Click, #, #, #

Okay, this is another comment to my WOW post. I feel this deserves another blog post because it's longer than a comment.

To summarize, when I say "clicking", it's my short form for "Click, #, #, #" which is my way of describing WOW's gameplay. You walk up to a guy, you click on him, which initiates the attack. So now your guy is attacking him, and if you have enough energy and the spell is ready, you press #1 to use a spell and deal more damage. If you are running low on life, you press #2. If you are about to finish him, you can press #3 to seal the deal, using a stronger spell but shouldn't be used too often, maybe it stuns you for a bit. Rinse and repeat for every enemy.

That is what I believe to be WOW's combat system. I believe there's not much to it... I think of it too much as a react-response system... low on life, you heal (by pressing a button, an "easy" button if you will)... you need to pull a guy away from a mob, I assume you can do that with another easy button... if the enemy says "charging ULTRA Beam" you concentrate more damage, or you get ready shield/regen or nullification spells.

So I'm watching Duy now, Duy is fighting 6 guys at a time, and he's standing there, hand not even on mouse, and he's button mashing one of the numbers, I think. And the guys just fall like flies after 40 seconds or whatever. Now Duy is looting each and everyone of these monsters... and now he's fighting more guys, training them together so he can face one direction and hit them all. Once again, he's rapidly pushing a combination of buttons. His life bar is at 66%, not bad... block, parry, block, parry... 50%... still good... one enemy left... and done. I was hoping he'd get to lower life and then I'd see him reach for another number and his life would regen back to a high number... oh well.

First, to agree with Ambrose, Final Fantasy's system isn't that involving either. If you are low on life, you also heal yourself with a few buttons, and the rest of the time is spent fighting. Halo 4 player co-op is a bit insane too, since there's no real fear of death, so everyone just becomes a sacrificial zergling, guns-a-blazing.

So what I mean by Click # # #, is not the buttons you press.. but it's how you deal with everything. Take TOTA for example. You are GUY, you approach an enemy, and you press X X X X, down Circ, forward Circ, rinse repeat. Not totally exactly, but close. X X X X are the normal attacks, down Circ if you have the energy to deal more damage, and then forward Circ as a sort of combo ender. If you have low energy then you don't do those.

Healing? Healing is a bit different. My idea of healing in WOW (Guild Wars, and let's put FF in here) is that you can do it while fighting. TOTA, you have to run away, find a safe place for you or the healer for a few seconds, and then do the healing. I'm not talking about pushing buttons, I'm talking about responding to the environment and how to do it.

Smash? Well, Smash is almost no contest - it's one of the most variable response-react games there are, you can do almost anything anytime. There's a lot of visual stimulii that might cause you to change your actions, and... well, I hope I don't have to talk much about Smash... who disagrees? Maybe when you're like, the best player in Smash, it's a bit more response-react. You see Samus. She's off the edge. Then with your expertise, you know Samus' optimal flight path to get back onto land. You are Ness. You can now calculate the best timing to force Samus. But even then, sometimes it doesn't go right.

But that might be your idea - you press forward, hold C-up for a few seconds, and then press down and A at the same time at this precise moment, where Samus is recovering from a bomb drop and you are right there to knock her down. If you become that Robotic, maybe the gameplay in Smash isn't involving for you either.

In response to Ambrose with regards to Halo... well, it depends how you play. The problem with what I do (which is what you described) is that it isn't very effective, and usually ends in a 1:1 kill/death ratio. Obviously, the way I play in halo multiplayer isn't quite the same as I play in single player, you can't do that as much in single player. So is it trigger to fight, melee to finish, and run around the corner to heal? Maybe, but it's more involving than that, with all the factors.

Maybe the other thing I'm criticizing is that... in WOW, I think the stimuli are the: the green bar, the blue bar, and the enemy's green bar, and maybe the spell icons to see if they're ready or not. I can think of Final Fantasy, where I think that might almost be true. You enter a battle, and it zooms in, and you see your life meter, your magic meter, and the enemy's life meter. Let's say the menu is replaced with hotkeys so you can access your favourite spells. The question is, can you finish a Final Fantasy fight like that? Maybe there's a prompt that says "you have not enough mana" or "Fire spell was ineffective", but you get my point. Is it doable?

It's not in Halo. You require to see the level in order to run around a corner, or if the guy moves, you have to see him move so you can adjust your aim accordingly. It's not in Smash. SO NOT. It's not in TOTA, since you have to run around correctly to avoid spells and attacks. It's not in PGR2. And so on... but is it possible in FF? Is it then possible in WOW?

I have another partially related question. Why Meph runs, and, do you do meph runs (equivalent)? I assume Jia is at end game in Diablo II, but pure end game, no more raids, no more harder enemies. So why Meph runs? Stat increase from 233 to 234? Something else? I don't know.

Also, if there exists an end-game in WOW (no more raids, nothing more to play for except bigger numbers), would you continue? I assume they're always releasing new content, but if they stopped, would you stop? If you didn't stop, would your playing be considered the same as meph runs?