I know this isn’t strictly related to patient gaming, but I think it fits the ethos of this community and I can’t think of a better choir to preach to.
The director of Dragon’s Dogma II made the following statement regarding limiting or removing fast travel
Just give it a try. Travel is boring? That’s not true. It’s only an issue because your game is boring. All you have to do is make travel fun
I think this is fairly compelling. Though I will say, I don’t think the answer is to limit fast travel. The real limitations developers should be placing should be on filler quests that have you traveling from point a to point b and then back with some slight pretext as to why you’re doing so. It’s not fast travel that’s the issue so much as mission design and the manners in which the player is compelled to cross the game world.
Metroidvanias are a great example of how to allow for fast travel while still making traveling around the game world compelling. The latest Metroid, Metroid Dread, was really fantastic in this aspect. You have this sense of progression and exploration even as you’re backtracking.
Would removing fast travel from Metroid Dread have made it any better? I don’t think so. The inclusion of fast travel feels thematic. You have to work for it so it feels like an achievement to unlock. It augments the game.
So in short, I agree with some of the sentiment expressed, with regards to lazy gameplay design being boring. I disagree with the opinion that fast travel necessarily is boring, or causes lazy desing.
I don’t mind a bit of grind personally, particularly with BDO the combat is so much fun that it made the grinding more fun as well.
There were a few things that killed it for me;
Having my PC on 24/7 running the client just so that my workers would continue to work to make me money.
The upgrade system, whilst I don’t mind something that increases the difficulty of obtaining gear and thus making it more of an achievement this was just pure RNG hell. Things like failstacks where by failing you then increase your chance to make subsequent upgrades so you are farming failed upgrades to build these stacks to then try and use on the actual item you want. Or jewelry straight breaking if you fail. It is a system that not only encourages the cash shop use but is quite honestly unfair as fuck.
The final nail in the coffin for me was spending around 16 hours across a couple of weeks digging in the same spot in the desert trying to find an item to advance the MSQ and never getting it. I wanted to continue with the main quests and that just entirely halted my progress to the point I finally just said fuck this shit.
Like a good addict I often get pangs of wanting to return to it because at the core of it the game looks and plays amazingly with so many great systems but they are just over shadowed by intentionally being made to funnel more people towards a cash shop.
BDO, I weep for you.