Legacy Characters in a 10 Year Franchise

by Kitekiller, Tuesday, February 26, 2013, 10:26 (4292 days ago)

Not sure if this has been discussed already, but having the same character over 10 years is an inciting idea to me. It is a conversation that me and a couple of friends have been having, and whether we should have the same character all the way through, or start fresh each time.

The heart of the conversation comes down to game balance and how legacy characters would be handled. In order to really feel like your character is being transferred down is by maintaining some level of skills and/or powers that were gained in the previous game. Importing a name or face doesn't really give a feel of continuation. I could play a Zelda game, name the character Master Chief, and despite retaining the green uniform, assault riffle or sword play skills don't really transfer over to either game.

The only other series that comes to my mind revolving around a single customizable character is Mass Effect. The focus of the Mass Effect series was carrying over your decisions, but since Commander Shepard is the same person in all 3 games, he should have the same skill set. Spoiler if you haven't played ME2, but you die in the opening scene, so they avoided continued progression. While serving as an exciting start, it gave an in game excuse for essentially building a new character. From ME2 to ME3 however, you maintain your skill progression and the game extend the skill trees to allow for further growth.

While I'd love to have the same character over 10 years, game balance is a real concern. Ideally, through the course of a game, you start weak and end strong. Carrying an already strong character into a new game could prove game breaking, but We've come up with a few ways around it.

A higher strength cap, where your previous skill get pushed to a new level can give. I think this is the most obvious answer, but poses the biggest disadvantage to new players.

A new set of skills, allowing parallel character progression. This is well balanced for new and returning characters, but is probably the most challenging to balance skills against each other, and potentially leads to unused or redundant talents.

Scaling enemies can lessen the effects of high leveled characters, but at some point, it becomes discouraging to still be fighting low level enemies with enlarged health pools, you worked hard to level up, and likewise, you should feel powerful when you get there.

I know this is pretty long winded, and based more on speculation than known information about Destiny, but it is the kind of conversation that the anticipation of a new Bungie game has lead to. I already know what I think, what I'm interested in hearing what you think; How should legacy characters be handled in this new 10 year, multi-game franchise?