In some games the difference between an ax and a sword is statistics; a sword hits for 7 damage every time, while the ax varies from 3 to 10 damage. As the character gains experience they get a +1 bonus to their chosen weapon.
That is boring.
Instead of axes having different stats than swords, we can make them act differently. If axes hit enemies on all sides of you when you attack, while swords automatically strikes enemies as you pass by, a skilled axman will learn very different tactics from a skilled swordsman. This both makes the game more interesting, and gives you skill progression without having to program it into the game.
Games are a process of learning, so any stat that increases over time can be instead given to the player as something to learn.
We don't even need to have the character level up explicitly; if each run through the game is full of idiosyncratic items that we never see again, then the player quite skilled in the tactics of one play-through, can be a beginner in the tactics of another play-through. Unidentified items are the traditional way of doing this, but we can also add lots of unusual conditions on items: like a wand of fireballs that fires left of where you point, or an amulet of speed that only works when you are standing in water, and so on.
This may be a confusing post but what I'm trying to say is that the player is constantly learning and getting better at the game, so we might as well take advantage of this by taking things that used to be modeled within the game and giving them for the player to learn instead.
We don't even need to have the character level up explicitly; if each run through the game is full of idiosyncratic items that we never see again, then the player quite skilled in the tactics of one play-through, can be a beginner in the tactics of another play-through. Unidentified items are the traditional way of doing this, but we can also add lots of unusual conditions on items: like a wand of fireballs that fires left of where you point, or an amulet of speed that only works when you are standing in water, and so on.
This may be a confusing post but what I'm trying to say is that the player is constantly learning and getting better at the game, so we might as well take advantage of this by taking things that used to be modeled within the game and giving them for the player to learn instead.
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