I wouldn't say Monster Hunter World and Rise have a durability mechanic like you mentioned. It does have the sharpness system that is similar in a way, but it's not consistently a bother like most systems. Of course the sharpness go down as you use it, and eventually goes so low that you do 0 damage. But fixing the weapon takes nearly no time and uses a free unlimited item. Also, the mechanic interacts with a lot of abilities and becomes less of a hindrance or none at all as the game progress
We love mojang back then because of nostalgia and the revival of Minecraft. There’s no reason to rush them during that period cause most game are also slow of update/development. It is basically the circumstances of that time, I still stand by my 2020 decision of letting mojang slowly cook……. Though current day is a different story
I thought you were gonna say Caves and Cliffs ngl, I saw SOOOOO much hate and controversy surrounding this update and it's one that I myself am not a huge fan of
Minecraft Dungeon's End was super interesting and stuff, it'd be cool if Mojang added some parity with Minecraft Dungeon's end, though I'm pretty sure lore-wise Minecraft Dungeon is supposed to have taken place a VERY long while ago, still post-fall but yeah I'd imagine it wouldn't be the exact same as it was back then.
You know what game doesn't have durability? Ultima IV. One of the most celebrated game designers in history looked at Ultima III and decided durability was a mistake that should not be repeated. That should tell you everything you need to know.
I saw a mod for Minecraft which changed durability to only affect you when you die, basically meaning when you die all your weapons and armor and tools take a huge chunk of damage, making it kind of an in-between between keepinventory on and off, where you can lose stuff from it but it's not 100%, also Project Zomboid is planning to overhaul the crafting system and with it, making it so when tools and weapons break, they turn into pieces of weapons that can be used to make more weapons. Both of these methods for durability seem to work way better than how it currently is in games, one is simply a punishment for lacking skill, while the other is a compromise and lets you make more weapons from the pieces of your previous weapons.
I really like the games that use durability and have the tolls be "damaged" instead of just removing them when they break. The other thing is that this mechanic becomes absolutely nothing but tedious once you have your little ender man farm and mending on the tools, it's literally like I'll be mining or doing anything and my pickaxe is going to break so I travel to the end, get to the farm and then just spam the left button for like 10 minutes until the tool's durability is maxed. Durability is a mechanic
i have to say that while the "story" aspect is interesting, this video isnt very well researched and makes a lot of points that simply dont make much sense, such as: animal crossing somehow being a pivotal game for durability as a mechanic, despite it only being used on one item just so players wouldnt cut down all of their trees not mentioning durability within the legend of zelda series until after mentioning breath of the wild despite those games having some really annoying uses of the system it is implied that durability only became popular in the gaming eco-space because of minecraft and botw, despite its popularity as a concept more likely to be attributed to its extreme use in survival games, causing minecraft and botw to add the mechanic in the first place its implied that hating on durability is a newer concept, and that durability was well liked "before the haters came" but durability was always reacted with with either indifference or dislike for almost all games, especially within the minecraft community its also implied right after the last statement that discussion on durability was "controversial" painting the picture that there were flame wars about it despite even your own examples shown that the community is at a consensus that durability generally just sucked, discourse mostly being on if some games did it well despite that saying that durability is impossible to balance is not very helpful to the discussion, especially as there are expamples of people doing it well, think the tinkers construct mod in minecraft or an example i saw someone else say being the witcher 3, which has blade oils and encourages you to take care of your weapons. i personally think that durability has a place in some games, minecraft being a good example as it gives more value into preparation with your tools, and due to the large durability numbers within minecraft by the time you break your tools you probably will be low on other resources like food or inventory space anyway, but also have materials to create better equipment for your next dive into the caves. the main issue minecraft contends with is when you reach the top of the equipment ladder, now using tools that would take hours to replace or expensive resources to repair these tools are generally going to be your "forever" tools that youll never likely let break, ones that youll enchant a ton and spend lots of time and effort into, now honestly mojang already has a solution to this issue, being to just not have repairing cost levels or add to the "worked on" number a tool has (as well as making it repair a lot more, adding a diamond to a diamond pickaxe should realistically add like 60%-70% durability back not 15%) this would also make using iron not as awful either, since iron is abundant and keeping iron tools topped up after getting to it would be simple, iron in general would feel less "disposable" compared to its lesser tools i will say though that using a whole diamond (or worse, a full netherite ingot) on your tool to refresh its durability is still not the greatest, so mojang should add options for up to "top up" tools, think like the repair hammers in the elder scrolls, or repair merchants in in the elder scrolls or in fallout. adding global repair options outside of mending would allow durability to still be useful while still allowing your "personal" tools to still be used as they will without fear of breakage (it would also make infinity actually useful, and mending less required of an enchantment, im so sick of making villager trading halls for mending)
Ratchet & Clank is an example of a long running series that encourages players to use multiple weapons They encourage switching weapons with a weapon progression system, where weapons level up with use (Note: The first game didn't have weapon leveling, instead you could buy an upgraded in New Game+ IIRC) They also force switching weapons as aside from Ratchet's wrench or Clank's fist, every weapon has limited ammo & while there are typically ammo crates throughout levels & in boss battles the only control the player has over what ammo comes out is based on what weapons lack ammo; That said folks who have worked on the game acknowledge that the games feature active difficulty tuning & that at least in the PS2 games the had the game adjust the amount of bolts (effectively the games currency for buying weapons & armor, sometimes weapon mods as well) to try a ensure that players will have at least a certain amount of bolts after completing a level; So it wouldn't be a surprise if ammo crates were to drop ammo for less frequently used weapons to try & get players to switch Non-Ratxhet & Clank mechanics ----- Another way to strongly encourage players to switch weapons is to have a type system where weapons of certain type might be great against one type of enemy, but they're weak against another & mid against the rest Also, I watched a video on Warframe & IIRC it mentioned that Warframe has something along the lines of a "pilot mastery" mechanic which encourages players to switch warframes as using & leveling multiple there character get better at using all warframes; This sort of mechanic could be implemented in over games as a "weapon master" skill that could passively buff a players attack, raise their evasion, and/or in games where morale matters boost their morale all because the player character has used a ton of weapons & knows how to weild them most effectively, the weapons range & general timing of attacks to dodge, & an individual who knows how to fight with or against any weapon should generally be more confident than the average combatant as so long as they're alive they can find something to fight with. Another way to make people want to switch weapons would be to make weapons characters like spirit swords, where the weapon has a personality & talks; Then there could be weapon bonding quests & weapon maintenance be the player character chatting with the weapon & building a friendship with it which could see the weapons attack increase as the spirit becomes more friendly towards the player character
I always found having to use eyes of ender to find the portal to be annoying, but what I really found annoying the most,was after you defeated the dragon, the end only had a few structures so there wasn’t really much to explore
What's great about Minecraft is the level of customization, don't want your tools to break? Get a mod! Personally, I don't understand the mindset of using your crappy tools to save the good ones, it's like in business - you have to invest to gain something, using an iron pick yields results faster, it's not the durability that slows you down, it's YOU, you're doing this to yourself. Diamonds in the newer versions are super abundant, you could definitely get a diamond pick on the first day. What do you do with all the resources you mine? Just hoard them in a chest? What do I do with my diamonds if I don't need to repair my gear? Just stare at them, make a beacon?
I think Enshrouded's system hits the perfect sweet spot with durability. Repairs are free and instant, but can only be done at certain POIs. This encourages you to explore areas for repair anvils, and rewards players for building bases. Items never break completely, so there's no concern about losing gear. The durability system instead acts as a "hey you should probably head back home, stash your loot, and repair your gear" reminder.
funnily enough, as someone who broke the shit out of breath of the wild, I used glitches to increase/repair weapon durability and it made durability a much more fun mechanic lmao
my reasons: -it's inconsistent -non-customizable (unless you have a cape, something most players don't have) -gets damaged while flying -no enchants -need fireworks/riptide trident and rain or water to fly higher -extremely bullshit to use -chunks don't load fast enough to use for long distance travel/exploring -touching a wall can insta-kill you while flying (see previous reason as to why that's an issue) -is obtained after the ender dragon when it could be better utilized during the fight -takes an armor slot to use -etc.
