RNG is Laziness

Random Number Generation has always been a part of loot system to ensure the rarity of rare items (and many more). It is awful to see that RNG has been widely used in everything for game nowadays.



RNG is a cheap way to prolong the game playing, but it does not bring depth to a game, sometimes it spoils the game when being used in the wrong system.

I will discuss the following bad examples using RNG in the wrong system.

Civilization V
They used RNG in Diplomatic System, so that players could get the unpredictable AI feeling. The actual approach Civ5 used to represent the unpredictable humanity, however is flawed, and their AI system is stupid (yes an AI labeled as STUPID, ironic).

The game company knows that, so they hide all the in-game diplomatic info from the players so that no proof can be acquired by the players.

Ironically, there are some players do love the "unpredictability" when it is just the cheap RNG.

Final Fantasy XIV
RNG everywhere, crafting system, XP (was fixed to static XP), repair system and even their only quest system.

The game company knows that their game is shallow, so they put everything to base on RNG, hoping to attract the players to stay in the game until they manage to release more content. (Everyone knows what happened then)

Remember what the gamespot reviewer had said about this game? "They put a lot of obstacles between you and your fun."

I understand some games were meant to play-it-once-and-forget (BioShock2, Mass Effect 2, Dragon Age etc), while the other games were designed to stay in players' harddisk until the sequel/more content being released (such as Civilization series, MMORPG), apparently, the later are much more difficult to design, as the game has to be deep enough to hold players for months up to years!

Another cheap tool is "Achievements".... To be continued