Rpg Game Length

[Vox Novus]

Okay so I've been designing a role-playing game with the intent to try and go commercial with it, I have however been designing the game with a specific way in mind; I've been designing the game to be a "micro" role-playing game. By this I mean a role-playing game that goes through all the motions one would expect from a full length rpg but cuts out the things that contribute to making a game longer than it really needs to be, i.e. excess backtracking, not being able to flee from encounters, save points, etc... So while I'm not at the point where I can fully estimate the length of my game I know its certainly not going to be a 40 hour juggernaut.

From personal experience I love playing long rpgs; heck I've sunk a good few hundred hours in skyrim and always look forward to finding rpg games that seem to provide lots of gameplay length. I've also found ones that were on the shorter side but still were enjoyable and felt like a full game. As I have gotten older I do realize people get less time on their hands to play those lengthy games in large sessions due to work or school or having family obligations, so a shorter game experience may be preferable.

I guess what I'm wondering here is what type of market could there be for this? Obviously pricing would be important to consider. For those of you that do buy games what are your thoughts? For commercial developers have you had any type of success with something like this? Do you feel there is a certain game length that works best for you? 

 

[whitesphere]

I know Chrono Trigger, to get from game start to finish, takes around 20 hours if you know where you're going and grind to max level.

Final Fantasy IV uses more backtracking and grinding so it takes around 40 hours to complete.

Personally, I'd say a good RPG should have at least 10 hours of content as a rule of thumb.

I haven't developed a commercial game yet but those are my personal rules of thumb.

 

[Kes]

I personally love longer games, but I'm aware that people rarely have the time to play them - also if you're thinking of going commercial, sadly one must acknowledge that people will not pay double the cost of a 20 hour game in order to play a 40 hour game.  I agree with whitesphere that 10 hours is not bad for a minimum - you need that to develop your story, have plenty of exploration (not the same as backtracking) and so on.

My first game, if you do everything, takes people on average between 15-20 hours (though one person took 47 hours!!); the second one, again on average, and if you do everything, takes people 18-25 hours.  Because I give players the choice of 4 difficulty modes, obviously the mode will affect how long it takes.  Both games have been successful.  That sort of length seems reasonable, particularly until one has build up the experience of developing a game, so that one can sustain the development process over a longer game if one wants to.

 

[Silent Darkness]

Use the intended price of your game as a guide. The more you're charging, the more content there should be. As a general rule, 1$ should be two hours worth of entertainment.

 

[Wavelength]

The most important thing is to make your game fun (or otherwise valuable to the player), and not only in a general sense but fun at every moment the player spends with your game.  Once you have a really good core to the game, a good hook (to get people to try it out), and interesting, varied content, then it's nice to add more and more.  But first make what's there shine - and if your RPG is only three hours long but it's an intensely enjoyable experience, that's far better (and will also sell more) than a generic 40-hour epic RPG that no one's truly enjoying from start to finish.

 

[Kes]

Even as a general rule I disagree with $1 for 2 hours entertainment. You wouldn't apply that to anything else (a movie, a trip to a theme park, the theatre, a live concert, a meal out with friends etc) so why apply it here? It takes no account of how much might have been spent on art, music or scripts - remember a lot of stuff is not free for commercial. Nor does it take into account how long it takes to develop a game.

Sure it's possible to buy games for $5 10, but it is highly unlikely that the dev can make a living out of it at that price. And so we have this unbreakable cycle of promising devs, who do a couple of games but then have to give it up just at the point they are getting skilled, because they can't afford to carry on. There are only a couple of indie devs who have been able to make a decent living out of it for several yesrs that I know of, and that's Aldorlea and Amaranthia, and both of them have moved away from the sort of pricing that you advocate. To expect anything else is not realistic.

 

[Matseb2611]

I agree with Wavelength that the quality of the experience is perhaps a more important factor than the length. Your game should be as long or as short as the story demands it. I personally tend to mostly make games in the region of 5-10 hours in length. That gives me enough to pull off an interesting story. I am not a fan of making longer games, simply because I start to feel that I am diluting down the experience and just repeating the earlier aspects of the game. On the other hand, with shorter games pricing becomes tricky. If you price your game say at $10 and it only lasts 1-2 hours long, then many customers will feel annoyed that the game didn't have enough content for its price tag, no matter how amazing the game is. In my personal humble opinion, a commercial RM game should be at least 4-5 hours long.

Most of all, I am glad you don't wish to extend the length of the game via cheap tricks such as excessive backtracking, frequent encounters, etc.

Edit: In regard to pricing, I too think that $1 for 2 hours is way too low and unsustainable. Generally the price will also depend on how much backing and fanbase you have. With the first commercial title it is good to start off humbly (my first commercial title for example is 10 hours long, for $10, so about $1/hour), but the more known your work becomes, and the higher its standard gets, you can afford to price things higher.

 

[Indinera]

For commercial developers have you had any type of success with something like this? Do you feel there is a certain game length that works best for you?

From my experience, longer games (30+ hours) make about double the money of shorter ones (10-20h) but they also take about 4 times longer to make.

So in the end shorter is more profitable. What works best for me is to hit 20 hours. Although, as a player, I like longer games (40+ hours). The games that I like the most among my own catalog are among the longer ones (The Book of Legends around 40 hours and Asguaard around 50).

 

[Silent Darkness]

Apologies. I see what you mean. Thing is, there is a fine line to be tread between not underselling your title and gouging the hell out of the price.

 

[Shaz]

From my experience, longer games (30+ hours) make about double the money of shorter ones (10-20h) but they also take about 4 times longer to make.


So in the end shorter is more profitable. What works best for me is to hit 20 hours. Although, as a player, I like longer games (40+ hours). The games that I like the most among my own catalog are among the longer ones (The Book of Legends around 40 hours and Asguaard around 50).

What is it in those games that makes them longer? Are there more steps to the main quest? More side quests? More walking/backtracking? More battles? How long will they be if you avoided doing everything you didn't HAVE to do to get from start to finish (you know, the extra things that make it more interesting & fun)?

 

[Indinera]

What is it in those games that makes them longer? Are there more steps to the main quest? More side quests? More walking/backtracking? More battles? How long will they be if you avoided doing everything you didn't HAVE to do to get from start to finish (you know, the extra things that make it more interesting & fun)? 

Simple answer: the story is bigger. In general there are also more characters involved, but it's not always true (cf Asguaard).

 

[Matseb2611]

I think longer games also demand a lot more testing. The testing time needed seems to increase exponentially with game length (at least from what I have witnessed), especially if there's a lot of optional content that can be done in any order of preference.

 

[Indinera]

Too true, Matseb! But I thought Shaz' question was more about what makes a game longer, not what makes a game longer to make?

 

[Shaz]

Yes, it was more about the content that makes for a longer playtime. Even a short game could take a long time to make, if you're introducing new mechanics and scripts, or have a whole heap of content in a smaller number of maps.

 

[Matseb2611]

Ah, my bad. I think the game can end up longer for a lot of reasons. Other than story, I also noticed I could end up spending a fair bit of time on managing stats and gear on the characters. When there are a lot of options available and the game gives a lot of freedom on e.g. how to upgrade the characters, then the player might spend a chunk of time experimenting with things and seeing what works best for them. Also the nature of battles can be a factor too. Some games have battles end within a couple of turns, whilst others have them last longer, boss battles especially.

 

[Indinera]

Yes having a lot of items, weapons, gear, secrets etc. all contribute for a longer playtime. Optional characters, optional quests, different paths etc.

Basically, content creates playtime.

 

[Shelby]

Game length has been all over the place for us, I wish there was some great answer I could give you. In a perfect world I would want all our games to be VERY long, maybe even like 20 hours! But in the real world you have to keep your story strong and many other factors play in it.

Best advice is just make it as long as you feel right about it.

 

[Frostyfirefly]

That's a good question, I think it all depends on how much variety and depth there is to the game (speaking as a gamer rather than a designer, of course). If a game has enough gameplay elements that feel fun, original, deep and what not, I just want to keep on playing and exploring the possibilities.

However, if gameplay is superficial, to the point that you keep doing the same thing over and over again, the game should not last more than 8 hours in my opinion. 

Of course, pricing is important, I would never pay more than 20 bucks for something that only lasts 8 hours.

I also avoid games that have hidden pay to win mechanics, that is, the game is a 60 hour long grindfest unless you buy special packs to empower your characters, etc.

 

[Dark Gaia]

As someone whose commercial games have (thus far) been relatively short (~15-20 hours for Legionwood 2 and ~10 hours for Mythos), I can offer some reassurance that a game does not necessarily need to be incredibly long to do well. Provided you're willing to sell your games for quite a bit less than some of the more "fully-fledged" RPG Maker games such as Aldorlea's titles, you can actually still turn quite a decent profit.

I retail my games for $5.99 each. So far, I've found that my main market seems to be gamers on Steam who are looking for cheap games during sales. These people are usually quite aware that the game they're purchasing isn't a 30+ hour epic and for 5 bucks they really don't expect it to be. At the moment, I can develop games around this length in a period of just a few months working on them a couple of hours each day, so releasing short games is a legitimate business strategy.

There's also the added bonus of being able to release many games in a shorter amount of time. I'm sure developers like Aldorlea with heaps of titles will tell you that a new release is a great sales booster for old games as well. Many of the new fans who came on with your new game, or who missed your last game, will actually go back and purchase older games as well.

 

[amerk]

Speaking from a consumer's standpoint:

Length and price don't go hand in hand. While I seldom purchase new games, I can tell you that I've purchased low priced games packed with hours of content, as well as higher priced games that can be beat within a few hours (once mastered).

That said, you'll usually find RM games ranging from around $5 to $20.

For a well designed game that doesn't add a lot of custom content (so long as it uses what it has well), and the story and gameplay is meant to mimic something from the bygone era of SNES games without a lot of extra effort, I'm usually willing to spend $5 to $10.

If the game adds in content, creates features that aren't part of the standard RPG Maker game, and attempts to push the envelope, I'm willing to spend more money. Usually my cut-off is around the $20 mark for a game.