What you hate to see in a video game?

JonB

• Invisible walls in games of this generation
• I hate it when a game has voice acting but your own character talks in text. It takes you out of the experience. I loved Oblivion and liked Dragon Age but these two games did this and it annoyed me
• I hate seeing game A.I where they don't use vision cones but instead they automatically see you, when you are in sight or cross a certain threshold.
• I hate seeing linear level design, It just feels lazy and by linear I mean proper linear games. Look at some stages of Gears of War or the new FF13.

Anyone else have some pet peeves like this?

VenomIreland

When games have few voice actors, take Fallout 3 for example, I played that game to death (still am playing it with mods and Fallout 2 with mods also), but the all too familiar voices started to get on my nerves after my first playthrough.

RolandIRL

i really hate it when games don't have AI for multiplayer. you have to play online/LAN. given that i have shíte internet, it really frustrates me. :mad:
games like Halo had no multiplayer AI and it really pissed me off. i'm forced to play older games like UT if i just want to mess around.

Hercule

I have a fair few - I am a very picky gamer :pac:

* invisible walls as mentioned above.

* lobby based P2P multiplayer.

* never ending maze until you follow a certain path levels (people who played vagrant story will know what I mean - several hours wasted in that poxy forest).

* A bonus features menu that only includes "credits" or "trailers for the sequel".

* Oirish accents performed by americans / sh1t voice actors eg.(saboteur/mercenaries 2).

* quick time events during cutscenes - just as you put the pad down having to scramble it back up to press jump :S.

* quick time events to capture vehicles/hack doors.

* CGI trailers that dont match actual gameplay.

* games that reward time played over ability.

* Fetch quests in MMOs (eg. Silkroads' "Go collect 50000 white tiger pelts".

* unskippable cinematics

* "Getting knocked out" and losing all your items (ok if there is a box with everything you had in it in the next room)

* escort missions with buggy AI comrades.

* cliffhanger endings.

* snotty nosed kids (those little ****s from fallout 3)

Willbbz

Games that have 'Health'
I much prefer Halo or COD where your health regenerates

And like the post before me I hate when CGI cinematics look nothing like the game

VenomIreland

That reminds me, I also hate in Fallout 3 vanilla how Stimpaks work, I love them now with this mod called Fallout Wanderers Edition, which makes Stimpaks heal over time (OK, it's over 9 seconds, but better than Vanilla as it also eliminates Stimpak spamming(using more than one at once is useless) and makes you try to get hit less)

Antar Bolaeisk

Health regeneration
Quick time events
Unskippable cinematics (I generally watch the cinematics but when I have to watch it for the 149th time and still can't skip it, that induces rage!)
Quick time events

5uspect

I hate the regenerating health that we see a lot of new games.
Turns FPS games into a process of empty mag>duck behind cover>wait for HP to recover>repeat. L4D on the other hand makes you think about when, where and who to heal.

Sandbox games that make you drive far too much to missions. GTA IV often sees you drive halfway across the map, sometimes before and after a mission. They seem to have improved things a bit in RDR with shippable trips.

Sloppy console ports. I don't mind console games being dumbed down a bit but at least optimise the fecking thing if you release if for the PC!

Fewer games with dedicated servers.

Mic spamming kiddies.

DLC you have to pay for, especially if it's content already on the game disk.
I don't mind an expansion but a lot of DLC is taking the piss.

MW2. Awful single player, don't even mention the multiplayer.

Gunmonkey

In RPG's, status effect attacks that dont effect 90% of the enemies in the game.

Escort quests where the escortee WALKS through a hazardous area on a pre-determined path that takes them right next to several dozen enemies.

Logical inconsistencies (early Resident Evils rickety wooden doors locked with a rusty padlock blocking the person with several high powered explosive weapons)

thorbarry

Battlefield bad company 2 did a good job on "invisible walls". There are none, but if you begin to leave the area where the battle is taking place, it gives you 10seconds to go back, otherwise you die

Mr. Presentable

Jumping tasks. Jump, jump, jump to the other side of the pit/acid whatever, and if you miss one, start again.


Unlockables. I paid for the game. The whole game, not just the first part/boring cars.

PirateShampoo

L4D1 and 2 was ruined because of invisible walls and blocked off area's.

And this new fad of games coming out with no dedicated servers. 1 of the reasons why Aliens vs Pred failed and why i wont buy Modern Warfare 2.

Orim

Antar Bolaeisk wrote: »

Health regeneration
Quick time events
Unskippable cinematics (I generally watch the cinematics but when I have to watch it for the 149th time and still can't skip it, that induces rage!)
Quick time events

I'd like to add quick time events to this list.

Sandbox/openword games with nothing to do. GTA IV was quite bad for the lack of extras beyond missions but Assasins Creed was the worst. Unless you wanted to collect everything there was no reason to go into the open-world once you had quick travel.

GTR63

1.Big Empty Worlds.
2.Escort Missions.
3.Bad AI bots in Co-Op Games.
4.Similar Mission types filling out games.
5.Short Single Player Campaigns.
6.Respawning Enemies.
7.Vehicle Missions with Atrocious Handling.
8.As many have said Stereotypical Voice Acting.
9.Mandatory Co-op with No Option for a AI Bot to fill in,eg Splinter Cell Convictions Co-op Campaign.
10.Lastly developers saying that a Console Exlusive is only Capable on the Console they put the game on.

5uspect

Bad hit detection. BF:BC2 has it in spades.

Incessant NPC dude chatter, I'm looking at you Dirt 2.

Fnz

nipplenuts wrote: »

Jumping tasks. Jump, jump, jump to the other side of the pit/acid whatever, and if you miss one, start again.


Unlockables. I paid for the game. The whole game, not just the first part/boring cars.

Poor check-pointing in general, rather than during jumping tasks, specifically, is an annoyance for me.

Unlockables, in car games, I'm of two minds about. I wouldn't expect the best weapons/armour/powers from the start when playing single player 'action' games. Yet in racing games, not everyone wants to play the career mode - where cars, as prizes, makes sense.

Retr0gamer

Unskippable logos at the start of games that outstay their welcome.

Fnz

Sports.

Gunmonkey

MMO games where the box you ticked under "class" will dictate the whole game for you, not great if you have no idea what each class plays like.

landsleaving

Escort missions with bad AI... and they ALWAYS have bad AI.

Time limits on awkward sections, eg. in GTA where you have to get somewhere in x amount of time but the car can't get damaged at all, so you drive really slowly, only to be blindsided by a random AI car out of nowhere and don't have enough time left to go fix it.

Sandboxes with nothing to do. I was loving Red Dead Redemption until I got to Mexico and the random sidequests are few and far between and its an insane distance between places. Fallout 3 showed how an open world with lots of emptiness can still be teeming with life. There's always something new on that compass beckoning you to explore.

The first 2 hours plus of a game, especially a sequel, being an extended tutorial. Listen kids, read the manual on the bus like we all used to and explore, enjoy and figure it out yourself, thats part of the fun.

First Person Shooters that just copy everything else completely. The regenerating health, the 2 guns at a time, etc. Ok, Halo 1 was decent, and the vehicle sections were fun, but really, only 2 levels really stand out, and that was because you were in a goddamn tank. There are other ways of making an fps... surely??

That bit where you're halfway through, you have most of the good weapons/equipment and your character is captured by the villain and you go back to square one. Ugh.. how cheap can you get.

New installments, rather than sequels. Ok it makes sense for sports games, but would it not be better to have told let treyarch do something other than ensure that there was a constant yearly supply of call of duty to sit proudly alongside 'gamers' copies of FIFA?

'Adult' themes that are adolescent fantasies of machismo, violence and vulgarity.

Space Marines/Soldiers/Heroes with the attitude and intelligence of a UFC fighter fresh from a lobotomy. Give me some characters I can in some way relate to if you want to tell a story, otherwise, don't bother!

Repetitiveness, like in Red Dead, again, where you seem to either do an escort mission, or have to kill some banditios after holding x to 'ride' your horse.

Repetitiveness.

5uspect

I've just started Borderlands. Add frustrating inventory menu UIs to the list.

Fnz

landsleaving wrote: »

First Person Shooters that just copy everything else completely. The regenerating health, the 2 guns at a time, etc. Ok, Halo 1 was decent, and the vehicle sections were fun, but really, only 2 levels really stand out, and that was because you were in a goddamn tank. There are other ways of making an fps... surely??

Agree with most of your peeves, but:

I don't know what you're asking for... you're want them to re-invent the wheel every time? Change the button locations, perhaps? Remove 'crouch'? Be 'original' by have non-recharging health?

There's a reason why we have conventions - people find systems that work or are intuitive and use them.

Tentacle bosses.

Dave D

I agree with pretty much most the comments in this thread.
Another thing that doesn't happen much but still didn't like in some games was poorly integrated real world advertising.
I remember playing The Matrix and seeing the power-aid vending machines and advertising. I know I can be too picky :pac:

tman

Loading screens when you walk between areas

Started playing HL2 again today and I'm loving it apart from the way it jarringly breaks your sense of immersion every once in a while while it loads the next area:(

Mr. K

When controls appear on a game's loading screen. Just do a tutorial, I never remember all of the controls from a brief glimpse on a loading screen. Learn by doing!

No local co-op. Castlevania: Harmony of Despair seems to be the latest offender in this regard. I enjoy being able to play games with a group in one room. The banter and atmosphere is just better, I remember having a great time playing through Castle Crashers like this. The Scott Pilgrim game seems like it's designed the same way.

Overheal

PirateShampoo wrote: »

L4D1 and 2 was ruined because of invisible walls and blocked off area's.

Originally they planned the levels as a large open area City with a point A point B but playtesters became lost and frustrated initially, and later just reverted to the same fixed path. Those beta levels were chopped up and became the No Mercy and Dead Air campaigns.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Unskippable logos at the start of games that outstay their welcome.

PUBLISHED BY EA RAWR YOU CANNOT SKIP WE WILL BURN INTO YOUR RETINA.... Game Developed by *skip* In association with *snip* runs great on *snip*

Seriously, with their Holier than thou Attitude.

Also - Games with slow matchmaking. I'm looking at you, Dawn of War II, GFWL.

landsleaving

Fnz wrote: »

Agree with most of your peeves, but:

I don't know what you're asking for... you're want them to re-invent the wheel every time? Change the button locations, perhaps? Remove 'crouch'? Be 'original' by have non-recharging health?

There's a reason why we have conventions - people find systems that work or are intuitive and use them.

I don't mean just going back to the old health pack system or changing controls, I mean adding new ideas, being creative, telling a different story, etc. If developers stuck to conventions because they simply worked, then we'd never have moved on from Doom and seen FPS classics like the Half-Life series, Deus Ex, System Shock 2, metroid Prime and Bioshock. There's more to the genre than simply shoot, recharge health, shoot, ad infinitum, but the success of Halo and Call of Duty has made games that don't just follow this template and carve their own niche far less common. Maybe it's just too intuitive a system!

Retr0gamer

Unpauseable cutscenes!

Azza

Guile.

thorbarry

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Unpauseable cutscenes!

very annoying.... Phone call from a person who might want to hire me.... or watch the end movie to a game i've been playing. Who wins?

Keith186

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Unskippable logos at the start of games that outstay their welcome.

That's what I came to type when I seen the thread title.

Vegeta

Mr. K wrote: »

I remember having a great time playing through Castle Crashers like this. The Scott Pilgrim game seems like it's designed the same way.

Castle Crashers was awesome like that

My 2 big annoyances are:
Extreme use of scripting
Cliche gameplay where the focus was put on spit shine

Overheal

- Cutscenes of "boss fights" that you cant play

- invasive DRM, SecuROM, etc.

- Random Encounters

- Getting superweapons on the last fight of the game, with no real opportunities to dick around with them. Crysis was awful for this.

.... but on that same note:

- a lack of mining lasers

Overlong cutscenes that add nothing to the storyline as a whole.

Cutesie kid characters that are annoying

Irritating catchphrases.

Japanese RPGs are extremely bad for these - especially Star Ocean: The Last Hope. It was the main reason I couldn't get past 12 hours - annoyed me too much.

thorbarry

Deleted User wrote: »

Overlong cutscenes that add nothing to the storyline as a whole.

MGS 4 anyone? God that was annoying, I actually gave up playing because i couldn't stand the cutscenes

5uspect

Games for Windows Live.

Monotype

Annoying, slow menus. UT3 really put me off, even though I enjoy the game itself.

WW2 games - on the decrease, but waaay to common there a while back.

Games that take themselves too seriously. It's fun to throw a ridiculously powerful weapon in there.

Limited saves. If you're going to limit saves, make sure you put in a generous limit and DON'T delete old saves when there's more than ten without telling you!!! :mad:

Unlockable content. Someone mentioned this up there as well. You don't show all your cards in one go, but don't make it near impossible with 3/4 of the game held hostage.

Emphasis on achievements. That's an added bonus of a game for those who want it, not a core feature.

People in team games who are more interested in increasing their own score and not helping the team.

Retr0gamer

thorbarry wrote: »

MGS 4 anyone? God that was annoying, I actually gave up playing because i couldn't stand the cutscenes

You didn't miss anything. The game gets worse and the cutscenes longer and more retarded. It does a hell of a lot of things that I hate seeing in games.

Overheal

Racial Stereotypes



"Aks me a question!"

Connavar

Limitless Re-spawning enemies in FPS.

This is what took away from COD 4 for me. I want to have the ability to clear an area with a sniper if I so wish. It was so bad in the harder difficulties that I just ran past areas to avoid the endless enemies.

Having to pay for map packs. Its ridiculous having to shell out more when I have already paid for the game. I was very disappointed when I saw this coming to the PC.

humanji

These are more about games in general, but

- I hate when developers don't put any effort into a single-player portion of a game because they just want to concentrate on the multiplayer side. Either put effort into it, or don't bother with it.

- Releasing unfinished games. Alpha Protocol could easily have been my game of the year if it wasn't rushed out with the AI practically unfinished. But the biggest culprit, for those who played it, was Ultima 9: Ascension which had to be seriously cut down and messed up because the publishers needed an early release.

- The "Rookie". Why do marines always give the new guy such a hard time when he's going to save the day? Do they never learn?

- Not having the Esc key bring up the main menu. I don't know why, but this drives me f*cking bonkers. I think it was Dawn of War that forced you to click on the menu button at the top of the screen.

- Developers assumptions that a brand name is all that is needed. I'm sure some developers/publishers deserve to be done for fraud by tricking people into buying games. Anyone who suffered Operation Flashpoint 2 knows exactly what I mean here. And leading on from that:

- Changing the sequel to a different type of game. Dawn of War 2 was a fun game, but it wasn't really anything to do with the first one, besides being set in the same universe.

- Tutorials that don't fully explain what you're meant to do. I was playing the old "Jack The Ripper" dos game a little while ago and in the tutorial it'll tell you to do something, but it doesn't always work and leaves you randomly clicking the screen hoping something will happen. There are more recent examples, but that one particularly got on my tits.

- Princess Peach has been kidnapped again? Well f*ck her!

- Bad voice acting. There really is no excuse for it.

- Having a good/evil choice of character development, but where evil is always a bad choice. The good guy gets discounts in shops, treats from NPC's and everyone loves them. The bad guy gets attacked constantly and nothing else.

- Metal Gear Solid 4 cutscenes. They should constitute a crime against humanity and script writing!

gizmo

Evidence that the game has been dumbed down for consoles...



03/04 Never Forget.

johnny_ultimate

Inventory size limits that are unreasonable - a lot of RPGs seem to have limited inventories these days. Now, I readily accept that it is quote realistic unquote to have such limitations in place. That doesn't mean it's fun. Also: I'm fighting giant mutants in a post apocalyptic wasteland with a mini nuke while I have radiation poisoning - realism doesn't necessarily come into it. If half my time is spent juggling inventories, it grows tedious (barring games where it's half the fun, such as dungeon crawlers full o'loot). But getting 'overburdened' can be irritating, particularly for someone who will hold onto pretty much every piece of loot I gather. Yeah, I mightn't ever use that giant axe, but I like having the option to use it should I want to, not having to sell it on to make room for another item. One aspect JRPGs more than certainly do get right over Western counterparts - I can carry every frickin' weapon I want!

Games without save options (i.e. relying on autosave) - it might just be me, but I get uber paranoid first time I exit an autosave game. If there isn't a clear 'save' option in the menu, I usually end up reloading my save game after the first time 'exit to main menu' just to ensure everything is fine and dandy.

Over-emphasis on co-op elements - I'm all for co-op options, but since I realistically play most games alone for the majority of the campaign, it does feel a bit unfair when the game suffers as a result. Dragon Quest IX and Peace Walker are two great games, but have elements clearly compromised in single player (such as the bosses in PW) for the benefit of co-op. Still great games, but you can tell the stress on co-op. Better to have a separate co-op option - Uncharted 2 or MW2 - or one that is basically invisible and filled in by AI, like Gears of War.

Pointless collectibles - because they're pointless.

Jazzy

whiteman19 wrote: »

games like Halo had no multiplayer AI and it really pissed me off. i'm forced to play better games like UT if i just want to mess around.

FYP :pac:

marco_polo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-6EFBlybD8

Mr. K

Connavar wrote: »

Limitless Re-spawning enemies in FPS.

+1. It takes away any skill or strategy, forcing you to run from checkpoint to checkpoint. Back in the Goldeneye days, I had a strategy for going through levels. Developing said strategy was part of the fun!

Penn

tman wrote: »

Loading screens when you walk between areas

Started playing HL2 again today and I'm loving it apart from the way it jarringly breaks your sense of immersion every once in a while while it loads the next area:(

Mirrors Edge was terrible for this. A game based on the fact that you can free run using pretty much anything, with huge, crisp locations.... then you end up in an elevator for 2 minutes. Unreal.

One of my biggest hates is when you start the game with huge powers or items, then lose them after the first mission and have to start getting them all over again. Assassins Creed 1 and the God of War sequels especially

Fanny Cradock

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Unpauseable cutscenes!

Unskipable cutscenes!

Kxiii

Roman Belic

I hate the way as soon as a mission is over he rings.. ''Hi cousin wanna go do something'' I am doing something, its called playing they game. I do like playing to play mini games occasionally but not when the game tries to force you to play them and the punishes you for just wanting to get on with it.

Fnz

Fanny Cradock wrote: »

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Unpauseable cutscenes!

Unskipable cutscenes!

Uncutable scenepauseskips!