I Had a Random Thought (About Video Games)

[SecretAsianMan]

I once had someone tell me a submarine sandwich is not a sandwich.

 

They were completely serious.

 

Did they call it a submarine sandwich or something else?

[Badfinger]

Good thing I've explicitly given examples that don't involve doing these things!

 

The point wasn't that there aren't skills that are more challenging to master. The point was that you can successfully argue all your way down to the granular level what takes or is a "skill" and what isn't, such that the term as defined isn't a concrete solution to answer the question.

 

A hot dog is not a sandwich.

[JonCole]

Right, a hot dog is an open-faced sandwich

[eot]

I definitely think FPS gameplay can be mindless, lots of challenging gameplay can be mindless. Serious Sam on low difficulties if often completely mindless, like the level with a thousand Kleers that rush at you while you just hold down the fire button. Tetris can be mindless when you're just playing it on instinct.

[Twig]

Did they call it a submarine sandwich or something else?

They just called it a sub.

 

No amount of explaining what the word "sub" came from would convince them.

[Twig]

The point wasn't that there aren't skills that are more challenging to master. The point was that you can successfully argue all your way down to the granular level what takes or is a "skill" and what isn't, such that the term as defined isn't a concrete solution to answer the question.

I think it's a vague wishy-washy thing that can mean any number of things, but early on in the conversation someone suggested we try to set a hard line on what the word "trash" means in this context. I ran with that and set a hard line. And then the hard line kept shifting because people didn't want a hard line after all apparently!

 

But all that said, I really have no emotional investment in the definition of "trash" whatsoever. I just think it's silly to say a word or phrase is meaningless just because there's no solid definition. If that were true, genres would be useless.

 

Actually I take it back, I fucking hate genres and I wish we didn't use them so frequently, or, indeed, at all, so let's never use words to describe anything again!

[Griddlelol]

I guess you're right about FPS enemies. I've only played a few first person shooters for more than an hour in the last 7 years, so I'm probably out of touch with how they're made.

Also I've never played FFX, but if it's such a simple mechanic, then I have no problem with calling it trash. The way Mangela originally wrote it made it sound like you have to interact with a complex mechanic on easy enemies, not auto attack while swapping characters.

[Mangela Lansbury]

I guess you're right about FPS enemies. I've only played a few first person shooters for more than an hour in the last 7 years, so I'm probably out of touch with how they're made.

Also I've never played FFX, but if it's such a simple mechanic, then I have no problem with calling it trash. The way Mangela originally wrote it made it sound like you have to interact with a complex mechanic on easy enemies, not auto attack while swapping characters.

In my defense, it's more complex than turning on turbo and putting a rubber band over the A button!

[Gaizokubanou]

Hitting the 1 key on cooldown is a skill. Setting up your party so they're all using the correct attacks is a skill, etc.

 

You can go all the way down on this until literally everything is trash or nothing is. I think we might have to agree that it's a broad and subjective definition that can change from genre to genre, game to game, and possibly even level to level. Like I said before, the first monster in Dark Souls after you've been playing for 10 hours is DEFINITELY a trash mob to me. Yet at the same time, I totally agreed with the argument put forth that it wasn't.

 

That being said, I think Twig's original point still stand that RPGs as a whole have embraced 'trash clearing' as a norm, at least much more so than other genre (except for cookie clicker which is way ahead in this aspect).

 

Sticking with two provided genres, let's examine the shooter.  Yes, I think shooters can have 'trash clearing' moments.  However, the difference is that it is often a point of criticism.  People will comment on how the game is dragging on, how pacing is too slow, enemies are too dumb, etc.  And they make those points because the expectation is that it should not be so.

 

But in RPGs, bit of farming (very easy enemies for resource gathering) is so expected of the genre.  In fact this aspect of progression through repetition is so heavily built into the name RPG, that when people talking about taking some RPG elements in for other genres, you can almost always bet that they are talking about progression through some repeatable tasks, not the actual 'role-playing'.

 

To get back to the source of this...

 

This concept is losing more and more meaning to me as we drill down to further and further specifics.  I feel like we have more exceptions than actual cases.

 

I think I agree with you SAM on the first note, but not with the second.  I agree with the first because any task if we break it down into small enough piece, we always end up with a trivial task.  Shooter can be broken down into moving a mouse.  RPG can be broken down into pressing a button (guess all games currently out, out side of kinect games (which are its own kind of trash, hurhur ) can be boiled down to this).  Those tasks, when described in isolation, are of course easy.  The issue with these hyper isolation specifics is that we are no longer talking about actual user experience but rather, pieces of it and then trying to compare to user experience (which of course doesn't measure up).  Kinda like trying to analyze the difficulty of learning how to drive while focusing on how turning the handle is easy and how stepping on the brakes is easy and how looking at the road is easy...

 

And getting back onto the broader topic on what constitutes a 'trash mob', I think everyone agrees it is something that is trivial... in that sense everything can become 'trash mob'.  Any enemy can be mastered and can be turned into a 'trash mob' status, sort to speak.  However, like I was previously saying to explain why I agree with Twig's original statement, RPG genre stands out because it popularized this design where the game encourages players to go back to the areas that player have mastered.  And by popularized I mean it is something that players expect out of RPG system more so than other genres, and when such system is in, it is often synonymous as RPG genre itself.  Any other genre you try to pull this off and it would rightly be called out for being boring.  But attaching repetition with incremental rewards is what RPG genre is one of the most famous aspect of the genre, more so that actual role-playing ironically.

 

Contrast to this is rogue-likes, where no encounter is meant to be 'trash' and that alone has earned a different genre recognition from RPGs (maybe sub-genre but still, difference is noted).

 

Apologies if this is bit rambly as I didn't have enough sleep but this is really interesting topic~!

[JonCole]

I don't really know if criticism is a good metric for this, considering the fact that JRPGs have completely fallen out of mainstream critical favor (as well as popular favor, in terms of overall sales) in recent years for some of the mechanics that make "trash mobs" make sense. Some of the more popular modern JRPG (and MMO) games like Bravely Default completely streamline, automate, better contextualize, or eliminate clearing of "trash mobs" to critical success.

[Mangela Lansbury]

I don't really know if criticism is a good metric for this, considering the fact that JRPGs have completely fallen out of mainstream critical favor (as well as popular favor, in terms of overall sales) in recent years for some of the mechanics that make "trash mobs" make sense. Some of the more popular modern JRPG (and MMO) games like Bravely Default completely streamline, automate, better contextualize, or eliminate clearing of "trash mobs" to critical success.

But also, Persona exists and is just littered with trash mobs and grinding, but is a critical success and, unless my viewpoint is skewed, a popular success.

[Twig]

In my experience (obviously no formal scientific research!), it's generally true that people tend to simultaneously criticize the grinding aspect of JRPGs while also sometimes liking the genre in spite of that. Of course, I've also talked to people who like the grinding on worthless mobs, but more often than that I find people who love Etrian Odyssey precisely because every encounter is important and dangerous and intended to wear you down as you explore the world before eventually running into the boss and dying. Or is that just me?

 

Fuck, Etrian Odyssey is so fantastic.

[JonCole]

But also, Persona exists and is just littered with trash mobs and grinding, but is a critical success and, unless my viewpoint is skewed, a popular success.

 

Yeah, I don't really have a perfect response for that. Maybe the charm and appeal of the non-combat sections of the game completely override the general contempt for those kinds of battles. Also, difficulty options specifically saying "pick this if you really care about story" + automation of combat through programming party members + speeding up combat by holding a button pretty actively indicate that even Atlus don't consider combat to be a big focus of that game.

[SecretAsianMan]

And getting back onto the broader topic on what constitutes a 'trash mob', I think everyone agrees it is something that is trivial... in that sense everything can become 'trash mob'.  Any enemy can be mastered and can be turned into a 'trash mob' status, sort to speak.  However, like I was previously saying to explain why I agree with Twig's original statement, RPG genre stands out because it popularized this design where the game encourages players to go back to the areas that player have mastered.  And by popularized I mean it is something that players expect out of RPG system more so than other genres, and when such system is in, it is often synonymous as RPG genre itself.  Any other genre you try to pull this off and it would rightly be called out for being boring.  But attaching repetition with incremental rewards is what RPG genre is one of the most famous aspect of the genre, more so that actual role-playing ironically.

 

I agree with this sentiment, I was just taking exception to the idea that RPGs are the (seemingly) only genre that has what could be considered trash mobs.

[Twig]

I agree with this sentiment, I was just taking exception to the idea that RPGs are the (seemingly) only genre that has what could be considered trash mobs.

It's definitely the only genre where there's often literally zero skill involved with dispatching whatever you might call trash. EDIT: "Traditional JRPGs", anyway. 

[Gaizokubanou]

I don't really know if criticism is a good metric for this, considering the fact that JRPGs have completely fallen out of mainstream critical favor (as well as popular favor, in terms of overall sales) in recent years for some of the mechanics that make "trash mobs" make sense. Some of the more popular modern JRPG (and MMO) games like Bravely Default completely streamline, automate, better contextualize, or eliminate clearing of "trash mobs" to critical success.

 

JRPGs are not alone in this though (but probably most famous/notorious?).  Best poster-child for this would probably be Diablo franchise.  It is disgustingly unabashedly shameless about its embracing of killing trash mob for slow progression as core attraction, that I'm not remotely weirded out by that string of adjectives I put together to describe it.  Then F2P games adopted and thrives on this (free to RPG, pay to skip forward), so did FPS (unlocking perks is so commonly identified as RPG inspired system)... now I am aware that way I'm talking is becoming close to being circular because I'm appealing to the raw appeal of it, but I suppose that is what I am saying kekeke

 

My point, yes JRPGs have faded but whenever we see this game design trope, I just think it is so commonly referred to as 'the-RPG-system'.  I mean, what is the most common genre associated with character (to exclude games like say, city builders) progression via repetition?  If yours is not RPG then I am genuinely curious as to what your own answer is.  Since this is definition discussion obviously none of us are right or wrong here beyond the scope of what is more common and what is less common but that is very much a worthy and interesting aspect of discussion I think?

[Twig]

I wouldn't describe Diablo as throwing trash at the player to slow them down. As the difficulty level increases, those enemies provide more and more threat, to the point that they're often just as, if not more, dangerous than the bosses.

 

Well, in Diablo 3, anyway. Get the right set of characteristics (wall, pool of acid, teleport, fuck (especially fuck)) and you're fucked! I haven't played D2 in years but I think it's similar?

 

Although I guess those aren't the "trash mobs" you're referring to. In which case I'd say the trash mobs serve the purpose of wearing the player down. Kind of like my previous example of Etrian Odyssey.

 

All that said, I only play Diablo-likes on hardcore mode, so I probably treat the games significantly differently from you.

[Gaizokubanou]

I wouldn't describe Diablo as throwing trash at the player to slow them down. As the difficulty level increases, those enemies provide more and more threat, to the point that they're often just as, if not more, dangerous than the bosses.

 

Well, in Diablo 3, anyway. Get the right set of characteristics (wall, pool of acid, teleport, fuck (especially fuck)) and you're fucked! I haven't played D2 in years but I think it's similar?

 

Although I guess those aren't the "trash mobs" you're referring to. In which case I'd say the trash mobs serve the purpose of wearing the player down. Kind of like my previous example of Etrian Odyssey.

 

All that said, I only play Diablo-likes on hardcore mode, so I probably treat the games significantly differently from you.

 

Well, if you play hardcore and push yourself to the hardest difficulty you can possibly clear then you are essentially treating it like a rogue-like, which is very cool.  But my experience with the game (1 2 and 3) and its community is that good majority seem to play the game for the 'phat-lewt', and that the best way to get it is find the difficulty (for d3, d2 farming was obviously more simpler cause of limited difficulty scaling and etc.) you can clear fastest and then to clear it as fast as possible over and over and over.

 

Hence the famous stuff like "mephisto run", 'baal run', 'cow level run', (sorry for d2 exclusives, kinda hazy on d3 names for some reason despite it being more recent :x ) which were all about getting the key monsters killed as fast as you can, as frequently as you can.  That is pretty classic example of trash mobs I think, because you are repeatedly killing the same entities you have complete mastery over for tiny bit of progression.  And that's kinda similar to how I and all the people I met that played D3 doing that weird portal what was it called umm

 

Edit: Oh yeah, rifts.

[Twig]

Yeah I know the best loot tends to drop from bosses in D2 (I think that's less true in D3, although since I only ever played hardcore, I never cared).

 

But my point was, those enemies can still provide a threat (in D3, anyway), even if they don't drop anything meaningful. That's wholly different from something that's literally only there to slow you down and doesn't force you to expend any limited (or even renewable) resources.

[Badfinger]

We definitely referred to the encounters between bosses in Molten Core as "trash pulls", but the first time our raid managed to get that first set of Molten Giants down and we didn't wipe, if a guild member was in the same room with me I would have high-fived the shit out of them.

 

6 weeks later if we wiped it was a lot of angry ventrilo, because even blasting through Molten Core took like 4 fucking hours.

 

Same monsters, referred to the same way at different times, different perspectives.

 

Hence the famous stuff like "mephisto run", 'baal run', 'cow level run', (sorry for d2 exclusives, kinda hazy on d3 names for some reason despite it being more recent :x ) which were all about getting the key monsters killed as fast as you can, as frequently as you can.  That is pretty classic example of trash mobs I think, because you are repeatedly killing the same entities you have complete mastery over for tiny bit of progression.  And that's kinda similar to how I and all the people I met that played D3 doing that weird portal what was it called umm

 

Edit: Oh yeah, rifts.

 

I believe we referred to that as "farm status". It's not a worthless encounter, but it has been mastered (or at least beaten).

[Twig]

Haha, I don't think I ever started calling mobs trash until well after The Burning Crusade came out and I joined a new server with new people who weren't all that interested in raiding.

 

Which is weird because the guild I was in before was a relatively hardcore raiding guild.

[Gaizokubanou]

kekeke, I guess it's the Korean farmer lineage (omg fuck this game (actually fuck all Korean MMOs, most grindiest worst stuff ever urgggg)) running strong in me.  In D3 hardcore whenever I faced a mob I couldn't one shot, I just went back to something I could and kill that over and over.

Basically I played that game like the most boring thing ever, and I guess it says something about my online gaming habit as well since everyone I socialized with also played like that, except I just spent more time kekeke :x

 

T_T

 

Edit: Oh man BC raiding talk brings back my pre-something memories~

 

 

6 weeks later if we wiped it was a lot of angry ventrilo, because even blasting through Molten Core took like 4 fucking hours.

 

Sums up about 4 years of my life playing Arena hardcore.  I made some people cry.  What an ass I was.

[Badfinger]

We definitely referred to the encounters between bosses in Molten Core as "trash pulls", but the first time our raid managed to get that first set of Molten Giants down and we didn't wipe, if a guild member was in the same room with me I would have high-fived the shit out of them.

 

6 weeks later if we wiped it was a lot of angry ventrilo, because even blasting through Molten Core took like 4 fucking hours.

 

Same monsters, referred to the same way at different times, different perspectives.

 

 

I believe we referred to that as "farm status". It's not a worthless encounter, but it has been mastered (or at least beaten).

 

Hi old guy. You assigned tank and mage targets to Majordomo Executus' adds, and when the stoner mages who didn't pay attention got the raid wiped you FUCKING HOLLERED at them because you were an angry young asshole who was going through rough shit and used World of Warcraft to escape. That was February of 2005. You're old.

 

Sums up about 4 years of my life playing Arena hardcore.  I made some people cry.  What an ass I was.

That wasn't even angry yelling. It's just at a certain point, there's no reason we should have died to things we died doing. With that said, what an ass I was.

[eot]

I was waiting for someone to bring up Diablo. While it's certainly possible to reach an almost god-mode state with the right gear (which would take endless time if not for duping), a lot of that game (Diablo II specifically) is actually spent in a Dark Souls like state where any situation can quickly escalate out of control. The difference is that it won't be one regular enemy that poses a threat, it will be a combination of your positioning, the random level layout and some particular set of enemies. Often a champion pack, or combination of them with nasty affixes. That's what makes playing it on Hardcore so fun, because you always have to be on your toes.

Well, in Diablo 3, anyway. Get the right set of characteristics (wall, pool of acid, teleport, fuck (especially fuck)) and you're fucked! I haven't played D2 in years but I think it's similar?

It's similar except the monster abilities are not fucked and actually fun to fight.

Sorry for the snark, but I will never get the D3 hate out of my body.

Invulnerable Minions, Waller, Arcane. Have fun! Not!

There are a few exceptions, like fighting Ancients in Hell, but you can reroll their affixes by opening a TP, plus in D2 you can save&exit the game in combat.

[Gaizokubanou]

Fuck invulnerable Minions + Waller + Arcane.  It's the worst urgh but I think they removed that combo from being possible now?  Like was it invulnerable minions that got removed in the expansion?  Kinda forgot but I do recall expansion being free of most of BS that plagued vanilla D3.

 

Only thing that stops me from damning vanilla D3 for eternity is the fact that I made about $90+ in real money AH.

 

So both of you guys mentioned certain volatility that exists in diablo games and yeah you know what, I agree.  However, wouldn't you also agree that good majority of time in diablo games is you laying waste to helpless mobs?