Leveling Up - Is it an outdated mechanic?

[Korica]

At their worst, leveling systems add in loads of grinding and arbitrary scaling of tasks; they "change" the game by making the numbers bigger but not affecting how the game plays at all.

I'm gonna have to go one further and say at their worst, they can stop people from wanting to play at all. I can attest to this personally, though I know I am not the majority.

I strongly dislike the Elder Scrolls leveling system. It directly rewards you for repeating the same action over and over again until you hit 100 in the skill, which is tedious and is thinly related to working towards interesting character goals. The basic (and good) idea behind it is that characters are rewarded based on their actions, but it also means that if you've got 20 different skills you've also got 20 different ways of leveling them. That means that instead of the developers focusing just on making combat interesting and fun, you've also got to make sure that those 20 different skill progression schemes are also interesting and fun. The Elder Scrolls does a pretty poor job of that; it rewards you for standing in front of an enemy healing yourself, for attacking with the worst weapon you can find to get more hits in, for continually casting buffs on yourself, and for smithing the same iron dagger over and over again. They have been doing better with each subsequent game, but it's still a deeply flawed system.

That's not taking into account the abysmal level-based enemy scaling they use, either.

I could see a hybrid system working much better - one which, say, after each goal accomplished and/or creature kill awards experience based on the event's significance to the three skills you used the most - so that you wouldn't be rewarded for sneaking into a shopkeeper's wall for three hours. But even so, unless it was very carefully designed it would still reward gaming the system over just playing the game. Tying character advancement purely to the player's choice and not his actions certainly has its flaws, but it also means that, not only is it a hell of a lot easier on the designer, players will choose the options that interest them most and hence they'll find character advancement to be much more motivating.

It definitely has some flaws in how it is implemented, but the core concept is solid - you get better at the things you do. If you use an two-handed weapon, you skill improves with it. If you use fire magic, your skill improves with it.

One might even say that EVE's progression system is related, if you overlook the fact that it is entirely passive.

Another thing that comes to mind is the Tactics from Warhammer Online. You had a limited number of slots but tons of choices, and each one was unlocked from performing certain tasks.
By way of example, if you kill X number of Dwarves, you unlock the Dwarf Slayer tactic which lets you deal 15% more damage to Dwarves. You might want to use that if you were venturing into the PVP area in Dwarf territory.

 

[Lightknight]

Human beings enjoy breaking up tasks into small goals and achieving those goals. In effect, achieving those levels is part of the fun. It stops being fun in a lot of MMO's because serious players don't have one character, they may have five. This significantly trivializes the accomplishment of leveling when you've already done it. I would expect to see a day when your alts are automatically the same level as your main character. Or perhaps the extinction of "alts" altogether with a hero that can morph into alts freely or at specific locations.

Leveling in general is a core expression of advancement. Without it, you either just magically start at the top with little more than a hunt for equipment that matters or they hide leveling in a way that robs it of the pyschological benefits of accomplishments.

So, even in online games it is not dead. But perhaps it needs to be approached differently according to game genre.

 

[Kilo24]

At their worst, leveling systems add in loads of grinding and arbitrary scaling of tasks; they "change" the game by making the numbers bigger but not affecting how the game plays at all.

I'm gonna have to go one further and say at their worst, they can stop people from wanting to play at all. I can attest to this personally, though I know I am not the majority.

[snip]

It definitely has some flaws in how it is implemented, but the core concept is solid - you get better at the things you do. If you use an two-handed weapon, you skill improves with it. If you use fire magic, your skill improves with it.

I think it's an interesting idea, and a realistic concept that solves a number of thematic issues - it's just pretty hard for a developer to avoid strongly encouraging repetitive gameplay with that design.

One might even say that EVE's progression system is related, if you overlook the fact that it is entirely passive.

I'm actually pretty confused. Are we talking about the progression system that's just a skill tree which is completely unconnected to your actions? I honestly can't see the relevance - could you please explain? Are you honing in purely on the lack of player levels?

Another thing that comes to mind is the Tactics from Warhammer Online. You had a limited number of slots but tons of choices, and each one was unlocked from performing certain tasks.
By way of example, if you kill X number of Dwarves, you unlock the Dwarf Slayer tactic which lets you deal 15% more damage to Dwarves. You might want to use that if you were venturing into the PVP area in Dwarf territory.

One-time unlockable "achievements" (for lack of a better word) is one way to somewhat get around the repetition of the design, and can be motivating especially with rewards. Getting from the binary state of "I haven't achieved this" to "I have achieved this" is a lot more interesting than the "go from 10 to 100 1 skill rank at a time" of the Elder Scrolls, even if they're both done via grinding (mostly because the former involves much less grinding). But, you need to have a hell of those reward-bearing achievements to make that design into a viable primary progression path.

Even so, "Do X Y number of times" achievements usually either devolve into grinding if the goal is set high or just become unlocked as you play the game normally; I can't really call them good design in almost any case. They're not aggressively bad or anything; they're just uninteresting bloat.

 

[Korica]

I'm actually pretty confused. Are we talking about the progression system that's just a skill tree which is completely unconnected to your actions? I honestly can't see the relevance - could you please explain? Are you honing in purely on the lack of player levels?

To be fair I did not play EVE extensively, so maybe my information is wrong. But if you removed the Perks from Skyrim, and made it so that instead of having to perform actions to skill up, you could just select "Level up my Alchemy skill" and X hours later Alchemy would level up - the two systems would be similar, no?

In that sense I think the two systems are similar. But it's a stretched metaphor so we can just ignore it!

Another thing that comes to mind is the Tactics from Warhammer Online. You had a limited number of slots but tons of choices, and each one was unlocked from performing certain tasks.
By way of example, if you kill X number of Dwarves, you unlock the Dwarf Slayer tactic which lets you deal 15% more damage to Dwarves. You might want to use that if you were venturing into the PVP area in Dwarf territory.

One-time unlockable "achievements" (for lack of a better word) is one way to somewhat get around the repetition of the design, and can be motivating especially with rewards. Getting from the binary state of "I haven't achieved this" to "I have achieved this" is a lot more interesting than the "go from 10 to 100 1 skill rank at a time" of the Elder Scrolls, even if they're both done via grinding (mostly because the former involves much less grinding). But, you need to have a hell of those reward-bearing achievements to make that design into a viable primary progression path.

Even so, "Do X Y number of times" achievements usually either devolve into grinding if the goal is set high or just become unlocked as you play the game normally; I can't really call them good design in almost any case. They're not aggressively bad or anything; they're just uninteresting bloat.

I tend to agree, I really hate Achievements myself. Some people love them, and I suppose devs should design with that in mind, but I personally hate them because they are often so arbitrary and grind-like.

It should be acknowledged though that "achievements" can provide a means of progression that does not effect game balance, which is a very desirable thing to have in an online game.




Totally off topic, but it could probably bear mentioning. If anyone tried the beta for the upcoming game Path of Exile, the system they use has some merit.

This is the skill tree they use.
http://i663.photobucket.com/albums/uu360/UrSickToo/Public%20Maps/Path%20of%20Exile/PathofExile_Fullpassivetree_20130201_versionbetatags0100e_withclasses_zps489f0cae.jpg
Where you "start" on that massive tree depends on your class, with the things your class is most likely to benefit from positioned closest to you. But you can expend anywhere if you wish.

And perhaps one of my favorite features, the extremely special traits (which are spaced out) all have pros and cons attached to them, rather than being one-sided powerups that just make you better in every way.

Example. If you want to specialize in summons, you can get a special trait that applies your Armor/Shields to your pets instead of yourself. This makes you weaker and them stronger.

Another example, you can get a special trait removes your ability to dodge enemy attacks, but in exchange you are immune to stuns.

These all allow for extremely unique, specialized playstyles. It's in the same vein as the "Focused Offense" tactic I mentioned from Warhammer, and I really think games could use more of these pro-and-con specializations that focus on making characters different rather than just better.

 

[Epona]

I recently played through Final Fantasy X and at the end of the game I realized how shitty the sphere grid really is. You really have no idea where your characters are in relation to each other.

 

[WanderingFool]

The majority of an online game is tailored for max-level play.

I basically said "fuck it" to the rest of your post, once I read this part, I am in agreence with you 100%.

 

[Hagi]

Totally off topic, but it could probably bear mentioning. If anyone tried the beta for the upcoming game Path of Exile, the system they use has some merit.

This is the skill tree they use.
http://i663.photobucket.com/albums/uu360/UrSickToo/Public%20Maps/Path%20of%20Exile/PathofExile_Fullpassivetree_20130201_versionbetatags0100e_withclasses_zps489f0cae.jpg
Where you "start" on that massive tree depends on your class, with the things your class is most likely to benefit from positioned closest to you. But you can expend anywhere if you wish.

And perhaps one of my favorite features, the extremely special traits (which are spaced out) all have pros and cons attached to them, rather than being one-sided powerups that just make you better in every way.

Example. If you want to specialize in summons, you can get a special trait that applies your Armor/Shields to your pets instead of yourself. This makes you weaker and them stronger.

Another example, you can get a special trait removes your ability to dodge enemy attacks, but in exchange you are immune to stuns.

These all allow for extremely unique, specialized playstyles. It's in the same vein as the "Focused Offense" tactic I mentioned from Warhammer, and I really think games could use more of these pro-and-con specializations that focus on making characters different rather than just better.

I would be careful with that system.

I've played Path of Exile's beta for two months and a problem of that system is that it allows possibly too much specialization, around which the rest of the content has to be balanced again.

It's entirely possible in that system to pick basically nothing but defensive skills and many players do. Consequently content has to be balanced around those players as well, they shouldn't become immortal. End-result being that enemies deal enough damage to still be threatening to those picking nothing but defensive skills and tend to slaughter people who don't.

And, if ported to MMO-format with more reliance on groups and possibly agro-mechanics, it'd also become entirely possible to pick absolutely nothing but offensive skills, around which enemy defenses would have to be balanced in turn.

Once you're fighting in groups there's no longer any real advantage to not specializing. You get one player to go all defensive to take the hits, one player to go all supportive with healing skills or whatever there is and the rest of the players to go all offensive. Meaning as a player you end up with three choices, defense, offense or support.

Which is happening in PoE right now. But since there's no groups there's generally one choice, full defensive so you don't die and lose xp (or get put in default league if you're playing hardcore). You'll have an extremely hard time finding viable builds that don't spend easily over half their skills in defensive talents, no choice there.

 

[GiantRaven]

Is leveling up an outdated mechanic? No.

Is leveling where there are no choices to be made in terms of character progression or consisting solely of arbitrary stat boosts outdated. Absolutely.

 

[Entitled]

Yes, it's outdated. Outdated in the same way as 2D platformers are more outdaed than 3D ones (that can have objectively more data, content, and options), or as turn-based games are more outdated than real time ones (turns used to be tabletop gaming's early imitation of interactivity that fast computing made redundant).

But game development is not an exact science where you can just measure the amount of fun that can be produced with a particular method, and try to increase that.

It's also an art form and a culture, where people are doing what they do for the sake of continuing their traditions, and completing their patterns, and evolving step by step.

There is such a thing as RPG fans, and many of these people might enjoy playing a traditional RPG specifically for the continued experience of playing an RPG, and not just any game for the experience of their time being used as effectively as possible.

 

[Rattja]

No it's not outdated. I would rather say that it is just not perfected, or fully explored yet.
(I kinda liked the idea of reverse leveling)

Personally I don't think it can really be outdated, like a dice, it just works.
But you don't really play card games with a dice now do you?

 

[purplecactus]

I quite enjoy levelling up. Yeah, sometimes it can get tedious if it drags on for too long or becomes repetitive, but for the most part I like working towards something, and I enjoy that in a lot of things you can steer the way in which you level up. I don't think it's outdated, just that some aspects are overdone. Like a lot of things really.

 

[Lucky Godzilla]

It's not, and I don't think it ever will be.

We as players LOVE progression, it's always from getting to point a to point b. Leveling up is a manifestation of this, but with a different award. Instead of making progress for the sake of the plot, we make progress for the sake of our skills. We level ourselves up, opening new options allowing us to tackle our objectives in different and interesting way. Our first run may be as a brawler type player, while our second run may be as a ranged character. Both characters must tackle the same objective in a different way, in order to emphasize their strengths and cover their weaknesses.

The real problem is implementation, having a leveling system for the sake of a leveling system does not make a good game. Of greater importance is the benefits allocated to the player. A leveling system should not be put in place to give us flat stat bonuses, as this leads to tedious grinding in order to progress further in the game. What should be done instead is give the player branching paths with new and unique abilities. This gives us, the player, strength not in numerical values, but in skill.

Of course this basic system can be done without a leveling system. Both Bioshock Infinite and Dishonored provide good examples of games that open up new abilities to specialize how we play free from the shackles of a leveling system. At the same time however, we are forced to deal with the hand we are dealt. We have no control over our progression outside of the upgrades we find scattered around the environment. A leveling system allows the player to choose how they progress, putting the decision making back in the hands of the player.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

I'd say it's not outdated, it just needs to be executed properly. If done well, it gives you a sense of progression and growth in the game, which can be very rewarding. Making your character stronger little by little and seeing the differences yourself is very satisfying.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

Speaking as someone who thinks MMOs are mostly garbage and mostly talking about other types of games. I like leveling up when it provides an interesting progression of increasing specialization of your character into a particular build and style of play.
However, there should be many avenues open to them even from early on, if it is a linear progression of getting slight stat bonuses per level, then it is kind of pointless. Level progression is good, but level treadmills are bad.