Good/Bad NG+ Modes?

[Moonface]

Having recently started a NG+ run in Grounded and really enjoying myself, it made me think of how it might have one of my favourite NG+ modes of any game I've played:

• Upgrade collectibles are all moved to new, randomized locations to encourage re-exploring the map rather than just gunning for the objectives.
  
• Enemies can now have special variants that have randomized buffs and will drop new trinkets and materials.
  
• Said trinkets are given randomized buffs from a list of 60+ options, so there's always an incentive to keep getting them to try and get something really good to drop.
  
• Garbage trinkets can be recycled for upgrade materials, so getting bad trinkets isn't a waste of time.
  
• Handy Gnat is available to make base building easier by granting the ability to fly freely in build mode, which is great for my base because it's suspended above the ground.
  
• New enemy spawns are added.
  
• Bosses get new attacks and other bonuses.
  

Most of the time a NG+ mode in a game just makes things a little harder but nothing else, and if you're decently upgraded before starting NG+ you usually don't notice the difficulty increase anyway and the game just becomes less about the game giving something new to experience and more just grinding out upgrades or alternate endings, etc.

What games have you played that you think do a good job with NG+? Or are you someone who doesn't care to play a game in NG+ after beating it once?

[azalea]

if i beat a game once (especially if it took me quite a bit of time to beat that game to begin with), it's unlikely i'm going to go for a new game+. it's really going to grant me more or less the same experience, except i either get to keep my equipment, my levels, my stats, or what-have-you, and idk i've literally JUST been through the hard work to get through and obtain all of that and while keeping some of those options are good, i'm not going to be particularly motivated to invest the hours and energy to beat the plot again.

[Maniakkid25]

It depends on the game, for me. But there are definitely interesting NG+ out there that I'd like to try.

• I was planning on doing a Digital Devil Saga NG+ to fight the super boss in that game, but that memory card is lost, so I am a sad panda about that.
  
• Dark Cloud 2 has a fun one where, after you beat Chapter 7, any new game made on that memory card will allow you to dress up in any cosmetics you've unlocked and worn, and if you bought a Name Change Ticket, you can change the name of one of your starting weapons. If you change your weapon name to a weapon that already exists in the game, you get that exact weapon, meaning you can start the game with a Sigma Bazooka, Max's strongest gun.
  
• The SMT series usually lets you NG+, and you keep the compendium of demons you've already unlocked. As long as your level is high enough and you got the cash, you can resummon.
  
• Lost Odyssey actually has one where you start at level 50. I don't know why you would do that, but it's there.
  

I'm sure there are others I know of, but I can't think of them right now.

[queenzelda]

Chrono Trigger was my first new game + because poor Lucca was so slow I had to give her every speed tab I could find plus the extra from a new save file. That and there are certain endings you can easily get too after NG+ I found. Another game I enjoyed with NG+ was Dragon Quest XI for the harder difficulty and the other characters you could marry in the new version, since in the original you were made to marry (yuck) Jemma. <_<

[Moonface]

if i beat a game once (especially if it took me quite a bit of time to beat that game to begin with), it's unlikely i'm going to go for a new game+. it's really going to grant me more or less the same experience, except i either get to keep my equipment, my levels, my stats, or what-have-you, and idk i've literally JUST been through the hard work to get through and obtain all of that and while keeping some of those options are good, i'm not going to be particularly motivated to invest the hours and energy to beat the plot again.

I only don't mind a NG+ that doesn't change anything and just lets you keep everything if it makes beating the game again quicker/easier to see alternate endings or something else you can't achieve in a single playthrough. If the game is just as long as the first time around though and isn't giving me anything else I'm the same as you though, not interested in sitting through the whole thing for the same amount of time again (unless the game is short). Horizon Zero Dawn and God of War 2018 for example both have NG+ but there's really nothing worth playing them for, and I only bothered playing the former of the two in NG+ because I wanted to replay the game again before Forbidden West came out without having to take the time to re-earn everything.

It depends on the game, for me. But there are definitely interesting NG+ out there that I'd like to try.

• I was planning on doing a Digital Devil Saga NG+ to fight the super boss in that game, but that memory card is lost, so I am a sad panda about that.
  
• Dark Cloud 2 has a fun one where, after you beat Chapter 7, any new game made on that memory card will allow you to dress up in any cosmetics you've unlocked and worn, and if you bought a Name Change Ticket, you can change the name of one of your starting weapons. If you change your weapon name to a weapon that already exists in the game, you get that exact weapon, meaning you can start the game with a Sigma Bazooka, Max's strongest gun.
  
• The SMT series usually lets you NG+, and you keep the compendium of demons you've already unlocked. As long as your level is high enough and you got the cash, you can resummon.
  
• Lost Odyssey actually has one where you start at level 50. I don't know why you would do that, but it's there.
  

I'm sure there are others I know of, but I can't think of them right now.

I'm guessing for Dark Cloud 2 you don't keep previous weapons? Since if so then wouldn't you just bring a Sigma Bazooka over with you rather than having to "make" one?
Lost Odyssey's one sounds weird to me because going purely off what you wrote, you either finish a first playthrough below lvl50 which means setting yourself to lvl50 for NG+ would make you stronger than expected, or you finish above lvl50 which means lowering your level is just penalizing yourself?

That and there are certain endings you can easily get too after NG+ I found.

Yeah, as I said earlier in this post I like it when a NG+ can make other endings quicker to obtain rather than having to spend the same amount of time as your first playthrough.


Thinking of it, one NG+ mode that I have a huge gripe with is Lies of P. The mode itself isn't a problem, but rather that after you beat the final boss you get immediately offered to enter NG+ and for me, I didn't expect the game to add new collectibles into my current playthrough after beating the final boss so thinking there was nothing left to do (as I had done everything that could be done in the game prior to fighting the final boss and didn't know/think more stuff would be added after beating it) I just accepted to go straight into NG+. Afterwards I learned about the new collectibles that I had now missed, and the only way to get back to them was to choose the exact same route/ending but not go immediately into NG+ this time, so I had to basically play the game the same way twice because its NG+ screen just didn't bother to mention there was a few new things to do before advancing...

[Maniakkid25]

I'm guessing for Dark Cloud 2 you don't keep previous weapons? Since if so then wouldn't you just bring a Sigma Bazooka over with you rather than having to "make" one?
Lost Odyssey's one sounds weird to me because going purely off what you wrote, you either finish a first playthrough below lvl50 which means setting yourself to lvl50 for NG+ would make you stronger than expected, or you finish above lvl50 which means lowering your level is just penalizing yourself?

Yes, you start with the basic bitch equipment in Dark Cloud 2 if you make a new game under those conditions, so it's not really a NG+ under the strictest of definitions, but I'd still say its an NG+ because it has stuff you can only unlock after completing the game once.

I think my Lost Odyssey playthrough for my rant clocked in at level 48, IIRC? Somewhere around there, but I did most of the side content, so mine was artificially high (I didn't do DLC, though). The problem isn't the levels, though. The problem is the game caps experience. See, once you are at or above a certain level for an area, you stop gaining experience outright. So starting at level 50 (out of 99, IIRC?) is little more than the devs pulling a joke on you, because you'll be getting no experience for the vast majority of the game, and absolutely curb stomping bosses as you go through the game. This is why I said "I don't know why you would want to do that."

Another JRPG, Eternal Sonata, has an NG+ mode, as well. Well, I say "NG+", but much like Dark Cloud 2, you start from zero. It's more of a "Hard Mode" than a true NG+. B-but there's a bonus dungeon in the PS3 version! Yeah! That's totally worth it!

[Moonface]

I think my Lost Odyssey playthrough for my rant clocked in at level 48, IIRC? Somewhere around there, but I did most of the side content, so mine was artificially high (I didn't do DLC, though). The problem isn't the levels, though. The problem is the game caps experience. See, once you are at or above a certain level for an area, you stop gaining experience outright. So starting at level 50 (out of 99, IIRC?) is little more than the devs pulling a joke on you, because you'll be getting no experience for the vast majority of the game, and absolutely curb stomping bosses as you go through the game. This is why I said "I don't know why you would want to do that."

Ah, that sucks. I was hoping it would be that the game balances everything around being lvl50 rather than just basically being what would nowadays be likely called "Story Difficulty".


I've never played a NG+ run of this game myself (since I just remembered I never actually beat it yet...) but Dragon's Dogma does a cool one where your previous character becomes the final boss I think? I tried looking it up but nowhere wants to give an actual definitive rundown of what can happen at the end of the game. Unfortunately, nothing else about the game gets changed for NG+ including the difficulty so it looks like you just start the game off as powerful as you were before which means you're just gonna steamroll just about everything.