Worst Video Game Tutorial

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

Europa Universalis 4 for me.

Jesus, the tutorial only teaches the bare fucking minimum of how to play the game. It took me 100+ hours of basically stumbling through various failed campaigns to grasp what is going on. I took me even longer to figure out trade. The sign of a bad tutorial is one that requires you to look up most of info outside of the game.

To be fair, the entire game's trade system was kind of fucked for a long while. It works now, but it is so streamlined. I'm honestly surprised that most people don't just start off cheating their asses off in that game- I mean, I learned most of EU3 in about ten hours by cheats- and the exact same cheats are present in EU4 (Albeit the technology cheats are a bit different).

 

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

Fallout 2 is a great game but the Temple of Trials at the start is terrible.

I've never beaten the first Fallout because (from what I understand) I have a finite amount of time and that kind of thing stresses me out in gaming to the point that fun is nearly impossible. I've never beaten Fallout 2 because I've never been able to get through the Temple of Trails. No, it's not the difficulty so much as it is the general confusion and the nagging thought that I could be playing something more fun...like Fallout 3! (beaten with multiple characters)

Fighting games in general are so notoriously bad when it comes to tutorials that the only one I can think of that's got anything close to a useful tutorial is Marvel vs Capcom 3.

In the updated versions the super-mutant attack timelimit is upped to thirteen years. You could beat the entire game, side quests and all and still take your sweet old time four or five times before that time limit is up. The waterchip timelimit is easily workable, and you can buy more time at one part of the game if you need it.

 

[Dragonlayer]

It's a toss-up between any Hearts of Iron game and Bloodborne, because neither of their tutorials tell you shit. I learnt how to play the former by pure trial and error on my friend's copy at his house - and even now I still don't fully understand how the economy works - and I died twice trying to judo-chop the first enemy to death in the latter because there was *no* information on how to change and equip weapons.

Fantastic games but completely useless at teaching people how to enjoy them!

Honestly, I love From Software, but I think its ridiculous that they don't properly teach people how to play their games. Just like how it's ridiculous that you can't pause. What eats me up is that it feels like an intentional design choice, as opposed to an oversight. Once you've played one of their games the others are pretty easy to understand, but it's unacceptable that you have to go through that much trial and error just to understand the basics of the game. They don't even explain the stats to you. For such well designed titles, I can't understand why they would do this. It makes things far too hard on newer players.

Thankfully, I had already completed Dark Souls, so Bloodborne felt like putting on a well worn glove. I can only imagine how the uninitiated felt (remembers Asylum Demon from Dark Souls and shudders).

As enjoyable as a game is, you shouldn't have to have the online wiki open at all times in order to learn the most basic of information: what is "Scaling" and how does it work? How do I change my trousers? What's with the A/B/C/D ratings on my trousers? What does everything mean!? And there really is no excuse for not having a functional pause button when playing offline; I shouldn't have to retreat ten miles and hide in a corner because I need to go make dinner From Software.

Also: I believe you were one of the helpful folks recommending I get the game in my thread a week ago, for which I thank you kindly because I am utterly engrossed in it. Now I must get back to this essay while pondering how to kill Martyr Logarius....

P.S. Tell me that Logarius is *not* a dark and gritty remake of the Ice King from Adventure Time!

 

[Eddie the head]

If you know it's a tutorial it's a bad tutorial. That said it's easy to forgive, there hard to to right.

 

[Twintix]

Well, I don't care much for any Nintendo tutorials. Not so much because they don't teach me how to play the game. In fact, I think their tutorials are a bit too hand-holding.
Look guys, I know a ton of kids play your games, but I'd appreciate it if you stopped assuming that they are idiots. If I could skip their tutorials, I'd have less of a problem with it. But aside from the basic fighting mechanics at the start of the Mario & Luigi games, I can't. Just let me skip them, please!

Oh well, at least they can be somewhat entertaining. The Curse tutorials from Paper Mario: TTYD are kinda funny.

Aside from that...Does the beginning of LOST: The Video Game count as a tutorial? Because I could not get past the beginning of the game due to the game not explaining anything. It told me to walk around and talk to the survivors, which I did, and the game was still not satisfied afterwards, but it refused to tell me what I did wrong.

But I guess the first hint that the game would be bad was that it was a game based on a TV show...

 

[pearcinator]

Definitely 'Driver'

It's not really a tutorial. You have 60 seconds to do a bunch of car tricks in an underground car park and if you crash once you're pretty much fucked. It has like nothing to do with the game and you can't even get to the 1st level without completing it. I finally managed to do it but it was definitely the worst tutorial I have ever played.

 

[Fdzzaigl]

The X-series of space games. Even the later ones, which supposedly have improved tutorials, never manage to explain anything clearly.

They ramble on about the various mechanics without telling you which keys to press, or why and how to use those things.

In their defense, all of those games are very complex.

 

[necromanzer52]

I think it was the original 'Driver'. It tried to integrate the tutorial into the story by being about how you needed to show the local crime boss how bad-ass of a driver you were. Unfortunately it immediately put you on this driving course that was really, really hard, and you couldn't skip it. I think it took me like 3 hours just to make it through the damn tutorial.

Exactly what I came here to say. The tutorial should not be the hardest level in the entire game. I had that game for about 3 years before I managed to get past it.

On the opposite side of the spectrum we have skyward sword which holds your hand for far too much of the game.

 

[Sewa_Yunga]

E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy.

It has a special tutorial menu that contains videos showing you how to do stuff in the game.
The very first video in that tutorial list... Is a video that shows you how to open the tutorial list to watch tutorial videos.

I almost fell off my chair when I first saw that, but now my legs are OK.

 

[TranshumanistG]

Battlecruiser Millenium comes to mind. So, we have a complex game where you can switch between being a starhip commander, a spaceship pilot, an ATV driver, an astronaut or a space marine as you wish, but have to memorise zillion key combinations and concepts that come with each of those. So what do the training missions consist of? They just let you run wild with zero prompting and try to figure it out yourself. Better RTFM.

 

[lowtech redneck]

Put me down as another Witcher 2 vote....if the one I experienced fairly recently was better than previous releases, I'd hate to have seen the original. I really wanted to like that game, but I never made it past the tutorial, and played Kingdoms of Amular: Reckoning instead. Maybe one day I'll be willing to waste a day or two trying to navigate the tutorial and learn enough of the ridiculously complicated and non-intuitive play mechanics to get started, but its probably not going to be anytime soon.

 

[Weaver]

Mine's for a game no one's played:
Guardians of Graxia.

It HAD a tutorial, it was just incredibly awful at explaining the game to you. It was beyond confusing, it seemed to explain some things and not others, the English was bad and it really just left you with questions of "what the fuck is going on" more than "Oh, I get it".

 

[sageoftruth]

Which is worse?

A)A tutorial that utterly fails to teach you how to play the game, sending you screaming for the nearest Wikia or guide book.
B)A very lengthy, completely unnecessary tutorial that you cannot skip every time you start a new game.

Depends on the game's replay value I'd say. A is less of an issue the 2nd or 3rd time you play it. On the other hand, B would be a serious chore.

However, if it's the kind of game you won't be playing a second or third time, then A is definitely the worse one.

 

[sageoftruth]

Well, I don't care much for any Nintendo tutorials. Not so much because they don't teach me how to play the game. In fact, I think their tutorials are a bit too hand-holding.
Look guys, I know a ton of kids play your games, but I'd appreciate it if you stopped assuming that they are idiots. If I could skip their tutorials, I'd have less of a problem with it. But aside from the basic fighting mechanics at the start of the Mario & Luigi games, I can't. Just let me skip them, please!

Oh well, at least they can be somewhat entertaining. The Curse tutorials from Paper Mario: TTYD are kinda funny.

Aside from that...Does the beginning of LOST: The Video Game count as a tutorial? Because I could not get past the beginning of the game due to the game not explaining anything. It told me to walk around and talk to the survivors, which I did, and the game was still not satisfied afterwards, but it refused to tell me what I did wrong.

But I guess the first hint that the game would be bad was that it was a game based on a TV show...

NONSENSE! Without Nintendo's helpful tutorials, how would I ever have learned what a door was and how to open it in Ocarina of Time?

 

[KarmaTheAlligator]

I'll just go ahead and say the one that usually gets me into trouble:

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days

That tutorial is absolutely infuriating, it's divided into little sections and all of them are unskipable. To elaborate on this imagine you make a combat tutorial for an RPG. What would you do? Explain all the menus in a single battle? Not in Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days you don't, each menu has it's own battle; for instance there's one battle that explains how to consume items and other one that explains how to attack. Fucking WHY

As someone who loves this game more than he probaby should... I agree 100% in terms of how the tutorial was handled in 358/2 Days... I mean, if I remember correctly, the game's tutorial last for a total of 12 in-game days! I feel like they only stretched it out just to showcase the Organization members you could play as in multiplayer despite [REDACTED] happening later on...

Yeah, those days were mostly to have some interaction with the Org members and flesh them out a bit more. Doesn't excuse the length of the tutorial, though.

 

[EyeReaper]

Any game with Newgame+/multiple endings and also an unskippable tutorial is probably my ultimate gaming sin. Hell, unskippable tutorials in general irk me to no end. It really hampers some of the replay value on some really great games like Persona 4 and Kingdom Hearts 2

I think the worst series tutorial wise though is hands down the Hyperdimension Neptunia games. Not only do they have long, story event, completely hand-holdy tutorials, all of the most important stuff is left vague. Especially things like the Share System and Lily Rank. It somehow hit every rung of the "don't do this" ladder and it stops me from getting those sweet sweet platinum trophies cuz there's no way in hell I'm playing Mk.2 seven times

 

[Treeberry]

A good way to get me to stop playing a game pretty early on is to have a crappy tutorial section.

Harvest Moon A New Beginning's tutorial is so slow and painful it made me angry, bored and apathetic. Really, the entire tutorial is spread out over the first season - you aren't really allowed to do anything - or discover anything for yourself - until the game tells you how/when. You can skip the tutorial by sleeping through the first season but I shouldn't have to do that just to be able to play the darn game and I think you get penalised for it anyway.

To tell you how stupid ANB is - you are given instructions on how to walk and use the map after you have already done these things in order to continue the non-optional, forced tutorial!

Comparatively the original SNES game allows you to view a tutorial video that is viewable from the main menu screen and has a guidebook in the toolshed. Back to Nature has an optional tour of the town, your bookshelf and a nice little optional segment on the TV.

My favourite tutorial segments are those that are optional, non-intrusive or contribute in some to world building. (Such as Dark Souls and the more recent Elder Scrolls games)

Also to the people talking about Paradox's tutorials: yes, they are rather lacking. You learn better by doing in these games though (and the wiki helps too >.>).

 

[FPLOON]

I'll just go ahead and say the one that usually gets me into trouble:

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days

That tutorial is absolutely infuriating, it's divided into little sections and all of them are unskipable. To elaborate on this imagine you make a combat tutorial for an RPG. What would you do? Explain all the menus in a single battle? Not in Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days you don't, each menu has it's own battle; for instance there's one battle that explains how to consume items and other one that explains how to attack. Fucking WHY

As someone who loves this game more than he probaby should... I agree 100% in terms of how the tutorial was handled in 358/2 Days... I mean, if I remember correctly, the game's tutorial last for a total of 12 in-game days! I feel like they only stretched it out just to showcase the Organization members you could play as in multiplayer despite [REDACTED] happening later on...

Yeah, those days were mostly to have some interaction with the Org members and flesh them out a bit more. Doesn't excuse the length of the tutorial, though.

Agreed. Besides, it wasn't until I played the game a second time that I realized

Spoiler: this during the entire tutorial...

that the members you interact with the most end up going to Castle Oblivion... and never coming back outside of Axel...

 

[Elfgore]

A lot of mine have already been mentioned.

E.Y.E. Cypermancy is terrible. First because they use video tutorials, which I already hate. Second, they don't even tell you which video you need to watch to learn how to do the thing.

Mortal Kombat 9 and 10's suck as well. They just give you a bunch of combos and tell you how to do them. They don't even properly explain how to do enhanced attacks. They never tell you when to click R2 to enhance it. Is it during the start, middle, end? I had to fucking google it, just to make use of them.

Dark Soul's was pretty shitty as well. It took me about ten characters to learn how to use kick.

 

[darkcalling]

Probably the worst was Dark Souls/Bloodborne as their tutorials are close to nonexistent. But having played through to the the first boss of each I can definitely say that they are simply not for me. Too obtuse for my tastes though I do appreciate the thought that went into them. TheScribeD on youtube has done let's plays of all the souls games that are quite interesting.

Two of the best tutorials I've played are Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and Transformers:Fall of Cybertron. Both for the same reason. They give you all the information you need to play the game while keeping things interesting with some rather epic events and the start of a great story.