'Refer to the wiki' games.

[Foolery]

Eh, anyone who says they've played through Dark Souls without consulting a guide or a wiki, is probably lying.
That said, sometimes I'm okay with the lack of tutorials in games, it just depends on how much time I'm willing to experiment. It's an odd balance that has to be worked out, you don't want to smother the player in tutorials.

 

[Cap'nPipsqueak]

In the case of strategy games it's fair to forgive this - they tend to be pretty complex even when you know what you're doing.

In some cases, they add flavour to the story as well; some wikis delve into the story and characters as much as gameplay.

 

[KissingSunlight]

I usually refer to wiki's and walkthrough guides when I'm stuck at a "stupid difficult" section of the game. What I mean by "stupid difficult" is I can't figure out how to advance in the game. Usually after I clear all the enemies in the area. What I find out after reading the wiki is that I should go to the back left corner, crawl under a barrel, shimmy up a crawlspace, move 5 ladders, play pattycake with a chicken, and shoot a mirror. Then you are able to get to the next part of the game.

Since we are swapping Dark Souls war stories. I am on a Dark Souls hiatus. It took me 4 hours to get from one bonfire to the next. Only to find out, it was the same bonfire. Way to crush the morale of the player. I had to look up the wiki on Dark Souls once. After wasting my time to trying to figure out ways to kill the creature, I found out I needed to sneak around that area and not attracts it's attention. There was no way to figure that out in the game.

 

[FalloutJack]

No, that's a terrible and lazy idea. It was bad back in Final Fantasy 9's time and it's still bad now.

 

[DementedSheep]

No, you should not have to access the wiki for controls, how stats work and upgrading work ect at basic level.
That doesn't mean you can't have secrets, very difficult puzzles or bosses with tricks to kill that you can reasonably expect someone to work out without a wiki.

 

[sXeth]

Its not really a new thing. At least nowadays it tends to be free and not some 30 dollar extra strategy guide (or a bonus in collector edition packages).

To my own recollection, it started out with some of the ludicrous stuff in old Adventure/Puzzle games. And probably jumped more into the mainstream with Final Fantasy having ever increasing amounts of unlockable stuff hidden in vague secret areas (started with 6 that I remember (the sandworm eating you dungeon), and really started kicking in with FF7. By 8 onwards, whole mechanical systems were basically dumped in haphazard wiki format in the games themselves.

With public Alpha/Beta/Early Access, it seems to be becoming extremely commonplace. Since the Devs wouldn't make a manual proper until the game is actually complete, to avoid redos from changes, you instead have a large community compiling all the info themselves, or even datamining info out of the files. At which point its an easy bit of laziness for the dev to just refer to the wiki.


As to souls itself, reading their utterly vague "Regulation Update" patch notes, I doubt an official manual would help much with the more technical aspects.

 

[LostCrusader]

My issue is more with achievements. Missable achievements in games where going back isn't simple are my bane. I don't want to look for optimal playthroughs, Id rather go blind, but I don't want to screw myself over later. This is something Dark Souls 2 has a lot of.

I'm curious which achievements you mean in Dark Souls 2. I've played an ungodly amount of that game and I can't remember any that are branched off of each other, except for killing NPCs before getting gestures, etc.

 

[Saelune]

My issue is more with achievements. Missable achievements in games where going back isn't simple are my bane. I don't want to look for optimal playthroughs, Id rather go blind, but I don't want to screw myself over later. This is something Dark Souls 2 has a lot of.

I'm curious which achievements you mean in Dark Souls 2. I've played an ungodly amount of that game and I can't remember any that are branched off of each other, except for killing NPCs before getting gestures, etc.

There are a few, such as the one for getting that girl with the mask's gear from her, which requires finding her a few times, some of which aren't obvious and easily missable if you had no idea.

 

[LostCrusader]

My issue is more with achievements. Missable achievements in games where going back isn't simple are my bane. I don't want to look for optimal playthroughs, Id rather go blind, but I don't want to screw myself over later. This is something Dark Souls 2 has a lot of.

I'm curious which achievements you mean in Dark Souls 2. I've played an ungodly amount of that game and I can't remember any that are branched off of each other, except for killing NPCs before getting gestures, etc.

There are a few, such as the one for getting that girl with the mask's gear from her, which requires finding her a few times, some of which aren't obvious and easily missable if you had no idea.

Fair enough, I didn't find the spot shes at in the black gulch for at least 5 playthoughs. I never got all the achievements in 2 but that was just because of the stupid spells that are only available at NG+2 or getting a rediculous pvp win rate with covenants.

 

[Odbarc]

I've been playing the Kick Starter Shadowrun Return games. You can very easily use a wiki to have all the codes and know how much of which stat to use to 'milk run' your way though the levels but the game very much has all the information hiding around the levels for you to discover them.
Not at all what OP meant by a wiki-game though. Interestingly enough, however, is that I find that most NES/SNES era games did this as well. Mostly as a two part strategy to increase sales and obstruct beating games via rentals but to also sell magazines which had 'all the tips and tricks' which really mean deliberate means to stop players from continuing with no clues or tips in-game on how to continue.

These traps stopped games from being better than they could have been because of the business side of gaming. Good games like the Legend of Zelda franchise had secrets littered everywhere. Metroid hid a lot of very helpful power-ups and forced you to explore to find them or to be very good at the game to continue past boss checkpoints.

But there's now an age of the internet where the information is accessible but even then I'd refer to my experiences with the Final Fantasy 9 game guide which CONSTANTLY told you to refer to their website for exact details on how or find anything and basically read like a cheap novel with screenshots. I have to say I hate it. I don't want to flip in and out of a game to know what to do next.

I think the most positive experience I had with looking up a wiki article to get all the information on a game would have been Dynasty Warriors (3?) which describe where when and how to collect every characters ultimate weapon. There were no in-game descriptions that they even existed but potentially you could stumble into them if you played the levels well (or poorly in some situations) to trigger or deny specific events.

 

[Saelune]

My issue is more with achievements. Missable achievements in games where going back isn't simple are my bane. I don't want to look for optimal playthroughs, Id rather go blind, but I don't want to screw myself over later. This is something Dark Souls 2 has a lot of.

I'm curious which achievements you mean in Dark Souls 2. I've played an ungodly amount of that game and I can't remember any that are branched off of each other, except for killing NPCs before getting gestures, etc.

There are a few, such as the one for getting that girl with the mask's gear from her, which requires finding her a few times, some of which aren't obvious and easily missable if you had no idea.

Fair enough, I didn't find the spot shes at in the black gulch for at least 5 playthoughs. I never got all the achievements in 2 but that was just because of the stupid spells that are only available at NG+2 or getting a rediculous pvp win rate with covenants.

Unless its a game like say, Stanley's Parable, or a level/stage based game, I really don't care for games that force multiple playthroughs for all the achievements. Even games like Mass Effect 1, which I have beaten numerous times, Id have preferred if I could get them all in one go.

 

[scw55]

Sometimes I wish games had a "stats for nerds" mode or menu.

You know, because people shouldn't have to go to the effort of datamining or experimenting in, say a multiplayer game where numbers make the difference in knowing what fights you can and can't win.

I don't know whether it's an issue with scaring off casuals or developers not wanting to be bothered.

A good tutorial mode for a game with depth would be a "hold your hand mode" where it tells you what to do and why. And then you can drop down to the "suggestions mode". And drop down to the "tells you sh*t" mode.

Balanced by the hold your hand isn't suggesting the optimum way to play, but a very good idea. With the intent that you learn why you need to do things.

MOBAs are pretty bad for refer to the wiki. They have a tutorial that explains the core game mechanics, but they never explain strategy. Probably because Metas shift and focus on map objectives shift. And it's easier to rely on the community to teach each other. But the people who need to learn the most are also probably ignorant about learning to play. But watching someone else play instead of you is boring.

 

[Czann]

It's cheaper and... that's it.

 

[stroopwafel]

I never had a problem with modern games b/c even obtuse ones like Souls all have very intuitive controls which(atleast the basics) are easy to figure out after some trial and error. I only used the wiki for secrets and to look up specifics on weapons and armor. My biggest problem are games with very specific mechanics that mixes up the traditional lay-out of buttons on a controller. A few indie games are guilty of that and they are usually not good(or fun) enough for me to really put an effort figuring them out. Other than that I played games as a kid on the NES that often required you to circumvent shitty programming or completely glitched out code or had this shitty mechanic of 'hit this totally random tree 15 times to unlock hidden path to proceed' so yeah..used to something.

 

[LostCrusader]

My issue is more with achievements. Missable achievements in games where going back isn't simple are my bane. I don't want to look for optimal playthroughs, Id rather go blind, but I don't want to screw myself over later. This is something Dark Souls 2 has a lot of.

I'm curious which achievements you mean in Dark Souls 2. I've played an ungodly amount of that game and I can't remember any that are branched off of each other, except for killing NPCs before getting gestures, etc.

There are a few, such as the one for getting that girl with the mask's gear from her, which requires finding her a few times, some of which aren't obvious and easily missable if you had no idea.

Fair enough, I didn't find the spot shes at in the black gulch for at least 5 playthoughs. I never got all the achievements in 2 but that was just because of the stupid spells that are only available at NG+2 or getting a rediculous pvp win rate with covenants.

Unless its a game like say, Stanley's Parable, or a level/stage based game, I really don't care for games that force multiple playthroughs for all the achievements. Even games like Mass Effect 1, which I have beaten numerous times, Id have preferred if I could get them all in one go.

Dishonored broke that habit for me when I tried to do a no detection or killing run while also only using the basic teleport ability, then had to pick one or the other to get past granny rags after failing every other option.

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

The Souls games are pretty cryptic in contrast to most others, which is intentional but understandably polarizing. For example if you're trying to get all the Trophies for best weapons it might take a few more play through's playing "blind". I'm one of probably quite a few people who don't have unlimited amounts of time, so I've no qualms about referring to the wiki in those cases. It's a justifiable trade off imo, even if it dampens some of the surprise.

 

[mojoismydog77]

I am uncertain how I feel about it. I understand how especially for indie devs resources can be spread thin but at the same time a tutorial can make or break a game. Prison Architect had a link to the wiki in the menu and it was really helpful, the tutorial was not the best at explaining how to play the game. The game is so complex however that making a good tutorial would be a nightmare and resource hog. In a perfect world, all games would have tutorials but this world is far from perfect so it is forgivable.

 

[Smooth Operator]

It is mostly laziness, but then again we only got the wiki craze because devs got lazy with info. So now we ended up with third party sources that are far better then companies themselves would ever do, and probably more honest because no one wants to mention their own mistakes.

But there is certainly no credit going towards devs, only awesome community members.

 

[Mcgeezaks]

Metal Gear Solid series, I don't think you can truly understand everything by just playing the games. It's a shame Kojima never got to fix that.

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

Metal Gear Solid series, I don't think you can truly understand everything by just playing the games. It's a shame Kojima never got to fix that.

I love the MGS encyclopedia off PSN. It should really get an update after Peacewalker and MGS: GZ/V.