Bek359 said:
KeyMaster45 said:
Here's how I see it, if your player at any point on their first play through has to refer to a wiki or guide to complete the main story you, as a developer, have failed. The flow of a game should be natural enough to where your player can overcome any obstacle you put in front of them without referring to an outside source. This does not mean it can't be challenging just that the game should be built in such a way that within a reasonable amount of time the player can overcome whatever you've put in front of them.
If you find yourself referring to a wiki or guide when playing through any game on the first run(of the main story, not including extras) then it's not you who's at fault it's the developer.
Well, this guy is talking about games like Fallout 3, NV, and Oblivion. These games have a massive amount of content. You can get through the main quest easily enough without a wiki, but some of the best weapons, for instance are a little difficult to find. For instance, the YCS-186 unique Gauss Rifle in New Vegas. It can be gotten as soon as you get to New Vegas, but it's carried by a merc at a camp that's rather out-of-the-way, and there's no "notable location" marker on that spot.
That's extra content you can do without. I'm talking about if your player runs up against a brick wall and must refer to a guide to complete the main story.
Take for instance Xenosaga Episode 1 for the PS2; they had this secondary fighting system with mechs. I didn't care much for the system so I never bothered to spend time upgrading them. After all my characters were kicking ass and taking names without them. Then towards the end I came up against a boss fight I just could not beat. It was in some kind of dream state and you had two characters mandatory to the fight and the boss would react to their attacks with extreme prejudice. It was essentialy unbeatable far as I could tell.(I spent at least a total of 15 hours over the course of week trying to beat it)
Eventually I caved and grabbed the Prima guide out of my sister's room. Much to my chagrin the strategy for the fight told me that I needed the mechs to beat the boss. I called bullshit and went to the internet...and every guide I found online said I needed the mechs. I was floored; I was almost done with the game and at that point they had decided to toss in a fight that required the mechs? I couldn't even upgrade the damn things because I was stuck in that dream state where you couldn't access anything to do so.
It's a glaring flaw in the game and one that should have been addressed. There should have been something to encourage or hell straight up force me to upgrade the mechs as the game progressed. I'd gotten by just fine up to that point on no guide and no mechs and BAM right at the end I not only had to resort to a guide to find out how to kill the boss but I found out that I was supposed to be using a system of combat that was very much unneeded in the rest of the game.
My options were restart the game and sink another 30 or so hours into it just to get back to that point or say fuck it, walk away, and trade the damn thing in at gamestop. Guess which one I chose?
So yeah, the point I'm getting at is when it comes to the main content for a game the player should never find themselves in an unwinable situation due to them not having done something earlier in the game that would have required the use of a guide to have known. Actualy a better description would be that a game should not be made under the assumption the player will be using a guide or wiki to complete the main content.
Games should be beatable without the player having to seek external help. The extra stuff like the best weapons and armor I'm willing to let slide when it comes to seeking outside help because it's extra and the experience of the overall game is not hindered by the player not discovering or creating it on their own.
