Weight makes sense from a story perspective. Even a top-spec fighter can’t carry four zweihanders and 500 food rations.
But even the 1-STR mage who might have a legitimate carry weight limit of 2kg, should not be told “you can only carry 3 different types of 10-gram herb.” Especially if he’s allowed to carry 200 units of any one of the types. Give me anything resembling a viable story-based reason for that.
But selling a solution to that is a very popular monetization paradigm for MMOs, so it stays.
If we leave realism aside for a moment, though, the difference is that:
a carry slot limit restricts how many distinct kinds of items you can have, whereas
a carry weight limit moreso forces you to leave behind duplicates of items or to e.g. make a choice between heavy armor vs. having auxiliary items.
It depends on the game what’s more fitting for the overall design, but yeah, ultimately you want to prevent the player from optimizing the fun out of the game.
Having very heavy armor or dozens of healing potions can be boring, since there’s no risk anymore.
But having one of each different kind of item can also kill the fun, because having the perfect solution for every situation is just as boring.
I’d argue that rather than carry weight, the real culprit is shops where you can sell stuff. If you knew right away that junk is not worth picking up, because you can’t sell it, then you wouldn’t pick it up. And then the carry weight limit can do what it was designed for, which is to make you strategize what equipment to bring along.
Yeah, and you’d often get a separate junk inventory, along with a one-click button to sell everything from there. I guess, at least it was an attempt to solve the problem…
All the junk in fallout? I know it’s worthless, but my compulsion is to loot everything.
I’m not opposed to those that want that mechanic, but it would be nice for there to simply be a toggle to disable it.
I can’t stand going into a dungeon and on the third chest having to decide what to throw away this time.
I’m ALWAYS going to have a max inventory, it’s stupid not to play a game without it. If I can carry 10 healing items, I will just in case. But it also means at every single drop, I have to go into my inventory and decide what to toss. Or if to toss. It’s takes up time when want to do the fun things in the game. And it makes me have to constantly make decisions and think if this item is better than one I have, and if so what do I get rid of. Do I get rid of healing potions or mana potions? When is the next time I can sell this? How much is this worth?
I play games to play games. Not to micromanage inventory.
Okay, but make crafting mats 0 at least or have a second “hoard” inventory that doesn’t count but is also inaccessible in combat or something. Just give us a way to clean out a dungeon without having to do a bunch of time wasting bullshit.
I played until they patches the bug where if you equipped/unequipped gear that affected carry weight fast enough it would’t remove the effect every time and you could max it out.
Also, I hated that your stash was also limited by carry weight.
Quick time events.
Carry weight.
Hiding content in New Game Plus. Making me play a game twice just to artificially ass replay “value.”
Carry slot limits annoy me more.
Weight makes sense from a story perspective. Even a top-spec fighter can’t carry four zweihanders and 500 food rations.
But even the 1-STR mage who might have a legitimate carry weight limit of 2kg, should not be told “you can only carry 3 different types of 10-gram herb.” Especially if he’s allowed to carry 200 units of any one of the types. Give me anything resembling a viable story-based reason for that.
But selling a solution to that is a very popular monetization paradigm for MMOs, so it stays.
If we leave realism aside for a moment, though, the difference is that:
It depends on the game what’s more fitting for the overall design, but yeah, ultimately you want to prevent the player from optimizing the fun out of the game.
Having very heavy armor or dozens of healing potions can be boring, since there’s no risk anymore. But having one of each different kind of item can also kill the fun, because having the perfect solution for every situation is just as boring.
I’d argue that rather than carry weight, the real culprit is shops where you can sell stuff. If you knew right away that junk is not worth picking up, because you can’t sell it, then you wouldn’t pick it up. And then the carry weight limit can do what it was designed for, which is to make you strategize what equipment to bring along.
Sometimes I would appreciate a “Loot all except junk” button, and possibly having the option of manually marking certain items as junk
Fallout’s solution to that is the Junk Jet which uses junk as ammo. You can collect all the teddy bears you can find and launch them at your enemies.
Remember that brief period where games would have items specifically designed to be vendor trash?
Yeah, and you’d often get a separate junk inventory, along with a one-click button to sell everything from there. I guess, at least it was an attempt to solve the problem…
Seriously, I will rate a game poorly on account of that replay plus bs.
It should only be there so you can experience being fully levelled out for the earlier missions.
Carry weight is gameplay balancing. Without it on those games you’d just hoard a million healing items or something.
All the junk in fallout? I know it’s worthless, but my compulsion is to loot everything.
I’m not opposed to those that want that mechanic, but it would be nice for there to simply be a toggle to disable it.
I can’t stand going into a dungeon and on the third chest having to decide what to throw away this time.
I’m ALWAYS going to have a max inventory, it’s stupid not to play a game without it. If I can carry 10 healing items, I will just in case. But it also means at every single drop, I have to go into my inventory and decide what to toss. Or if to toss. It’s takes up time when want to do the fun things in the game. And it makes me have to constantly make decisions and think if this item is better than one I have, and if so what do I get rid of. Do I get rid of healing potions or mana potions? When is the next time I can sell this? How much is this worth?
I play games to play games. Not to micromanage inventory.
Okay, but make crafting mats 0 at least or have a second “hoard” inventory that doesn’t count but is also inaccessible in combat or something. Just give us a way to clean out a dungeon without having to do a bunch of time wasting bullshit.
Just because a bad mechanic has a purpose doesn’t mean it’s not bad.
I hate being forced to think about that shit.
I love a partial solution in Cyberpunk where healing items simply have a cool down.
Odenst make lore sense really, but you can flavour text that up.
Weightlimits mostly serve to add annoying inventory management to a game that is supposed to be an escape.
They should design their games better to not need the player to do that or horde things.
Its part of why I hate how “loot” is typically done.
I like that system and also collection ones where you don’t have to have multiples of an item. Once you have it its an option.
Better save this potion for later, I might need it.
Oooh, you would not like Fallout 76.
I don’t think anyone likes Fallout 76
I played until they patches the bug where if you equipped/unequipped gear that affected carry weight fast enough it would’t remove the effect every time and you could max it out.
Also, I hated that your stash was also limited by carry weight.