Every gamer recognizes the healing room signal: a showdown awaits. No excuses, only battle. What if every room heals the characters? Despite their many differences, Xenoblade and Ys feature automatic health regeneration anywhere in the world, shaping their every enemy. When developers expect that a player will generally be at about 40% HP, they’re more likely to design enemies who can be defeated by characters at about 40% HP. Guess how this works when a player will generally be at 100%!

When heroes always have their full health, villains always use their full strength. Keeping players’ heroes in optimal condition is like throwing down a gauntlet: it announces that everything, everywhere, knows how to kill them and will cut loose trying.