The Latest Scourge of AAA Game Design

[beastro]

Isn't this whole thing just a devolved version of hitting the button on games with text to move onto the next bit of exposition?

 

[shrekfan246]

I wonder what happens if you don't? I would purposefully hold back and be deliberately disrespectful just to be awkward.

Presumably nothing.

Portal 2 at least had the self-awareness enough to script jokes in if you refused to acknowledge Wheatley's prompts at the beginning of the game, but I imagine the writers/designers for CoD didn't view the picture big enough to implement awkward shuffling and coughing and the crowd looking around and whispering to themselves about how rude you're being by not paying respects.

But I haven't played it either, so who knows?

 

[sageoftruth]

There was one time when I saw an STE done well. (Possible spoiler) At the end of Metal Gear Solid 3 when you defeat Boss and have to execute her. After being told that everything you were fighting for was a lie and that she is nothing but a willing pawn sacrificing herself to save the government's global reputation, she asks Snake to finish the job and shoot her, and the game won't continue until you, the player, press square to pull the trigger, placing the guilt of it on your shoulders.
Sure, you have no choice in the matter, but it would have had far less of an impact if the whole thing was just a non-interactive cutscene.

 

[Kolyarut]

- by pressing the button, you're acknowledging that you're handing over control to the plot for a moment...

What control? These games are so scripted that you're reduced to just an actor in a war movie. That STE is pretty much the director giving the cue with his megaphone.

You have control over the protagonist during gameplay sections, and it's frustrating to have that yanked away from you, for the mouse and keyboard to stop accepting input, without any warning. The on-screen prompt is your warning - pressing the button is simply saying "yes, I'm ready for the cutscene now". If the director calls the cutscene and you're not ready for it, it's jarring and annoying (in any game).

That control over the protagonist during gameplay sections isn't control over the plot. Even during the gameplay sections, the control is limited to the corridor. And if you stray from it for more than a couple of seconds (ignoring the warnings), you die without a logical cause (it's pretty much the director head-shooting you for trying to escape from the movie set during the filming session)

Sure it's not, but who goes into a CoD campaign expecting to exercise control over the plot?

The issue of getting killed because of straying in the wrong direction certainly annoyed me about Ghosts (it generally wasn't too bad but there were a few moments where it was really obvious and annoying), but it's kind of off topic to the issue at hand.

PS: The STE appeared at mid-cutscene. You didn't had control over the character and were prompted to start the cutscene. In fact it was totally the opposite.

Fair enough - I haven't played this one in particular, I may or may not pick it up when the sales hit (not that you ever get really deep discounts on CoD games), but if it's an interruption that happens mid-cutscene then I agree that does sound unnecessary. It still doesn't sound that risible to me that paying respects to the fallen would happen during one of these stories, though, and the Press F method is entirely in keeping with what the series has always done since forever, so I never really found the funny when people were passing this screenshot around in the first place.

 

[Covarr]

There was one time when I saw an STE done well.

Spoiler: MGS3 ending spoilers

At the end of Metal Gear Solid 3 when you defeat Boss and have to execute her. After being told that everything you were fighting for was a lie and that she is nothing but a willing pawn sacrificing herself to save the government's global reputation, she asks Snake to finish the job and shoot her, and the game won't continue until you, the player, press square to pull the trigger, placing the guilt of it on your shoulders.
Sure, you have no choice in the matter, but it would have had far less of an impact if the whole thing was just a non-interactive cutscene.

The reason it works here is severalfold:

Spoiler: More MGS3 ending spoilers

• 
  [li]You are using a the square button for the exact same function it's been used throughout the game: shooting a gun.[/li]
  [li]There is no button prompt.[/li]
  [li]It is vital to the story that Snake does this, not some other character. It is central to the theme of the game, and a hugely important step for his role in the larger franchise and eventually becoming Big Boss[/li]
  [li]Snake never fires his gun in any cutscene except this one. This helps reaffirm gunfire as an action which can only ever be player-initiated.[/li]
  [li]As you said (and perhaps most importantly), having the player do this helps the player clock into Snake's emotions here. While this is certainly the biggest reason this STE works, it's by no means the only one.[/li]

There are very few game mechanics which I think have literally zero merit (binary good/evil systems, maybe). Much like most everything else, it's just a matter of putting it in the hands of competent writers and designers. Before putting any game mechanic ever invented, three questions need to be asked: What purpose is this meant to serve, does it effectively serve that purpose, and does this actually benefit the game as a whole? If you can't answer these questions properly, you probably shouldn't be putting a mechanic or system.

P.S. Thanks

 

[MrBaskerville]

It's been around for ages and it't just as pointless now as it was 5 years ago. I really hope it goes away, i can't see how it adds anything to the experience. It's not gameplay or storytelling, it's just pointless interactions added because they are afraid that someone will complain about long cutscenes (Or whatever...). I can't figure out why it's there, most often it would work better as a cutscene and it really feels like something added just because games have to be interactive at all possible times... Worst of all, these crappy cutscenes can't be skipped, which is probably the worst offense of all.

I wish we just had an interaction button, that worked back in the old days. If you need to do something that doesn't involve shooting? Press space...

 

[sageoftruth]

There was one time when I saw an STE done well.

Spoiler: MGS3 ending spoilers

At the end of Metal Gear Solid 3 when you defeat Boss and have to execute her. After being told that everything you were fighting for was a lie and that she is nothing but a willing pawn sacrificing herself to save the government's global reputation, she asks Snake to finish the job and shoot her, and the game won't continue until you, the player, press square to pull the trigger, placing the guilt of it on your shoulders.
Sure, you have no choice in the matter, but it would have had far less of an impact if the whole thing was just a non-interactive cutscene.

The reason it works here is severalfold:

Spoiler: More MGS3 ending spoilers

• 
  [li]You are using a the square button for the exact same function it's been used throughout the game: shooting a gun.[/li]
  [li]There is no button prompt.[/li]
  [li]It is vital to the story that Snake does this, not some other character. It is central to the theme of the game, and a hugely important step for his role in the larger franchise and eventually becoming Big Boss[/li]
  [li]Snake never fires his gun in any cutscene except this one. This helps reaffirm gunfire as an action which can only ever be player-initiated.[/li]
  [li]As you said (and perhaps most importantly), having the player do this helps the player clock into Snake's emotions here. While this is certainly the biggest reason this STE works, it's by no means the only one.[/li]

There are very few game mechanics which I think have literally zero merit (binary good/evil systems, maybe). Much like most everything else, it's just a matter of putting it in the hands of competent writers and designers. Before putting any game mechanic ever invented, three questions need to be asked: What purpose is this meant to serve, does it effectively serve that purpose, and does this actually benefit the game as a whole? If you can't answer these questions properly, you probably shouldn't be putting a mechanic or system.

P.S. Thanks

Well said. This should be entered into a textbook about game design. So many developers seem to throw stuff in without thinking about why it should be there.

 

[Kolyarut]

I wish we just had an interaction button, that worked back in the old days. If you need to do something that doesn't involve shooting? Press space...

We do... it's "F".

Unless I'm missing some sarcasm here?

 

[IamLEAM1983]

The problem, I think, is that the developers and script-writers were so convinced of the emotional weight of the scene in question that they figured that allowing us to participate in the funeral in the shallowest means possible would actually foster some sort of engagement from the player.

I watched a friend play through the funeral sequence and was all "Okay... So you pressed F to put your hand on an ancillary character's casket. An ancillary character whom you were TOLD is your best friend, but with whom you've had precisely zero opportunities to socialize."

Friendship requires character buildup. Games that go "OKAY HERE IS THIS GUY HE IS YOUR FRIEND BUT NOW HE IS DEAD SO BE SAD NOW" aren't just missing the point - they're sailing past it like the basketball-throwing dude from that one side-mission in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.

It's not just poor mechanics, it's poor narrative design. If this trend catches on any further, I'll be sorely disappointed.

 

[MrBaskerville]

I wish we just had an interaction button, that worked back in the old days. If you need to do something that doesn't involve shooting? Press space...

We do... it's "F".

Unless I'm missing some sarcasm here?

I meant, i wish we just taught people which button was used for general interactions, so they didn't have to write it on the screen. If the interaction isn't intuitive for the player when the scene happens, it's probably pointless and therefore it should be removed or automatic, The best solution though, would be to either do proper interactive storytelling or just use skipable cutscenes^^.Instead of this pointless combination.

 

[Darth_Payn]

Maybe that explains what happened to Kevin Spacey in that game: he pressed 'F' to turn into Cobra Commander.
And this is why I don't play the CoD games, because of crap like this.

There was one time when I saw an STE done well.

Spoiler: MGS3 ending spoilers

At the end of Metal Gear Solid 3 when you defeat Boss and have to execute her. After being told that everything you were fighting for was a lie and that she is nothing but a willing pawn sacrificing herself to save the government's global reputation, she asks Snake to finish the job and shoot her, and the game won't continue until you, the player, press square to pull the trigger, placing the guilt of it on your shoulders.
Sure, you have no choice in the matter, but it would have had far less of an impact if the whole thing was just a non-interactive cutscene.

The reason it works here is severalfold:

Spoiler: More MGS3 ending spoilers

• 
  [li]You are using a the square button for the exact same function it's been used throughout the game: shooting a gun.[/li]
  [li]There is no button prompt.[/li]
  [li]It is vital to the story that Snake does this, not some other character. It is central to the theme of the game, and a hugely important step for his role in the larger franchise and eventually becoming Big Boss[/li]
  [li]Snake never fires his gun in any cutscene except this one. This helps reaffirm gunfire as an action which can only ever be player-initiated.[/li]
  [li]As you said (and perhaps most importantly), having the player do this helps the player clock into Snake's emotions here. While this is certainly the biggest reason this STE works, it's by no means the only one.[/li]

That's the way you do it! It looks to me that CoD's designers did with Metal Gear what the comic book writers of the 90's did with The Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen.

There are very few game mechanics which I think have literally zero merit (binary good/evil systems, maybe). Much like most everything else, it's just a matter of putting it in the hands of competent writers and designers. Before putting any game mechanic ever invented, three questions need to be asked: What purpose is this meant to serve, does it effectively serve that purpose, and does this actually benefit the game as a whole? If you can't answer these questions properly, you probably shouldn't be putting a mechanic or system.

P.S. Thanks

Well said. This should be entered into a textbook about game design. So many developers seem to throw stuff in without thinking about why it should be there.

 

[EeviStev]

Adding to the list of clues from which one can infer the final solution to Portal 2, just as player agency is returned after being knocked to the ground by an explosion*, part of the ceiling, in full view as the player is on her back, falls away, revealing the moon. What I find impressive is that this is arguably the most overt clue of all, but would not suffice without the previously mentioned, more subtle hints.

 

[warmachine]

I have to agree with Yahtzee. The buttons are for the gameplay and I want to decide how to use those buttons to win, not have it told to me. When the writer uses cutscenes to tell a story, I want to watch that story and the buttons just get in the way.

 

[Ten Foot Bunny]

Oh joy.

Portal 2 was next on my list of (long-running) backlogged games to play. I'm SO fucking glad this article/thread showed some awareness of the fact that some people who WANT to play the game still haven't done so.

Fucking fuckity fuck!

 

[RavingSturm]

Good gameplay is about establishing a set of rules and teaching them to the player just enough that they can intuit the next solution, one not so obscure as to be frustrating but not so obvious as to kill their sense of achievement. The moment you need to flash up a caption instructing the player of what button to press (at least, past the point that the standard controls have been tutorialized), you have failed.

I'm taking this to the grave. It's one of the main reasons I love Half-Life and Super Metroid.

I've always hated quick time events, in almost every form. Hated them in God Of War and other popular games. Heavy Rain even cracked me up during it's most dramatic scenes because of the colourful goofy looking button prompts.

The only quick time events I like (if you can even call it that) is the single button KOs like in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles In Time.

I also hated QTE's especially in the GOW games for some reason. The button mashing, tug-of-war QTEs felt more like an endurance test and some of the more extended sequences were just lazy excuses for player interaction in completely automated sequences. The last Boss fight of Space Marine, imho, is one of the worst examples of QTE boss fights in the last decade.

 

[srpilha]

It's like the appartment ending of the Stanley Parable.
Press G to watch TV. Press Z to be at work in the morning. Press N to question nothing.

My thoughts exactly when I first saw that sreencap. Makes it all the more creepy and sad for CoD...

Isn't this whole thing just a devolved version of hitting the button on games with text to move onto the next bit of exposition?

pretty much... but *really* devolved, then, because there's absolutely no excuse like size of text here.

 

[Bad Jim]

Isn't this whole thing just a devolved version of hitting the button on games with text to move onto the next bit of exposition?

People read at different speeds, and there is no way for the program to automatically tell whether you have read what is on screen. Fast changing text would alienate slow readers, while slow changing text would annoy slow readers and anyone who wants to skip it. So they came up with an elegant solution - press a button when you are done reading to move on.

But there is no need for this in a cutscene, because everyone watches at the same speed. There is no need to require input. It would be better if the player just stood there and watched the funeral happen, though it would be less funny.

 

[DaViller]

I disagree that quicktime events are the antithesis to good game design. The ending one wonderfull 101 was a quicktime event in wich you hammer the A-button like a madman and it was the hypest moment in any videogame I have ever played (and I have played a lot of videogames). Quicktime events like cutscenes are a tool, they can be used in the right or wrong way.

 

[RavingSturm]

Anyone remember the GF boosting crap in FF8? Those really long ass sequences with button mashing for player interactivity. grrr.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

ill press A, W, I, T, T, Y, C, O, M, M, E, N, T to write a witty comment

the sequence is almost a parody of AAA gaming itself, im surprised anybody thought this was a good idea