buy them more and enjoy them more than they do the games that have combat shoehorned in just because it's expected against the needs of their individual game. This misbelief that combat is inherently expansive (never seen a combat system build itself) is part of why we get crappy combat in games that don't need it, and would be much better off expanding on their core ideas. Combat is cheap to add in, and it gets a lot of bang for it's buck, but that mindset IS the padding mindset, and it is antagonistic to quality.

[@MrPurple3000]

I would rather have a short game that consistently plays to its strengths than a game that pads itself out with generic combat encounters that kill pacing. Length should always be sacrificed for quality, never the other way around.

[@civilwarfare101]

I think it does but it kind of needs in order to engage the player more. I have to disagree with SoT example you used. At least the combat in the sands trilogy got better.

[@Thagomizer]

Yes, they do. Too many games utilize the F.E.C.A.L. (Forced Endless Combat Adds Length) design philosophy to waste your time.

[@TheDanteEX]

New Vegas can be completed with very little combat. Dialogue systems to me are just as much gameplay to me as killing people is.

[@VladTheImpaler454]

Pete Rock Kreygasm

[@BrightHero_Ultimato]

And they never learn

[@stevenmillett]

it would make Bioshock Infinite a bit lessss of a shitty disappointment. Still wouldn't be a great game but it'd be far less tedious

[@marcelostockle2]

Sorely reductive. Much like this comment.

[@SquidwardAF]

Maybe you just play bad games?

[@139-b7j]

KZbin relies too much on crappy essays like this