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Some time ago, Linguistic stumbled across a discussion thread — the source has sadly since been forgotten — asking the question whether there should be an option to make combat skippable in some RPGs. Would it be worth it, the poster asked, to offer players a way to experience a game’s story even if they found the gameplay itself impenetrable or frustrating? The topic devolved swiftly into name-calling and various other retorts – if you wanted to play a game for primarily story then go read a book or watch a movie instead, that’s what easy difficulties are for and that’s concession enough, that’s what Let’s Plays are for – but it did hold an intriguing question beneath it all. Exactly how important — or even prevalent — does combat have to be in an RPG?

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