Videogames Will Never Escape The Elements (and neither will you)
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- Опубликовано: 30 апр 2024
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It seems like you can't take two steps inside a videogaming without running into elemental weaknesses and resistances, elemental systemic mechanics, characters with elemental theming and even entire worlds split into elementally-themed chunks... but why? What makes the elements so special that makes them such a common theme that everyone seems to be able to interpret in the same way?
Well, The Architect, after taking a quick sojourn to ancient Greece, stopping by Azeroth and sauntering through the forgotten realms - all whilst trying to avoid Nickelodeon's lawyers - has an answer. The elements aren't just a cornerstone of culture, they're an inherent part of our psychology too - and that means no matter how hard we try, we'll never be entirely rid of them... but is that a good thing?
You saw:
Dark Souls 3 - 2016
Genshin Impact - 2020
From Dust - 2011
Dota 2 - 2013
Super Smash Bros Ultimate - 2018
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim - 2011
World of Warcraft - 2011
Baldur's Gate 3 - 2023
Darkest Dungeon 2 - 2021
Battlerite - 2016
Persona 5 Royale - 2019
Pikmin 4 - 2023
Pokemon Soul Silver - 2009
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time - 1998
Mega Man 11 - 2018
Final Fantasy 7 Remake - 2020
Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga - 2003
Heroes of the Storm - 2014
Borderlands 3 - 2019
Wizardry 2 - 1982
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty - 2023
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom - 2023
Team Fortress 2 - 2007
Overwatch - 2019
Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition - 2020
Elden Ring - 2022
Another Crab's Treasure - 2024
Hearthstone - 2014
Atomic Heart - 2023
Diablo 4 - 2023
Grim Dawn - 2016
Path of Exile - 2013
Resident Evil 2 Remake - 2019
Dark Souls - 2012
Destiny 2 - 2017
Doom Eternal - 2020
Don't Starve - 2013
Passpartout 2 - 2023
Wizard of Legend - 2018
Fortnite - 2017
Opus Magnum - 2017
Potioncraft - 2021
The Legend of Korra Game - 2014
Spellbreak - 2020
Bioshock - 2007
Psychonauts 2 - 2021
Banjo Kazooie - 1997
Mario Kart 8 - 2014
Far Cry 2 - 2008
Final Fantasy 14 - 2010
Noita - 2019
Control - 2019
Max Payne 3 - 2012
DOOM - 2016
Hitman 3 - 2021
Slay the Spire - 2017
Magicka - 2011
Daikatana - 2000
Half Life 2 - 2004
Horizon Forbidden West - 2022
Super Mario Wonder - 2023
Terraria - 2011
XCOM 2 - 2016
Subnautica - 2014
Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom - 2024
Journey - 2012
Abzu - 2016
Nier Automata - 2017
Ori and the Will of the Wisps - 2020
Starcraft 2 - 2010
Alan Wake 2 - 2023
Rayman Legends - 2013
Half Life Alyx - 2020
Superliminal - 2019
ULTRAKILL - Early Access
En Garde - 2023
Halo Infinite - 2021
Halo: The Master Cheif Collection - 2014
DUSK - 2013
Into the Breach - 2018
Devil May Cry 3 - 2005
MTG:A - 2018
Honkai Star Rail - 2023
Pokemon Scarlet - 2022
Pokemon Ultra Moon - 2017
Pokemon White 2 - 2012
Fire Emblem Engage - 2023
Final Fantasy 10 - 2001
Palworld - Early Access
Teardown - 2022
Dishonored 2 - 2016
Super Mario Sunshine - 2002
Yoku's Island Express - 2018
Celeste - 2018
Mario Maker 2 - 2019
Donkey Kong Country 2 - 1995
Sonic Generations - 2011
Xenoblade 3 - 2022
Unicorn Overlord - 2024
Super Mario 64 - 1996
Crash Bandicoot - 1996
Spelunky - 2008
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater - 2004
Shadows over Loathing - 2022
Nexomon Extinction - 2020
Coromon - 2022
Temtem - 2020
Shovel Knight - 2014
Cassette Beasts - 2023
Amnesia: The Dark Descent - 2010
Rain World - 2017
OFF - 2008
Cultist Simulator - 2018
Book of Hours - 2023
Spore - 2008
Minecraft - 2009
Dragon Quest 9 - 2009
The Legend of Zelda: Minish Cap - 2004
Reventure - 2019
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - 2019
Divinity Orginal Sin 2 - 2017
Kirby and the Forgotten Land - 2022
Lords of the Fallen - 2023 
Игры
When you think about it, money is the most important element of all - looking to get some pals together to summon a Cash Elemental and maybe kill it haha no reason totally not running out of frazzles or anything: www.patreon.com/ArchitectofGames
Twitter, Tiktok, Reddit, Discord, long ago, the four elements lived together in harmony, but everything changed when the twitter people attacked!: twitter.com/Thefearalcarrot
Could you please display the titles of the games you're showing us?
It's all rock paper scissors. It's literally the oldest game in human history. It's simple, easy to understand, and difficult/impossible to master.
I thought you were going to talk about elements in terms of game mechanics. Rather your talk of paradigms really is just an explanation of what psychology calls heuristics.
LOL. Such an appropriate response to "MTG" 🤣🤣🤣
Have I been watching your videos for too long if I can say "Aww, I miss Filby the Bilby"?
You can't show MBTI tables that many times and not drop your type.
Domino meme:
"Guy named Paracelsus has some wacky ideas about Salamanders" -> "Every game is contractually obligated to include fire, water, air, and earth damage types"
Dude also invented water elementals being sexy
But somehow, we lost the gnomes in the process.
@@LimeyLassen you're telling me I have unholy knowledge about Vaporeon because of Paracelsus?
@@brzt4256 100% true
I can't believe it's all because of a sexy key
I really liked Mario Odyssey's way of playing around with archetypal elements/settings. All the typical settings are there, but in a different form. There's a desert, but it's the Mexican/Southwest American desert rather than the Egyptian one. There's a forest, but the focus is on machinery. There's a fire/volcano level, but actually it's just hot soup and the level is themed around cooking. Bowser's Castle, but now there's heavy medieval Japanese theming to the decor. Lots of familiarity in these settings, and lots of tropes like quicksand in the sand world or whatever, but just enough of a twist on them to feel noticeably different.
rayman origins and legends both have some unique worlds. Like in origins theres a world themed around fire and ice, but they're both food related. The ice part is a freezer and has blocks of ice and cans of stuff, while the fire part has boiling pots being heated by fire-breathing dragon chefs
I like how the Desert is really cold. That's my favorite part.
odyssey is peak and i hope they make a sequel
A paradigm that does get used often but not often enough imo is that Healing magic damages undead enemies.
I will never get tired of that one boss in Final Fantasy X getting absolutely annihilated by Phoenix Downs
That does seem situational. The cleric in Dungeons and Dragons have turn undead ability. They may be able to destroy undead at higher levels. I am not sure. So what you are talking about about reminds me of that. I think of a way to make the ability more helpful. The cleric or other kind of healer can turn all opponents for a period of time. It helps keep them safe while they heal.
One thing I don't like is when bosses are immune to everything, immune to all elements, immune to magical and physical attacks, immune to all status effects. The devs just basically threw out their own game design and made the fight about dwindling down the HP sponge.
3:08 omg now i'm imagining an rpg that uses Jungian personality types in place of their elements
("Be careful of that attack! It's an Extravert attack and your character is weak to it!")
We're all scared of extroverts that's why we're on youtube
In a sense, Omori is kind of like that if you wanna check that out!
That's why we extraverts are so vicious online. We're all just mad that we can't make introverts sweat IRL. 😂 Ok, well, maybe I'm training to be a pilates teacher & some of my wires are getting crossed here.
Myers-Briggs, the game. "I am Cornholio! ISTP for my bunghole!"
So like Inside Out but it's a monster catcher game? That sounds lit.
Gravity gun is a crazy example to because any game thats ever had a gun shaped vaguely like that you can expect to work similarly as well. Portal obviously but even Ratchet and Clank games have guns with the three arms that pull material or enemies together then launch them. It created a whole new fantastical paradigm right alongside our existing one.
Though in the case of R&C, those weapons owe more to the very first Ratchet and Clank's Suck Cannon, which predates the Gravity Gun by three years.
R&C 3, which was contemporary to Half Life 2, also had the Rift Inducer, which shot screen-distorting singularities that would suck up enemies like a black hole, a pattern that also showed up in a bunch of places slightly later.
Honestly, Ratchet and Clank as a series deserves more credit for introducing or popularizing wacky mechanics.
Like the video mentioned, it's the way they're designed that informed this new paradigm. They're not standard guns at all, the extending claws implies it's actually meant to pinch/grab stuff instead of shoot stuff. Which is then confirmed when you use it, and then you're taught _that's_ what it shoots.
The portal gun does technically shoot stuff normally, but the design at least implies it's not a "bang bang kill" gun, and you see it shooting portals even before you're allowed to use it yourself. And then in later puzzles you see it _also_ cube-lifting abilities too.
Elements feel so much less token when there's not an optimized damage system built around them. A lightning sword in Sekiro feels so much more significant than a lightning sword in any flavor-of-the-month RPG because it's not just 'yellow damage number,' it's a set of moves and status effects not seen in any of the normal steel-on-steel fights.
True,a lack of organizing actually helps giving the feel.
I liked Dragon and Ghost before they were balanced ,because the coolness was that they were "Prestige" types,with very few pokemon and op stats. Dragons were resistant to the starter(and Elett.) ,so real " final boss "feel. Ghost were the "trickster-joker" ,like being able to ignore terrain in MD,moves always 100% acc, and peculiar status moves.
After gen 4,they were normalized too much.
Plus it fits the mechanics while being distinct from them. It’s still a parry-counter, but even the mechanics of that are vastly different to the normal attacks.
It also helps it hits like a truck and goes through enemy block, but rare enough
@@junichiroyamashita I've started to appreciate early Pokemon types because of this. Ice offers no resistances? It's a late-game extension of water, it's not meant to be on its own or used by amateurs. Also, types were balanced by abundance (which had the knock-on effect of making psychic types indestructible, admittedly) You only have to start worrying about symmetry in the designs if your game is going to focus on competitive PVP or going to be played for hundreds of hours.
Yellow lightning is cringe. Blue lightning is where it's at. It looks so much cooler than crackling piss
Yup, that's one of the places where FFXVI really fucked up
Honestly as long as a game can use the same mechanics we see in older games but improve upon them or fix what doesn't work it's never a problem to me
Agreed. I like the fact that when I buy a new game, I'm already at least 90 percent of the way toward intuitively knowing how to play it because these genre conventions are so well entrenched.
@@SimuLord well for me I want it to feel comfortable in some aspects so when the game is a bit more complex it makes it easier to get adjusted to it by already knowing the element system or how to level up equipment or such.
Personally I think the opposite. Things should be as interesting and different as possible.
@@sonwig5186 That's how you get things like the guns in Daikatana. Innovating purely to be different is a recipe for having an unintuitive, byzantine control scheme or a completely incomprehensible UI. It's like those stupid door handles on the Tesla Model 3. They didn't need to screw with what everyone was familiar with, and it's a PITA to get into and out of an Uber when they had this figured out decades ago in the automobile industry.
Part of gaming's maturing as a medium has been to codify and standardize essential game mechanics so that today's devs can shift their focus to using those tools to create narratively interesting game worlds or to combine those mechanics in new and interesting ways to expand the scope of existing genres.
@@SimuLord We are looking for different things. I think it is better to have wierd unpolished games than boring standardized games. I'm saying this as someone who values atmosphere etc. as the most important part of gaming today. Also I liked Daitkatana.
If we look past the poison swamps, Fromsoft is really good at playing with paradygms. Shout out to the Dark Souls series for building an entire paradigm association of "Lightning beats Dragon" in it's very first cutscene (and subsequently reversing that association in Elden Ring to push the two IPs apart story-wise, even though they're mechanically connected). Or how thoroughly Bloodborne teaches you "if it has fur and it drools, burn it" not just with helpful item descriptions, but also dozens and dozens of werewolves already burned at the stake in the enviroment. Or the way Elden Ring's eldritch alien invaders are themed around _rock_ instead of poison, acid, or mental damage.
My favorite thing is when games have elemental damage systems other than the standard mythological ones, but still are able to carve out their own niche for each one. Something like biological-mechanical-magical/psychic.
One of my favourite examples is Runescape's combat triangle. Wizards can kill warriors (they have a range advantage, can use debuffs and freeze effects, and spells do increased damage against metal armour), warriors can kill archers (arrows can't penetrate heavy armour, and without any kind of freeze effect the range advantage is negligible), and archers can kill wizards (wizards can't debuff archers, the archers can still attack while frozen in place, wizard robes don't provide any defence against arrows, and archers wear dragonhide armour that resists magic). It mostly makes sense and it adds some mechanical depth.
Reminds me a little bit of how Disco Elysium invented a familiar yet unique set of skills for your character. There were counterparts (with new, often creative names) for your typical ones like strength, perception, and charisma, but also brand new ones like Shivers, which gave you a kind of visions of past and current events, Inland Empire, which was how crazy things were inside your head (level it high enough and your necktie becomes a party member) and Electrochemistry, which was your inner party animal, complete with broad knowledge of alcohol and drugs.
Never thought too much about elementals like fire, ice, etc. being a mainstay in games. I'm typically more annoyed by how so many fantasy settings resort to the Tolkien-esque array of humans, dwarves, elves, etc. But that's getting too far off-topic, ig.
My current system for the game I'm working on has warmth/energy, cold/entropy, motion/vigor, stillness/apathy. They map to classical elements pretty well but with different implications when you mix them together. For exemple an ecosystem like a forest would be warmth + vigor, while warmth + apathy would be a desert but cold + vigor would be a city because the city itself is a lifeless environement but with a lot of dynamism from the humans living within.
And rather than being about weakness and resistances it's about the type of effect (energy is typically going to be damage, cold is going to be negation effects and shields, motion is going to be buffs and empowerements and apathy is about debilitation and enfeeblements), and elementalist can gather energy from the terrain they're in so the type of effect they've access to vary depending on the terrain.
I honestly loved OFF's different elements
@@Specious_SeraphimSmoke is mined from the ground to create the air we breathe, meat flows from fountains, plastic forms the oceans, metal is extracted from the stomachs of cows, and sugar is... well, I won't spoil it for those who have read this far.
6:38 Gun Elements:
"Shoot tube"
"Zoom-O-Matic"
"[UNKNOWN OBJECT]"
One of the strangest paradigms in action/fighting games is that Fast movements are balanced to be weak/light, but Slow movements are balanced to be Strong/Heavy. When you learn anything about physics and fighting, things that move faster, have weight, and impact on smaller surface area much stronger than a slow wind-up with a long, overhead animation. The only reason this really works, i think, it that we also falsely perceive large things as moving more slowly the further away they appear. A train can look quite slow until it is within a few hundred feet from ya
Of course, it's a balancing thing: if devs don't want you to be able to do everything at once, everything requires a tradeoff
It's not strange at all, it's about game balance. Imagine if fast moves dealt high damage, and slow moves dealt low damage. Why would you then ever use the slow moves?
I think a part of the logic is also that swinging a sledgehammer is very slow compared to swinging a baton but also carries a lot more force behind the strike. It's just that the same logic doesn't exactly directly extrapolate everywhere. A knife is much faster than a sledgehammer but you are also able to do several lethal wounds in the time of a one lethal sledgehammer impact
I mean, force = mass x acceleration. A big heavy dude is gonna take more acceleration to negate inertia, thus bigger acceleration x bigger mass = bigger force. A quick, light punch doesn't have as much inertia to overcome to begin with, so it doesn't take much to get it started. With a lower overall level of force, it transmits less force as well. Makes perfect sense to me 😂
Agreed I never found the slow vs. fast style exciting. What makes the design worse is when you have to choose one style to lock yourself into, you're either fast all the time or slow all the time. It's a very boring choice. I prefer that you can use both at the same time depending on the enemy type. So far Sleeping Dogs is the only one that I've seen do that right.
Many paradigms also start by using existing common elements (like fire, water, lightning, etc.) before starting to add in their original, more weird elements. Hence, the player doesn't have to start at zero when learning elemental interactions
Ok, so I hear you asking for a game about a witch that travels from the friendly and familiar poison swamp through a warm and inviting volcano land before finally traversing the oppressive forest and facing the villain of the Green Grasslands...
I'm particularly fond of In Stars and Time's element system. It just fully drops the pretense and labels them, both mechanically and in-universe, as rock, paper, and scissors.
The best part is that the elements still inform the character archetypes. Your rock party member is a tank, your paper party member is the bookish mage, the speedy rogue gets scissors by process of elimination, and the super special Chosen One textually gets two elements (nevermind that she's not the only one who can use moves of multiple elements for gameplay purposes). They're also repeatedly stated to all have plenty of uses and cultural significance outside of combat.
Adam, there's like 3 poison swamps in the first ER DLC trailer already... Poison swamps and dirty feet are Miyazaki's serial killer calling cards, his PARADIGM if you will
crying in the club rn. sobbing. why wont he stop.
@@ArchitectofGames He just can't help himself.
...feet?
@@ArchitectofGamesRoughly paraphrasing his own words, it's not because he likes inflicting pain, it's because he's a masochist and likes experiencing it.
Man made his kinks every action combat game fan's problem and we all signed up for the highest tier of his Onlyfans.
@@LimeyLassen Food for thought: Ranni, Malenia, Miquella, Radagon, Marika, etc
I joke that in some games like ARPGs where the elements don’t really do anything special that the game has “raspberry damage, blueberry damage, kiwi damage, grape damage, etc.”
that's one of the major gripes I had against Diablo3. D2's elements had identity. You see what's happening on screen and can adjust to it. In D3, when I died to a specific enemy I was always like:
"Oh, this enemy does alot of damage. I have to take care of his attacks"
and never like:
"Oh, this enemy does lightning damage. Let me stack up some light res"
btw wtf is arcane damage!?
Another thing I don't like is damage over time is usually not worth it. Wow 3 damage over 20 seconds? Just smack them with a sword and be done with it. Trash mobs don't last 20 seconds anyway and bosses are mostly immune to it. Instead of wasting your skill on damage over time, just spend that skill increasing your sword damage.
I liked Horizon where damage from elements was pretty poor, and instead elemental damage was used to trigger reactions from different parts on the target. And what element mattered for what part required taking the time to scan your target and learn about it, and having the accuracy to hit where you mean to hit. IMO that was a valuable shakeup of the normal elemental system. Another option for elemental identity is non-combat spells. The way you navigate the world is a really valuable way to give different roles to air, fire, water, earth, etc. The ability to repair objects, endure harsh environments, cure disease, teleport past physical barriers, open complex locks etc with the different elements can give them highly distinct identities.
I suppose another paradigm would be size. Even in games where an enemy's looks doesn't at all impact you, such as in card games as opposed to action RPGs, if the monster depicted looks big, it's strong, bulky, hits hard, but is slow.
OK, that off-the-rails intro was truly S tier.
I've been meaning to join your Patreon for awhile now and that got me to actually click the link and do it.
Thanks so much!
Excellent Avatar references here. I especially love the reference to the Avatar intro complete with Chinese terms for the various elements, beyond even the standard four elements.
Ha , the philosopher , nametag gag was neat .
But guess what : Plato IS ALREADY a Nametag .
By that , i mean it wasn't the guys actual name , but his wrestler name , meaning WIDE .
he was apparently quite good at wrestling too .
Wrestling or pankration? For those unfamiliar, pankration comes from the Greek words pan, meaning all, and kratos, meaning angry video game protagonist.
I had no idea of this, that's amazing!
Platos meant " Wide shoulders" ,which was considered unattrative,but was an indicator of his wrestling skill.
wh at
Someone should probably mention that his real name was Aristocles. Perhaps the nickname Plato stuck around for so long just to prevent confusion between Aristocles and his very similarly named disciple Aristoteles.
Imo another reason the “4 Elements” have such a chokehold because they mirror the states of matter
Earth - Solid
Water - Liquid
Air - Gas
Fire - Plasma
Such a great video so far!!!!
I've noticed the same thing!
People did not know about plasma for most of history and I don't think most people have an intuitive grasp of what it is. Also it's more related to lightning than fire
Three-Headed Dragon Meme:
Left dragon: 火烈 fire fierceness, 气和 air harmony, 水善 water benevolence, 土强 earth strength
Middle dragon: 金属 metal, 闪噩 lightning bad, 株健 (tree trunk) healthy, 水寒 water cold, 龙异 dragon strange
Right derpy dragon: 魔吗 (evil spirit) (question particle), 毒同 poison same, 光哥 light (older brother), 黑姐 black (older sister), 核今 nuclear now
My Chinese isn''t very good but I had a feeling they didn't sound right.
@@michaelcheng9987 I'm native Chinese and I have strong feeling that they didn't sound right
@@FlameRat_YehLon I'm ethnic Chinese too, I'm just terrible at the language.
The breadth of game footage you have is incredible.
Seriously, thank you for the editing and including so much footage for those of us that watch closely
If I had a nickel for every Indie fantasy game that checked at least two of these points...
- long dormant "ancient glowing stone-technology"
- enemies born from said technology
- elemental variations of the technology
- the name of the realm is some variation of "Arcadia"
- a godess named Gaia, Maia, or something similar
- promotional art that's heavily inspired by anime
- in-game art that's an entirely different art style
I'd had an excessive amount of nickels.
This is just because of people who grew up playing Square SNES JRPGs.
I did not grow up playing them, but definitely makes sense as one source of the pattern.
Grail is easy to understand. I still haven't gotten around the fundamental differences between Lantern and Moth though.
Those are fun. Like Moth is associated with crime and sin, but also safety and transformation. It's really nonstandard. Also lantern is associated with enlightenment even though the gods and angels are all sorta evil and crazy.
If someone is right, it's lantern, if someone is wrong, it's moth :P
If I had to boil the aspects down to one word, I'd say that Lantern is knowledge and Moth is chaos. Both are connected to insanity, but Lantern is the insanity of knowing too much and Moth is the insanity of not knowing if you're even real.
The diverse list of games shown as background footage in this video was a fantastic Who's Who of gaming! Great video
I agree!
I love pokemon type system,they are lot more than the common 4 or 5. Each type has its own identity in flavour and mechanics,with main themes and subthemes. You find stuff like Dragon,Ghost,Bug,Rock(specifically) Psychic,and Poison,all things that cannot be found anywhere else as main types.
And in the earliest games, you had types that act as modifiers. Rock was pretty much an extension of Ground, Ice was an extension of Water, Psychic could exist on its own, but could also modify special types, overriding the previous rule and Flying can modify any type.
@@connordarvall8482 I really like the mechanical identity set by the Dark type being all "underhanded" or "cheap" moves, that have less direct power than other types. For example sucker punch, fake out, pursuit, knock off, thief, etc all having some kind of utility or effect that hurts the other poke in ways other than just doing good damage or a status. There are other characteristics of other types too. Rock moves tend to be inaccurate. Fighting type moves tend to have really high numbers, but some kind of risk or drawback (focus punch, dynamic punch, close combat, high jump kick, etc). Some of the other types aren't as well defined (like flamethrower/bolt/icebeam all being basically the same attack, or scald in general) but gamefreak has done a great job especially with the gen 5 elite four types making their moves "feel" like they couldn't belong to any other type.
"Can you afford to take out some low-level Grunts and Jackals early, or do you have to focus on the much more threatening Elites and Brutes..."
Sniper Alley PTSD: Ha. Ha. HahahahahahahAHAHAHAH
I'm glad as a kid I figured out running on the roof long before I ever actually played Legendary.
Magicka is a timeless classic
If only it didn't crash all the time
A series that does a stellar job at putting a twist on a classic system is the Like a Dragon RPGs! Having "homeless guy" and "cabbie driver" as RPG jobs is genius, you have to actually use each job for a while to notice "oh, so this is supposed to be a mage" lol
I especially liked what the first few Kingdom Hearts games did with their elemental magic. There are only three basic elements: Fire, Blizard, and Thunder. The player has one spell of each type, and they vary in the way they target enemies, in their amount of damage, and in MP cost, making each useful in different situations even without taking into account their elemental aspect.
Each enemy type has its own elemental resistances and vulnerabilities, and its own elemental attacks. Equipment can grant partial elemental resistances to the player, but enemies also have access to Darkness-type attacks, which only rarer equipment can provide resistance to. Some enemies can also absorb certain elements and be healed by them. Luckily, these enemies cannot absorb Gravity magic, a special player spell that deals proportional damage.
So most of the time, you choose which spell to use based on (1) which enemy you're fighting, (2) how much MP you have, (3) where is the enemy position in relation to you and other enemies, (4) how much HP the enemy has left. That's a lot more interesting than just picking the right attack for the right enemy, and resorting to melee attacks when you're out of MP.
But every enemy is vulnerable to a Keyblade to the face.
@@Poldovico Um Actually, Large Bodies are only vulnerable to a keyblade to the *back.*
@@daniellemurnett2534 If you jump you can hit them in the face and it works :P
It's just the belly is in the way most of the time.
@@Poldovico I literally knew this but it somehow didn't coem to mind I'm a fake fan
Guardians are only vulnerable at the back for realsies though!
@@daniellemurnett2534 It's much harder to avoid hitting the Guardian's shield than to avoid hitting the Large Body's belly, but I think it's possible.
Keyblade ALL the faces! :D
Elements are just cool as hell. If a game revolves around elements i'm instantly more interested in it
100%
I’ve always wanted a game that starts out with traditional element match ups; water dousing fire, fire melting ice, ice freezing water, etc, and then over the course of the game it starts shifting to one’s that go against what we expect. One day water is putting out fire, the next it only makes it burn hotter
Sorry you’ve been having a rough time Adam, but your videos always brighten up my day so I’m glad you’re able to keep working through and hope you know there are lots of people who really appreciate your content😁
Honestly i wanna see nature types be more brutal as nature is very destructive when at it's worse
Or like avatar sub type to each element so characters can grow into their own unique powers
theres a lot of that in the form of druids in various games. shapeshifting into savage animals and tearing people apart
funny thing, each "sub-type" in avatar isnt really an entirely new element, its just a new and novel form of bending their already natural element.
metal benders can only bend metals that contain certain amount of impurities, as found by that blind girl character.
blood benders can only bend blood bc it contains water.
lava benders (Bolin from Korra) still bend earth, just in a too violent way.
lightning benders, like azula, are just bending fire (which is just plasma, aka energy) with extreme force and violence making it summon lighting.
There is a fifth and special element tho, but only spirits and the avatar themselves have shown to use that one, Spirit Bending, which not only bends darkness and light, but also is the core of what allows an avatar to bend all elements, it can also be known as "life bending"
My favourite element is fire
Yes fire element is normally paired up with destruction and burning but fire is also heat to keep away the cold, light to chase away the shadows, and energy in it’s most pure form
Yes fire can be dangerous but it can be very useful if handled correctly
The Last Airbender had that rainbow column of fire towards its end.
Can't be the only one but but it's my favorite mental concept/image of fire being non-destructive(almost creative).
@@il-ma.le.Yes! This was exactly on my mind.
The Bullet Heaven subgenre uses fire for healing surprisingly often. 20 Minutes Till Dawn is just one, but a lot of them seem to have caught onto the whole phoenix theming.
@@FelisImpurrator that is nice to know :)
I don't remember the title, but there was a game where the fire user was a really calm type.
A divine priestess with all the saintly powers. Her personality was more like a boiling volcano waiting to erupt anytime though.
But that's beside the point. All the other characters with their relative elements are very non-conventional by todays' norms. This was around the 2010s.
Our current landscape of "standard" (and boring) stereotypes started around 2012, i feel.
I dunno, I feel it’s a fair bit older than that
Seeing a paradigm or motif realized feels kind of like the relief / catharsis that's felt when tension in music is resolved. Idk if that makes sense haha
Okay, this is probably gonna be a longer comment, but bear with me as something discussed here led to an idea to consider and work with.
Let's say we made up a magic system to use in a world. This system has different aspects of magic become stronger or weaker depending on the season of the year it is. Now, it probably would make sense. Spring, a season of rebirth, would favor healing magic. Summer, a period of heat, favors destructive. Fall, a period of calming, could favor DOT magic. Winter, a period of stillness, would favor debuff magic. For the sake of argument let's say what that is.
Now, here's where it gets interesting. While this is true for the homeland of your game or where you are, they soon learn of another culture where everything seems wrong. For some reason, this other culture has DOT magic in Spring, Debuff magic in Summer, Healing magic in Fall, and Destructive magic in Winter. Why is this?
Because this other culture is on the opposite hemisphere, where the seasons are inverted for the same period of time. Spring in America is Fall in Australia, but both have the healing magic.
Now, put your mind on and try and think of how this Southern society would explain such things in a way that would make sense to their culture.
*ahem*
Yoink!
@@ShiftySetax Hey go ahead. It was a basic idea, if you have better ways to work it and throw it into your D&D world or anything else go ahead.
@@Chessrook44 Thanks, mostly kidding though. That's certainly an interesting idea though, and I might consider using something similar.
Thats avatar. Still you did your best.
@@danieladamczyk4024 Wait... I thought Avatar was Earth, Wind, Fire, and Water. Admittedly I never WATCHED the show but still...
I love that you mentioned Cultist Simulator and Book of Hours. They're two of my favorite games that no one seems to talk about.
One time in college, my roommate and I were talking about the "four elements" and he pointed out that they aren't so crazy and are a decent representations of the phases of matter: earth = solid, water = liquid, air = gas, fire = plasma. That has always stuck with me, and has made interested in designing an elemental system for a game rooted more in the physics of each element. Earth practitioners excel at increasing covalent bond strengths between molecules, whereas fire practitioners can ionize and direct jets of plasma. This could lead to interesting extensions, such as lightning being a master level of fire, more precisely controlled and less wasteful.
Some day I'll work on this... some day...
Obviously the alternative that we should be pursuing is switching to actual periodic elements, where each element's themes become more abstract and esoteric as you increase the number.
"Molybdenum type enemies. Vulnerable to insults to their dancing skills, but very resilient to fire damage."
Seeing Into the Breach in this video is interesting because *its* fire squads are more focused on (in the case of the flame behemoths) positional manipulation and slowly letting the Vek burn to death, or (in the case of the heat sinkers) just sucking. Then again the hyper offense squads in that game are based on lightning and acid so i guess they stick to the elemental paradigm somewhat.
This has been one of your most interesting videos for me, personally. Well done, Sir.
3:20 you thought I wouldn't recognize that Opus Magnum music with you talking about the elements
Burn out is rough. Take care of yourself. I'm happy if videos take longer and you take good care of yourself.
A neat way I can see an elemental system being used, particularly in action games, is via having each element can alter combat in some way.
A good example would be Fire where targets afflicted with it experience a short duration of continuous damage that deals a set amount of damage, this damage being further increased by damaging the target with the Fire causing the target to take increased damage from your attacks.
Another example would be hitting a target with a life plant that leaches a percentage of a targets health, taking slightly more health over a longer duration than fire. The plant having a secondary effect of staggering a target that has the plant latched onto them, allowing one to more safely to attack with slower yet heavier hitting attacks with less risk of being countered.
Examples such as these can also have a synergy effect where Fire can have its duration increased by having a plant latch onto a target that is on fire, additionally increasing the damage buff of Fire in the process.
I just started listening to that beef and Dairy podcast, and so far pretty funny, thanks for the recommend.
I'm always happy to see a video from you, no matter how long it takes. I might think differently if I was actually paying you though. Hmmm...
I probably should do that someday though, since I find your stuff pretty valuable.
At 0:07, I was waiting for "Once the four elements lived in harmony, but everything changed when the fire nation attacked." or "Only the avatar can master all four elements..."
Take a break when you need to. Don't make your work a Swamp Level.
The ideas of the elements are not "nonsense," rather they got the idea of the phases of matter right. Solid, liquid, gas, plasma (there are more but I won't belabor it).
yeah the epistemology of this video was really bizarre to me; I didn't expect it to be so...idk, sociological? Like they're like that because of the possible spaces of earth climates, not because people just agree or have evolved to categorize this way. Blindspot going on for sure.
all of From Software's games are a metastory of one man and his love for poison swamps.
Let the man cook... toxic waste in his poisonous swamp.
Clearly, the only way he can free himself is to make a game themed entirely around feet and poison swamps.
Call it…Dark Soles
nightmare reaper generally has a basic elemental damage system, but shortly after unlocking the upgraded grappling hook it introduces a bunch of enemies with electric attacks and it's around this time you learn that getting electrocuted temporarily disables your grappling hook
8:50 I wish you touched more on the idea that video games didn't invent these associations - they run deeper than even the elements. Grasslands are safe places because you can see predators coming. Dark woods are dangerous because you can't. Most animals know this instinctively, and we're no exception. Our sense of primal danger is not based on the media we experience, though it can be reinforced by them.
Swamps have been full of stench, poisonous plants and biting insects since long before humans existed, let alone video games.
Dragons exist in the cultural psyche precisely because they're scary. They combine things we instinctually fear -- big teeth, big claws, giant bat wings, fire. We didn't learn that from video game conventions.
This is also true of the elements, to a degree (though I haven't finished the video yet and you might touch on this): while you said they're "scientifically nonsense", they're actually a reasonable proxy for the phases of matter (solid=earth, gas=air, liquid=water, fire=....fire). And these abstractions are not just an outdated paradigm, we STILL experience the world this way. We don't pour glasses of Dihydrogen Monoxide, even though that is a more precise elemental paradigm than "water". We don't burn ourselves on exothermic oxidation reactions.
Elements are just extremely useful as a framing device for mechanics... because they are ingrained in the game mechanics psyche and work on simplistic knowledge and deeply ingrained societal concepts. Plus they are easily done uniquely
it's funny you remark burnout when this video was so good! fr, it was so well done and on such good subject matter!
It says something about me that I saw the thumbnail and thought, "TOO SOON!"
Probably that I'm as old as the ancients to bring up a reference that old.
sorry to hear about the burnout, i know I'll still love your vids even if they take a little bit more time in between! they're best when you're having the most fun, anyway
14:44 For real though, why is that stupid doll one of the hardest fights I had in P5? It's weirdly powerful for such an early pseudoboss.
In every game I play. If I have access to water/ice magic, powers, weapons, or abilities. I am required to express myself through it.
I like the Grounded system of elements that are based on ‘flavors’- salt, mint, spicy, and sour, just the kind of thing bugs can be affected by.
Shout out to Epic Battle Fantasy IV with the lava level being the first one and the forest level being the difficulty spike in the later half of the game. That really makes it quite memorable compared to other rpgs.
Rain World mention! I am so happy :)
Not gonna lie, did not expect Rain World to come up in this topic, but I am definitely not complaining!
horse element beats arrow element
arrow element beats spear element
spear element beats horse element
The B roll goes crazy in this video. Well done ❤️
I'm sad this video didn't contain the element of surprise
It did! Just listen to the first Patreon name shoutout!
One could say you were surprised the video didn't contain it
I have bad news for you, a poison swamp is already confirmed in Edlen Ring's DLC, sadly.
This video makes so much sense, I don't know if it's because it's brilliantly explained or because it's so damn obvious. Probably a bit of both. It's worth stressing that something not feeling new or surprising is not an unfortunate consequence of using an already understood paradigm, *but a tautology.* Understanding something means that you are not surprised by it and can predict how it works. The trick is for games to find the right balance between understandability and novelty (which depends on the mood the game is going for), rather than trying to be both at the same time.
In case it helps with burnout: I always look forward to your videos and genuinely think they're the best gaming YT content out there.
Calling taxonomy easy to understand boxes is the funniest thing i've heard all week, for how wrong it is.
Azurik: Rise of Perathia is my all-time favorite game. From what I hear online, it was Microsoft's attempt at a Zelda killer and every review on RUclips is just "camera controls bad 0/10" without actually playing to the end of the game.
I can tell you with certainty that this game is incredible if you can get over the inverted camera controls. Your weapon is a bladed staff that has these four buttons on it, that correspond with the color scheme of the xbox controller and you activate the elemental effects of your staff via combinations of the elements or just one element (earth + fire gives lava damage, water + fire + air gives you a lightning shield that can repel and damage enemies). Each enemy has it's own weakness to an element and you learn what that element is based on the globes they drop on death (the globes refill your power, as each use drains some power from that respective element). The puzzles are incredible as well, such as one that spams over several zones that unlocks an entire area, so backtracking is also a part of the game.
Overall, it's an incredibly fun and unique game and I wish it could be remade or playable on PC.
This would be an interesting switch up. Select a culture like Innuit and make fire heal, ice do the most damage, earth be very valuable etc.
Keep going you beast, Much love
I was just working on an elemental system for my game when I saw this video! And yeah, a lot of it is already set in stone, but there's no reason not to shake it up a bit. What about Salt? It can counteract Wetness and deal extra damage to slimes, slugs, amphibians and fish.
Hahah amazing you were shouting out beef and dairy network. It's great. Going to see three bean salad in a couple days . 😁
I was off work for the day once and was standing surrounding waiting for my ride when I got to thinking about these same elements. I had an epiphany.
Earth = Solids
Water = Liquids
Air/Wind = Gases
Fire = Plasma
The four basic elements are the four states of matter.
Dishonorable mention to a gatcha game- Limbus Company- where elements are associated with sins and make both concepts richer through this.
Slashing, piercing and blunt damage interactions also help
I'm really happy you mentioned Book of Hours because I was going to come down here and mention it anyway. You may need a notebook/word doc to play the game to its fullest, but the game is fantastic! Check it out.
Something that would be a lot of work but would be cool is a soulslike or beat em up with the main character being a scientist. For magic or elements you'd have the entire periodic table, but to unlock them you'd have to either guess the atomic weight of the element, or fight a boss themed around that element, with heavier and lighter atomic weighted elements working as weaknesses to and strengths to other elements. But you couldnt go too low because then they would become unstable and explode where you hit them, hurting you in the process. Just an idea
12:53 aaggghh.
In all seriousness the colour pie is one of the single best pieces of game design i have ever encountered
Fair play to Infamous Second Son for mixing the elements up: smoke, video, neon, concrete. I appreciate that
Honestly elements in games are one of my favourite elements. They add a fun rock paper scissors dynamic, are free in world philosophy, and can add loads of creativity within a set system
it´s easy to understand and to visualize. you can get creative like having different psyches, morales, wind directions etc. but you will end up with something that visualizes symbols, shapes and use the primary and secondary colors
12:58 the instinctive revulsion of seeing the Magic color pie rotated slightly is incredibly unfun to experience
"And we know dragons are threatening since we've been associating them with danger ever since the days of DnD."
Adam... have you ever heard about St. George?
I freaking love elemental magic systems, as far as I can remember I always have. My earlies related memory was seeing a movie that mentioned astrology and the elementa related to the constellations and I found really cool. Since then it is always some of my favorite tropes specially in videogames no so much in books and movies anymore.
Mark Rosewater's talk on game design called "twenty years, twenty lessons" is an excellent read and is quite applicable to this topic
I'd recommend doing a quick search on schema theory. Categorizations in humans' memories can be called "schemata!"
Slight 'oops' in the description, Adam. You said it was Mega Man 10, but it's actually Mega Man 11, that you showed at the time.
Oops! Will change that now!
I'm absolutely here for you whining, Adam. Hope you take enough rest to feel well soon. Remember to do things that you can see the immediate reward for. Thank you for making this video, I love your channel and your work is great.
22:30 I mean we saw a really yucky brown looking swamp in the Elden Ring DLC trailer so looks like you're goin' to Japan. :)
My brother is a big fan of the Beef and Dairy Network podcast! Extremely funny 😂
Gotta love a good shoot tube! Thanks for the content
Didn’t expect Darkest Dungeon to be in this video but it was a surprisingly good example.
I would say the Mega Man series has done a great job at exploring alternative paradigms... _to varying degrees of success_ ... But they also mix in some more common paradigm associations in their boss weakness order just so players have somewhere to start. I just wish they were more consistent with it. Ice was strong against Fire in the first game, but it switched to being weak to it in the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 10th. Then it switched back to being strong against it in the 11th.
That's why I prefer when element typings aren't stronger or weaker than others, but are _mutually reactive_ . Elements that are polar opposites either cancel each other out or are equally effective against their counterpart. It takes some of the guess work out of knowing what's effective against what and helps mitigate problems from cropping up like in the Pal World example where one ends up outclassing all the rest.
Elements have always been a compelling paradigm, and I'm actually creating a board game where the core mechanic is collecting different Elemental abilities/cards. Each Element has a unique mechanical identity and elemental enemies have specific weaknesses/resistances. I dialed it back such that they only resist their own element at this point because the system doesn't need to be so complex for my purposes. I like to think the mechanics mirror expected paradigms but only time will tell.
Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom is so fun. Really great look at platforming