Video Game Logic

[TheDarkOne]

I was just playing a game the other day and it occurred to me to wonder about the logic here. Consider this: in the Konquest Mode of Mortal Kombat Armageddon, there are two game modes. There is the walking/fighting mode that is most of the game, which plays sort of like a 3D beat-em-up style. In this mode, you have a few standard punch and kick moves, and a few special moves once you unlock them. So far, so good. However, in this mode you have no actual weapons except temporary ones given to you in a specific areas. Now, then, at certain points there is a second mode that plays like the standard Mortal Kombat style one-on-one battles. In this mode, you can wield a sword if you choose, but that sword does not seem to exist in the other mode. This is what I like to call "Video Game Logic" or simply "VGL."

So, let's discuss our favorite (or least favorite) VGL experiences!

[mrz84]

Invisible boundaries. If you are gonna wall of areas, use chasms, walls or something that might actually make sense. And if you wanna go into more detail on why said chasm/wall is unpassable, make them inclined/whatever to make them unclimbable or whatever. OR put lava in the chasm. I don't care, just make a logical excuse why I can't go somewhere other than invisible walls outta no where UNLESS a wizard/spellcaster puts them there in the middle of a fight or something for THAT area ( and NOT THE WHOLE DAMN WORLD)

[TheDarkOne]

Here's one of my favorites: Chrono Trigger. When you first battle Magus in his castle, near the end of the battle he uses the spell Dark Matter. Later in the game, Magus can optionally join your group, but DOES NOT have this spell yet! So how the blazing frack was he able to cast it before!? That is more VGL that makes no sense.

[King Aquamentus]

Here's one of my favorites: Chrono Trigger. When you first battle Magus in his castle, near the end of the battle he uses the spell Dark Matter. Later in the game, Magus can optionally join your group, but DOES NOT have this spell yet! So how the blazing frack was he able to cast it before!? That is more VGL that makes no sense.

Explained in-game. Remember when Magus (fruitlessly) attacked Lavos in the Ocean Palace? Lavos drains his power here. Magus even says so. Leveling him up is a road to recovery.

[TheDarkOne]

Explained in-game. Remember when Magus (fruitlessly) attacked Lavos in the Ocean Palace? Lavos drains his power here. Magus even says so. Leveling him up is a road to recovery.

I was under the impression that Lavos "draining his power" meant his MP, not his actual magic abilities. I suppose that does make sense when you put it that way. I never thought of that.

But here's a major one from the same game: Lavos lays waste to their world when it awakens in 1999 AD. Crono and co find this out during a visit to 2300 AD. But, no matter what method you use to get to it, the final battle always takes place in 1999 AD. So by destroying Lavos in that time period, the version of 2300 AD they visited never would have happened and they would never have known about Lavos, so never would have battled it. Time paradox.

[mrz84]

But here's a major one from the same game: Lavos lays waste to their world when it awakens in 1999 AD. Crono and co find this out during a visit to 2300 AD. But, no matter what method you use to get to it, the final battle always takes place in 1999 AD. So by destroying Lavos in that time period, the version of 2300 AD they visited never would have happened and they would never have known about Lavos, so never would have battled it. Time paradox.

I think they touch upon that in Chrono Cross, but I could be wrong (I haven't played it for almost a decade). I do remember that one of the main plot points is that Crono and friends' meddling with time to defeat Lavos caused alternate time-lines/dimensions/whatever (ie: a time-line where the reptites won). Heck I think the Dead Sea or whatever its called in the game is where you learn about it from little "ghosts" (for lack of a better term) of Crono, Marle and Lucca as kids.

But then again, I haven't played the game in almost a decade and my memory is spotty at best. (and to get back on topic...)

In the first Ninja Turtles game on the NES, when one of your turtles "dies", he demutates into his normal turtle form/whatever. However, its possible to find them, fully mutated, and tied up in certain areas that the Foot controls and save them. My question is, if they demutate when defeated, why would the foot remutate them instead of leaving them be or simply killing them, their worst enemy, in a weakened state?

[TheDarkOne]

Relating to Chrono Cross, I don't play that game because the battle system is too weird and confusing for my taste, and I don't think it count as a "true" sequel to Chrono Trigger anyway. Originally the game was titled Radical Dreamers and did not contain any reference to Chrono Trigger.

About TMNT, that always confused me, too. The game does this so you can regain a captured Turtle. But the only explanation I can come up with is that the "demutation" is temporary and the Turtle "remutates" shortly afterward. As for not killing them outright, perhaps they are under orders from Shredder to leave them alive so he can execute them himself later.

Another one is common in many platform games, but especially in the Mario series. Almost all Mario games contain underwater levels which Mario can swim through (and does not appear to have any need for air, but let's not go there just yet). In other levels there is only surface water, which will instantly kill Mario if he falls into it. Why can he swim in some levels and not in others?

[mrz84]

Relating to Chrono Cross, I don't play that game because the battle system is too weird and confusing for my taste, and I don't think it count as a "true" sequel to Chrono Trigger anyway. Originally the game was titled Radical Dreamers and did not contain any reference to Chrono Trigger.

About TMNT, that always confused me, too. The game does this so you can regain a captured Turtle. But the only explanation I can come up with is that the "demutation" is temporary and the Turtle "remutates" shortly afterward. As for not killing them outright, perhaps they are under orders from Shredder to leave them alive so he can execute them himself later.

Another one is common in many platform games, but especially in the Mario series. Almost all Mario games contain underwater levels which Mario can swim through (and does not appear to have any need for air, but let's not go there just yet). In other levels there is only surface water, which will instantly kill Mario if he falls into it. Why can he swim in some levels and not in others?

I never had a problem with Cross's battle system, but then again, I'm fairly adaptable to control schemes it seems. On another note, Radical Dreamers does exists, but its a "novel adventure" (ie: zork, with less dark loving flesh eating beasties) for the super famicom (there is an english translation patch).

On Mario, the first game had you enter warp pipes between levels so maybe they granted water-related abilities?

[TheDarkOne]

I didn't know much about Radical Dreamers, just that it was original game that became Chrono Cross. I like text-based adventure games, even programmed some myself, so if I can somehow get my hands on the English version, I'll give it a try.

Let's talk about Final Fantasy for a moment: the first one, in fact. These four people show up out of nowhere with these orbs, just when things are getting bad? Awfully convenient, no? And they just happen to be there right on time to rescue the kidnapped princess. How nice.

[King Aquamentus]

Chrono Cross is weird and confusing. Basically since Lavos exists in all times at once (or something), being killed in 1999 convinced it to simply assimilate Schala during the fall of Zeal in 12,000 BC and feed on her desire to either cease existing or make everything else cease to exist. Before it took her over though, she heard Serge in distress in 1010-ish AD and figuratively raised hell to interfere through time and save him. This cause a huge storm and error in 2400 AD which sent a Time research station into the stone age and created a reptite version of it, and uh... beyond that I"m not sure. Also kid works into Schala trying to save Serge somehow and is like an avatar of Schala or something. I don't know even the ending is ambiguous.


Anyways

One thing I've always waxed heavily on in games is the volatility of the dead, or thoroughly defeated. Being dead in games is like being a witch splashed with water: seconds later, there's nothing but a few puffs of steam. This makes sense purely from a game's standpoint since bodies add up, get taxing on the system, and generally are a little disturbing to all see laying around, but... if you were Mario, and you really were in the mushroom kingdom, would every flattened goomba's flesh start to rapidly evaporate in a matter of seconds?? Would there be tall wisps of steam everywhere you go from all the enemies you killed? Or are there just smeared corpses all over the place and some poor mushroom guy with a mop saying how much he hates his job?