Bad design decisions in otherwise good games.

Josey Wales

Today I was playing Luigi's Mansion 2 and so far I am really enjoying the experience. Another great game in the 3DS library. But then I got to the Eerie Staircase section. I don't know who thought it would be fun.

The section has you make your way up countless flights of stairs but there are three routes to choose at each flight of steps. Only one is the correct route. Choose poorly and you slide all the way back and have to fight another ghost. You have to redo this section so many times that I was tempted just to give up. I took a break and came back just to power through.

Other examples:

Far Cry 2 - Nearly instant respawn of enemies and the whole malaria system. Both combined to make me ditch the game.

NSMB Wii - In multiplayer when one player dies the action pauses for a second. It is just annoying and can put your own timing off. Also the decision to use two Toad characters instead of bring in another character from past Mario games.

Donkey Kong Country Returns - The waggle controls for no real reason. Doesn't ruin the game but it is annoying.

-- Edit --

Just noticed I've listed three Nintendo games out of the four. I don't mean to pick on them, just a coincidence.

sarumite

It has been mentioned before, but the whole social networking in GTA IV. I remember someone describing it as a "cousin dating sim" and at times that wasnt far off!

FortuneChip

Valley Of Defilement
Blighttown

The clock section on disc 4 of Fear Effect. Don't think I finished the game on account of it.
Actually, that's probably not so much bad design and me being 13/14 and not having the patience to put up with something I didn't get

CastorTroy

Yeah that stair section in Luigi was annoying. Main problem with it was

No hints of which was the correct path unless you could see far ahead and remember which torches are out before they came back on

Kiith

Boss battles in Deus Ex: HR would be a pretty obvious one for me.

danthefan

FortuneChip wrote: »

Blighttown

I never really had a problem with Blighttown other than the fact the framerate dropped to about 25 frames per hour. Once you get down there you can sprint straight to the boss in probably 60 seconds or so.

Bravely Default, the latter half of the game has some issues,

i.e. the last 4 chapters are all basically repeats of the same thing.

Dave_The_Sheep

I get the impression this will contain a lot of the stuff from the "bad sections in otherwise good games" thread.

Mr.Saturn

Josey Wales wrote: »

Donkey Kong Country Returns - The waggle controls for no real reason. Doesn't ruin the game but it is annoying.

Actually just wrote a post elsewhere about the follies of motion-controls when tacked onto legacy mechanics, DKCR immediately came to mind too. Mind, it's pretty minimal, similar to Mario Galaxy, but having to use the waggle to get a tumble going had me avoid it as a technique more often than utilizing it; it's still my favourite entry in the series, though, so that's how little it factors in. I have been meaning to go back to it again, having 100%-ed it, with the classic-control hack locked onto it.

Josey Wales

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

I get the impression this will contain a lot of the stuff from the "bad sections in otherwise good games" thread.

I did a search and that didn't come up. I thought I had seen something similar but wasn't sure if it was here or another forum.

Oafley Jones

The combat in Mirror's Edge. Still one of my favourite games of the last gen. Things are very quiet on the sequel.

Duggy747

Oafley Jones wrote: »

The combat in Mirror's Edge. Still one of my favourite games of the last gen. Things are very quiet on the sequel.

The complete mess of Battlefield 4 has forced Dice to put everything else on hold until they fix the major problems.

Crysis 1 for me was really enjoyable when you were able to roam around the jungle and suss your own way to tackle a compound. It lost it's momentum once the alien section came about and became more linear, felt like a different game at that point.

richymcdermott

Fragile Dreams : Its combat is pretty poor but the overall game is amazing in both its artistic visuals , voice acting story and music.

Ico: Again very much Like fragile dreams everything is so amazing but I would of preferred it without the combat.

Agricola

The lack of proper tombs in a Tomb Raider game!

o1s1n

richymcdermott wrote: »

Fragile Dreams : Its combat is pretty poor but the overall game is amazing in both its artistic visuals , voice acting story and music.

Ico: Again very much Like fragile dreams everything is so amazing but I would of preferred it without the combat.

The fighting in ICO was clunky, but then I think it's needed as it helps form your bond with Yorda as you are genuinely afraid for her when she's in danger.

I found there to be a real panic any time that dark shadow appeared around here and you were miles away fighting guys off. Found myself shouting at the screen on occasion!

savemejebus

Halo Combat Evolved - the library level
Halo in general - the flood

richymcdermott

o1s1n wrote: »

The fighting in ICO was clunky, but then I think it's needed as it helps form your bond with Yorda as you are genuinely afraid for her when she's in danger.

I found there to be a real panic any time that dark shadow appeared around here and you were miles away fighting guys off. Found myself shouting at the screen on occasion!

I can see what team ico wanted to do but I found it to be sort annoying at times. great game overall still though :L

Gunmonkey

The sheer amount of "Uncharted-ness" in the last Tomb Raider game. Between the over abundance of combat (game could have done with about 1/4 of it), the sections where stuff starts exploding and you have to escape a burning building....ooooohhhh, tension! :rolleyes:

Another problem I have is the terrible stealth elements, was in one section in the pitch dark, on a small platform in a tree and missed a shot on one guard, on his own, in the back with an arrow but headshotted him a second later. Unfortunately, since it wasn't a clean kill he scream out and 2 guards, several hundred meters away, immediately turned to my location and rained fire on me. So...did they see the muzzle flash of the bow and arrow? Are they vector experts and can extract the direction the arrow flew in a split second as it protrudes from their friends back? It bugs me as the game pains itself to include stealth kills, silencer upgrades for the weapons and "these enemies will alert others when killed" in the "Survival Awareness" vision Lara got from her Assassin order anscestors.

Worst part is where you do one of the "run into the screen as something chases you" lifted from Crash Bandicoot and then Uncharted, it had a templ eor something be destroyed as you ran into the screen...and all you did was ppsuh "down" and jump one waist high wall....for almost a minute! What was the point? To emphasize how "intense" this game is? Best part was the Tomb Puzzle sections and when some of the areas opened up and you could explore and search for collectibles, pity these were tacked onto a generic 3rd person shooter with created by a director with a MASSIVE female-imperilment fetish.

snausages

richymcdermott wrote: »

I can see what team ico wanted to do but I found it to be sort annoying at times. great game overall still though :L

Yeah, I think clunkiness is partly the intention there. It's hardly supposed to be Devil May Cry :pac:

Speaking of DMC, just about any of the platforming sections in that series. Also the poster above reminded me of a terrible section in Ninja Gaiden Black where you get chased by a boulder down a narrow corridor. I think it was so bad they even removed it for Sigma

johnny_ultimate

I have a massive rant brewing up inside me about Tomb Raider, which I'm playing through at the moment, which is an insanely frustrating mix of great ideas and truly insipid, dissonant execution.

snausages

I hate moviefied games. It's almost as bad as gameified movies.

Retr0gamer

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

I have a massive rant brewing up inside me about Tomb Raider, which I'm playing through at the moment, which is an insanely frustrating mix of great ideas and truly insipid, dissonant execution.

How many crazed cultists does it take to kill one archeology student?

death1234567

The 'End' of Rage. Playing along happy enough then bang it's over.

Wossack

Retr0gamer wrote: »

How many crazed cultists does it take to kill one archeology student?

1.... if-you-dont-press-X-right-now!

Skerries

as mentioned above the malaria part of Far Cry 2 making you take pills in order to progress which forces a time limit on you unless you find more.
Another great game I played on the PS1 was The Gallerians which had a similar where you had to take pills otherwise your powers went nuclear thus killing you, I was in a big boss fight when this happened with no way to get more pills unless I replayed the whole game again.
**** that!
in fact any game that forces a time limit on you, please go away!

quarryman

Lots of hate for Tombraider.

Was it that annoying at times? It was next on my playlist...

krudler

All the animus stuff in the Assassin's Creed games, especially when you have to play as Desmond and do absolutely basic "training" stuff halfway through a game when you've been doing it the whole time. Just set each game in whatever time period you need and ditch the future stuff altogether Ubisoft.

Zillah

Wossack wrote: »

1.... if-you-dont-press-X-right-now!

Came here to post this. I was actually quite liking the new Tomb Raider until I burned out on quicktime events.

Don't ever put a quicktime event in your game, certainly not fifty.

-( i )- Wicker

quarryman wrote: »

Lots of hate for Tombraider.

Was it that annoying at times? It was next on my playlist...

I really enjoyed it. But expect Uncharted style gameplay rather than the usual Tombraider style.

johnny_ultimate

quarryman wrote: »

Lots of hate for Tombraider.

Was it that annoying at times? It was next on my playlist...

Mechanically, it's actually rock solid. The presentation is excellent, and there are times when it feels like a true realisation of the potential in both the character and concept. The tomb raiding, hidden, brief and optional though it often is, is brilliantly atmospheric.

But it's for that reason the game shoots itself in the foot repeatedly, too often resorting to inane cover shooting and blockbuster spectacle that, at worst, aggressively conflict with the characterisation and ideas presented elsewhere. It's the sort of game where you'll be badly injured by a branch one minute to the point where you can't even jump, and effortlessly soak up bullets while committing mass murder two minutes later. Her first killing leaves our heroine (and the player) sickened and disturbed, but five minutes later you've been forced to off a dozen more grunts with nary a concern. Lara Croft is equal parts fragile human being and immortal superhero, often within moments of each other. There's promising hunting and survival mechanics that are barely explored beyond the first hour, and I spent the last two hours of play doing nothing but escaping exploding caves, collapsing castles and mowing down nearly endless waves of generic enemies. It's like 127 Hours one minute, a Michael Bay film the next. Bay might even blush at the level of insane, empty spectacle on display here.

And worst of all, there's so many good ideas in there, so much potential, and they regularly come to the fore when you're, for example, exploring some of the game's larger environments. It's a delightfully miserable, moody and well realised gameworld, and Croft actually has an intriguing character arc when the writers aren't subjecting her to an assault of contrived torture porn. It's because there's much to like that it's frustrating there's also so much to hate, reverting to the most tired third person shooter mechanics with depressing regularity. It's the same sort of dissonance between character, narrative and gameplay we see in Uncharted, but amplified to stupid excess. It has admirable pretensions to be something better and more interesting, but fails pretty miserably.

gaynorvader

Kiith wrote: »

Boss battles in Deus Ex: HR would be a pretty obvious one for me.

I actually picked up the Directors Cut version on steam recently and it actually has fixed these fights. They've added in turrets you can hack and stuff.

Retr0gamer

It's a case of a developer just not being brave enough to break from standard conventions due to trying to make their budget back. I can see them thinking the only way it will sell and make back their budget would be to appeal to as much people as possible and to do that they copied uncharted which appealed to a lot of people. I'd love if a developer had enough faith in their art and mechanics that they would release a game that limited or even forgoes combat for exploration.

In the end Tomb Raider still failed to make back it's ridiculous budget which is probably why there's the definitive edition coming out to try and claw some of that back.

Agricola

Don't think we'll ever see a traditional Tomb Raider game again and that's a pity. If an Uncharted clone didnt sell as well as they expected, what hope would a largely puzzle based 3rd person platformer have? All we can hope is that they listen to the internet chatter and flesh out that aspect of the sequel. If it goes full on COD mode, then I wont bother even renting it for console.

landsleaving

krudler wrote: »

All the animus stuff in the Assassin's Creed games, especially when you have to play as Desmond and do absolutely basic "training" stuff halfway through a game when you've been doing it the whole time. Just set each game in whatever time period you need and ditch the future stuff altogether Ubisoft.

And the disconnecting from the past rubbish, all the wireframes on the screen, and everything else that ripped me straight out of the setting. Such a bad idea, the premise of those games is amazing but I just can't enjoy them. I get suckered in with every new setting too, forgetting that I'll be playing as either a guy in a hoody or a bad ass assasain being punished for exploring the painstakingly detailed setting.

Retr0gamer

Sometimes a change is good. Look at how popular Minecraft is and Tomb Raider became a surprise hit despite breaking convention at the time. Developers are just so risk adverse now but it's hard to blame them when you have the amount of money that was riding on Tomb Raider that needed to be made back.

Agricola

Yeah, the massive AAA budgets are a killer. And while a change is nice sometimes, I don't want all games becoming brainless shooters. So many titles come out nowadays in the form of reboots using old and venerable IP's but they are often a long way off what the original was really about. Thief looks like another to go down this route. I hate the way the lowest common denominator rises to the top as a result of financial worries about making back the budget, exactly in the same way cinema is going these days.

It is nice to know that, in Tomb Raider's case at least, it took a full year before the game actually turned a profit, which means this is a genuine problem about a company breaking even from the work it puts out, and not simply about being pissed off it didnt sell 10 million copies in the first 2 weeks so that all concerned could go buy a Ferrari.

Randall Floyd

Unnecessary tacked on online multiplayer modes need to stop.

gugleguy

Sims 3: Dumbing down of the PC version it can be sold to a younger audience.
One example of dumbing down: Female sims can no longer have the Grim Reaper as a boyfriend/ or have Grim reaper's child. (Well if you look in the right place on the web, you can find mod to re enable this. )
SIM city town's now are more Apple pie than 'Sin City'

McDonnellDean

The ending of the Mass Effect series. It was completely disconnected from the premise of the story. I would have waited longer for a better ending.

death1234567

McDonnellDean wrote: »

The ending of the Mass Effect series. It was completely disconnected from the premise of the story. I would have waited longer for a better ending.

Not just the ending, which amounted to pick your favourite colour, but the failure to recognise any of the decisions you had made earlier in the game. Worst ending ever.

pablomakaveli

The combat sections in Deadly Premonition were horribly designed. They really didn't fit well with the rest of the game. The shooting felt awkward and every shooting section was the same as the last.

I do believe these sections were added later in the games development and weren't intended to be in the game originally and you can sense that when playing the game.

SeantheMan

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

I get the impression this will contain a lot of the stuff from the "bad sections in otherwise good games" thread.

Just started reading the thread and thought it was the old one.....

-( i )- Wicker

The multiplayer in GTA5 was horribly done. If you want to join friends it takes half an hour of retrying to connect, then when trying to join a mission you'll regularly be thrown into a different party and you have to spend another half an hour trying to connect to your friends again. Such a shame as the gameplay itself is great.

Potatoeman

Duggy747 wrote: »

Far Cry 2 - Nearly instant respawn of enemies and the whole malaria system. Both combined to make me ditch the .

I didnt mind that but I got the later edition for 20 quid where you get the truck with a heavy machine gun which makes tavel easier. It spawned near the gun shop too which I would go to so I could re-equip after every mission.

FC3 had quick time events :-( and I tried to replay it recently but the story missions can be a pain. The stupid climbing and platforming bits too. You have to do missions to get skills. I really enjoyed the first run through though.

Grimebox

The fighting is Mass Effect is utterly pedestrian. There is no depth to it at all. Shoot then hide behind a box till health recharges, repeat ad nauseum. I'm playing through it now for the first time and it is really grating on me.

So the design of those actual sections I think are poorly thought out. Corridors with conveniently placed waist height boxes. They are tacked on in an otherwise brilliantly diverse and colourful universe.

Stone Deaf 4evr

Battlefield 4's squad system / friends implementation.

if I'm joining friends, surely it'd be safe to assume that we all want to be in the same squad and on the same side? I know you stick together once you've manually sorted it out but its an odd choice nonetheless.

Potatoeman

Grimebox wrote: »

The fighting is Mass Effect is utterly pedestrian. There is no depth to it at all. Shoot then hide behind a box till health recharges, repeat ad nauseum. I'm playing through it now for the first time and it is really grating on me.

So the design of those actual sections I think are poorly thought out. Corridors with conveniently placed waist height boxes. They are tacked on in an otherwise brilliantly diverse and colourful universe.

I didnt think it was as bad as most coverbased shooters which I cant play. I stopped playing gears of war and spec ops.

Grimebox

Potatoeman wrote: »

I didnt think it was as bad as most coverbased shooters which I cant play. I stopped playing gears of war and spec ops.

I have never really played any cover based shooters to be honest, not the two you mentioned anyway.

I was trying out ME2 combat just there again. If you stand behind a pillar, you will get shot. However if you cover behind that pillar exposing pretty much the exact same amount of your character, you do not get shot even though the bullets appear to be travelling along the same trajectory. This happens to me a lot as I prefer a "gun and run" approach rather than playing whack-a-mole. So basically you are invulnerable to extent when behind cover. The game could be beaten with the assault rifle alone. Unlimited ammo. It's just awful all round.

gaynorvader

Grimebox wrote: »

I have never really played any cover based shooters to be honest, not the two you mentioned anyway.

I was trying out ME2 combat just there again. If you stand behind a pillar, you will get shot. However if you cover behind that pillar exposing pretty much the exact same amount of your character, you do not get shot even though the bullets appear to be travelling along the same trajectory. This happens to me a lot as I prefer a "gun and run" approach rather than playing whack-a-mole. So basically you are invulnerable to extent when behind cover. The game could be beaten with the assault rifle alone. Unlimited ammo. It's just awful all round.

I prefered ME1's cover system. You had unlimited ammo, but you had to be clever with your crouching.

Potatoeman

Grimebox wrote: »

I have never really played any cover based shooters to be honest, not the two you mentioned anyway.

I was trying out ME2 combat just there again. If you stand behind a pillar, you will get shot. However if you cover behind that pillar exposing pretty much the exact same amount of your character, you do not get shot even though the bullets appear to be travelling along the same trajectory. This happens to me a lot as I prefer a "gun and run" approach rather than playing whack-a-mole. So basically you are invulnerable to extent when behind cover. The game could be beaten with the assault rifle alone. Unlimited ammo. It's just awful all round.

I tried to give them a chance and ME is not too bad once you get into it but most coverbased shooters for me are unplayable.

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

max payne 3 is the only cover based shooter I've played where I didn't feel like I was playing a game designed for five year olds. the enemies actually shot the cover away from you so it forced you to react, it was great.

still not a patch on classic max or classic shooters but as far as cover based combat goes it was actually entertaining, i'd even throw a 'dynamic' in there.