Click, missed, click, missed, click, 48 dmg, click, mana potion, control, click, missed, click, 89 dmg… Repeat this pattern for endless hours, mix it with occasional conversations with game characters, add a simple trading system. Ladies and gentlemen, meet “Divine Divinity”, a classic fantasy hack’n'slash title from 2002 that revealed to me a frightening truth about my humble person: I have started to hate games that offer nothing more than hours of mindless clicking.
The game is quite pretty, with detailed, two-dimensional backgrounds and sprites. The story, set in the land of Rivellon, is a standard fantasy tale with reasonably convincing mythology and plot. Unfortunately, the game itself is tedious and dull. It does not test your manual skills, it does not pose any kind of intellectual challenge, either. Click to hit, click to move, click to use a potion, click to move again. Do it repeatedly. Make sure you have the best armor and weapon available, check if you packed up enough healing and mana potions. Embark on the fantastic journey of countless clicks. Try not to fall asleep in the middle.
It is not possible to engage me with gameplay of this sort. Not anymore. It was OK a decade ago when “Diablo II” was still fresh. Then my interest in this type of games started to fade quickly with “Torchlight” being the first game I almost dropped before finishing the main plot. There will be no “almost” with “Divine Divinity” as I am not going to see the final boss. Lord of Chaos, praise his dark cheesiness, is saved.
When you design a game that demands spending most of the time on fighting hundreds of monsters, the combat system must be interesting on its own. It alone needs to be worth running a game just one more time. It needs to offer something that gets you hooked for the sake of playing. It may be just difficult (and satisfying) manually, it may involve tactics and turns but whatever it is, tt has to look like a series of attractive mini-games that keep you going long enough to reach the end of a dungeon or finish a quest. “Divine Divinity” does not offer this type of incentive at all. You could just click randomly with your computer switched off instead and the level of satisfaction provided would be similar.
I know the game has its followers and I think I understand what attracts them. But I am not becoming one of them. I am leaving Rivellon for good and I am not coming back. What is worse, I am probably skipping “Diablo III”, too, because its formula will probably bore me to death.
Screenshots follow.
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You are getting old. ;-)
I always thought that fighting hordes of simple enemies was a way of testing only the quality of the character’s build – not the dexterity of the player himself.
I believe it still works in text roguelikes, but they do not waste player’s time with long, boring spell or death animations and provide more of an intelectual challenge.
Simple RPG-like customizations also work in games like Resident Evil 4 – but they are not their main point.
Myself, I have been trying to finish Diablo II for several last years. A funny thing, I have completed the original numerous times – and DII is so much better in all respects. But it just gets too boring to constantly click…
Sure, I am getting old but this is more about this sudden realization on how pointless this type of game mechanics is.
I will try to elaborate on the subject next week as I have spent some time thinking about it and even formed a small theory of sorts.
I am waiting for the next week. Simple hack’n’slash games are soap operas of gaming – I think they are meant to be played rather passively, only clicking and checking your inventory every time and then.
Judging by their popularity, the mechanics are still quite ok – especially for younger players.
Even much more demanding FPS shooting can also get boring – I remember how I changed my way of playing when I bought SWAT 3 and 4. I mostly took care of the tactics all the time, letting my men do the shooting. Refreshing.
Good points, I will include them in what I want to write. In the meantime I have two other posts waiting in the pipeline so I cannot promise anything before weekend.