I’m okay with that; it’s the ones who walk juuust far enough away to not aggro, then the mob aggroes on me as I try to sneak past, and the escortee doesn’t come back and help, and in the time that it takes me to solo mine, the escortee goes on ahead and gets killed by the next mob down the road.
But that pales in comparison to the STUPIDEST DRUIDS IN ALL THE LAND, who have the ability to go INVISIBLE and they AREN’T EVEN LOCKED UP, but still somehow feel they are being kept captive… somehow? The Tauren in Zangamarsh doesn’t even have anybody in the room with her, so for any rational druid, it would be three mouse clicks and she’s GONE. This makes Archdruid Staghelm’s posturing seem even stupider when he rants about the priestess not knowing how to rule the night elves. Hello? Staghelm? It’s called PROWL. Make sure your druids hotkey that one, mmkay? Then you can talk to us about who’s the more qualified leader.
As time wore on, pretty much every bit of a Sierra-produced adventure game. I know they were the staple diet of those of us who gamed on the PC in the 80s/90s but looking back without the rose-tinted nostalgia glasses they weren’t the fun experiences we often think. Just a few examples:
Space Quest 2 - land in the jungle, death is no more than 3 feet away at all times. You WILL have 30 save files by the time you’ve got out of there. You get kissed by the alien in Vohaul’s base but it’s not in the least obvious that this will kill you in about 20 minutes time, so you’ll waste your time playing the game before suddenly dying and have to go back to a save point BEFORE the alien.
Space Quest 3 - pick up the sheet of metal = the sheet of metal is sharp and cuts you, you bleed to death. You step out of the ship on Ortega and you don’t have the cooling boots = die instantly. You’re being chased by the cyborg and will die many many many many times before you work out how to kill him.
Kings Quest 1 - the dwarf robbed you taking critical objects and there is no way to get them back = game over, but you probably don’t realise it for a good long while.
Kings Quest 3 - cast spells exactly or you die. Give Mannanan any hint that you’ve moved anything in the house whilst he’s gone or even be outside the house when he comes back, or you die. Use the spell items you make at exactly the right time because once they’re gone you can’t make more, and the game is over (but again you dont’ know it).
Kings Quest 5 - you are tied up in the inn basement and because you didn’t previously throw the shoe at the cat chasing the rat in the 20 seconds or so it was on screen you won’t get rescued and you die. You meet the harpies but because you don’t have the fishhook you die. [one of four stages where you are in danger] and because you didn’t stop Cedric being killed earlier you die. You end up in Mordack’s dungeon and because you didn’t speak to Princess Casima you stay there and die.
Are you seeing a pattern here? Compare and contrast to the games that were created by Lucasarts (with the exception of the Indiana Jones games) where it was impossible to die or get in a situation where it was game over which actually encouraged you to try things, explore and enjoy yourself without fear of dying every 10 seconds (often for no apparent reason).
The missions in GTA : IV, called The Driver I believe, where you had to race this guy - and you can’t choose your car. Never finished that one.
I recall a game I rented many years ago, called Captain Quasar I believe which was pretty fun for most of the game. But at the very end, without warning it switches from a run-around-and-blow-stuff-up type game, to a chase with a spaceship - with no chance to practice the controls and lots of asteroids. And you have to redo the previous mission all the way through if you run out of lives.
In Final Fantasy Tactics, the mission where you have to keep both of a pair of siblings ( IIRC ) alive in a fight against a guy who can one or two shot them.
And of course they insist on attacking him, and of course they are real close.
That’d be from GTA:Vice City, I believe. And yes, a hellish mission. Especially since you had to start from your safe house and drive over every damn time. I really loathed that drive.
63 replies and no one’s mentioned the “Chamber of Fayths” from FFX?
I loved that game, but I’d dread every time I’d come across those stupid puzzles. Especially that one towards the end, where you have to transport around on those stupid pedestals in a 3d maze.
I’d always go back and play that game every 2 years or so, which apparently is just the right amount of the to completely forget the tricks you used last time to make it through the chambers.
I like casual games (Big Fish, etc). I like hidden object games (yes, that’s me that’s keeping them alive). I like games that switch things up a bit with minigames in between finding objects in rooms.
But there are some minigames that make me tear my hair out. Stupid Temple of Hanoi. Stupid LONG remember-the-order games (I threw away my Simon a long time ago). Stupid waterpipes. Hate. Them.
The seen in Half Life 2 where you attach yourself to that moving prison cell thing and go into a 10 hour video if it taking you from point A to point B. Other than that, it was a good game.
Escort missions. No matter the game, whether it’s squad tactics, first person shooter, RPG, GTA… I don’t care, whenever I have to care for a virtual dumb as rocks pain in my neck, I know I’ll be in for a crappy time. I’m looking at you, Resident Evil 4, a.k.a. Resident Dumb Broad Escort
First Person Dungeon crawling. I loved S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Deus Ex, Far Cry, and Oblivion and yes, even Fallout 3 for their fantastic exteriors, landscapes and towns. They’re the thinking man’s boom-boom-dead - stay on your toes, scan the terrain for good defensive positions and cover, look out for ambush sites etc…
When it becomes corridors, doors and ennemies jumping out from the ceiling/shadows/air ducts without any kind of cover, warning, rhyme or reason… sucks. That’s even worse if the critters somehow respawn. I get lost faster than a blind mouse on a gyroscope, OK ?
The worse offender was the game Viet Cong. Most of the game is excellent, realistic combat out in the jungle and fields, requiring good shootin’, good use of cover and grenades, good use of your squad for covering fire/flanking, and certainly no ramboing, one-man-army style. And then they drop you alone in a VC tunnel maze with just a handgun and a flashlight. Twice. Did I mention there were only 3 saves per level allowed, a few shots killed you (nevermind boobytraps) and those tunnels went on for frackin’ EVER ?
I’m with you on this. I adore the first part of Quake 4, where most of the fighting is outside. On foot, you really get the sense that you’re immersed in a war and your actions actually mean something, and then you hop in vehicles and go to town.
After that, though, it becomes your standard Doom corridor-crawling with pop-out monsters, dead ends, and dark cramped passageways, and it lost a lot of its fun for me.
I absolutely LOVED the haunted hotel. Too bad it loses all of its teeth on subsequent playthroughs - now I just run all the way through in under 2 minutes. But man, that first time… “He’s heeeeere” bang go the knees on the desk.
One of the best scary levels I’ve played since the Cradle in Thief Deadly Shadows. Seriously, you do not know scary until you’ve been through the Cradle. I love all three Thief games, play them every other year. I’m still terrified of that damn sentient asylum.
If you mean the fight on the rooftop after Wiegraf, I found that really easy. But I had two ninjas and I’ve heard that makes it easy.
I found the Wiegraf fight much harder. And if you saved in the castle before the battle, and aren’t prepared, then you’ve pretty much screwed your game because you can’t leave.
You only have to play Blitzball once, and you don’t have to win at that.
Many of my choices have already been mentioned, but one that has not (I think) are the requirements to get the celestial weapons in FFX. It took me way too long to get 0.00 seconds on the Chocobo race, finish the butterfly obstacle course, etc.
