I've always wanted to make this essay, but never had the time when the subject came up. (Forgive any cold-medicine induced randomness.)
THE CASUALNESS OF STATS
Much ado has been made about the "myth" of casuals hating stats. Of course, anyone could just read playtester notes for an inundation of such shit, factor in the percentage of such notes versus the total playtesters, and form a theory. But, we're going to do this the long way around.
So, here is one of the more famous proofs about casuals liking stats.
versus
And it should be noted that there are a number more stats in the baseball game in two separate categories.
People look at these two screenshots, and ooh and ahh about the depth of the stats of the baseball game, and how it obviously has so many more stats than the Gold Box game. Why? Because rpg players are idiots.
The baseball game is the perfect example of the casual version of statistics. However, "Casual" is a term that's been thrown about too much, so let's define two new terms. Rpg-liters and plebs. Rpg-liters are the fans of the likes of Bioware, where the stats are thin, but still complex. Plebs are the real casuals, the ones for whom Bioware is still too complex, and Dungeon Siege is where it's at. The baseball game is not a pleb game; it has far too many stats for that.
But it is an rpg-lite, and one that is the perfect vision of streamlined design. Take the picture. They call them Attributes, but lets use the rpg term of skills for easy translation - every one of their skills is simple and straightforwards, defining one and only one aspect of the character. There are no compound (stacking, in modern parlance) or hidden stats affecting these values. When you have the xp to advance, you choose what skill you want to increase, and you pump it. Liters understand pumping, very much so. They pump gasoline at work, they pump weights, and they pump their dicks all the time. You don't have to explain to them a simple detail like - pump it, and it gets bigger. Pump it, and you become more awesome. Not only do they like that, but that's simple addition math. Grade school shit.
Now, let's go to the Gold Box game. Please note, this is early D&D, so it's not even one of the complex versions. Okay, what's the first stat on that character sheet? Did you say Strength? I'm now the teacher at the head of the class sadly shaking his head. The first stat on that page is Race. Not only is it a stat, it's actually a number of hidden stats that aren't shown on the page. Let's pick one - say, everybody's favorite, the whinging elves.
- They can be fighters, thieves, assassins, magic users, and several combinations including some triple classed combinations.
- Elves who are multiclassed as magic users may cast spells in whatever armor is appropriate to the other classes.
- 90% resistant to sleep and charm spells
- Gain +1 to hit on the use of any bow (but not a crossbow) and any long or short sword.
- Speak their alignment language, common, elfish, gnome, hobbit, goblin, hobgoblin, orcish, and gnoll. And they can learn one additional language for each point of intelligence over 15.
- 60' infravision.
- Notice concealed doors 1/6 passing, 3/6 if searching, and can find secret doors 2/6 (twice the normal chance) if searching for them.
- +1 on dexterity and -1 on constitution.
- Elves who are not in metal armor (and not accompanied by noisier races) surprise 4/6 if they do not have to open a door or portal to reach the opponent.
Now, isn't that special. One word on the screen governs a whole bunch of unseen stats, some of which include words that a pleb wouldn't even know, and a number of which compound with other stats on the screen.
So, let's go to the next stat: class. Dear lord, we just walked across a doozy. Here's one with not just bunches of hidden stats, but hidden stats that compound with level to form huge tables of unseen stats. The plebs are already in the back of the class, drooling in their sleep, and the liters are staring up at you with eyes large in dismay. But let's forge ahead and pick one: wizard. Now you have an hp per level stat, 5 saving throws by level stats, a THAC0 stat, stats governing what kind of equipment you can use, spells per day stats, and a list of spells to choose from - each of which spells has upwards of 10 stats of its own. And not only that, you don't get to have all of those spells with their stats ready to hand, but have to choose which spells you will have available
ahead of time, having considered what you are likely to face ahead.
And the liters just pitched a fit and stalked out, before we even got to equipment, and how it is interchangeable, and how some equipment stacks with certain stats and not others, and some have the stat of reach, and ranged equipment has different range values. And on and on and on.
*
Now, picture someone breaking down 3e in the same way, from which TOEE derives. When 3e was released, we were already in the depths of the console casual era. So, is it any wonder that all the rags said it was too hard? But TOEE didn't just lose out on the reviews. The rags cater to their audience of liters and plebs, and thus TOEE lost out on all the pre-release hype articles that it otherwise might have received. The rags didn't care about it before it was released, they didn't care about it during its release, and they said good riddance after it disappeared from view, and went off to write another article about Call of Duty.
Nasty, brutish and short - and that's once you've got past the interface problems. - Awful
Edge Magazine
From the graphics to the gameplay, in the eye of this beholder, Temple of Elemental Evil screams mediocrity. - Poor
Game Informer
As a result, if you don't already know enough about post-3rd Edition D&D to know that "cleave" is an extremely useful feat for a fighter, or that any wizard worth his salt should learn "fireball" at his or her earliest opportunity, then The Temple of Elemental Evil will be very difficult or even bewildering as you slog through the character-building process. It would have been great if the game, like Neverwinter Nights, allowed you to automatically choose "recommended" features for a character upon leveling up or during character creation. - Average
Gamespot (Do note, any time a reviewer uses words like "slog" or "bewildering", these are key words that turn off liters and plebs.
A little boring. There are only two towns and two dungeons in the game, there is absolutely no story to drive things along (when I got to the end boss, I didn’t even realize who it was), and the quests are a joke. - Poor
Game Over Online
As close as you can get without pen and paper, but for diehards only. - Poor
PC Format
A good RPG brought down by the very thing it touted as a feature: complexity. - Awful
Game Revolution