CriticaGeek

Turn-based Combat: The classic and most recognized gameplay in RPGs. It's full of strategy, nostalgia and... shit. Many of my friends are going to disagree, many of them believe that TBC it's one of the best ways to use strategy in a game and has aged as well as Keanu Reeves, sadly they are just plain wrong. There are three good reasons why big mainstream blockbuster games should not have this gameplay anymore.

Technology----------------------------

TBC was created when table role playing games were the only RPGs that existed: No computers, no screens or gamepads. Just you, your friends and your imagination. Although, the only people who played this games were nerds, and nerds cannot do a real fight to continue the story so they created TBC to add strategy to the fictitious fights.

After those games, RPGs in videogames were in the scene, and given that old game consoles and computers had no way to simulate a fight with movements and shit, TBC were the only choice and worked pretty well. After few years, consoles continued to evolve to the to the point were Street Fighter and Mario Bros. were pretty playable, but still had TBC some place in the show.

Now days, where most of the consoles have more power than my car and physics, graphics and gameplay have improved so much: Why do we have to keep playing with this stupid system like a shitty version of  Chess? There is NO WAY this should be right, because it's like buying a brand new and expansive car with a carburetor and no seat belts. It's a waste of resources to spend millions of dollars into making a game with such a bad gameplay.

Many will ask how I justify myself for calling it a good gameplay but now not. The same way that a musket was useful in war but now it doesn't

Strategy----------------------------

RPG nerds say that strategy needs time to be applied... As a martial arts, kickboxing and gaming practitioner I must say that's a stupid shit to say. Complex and not right-away strategy might be right, but that's to create a plan (like in the RTSs). When you are in a fight one on one you don't have 2 minutes to think what you are going to do and you have to add to your strategy the possibility that he will block, defend or counter.

Your strategy in a more realistic (and fun) way must be done in a more urgent sense, that has more merit, it's more fun and technically, it develops better strategy decision sense. Most of the times when you need a strategy, it has to be made right away. Maybe those nerds think most fights are just random flailing of fists until one connects... Another evidence that nerds don't know how to fight.

Value----------------------------

Do we pay 60 bucks for a PS2 games now days or 50 for a PS1? No? Then why the hell do we have to pay 60 bucks for games like FFXIII if it's the exact same gameplay with no improvements? The game has even worse gameplay than FFVI!!!! The same happened with Super Mario Wii (but that's another story). Many still try to counter me with the same thing of Forza 4 because has the same gameplay, but when a game it's a simulator (or even arcade racing games), the changes in the gameplay are made in the physics and experience, that's the whole point of  these games.

So again, why we still pay 60 bucks for a TBS JRPGs if the point of these games aren't graphics, and could easily be a story told with simple pictures and be even more epic, and the game could cost 10 to 20 bucks in XBLA and PSN? The simple answer is: Because we are just idiots.

-FF-

PS: Yes...