OVERKILL!??

[Myzt]

OK...just a crazy question.

I'm abit bothered by the Overkill(or similar thing) bonus of FFX ,DMC etc.

Was that a very intentional thing to games or just an accident like "hey we could use this bug/glitch"?

It's abit pointless question but...juzt curious :)

 

[Macro]

I don't know but that mechanic annoys me especially when they base loot and bonuses on how much overkill you can get. Wastes so much time in my opinion.

 

[Xilefian]

I don't know but that mechanic annoys me especially when they base loot and bonuses on how much overkill you can get. Wastes so much time in my opinion.

It rewards those who carefully set up overkills and plan their battles. Not a waste of time at all considering that the additional loot is optional.

@Myzt it is incredibly unlikely that overkills came about due to a bug.

A naive way to do killing would be;

self->health -= attack->damage; // Subtract damage
if ( self->health <= 0 ) { // Check if HP is below the death threshold (zero)
    Battle_KillEnemy( self ); // Kill the enemy
}

The safer way would be;

attack->damage = ( attack->damage > self->health ? self->health : attack->damage ); // Make sure damage is not greater than health
if ( self->health - attack->damage == 0 ) { // Check if HP is equal to zero
    Battle_KillEnemy( self ); // Kill the enemy
}

That's safe as it avoids potential unsigned integer overflow (negative health wrapping to a huge positive number) and is very (almost certainly) likely the way it was implemented in the NES, SNES and PSX days.

To do overkill, you'd have to undo that safe method and go back to the naive way and explicitly guarantee that signed integers are being used to allow negative damage;

#define MAX_DAMAGE    ( MAX_SIGNED_INTEGER )

attack->damage = ( attack->damage > MAX_DAMAGE ? MAX_DAMAGE : attack->damage ); // Clamp the damage so it does not wrap too far
self->health -= attack->damage; // Subtract damage
if ( self->health <= 0 ) { // Check if HP is below the death threshold (zero)
    Battle_KillEnemy( self ); // Kill the enemy
    if ( self->health < 0 ) { // Check if this is an Overkill
        Battle_Overkill( self, -self->health ); // Overkill with negative health (the difference between HP and damage)
    }
}

In this scenario, if you damage an enemy with 200HP by 300 then the health will be -100, which in the old days may result in the number wrapping around to something really big (depending on type strictness), but because we know that health is signed and that max damage is the maximum potential health you can possibly subtract (due to the clamp) we can flip the sign of that -100 back to 100 and then we know we've just overkilled the enemy by 100 HP.

That value can then be used against a threshold table to determine the rewards (a good way to do this would be divide it into an exponential value and use a drop-table directly; avoids an if statement).

So you'd have to go out of your way to implement the Overkill feature and go against the regular tried-and-tested safe method.

 

[Myzt]

@Xilefian , wow I'm amazed you proved it with much effort using code syntax o.o as evidence (very case sensitive) , thanks for proving and answering my ridiculous question :)

@Macro , I partly agree...cuz IMO, I like ovks but becomes very annoying in the long run :3

 

[Macro]

Yeah it's a waste of time in my opinion because the game further promotes wasting time which rewards people for wasting even more time. -_- If something is going to die, it's going to die. "I'll hit you harder so you drop more loot, you living pinata!" It makes 100% sense in games like Mortal Kombat for me though, when the game is all about beating everything into a bloody pulp. xD I guess it could with Dante too, since he is a half demon after all..

I can't find any satisfaction or point in pummeling a corpse and being rewarded for it, but hey, that's just me. :) I know some people enjoy looking at numbers and juggling corpses.

 

[Xilefian]

Yeah it's a waste of time in my opinion because the game further promotes wasting time which rewards people for wasting even more time. -_- If something is going to die, it's going to die. "I'll hit you harder so you drop more loot, you living pinata!" It makes 100% sense in games like Mortal Kombat for me though, when the game is all about beating everything into a bloody pulp. xD

I can't find any satisfaction or point in pummeling a corpse and being rewarded for it, but hey, that's just me. :)

I still entirely disagree with your opinion.

In Final Fantasy X, when an Overkill happens it doesn't add any additional time to the game at all. You get a little text informing that an Overkill occurred as the damage appears and the reward appears in the loot list with no additional fanfare.

If you play the game normally, you may benefit from the odd Overkill, but you can outright ignore the feature entirely.

If you're a hard-core player then you're going to want to invest the extra time into setting up Overkills and gaining the bonus drops; that isn't time wasted, that's time that a hard-core player would have spent anyway.

What is a nice-little bonus with no-drawbacks at all for regular players becomes an additional level for hard-core players to play the game. That's exactly what RPGs need for longevity - it needs to be simple, no-frills for a regular run-through and for additional runs to have re-playability with the hard-core grinding (which is entirely optional - reminder).

If you feel the rewards for Overkills takes too much time, then don't worry about them. They aren't detracting from your experience (they add to your experience when they do happen every now and then by accident).

Additionally, these are RPGs we're talking about; there is no pummelling to a pulp occurring, the enemy still drops on the ground with standard animations and then fades away with a small boom.


I think your complaint of "time wasted" is entirely unwarranted and ill-considered...

 

[Macro]

Yeah when I know I could be fighting new monsters for different loot and battle circumstances it's time wasted. More battles is A LOT more fun than whacking on a body for an extended period of time.

But yea, we both have our opinions and are mature enough to understand that, so it's all good. :)

 

[Xilefian]

Yeah when I know I could be fighting new monsters for different loot and battle circumstances

Then go ahead and do that, there is literally nothing stopping you...No time wasted at all; you are the one to choose when to hang around and spend time planning Overkills.

If you really, really feel that Overkills are a waste of time then realise that you're the one choosing to waste your own time dealing with them, you can ignore and move onto the next monster - there is nothing compelling you to hang around and plan your battles whatsoever.

 

[Macro]

I don't think we are getting anywhere. So I'll let that (and whatever else you feel like chucking my way) slide. xD

 

[Xilefian]

I don't think we are getting anywhere. So I'll let that slide. xD

I just think it's entirely absurd to label an optional mechanic that removes nothing and adds something for everyone "a waste of time".

If you think Overkill loot drops are a waste of time, then you must also have the opinion that rare-drops and stealing-items from enemies is a waste of time as they are all optional 'time-wasters' that reward players who choose to invest their time in these areas in exactly the same vain.

I feel these kind of things are a fundamental mechanic for adding longevity and re-playability to RPGs, and it is truly a mistake to consider these optional features as negative traits for a game. If you remove these sorts of features then every play through of a game will be the same for every player, at which point you might as well make a visual novel and not a role-playing game.

 

[MinisterJay]

Please be careful when discussing with others. Watch the adjectives used when addressing other member's opinions. This is a friendly forum. This thread may be closed if the behavior does not improve.