In the last 8 to 10 years, most games are not simply worth my time to complete. I'm an avid PC gamer, but most games are just plain boring! I tend to play RPG's (which have been severely lacking in quality) and turn-based strategy games (which really are never "finish-able"). Grand Theft Auto IV, and it's DLC (I hate that term!) was the last game that was worth finishing. The story was great - especially the Ballad of Gay Tony, the game-play was good (except the final mission for the original), and it was a blast to play. However, I normally spend 2 hours max playing a game before I get bored. Game designers need to remember that a game is meant to be FUN! It seems that most games are almost like work - you need to spend way too much time reading strategy guides and planning what you are going to do then actually doing it. I want games to be fun again!
Unfair/grinding/multiplayer trophies/achievements
The longest I've spent to get a single trophy is about 14 hours, to beat Dead Space 2 on hardcore mode. Dead Space 1 and 2 are some of the best games I've ever played.
Other games don't come close, yet they have the nerve to have grinding trophies that could take years to get.
Killzone 2's were so bad, that you had to stay in the top 1-5% of the entire WORLD's leaderboards for a whole week. I don't have entire weeks to dedicate to TRYING to get a trophy. Then there's 6 headshots in a row, in a game where EVERY enemy wears a helmet that randomly blocks headshots. That game was the first I ever sold back to a store.
There should never be a trophy that depends on other people or random numbers
I have dozens of games I haven't beaten yet. Once I beat a game, and gotten the fair trophies, I move on to the next game. I don't have time to waste on games where the devs think so highly of it that they think I'll devote my life to it.
Grinding is never fun.
Hyperdimension Neptunia just wasn't fun. The dungeons were boring. You couldn't even heal in-battle.
I gave up on the DS Zelda's due to crappy controls, Twilight Princess cause Nintendo refuses to evolve with the rest of the industry and use voice acting like fricken PS1 and PSP games do.
I gave up on Crackdown 2, which became the second game I ever sold back to a store, because it took place in the same city as the first game! It was 90% the same game! I bought Infamous because someone said it was like Crackdown, and now Infamous 2 surpassed Crackdown 2.
I see these articles every so often. They pretty much make me annoyed. They have become the justification for short / bland / repetitive games with online experience, making you pay for even smaller DLC packs. When the truth is that just makes for a poor gaming experience Level one is just live level three...I have other fun things in competing for my attention, and the games lost out because of quality. That said after YEARS of not playing computer games, because of this..and its an expensive hobby. A few top notch open source games for their re-playability/balance and evolution. Indie games for their uniqueness and thoughtful design..loving super meat boy...and its a platformer wtf. Xpedia Play for cheap mobile gaming.
I also believe that the author was not much of a gamer to begin with. (a large MMO) common... we are talking about WOW and plants vs. zombies? seriously?
I'm really stubborn, I have to finish. That said, my husband bailed on one of the Prince of Persia's as one of the final boss fights was damn near impossible. You want a game to be hard but not so hard that you want to throw the controller at your tv.
I get bored as soon as strategy stops developing (run, kill, run kill)
If I see a zombie in a game that has not been about zombies (Uncharted) or a wizard in a game that has not been about a wizard (assassins creed).
Within an hour of any GTA/GTA clone as I realise that format still hasn't evolved.
As soon as I got out the hatch in Fallout. For me the graphics went down hill and the game went from being an intimate story driven masterpiece to beating off crazed animals in an ugly open world.
If I'm watching instead of playing for any longer than 30 seconds, I'm turning off.
there was this Sponge Bob game that I played with my son that almost drove us nuts. Especially the really repetitive "don't make one mistake or you do it over" sequences -- which were every other puzzle.
It took sheer dog-headed determination to make it halfway through. It took the disgust with the time wasted coupled with the "at least we can finish it" drive to get another eighth of the way through. The next eighth was a bit of sadomasochism. I don't know if we could have gotten further through morbid curiosity, because the memory card on the Wii got corrupted.
So like a year later, my son says; "you remember that game?"
After a sad pause, I said; "yes."
And then we started over on it. I think I accidentally on purpose lost the disc somewhere.
>> The reason a lot of games don't get finished is because some games make you LONG to be at work, not trying to hop over a lava-filled pit with a hamburger.
The games I don't beat I go back to later. I don't like the idea of not finishing a game. That being said I have very little time to play now that I've started a new business. (selling fan art)
Time is the biggest issue. There are a lot of games I'd love to finish, but simply lack time... you can get really into a game and get through it, but if you can't have a long enough period playing it's really easy to get to a point you can't get past because your game skills have fallen out of practice. You almost need to play through again to get good enough to finish!
I'm a "the glass is half empty guy" kind of guy, but I really think the root problem is the mentality of designers and developers rather than player time limitations. Games have always required large time commitments. However, if modern designers were more realistic about the amount of the average player can devote to gaming per day or week and they paced their games accordingly, I think the majority of the audience would progress much further. Still, time limitations are only part of it. Balancing difficulty curves and age appropriate content for players in their 30's or older (the age of the average core player is 37 yrs. old) have also become big issues in recent years.
There are a large variety of gamers, old, young, busy, bored, man, woman. It's very crass to dismiss someone who may have been a gamer their entire youth and they just finds that reality has set in and they don't play as much as they USED to. Not everyone has the energy or attention span to complete all the games they want to play these days. Be a little more open minded. I think this article hit on it very well.
"Game designers need to remember that a game is meant to be FUN! It seems that most games are almost like work."
Exactly! It becomes work when designers create unrealistic grinding requirements / progression wall and design the difficulty curves from the hardest mode down instead of Normal then up. The result is Normal and Casual modes become misaligned with the preferences of the average players in the audience, a.k.a. the people responsible for the majority of all sales, in all genres. The games aren't too hard for them to play on normal or causal, they just aren't fun.
jjtuckerFeb 3, 2012Buried
Accusations of laziness from someone who shortens words like "thanks," "you," and "are"? Ha, ha!!!
theerisFeb 3, 2012Buried
In the last 8 to 10 years, most games are not simply worth my time to complete. I'm an avid PC gamer, but most games are just plain boring! I tend to play RPG's (which have been severely lacking in quality) and turn-based strategy games (which really are never "finish-able"). Grand Theft Auto IV, and it's DLC (I hate that term!) was the last game that was worth finishing. The story was great - especially the Ballad of Gay Tony, the game-play was good (except the final mission for the original), and it was a blast to play. However, I normally spend 2 hours max playing a game before I get bored. Game designers need to remember that a game is meant to be FUN! It seems that most games are almost like work - you need to spend way too much time reading strategy guides and planning what you are going to do then actually doing it. I want games to be fun again!
grabateFeb 2, 2012Buried
Guilty, my game back catalogue is depressingly high.
norman619Feb 2, 2012Buried
Did you know most games aren't worth completing?
niceguyvanFeb 3, 2012Buried
Why I stop:
Unfair/grinding/multiplayer trophies/achievements
The longest I've spent to get a single trophy is about 14 hours, to beat Dead Space 2 on hardcore mode. Dead Space 1 and 2 are some of the best games I've ever played.
Other games don't come close, yet they have the nerve to have grinding trophies that could take years to get.
Killzone 2's were so bad, that you had to stay in the top 1-5% of the entire WORLD's leaderboards for a whole week. I don't have entire weeks to dedicate to TRYING to get a trophy. Then there's 6 headshots in a row, in a game where EVERY enemy wears a helmet that randomly blocks headshots. That game was the first I ever sold back to a store.
There should never be a trophy that depends on other people or random numbers
I have dozens of games I haven't beaten yet. Once I beat a game, and gotten the fair trophies, I move on to the next game. I don't have time to waste on games where the devs think so highly of it that they think I'll devote my life to it.
Grinding is never fun.
Hyperdimension Neptunia just wasn't fun. The dungeons were boring. You couldn't even heal in-battle.
I gave up on the DS Zelda's due to crappy controls, Twilight Princess cause Nintendo refuses to evolve with the rest of the industry and use voice acting like fricken PS1 and PSP games do.
I gave up on Crackdown 2, which became the second game I ever sold back to a store, because it took place in the same city as the first game! It was 90% the same game! I bought Infamous because someone said it was like Crackdown, and now Infamous 2 surpassed Crackdown 2.
manicdvlnFeb 3, 2012Buried
I'm the opposite, I hate starting a new game, but can't wait to finish it once I get used to game play.
mtownFeb 3, 2012Buried
efficient? Laziness has nothing to do with efficiency.
And if you where really where an "IRL gangster" you would not be posting on digg.com, of all places.
tuppe666Feb 2, 2012Buried
I see these articles every so often. They pretty much make me annoyed. They have become the justification for short / bland / repetitive games with online experience, making you pay for even smaller DLC packs. When the truth is that just makes for a poor gaming experience Level one is just live level three...I have other fun things in competing for my attention, and the games lost out because of quality. That said after YEARS of not playing computer games, because of this..and its an expensive hobby. A few top notch open source games for their re-playability/balance and evolution. Indie games for their uniqueness and thoughtful design..loving super meat boy...and its a platformer wtf. Xpedia Play for cheap mobile gaming.
razorsfuryFeb 3, 2012Buried
I also believe that the author was not much of a gamer to begin with. (a large MMO) common... we are talking about WOW and plants vs. zombies? seriously?
darwininmotionFeb 3, 2012Buried
I'm really stubborn, I have to finish. That said, my husband bailed on one of the Prince of Persia's as one of the final boss fights was damn near impossible. You want a game to be hard but not so hard that you want to throw the controller at your tv.
fonderplagueFeb 3, 2012Buried
Hahaha..."gangster".
dandoniaFeb 3, 2012Buried
I get bored as soon as strategy stops developing (run, kill, run kill)
If I see a zombie in a game that has not been about zombies (Uncharted) or a wizard in a game that has not been about a wizard (assassins creed).
Within an hour of any GTA/GTA clone as I realise that format still hasn't evolved.
As soon as I got out the hatch in Fallout. For me the graphics went down hill and the game went from being an intimate story driven masterpiece to beating off crazed animals in an ugly open world.
If I'm watching instead of playing for any longer than 30 seconds, I'm turning off.
vitriolandangstFeb 3, 2012Buried
MOST platform games I don't finish.
there was this Sponge Bob game that I played with my son that almost drove us nuts. Especially the really repetitive "don't make one mistake or you do it over" sequences -- which were every other puzzle.
It took sheer dog-headed determination to make it halfway through. It took the disgust with the time wasted coupled with the "at least we can finish it" drive to get another eighth of the way through. The next eighth was a bit of sadomasochism. I don't know if we could have gotten further through morbid curiosity, because the memory card on the Wii got corrupted.
So like a year later, my son says; "you remember that game?"
After a sad pause, I said; "yes."
And then we started over on it. I think I accidentally on purpose lost the disc somewhere.
>> The reason a lot of games don't get finished is because some games make you LONG to be at work, not trying to hop over a lava-filled pit with a hamburger.
dustysantosFeb 3, 2012Buried
The games I don't beat I go back to later. I don't like the idea of not finishing a game. That being said I have very little time to play now that I've started a new business. (selling fan art)
superkendallFeb 3, 2012Buried
Time is the biggest issue. There are a lot of games I'd love to finish, but simply lack time... you can get really into a game and get through it, but if you can't have a long enough period playing it's really easy to get to a point you can't get past because your game skills have fallen out of practice. You almost need to play through again to get good enough to finish!
drunkrobotFeb 10, 2012Buried
I'm a "the glass is half empty guy" kind of guy, but I really think the root problem is the mentality of designers and developers rather than player time limitations. Games have always required large time commitments. However, if modern designers were more realistic about the amount of the average player can devote to gaming per day or week and they paced their games accordingly, I think the majority of the audience would progress much further. Still, time limitations are only part of it. Balancing difficulty curves and age appropriate content for players in their 30's or older (the age of the average core player is 37 yrs. old) have also become big issues in recent years.
sndsFeb 3, 2012Buried
There are a large variety of gamers, old, young, busy, bored, man, woman. It's very crass to dismiss someone who may have been a gamer their entire youth and they just finds that reality has set in and they don't play as much as they USED to. Not everyone has the energy or attention span to complete all the games they want to play these days. Be a little more open minded. I think this article hit on it very well.
drunkrobotFeb 4, 2012Buried
Collectively, AAA games across all platforms.
particleman420Feb 4, 2012Buried
i must be weird then since i always try to finish games
drunkrobotFeb 4, 2012Buried
"Game designers need to remember that a game is meant to be FUN! It seems that most games are almost like work."
Exactly! It becomes work when designers create unrealistic grinding requirements / progression wall and design the difficulty curves from the hardest mode down instead of Normal then up. The result is Normal and Casual modes become misaligned with the preferences of the average players in the audience, a.k.a. the people responsible for the majority of all sales, in all genres. The games aren't too hard for them to play on normal or causal, they just aren't fun.