A Character's Departure Is Neither Unfair Nor Disruptive

So I was shown an article on Kotaku about an article that Masahiro Sakurai make in Famitsu (http://kotaku.com/5984189/kirbys-creator-shares-his-thoughts-on-game-writing). There is one part of that article specifically I wish to address:

"Take when a character you have spent time building up dies or leaves your party: for someone playing the game, it feels unfair." Sakurai explains. "The departure of a companion. In a standard story, this is a very basic plot point. But in games, it leads to a disruption."

So having characters leave your party is "unfair" and "leads to disruption"?

First of all I would like to point out that it is by definition impossible for a single-player game to be "unfair". Sure games can be dissatisfying at some points, but "fairness" is about how all the participants are given an equal opportunity. Since single-player games consist of one player, then it must follow that all the players get equal opportunity, it's not like a computer can be prejudice towards certain players. But by "unfair" it seems he doesn't mean that, rather he means that the players suffer a great loss from something outside of their own control. So from now on, I'll use the word "unfair" to mean that.

The "disruption" he mentions is really nothing more than an alteration presented by the game. I find it strange how RPGs can be blamed for being too repetitive and yet here they are being blamed for being "disruptive" (and we can see he is talking about RPGs here since he mentioned "spending time building up  characters").

So let's think about these two complaints.

When characters leave or enter the party its to set the game up as to present the player with a new scenario. Sure there's great games where you pretty much stick to one party the whole way through (like Final Fantasy V and Dragon Quest VIII) but we don't need to have that in every game.

Indeed, if the game gives us new party set-ups, it is up to us and our strategy to figure out how to effectively use that party. Equally the case, if the game gives us the choice of what characters to use then it is up to us to make strategic decisions on what party we should form.

Even if we do get to the case where you need a certain character that you have not leveled up. That does not mean you should fret from not having that character a certain level. As much as it means you do have to train that character you still have to figure out the best way of doing that. And besides, this also means you get some extra EXP that will help you later on.

There are all sorts of different examples of how you can mix up the party set up

and still have it a fun game. Let's think of some possible examples:

1. Games where you have set characters that never change:
 if your characters never change then that means you will always have your own custom set-up with you

2. Games where you can change to any characters at any time and it is advantageous to focus on a few:
here the strategy is trying to figure out which team is the best team in the long run whilst also taking into account what characters are worth taking in a certain situation. Is it worth holding back your final team back temporarily in order to make this section of the game easier? that's something you need to be strategic over.

3. Games where you can change to any characters at any time and it is advantageous to focus on a many:
In this case the strategy lies in not how unevenly to distribute the EXP, but rather when and where to distribute it with each character.

4. Games where you can change to any characters at any time and it is not strictly  advantageous to focus on a many or focus on a few:
Well in this case what you have to consider is how you want to distribute the EXP, as well as who works well at what points in the game. It may not be clear as to what the best thing to do is, but this means that the player has to figure it out.

5. Games where you can't change any characters at any time and the game keeps switching between them:
In this case the strategy lies in how you approach the individual parts of the game. How can you deal with what you are presented with.

These are just a few examples, and there are a lot more that can be explored (such as if the EXP is distributed in certain ways, if you have points where you create multiple parties, if certain characters grow at different rates, etc.). The point here is that all of these require the player to be strategic in some shape or form. These examples do not inherently result in the player having "wasted time" and the results do depend on the player using skill. Even if we try to think of extreme examples, they end up not being all that extreme. One reason is that we can't judge the loss of the purely on the loss of the characters. Let's use the most common example that everybody knows about: Aerith's death in Final Fantasy VII. Yes, she dies, and yes, you lose all the levels you built up for her. However:

1. In FF7, EXP is distributed 100% to all the alive party members and 50% to all the inactive ones. If what we are saying is that Aerith's death makes her EXP worthless, then lets consider how much EXP you get total depending on wheteher or not she is in your party. There are 9 characters overall, if an enemy gives 1000 EXP, thats 1000EXP to all alive party members and 500EXP to all out of party. That would be a total of 6000EXP (assuming all party members are alive). Running off the assumption that all Aerith's EXP is "worthless" and can be ruled out, then having her in your party nets you 5000EXP total and 5500EXP total if she is out. That difference is not so extreme. And yes I know you would also have to take into account all the stuff you would have to do for her such as buying weapons and building up limit breaks but I'm addressing just the leveling here for the sake of simplicity.

2. Secondly, it still would not be fair to claim all the EXP she does gain as "worthless". This is because you have to use her in the Temple Of The Ancients where the EXP she has accumulated helps you to get through. So even though it will be lost it does help.

So that is an example of where a character's death (or departure) does not result in a great loss for the player. The reason for this is because we are given context and the game is set up to fit the context. The second disc onwards was designed and released with the full knowlegde that Aerith would not be playable anymore. It is not reasonable to believe that the loss will make the game a lot harder because of this. A huge difficulty spike may be disruptive,
. A game that completely changes the gameplay at one point in time may be disruptive. Aerith's death is neither disruptive or unfair (regardless of what definition of "unfair" you want to use).

I suppose it is possible for the departure of a character or the introduction of new characters to be "unfair" or "disruptive". But they would be rarer and more specific cases and not simply "the departure of a character".

"Worse" Does Not Mean "Bad"

I don't really understand the idea that if you make something new, the whole purpose is for it to be better than the last. That makes sense in terms of functionality (a TV in 2013 should be better than a TV in 1995), but when it comes to creative pieces I'm not so sure. Sure you should always make something as good as you can, but should the creation of something new be dependent on it's quality compared to the previous?

Last September I released my album "The Eclectic Duck" and I believe it was an improvement over my previous album "Another Acidic Album". I have started (though not done much) of my next album (which I'm not revealing the title of yet :P ). To me, this album (so far) isn't as good as TED, and I don't suspect it will be (just being honest). Sure, I will try to make it as good as I can, but I really feel TED was a high-point for me. Even if I do complete the new album and still feel that TED is better than it, does that mean the new album is not good enough for release? I don't think so.

Even if the new album is (to me) worse than TED, somebody else who hates TED might like the new album. Likewise, it's possible for somebody to love AAA but to hate TED. I'm not trying to say that you shouldn't put effort into making things as good as you can, I'm not saying that at all. Even if (hypothetically) I release this new album and nobody prefers it to TED, that's still fine. You don't have to spend your life enjoying just your favourites. How many people (in all seriousness) would be happy enough listening to just their favourite album or playing just their favourite game? Sure I'd love to play Azure Dreams whilst listening to Rancid 2000, but to be limited to that?

All in all, I think its fine to indulge in that which is "above average" or "quite good". We should look forward to improvements but not demand it. We should try to improve our works but not be limited by them. When a series "isn't as good as it used to be", my question to you is: "well is it bad?". Should they end the series just because it's getting worse? Well, what good would it do if they did stop? Has the series become so bad that its continuation is a hindrance? If not, I don't see what the problem is.