History Main / AbsurdlyHighLevelCap

* [[Etrian Odyssey]] played with this trope just a bit in its first game; The player's level cap is 70, but beating the story final boss can be done at slightly lower than 60. However, its BonusDungeon pretty much demands you to use all those 70 levels. However, this is played even straighter in the sequels: The level cap has been increased to 99, but not only you should be able to beat the main game at 50-60s, your characters' level cap is also 70 at natural, but can be increased by retiring those characters which resets their levels but ultimately increases their level cap by ''1'' per retiring. Yes, you need to retire your characters '''30''' times to finally reach their level cap.

** Nethack's monster-scaling algorithm means that ''avoiding'' leveling past the minimum required (you have to be level 13, if memory serves, to unlock part of the main quest) is a viable strategy.

** For those who think 130 is on the low end? Endgame for the storyline has a minimum doable (and, honestly, it's still feasible) level of ''thirteen''.
*** Lets see, the final storyline quest is avabliable at and designed for level 13. The highest level skills are at level 15. There's some high-level content hovering around high teens and low twenties, and a BraggingRightsReward for reaching level 30. [[WordOfGod The designers have stated]] that they have no intention of adding content for higher levels than 30. And yet the level cap is still [[BinaryBitsAndBytes 255]], and will probably increase as the few characters in the region (yes, there are some) approach it.

*** Similarly, in ''Harmony of Dissonance'', once you hit level 53, all enemies are worth 1 exp.

* The ''TalesSeries'' usually has a level cap of about 200, but even with 10X experience it'll take you a lot of playthroughs or LevelGrinding to reach the cap.

* While ''GuildWars'' has an absurdly low level cap of 20, its sequel will reportedly have no level cap whatsoever -- with the implication that characters will [[CosmeticAward no longer benefit]] from leveling after a certain point.

* For ''Nethack'', the experience level cap is 30. This sounds reasonable for a fifty-floor dungeon; but, around experience level 12, conventional methods of level-gaining - kill stuff - are no longer efficient. A more regular interval emerges for experience levels 20+ but getting from 12 to 20 looks daunting on paper. A wily player has to develop other strategies to compensate for the growing violent horde while scraping together whatever other experience levels they can for the endgame.

* In the ''{{Pokemon}}'' games, you're likely to beat the [[FinalBoss Elite]] [[BossRush Four]] with pokemon around level 50 or so. Later generations have added endgame content that will probably bring your pokemon up to level 60-70, even though the level cap is 100. Of course, [[FinalBoss R]][[PreviousPlayerCharacterCameo e]][[CrowningMomentOfAwesome d]] and [[TheRival Bar]][[BonusBoss ry]] have teams in the 80s. The easiest way to beat them is to hope that you get lucky.

** ''FinalFantasyXI'' is currently capped at 85, though for the majority of the game's lifespan the cap was 75. And boy, did you need all 75 of those levels. ''FinalFantasyXIII'' doesn't have experience levels, just a character enhancement system a la ''FinalFantasyX''.

* [[TalesofSymphonia Tales of Symphonia]] has a level cap of 250. It can be beaten at level 70.

* The ''{{Final Fantasy}}'' series tends to play this straight with a level cap of 99, the only exceptions being ''{{Final Fantasy II}}'' and ''{{Final Fantasy X}}''.

* Averted in the first ''DotHack'' series -- you'd actually end up around level 90 by the endgame. Good luck getting much higher than that, though.

* The ''{{Final Fantasy}}'' series tends to play this straight with a level cap of 99, the only exception being ''{{Final Fantasy X}}''.

* The ''{{Final Fantasy}}'' series tends to play this straight, the only exception being ''{{Final Fantasy X}}''.

* The ''{{Final Fantasy}}'' series tends to play this straight, with the exception of ''{{Final Fantasy X}}''.

* [[TalesofSymphonia Tales of Symphonia]] has a level cap of 250. It can be beaten at level 70.

* Averted in the ''{{Persona}}'' series, where you have a good reason for grinding to as high a level as you can reach - you can't equip Personae of a higher level than the character. In ''3'' and ''4'', you get another incentive - reaching Level 99 sets your maximum HP and MP to 999 (from the initial 300+). All this said, without taking extra time, you'll clear the game in the mid-60s.

* [[Tales of Symphonia Tales of Symphonia]] has a level cap of 250. It can be beaten at level 70.

* Averted in the ''{{Persona}}'' series, where you have a good reason for grinding to as high a level as you can reach - you can't equip Personae of a higher level than the character. In ''3'' and ''4'', you get another incentive - reaching Level 99 sets your maximum HP and MP to 999 (from the initial 300+). All this said, without taking extra time, you'll clear the game in the mid-60s.

* ''BaldursGate II: Throne of Bhaal'', with its XP cap of 8,000,000, which means level 31 to 40 depending on class. Normal finishing level is maybe a bit under thirty, and the cap is so absurdly high for 2nd edition DungeonsAndDragons rules that even the new special abilities introduced in this game can't make for meaningful content for so many levels. Wizards cease to gain any new powers at all long before the maximum.

* Most of the {{Metroidvania}} iterations of the ''{{Castlevania}}'' series end with the main character around level 50 (and the max being 255).