I Truly Don't Get the Quicktime Event Hate

[Eclectic Dreck]

There are two issues. First, they tend to arrive suddenly and ask the player to quickly perform a set of steps they do not often practice and usually lead directly to a fail state. Because of the surprise, this often means players will fail on the first try. The second problem is that it serves as an abstraction of what the player was already doing and effectively seizes player control and removes player agency for a segment of the game. It becomes a cutscene you can fail at.

Heavy Rain was a game that relied nearly exclusively on QTEs for it's mechanical interactions and thus managed to avoid both of these issues entirely. That it wasn't a particularly good game is largely related to the story itself rather than the reliance on a mechanic. This was because the interaction was both expected and because the game made heavy use of this abstract control method throughout the game in the aim of being an interactive movie. Thus it is easy to see that the problem with QTEs is that it effectively serves an interest that is contrary to what most games aim for.

 

[Fireaxe]

Most of the time a QTE just exists where a regular action would work just fine and not break movement flow, when I see that all I can think is that the devs got lazy.

Irregular QTEs can go to a special place in hell too, randomly having to push a button with no warning is infuriating.

 

[Nimzabaat]

Because scripted bullshit. I like my character control and QTEs (the cinematic kind, not stuff like Batman games blocking and such) are just a movie where I have to play Simon Says to keep it from restarting.

I totally agree. The worst part for me though is that I don't get to watch the cutscene. I have to pay attention to what button to push and if I want to know what's happening, watch it on youtube. I've never met a QTE that I liked.

 

[Vrach]

Because scripted bullshit. I like my character control and QTEs (the cinematic kind, not stuff like Batman games blocking and such) are just a movie where I have to play Simon Says to keep it from restarting.

I totally agree. The worst part for me though is that I don't get to watch the cutscene. I have to pay attention to what button to push and if I want to know what's happening, watch it on youtube. I've never met a QTE that I liked.

That too, I remember playing Heavy Rain and thinking "this would be a lot more interesting if I could pay attention to the story rather than the directions to what button to press" several times.

That said, I did meet a QTE I liked - Mass Effect 2. It's small, unnoticeable and essentially worthless, but somehow I loved interrupting conversations, even if it was with just a button press.

 

[Nimzabaat]

Because scripted bullshit. I like my character control and QTEs (the cinematic kind, not stuff like Batman games blocking and such) are just a movie where I have to play Simon Says to keep it from restarting.

I totally agree. The worst part for me though is that I don't get to watch the cutscene. I have to pay attention to what button to push and if I want to know what's happening, watch it on youtube. I've never met a QTE that I liked.

That too, I remember playing Heavy Rain and thinking "this would be a lot more interesting if I could pay attention to the story rather than the directions to what button to press" several times.

That said, I did meet a QTE I liked - Mass Effect 2. It's small, unnoticeable and essentially worthless, but somehow I loved interrupting conversations, even if it was with just a button press.

Holy crap! That was an acceptable QTE! I thought there were no examples of a good QTE but you're right. I think what made that QTE work is that the buttons were clearly established so you could focus on the scene. They just flashed the symbol in either corner, again not really detracting from the scene. Huh.

 

[JCAll]

I don't mind cutscene QTEs. What was it Yhatzee said? "As good a way as any to get through a cutscene."
What I hate is when QTEs are used to replace boss fights. No, Simon Says is not a boss fight. Not even in Castlevania.

 

[Jadak]

It's boring.

I'm not playing 'dance dance revolution', I want something more interesting than responding to button prompts on a timer.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

They can be good, BUT, some games use them to mess up games. Like Fable 2 and Halo 4 - both i think you beat the boss with a QTE instead of fighting them. I think even Far Cry 3 you beat the boss with a QTE. Its just unsatisfying. Heard they had that with that Ryse game, though ive not played it so maybe someone can put me right on that fact.

 

[ccggenius12]

Dragon's Lair and Space Ace were popular because they looked so much better than other games of the era, not because people found that game-play rewarding. Disney Quality animation vs Pac Man.

 

[Eve Charm]

Well it's because QTE's in cut scenes are just an annoying waste of time. Why even bother putting an game over in the middle of a cut scene if the player isn't really going to have open control anyway? Oh you just beat this hard boss but you didn't hit X at the right time, get ready to do that whole boss over again, Way to disengage the player in less then 5 seconds.

They are just lazy, Imagine if the end of Metroids iconic "Oh crap self destruct is activated time to GTFO" Running through a good portion of the game with a time limit and all your abilities was just boiled down to "Mash X for 10 seconds." you'd lose all the fun of that.

 

[unindexedsearchengine]

It entirely depends. If you have a solid QTE system built into the core gameplay in a reasonable and justifiable way, sure, go ahead, no problem there. In cases like this the dev plans ahead and structures gameplay in a way to accommodate QTEs in a non-jarring way, that may not break the flow too much.

However, if the only reason you threw in a few "mash button to not die" sequences is that you can't be assed to add variety to gameplay in a meaningful manner, then that's just plain shitty game design.

 

[lord.jeff]

They can be done well but much like cover fire no one is interested in doing them well they just throw them in because it's popular or as a shortcut for adding challange to a game.

 

[Callate]

People liked Space Ace and Dragon's Lair because they were beautifully animated showpieces that didn't look like anything else on the arcade floor when they were released. You have to remember they both came out in the early eighties- their contemporaries were things like Balloon Fight and Great Swordsman, Spy Hunter and Mario Bros.

They were beautiful. They were huge quarter-eaters.

They were also terrible games.

They weren't about mastering mechanics, or awareness of resources and enemy placement, or trying different approaches to situations to find which ones were more or less viable. They weren't even about reflexes, by and large; they were about one thing, and one thing only: memorizing a strict pattern. Maybe mirrored to the opposite side if the dip switches were set to be particularly tricky. They were Simon with less unpredictability.

To this day, QTEs are used when a game's creators want a showpiece but don't want to risk the player screwing up their beautiful cinematic moment by implementing functional controls to make their avatar do cool things. If you play by their rules and memorize their patterns, after a certain number of deaths the player will be rewarded by seeing a cut scene they've already seen at least half of multiple times and which they are probably by then sick of anyway.

They can be tolerable as a change of pace if used very, very sparingly. As climactic moments- where they are used far too often- they function as a kind of refutation of the time the player has spent mastering far more meaningful and engaged control mechanisms on the way.

In some ways, I'd argue they can actually be worse than non-interactive cut scenes. Those at least can say "Look, you've already proven you're awesome- we know if you were at the helm, your awesome hero would handle things this way." QTEs say "We need to keep you just engaged enough to not leave the chair to get a snack while we pull out the stops."

 

[kaizen2468]

They're ok if the game doesn't overdo it. I'd rather have more control over an encounter than just timing buttons though.

 

[Zendariel]

They just aren't very well done usually, and like many others have said, it can really distract you from the possible epicness of the cutscene if you enjoy cutscenes. For example in south park - stick of truth, most of the quicktime events kinda made sense, and most of them were woven into gameplay(like paper mario) now off the top of my head i can remember two types of events that i hated in that game. Kenny's and Kyle's final abilities utilized random buttons with pretty fast reflex time when literally every other sequence was formulaic or made sense actionwise. Kenny and the unicorn were just adorable but i could not watch the animation because i had to guess if i would press the right button or try to change it in the short time.

As for when it can ruin the whole game, I haven't felt an inkling to play god of war 2(or 1) again because i spent literally more than hour to get through the last qte sequence with zeus and always died at the 3rd or so qte. It was way faster than the others in that and now aside from remembering that hades was a boss in that game(possibly) I can't remember a single other thing than that quicktime event. To be completely honest, i haven't even tried god of war 3 because of it even though i love the genre.

EDIT: the zeus fight quick time event also changed the buttons every time so if you weren't fast enough to process that input, you just had to guess. It was followed by a game over retry screen that put you right before the event.

Those aside i quite enjoyed the demo of azuras wrath because it fit the style, and there was a sequence in heavenly sword that used it somewhat well, it was semiscripted (the buttons you pressed had effect very close to real time instead of just checking if the button was pressed when the prompt was up) and doing it well ended in you getting on a better position for the next fight, and failing ended you in the middle of enemy horde. There might have been a fail condition at the very beginning that made you do it again, but it still felt like you were playing it.

 

[Drizzitdude]

Because sometimes its just annoying as all hell having to try to mash a button to make the story progress, or be constantly aware during a cutscene just in case one shows up. Take resident evil for example, there might be 3 minutes of story happening in a cutscene, and then BOOM "PRESS A HOPE YOU WERE PAYING ATTENTION".

 

[Halla Burrica]

I'm not terribly fond of quick-time events, but I think they do have their place and done right they can add something more than just watching a cutscene doing absolutely nothing but scratching your ass waiting for player input again. Though I totally get the criticism, they can come out of nowhere and break the flow of the game completelyif done wrong.

And one other thing.
Guys, can we stop it with the whole: "I hate QTE's because it's not gameplay, it just looks like it is" argument, because (to me at least) it kinda doesn't work. It may sound right, but when you look at the core of what gaming is, it starts falling apart. A video game is defined as "a game played by electronically manipulating images produced by a computer program on a television screen or display" (from the Oxford dictionary, also defined pretty much like this elsewhere too). So when we really look at it, there isn't that much difference between QTEs and normal gameplay. In both situations you are playing the game, because you are electronically manipulating images produced by a computer program.

A Quicktime Event IS gameplay, whether you like it or not is another subject matter.

 

[verdant monkai]

So again, I ask, why the frothing rage?

They ruin cutscenes because you are always on edge looking out for them. Ruining the crucial down time in which you enjoy the story.

If you fail at it you have to restart or retry its annoying and hurts the cutscene.

Pressing one button because a flashing prompt told you to doesn't feel like you are doing something awesome, or playing a game at all.

They are lazy game design personified. Very few people like them. And for very good reason.

 

[Mahorfeus]

I do agree that QTEs can be a compromise of sorts. God of War seemed to start the trend, and I thought it pulled them off tastefully enough, particularly against the bosses. The developers envision this badass part of the fight in which Kratos snaps the ship's mast, latches onto the hydra, and impales its head. Or he runs up the giant's arm, cuts off its hand, and swings up to cram it down its throat. It's really freaking cool... the problem being, none of that can be emulated with traditional gameplay. Especially not with older tech. So QTEs give them a way to add a cinematic element to a fight, while still maintaining some faint vestige of possible failure. It was easy enough in God of War, where most enemies have unique input commands that are easy enough to remember. Analog sticks for the gorgons, X button to cram your blade down a minotaur's throat, etcetera etcetera.

Granted, many games go overkill with them. Especially with the "push to kill this enemy instantly" mentality. At least in God of War, the mundane enemies could be killed without them.

 

[Signa]

There's only a handful of games that people actually liked the QTEs in them. The entire music/dance genre, and a few RPGs like Legend of Dragoon and Mario RPG. Everywhere else is exactly as described as above. I have a hard time playing games with simple ones like in Just Cause 2. I don't want to keep punching the driver in the face, because if I fail, I'll either just try boarding again, or find a different car. It does nothing but stop me from playing the game.