What's The Purpose of Inflated Damage in RPGs?

[AyreonMaiden]

I was reading the FFXIII-2 impressions, and I sighed mournfully when I read that the battle system remains largely unchanged, so I guess I'm to expect, once again, characters that can easily do upwards of 9000 damage every hit with the minor caveat that the overworld enemies all have 6,000,000,000,000,000 HP.

I quit FFXIII not because of the linearity (I got accustomed to it and even got into the story quite a bit) but because of the ridiculous amount of time that it took for me to take down average enemies upon entering Gran Pulse. Yeah, a challenge is good, but noticing that I was rocking 7000-9999 damage and was still not so much as making a dent in any of these enemies was just a taunt in my opinion.

So just what the hell is the purpose of having so many digits, besides making you feel like you're fighting a goddamn mountain with a plastic spork every time?

 

[Kahunaburger]

I'd imagine because it creates a sense of progression without actually requiring actual progression to be planned haha.

 

[PimpHandofGod]

It makes it seem like you're doing more than you actually are. There really is no point to it.

 

[Kopikatsu]

If you like low number games, I would suggest Paper Mario. (Seriously, I beat the game with 5 max HP. 'Course, I was rockin' a Danger Mario build, but hey.)

I imagine that the high numbers makes it seem like you're accomplishing more. In the beginning of the game, you were doing 100-ish damage a hit. By mid-game, you're pulling out 9999x15 hit combos. Sure, you need 20 of the 9999x15 combos to kill an enemy when it only took 5 100 damage combos earlier, but it still seems more significant.

I found Tatsunoko vs Capcom to be amusing for this reason, though. A simple punch did something in the area of 2 billion damage.

 

[Hal10k]

I suppose it comes out of the feeling that the latest game has to top the last one. The final boss of one of the early games had the maximum that was allowed in that game- 9999, or something like that. Since the sequel has to be bigger than the game before it, the final boss of the next game had health around 99999, and the enemies were scaled up accordingly. This progressed to the state we see today.

 

[Fwee]

I think it's like foreign currency. About a decade ago 100 pennies (US) were worth about 1000 yen (JP). So really you're just measuring hit points and damage on the same scale with an extra digit slot. Not really a point to it, it's just the way the Final Fantasy games have been doing it since the SNES and at least there's one thing they kept familiar all these years.

 

[AyreonMaiden]

If you like low number games, I would suggest Paper Mario. (Seriously, I beat the game with 5 max HP. 'Course, I was rockin' a Danger Mario build, but hey.)

I imagine that the high numbers makes it seem like you're accomplishing more. In the beginning of the game, you were doing 100-ish damage a hit. By mid-game, you're pulling out 9999x15 hit combos. Sure, you need 20 of the 9999x15 combos to kill an enemy when it only took 5 100 damage combos earlier, but it still seems more significant.

I found Tatsunoko vs Capcom to be amusing for this reason, though. A simple punch did something in the area of 2 billion damage.

Paper Mario is precisely where I began to get pissed off at the damage inflation! My girlfriend was playing PM64 and I was noticing that no one had above 100 HP, and it was still a challenge!

I thought for a minute that it might be there for the real gearheads. Those who love to tweak damage down to the very single digit. But then I realized as my gf was playing Etenral Sonata that these games seem to be nowhere near THAT sophisticated to allow you to tweak damage to such a level of detail.

So it just ended up feeling like every encounter was a boss fight, and I lost patience after the 50th one, hahahah

 

[UmJammerSully]

If you like low number games, I would suggest Paper Mario. (Seriously, I beat the game with 5 max HP. 'Course, I was rockin' a Danger Mario build, but hey.)

Damn, badges or not, that is difficult to pull off so props there. XD

Yeah, we need more RPG's that don't take the numbers too far. I'd say if any stat, enemy other otherwise, is above 10,000 then it's gone too far. I remember Legend of Dragoon on the PS1 being good at keeping the numbers pretty low.

 

[DJ_DEnM]

A friend who's a DM in D&D taught me that player's feel more accomplished when there's bigger numbers...or something along those lines

 

[Krantos]

Same reason the xp for MW2 multiplayer was the same as COD 4 only with a zero on the end.

People get easily excited over bigger numbers, I guess.

 

[LordGarbageMan]

Seems like its just oldschool. nNow a days its much faster, but those games that cling to the old ways make the game super fucking hard, and the bosses even worse, because in the end it's more satisfying. At least I believe that's the logic.

 

[Jodah]

People like big numbers in games.

 

[Kopikatsu]

If you like low number games, I would suggest Paper Mario. (Seriously, I beat the game with 5 max HP. 'Course, I was rockin' a Danger Mario build, but hey.)

I imagine that the high numbers makes it seem like you're accomplishing more. In the beginning of the game, you were doing 100-ish damage a hit. By mid-game, you're pulling out 9999x15 hit combos. Sure, you need 20 of the 9999x15 combos to kill an enemy when it only took 5 100 damage combos earlier, but it still seems more significant.

I found Tatsunoko vs Capcom to be amusing for this reason, though. A simple punch did something in the area of 2 billion damage.

what do you mean rocking danger mario build? stacking danger marios + ultra jump is just cheap as hell >.>

I mean what I said!

I never said that a Danger Mario build made the game difficult, just that it was how I played through the game.

 

[Erana]

If you like low number games, I would suggest Paper Mario. (Seriously, I beat the game with 5 max HP. 'Course, I was rockin' a Danger Mario build, but hey.)

Damn, badges or not, that is difficult to pull off so props there. XD

Yeah, we need more RPG's that don't take the numbers too far. I'd say if any stat, enemy other otherwise, is above 10,000 then it's gone too far. I remember Legend of Dragoon on the PS1 being good at keeping the numbers pretty low.

That was partly due to the block system, in my opinion. Keeping the numbers smaller made choosing between halving damage and recovering 10% of your health, or going in for the attack more of a risk. The attacks from lesser monsters involved in the conflict meant more, too.

 

[Midnight Crossroads]

Big numbers are more attractive, I guess. It's the same with most RPGs I play. Why does it matter that I'm dealing 9999 damage to a dragon at level 70 in Final Fantasy when the battle takes as much thought and time as the first battle in the game?

 

[SwimmingRock]

Apparently, it's a legitimate selling point to some people. The Disgaea games always advertise the fact that you can do combos in their games which will allow you to do literally billions of HP damage, provided you level your character to 9999 first. Anything for sales, I guess.

 

[Keldon888]

Some people like big numbers, and sometimes it's just a product of the engine design. Someone could design level progression is doubling stats every few levels, another can design it so 5 points makes all the difference.

 

[Hisshiss]

Its pulp, the same appeal that the exagerated explosions and fight sequences in movies have, and usually enhances the excitement of the game/film.

Of course it can be out of place in certain titles, personally I love it though, actually just finished playing eternal sonata, Its not the biggest offender out there, but I was ripping out 400,000 damage combo's per turn by the end. WoW is another game that sells that system well, the speed of the rotations, large numbers and big sudden crit numbers make what is bassicly numbers numbering eachother to death into something really fun to watch.

I actually don't mind low numbers in RPGs, but someone higher up mentioned a sense of progression, nomatter how low, damage done and taken in an RPG should go up constantly til the end, those DnD style RPG's where your doing like...15 damage at the end of the game just make me sad.

 

[Veylon]

I remembered thinking that the damage for Final Fantasy II (4) was inflated when I saw Cecil dealing triple-digit damage with items in the opening scenes.

Anyway, it's one of those things, especially in series games, to make each one seem like a continuation in epicness, not a do-over. The Ogre Battles and FFT kept the numbers low, with very few bosses even breaking a thousand in HP.

The problem is that big numbers only feel like progression when you progress. The first time you break a hundred in Final Fantasy with a critical it's kind of cool. Reliably doing that kind of damage doesn't come until much later in the game. Spells are rationed by level, so dishing one out is a significant cost and more meaningful than summoning Bahamut a half-dozen times. Changing class - and thus becoming badass - is progression because of how woefully un-badass you were at the beginning.