Alternate ways of playing games.

[CastletonSnob]

Inspired by SNESDrunk's "Unconventional Ways to Play Classic Super Nintendo Games" videos. (You should definitely check SNESDrunk out).

Finding alternate ways of playing a game, whether by doing a self-imposed challenge, or just playing a game differently than it was intended, are a good way of spicing up games you've played hundreds of times.

I'll start with the 30 Melon Challenge in Yoshi's Story, where you try to get all of the 30 Melons in each level, and NO OTHER FRUIT. It's basically like Hard Mode for the game. Particular Mushroom has a video that goes into more detail.

 

[Chimpzy]

How about we skip alternate, and move straight on to moronic/awesome ways to play?

 

[Thaluikhain]

Yeah, once I played Rainbow Six: Raven Shield a few times, I would do full playthroughs with weird weapons. Everyone always uses shotguns every time, or everyone always uses backup pistols every time, say.

 

[CriticalGaming]

It's hard for me, once I find a playstyle I like in a game, I'll usually never change how I play that given game. For example I can never do a Renegade ME playthrough because I find the evil shit so over the top and stupid that it isn't fun. By that same token, I will never play a ranged or magic build in a Souls game because I have found an established style that works for me and I enjoy and it isn't worth the struggle of trying something else to me.

 

[CaitSeith]

It's hard for me, once I find a playstyle I like in a game, I'll usually never change how I play that given game. For example I can never do a Renegade ME playthrough because I find the evil shit so over the top and stupid that it isn't fun.

What about the classes? I played the trilogy 3 times: as a soldier, as an engineer and as a vangard. Interestingly, I found the ME3's Vangard gameplay really fun in comparison (and the ME3 DLC Omega has a paragon interrupt exclusive for the Engineer class).

But when it comes to personal rules, I think I only have done a nuzloke in Pokemon Soul Silver. tl;dr: I lost against the Champion when his Dragonite froze my Nidoqueen (right after absurdly and against all odds defeating his Charizard with my Skarmory).

 

[BrawlMan]

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As for me, some times I do certain limits or alternates just to mix things up or challenge myself.

• Don't use Demon Evade in DmC (2013).​
• Get SSS rank on Must Style, Gods Must Die in DmC.​
• A no death run in Vanquish on Hard Mode.​
• Upgraded Laser and Machine Gun only run in Contra 4.​
• 1CC all of the Streets of Rage games.​
• Sparda Sword only on Dante Must Die in DMC1. Never again.​
• Pistols only playthrough in Stranglehold.​

 

[CriticalGaming]

What about the classes? I played the trilogy 3 times: as a soldier, as an engineer and as a vangard. Interestingly, I found the ME3's Vangard gameplay really fun in comparison (and the ME3 DLC Omega has a paragon interrupt exclusive for the Engineer class).

But when it comes to personal rules, I think I only have done a nuzloke in Pokemon Soul Silver. tl;dr: I lost against the Champion when his Dragonite froze my Nidoqueen (right after absurdly and against all odds defeating his Charizard with my Skarmory).

Nah I don't swap classes either (mmo's being an exception). The classes in ME never felt to me like they mattered anyway.

I've done a couple of nuzlockes. But if I lose them, then I just ignore the rules and keep playing because I don't like to throw away all the progress.

 

[CastletonSnob]

There's the famous A Button Challenge in Super Mario 64, where you try to beat the game while pressing the A button as few times as possible.

 

[Gordon_4]

Nah I don't swap classes either (mmo's being an exception). The classes in ME never felt to me like they mattered anyway.

I've done a couple of nuzlockes. But if I lose them, then I just ignore the rules and keep playing because I don't like to throw away all the progress.

Beyond flavour, as a rule you will be shooting most of your enemies in Mass Effect. However believe me when I say there is a unique pleasure in playing a Vanguard in ME2-3 and just biotic shoulder charging mother fuckers and unloading with a shotgun.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

I just started a replay of AC: Odyssey 'cause I wanted to play something pretty and mindless while listening to podcasts and streams and music. This time, I will refrain from side missions because I have read complaints from people about being "level-gated," even though I never had that problem. So I'm only doing side quests if I need to "level up" to match the next main quest level. So far I only "had" to do one side quest to match the recommended level for main task.
Previous play-through I do whatever side quests in the area because that's just how I play games and I figured so do most people.

 

[Schadrach]

The last time I did one of these was of all things in modded Minecraft, last year. Was running a modded 1.7.10 server primarily for Reika's mods and decided as a challenge to see how many "important" bits of Rotarycraft's intended progression I could skip outright, given how particular Reika is about trying to make you hit all the important milestones.

Answer: I never made Ethanol. I was more than halfway through before I made Lubricant. Usually you make lubricant and ethanol very early on (like, right at the beginning), and it takes a fair bit of finagling and engineering to skip everything that requires ethanol.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

However believe me when I say there is a unique pleasure in playing a Vanguard in ME2-3 and just biotic shoulder charging mother fuckers and unloading with a shotgun.

It's the closest thing to being able to play as Wrex.

 

[laggyteabag]

Im pretty luke-warm towards achievements these days, but some games include some really interesting achievements that encourage you to play a game in a certain way.

The Halo: Master Chief Collection has loads of these.

You've got the basic "Complete X level within X amount of time achievements", which, whilst simple, are really fun to just see how quickly you can just blast through a level.

You've also got more specific ones, like "Complete Two Betrayals on Legendary difficulty without picking up a new weapon.", or "Finish any Halo 3: ODST level solo on Legendary, with no shots fired or grenades thrown." which are a couple that I found to be a lot of fun.

Halo also has these things called Skulls which are basically modifiers to the way the game plays. One example is a skull that restarts the mission if you die, another causes your health to regenerate only if you melee someone, a third causes enemies to constantly throw grenades, as well many others. Enabling skulls corresponds to a higher mission score, and there are also achievements and in-game challenges relating to enabling specific, a number of, or all skulls.

Halo in general is great for replayability.

 

[Schadrach]

Im pretty luke-warm towards achievements these days, but some games include some really interesting achievements that encourage you to play a game in a certain way.

The Halo: Master Chief Collection has loads of these.

You've got the basic "Complete X level within X amount of time achievements", which, whilst simple, are really fun to just see how quickly you can just blast through a level.

You've also got more specific ones, like "Complete Two Betrayals on Legendary difficulty without picking up a new weapon.", or "Finish any Halo 3: ODST level solo on Legendary, with no shots fired or grenades thrown." which are a couple that I found to be a lot of fun.

These make me think of Painkiller card unlocks. Several were using only one specific weapon or taking no damage or not grabbing a pickup or grabbing all of a pickup or clearing a boss under a time limit. But then I played a lot of Painkiller, the FPS with the absolute best default weapon ever.

 

[BrawlMan]

Must Style Mode in DmC: Definitive Edition is a cool modifier that was never brought back for some dumb reason in DMC5. You can only damage and kill enemies at S-SSS (aside from environmental hazards and pitfalls). You can't get a ranking score at the end though, and it does not go to the leader boards. Still fun, and adds even more challenge when playing on Gods Must Die Mode. There are mods on the PC version of DMC5 that puts this back in. I don't know why Capcom has a habit of dropping good ideas and certain game modes for this series. Turbo mode is a cool edition, but is always seen only in the Special or Definitive Editions of each game. Once again, the modders on PC come to the rescue on DMC5.

 

[Chimpzy]

Playing Sekiro blindfolded is certainly alternate

 

[Specter Von Baren]

This is one of my favorites.


Edit: I hate how I can't #$^king post videos on the forums without the link getting screwed up when I use my phone for it.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

Playing Sekiro blindfolded is certainly alternate

I actually watched this whole thing (and I don't normally watch this kind of stuff for more than a few minutes here and there). I'm a huge fan of the game so seeing how they planned out this run was really interesting.

 

[BrawlMan]

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[Kyrian007]

One of my open world benchmarks is generally one of the first different ways of playing I'll try. No fast travel. That's my benchmark for a good open world. It isn't always a dealbreaker for me, but it is a metric I judge games by. If I can complete a playthrough without fast travel and not want to kill myself... it is a good open world map. An example, Fallout 3 and NV. I can easily complete a no fast travel run of FO 3. It is a great game and the map is packed with things around every corner. NV, it too is a great game. But I couldn't ever complete a no fast travel attempt. There are huge areas in the wasteland with NOTHING in it. You could easily walk 5 minutes of real time and see nothing but desert and encounter nothing.