JRPG Mechanics 01 - Random Encounters

[I’ve been a Japanese RPG fan for as long as I’ve been gaming, but lately it seems the popularity of such games outside of Japan has been dropping off dramatically. Perhaps this is because of some preconceived outdated game mechanics compared to their Western counterparts, which seem to be wielding heavy influence in the general RPG genre. This column will examine some of these “outdated” game mechanics and hopefully incite discussion on whether they actually can or should be updated and why.]

As the first topic for discussion, I’ll be delving into the realm of random encounters in JRPGs. We all know the drill. You, the hero, are wandering in the wilderness along with your band of friends, themselves perhaps picked up off the streets of the castle-town from which you hail. During your wandering, you suddenly hit an invisible enemy and are thrust into battle. As the omni-present gamer, you have just been the victim of a random number generator. To some, these are inconvenient annoyances, to others, it provides a sense of danger, because you never know what is going to happen at any given time.

The idea of random encounters, of course, started back in the days of table-top RPGs. They were sometimes used back then as a game mechanic to strain a player’s characters, perhaps forcing them to use consumables or face a stronger foe in a weakened state. By a stretch, you can probably say the same things about random encounters in video game RPGs today. They are meant to convey a sense of ever-present danger. Its kind of like opening a box of chocolates – if you step outside the safety of a town, you never know what you’re going to get.

Because of the simple formulas used to determine when these encounters will be triggered, you can have very frequent occurrences or, on the other hand, stretches of time where you will not trip the wire at all, so to speak. It’s the times when the frequent encounters happen that most JRPG gamers scream in a fit of nerdrage. There are formulas that limit the amount of random encounters you can experience in a given amount of your character’s steps on-screen. This makes the possibility of triggering an encounter every step impossible, and, in turn, alleviates some of the issues with the concept as a whole.

The last game I played which involved random encounters was Lost Odyssey, and it seemed to me they were still able to be triggered almost every step. I remember a couple times where it seemed like, over the course of five steps, I triggered four encounters. This is rare, but still quite annoying and, as some claim, a discouragement to exploration. The more you explore, the more you wear your characters down, perhaps so much that you can’t handle an upcoming boss without using consumables to beef up your health and mana. This is even a more significant problem if the save point doesn't completely recharge your character (more on this in a future installment of this column).

Do I personally think this is an outdated system of determining when battles happen? Yes, I do. However, I am not as adverse to random battles as some reviewers and other gamers are. With that said, the best route, I feel, is to not even bother with a random number generator at all and just place a set amount of enemy spawns in areas, which can “respawn” either on their own or when the player moves into another area and returns. This allows the player to fight as many or as few enemies as they want, without the absolute need to if they don’t want to. Exploration can occur more freely, as these monsters on the field screen can usually be avoided (although some have AI that causes them to aggressively move toward the player when they move within a certain range). Granted, there are also drawbacks of avoiding these on-screen encounters - you lose out on experience points gained for your characters, as well as item drops, currency and perhaps other benefits, as well. But, simply put, placing enemies on the field screen allows the player to control their characters to a larger extent.

Not having random battles isn’t necessarily innovative, either. Its not a new idea to suddenly grace the genre in the last year or two. Placing enemies on the screen for all to see has been around for quite some time. It’s in this respect that I fail to see why games are often treated harshly when they involve random encounters. But, in the end, it all boils down to personal preference. By my own admission, random encounters can – and will, if given enough time – get incredibly tedious. Developers seem to have noted this, as we’ve seen less of this particular mechanic in JRPGs as of late.

However you feel on the subject, I don’t think random encounters are going to completely disappear anytime soon. Square-Enix, in its continual output of ports and remakes of older RPGs, is possibly introducing the mechanic to a whole new generation of younger gamers. Two of their heavily-publicized recent remakes – Dragon Quest IV and Dragon Quest V – have random encounters (as do all the DS and PSP Final Fantasy ports/remakes). As long-time JRPG enthusiasts, this mechanic is part of our past – at one point or another, whether it was loved or hated, we dealt with it so we could join a band of stalwart heroes on their adventures. I doubt those feelings of nostalgia will dissipate anytime soon. That being said, it doesn’t mean we have to like the idea of random encounters. To some it’s a bane, to some it’s a blessing – in either case, I’m sure we enjoy the genre for more than the means in which we’re introduced to a salivating pack of monsters that want to end our hero’s cliché, yet potentially world-changing, existence.