Trails in the Sky #10 This Is The Part Where She Punches You pt.2

Recap: Oh, Now That's Just Evil

The gang stops by the local inn and, much to their surprise the receptionist not only offers them a recently opened penthouse suite, but gives it to them free of charge in appreciation for helping out around town. So with the day swiftly approaching its end and the junior bracers squared away to begin their job, Kloe cordially bids the two adieu and heads back to the academy for class.

Estelle and Joshua then take a moment to explore their lodgings, eventually stopping on the balcony

Sure. Let's go with that

to reflect on what Cassius might be doing. Suddenly, they hear a voice from inside the suite and investigate. They swiftly find a human toad an aristocratically dressed man who snidely tells his misfortunate steward that he will be taking the (already occupied) room. When he finally notices the rightful owners, he assumes that they are either thieves or assassin. But, much as I’d like to punch him in his fish-eyed face Joshua quickly tries to set matters straight, and politely asks him to leave. The obstinate man refuses on account of supposedly being a Duke (Duke Dunan, to be precise) and nephew to Queen Alicia II. The bracers (understandably) do not buy it. His steward however confirms this and discretely offers the bracers a large sum of money to let the man-child have his way. Estelle and Joshua take pity on the poor steward and, ignoring the bribe, relinquish their good fortune.

YUP

Downstairs, the bracers ask the receptionist if there are any other available rooms. Alas, their good fortune appeared to have run out when, like an angel with emphysema, Nial walks in and offers the bracers the spare beds in his room. Though skeptical, the bracers comply and thank their journalist ally. At Nial’s (shockingly spacious) room, he informs the bracers that his “bad luck charm” Dorothy is off doing her own business after “supposedly” (I cannot emphasize my profound doubt enough) receiving enough field experience from the missing airliner story. Estelle astutely notes that he should be chasing his next story instead of taking a break, but quickly notices that his story probably has something to do with the despised Duke upstairs. A few of Nial’s responses then alerts Joshua that he’s actually working on his next story and is interested in learning about a potential scandal with the Queen concerning the odd decision to make her nephew the throne’s successor, despite his blatant incompetence. Nial is understandably impressed and frustrated, but doesn’t divulge any further. He then concludes the conversation by offering to buy the young heroes dinner from the best eatery in town. They of course, take him up on his offer.

That night, a fire erupts at Matron Theresa’s orphanage, burning it to the ground.

I was genuinely surprised and remorseful to see something THIS dark in this game

Come daybreak, Nial and the bracers part ways each to continue their respective work. Shortly after walking through the guild doors and greeting Jean, the branch gets a call about the orphanage and immediately dispatches Estelle and Joshua to investigate. So, after an expedient jog, the bracers arrive at the now ruined orphanage cite.  The two Manoria citizens on cite assure the duo that the Matron and the orphans made it out safely and are resting at the Manoria Inn. However, though Estelle immediately wants to go check up on them, Joshua reminds her that they have a job to do. So, with their skills slightly practiced from the theft at the Rolent mayor’s estate, the bracers quickly

:(

observe the evidence and conclude that the orphanage was deliberately burned down by a person. As if on cue, Kloe arrives and is devastated by the sight before her. Estelle kindly comforts her, and the trio then decides to turn over their findings with the Matron in Manoria.

A few screens later, the group returns to the cozy coastal town and finds the arson victims crowding the Inn’s 2nd floor. After an exchange of condolences Kloe (and a refreshingly mature young orphan girl) coax the kids to leave the room so that Estelle and Joshua can bring the Matron up to speed. Theresa then adds that the orphanage has lacks wealth and enemies to seek it, but a mysterious young man with silvery hair and a troubled expression helped them escape before vanishing into the crowd. Joshua writes him off as a fellow bracer, but before Estelle can pursue any further questioning, Kloe, Dalmore (the mayor of Ruan), and his Steward enter the room and further add their suspicion that the Ruan gang from the day before might be responsible for the fire.

Still, with the more pressing matter being securing lodging for the now homeless orphans, Dalmore offers the Matron an unused portion of his estate as a temporary solution. Theresa, however, heels

*facedesk*

nostalgic for her home and says that she’ll think on it. She then entrusts Kloe and the bracers with continuing their search for the arsonists. The new investigative team then heads outside, determining that they should head back to Ruan at the very least, when Mary runs to them from down the coastal road to shout that Clem (the thieving orphan boy) ran away. Though surprised, the group rationally determines that he likely overheard their conversation with the mayor and ran back to Ruan to confront the sexually frustrated gang of ugly lowlifes the Ravens.

With renewed vigor, the group sprints back to Ruan to catch the indignant child. Unfortunately they don’t see him along the road and only just catch a glimpse of him running to the warehouse district…as the drawbridge is raising for the following hour. Kloe almost starts panicking when Joshua reminds her of the very history lesson she gave that people used to travel around the city by boat, before the bridge was built. She perks right up at this, telling them that fishing harbor is beneath the inn. With great haste, the teens storm down the inn halls and find the harbor master, who fortunately states that though the boat is reserved for Duke Jerkass-Esquire Dunan, he’ll lend them his skiff because screw that guy, a kid is in danger.

One does not simply fuck with Agate

On the opposite shore, the gang barges into the previously guarded warehouse and finally catches up with Clem, just as he’s about to be beaten up by the Ravens. Kloe gives a brief but impassioned speech before producing (from god knows where) a self-defense rapier and declaring that she will fight for Clem with the bracers (which for some reason, seems to “appeal” to the Ravens…gross). A fight ensues; naturally, the heroes completely decimate the common street thugs. The Ravens are astounded, but before they can mutter a surrender, Agate appears with his sharp sword and sharper words. As pissed off as usual he proceeds to knock the ever-loving crap out of the Ravens to get them to relinquish the boy peacefully, if he stops knocking them around. Then, Matron Theresa arrives as well to meet the boy for an emotional moment. Agate then alters the arrangement and resolves to stay behind and beat the truth out of the Ravens while the others return to the guild to review the events that transpired.

Oh, don't worry. There's no flesh-eating mimes...on stage

Outside of the guild branch, Clem and the Matron say their farewells before returning to Manoria. Inside, Jean welcomes the heroes with a congratulatory reception before telling them about Agate’s history with the Ravens (long story short: he used to lead them, but straightened up and became a bracer). The devil himself walks in and informs everyone that the Ravens didn’t burn down the orphanage. Everyone seems to agree with the fruits of his Jack Bauer interrogation techniques, however, he follows this by telling the bracers that he will continue the investigation…alone. Estelle naturally resists, but Agate pulls rank and chastises the bracers for acting unprofessionally (making the case personal, involving a civilian, etc.). The bracers frustratingly don’t have a legitimate counter-argument and cave to Agate’s demand as he marches out of the room.

The group is sullen that they won’t be able to maintain their word to the mayor and the Matron, however Kloe proposes that they help her with the upcoming campus festival in the interim by acting in the school play. Jean concurs and makes it an official guild mission. The bracers somewhat hesitantly agree, and after Joshua reminds everyone to handle whatever other business they have in town, Kloe points the way to Jenis Academy.

On Pacing in Story-Driven Games

II.

Alright, last time I left off with the conclusion “the combat’s purpose is solely to break up the action; it helps establish the game’s pacing by providing an engaging way for the player to fill in the ‘jump cuts’; to play through the sequences where nothing of consequence happens.” That statement probably needs some unpacking for those who aren’t well-versed in game design.

Since video games are an interactive medium, the player has to do something. However, if the game
designer(s) want to tell a very specific story, such as one that would be found in another piece of media, they may prefer to give the player agency over some other aspect of the game that’s inconsequential to the plot. Because the story is the driving impetus of the game however, designers do not want to bore players during the non-story segments, after all, jump-cuts exist because they skip past boring, but necessary story elements in order to help maintain interest in the media. Thus, it behooves the devs to make every aspect of the player-experience interesting.

Some examples of these non-plot-essential elements a player can typically engage with are: travel, fighting, exposition, and information gathering. The latter two are inherently interesting to players as the substantive portion is in the content of the words, not the way they are presented. However, the latter two are are nigh incommunicable through mere words alone and rely on the audience’s imagination to understand. As such, the devs have to put in some more effort into conveying those experiences which is why RPGs have specific systems for combat and (usually) exploration.

As was probably clear by almost all of the last post being about combat, fighting in RPGs is extremely important. For one, the stories told through RPGs all involve characters who have to oppose some sort of external force(s) through combat. The battle system thus acts as a means of creating a player-character connection, in lieu of the typical connection established through narrative agency. What’s more, in order for the battle system to remain interesting throughout the game, it needs to consistently pit players against new opponents as the plot dictates. So, because the main character necessarily has to do a bit of fighting, they should logically become more adept at combat as the game progresses.

This is easy enough to display in the written narrative (you just write in commentary from other 

Here's a visual representation that (loosely) describes
what I'm talking about. I'd recommend reading the
originating article if you're still a bit fuzzy/curious
about all this technical mumbo-jumbo.

characters or inner-monologues), however, it’s essential to reflect this in the gameplay as well to harmonize the story with the player-character connection. RPGs usually portray a character’s increasing combat experience with the appropriately-named Experience Points (EXP) accompanied by a system of character progression (level-ups). There are also some titles whose combat mechanics are inherently challenging to master (e.g.Demon’s Souls), so instead they rely on the player becoming more skillful at the game instead of hard numbers to represent the player character's increased skill.

Of course, in order for this system to actually necessitate thoughtful player input, the enemies have to pose some sort of challenge throughout the game. So, for games using the former system of EXP points to represent character growth (like Trails in the Sky and FFX), the enemies have to become progressively more powerful numerically. And for games with the latter, the enemies have to gradually require more knowledge of the various gameplay systems and/or superior player execution to take down. Merging the two approaches is entirely possible (again, see: Trails in the Sky), and I actually prefer RPGs to do so, though it’s not required. These underlying systems are thus the essence of the interactive player experience in JRPGs and consequently make up the core of how these games are paced.

If all of that still sounded too technical/theoretical, perhaps this article will help clear up any grey areas.

SIDENOTE: This is also one of the reasons I find the 3D Legend of Zelda games to be abhorrently terrible. Just like in these other RPGs, Link, the protagonist, doesn’t gain EXP when he defeats enemies. But, as the story progresses he gains new tools which helps him both traverse new terrain and fight new enemies. Unfortunately, though the enemies often go down with little more than a single use of the new tool, Link almost always has to wait until the enemy “reveals their weakness” before striking them down. For normal enemies that you’ll be fighting hundreds of times, it’s tedious, but you can simply avoid most of them. For boss battles on the other hand, where you have to repeat the cycle of waiting three times, it’s insufferable.

Imagine that you are given a test with only one math problem on it that you’ve already worked out the answer to, but can’t start for at least five minutes and if you write the answer before the five minutes are up, you’ll fail and have to retake the test again tomorrow. Now imagine doing this several hundred times for twenty hours. That’s 3D Zelda combat in a nutshell. It doesn’t convey any semblance of skill or character progression (you’re just completing a previously solved puzzle), blatantly disrespects your time, and the fact that to this day Nintendo haven’t amended it in over twenty years is indicative of just how absurd gamers’ reverence for this franchise is. Arin "Egoraptor" Hanson also goes into more detail about the poor combat design in a hilarious way, if you're curious.

Now, with all that often unspoken context squared away we can finally continue from where we left off last time: “[The combat] helps establish the game’s pacing by providing an engaging way for the player to fill in the ‘jump cuts’; to play through the sequences where nothing of consequence happens.” 

III.

It’s most obvious in JRPGs where the battles and the story are usually rigidly separated by a screen transition into a pocket dimension with its own set of rules, but there is a very real risk of dragging out sequences of player agency for too long. Since the combat and exploration are superfluous to the plot, extended involvement in these sequences can dilute player investment in the story, and (eventually) their interest in the game as a whole. At the same time, protracted sequences of near non-existent player investment can become boring because the player isn’t doing anything but advancing dialogue. As with most things in life, a balance is necessary. Due to the temporal relationship between the sequences of player agency and the static plot, this balance is commonly referred to in this industry as Pacing.

Because the story acts as the contextualizing framework for the gameplay, advancing it is the chief concern of both components of the game’s pace. Thus, effective pacing consists of making the sequences of player agency as unobtrusive as possible, or acceptable as breaks from the story. Both of these reactions are of course subjective and impossible to elicit in all players 100% of the time (thus leading to countless Internet debates over whether X game is better than Y game). However, one can always recognize when the pacing is acceptable simply based on how logical the sequences of player agency are; basically if the sequences of player-agency should realistically occur within the “jump cut.”

Take Final Fantasy X for instance. Though I’m on record for calling FFX a mediocre game, it has undeniably effective pacing from start to finish. Every segment of the gameplay can be completed under an hour and every story sequence lasts under ten minutes. Every environment is linear so that no exploration is required to advance the story, however, there are optional areas astride the paths containing treasure should a player choose to prolong the gameplay.  Combat has a short feedback loop of player input, and each encounter only ranges from a few seconds to a minute or two. Even though I think the story is poorly conceived, the characters are bland, and the combat is too easy to be engaging, the game is paced such that the gameplay and story are cohesive, making both at least tolerable to get through.

At the same time, any player (and usually spectators, for that matter) can also recognize exceptionally poor pacing due to the way it arbitrarily extends the length of the player-agency sequence. Of course, defining whether a gameplay sequence is arbitrarily long can often be a subjective judgment as well, so to clarify, here’s a recent example that lacks any sort of subjectivity: Dragon Age Inquisition’s Power system.

In Dragon Age: Inquistion, in order to advance the story, one has to spend a certain amount of an arbitrary resource called Power. To acquire Power, one has to fulfill requisitions (deliver a set amount of resources into a bin to “help the war effort”), close Fade Rifts (kill specific monsters), or complete quests that offer Power as a reward (which is displayed by the game, when the quest is added to your journal). On its face, the system appears to be designed to force players to prevent the player from advancing the plot too swiftly as the fights may be too difficult to win immediately after completing the previous story sequence. However, there are at least three problems with this reasoning:

1.       The player’s weapons and armor have the greatest impact on their combat performance, not their level. When a player levels up, their stats only increase by an almost imperceptibly small amount. So, because this is a game with statistical skill representation, their power is alternatively tied to their equipment which is itself limited by their level…unless a player crafts the equipment themselves, removing the level restrictions (and allowing for better, controllable stat allocations). Thus, all a player has to do to remain competitive with the enemies, regardless of their level is craft gear instead of finding it.

Gaining crafting schematics requires a priori knowledge of where to find/buy them, however this is also an arbitrary design decision by Bioware. They could have simply made schematics fixed loot acquired during story missions, or better yet, make the weapon drops consequential throughout the game (ala FFVI) instead of cramming everything of remote value into the latter half of the game in exactly two optional locations. Basically, the player can always handle the enemies at any point in the story, so gating them doesn’t make the game any more manageable.

2.       The enemy's level could just scale with the player's, as they did in previous games. Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age 2 both solved this potential problem of the enemies being too difficult by making the opponents scale to the player’s level. Dragon Age 2 even went so far as to display the strength of the player’s weapons relative to their current level with a dynamic 5-star rating system, so that the player always knew whether their gear was competent at a particular point in time. And though a player with knowledge of the underlying mechanics of the game (e.g. cross-class combos) would enable them to gradually outpace the enemies relative to their level, the system of scaling succeeded in making enemies always require some effort to take down at every point in the game. It was simple, effective, and most importantly it worked. In DA:I however, enemy levels do not scale with the player and worse, are gated by locations which also require a certain amount of Power or story progress to access in the first place. So no matter how you slice it, just by gaining access to new locations, a player necessarily has to have earned an appreciable amount of experience to even face the new enemies to begin with.

3.       Power makes no sense within the context of the game as a means of accessing parts of the story or new locales. As explained by the game, Power is supposed to be a representation of the Inquisition’s strength at a particular moment in time. However, why should strength be a requirement for scouting (which is what the Inquisition supposedly do whenever they unlock a new area for you to explore)? That’s an action that is logically done when a person/faction does NOT have any Power, as it can help them acquire more or use what little they have more effectively in the future.

Further, what use are military might and war supplies when you are only dispatching a small task force of ambassadors or investigators for 90% of the game’s missions? There’s a stat in the game called “Influence” which seems like an infinitely more applicable resource for these endeavors, yet its only use is in gaining access to war table operations ancillary to the plot. And finally, how the hell does clearing a Fade Rift grant the Inquisition more power? There’s not even a cursory explanation offered by the game, and there isn’t any external logic backing it in the slightest.

The goal of careful pacing design is simply to ensure that the player is never taken out of the game; never questioning why they’re even playing it. This bullshit Power system actively drags those existentialist questions to the fore and entices the player to put down the controller, and do something that isn’t a complete waste of their time. If they didn’t exist, the game would lose nothing other than its thin veneer obfuscating the brevity (10-15 hours) and childishness (Saturday morning cartoon villain wants to take over the world because of reasons) of its plot. Coincidentally, Trails in the Sky acts as a foil to this by literally exemplifying how to execute gameplay progression like Dragon Age: Inquisition without the Power system holding it back.

IV.

Just like DA:I, Trails in the Sky has a linear story and affords the player a myriad of optional tasks to engage with during the sequences of player agency I really need to come up with a word for this. However, unlike Dragon Age: Inquisition, if a player wants to advance the plot, there is nothing preventing them from doing so. Travel from one location to another only takes a minute or two, so it’s never obtrusive. There are no random encounters (all enemies are visible on the map), the game offers the player multiple quartz to avoid attracting enemies within the first Act (Eagle Vision and Haze), and even if a player does get into a fight by accident, they can flee at any point in time without risk of it failing/a lost turn in combat. Experience acquisition is elastic meaning that the player gains more experience when they are under-levelled (weak) and less experience when they are over-levelled (strong), so the enemies almost never become too strong or too easy. And to round things off, every boss battle is a puzzle of some sort with a solution that can be brute-forced. So if a player is overlevelled, they can steam roll bosses without too much thought, and if a player has been avoiding combat for most of the game, they can still get through a boss battle with careful planning.

Everything outside of the story is optional, so the player has genuine freedom to advance the story at whatever speed they like. However, the non-story sequences are also carefully conceived (yes, even the enemy encounters) making them worth delving into. This is the reason why so much happened during these past two sessions; I didn’t feel that it was necessary to engage with the combat because my characters are currently over-levelled and I was curious about the story. I only advanced the plot for two and a half hours. There was no need for me to break up the story, and the in-game support mechanisms (read: good dialogue + the Bracer Journal) were there to remind me of it in case I somehow forgot what I was doing. THIS is why Trails in the Sky has amazing pacing; it’s self-balancing to accompany any and all types of players.

There was something else that I wanted to write this time around *cough*recurring NPCs *cough*, but this topic is incredibly important to grasp in order to understand why Trails is such an amazing game. So, since next time I’ll be completing approximately 4 metric shit-tons of sidequests, I’ll leave these findings for Tuesday.

I didn’t open any treasure chests this time around, so here’s another one from last the last session.  I should also mention that at this point in the game, one of the chests has recycled its text. It’s a shame, but considering that I’ve opened almost 100 of the things so far, it’s still pretty damn impressive (though it would have been funnier if they had reused the chest that said: “Alzheimer’s much?”).

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