appreciate that one of the most terrifyingly powerful characters in Wandering Sword is just this chill old buddhist monk
Animation Lead on Wanderstop! She/Her & Transgenderrific! Past: Radial Games, Gaslamp Games
appreciate that one of the most terrifyingly powerful characters in Wandering Sword is just this chill old buddhist monk
everything about this pitch is like "game that would get someone killed within a month"
I've been playing a lot of Wandering Sword recently and that game does something I think is kind of fascinating in that I think many designers would consider it a no-no but I think it works REALLY well in context
So the thing is that Wandering Sword is a wuxia game and wuxia as a genre is REALLY heavily defined by an interest in 'self improvment' and growth and the protagonist's journey from weak nobody to unstoppable martial artist. And while that's already a natural fit for an RPG, the game works really hard to emphasize this by making you feel weak at every turn as the game progresses.
They load you down early on with a procession of guest party members who are COLOSSALLY stronger than you and give you full control of them, allowing you to feel as though you're still playing the game but also making it feel like a natural experience to use your weak protagonist as bait, or have him get KO'd every battle. The game even tacitly encourages you to do sidequests by bringing these OP characters places outside the narrative, because, you have them, why not? When at the end of one of these adventures, the character leaves and you're now JUST BARELY strong enough to take on some of the enemies in that same area by yourself, it gives an incredibly pronounced sense of character growth, far stronger even than in most RPGs I've played.
Similarly, they leave a lot of room for you to just get casually beaten down. Sidequests frequently feature forced losses and ties. Random wildnerness enemies have animals that will Just Kill You. You can spar with nearly any NPC in the game and the ones with any martial training at all will absolutely demolish you for most of the game. But this is great! It means that no matter where you are or what you're doing, there's probably a huge amount of things you're thinking about coming back to once you're stronger at any time. In its own way, this is an incredible way to put you in the head of a protagonist whose goal is the classical "I gotta train to be stronger" type. You, too, want to train to be stronger, and can't wait to fight a bunch of people once you do.
It's really neat, honestly - I think a lot of modern design says that this takes people out of a "flow state" or is frustrating or that players hate being forced to lose, but by making it a part of the fabric of the setting and the core power fantasy, I think Wandering Sword turns that feeling of weakness into an incredible strength.