General Gaming Outdated gaming mechanics.

[CastletonSnob]

What game mechanics do you consider outdated?

[XxEvil AshxX]

 

Supplies mechanics

[Fizzzzle]

Obvious answer is escort missions. Nothing like creating fun challenge by taking agency AWAY from the player. Thankfully you don't see them very often anymore, but they still pop up every once in a while somehow. Someone will always think it's a good idea.

 

I also hate rubber band AI. It's most associated with racing games, but similar concepts are used in most sports games of all kinds, and even some fighting games and such. Win a game in NBA2K by blowing out the AI by 40 points? Your next game is going to suuuuuuuck. I get wanting to keep relevant challenge to the player, but it shouldn't be done by actively *punishing* the player for being too good. Unlike escort missions, rubber band AI is still used all the fucking time.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Boss fights in games where they aren't the main focus (Soulsborne-type titles)

[Biggie]

save points

 

 

[Ghost_MH]

5 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

Obvious answer is escort missions. Nothing like creating fun challenge by taking agency AWAY from the player. Thankfully you don't see them very often anymore, but they still pop up every once in a while somehow. Someone will always think it's a good idea.

 

I also hate rubber band AI. It's most associated with racing games, but similar concepts are used in most sports games of all kinds, and even some fighting games and such. Win a game in NBA2K by blowing out the AI by 40 points? Your next game is going to suuuuuuuck. I get wanting to keep relevant challenge to the player, but it shouldn't be done by actively *punishing* the player for being too good. Unlike escort missions, rubber band AI is still used all the fucking time.

 

I don't know. A Plague Tale is basically a giant escort mission and that game is pretty great.

 

Two that come to mind are ones that JRPGs absolutely abused. Save points and random battles.

[Fizzzzle]

2 minutes ago, Biggie said:

save points

 

 

I like a mix of auto saves and save points. Save points can be used to signal the player "hey, some shit's about to go down," which can be useful for many reasons. 

 

I guess a companion to that would be games that don't let you save anywhere, or don't let you manually save at all.

[LazyPiranha]

Any status effect that changes your controls.

[Fizzzzle]

4 minutes ago, Ghost_MH said:

 

I don't know. A Plague Tale is basically a giant escort mission and that game is pretty great.

 

Two that come to mind are ones that JRPGs absolutely abused. Save points and random battles.

Can your compaion (forget his name) die in that one, though? I assumed it was like God of War or The Last of Us, like you don't really have to worry about them.

[Mr.Vic20]

* Bullet sponge enemies as a solution to increasing difficulty. 

* Cut scenes you can't skip directly after a save point to hide loading

* Good/Bad choices in dialog trees

* Infinite macguffins to collect for "reasons" 

[Ghost_MH]

14 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

Can your compaion (forget his name) die in that one, though? I assumed it was like God of War or The Last of Us, like you don't really have to worry about them.

 

Yes, very much so. Nothing like seeing your 5/yo brother eaten alive by rats.

[vaxick]

Since escort missions have already been stated, I'm going to go with my other frustration.   Objects you cannot crouch to get under or jump to get over.  Do not put a freaking object in a game that your character is easily capable of navigating around unless it's actually apart of the map.

[TwinIon]

Not having a flashlight. I've been playing Deathloop and still playing Destiny 2. Both use primarily baked lighting but both clearly have some support for dynamic lighting on top. Both often have you going into dark areas, but neither lets you turn on a flashlight. In Destiny there's an automatic flashlight in some areas, but you can't manually turn it on. In Deathloop it's a real frustration. I've got a great OLED display where blacks are black, but I can either have a good looking game, or one where I turn the gamma and brightness up to the point where I've got a nice gray layer over everything, but I can see stuff I'm supposed to see. Just give me a freaking flashlight already! I really hoped that Doom 3 would spell the end of this trend, but no such luck.

 

I have a number of pet peeve mechanics, but I don't know if they really qualify as outdated, even if they were much more common in older games. A good example is the instant fail stealth mission. A lot more games take a more open approach now, where stealth is an option, but even in those games there are usually sections that instantly fail you if you're spotted.

[TheLeon]

Lives. 

[skillzdadirecta]

Turn based combat systems.

[Fizzzzle]

2 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

Turn based combat systems.

If I had a glove, I would throw it at your feet, sir.

[Ghost_MH]

9 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

Turn based combat systems.

 

And here I thought you were cool people.

[Biggie]

16 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

Turn based combat systems.

[Xbob42]

Any attack/status effect that takes control away from the player. Hate it in single-player games, multi-player games, everything. It's especially awful in MMOs because instead of crafting interesting combat they're all about just chain stunning someone until they die. Super fun to be on the receiving end of that!

[Fizzzzle]

xbob's reminded me of status effects in JRPGs. They're useless on offense a lot of times, outside of very specific situations. Like in random encounters, it's not worth the time taking extra damage to put status effects on enemies, and bosses are almost always immune to like 90% of status effects. So unless you're using a guide or are building out your bestiary (doesn't help for the bosses, obv), offensive status effects are basically useless.

[Keyser_Soze]

Loot boxes

[Brian]

The boss fight where you are whopping his/her ass, but a cutscene interrupts it so the enemy can be like “fuck you buddy. You are too weak for me”. 
 

I also hate when you hit a button to do an action like opening a chest, the game wants you to confirm it by hitting another button. 

[Keyser_Soze]

Not a gaming mechanic but I thought about this last night.

 

Remember when you'd go to a website to download something but you'd have to wait in a queue of people and wait before your download would start? What was it, like fileplanet or something like that? Some waits were like hours.

[Ghost_MH]

11 minutes ago, ManUtdRedDevils said:

The boss fight where you are whopping his/her ass, but a cutscene interrupts it so the enemy can be like “fuck you buddy. You are too weak for me”. 
 

I also hate when you hit a button to do an action like opening a chest, the game wants you to confirm it by hitting another button. 

 

I so absolutely hate the "I'm winning this fight, cut scene, oh no I am defeat". It's still out there in games. Fuck you. If you're going to make me lose anyway, don't let me waste time restoring my health or have to "win" the fight by knocking the enemy HP down to some random number.

 

I think the most recent bad offender here is Kakarot in the fight versus Raditz. You have to lose that fight, but it still makes you go up against Raditz for two rounds and bring his HP down to zero before he's like "Ha, you're so weak and I was holding back". Meanwhile Goku went from 100% HP in the fight to ragged and almost dead in the cutscene.

[Dre801]

"Protect this guy as he slowly hacks a terminal or opens a door as you fight off a  seemingly endless gauntlet of bad guys."

[heydude93]

Not a skilled writer so my critique on this isn't too valuable, but I think dialogue trees with writing and acting that isn't at the level of a good movie, show or comic are absolutely pointless compared to the RDR2-style of NPC interaction. 

 

The amount of scripted events in detailed and immersive games in general will probably be a thing of the past as emergent simulation becomes more achievable.

 

And I say this too much but I really hope we see physics systems and destructible environments become a standard feature in most 3D games starting this gen

[Ghost_MH]

2 hours ago, heydude93 said:

Not a skilled writer so my critique on this isn't too valuable, but I think dialogue trees with writing and acting that isn't at the level of a good movie, show or comic are absolutely pointless compared to the RDR2-style of NPC interaction. 

 

The amount of scripted events in detailed and immersive games in general will probably be a thing of the past as emergent simulation becomes more achievable.

 

And I say this too much but I really hope we see physics systems and destructible environments become a standard feature in most 3D games starting this gen

 

Go play Teardown on Steam. It's still in early access, but who cares. That game doesn't get nearly enough love around here.

[Bacon]

positionals

[BloodyHell]

14 hours ago, Ghost_MH said:

 

I don't know. A Plague Tale is basically a giant escort mission and that game is pretty great.

 

Two that come to mind are ones that JRPGs absolutely abused. Save points and random battles.

Is Plague Tale great?

I played about an hour of Innocence, and I found it pretty weird, like an on rails shooter without the shooting (aside from the sling). 

Did I not play enough, or does it just continue to be a constant run/stealth/run/stealth? It wasn't bad, just not interesting enough to feel I had to keep going.

 

 

Most of my pet peeve mechanics have already been named. Rubber Banding, unnecessary boss fights that add nothing to the game, normal escort missions. I don't consider LoU/2 and God of War to be escort missions, even when I guess they technically are?

But the dumb shit, like slow walk for a mile, fighting off hordes while your charge slowly saunters down the road towards the goal. You telling me this guy only has a first gear and can't move faster than a slow walk? Ffs. Make it a longer run if the designer wants it to last longer. Nobody is walking in an orderly fashion while trying to escape hordes of monsters.

[Ghost_MH]

5 hours ago, BloodyHell said:

Is Plague Tale great?

I played about an hour of Innocence, and I found it pretty weird, like an on rails shooter without the shooting (aside from the sling). 

Did I not play enough, or does it just continue to be a constant run/stealth/run/stealth? It wasn't bad, just not interesting enough to feel I had to keep going.

 

 

Most of my pet peeve mechanics have already been named. Rubber Banding, unnecessary boss fights that add nothing to the game, normal escort missions. I don't consider LoU/2 and God of War to be escort missions, even when I guess they technically are?

But the dumb shit, like slow walk for a mile, fighting off hordes while your charge slowly saunters down the road towards the goal. You telling me this guy only has a first gear and can't move faster than a slow walk? Ffs. Make it a longer run if the designer wants it to last longer. Nobody is walking in an orderly fashion while trying to escape hordes of monsters.

 

I'm a big fan, and I normally hate this run/stealth/escort/stealth/run genre, but for some reason it really works well here. Everything is set up well, so it's more of a puzzle than your typical stealth game and that's more of the case as the game goes along.

 

There are a couple of weak parts in the game where it leans a little too hard into action, but I still beat it. I should point out, I seriously value my time. I am not at all the type to finish every game I start. I'm pretty quick to drop a game when I'm not enjoying myself, even if I'm hours in. Hell, I haven't even beaten Outer Worlds because I found the final mission annoying. I'll beat it one day because I absolutely loved the rest of the game. I paid full Nintendo price for Tokyo Mirage Sessions and dropped it like half an hour before the final boss because the whole maze dungeon leading up to him was obnoxious...and I maxed out the stats in every character in that game.

 

Either way, I never even bought Plague Tale on release specifically because I didn't think I would like it. I literally only gave it a shot recently because it was free on EGS.

[Nokt]

Weapon/armor durability

[Fizzzzle]

42 minutes ago, Nokt said:

Weapon/armor durability

I agree, unless it's like a game built around crafting.

[gamer.tv]

Poor sign posting resulting in looking for one particular item/route when the game should just do a better job or organically signposting it for you. Most likely (or always my fault) but there was a part of RE: Village where I was running around for about -5 minutes trying to progress, to find out I had to shoot lights on the door. It didn’t seem like the obvious thing at the time.

[Xbob42]

Oh! Aim Down Sights. Console bullshit designed to slow down combat and make shooters less fun. Only exception is scoped weapons, of course.

[Brian]

Another one I don’t like is stealth games with a NPC. Nothing breaks immersion as you sneak around and the NPC is standing in broad day light for all to see yet no one sees them.