Three things I will not accept from video games

Cafe Society
1

I’ve decided that there are simply some things that are too idiotic (best case) or simply malicious (worst case), that should they occur in any video game, that game gets the boot from me.

1. Limited saving.
I’ve been playing Dark Corners of the Earth, a game that only lets you save at certain marked spots (maybe there is menu or something that lets you turn this off? If so, tell me please). Now, I love the game itself, but after playing through roughly 30 minutes of content, during which there is no opportunity to save, only to have the game freeze because of some stupid bugg? Unacceptable. Out it goes.

**2. Games that are unplaybe unless you are already familiar with other, similiar games. **
I sat down to play a game called, if I rememer correctly *XIII *(13), at someone elses X-box. I’ve never owned an X-box, and this was pretty much the first time I handled an X-Box controller. Anyway, after a brief tutorial that doesn’t actually teach you which buttons do what, the game starts with someone shooting at you. Ok, I have my character run around a bit, try to open doors, try to pick stuff up, try do anything really, and suddely realize I really hate this controller. It has a whole mess of seemingly superfluous buttons that don’t do anyhting much, I have no idea how to perform any function in the game at all, and the game gave no hints whatsoever. I threw the controller away in disgust, and was told by the owner of the infernal machine that “…the game is really easy if you’ve played other FPS’s on the X-Box.” Right. X-box, XIII and anything asociated with either gets the boot.

3. In-game punishments for down-time.
This is by far the worst one, and the only one I atribute to actual evil intent from the designers.
Another friend wanted me to try EvE online. Fine, I signed up for a free trial, play through the intro and leave. Later, as I logg in again, missions have timed out. The game punished me for logging out and going to bed. Sorry, mister game designer, I am not an employee, you do not pay me, and you do not get to say when or how I play video games. I will not be giving you any money, ever.
Well, those are my deal-breakers for video-games. What are yours?

2

  1. **Escort Missions **- I just mentioned this in the cliche thread.

  2. **Irrational Boss battles **- Boss battles that require some skill almost totally unrelated to everything you’ve done up to that point.

Starfox Adventures final boss battle focused on the space missions, which only took up a small portion of that game(I’m aware of Starfox 64). The final battle wast hard and totally unrelated to the main game. Pain.

3

Metroid Prime: Corruption does this and it pisses me off. Love the game, but seriously hate that I have to find the “save stations” to continue. What a pain in the ass.

4

Games recycling or re-using stages. The last Silent Hill game was basically 8 stages, each repeated twice. When I realized that the rest of the game was simply going to have me running through the same stages I had already explored, but with the items and enemies in a different places, I took it out and never played it again. That’s some Atari shit!

5

For what it’s worth, I think the Xbox 360 controller is the best designed controller ever.

6

This one doesn’t bother me- sometimes timed quests enhance the challenge and make it interesting, especially if there’s a plot-related reason for the timeout.

My peeve? Having to talk to one specific (non-obvious) NPC at the beginning of the game, or having to talk to someone four times instead of three, in order to trigger something that advances the plot, which can’t be done later if you miss it. This drives me nuts, especially if it’s done in the name of “replayability.” Although I loved Final Fantasy X, I didn’t play X-2 specifically because a friend told me that it did this.

7

Multiple endings or “bad endings” in 50+ hour role-playing games. I had played the last Suikoden for a few hours when I found out that I was going to get the “bad ending” because I had given the “wrong” answer to a completely arbitrary question someone asked me in the first 10 minutes of the game. When I read that, I immediately traded the game in.

8

Back in my Nintendo-playing days, I was pretty tolerant of limited save points. Now that I use my computer for my gaming, I can’t stand them any more.

I never did like timed stuff in games. I won’t play games that do this.

I’m not a fan of jumping puzzles, mainly because I suck at them.

I don’t play games where, if you discover you need a certain object that you were supposed to have gotten earlier but didn’t, you can’t go back and get it any time.

I won’t play a game that requires me to memorize a whole bunch of random hotkeys. If I want to do something like that, I’ll learn some new software for work and get paid for it.

9

Related to the limited saves:
inability to pause at certain times Especially during cut scenes. Especially, Especially during cut scenes that have important plot info. Especially, Especially, Especially during cut scenes that have important plot info that are many minutes of game-time since the last save point. Ugh. Hello, sometimes I need to answer the phone, or stop my daughter from sticking a fork in an outlet, or sign for a package, etc…

10

Oh boy, do I agree with this. I once had to leave my PS2 on for a whole week until I finished the friggin chariot race of Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones. And when finally! finally!!! the stupid idiot turns the last corner, he runs smack dab into the level boss. Another week down the drain. Thoroughly unenjoyable bit of an otherwise great game.

Also:

Hello, I’m not really good at these games anyhow, I need to build up my skill level for a while. Not watch a half-hour introduction, then ditz around and wave my sword at the sun to pinpoint my location (how does that work anyhow), roll and duck for a bit, and then WHAM - perform Chopin études on my controller to defeat the huge thingamabob made of steel that squashes me with one step (Shadow of the Colossus, I’m looking at you).

11

Sure, timed quests can be fun if they’re timed in-game. But if the clock keeps ticking down while I’m not playing, but am, say, living my real life away from the computer with the game turned off, then the designer can go fuck himself. I’m not going to dedicate my life to his game, and I’m insulted he tried to make me.

12

Why? Not arguing, I’m genuinly curious. From my, non-x-box-playing angle, it has a bewildering amount of buttons stuck all over it, what looks like two sets of movement controlls, and is big and clunky. I just don’t get it.

I love the nintendo controller. Tastes differ, I guess.

13

Overly long cut scenes that you have to view before taking on a boss.
Okay, the first few times I fought the boss he kicked my ass while I was just getting the lay of the land and formulating a strategy to kill him. The next few attempts I get closer and closer so progress is being made.
But for god’s sake, do I really have to sit through that same cut scene for the umteenth time just to be allowed an attempt to beat the guy.

14

Aren’t cut scenes in place oftentimes to hide the fact that the game needs time to load information?

15

Every game should have the option to skip cut scenes the second time they are played. I have no idea why they don’t always have that. Prince of Persia does, by the way.

16

I came in to mention unskippable cutscenes before boss battles but I see that I’ve been beaten to it many times over.

I’ll throw in games with extremely steep difficulty curves. Guitar Hero 3 is the latest offender. You’re cruising along for the first 7 sets with each set a little hard that the last and then you hit a brick wall of difficulty.

17

But on the other hand, being able to save as often, whenever/wherever you want can cripple you too. I realized this when playing Neverwinter Nights that I would literally save right before a big battle, and every time I got a good hit, I’d save again, and if the enemies got a good hit on me, I’d load the most recent game. I wasn’t really playing the game and enjoying it the way it’s supposed to be.

I think, in general, the Metroid Prime series did a good job. Rarely am I ever in desperate need to get to a save point, because they are scattered pretty liberally, IMO. Plus, since the save points also heal you completely, putting them in too many locations makes the game too easy.

And timed missions aren’t bad if they’re done right. If it’s a long mission, that has a good chance of failure close to the end so you have to do it all over again, then yeah, bad design. But a simple “do X task” within a minute, and an average player can do it in thirty seconds? Odds are even a poor gamer will need, at most, two or three tries, and it didn’t take that long.

18

Real Time Strategy Games - Highlight a bunch of guys and click on where to attack, but can you do it fast enough? That’s not strategy, that’s multitasking ADD training.

Xbox games that don’t have 2 player story mode - I’ve gotten a few in the past, but it’s often a deal breaker 'cause I don’t care about online play enough to deal with getting noob hunted.

**How many hours can you press the X button continuously? **- You know who you are, Dynasty Warriors.

19

I don’t think this is a flaw of the game. I look at this the same way that I look at gamers complaining that there are cheats in a single player game and someone wants to use them. Sure, you could micromanage your battles, or cheat through a game exploiting a flaw or in god mode. So what? Your ability to do either doesn’t impact my ability to pause or save a game mid-battle when my wife calls or my ferret once again gets into something she shouldn’t.

20

By “big and clunky” do you mean the Xbox original controller, rather than the Xbox 360 controller? The original Xbox one was a huge bastard, but the current one isn’t all that much bigger than a PS2.

Also technically it has three sets of movement controls, two joysticks and a d-pad, but generally you only use two at once. And two d-pads is pretty essential for console FPSs. You need movement and aiming.