for some reason I hate RPG elements when they’re framed as attacking an enemy but I love them when they’re framed as Clicking On Rocks

like why the fuck do I love Runescape but not Pokémon? they’re effectively the same thing: do a braindead simple task an unreasonable number of times in order to unlock a slight variation on that task that you have to do even more times

what’s weird too is that WoW’s combat-oriented progression systems frustrate me. but the crafting progression systems? fucking love them

maybe part of it is I just like being able to make my own gear and see the aesthetic change of wearing different gear that looks cooler and better

I think a part of it though is that in Runescape the relationship of my mining skill to my Clicking On Rocks ability is extremely straightforward and simple, and I like that I don’t need to optimize multiple variables in order to Click On Rocks. that’s very comfy to me

same with WoW’s professions: get better at professions to get better at professions. there aren’t separate “stitching accuracy”, “stitching speed”, “stitching strength” stats that I need to balance in order to do tailoring. I can just enjoy making clothes

I think the problem for me might be related to the Paradox of Choice: if I have to make a bunch of small optimization decisions before I can Click On Rocks, my Clicking On Rocks efficiency will always be a source of anxiety and dissatisfaction to me. whereas if my choices are Click On Rocks or Click On Something Else then I can enjoy both of those tasks more fully

I also think that a big factor is that in Runescape it’s impossible for me to make a choice that locks me out of another choice. for example I can’t choose to spec into defense in a way that locks me out of speccing into strength or attack. everything is always available to me, so the choice becomes which thing I want to focus on first. and it’s hard to get anxious about that

but in more traditional RPGs the choices feel permanent and dangerous - like I’m supposed to understand a lot of implicit information in order to make the “right” decision and the fact that I don’t means that I’ll regret my choice for the rest of the game. I’ll always be asking myself “would this be easier of I had put those points into strength instead of defense? should I have given myself that passive so that I could have done this more quickly?”

this is also why I can’t do strategy games lol. every single time I make a choice I immediately regret it - whatever it was - and start thinking that the other choices would have been so much better and I just fucked myself completely by choosing the wrong thing. and the thing about strategy games is that those choices hang over you for the entire game, and you have to make a lot of them too

@kasdeya I highly recommend J1mmy’s latest video. It touches on exactly why this is OSRS’s biggest strength: https://youtu.be/xnINMGL1TQ4

@emmy oohh omg I am definitely watching this later. I would love to hear someone else’s take on this. thank you!