Post Game!

I was talking to a person at work and I told them that after only about 40 hours of gameplay I finally finished Ni No Kuni, but I was no where near beating it. This lead to some obvious confusion, and so I need to clarify for everyone out there.

Finishing a game = the story is finished. You can walk away from the game at this point if you're not interested in it, or if you're a filthy casual.

Then there's the invention of post game content and the phrase beating a game comes into play.

Beating a game = you did everything. You get the stuffs, save the princess, kill the monsters in the arena, get all the Easter eggs, level up until it hurts, and generally make it so that if there is ever a conversation about the game ever you can say, "yeah, I did that." This, in RPG's, is REALLY common. There is your normal game, and then there's your post game, and then if you're really lucky there's New Game Plus (NG+) that also has post game in it as well.

This is part of the reasons that I enjoy RPG's so much. That you have your normal story that takes as long as other games, if not longer, and then you have EVERYTHING else that you can do. Just look at games like Skyrim. You can play the story line finish the game, and then there is the billions of options that you can do besides that. If your game has a golden saucer, a casino, a monster arena, mini-games, collectables that do nothing besides being collectable, or monsters that you can capture- you've found yourself a game that has post game content. Once you finish the game you beat everything at the golden saucer, win all of the monies at the casino, kill everything at the monster arena, set all of the high scores for the mini-games, collect all of the collectables, and make sure that you have at least one of every monster in existence.

Finishing the game versus beating the game is the difference between beating the elite four and your rival, and collecting all 151 of your best friends.

Finishing the game versus beating the game is the difference between killing Sepheroth and getting a golden chocobo, knights of the round, and killing all of the weapons.

Finishing the game versus beating the game is the difference between beating Lavos and face-rolling Lavos with your ultimate weapon. 

Finishing the game versus beating the game is the difference between finishing the Wu and Wei story lines, and then maxing your bond with every officer in conquest mode.

I finished Ni No Kuni. I have not yet beaten it.