People talking about playing the game on easy mode cuz it’s too tough (though others said it wasn’t and instead of figuring out why others find it easy…why bother…hey I’ll just ramp down the difficulty.
This might hit close to home because I have a son (though he is 25 now) who did this stuff constantly when he was a kid. He modded to make things easy. Constantly reloaded games if things didn’t turn out right (watching him play Civilization was a real hoot…lose a battle…RELOAD!)
Gah…drives me batty. Why play? Just say you won and do something else.
Am I in such a minority? It seems so widespread, like I am alone in this view.
There’s a number of reasons. Not all are applicable at once, but they apply in different situations.
People like a challenge, but they also like to win. Sort of like how a movie can be tense and exciting even though you ultimately know the good guys will win out. When the bad guys win, even when it’s a reasonable conclusion from the rest of the preceding plot, it’s almost always a letdown and upsets moviegoers. Similarly, there’s plenty of gamers who enjoy a fight but hate seeing a Game Over screen.
The game balance might be out of whack. Mods to make things easier sometimes aren’t so much about giving you an I Win button as simply making the game more fair and reasonable.
Some folks do like an I Win button. There’s a certain amount of visceral thrill to be gained from being able to one-shot enemies. For some the experience is fleeting and boring, for others they could spend hours dominating enemies.
Some folks just play for the experience, not the challenge. When I do use cheats, this is usually the reason why. I want to see the plot of a game unfold and experience the set pieces, and my skill may not be enough to see the game through. I generally have better things to do than waste several hours working on one particular irritating boss.
Of course, although the thread title mentions it, it bears repeating that this is only for single player games. Cheating is never, under any circumstances, okay or appropriate in multiplayer games.
They bought the game and should have whatever experience they want. It’s not harming anyone else, since it’s a solo game.
Why should gaming be about saying that I won? I’m more concerned with enjoying the time I spend gaming. Who cares if I “won” by the game’s terms or my own?
Fun is the point, after all. Additionally, what makes a game too easy for you might make it just right for another player.
I don’t have a problem with cheating in single-player games. I have cheated from time to time, but it’s almost always after playing the game legitimately without cheats and then setting a new goal. For instance, I’m sure there’s plenty of other completionists out there who will like to play through an RPG again a second time and make sure they get EVERYTHING and make all of their characters as powerful as possible. It’s a different way to play the game. But often playing through again to find everything means finding a guide. Sometimes it means using cheat codes to make a LONG grind faster, or make certain other parts easier because you’re no longer interested in playing for the story or concerned with making sure that the leveling process keeps the content challenging. At that point, it isn’t challenging to kill the same enemies over and over for hours waiting for a rare drop when you can just use a code for it and save a lot of time.
For some other people, they may like a particular game and get stuck at a point that they just aren’t good enough to get past, or maybe it uses a different mechanic than most of the rest of the game uses and they don’t enjoy it. I wouldn’t blame them for cheating to get past that.
And sometimes it’s just fun to play a game in god mode. I remember playing through GTA and I would get bored of the story missions, so I’d occassionally just use the weapon and health codes and spend some time causing all kinds of havoc. Either way, it’s your experience, just because it’s not how the game designers necessarily meant it to be played doesn’t that that if you find it fun that way you shouldn’t do it.
However, what DOES make me angry is cheating at multi-player games because there you often will affect the experience that other people are having playing the game. So, yeah, no weapon codes, or god modes, or bug exploits there please. Thanks.
it’s cheating in multi-player games that makes me angry because you’re a
The only single player game where i can understand and encourage cheating is The Sims. Honestly the game is simply a whole lot more fun if you start off with a bunch of money, i found it very frustrating to play without the money cheat.
This is generally true of most of the Sim games. I found Simcity vastly more entertaining when I had a bottomless well of money.
This is actually true of a lot of games that limit your resources in order to create an economic aspect to the game. In Blizzard’s RTSes Warcraft and Starcraft, I enjoy removing the resource scarcity from the equation, because it allows me to focus on creating units and messing with the strategic side of the game rather than the economical. Similarly, in Simcity, it allowed me to focus on the city-building side, which was way more fun (at the time I played it, anyway, which was in my teens. I might find the economic side more fun now, I don’t know).
Hmm. I totally cheated to win Myst IV - just looked up the color-code door lock. Of course, that was because my copy of the game was bugged and froze every time I tried to go into the dream-state thingy where you learn what colors you’re supposed to use.
Also, I would totally use a cheat to avoid every time an otherwise-fun game turns into a platform-jumper. Generally I just grit my teeth and plow through, because finding cheats is annoying, but if I had one at my fingertips I totally would.
Now this is a gigantic falsehood. No offense intended toward you personally, because I’m pretty sure you haven’t actually played the game. But please read this article, then try to claim it’s the same as real life.
I just tease anyone I see cheating in single player games. A friend of mine has a son (18 years old) that does this. I tell him he’s “just not man enough” to beat it without cheating. On the other hand, if I get into an online game that he’s in, I try mightily to not be on the same side as him. He’s an easy kill.
Usually there’s too much min/maxing going on. Why can’t I have a warrior who is charming and intelligent? I’m the damn hero. Also many RPG’s make you feel like you’re missing out on half of your choices if you have a low speech skill yet battles are murderous with a charming rogue type character. I want to see every option in the game. I tend to do this less on team based RPG’s where I can have one member be my ‘talker’ and another be my dumb warrior.
If I feel like there’s a nonsensical grind thrown in just to make the game longer. I’ve proven I can kill 10 swamp rats for 50xp what’s the point of me killing another 1000 just so I can level? This has become less of a problem the last few years as more and more RPG’s seem to be better balanced.
Somewhat related to 2 if the game has become a slog for no reason and I want to see the next part of the story. This is more common with First Person Shooters. If I clear out a room and took say 25% damage and know there’s a healthpack I left 30 yrds behind I’ll just cheat myself a health pack instead of walking back to pick it up then walking forward again. It’s one reason I think health regenerating FPS’s are much better for me. I don’t want to make a mental note everytime I leave health behind because I didn’t need it then but I might need it up the road.
Back to RPG’s. I’m 20 hours into a game and realized I didn’t fully understand the leveling system. I’ve made a crap character that can’t swat a fly. Do I restart? Or do I pump his stats and if I still like the game after the first go around make a better character when I do replay it? I’ll take option two.
I’ve beaten the game a million times before. I’ve mastered it and I just want to make a mini god and stomp everything in sight.
I occasionally load up Starcraft or Warcraft so I can play a few levels I really enjoy. I’ll just cheat through the ones I think suck so I can get to the fun ones. Heck I’ve beaten the last level of the Frozen Throne expansion more times then I can count but I’ll cheat through the ‘easier’ ones because I don’t enjoy them as much.
Yes and no. People have the power and prerogative to do what they want within a game to finish it, but it may end up saying something about the person that chooses to complete or play a game a certain way.
After all, you’ve got people that with any given game will be very good and will beat it on the highest levels, the bulk of people that complete it on the intermediate levels, and then the few that really, truly suck at the game and a game has to try and cater to everyone.
Also, what Blaster Master said about multiplayer. Cheaters on multiplayer deserve beatings.
I’m one of those guys who constantly reloads the game when I lose a battle in Civilization or when I lose a trooper in X-com. I can’t help doing otherwise. I think part of the problem is that a single game of Civilization can take a full day to complete, and something like X-com can take multiple days. It’s really tough to invest so much time, only to have single blaster bomb wipe out your entire elite strike team and screw you over for the remainder of the game.
And the thing is, I hate it when I savescum, because I never learn the value of scouting (why bother when I can just reload if blindly send my army out and they get slaughtered), keeping a good defense (why bother when I can just reload if the enemy sneak attacks one of my bases, and have my entire army waiting for him next time), or tactical withdrawal.
I really think more PC game developers should include a “iron man” difficulty setting option, that only allows for a single “save and exit” slot. That way there’s some sort of official encouragement for playing it the real way.
