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First, I'm not talking about puzzles that involve a lot of moving and all that. I more mean your old-school RPG puzzles; stuff like 'get the sword from the other room 5 floors down and put it in this slot here or the old "figure out the door switches just right to get the key to appear."

For those of you that have played RPGs with such puzzles, can you remember any of your favorites? Any that you felt were way to frustrating? Any that were just hard enough without getting you annoyed? What were they like?

And in general, are there any sorts of similar puzzles you'd like to see; either as essential, or to get a special, but non-essential item?

This one is a bit more specific (Eternal Sonata) but that stupid puzzle in this like secret entrance that requires you moving huge platforms through water. Sounds awesome and the dungeon looks awesome, the problem is the puzzle room is so damn huge, and I mean HUUUUGE! that just to get to another switch takes a good 5 minutes, and there's multiple switches and if you mess up. Well crap, you have to walk ALL THE WAY BACK to the switch 5 minutes prior or worse.

^ the only way I would accept the above puzzle if it was for an item that is amazingly amazing and is optional. If it's optional and like an "Ultima blade." that has no impact on the story other than to be strong I would go to the ends of the world doing unmentionable favors to NPCs just to get it because you get that sense of satisfaction "HELL YEAH! I JUST GOT THIS _____"

but if you do it in a mandatory room it simply makes you go "this is neat." *10 minutes later* "uggh, I want to get to the next part" So

mandatory = short puzzle or puzzle that takes place in close proximity from eachother like in the same room or adjacent.
optional = long puzzle that makes me feel like I accomplished something, (this is ruined if that item is useless however.)

I'll edit or post with a favorite of mine in RPG history if I can remember any.

Iron Cave in FF4. I bet this one is quite famous since it appears often in Top 10 List of GameFaqs.

In case you don't know... in this cave, you have to rescue a boy that entered a cave full of monster (typical...). What makes this cave very difficult is that you couldn't use any metal equipment due to strong magnetic nature this cave possess, which leaves you with weak weapons and equipments (if you insist on wearing it, you couldn't move in battle at all).

Not to mention that this cave have strong monsters that could decimate your party in several turns... and since this is FF4, random encounter happens every several steps. To ramped up the difficulty, there is very strong boss at the end of the cave.

And don't forget that FF4 doesn't have any save points outside inns.

LVUER: Uh, I've never played FFIV but that sounds really frustrating

I have to admit, I don't remember any great puzzles that would stay in my memory for far longer, nor played any RPG's lately, but one did amuse me - the "Invisible bridge" from the Gauntlet in Dragon Age, where you had to place your members in a proper step-by-step combination on magic stones for the bridge parts to appear and be able to cross the bottomless pit I've spent quite a long time having fun there, although I usually don't like such puzzles because they tend to be reapetable and frustrating

I'll post the screenshots later, when I'll ind them. I also remember few puzzles from the witcher, especially with the sefirs which you had to find, with no idea were to search for them and only few vague hints on how to look for them. It was quite interesting, although it didn't require any sorts of minigames or other stuff - it was just one another riddle to solve, with research on many books, asking people (which required many small side quests to be done) and searching for the right places

My favorite RPG with puzzle is Lufia 2. There are puzzles in most dungeon, ranging from simple to a really complex one.
Easy puzzles such as pushing pillars to a button and it will reveal a door.
More difficult one such as rearranging similar color blocks to make all of them disappear in order to open a door.
Destroy every single grass with fire arrows before they grow (they grow is sequences, you have to remember them exactly.)

I really like the variety of puzzles they have. It can be really fun and challenging. I suppose if you want to make people less frustrated, you can make the mandatory puzzles easy (for people who just want to see the story), and optional puzzles difficult (for people who like challenges and unlock extras)

Lufia 2? The optional 99 floor dungeon (forget the dungeon's name) would be the hardest "puzzle" among all...

Your LV would be reduced to LV1, no equipments, no items, no save points, and it's 99 floor dungeons (with lots of enemies). And at the last floor, not only there's a very strong boss (especially if your LV isn't high enough), there's also one last most formidable obstacle... which every one will shake in fear when facing it... It's a bug that cause your game crashed (and of course, you have to press the reset button). This makes the dungeon unfinished-able for most people at that time.

I like riddle puzzles where you have to figure out a riddle to know what to do (like what order to turn the switches). There was one I remember from when I was younger, can't remember the name of it, it was back on the ps1. You had to talk to the statues in a certain sequence.

Take heed stranger as you walk by,
as you are now as once was I
as I am now so you will be
so be prepared to follow me

It was fun figuring it out and you felt good when you did. Wish I could remember the name of it though.

Personally, I HATE puzzles in RPGs And I think I'm not the only one. I always used walkthrough from the net when I encountered one. If you really want to include them, make them optional maybe? unless the whole RPG game is BASED on them of course.

I'm not a fan of overly difficult puzzles in RPGs where there are also massive dungeons and you really do need to go up and down 5 floors to get a single item (yeah, Golden Sun 2, here's looking atcha), but I do like riddles and simpler stuff like "keep this item until you get to X and then insert."

@Auro

Riddles, hands down, are my favorite kind of puzzle.

yeah, I'm a pretty big fan of those riddle style puzzles that give you (sometimes not so) subtle hints about what you're supposed to do, but if I have to use a walkthrough for it it's probably too hard.

I liked the puzzles in Zelda a link to the past. Pretty simple and fun too.
In general, I prefer RPGs that have some puzzles rather than not because it adds some challenge.
I think I remember there are riddles in Tales of Phantasia but I'm not quite sure (I forgot).

The biggest problem with puzzles in RPGs tends to be replay, because very few RPGs give you any method of skipping that kind of thing on replay. That Dragon Age puzzle was fun the first time and ANNOYING when I was playing through with a second character... and it's not a very long puzzle. They can get much worse.

Tough puzzles should probably be either completely optional OR a major component of gameplay from the beginning. If it's obviously an RPG packed with puzzles, the player knows what they're getting into. If it's been straight combat for hours and then suddenly there's a mind-boggling puzzle that you HAVE to complete to succeed, the player may throw a tantrum before consulting a walkthrough and grumbling.

Also, puzzles that take a long time to complete even if you know how to solve them are likely to produce boredom and frustration. If you must do such a thing, try to make the intermediary steps look fun and exciting. Flashy visuals can go a long way to reducing player irritation.

LVUER wrote:Lufia 2? The optional 99 floor dungeon (forget the dungeon's name) would be the hardest "puzzle" among all...

Your LV would be reduced to LV1, no equipments, no items, no save points, and it's 99 floor dungeons (with lots of enemies). And at the last floor, not only there's a very strong boss (especially if your LV isn't high enough), there's also one last most formidable obstacle... which every one will shake in fear when facing it... It's a bug that cause your game crashed (and of course, you have to press the reset button). This makes the dungeon unfinished-able for most people at that time.

There is some tactic to get pass this. It requires a lot of patient and luck. You need to collect blue item treasure chest first. I get around 2-3 items per 20 floors. Once I get everyone equipped properly, it should be easy to pass the first 40 floor. After that, the "luck" part is to get the following magic: Absorb (Most important), any healing/revive magic (I like getting Valor, 2 in one), Destroy (Required pass 80th floor to kill dragons). Last but not least, there are monsters than summon extra monsters during battle, you can manipulate this to gain extra levels.

To be honest, I have harder time collecting dragon eggs. I consider that harder than 99 dungeon. Orz

papillon wrote:The biggest problem with puzzles in RPGs tends to be replay, because very few RPGs give you any method of skipping that kind of thing on replay. That Dragon Age puzzle was fun the first time and ANNOYING when I was playing through with a second character... and it's not a very long puzzle. They can get much worse.

Well, I like replaying RPG, and I know a puzzle is a good puzzle if I look forward of replaying it. I remember I became an expert in one of the puzzles in Breath of Fire 3 that all my friends who played the game asked my help to solve it.

@Mirage:
I have collected all the dragon eggs myself (and get all the treasures). The biggest obstacle is not the dungeon itself, but rather the crash bug. But I think it all doesn't matter anymore since the advent of SNES emulator and internet ^_^

LVUER wrote:@Mirage:
I have collected all the dragon eggs myself (and get all the treasures). The biggest obstacle is not the dungeon itself, but rather the crash bug. But I think it all doesn't matter anymore since the advent of SNES emulator and internet ^_^

Lol, yeah, emulators make everything 100 times easier. XD