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{{trope}}
[[File:Residentevil4-grid.jpg|thumbnail]]
An alternative to the [[Hyperspace Arsenal]]. Instead of having an infinite amount of generic space to store things, you have a grid to store them in. The size and shape of objects varies; a key may fit into a single grid section, while a box of ammunition takes up a larger square of sections, and a rifle needs a long rectangle. Usually an object must always take up at least one section, no matter how small the object, so one's inventory can quickly become filled up with small things like keys and scrolls.
▲An alternative to the [[Hyperspace Arsenal]]. Instead of having an infinite amount of generic space to store things, you have a grid to store them in. The size and shape of objects varies; a key may fit into a single grid section, while a box of ammunition takes up a larger square of sections, and a rifle needs a long rectangle. Usually an object must always take up at least one section, no matter how small the object, so one's inventory can quickly become filled up with small things like keys and scrolls.
Weight is generally ignored in these systems. A gold ingot and a sheet of paper will take the same percentage of carrying capacity, even though the ingot is thousands of times heavier.
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{{examples}}
* ''[[System Shock]] 2'', with the variation that the size of the grid varies with your character's strength.
** The first ''[[
*** ''[[Deus Ex: Human Revolution
* The ''[[Diablo]]'' series. The first also had the rather painful restriction that ''gold'' (in stacks of up to 5,000, though double this with the right and otherwise useless amulet in the unofficial expansion pack) took up precious inventory space. Few items were actually worth more than their gold worth, which made them that much more precious.
** And its [[Spiritual Successor|spiritual successors]] ''Mythos'' and ''[[Hellgate
** In Mabinogi, gold only stacks up to 1,000 per square. However, there are items called Gold Bags which occupy four squares each, and can hold up to 50,000 gold each. Also, your bank account can hold up to six million gold per character, and any of the characters can access it (useful for kitting out a new character with no money of their own).
** Diablo II also had a plot-necessary item (the Horadric Cube) that contained several inventory slots. It was actually used for transmuting various items together, but doing that is rare enough that it usually got used just for extra inventory space.
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*** Worst of all? There are two vests that provide you with more health (melee and bulletproof), each of them taking up a space.
* The ''[[Dungeon Siege]]'' series features this, but refreshingly includes a feature to sort it all into the most continuous space possible. Your mileage may vary. Fortunately, if you run out of inventory space, you can get a mule at almost every city to carry your stuff.
* ''[[
** There's also something of a cheat: in order to assign an object to a hotkey, you need to place it in one of the ten slots at the bottom of the screen, thus removing it from the grid. These slots ignore the dimensions of the item, and you can assign any item to them, which means that you can save a lot of space by assigning armor and weapons to them.
* The ''[[Neverwinter Nights]]'' and ''[[Neverwinter Nights 2]]'' series have both a grid system ''and'' a weight system, although in ''NWN 2'' you almost never run out of grid space. They don't have a size limit, though, so, as long as you can carry items to the weight of ten full-plate suits of armour, you can carry ten full-plate suits of armour, even though any one of these is almost as big as you. And ''NWN 2'' does have a defragmenting button (?Arrange Inventory?). Ha!
** The key difference between both games is that ''[[Neverwinter Nights]]'' takes different sizes into account: An armor set requires much more space then a potion although you are still given enough grid space to carry around several sets of full plate armor. In ''[[Neverwinter Nights 2]]'', every single item takes up exactly on space on the grid and containers such as bags can hold an absurd amount of items, rendering the
* The ''[[X-COM]]'' games made heavy use of this, even giving the characters separate grids for each body location (and separate Time Unit costs to move things from place to place).
** Most slots were never used. A gun in hand, ammo and grenades on the belt, and ''maybe'' an additional gun and ammo in the backpack. That still left shoulder and leg spots available, but, considering the fact that there was nothing useful to put there, ''and'' the fact that the weight of equipment is an important factor in how far your soldiers can move, they were almost always left blank.
*** However, it's marginally faster to move grenades (and high explosive) to the hands from the shoulders, rather than the default belt slot.
*** [[Spiritual Successor]] series ''UFO'' does much the same thing. Starting with the second game ''Aftershock'', certain units had larger or smaller inventory grids (humans had the largest, with cyborgs slightly smaller and psychics the smallest). In the third game, ''Afterlight'', the type of environmental suit worn by the soldier determines the carrying capacity, with more protective armors resulting in smaller inventory grids (usually).
* In the ''[[Gundam]]'' spinoff RPG ''[[MS Saga]]'', each mobile suit has a Grid Inventory to determine how many weapons it can carry. Melee weapons are taller than longer, while the reverse is true for ranged weapons, and every MS has a unique grid in order to suit its specialization. That's right, they made the [[Inventory Management Puzzle]] an integral part of the game balance.
* ''[[Might and Magic]]'' ''6''-''8'' (the original RPG, [[More Popular Spinoff|not the]] [[Turn
* The ''[[
** Although the strategy game ''[[Mech Commander]]'' only had weight restrictions for adding weapons and components, the sequel played this completely straight- each 'Mech had a grid inventory the represented both size and weight of the weapons added, as well as extra armour and heatsinks (the other limit on components) This system was used somewhat creatively, however, since smaller 'Mechs could have a lot of space but the grid would be made tall and narrow, preventing the addition of heavy weapons.
* ''[[Super Smash Bros Brawl]]'' uses a similar system for its sticker power-ups: you can only use as many oddly-shaped stickers as you can fit on the round base of a trophy.
* Many games fail to account for different sized objects properly. In ''[[Diablo]]'', six sheets of paper take up as much space as a breastplate. ''[[
** Most mods, particularly mods developed by one of the ''game designers'' fix this by allowing identical items to be stacked. Additional mods (of even the same ones) can allow items to be stacked infinitely, making the game ''much'' less annoying for inventory management.
* The game ''[[
* [[First-Person Shooter]] ''Chrome'' is not a [[Role
* The ''Dark Sun'' games had an inventory system similar to ''[[
* Basically every single game made by Level-5:
** ''[[
** ''[[
** ''[[Dragon Quest]]'' VIII was developed for [[Square Enix]] by Level-5, and also features a grid inventory.
** ''[[Rogue Galaxy]]'' has a grid inventory which is divided into 7 pages, six of which hold 40 items each, the seventh of which is designed specifically to hold the game's rarest items. The warehouse is also gridded. Like items stack, like in DC2. It's still possible to cram most of your inventory panels completely full of the ridiculous amounts of crap you collect in this game.
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* [[Titan Quest]] also sport a grid inventory, plus extra grids in the form three magic bags. The expansion add a sort button and has a much smarter inventory auto-management.
* ''[[Silent Storm]]'' has a grid inventory, but due to the shapes of some items it is very prone to [[Inventory Management Puzzle]] syndrome despite its auto-sort feature. And to survive properly you pretty much have to loot every battle map before leaving for home, making things even more difficult. And yeah, weight is meaningless.
* The main gameplay mechanic in ''[[Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days
* ''[[Fate]]'', a [[Diablo]][[Roguelike|like]], featured this in all its irritating glory. There was nothing more fun than warping home with an inventory "full" of six double-bladed axes, and about 33% of your grid actually empty.
* ''[[
* The [[Car Wars]] like boardgame ''Battlecars'' used this. Each car had several weapon bays, usually 2x4 squares. You could carry 8 volleys of machinegun ammo (1x1), four 1x2 artillery shells, or two 1x4 missiles, of increasing power, mixing and matching as you wish.
* ''[[Minecraft]]'' has a grid system for your character's inventory. 40 slots, including 4 for crafting and 9 available for use/hotkeyed. One slot can hold up to 64, 16, or one of an item, depending on the type. You can also build chests, which have 27 slots or 54 for the big chests. While there are no objects larger than one slot, one often has to rearrange inventory just to put what you need in the use row, to be able to find things in it, or to combine multiple stacks into one 64-stack to free up slots.
* ''[[Legend of Mana]]'': The Logic Blocks that go up into making your [[Robot Buddy]] are arranged on a grid, with more powerful Blocks taking up more space. Where they are arranged also affects the behavior of said robot.
* ''[[Dead Space (
** Though in ''[[
* ''[[World of Warcraft]]''. You start off with a 4x4 backpack. You also have 4 slots for bags, which each add anywhere from 4 to 22 additional inventory spaces. There are also specialized bags which can hold even more items (up to 32), but only of certain type. (These originally included quivers and soul shard pouches, at least before Blizzard [[Bottomless Magazines|phased out the systems of "Ranged Weapons Use Ammo"]] and "Soul Shards Take Up Inventory Space". Now the only specialized bags are for crafting supplies.) Items stack depending on type; some as few as 5, others over 200, and weapons and armor do not stack. There was also a separate inventory section for keys that grew as you found more of them, but this is also about to be phased out.
* ''[[Solatorobo]]'' allows the Dahak to be upgraded with modules slotted into a grid, but the entire grid isn't available at first. Finding Power Crystals to unlock new slots is one of the main reasons to search areas thoroughly! The modules come in all shapes and sizes, including some of the classic Tetris blocks. Once you get the Mk 2, the total unlockable space increases as well, allowing for further enhancement.
* ''[[Kid Icarus: Uprising]]'' uses this for equippable powers.
* ''
* ''[[Freedroid RPG]]'' has a grid, with the bottom row doubling as hotkey slots.
* ''[[UFO Alien Invasion]]'' is one of the few that have grid inventory, but items can be turned (e.g. a typical magazine can be fit in 1x2 or 2x1 space) and not all are rectangular (while most weapons are 2 squares wide, bullpup rifles have 1 square wide muzzle side, laser rifle and plasma blaster have thick barrels, but 1 wide stock side, LMG and needlers have both).
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Video Game Items and Inventory]]
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