What exactly is it that people hate about Re:Chain of Memories card combat?

[Vulpes XIII]

While I was replaying Re:Chain of Memories the other day a random thought came to me during one of the battles which was what exactly is it about the card combat that people hate so much? As someone who really enjoys the combat system ( which I know is a very unpopular opinion to have) I can’t figure out why it hated so much. As people say ” the combat is awful” or “I hate the card system” but I realised that I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone state why? Is it the reload times, deck building, card breaks or something else?

 

[KingdomKurdistan]

I liked it too. Especially on the GBA. There's a thrill to scrambling around your deck looking for a cura. Plus, when I finally beat Riku after hours by making him run out of cards, it felt like the greatest achievement of my gaming life.

But when I introduced my cousin to KH and we beat KH1, he was so excited to see what comes next.

First thing he says about COM is: "what's this maths, why is it making me do maths? I have a headache already what's this it's like I'm doing homework; my days algebra was better than this. Can we just skip this please."

It was the first fucking door.

 

[Elysium]

Yeah, I read a post recently about re:CoM's combat that made me realize it's the fact that a lot of people are bad at math.... I was always strong in math, which may be the reason it never bothered me. I think it's fun, actually.

Another thing is--just guessing--a lot of players aren't strategic at all, either because they're young or very casual players. They probably play nonstop combos (three cards put together) until they end up with only 2 or 3 cards left and have to constantly re-load to finish a battle, lol.

 

[Vulpes XIII]

I never thought maths would be one of the things that makes people hate the game. As in my case I hate maths but I find the card combat a lot of fun and I enjoy the challenge of the fights and I actually find it a lot of fun trying to figure out the best deck setup and best strategy to win.

 

[AdrianXXII]

Yeah, I read a post recently about re:CoM's combat that made me realize it's the fact that a lot of people are bad at math.... I was always strong in math, which may be the reason it never bothered me. I think it's fun, actually.

It's a nice theory, but I'd debate it's validity, unless I'm the exception to prove the rule. I always got near full mark in math and yet I really found the battle system tedious.

Another thing is--just guessing--a lot of players aren't strategic at all, either because they're young or very casual players. They probably play nonstop combos (three cards put together) until they end up with only 2 or 3 cards left and have to constantly re-load to finish a battle, lol.

This theory is more likely, seeing I've never been too good with strategy or resource management.

Here are my personal grievances with the system:

1. The cards you get and there for the moves you can perform are given at random and are pure luck. Whether or not you have the cards needed to get through a boss fight depends on your luck of draw. If you mainly have a deck of 1 to 5s when you face Larxene and so on than you're out of luck. This is probably the biggest one for me.
2. Limited resources. For me this was always an issue, especially when I was young, when something was limited I was hesitant to use it. I usually didn't like using sleights because that's would rob me of an attack card and the more I'd use them the less I'd have available. Nowadays I'm better and judging when to use them, but I'm still rather conservative in their usage.
3. Shuffling through the deck to get the right card in time to block. This is more an issue earlier on in the game than latter when you should have more 0 cards. Still I was always really stressed trying to find the right card to cancel an attack.
4. Regular attacks being restricted. You can only attack as much as you have cards in your deck, put a lot of high number cards in your deck to be harder to block, load more, put in fewer to perform more attacks, get blocked all the time. I know this is part of the games strategy, but as a kid this was really frustrating because it felt like there was not good middle ground.

The system isn't bad, but I definitely enjoy it less than the other battle systems the series has had so far.

 

[Grey Skies]

I think people just don't like being expected to do any sort of math when playing a game, especially when doing it quickly is important. I can also understand why some people would be irked by having to create decks effectively and plan out what sleights to use.

I myself think the card system was brilliant. I'm very good at basic math and I quickly discovered how to set up and use an effective deck. I find it to be a very exciting and rewarding system.

 

[Face My Fears]

Honestly, I really liked the system for the GBA version. I think it just doesn't translate well onto the PS2. It feels very limited on the PS2, where you kind of expect the freedom of KH1.

 

[Absent]

I enjoyed playing CoM, I did not enjoy playing Re:CoM. If I'm to play a game with a different and more complex system, it needs more redeeming qualities. CoM is a very charming game with stunning sprite work, Re:CoM is....something.

 

[EnchantedDominion]

I'm replaying that right now (trying to get Riku to 99 and it's taking forever), and so I can dive into this and say my brain doesn't work fast enough for it. I can't "math" that fast. I'm talking about bosses like Marluxia, of course. They do those combos and I can't add them up quick enough in my head to counter them. I hate how you run out of cards. You have to try and remember what you used. If you don't use a high enough combo with the elixirs they will break your combo and you'll lose the elixir and have to start again. I also hate how when I'm low on health and I go for a Mickey heal on Riku it turns me into dark mode and I lose my Mickey. It's just a very frustrating game.

 

[Sean Wheeler]

It's more like we're used to the button mashing in combat, but because our button mashing attack combos are limited to Attack Cards and we would very likely put some Magic Cards in our decks, we have to watch our cards to make sure we don't accidentally cast Magic like Fire or Cure.