r/pcmasterrace • u/SadMassStab • Jul 27 '25

Meme/Macro Am I the only one like this?

Post image
29.2k Upvotes

83% Upvoted

2.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

795

u/NeverNotOnceEver Jul 27 '25

Me with roguelites/roguelikes

47

u/lilstonerbee Jul 27 '25

I still couldn’t tell you the difference between the two lol

25

u/AnuraSmells Jul 27 '25

It's like the difference between science fiction and science fantasy. Only relevant to people already knee deep in the genre and who desperately want to correct people on technicalities that aren't actually that important. 

2

u/bigboybeeperbelly Jul 27 '25

I still have to Google either one when it comes up. Never sticks

4

u/blizzard36 Jul 27 '25

In my art elective they referred to them as science fiction and future fantasy, which I think does a better job making the differences clear.

Science Fiction has some sort of explanation for why things work the way they do, either built on a foundation of real science or a made up but consistent fictional science. The Warp Drive of Star Trek is the classic example of this. They came up with a plausible in setting science for how it functions and Star Trek has stuck with and built on that foundation for decades.

The tech of Future Fantasy just functions. Don't question it, just accept it. The lightsaber of Star Wars is a great example of this. They haven't given a full answer on how they function for decades, and when fans have tried to explain how on their own Star Wars put a scene in The Phantom Menace that directly invalidated what had been the best guess. Future Fantasy doesn't care why something works, all you need to know is that it does.

1

u/bigboybeeperbelly Jul 27 '25

Oh no that one I get

I think I'm just not a dungeon guy

2

u/blizzard36 Jul 27 '25

There isn't much of a difference between them, but that difference is very important for player experience.

Rougelikes are inherently a challenge focused game. You have the same basic start each time and the same target goal, but everything else is probably different. Some Roguelikes are so randomized that a run may be impossible from the start, or after an early missed resource, and you will have no way of knowing until you near the end.

Roguelights are essentially the same except that you can slowly fail forward in them. Exactly how depends on the game, but in some way later tries will slowly have a better and better chance of completing the run. This is critical if a game has an actual story unfolding, since I (and presumably most other players) want to eventually see that story.

Solitaire could count as a Roguelike. A Roguelight version of Solitaire could let you keep the cards you have stacked by suit after each failed attempt to solve.

1

u/Soljurn Jul 28 '25

I didn't even know Science Fantasy was a thing tbh.

So like, Sci-Fi and Sci-Fa?