Minor things in games that you greatly appreciate
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- I do appreciate loading screens that prompt for a button press to continue. Then I have time to read the loading tips, and prepare myself mentally.
- I also appreciate really slick UIs. Blizzard is good at it, so is Dota 2.
- I like logs, and they can be useful in most games. If I miss a visual hint, or just didn't pay attention having a log at hand is very handy.
- Tight responsive controls are yummy.
- Graphs, graphs, graphs. Many games have lots of numbers, but too few bother to graph them. I'm looking at you Vicky 2.
Now this is graphs:
- I also appreciate really slick UIs. Blizzard is good at it, so is Dota 2.
- I like logs, and they can be useful in most games. If I miss a visual hint, or just didn't pay attention having a log at hand is very handy.
- Tight responsive controls are yummy.
- Graphs, graphs, graphs. Many games have lots of numbers, but too few bother to graph them. I'm looking at you Vicky 2.
Now this is graphs:
aside from small details when a charachter expresses what your thinking at the time
for example in Tomb Raider as I was trawling through some flooded cave Lara said "what the hell am I doing?" to which was exactly what I was thinking
or Maya from boderlands 2 specifically saying "QUIET!!" when doing her phase thing
for example in Tomb Raider as I was trawling through some flooded cave Lara said "what the hell am I doing?" to which was exactly what I was thinking
or Maya from boderlands 2 specifically saying "QUIET!!" when doing her phase thing
They've both been said at this point, but pause-able cutscenes and idle animations, so I guess I'll say something else.
I really like it when player characters and npcs alike will move around on their own; my biggest gripe with Fallout 3 was stealthing around places only to find the enemies all standing around waiting for me.
Oh, and reflections. I love when I can see the game world and characters reflected on shiny things.
I really like it when player characters and npcs alike will move around on their own; my biggest gripe with Fallout 3 was stealthing around places only to find the enemies all standing around waiting for me.
Oh, and reflections. I love when I can see the game world and characters reflected on shiny things.
Properly done quest markers. I don't want to be told EXACTLY where to go unless there's some story reason that makes it clear that my character SHOULD know EXACTLY where the goal is... but otherwise... just a general idea of where to look would be enough. I rely on quest markers mainly as a reminder of what I should be trying to get done.
Also...
A proper UI.
The Piboy in Fallout 3 and New Vegas is so unbelievably clunky that I have to install a mod to streamline it.
Pipware UI, if you were wondering.
Also...
A proper UI.
The Piboy in Fallout 3 and New Vegas is so unbelievably clunky that I have to install a mod to streamline it.
Pipware UI, if you were wondering.
A lot of things come to mind, especially since I've been on a Super Meat Boy binge lately (finally got around to playing it). But to go with something both recent and subtle, I'd have to say...
EDIT: I also should mention Far Cry 3's stealth system. While the enemies were still a little too blind, the fact that hiding in foliage actually made you harder to detect and occurred very naturally is amazing to me.
...the way Dennis reacts to accidentally killing Citra. As much as I absolutely despise Far Cry 3's storyline (still need to make that thread on it), seeing him physically shaking ever so slightly as he just stands there in complete horror at the realization that he just killed the love of his life is one of those standout moments in gaming for me. The whole thing with Dennis was just so believable to me. Just look at this (go to 0:45):
EDIT: I also should mention Far Cry 3's stealth system. While the enemies were still a little too blind, the fact that hiding in foliage actually made you harder to detect and occurred very naturally is amazing to me.
An anti-aggro skill
I like exploring but really, the only games I've found with scenery that doesn't just get samey over time is in MMORPGs. The problem with this is that they want me to grind for 6+ hours to be able to see more and travel. I'll pick a ninja-class just to go invisible and avoid fights in high level area.
I like exploring but really, the only games I've found with scenery that doesn't just get samey over time is in MMORPGs. The problem with this is that they want me to grind for 6+ hours to be able to see more and travel. I'll pick a ninja-class just to go invisible and avoid fights in high level area.
Interesting NPCs in RPGs that act like hidden mini stories within a setting that you discover just by talking to people - bonus points if they're ongoing.
I remember Final Fantasy 12 featured a troupe of performing slave moogles and I felt so sorry for them, only to find out later that they freed themselves by kicking the crap out of their owner. Hooray!
I remember Final Fantasy 12 featured a troupe of performing slave moogles and I felt so sorry for them, only to find out later that they freed themselves by kicking the crap out of their owner. Hooray!
Good voice actors in every language... i was kinda blown away when the voice acting in liberation was actually better in french than english. 3 was about 50/50 on that too, but its quite pleasant when the localized version of a game feels just as good as the original title.
I always love a detail in my surroundings. For example, my friend and I recently finished the Citadel DLC on ME3 and when I first got to the new casino alley I paused and looked up and around, I actualy asked my friend to take a sec and just pan around slowly as I gaped stunned. It always really amazes me how big and detailed your surroundings is and how you feel like a small piece in a big puzzle.
I wholeheartedly agree. In cutscenes it doesn't bother me but I do want to hear what people are saying when I walk past.teebeeohh said:
It's been said before but I do like seeing your legs & feet in FPS. Though why does this only happen in the lower budget games like Condemned, F.E.A.R and Shellshock series & not the big budget AAA titles? All the explosions took away the leg money?
When you recieve a "Thank-You for Playing" message at the end of the game or credits. Really do miss that. Not many modern games do it & it always puts a smile on my face when I see it.
Oh, I have a lot. The little things are what I enjoy most about games.
-Interesting credits, e.g. Smash Bros, instead of a long, scrolling wall of names you don't care about, e.g. Assassin's Creed 3.
-Walking through water makes your character's clothes wet, e.g. Uncharted.
-Blood sticking to you, e.g. Dragon Age.
-Camera freedom. Planetside 2 lacks this in vehicles. Chivalry doesn't even let you look straight up. You usually can't turn the camera in isometric games, even when everything is 3D--one of the only qualms I had about Torchlight 2.
-NPC banter. Bioware RPGs have been mentioned, but I like banter not only with squadmates, but between everyone in the world. Metro 2033 does this beautifully. In contrast, the lack of this is what made GTA 4 feel a little dead to me.
-NPCs acknowledging things about your character, especially when s/he's customized, e.g. Skyrim (though "An archer, eh? I prefer the sword myself" is just slightly off-setting when you're running around with a sword and no bow in sight).
-Characters gesturing as they speak, like Half-Life 2 and Rage. Mass Effect desperately needed this.
-Nuances in character's facial expressions, or facial expressions to begin with. In Left 4 Dead 2, I would just stop and sit around watching my companion's faces as they spoke. And in Mass Effect, though it needed much more, I loved when I gave Kaiden a compliment and he smiled, just a little.
-Player characters with a voice and a personality. I don't like playing a blank slate if I can't choose what to write on that blank slate (Skyrim). I love it when Jason Brody comments on what you're doing in Far Cry 3. I love it when I can essentially choose a personality, like in Mass Effect.
-Good physics. This is the only reason I like GTA 4 more than Saints Row 3.
-Messing with dead bodies. Kicking dead people around in Saints Row 3 was fun, and using them as stunt jumps in GTA was awesome.
-When NPCs seem to have their own lives and concerns and don't just revolve around the player. Though I hated having to chase people down in Mount and Blade, I appreciated it for what it was. Sui Generis looks like it could accomplish this as well.
-Weapons with weight, especially swords. Chivalry does this extremely well. Skyrim does not.
-Location-based damage. Fallout 3, New Vegas, and War of the Roses are the only ones I can think of so far, though I haven't played every game ever, unfortunately. I'd love to see a game where hitting someone's leg actually made them fall and have to crawl.
-Good mod support/lots of mods. You know something's been done right when you can't tell the difference between Skyrim and Second Life. [http://static.skyrim.nexusmods.com/images/5244670-1362711876.jpg]
-Interesting credits, e.g. Smash Bros, instead of a long, scrolling wall of names you don't care about, e.g. Assassin's Creed 3.
-Walking through water makes your character's clothes wet, e.g. Uncharted.
-Blood sticking to you, e.g. Dragon Age.
-Camera freedom. Planetside 2 lacks this in vehicles. Chivalry doesn't even let you look straight up. You usually can't turn the camera in isometric games, even when everything is 3D--one of the only qualms I had about Torchlight 2.
-NPC banter. Bioware RPGs have been mentioned, but I like banter not only with squadmates, but between everyone in the world. Metro 2033 does this beautifully. In contrast, the lack of this is what made GTA 4 feel a little dead to me.
-NPCs acknowledging things about your character, especially when s/he's customized, e.g. Skyrim (though "An archer, eh? I prefer the sword myself" is just slightly off-setting when you're running around with a sword and no bow in sight).
-Characters gesturing as they speak, like Half-Life 2 and Rage. Mass Effect desperately needed this.
-Nuances in character's facial expressions, or facial expressions to begin with. In Left 4 Dead 2, I would just stop and sit around watching my companion's faces as they spoke. And in Mass Effect, though it needed much more, I loved when I gave Kaiden a compliment and he smiled, just a little.
-Player characters with a voice and a personality. I don't like playing a blank slate if I can't choose what to write on that blank slate (Skyrim). I love it when Jason Brody comments on what you're doing in Far Cry 3. I love it when I can essentially choose a personality, like in Mass Effect.
-Good physics. This is the only reason I like GTA 4 more than Saints Row 3.
-Messing with dead bodies. Kicking dead people around in Saints Row 3 was fun, and using them as stunt jumps in GTA was awesome.
-When NPCs seem to have their own lives and concerns and don't just revolve around the player. Though I hated having to chase people down in Mount and Blade, I appreciated it for what it was. Sui Generis looks like it could accomplish this as well.
-Weapons with weight, especially swords. Chivalry does this extremely well. Skyrim does not.
-Location-based damage. Fallout 3, New Vegas, and War of the Roses are the only ones I can think of so far, though I haven't played every game ever, unfortunately. I'd love to see a game where hitting someone's leg actually made them fall and have to crawl.
-Good mod support/lots of mods. You know something's been done right when you can't tell the difference between Skyrim and Second Life. [http://static.skyrim.nexusmods.com/images/5244670-1362711876.jpg]
I love how in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, you can pick up and cuddle cats and dogs. Yes, even tiny little kittens that squeak. You can even play fetch with the dogs and roll around a ball, getting the cats (or dogs) to chase you. It's adorable.
Damn, I was going to mention this. I hated how in earlier games, pausing either didn't work or it actually skipped the cutscene. Luckily pausing cutscenes seems to be a common thing now.David Huff said:
Other than that, I love how in SSX when you pause during an event, when you unpause the game momentarily starts in slow motion so you can get your bearings, rather than continuing at full speed where you might not remember what you were about to do (like jumping to avoid falling off a cliff). That extra second is really useful.
One thing I absolutely adore in RPGs is reading backstories of the various places I'm going to. Deus Ex: HR did this really well with hacking and reading emails, and Skyrim makes a point to have nearly every location have a backstory, whether it be a journal you find of an adventuring group hoping to find riches in the cave you're about to explore, and later finding more notes that give extra detail of how they ventured. It makes their worlds so much more alive, and I really enjoy it.
And always a good light-source of some sort. In Far Cry 3 the flashlight was quite odd, in that it only turns on at certain moments - which meant sometimes you are in a dark location and it won't trigger, or it turns on quite late into a cave, or turns off too early as you're leaving one. I really missed being able to have control of it myself.
Can be a broad statement, but I do appreciate well done banter. Whether it's ambient or during cut-scenes, it's nice to see attention payed to lighter toned interaction that doesn't have to feel entirely plot relevant but doesn't come across as filler either.Da Orky Man said:
And then it had the audacity to auto-save...Voulan said:
*remembering twelve-year-old rage*
Menu systems that map yes and no to a single button each (like A for yes and B for no) instead of you having to scroll between the two.
Even if a dev team doesn't have the means to make new models, I still like having flavor text and just more stuff. For example, in Dwarf Fortress, after my tanner tans hides, the leather isn't just generic leather, its yak leather, or coyote leather and the likes. I also like how in TES games, enchanted weapons are "Glass blades of jinxing" or other sorts of fanciful things, rather than just "blade of +paralysis."
I enjoy the really little things that add a touch of realism. It gives games some soul or substance or whatever you want to call it.
In Pokemon Gen III they introduced Pokemon cries that play every now and then within the Background music, making it feel more like there are really wild creatures around you. In HG/SS, we had Pokemon follow you like Pikachu from Yellow, which is an addition I hope they bring back eventually; I quite enjoyed trotting around Johto with my Totodile, watching him grow from the little sprog I met in Newbark to the big tough monster he was by the end of Victory Road. Also, the Auto-Running button from HG/SS. I must say it was a slightly annoying disappointment in Black and White when I discovered I must once again constantly hold down B to move at faster than a snail's pace.
In GTAIV, I loved things like how during storms, people would be carrying around umbrellas, and at night how steam would rise from the sewer grates.
Ordinary NPC's having conversations between themselves, not in a cutscene.
The slight motions some characters make in games like Assassin's Creed. I still recall how realistic Altair seemed as I walked through crowded streets, and he would slightly place his hand on someone's shoulder to get by, or twist his body to slide by someone without bumping into them, and while sprinting, if you ran into a wall without meaning to climb, he would throw his hands up and stop himself before colliding with the wall.
Characters in retro games falling asleep or doing some other action if you've not moved them in a while.
And of course, the goofy as hell little Easter eggs that add nothing to overall gameplay, and are just there for the sake of being there, such as Legion dancing the Robot in Mass Effect 2, complete with him beatboxing, or the Dark Souls reference in Borderlands 2 (I know there are a lot of references, but most of them give you something, like the Minecraft head, or are paid quests such as the Ninja Turtles Easter egg, while this one was really hard to reach and gave you nothing but a cool thing to find).
In Pokemon Gen III they introduced Pokemon cries that play every now and then within the Background music, making it feel more like there are really wild creatures around you. In HG/SS, we had Pokemon follow you like Pikachu from Yellow, which is an addition I hope they bring back eventually; I quite enjoyed trotting around Johto with my Totodile, watching him grow from the little sprog I met in Newbark to the big tough monster he was by the end of Victory Road. Also, the Auto-Running button from HG/SS. I must say it was a slightly annoying disappointment in Black and White when I discovered I must once again constantly hold down B to move at faster than a snail's pace.
In GTAIV, I loved things like how during storms, people would be carrying around umbrellas, and at night how steam would rise from the sewer grates.
Ordinary NPC's having conversations between themselves, not in a cutscene.
The slight motions some characters make in games like Assassin's Creed. I still recall how realistic Altair seemed as I walked through crowded streets, and he would slightly place his hand on someone's shoulder to get by, or twist his body to slide by someone without bumping into them, and while sprinting, if you ran into a wall without meaning to climb, he would throw his hands up and stop himself before colliding with the wall.
Characters in retro games falling asleep or doing some other action if you've not moved them in a while.
And of course, the goofy as hell little Easter eggs that add nothing to overall gameplay, and are just there for the sake of being there, such as Legion dancing the Robot in Mass Effect 2, complete with him beatboxing, or the Dark Souls reference in Borderlands 2 (I know there are a lot of references, but most of them give you something, like the Minecraft head, or are paid quests such as the Ninja Turtles Easter egg, while this one was really hard to reach and gave you nothing but a cool thing to find).
Being able to map my own controls. I know this isn't an issue to those of you in the PC Master Race, but as a console scrub, nothing annoys me more than when a game decides that there button choices are the one true choice. This was made especially clear to me when I picked up Mirror's Edge recently. Who the fuck uses L1 for a jump button?
That, and good checkpointing: I don't want to watch your shitty unskippable cutscene for the fifteenth time in a row, then do the same mundane busywork to get to the part I'm actually dying at.
That, and good checkpointing: I don't want to watch your shitty unskippable cutscene for the fifteenth time in a row, then do the same mundane busywork to get to the part I'm actually dying at.