Current Events > Where is the line between grinding and just playing a game for a long time?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Lately people have been bringing up grinding vs microtransactions looking for a reason to hate them. People say games are being made that, if you don't spend more money on upper level gear/weapons/whatever, then you will have to grind for an inordinate amount of time to get them. I used to think grinding was doing one specific task or area over and over again to get an optimal amount of xp or money that you can then trade in for high level stuff you want. Doing something not fun repetitively to get something you want. Nowadays when people talk about microtransactions they talk like just playing the game in any way for... longer then you may want to is grinding? Not trying to pretend to play my old man card but wasn't playing the game for a long time to get good stuff just how games used to work? So my question is; when does playing the game turn into grinding and why is it such an egregious sin in relation to microtransactions?

Depends on if the game is free or not, or if the grind is the gameplay (like warframe).
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pogo_rabid posted...

Depends on if the game is free or not, or if the grind is the gameplay (like warframe).

Playing Monster Hunter World lately, and most of the game is grinding, and that's the fun of it.
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Your definition sounds right but I don't know if I've seen people claim that playing for a long time is a chore, not if it's natural progression in game mechanics. It's an egregious sin in regards to microtransactions when the amount of grind doesn't feel remotely proportional to the reward given and it's obvious they're just baiting you into taking the fast route of spending money.

When it says something like "wait 24 days...OR buy gems NOW ON SALE", it's clear they've decided to sacrifice a fun gameplay experience for more money.

The only reason people grind is because it's the only way to get X. If you then provide an alternative route, e.g. "grind for X, or spend more for X now!" you're basically saying "don't play our fucking game, just pay for the end result".

As for a definition of grinding, I'd say doing something incredibly repetitive that has no feeling of progression beyond levelling up your stats = grinding, to me.

Also:

Repeating the same action over and over again in the hopes of getting some kind of rare reward.
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low percentage based enemy drops as the main means of character progression and/or a leveling system that requires weeks+ of in game time in order to maximize
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pogo_rabid posted...

Depends on if the game is free or not, or if the grind is the gameplay (like warframe).

Let's assume we're not talking about F2P games. I've seen this brought up a lot recently regarding the new COD, Assassin's Creed, and there was the whole debacle last year about Shadow of War. It seems to pop up any time microtransactions are announced and usually comes right after the screaming about P2W, even if it's not a competitive game to be won.

Why grinding even exists in single player experience is beyond me. It's all predatory. No grind is worth it in non-competitive gaming.

Mircrotransactions in the context of speeding up a process to unlock "x item" instead of fresh content? Let's make the grind absurdly long.

Microtransactions offering fresh content? Let's lock the bulk of the game behind dlc.

No microtransactions? See example 1 anyway.

Of course anything rng based is apex predatory type shit regardless of its impact on progression but that's different from TC's question.
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I think the most obvious example is the most recent Battlefront, right? You could just play the game to unlock stuff, but it was a crazy amount of time to do so. So much so that when the game took out microtransactions, they had to rebalance the game entirely just to make it work.

And in my opinion, a lot of games are like this. The game is built around microtransactions instead of them just being a neat extra.
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specialkid8 posted...

pogo_rabid posted...

Depends on if the game is free or not, or if the grind is the gameplay (like warframe).

Let's assume we're not talking about F2P games. I've seen this brought up a lot recently regarding the new COD, Assassin's Creed, and there was the whole debacle last year about Shadow of War. It seems to pop up any time microtransactions are announced and usually comes right after the screaming about P2W, even if it's not a competitive game to be won.

in a game like Warframe, World of Warcraft, Destiny, etc, progression is the entire point of the game. the whole appeal of the genre is getting to the next level, getting that sword or gun with +5 higher damage, stuff like that.

inversely, the grinding mechanic that works in WoW is completely out of place in something like Assassin's Creed. the point is to generate enjoyment out of playing through the missions, story, exploring, whatever draws ppl to assassin's creed.

these grinding mechanics really only work on people who are prone to game addiction, it's scummy design and it is ruining games imo
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Hard to get a simple objective metric since different games are different.

But the difference is whether or not you need to do the gameplay to advance or whether you're doing it for fun.

"Either pay money or spend 7 hours getting to level 10 to beat this boss" is a grind.

Spending 7 hours kicking around having fun, is not.

I think the docks in Shenmue are a great example. That's a fucking grind because it's mandatory to drive a crane moving boxes around for hours and hours just to proceed the game.
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KlownArt posted...

I think the most obvious example is the most recent Battlefront, right? You could just play the game to unlock stuff, but it was a crazy amount of time to do so.

That was a pretty big one too and it still begs the question; how long is too long to unlock Darth Vader? Shouldn't the biggest baddest motherfucker in the galaxy be a top level unlock? And also, is just playing the game a lot to unlock stuff a grind? Romulox28 posted...

inversely, the grinding mechanic that works in WoW is completely out of place in something like Assassin's Creed. the point is to generate enjoyment out of playing through the missions, story, exploring, whatever draws ppl to assassin's creed.

What grinding mechanics are in Odyssey? The reason I think about this so much is because people, not pointing at you, are so damn vague about particular games that it seems like they don't actually know the reason and just want to complain about microtransactions. Does Odyssey, or Shadow of War actually have grinding mechanics or do people just want end game loot without playing through the end game?

specialkid8 posted...

What grinding mechanics are in Odyssey? The reason I think about this so much is because people, not pointing at you, are so damn vague about particular games that it seems like they don't actually know the reason and just want to complain about microtransactions. Does Odyssey, or Shadow of War actually have grinding mechanics or do people just want end game loot without playing through the end game?

idk, i never played odyssey, im just going off what you said. ive played other ubisoft games though and they contain mandatory grinding (unless you are willing to pay for premium currency). rainbow six siege immediately comes to mind
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it goes from playing for a long time to grinding when the thing you're playing stops being new gameplay and starts being repeated old gameplay. Well, not like just a single instance of something repeated makes it all entirely grinding but somewhere along that scale of new/old is where the distinction lies imo
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Romulox28 posted...

ive played other ubisoft games though and they contain mandatory grinding (unless you are willing to pay for premium currency). rainbow six siege immediately comes to mind

Multiplayer is inherently repetitive but I wouldn't call it grindy, although I haven't played siege. What other ubi games have "mandatory grinding" that can be bypassed by money? I've played most of the big ones and can't think of any examples.

specialkid8 posted...

Romulox28 posted...

ive played other ubisoft games though and they contain mandatory grinding (unless you are willing to pay for premium currency). rainbow six siege immediately comes to mind

Multiplayer is inherently repetitive but I wouldn't call it grindy, although I haven't played siege. What other ubi games have "mandatory grinding" that can be bypassed by money? I've played most of the big ones and can't think of any examples.

in siege the gameplay revolves around these different operators that have different abilities. the default ones are easy to unlock through regular gameplay but the newer ones ubisoft keeps coming out with need a ridiculous amount of grinding to unlock, you have to play something like 50 hours worth of matches to get one operator (or of course pay real $$$).

it's why i stopped playing the game, blows my mind that you'd have to play hundreds and hundreds of hours to unlock all the characters required for any degree of competitive play.

i think ghost recon wildlands had a premium currency too you could abuse. honestly i stopped buying ubisoft games after that
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How does that progression rate compare to other hero shooters like overwatch?

specialkid8 posted...

How does that progression rate compare to other hero shooters like overwatch?

all characters are unlocked from the start in overwatch & all new characters are free to all players
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I usually think of a grind as doing a task over and over again in order to be able to progress the game. Farming mobs is an example of this. Almost always, the task isn't difficult, just something that needs to be done many, many times.

specialkid8 posted...

That was a pretty big one too and it still begs the question; how long is too long to unlock Darth Vader? Shouldn't the biggest baddest motherf***er in the galaxy be a top level unlock?

In the past, the most desirable characters were locked behind the hardest objectives. To get Darth Vader you would complete the story mode on the hardest difficulty, complete some optional hard level, etc. Not usually "Play 500 hours" or "Kill 10,000 enemies across all playthroughs".
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