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[Euld]

A friend and I had a debate about the game we're working on.  The subject was (yeah I know the title says it) whether our game should allow limited or unlimited player inventory.  I'll post our arguments here, but I'm also hoping some of you guys could bring in some insight.

Unlimited inventory:
Pros
+Player never needs to stop gameplay to empty their inventory
+Some players enjoy the vast riches they can accumulate
Cons
-Hit to realism, player stores incredible amount of loot on person
-Player needs different motivation to leave the major gameplay area to empty inventory

Limited inventory:
Pros
+Some players enjoy micromanaging their inventory
+Possibly adds feeling of worth to items
Cons
-Breaks the flow of gameplay
-Often needs a different, unlimited storage for player to store the loot they're keeping for later
-Requires a logical, very thought out system of storage

edit: Our game is called Heart of the Mountain.  You play as a Dwarf who has returned to his grandfather's abandoned mine to reclaim it from the mysterious creatures within.  The game is a 3rd person Action-Adventure game (it doesn't fit into any other major categories).  You mine usual things like iron, gold, and gems, but you also mine various elemental ores (water, wind, earth, and fire), which you use to make deadly traps to kill any hostile creatures you find.  The caverns of the mountain have been struck by dimensional flux; the four elemental planes have converted the caves to their respective elements.  You also capture 4 different creatures that allow you to clear/avoid/circumvent obstacles to further advance into the mine.  You can cash in your gold/silver/gems at a town at the foot of the mountain while also getting upgrades with your iron/copper/tin.

So yeah, inventory-wise: gold/silver/gems for cash, iron/copper/tin for upgrades, 4 elemental ores, 4 different elemental traps.

edit: oh right, one more change.  The point of selling the gold/silver/gems is that increases the wealth of the town.  Which does... well we're not sure what the point of helping out the impoverished town is, but we're working on that.

[Derekristow]

The single most important question:  What kind of game is it?  Neither option is inherently better than the other, so there's no way to tell without some information on the game.

[Euld]

edit: editing done!

[zombie urist]

Do whatever makes the game more fun. 

[MrWiggles]

Whichever one conforms to the games intentions and core game play. One isnt really better then the other. 

[Flare]

I often find the argument from realism is closely tied to how intuitive a system is to the user. Most of us operate with some real life assumptions when playing games, for example things generally fall to the ground when unsupported, and if the character were to fall from a high height they would probably be hurt.
Some of this is mitigated by experience from other games though, some people might expect an unlimited inventory, but many probably won't criticize you for implementing a limited or restrictive inventory system that is consistent with their real world understanding of carrying things around. People often don't have a problem with unlimited inventory space if there are penalties attached to carry way too much stuff.
Take into mind though that having an arbitrary limit on how much stuff you can carry often incorporates the worst of two worlds. It can be neither intuitive, nor be representative of how people who has packed something in their lifetime view inventory management.
A reason to not go for the unlimited inventory manage I would think, is that item systems are often closely tied to the material availability of the world. Giving the players a whole lot of junk to justify an unlimited amount of inventory space might not be the best idea. A lot of stuff in games often aren't used until the end of the game. Players often collect things for the sake of hoarding rather than for the materials utilitarian benefits in systems with unlimited inventory.

[Sirus]

If you're going to be mining stuff and returning to town to improve it, I would go with a limited inventory. You could be able to upgrade inventory space as you go along.

[alway]

You forgot a major negative to infinite inventory: finding things. Or rather the lack thereof.
"now where did I put that important item..."
"vial of bat piss, no
cave spider venom strength 1.5, no
poisonous lichen strength 2, no
jar of guano, no
cave troll dropping, no
cave spider venom strength 5, no
poisonous lichen strength 6, no
cave spider venom, strength 1, no
cave troll tooth, no
edible lichen, no
cave spider venom strength 4, no
glowing lichen, no
vampire bat fang, no
poisonous lichen strength 1, no
cave troll spittle, no..."
*continues for 8 more pages, before stopping part way through*
"Wait... what was it I was looking for again?" *sigh*

[Blizzlord]

Have you thought of having one inventory for each of the ores, so that there is a(n upgradable) cap on how much you can mine while having a separate inventory for other random junk you find or craft? Seems like something that makes for better pacing if the inventory size is generous enough.

[Flare]

You forgot a major negative to infinite inventory: finding things. Or rather the lack thereof.
"now where did I put that important item..."
"vial of bat piss, no
cave spider venom strength 1.5, no
poisonous lichen strength 2, no
jar of guano, no
cave troll dropping, no
cave spider venom strength 5, no
poisonous lichen strength 6, no
cave spider venom, strength 1, no
cave troll tooth, no
edible lichen, no
cave spider venom strength 4, no
glowing lichen, no
vampire bat fang, no
poisonous lichen strength 1, no
cave troll spittle, no..."
*continues for 8 more pages, before stopping part way through*
"Wait... what was it I was looking for again?" *sigh*

That has happened in starfarer with their station's unlimited inventory space and the large set of items. Although the way this is solved, or will be solved, is just to implement a search or categorization function with the inventory.

All in all though, I personally think inventory space gets rid of a whole slew of logistical enjoyment that would otherwise go well with games that are intensively focused on the player finding things. Games like Warrior Kings, Patrician, and DF can show that figuring out your logistical train, while not hard to do if all you want is to get stuff from A to B, does offer a lot of room for inventiveness, creativity, and a lot of fun to be had in how their simple factors can combine into a very complex system.

[Frumple]

... either depends pretty heavily on how you implement it. There's a world of difference between the limited inventory of Angband, ToME4, and Incursion, ferex.

Uh. Huh. Actually, I can't think on any unlimited inventory games off the top of my head. Most that come close just use "soft" (i.e. total weight, which is influenced by varying things) instead of hard (inventory slots) limited inventories.

As far as preference goes, I like whatever doesn't get in the way of the playing the game. If there's going to be a limited inventory, make sure it does more than just waste the player's time or force them to (more or less meaninglessly) trawl through junk/leave behind useful stuff. I've never been fond of Angband, Crawl, or Diablo's (/varying multitudinous MMOs) inventory systems. T4's conversion of utility items into a limited slot thing is close to ideal, t'me. Some other games (I think a few MMOs?) do something similar with healing items on cool down rather than chewing up inventory, as an example. Resource management is fine and dandy, but I've not seen many that try that that aren't... clumsy. Dev seems to have more power insofar as creating the experience they want when they can just say, "Okay, this is your utility, you have X of those. This is your healing, you have Y of these." Instead of "Well, have, uh. Twenty slots. Do whatever."

If there's going to be an unlimited inventory, make sure it's easily navigable and do what you can to supress "junk" items, unless something useful can be done with said junk -- and in that case, probably do something interesting with it on the fly. ToME4's a good example -- it has an artifact that automatically picks up everything for you and can break whatever you don't want down into gold. Items stored in the artifact are weightless, and it prompts you to clear the thing out on level change.

[Slayerhero90]

If you're going to be mining stuff and returning to town to improve it, I would go with a limited inventory. You could be able to upgrade inventory space as you go along.

This is a good idea.

   I have a problem with limited inventory in that I have an immensely hard time figuring out what to get rid of.
   I three games I have played, Everquest 2 and Fallen Earth, both MMOs, and Skyrim, there was a limited inventory system.
   The way Everquest went with this was that you could buy or craft better backpacks (not easy to get, though) that allowed you to hold more stuff. There was no weight system. As a result of me being a packrat, desire to carry crafting resources on me at all times for my carpenterness (even though I would likely not be near a crafting station, at all), and tangible quest related objects, I was always deciding wheter do drop the obscure crafting thing that I haven't used at all, the severed hooves of a minotaur, or a quest starter object. Not fun.
   Fallen Earth was so that there was limited space and weight, in addition to a lack of backpack-like things and mobile crafting (complete with heavy raw metals), making me decide to drop a bit of copper, eat food, take meds, or drop a repair kit. Still not fun.
   Skyrim had just weight, causing you to be a slow as hell person. Always deciding to drop a hide that needs tanning or an enchanted item to disenchant or food to eat. As a result looting dungeons is not as fun. So again, not fun. However, with the Earring of Unburden (mod) things worked out. How about you make the decision of limited/unlimited available when starting a new game?

[Neyvn]

With Limited Inventory there is a requirement for the player to be able to enhance how much they can carry, be it with Carry Weight or Addition Containers. This gives the player a feeling of being able to advance forward and develop the game to their liking. Think of it this way...

Imagine playing you Fav MMO. Now Imagine it where those extra bag slots were always limited to only 4 slots. Compare it to how you first felt when you found a 6 Slot bag, heck thats only TWO EXTRA Slots that you get, but it felt like your character got stronger despite the fact that you only got a bigger bag...

[MrWiggles]

With Limited Inventory there is a requirement for the player to be able to enhance how much they can carry, be it with Carry Weight or Addition Containers. This gives the player a feeling of being able to advance forward and develop the game to their liking. Think of it this way...

Imagine playing you Fav MMO. Now Imagine it where those extra bag slots were always limited to only 4 slots. Compare it to how you first felt when you found a 6 Slot bag, heck thats only TWO EXTRA Slots that you get, but it felt like your character got stronger despite the fact that you only got a bigger bag...

There isn't a requirement to have a limited inventory to be 'enhanced'. Pretty much whenever you see this mechanic, its a resource sink to slow down progression or used as a luxury, but its not a requirement simply because its a limited inventory.

[Bauglir]

If you do want to enhance inventory size as the game progresses, it should probably use resources separate from other scaling resources like gold and experience tend to be, and it should probably expand in step with the game's expectations of what you should be able to use at a given moment. By that I mean, don't just give inventory space so that it's a luxury or to cultivate a sense of progression. The former just turns the limitation into an arbitrary annoyance (you should never have a game mechanic whose primary purpose is to annoy the player, which is what a limited inventory system is if you consider a bigger one to be basically a luxury on the player), and the latter should be the domain of things your character can accomplish (slaying dragons, diplomatizing a truce between nations, etc).

Instead, make the game expect you to have a larger inventory. For instance, you might use inventory size as the primary restriction on what you can buy - material rewards from completing tasks, presumably precious metals and jewels, would not increase in frequency as the game progresses, nor would more valuable items become unlocked later on. You'd have everything technically available right from the start, but you can't carry enough valuable stuff to pay for the really top-end gear until the end-game. Another option might be to make puzzles that are dependent on how much you're carrying - maybe you need enough extra weight to trigger a pressure plate that is jammed or expects a statue or something.

Bring something more to the table than just a mechanism to force you back to town less often.

In any case, concerns about storage organization are valid. Skyrim has limited inventory, but even with SkyUI installed to improve the menu interface, the vast numbers of shitty enchanted rings I wound up with from grinding smithing and enchanting rendered my armor inventory a chore to navigate, and random thingumbobs rendered most other screens similarly grating (particularly potions). I couldn't sell them off fast enough because of limited merchant gold, either. Personally, I prefer an unlimited inventory (Final Fantasy style, except with a cap so high on individual item types that it's all but impossible to reach), but I'd probably find a meaningful limited system to be preferable for games like the one you're describing, which focus largely on collecting loot. Just make sure that it isn't an afterthought.