Your "What were they thinking." Moment while you were playing a game.

[EvilRoy]

The Surge had a pretty rough story break along those lines.

You chug through the game following an ostensibly good AI, with all these hints that maybe she isn't on the up and up. At the same time your directly fighting some kind of evil AI that's pretty good at planning and the long con so there's a bit of dramatic tension as you try to figure out how the game will try to fuck you and what sort of relationship these things have. Then like an hour or two before the end of the game you resolve the allied AI story, she disappears, and then you just sort of play to the end and fight the big bad.

Like... the story wasn't going to blow anyone's world to pieces, but it was pretty good and had a lot of potential to end in an interesting dramatic way. And they just kind of blow it on the last lap. Even the final beats of the allied AI story were decent, they just hit at the wrong time, in the wrong way, and effectively put her on a bus for weak story reasons just long enough before the end of the game that she wasn't really part of the climax.

Oh, also HL2 and Dishonoured. Don't take my shit from me and make me sit through the big bad smarming. I play games to play games, and we all know I'm going to get the guns back in like 60 seconds and shoot them anyway.

 

[Dalisclock]

I know everyone and their mom has hit this particular note but.....

Weapon Durability. Especially in BOTW.

I know what the purpose is. BOTW's big issues are:
1.) The weapons, shields and bows are all made of reinforced cardboard and break if you use them for any length of time.
2.) With a few notable exceptions, Weapons cannot be repaired once broken and cannot be repaired before breaking at all. There are blacksmiths in the world but they will only repair a select few special weapons granted as part of the main story(and only one per blacksmith).
3.) Weapon/Shield/Bow Slots are notably limited to start out with. While there is a way to expand these, it involves hunting a ton of collectables and eventually delivering to a certain NPC who resides in one spot that is initially difficult to reach. Shields and Bows are also subject to this but tend to break at a slower rate the weapons so it's not as noticable.

One of these would be annoying. All 3 combines to a "What were you thinking?" moment. It doesn't help that it's not explained why this happens even though there was the easy out of "Malice is corrupting the land and thus things derived from the earth are beginning to go bad aka Weapon embrittlement" that for some reason they didn't take.

 

[Dalisclock]

Shit like that is what made me quit playing Red Dead Redemption 2. It's a game that revels in wasting your time.

No Rockstar, crafting every bullet one at a time isn't making me immersed in the world, it's making me bored and annoyed, fuck you.

As someone who actually really loved RDR2, that particular bit was just damn annoying. I stopped cutting my own bullets once I made some money and realized Express and Nitro was just a tiny bit more expensive then the normal stuff(and frankly, ammo is cheap in this game).

I get they wanted to do the realism, but if you can use the trains/stages for fast travel(as well as the map at camp), you can allow Arthur to select X number of bullets and do a quick fade in/fade out while he presumably cuts them all, not "Press X one at a time"

 

[Casual Shinji]

The museum section in Spider-Man: Miles Morales.

You get toward the end of the game, and it's building up to the big final confrontation. You're psyching yourself up for the obvious Boss battle, excited for what they're going to throw at you. We interupt this sick action to give you a boring flashback where you walk through a museum to solve some boring puzzle that still takes your brain by sursprise because it was SO ready to throw down. And this is at the end of the damn game. The game even tells you before you enter the mission that this is it, you're going to finish this NOW, so get ready. But no, first we slowly walk through a flashback, stopping the excitement dead in its tracks. Seriously game, the fuck!?

I mean, why the hell is this here? No new plot or character relevant information is given, and it's only there because apparently the slow-walking flashback is the new thing in Sony games. I really don't mind a section of slow walking in games if it's in the moment, like it's the very start of the game or maybe after a very tense action sequence. But doing it in a flashback not only breaks the pacing of the story and the immersion of being in the here and now, it forces you to have to slowly walk through it. Uncharted 4's mansion flashback was murder even on my first playthrough, and so was the Miles Morales one, but this gets only worse the more I replay a game. The Last of Us 2 had 6 of these fuckers, for the love of Jesus!

Please Sony first-party studios, I beg of thee, knock this bullshit off.

 

[BrawlMan]

The museum section in Spider-Man: Miles Morales.

You get toward the end of the game, and it's building up to the big final confrontation. You're psyching yourself up for the obvious Boss battle, excited for what they're going to throw at you. We interupt this sick action to give you a boring flashback where you walk through a museum to solve some boring puzzle that still takes your brain by sursprise because it was SO ready to throw down. And this is at the end of the damn game. The game even tells you before you enter the mission that this is it, you're going to finish this NOW, so get ready. But no, first we slowly walk through a flashback, stopping the excitement dead in its tracks. Seriously game, the fuck!?

I mean, why the hell is this here? No new plot or character relevant information is given, and it's only there because apparently the slow-walking flashback is the new thing in Sony games. I really don't mind a section of slow walking in games if it's in the moment, like it's the very start of the game or maybe after a very tense action sequence. But doing it in a flashback not only breaks the pacing of the story and the immersion of being in the here and now, it forces you to have to slowly walk through it. Uncharted 4's mansion flashback was murder even on my first playthrough, and so was the Miles Morales one, but this gets only worse the more I replay a game. The Last of Us 2 had 6 of these fuckers, for the love of Jesus!

Please Sony first-party studios, I beg of thee, knock this bullshit off.

Don't you know you got to have that immersion! Don't you want it?!

I know I didn't care much for that section either. That flashback could have been showing in a cut scene and at any earlier part in the story. The only reason it's there so you can see Finn and Miles relationship as tragic. Remembering the good times. Too bad the former is an unsympathetic and self-righteous twat, so it falls flat on its face. I've noticed that this is becoming a problem with Sony as well. Characters or supporting characters were supposed to find sympathetic or like, but they either do something really bad or are such jackasses you feel nothing for them and rather punch them in the groin a thousand times and listen to them babble on about their justifications.

​

 

[Casual Shinji]

Don't you know you got to have that immersion! Don't you want it?!

I know I didn't care much for that section either. That flashback could have been showing in a cut scene and at any earlier part in the story. The only reason it's there so you can see Finn and Miles relationship as tragic. Remembering the good times. Too bad the former is an unsympathetic and self-righteous twat, so it falls flat on its face. I've noticed that this is becoming a problem with Sony as well. Characters or supporting characters were supposed to find sympathetic or like, but they either do something really bad or are such jackasses you feel nothing for them and rather punch them in the groin a thousand times and listen to them babble on about their justifications.

​

Yeah, but it wouldn't really matter even if she was sympathetic, since by that point the character and relationship building SHOULD be completely done. And the ending SHOULD see all of that come to fruition. Putting a moment of character bonding in more innocent times right before the end, and doing so via a slow walking/puzzle section... It would feel a lot more impactful if they showed (emphasis on 'showed') that part right after Phin died as sort of a 'this is how we once were, but this is how it ended'.

But yeah, the relationship between Miles and Phin was stilted and unnatural feeling from moment one. The few short scenes Miles had with Hailey (the sign language girl) was infinitely more engaging.

 

[BrawlMan]

The few short scenes Miles had with Hailey (the sign language girl) was infinitely more engaging.

Hailey is best girl. Her and Spider-Gwen.

 

[happyninja42]

The Surge had a pretty rough story break along those lines.

You chug through the game following an ostensibly good AI, with all these hints that maybe she isn't on the up and up. At the same time your directly fighting some kind of evil AI that's pretty good at planning and the long con so there's a bit of dramatic tension as you try to figure out how the game will try to fuck you and what sort of relationship these things have. Then like an hour or two before the end of the game you resolve the allied AI story, she disappears, and then you just sort of play to the end and fight the big bad.

I didn't think she was an AI? I thought she was just another member of the company, in another area of the facility. I did think the reveal of what she was doing, and WHY she kept telling you to hurry, was well done, and genuinely disturbing. How she was keeping the board members alive to prevent them from dying, so the vote didn't default out and launch the death rocket. And you see them twitching and groaning, obviously in a state of constant agony....for basically the entire time the surge has been going on...and all the time you've been wandering around doing stuff...." I thought that bit was nice.

OT: The Metal Thong Ass Close-up Slow Motion shot in Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. Just...why game? WHY? Nevermind completely butchering a very fun and charismatic protagonist, and turning him into a grimdark edgy edgelord of edgeness, and making the soundtrack fucking death metal stupid compared to the previous one, but then you introduce his atagonist....ASS....FIRST!! And she's wearing a METAL THONG. Just...no...no no no. Bad development team! *slaps their collective wrist* Bad! Go sit in the corner and think about what you've done!

 

[happyninja42]

Hailey is best girl. Her and Spider-Gwen.

They definitely loved showing off Hailey's ass in those tight jeans. And yes, she is best gurl in that game.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Hailey is best girl. Her and Spider-Gwen.

I'd be super down for a Spider-Gwen game. Honestly, considering Spider-Man is pretty much locked to New York as a setting, creating variety through characters is probably the only real option this game series has to keep things fresh as it continues.

They definitely loved showing off Hailey's ass in those tight jeans. And yes, she is best gurl in that game.

I -.. I wasn't looking. Honest.

 

[happyninja42]

I -.. I wasn't looking. Honest.

I was, why the fuck weren't you?! They clearly wanted it to be front and center in a lot of the establishing shots. I'm not complaining, it's a nice ass to put front and center.

 

[BrawlMan]

I didn't think she was an AI? I thought she was just another member of the company, in another area of the facility. I did think the reveal of what she was doing, and WHY she kept telling you to hurry, was well done, and genuinely disturbing. How she was keeping the board members alive to prevent them from dying, so the vote didn't default out and launch the death rocket. And you see them twitching and groaning, obviously in a state of constant agony....for basically the entire time the surge has been going on...and all the time you've been wandering around doing stuff...." I thought that bit was nice.

OT: The Metal Thong Ass Close-up Slow Motion shot in Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. Just...why game? WHY? Nevermind completely butchering a very fun and charismatic protagonist, and turning him into a grimdark edgy edgelord of edgeness, and making the soundtrack fucking death metal stupid compared to the previous one, but then you introduce his atagonist....ASS....FIRST!! And she's wearing a METAL THONG. Just...no...no no no. Bad development team! *slaps their collective wrist* Bad! Go sit in the corner and think about what you've done!

It's Ubisoft, the company that's more than happy to protect rapists and sexual harassers. Not say that you can't have fan service, but when you do it at really inappropriate time or just to be there for no other reason, you fail.

They definitely loved showing off Hailey's ass in those tight jeans. And yes, she is best gurl in that game.

I honestly didn't even notice the butt shots because interactions between them are so cute. Still, she's a pure girl and Insomniac just did a great sin.

 

[happyninja42]

It's Ubisoft, the company that's more than happy to protect rapists and sexual harassers. Not say that you can't have fan service, but when you do it at really inappropriate time or just to be there for no other reason, you fail.


I honestly didn't even notice the butt shots because interactions between them are so cute. Still, she's a pure girl and Insomniac just did a great sin.

I'm not against fan service, or ass shots, just look at my comments about Hailey's butt for evidence of that. But there is a way that it can be done that serves the narrative, and way that harms the narrative. And PoP:WW did it the latter way.

It's the difference in setting up a scene JUST to show off tits and ass, or cock if they're going the guy route, and having it just be garnish on a scene that also has other things going on of importance.

 

[EvilRoy]

I didn't think she was an AI? I thought she was just another member of the company, in another area of the facility. I did think the reveal of what she was doing, and WHY she kept telling you to hurry, was well done, and genuinely disturbing. How she was keeping the board members alive to prevent them from dying, so the vote didn't default out and launch the death rocket. And you see them twitching and groaning, obviously in a state of constant agony....for basically the entire time the surge has been going on...and all the time you've been wandering around doing stuff...." I thought that bit was nice.

She was like a personal AI-assistant of one of the board members specifically, who I believe she was trying to save. The "not default vote" thing seems to be like a slight obfuscation in that it was true but also not her reason for wanting to save them. Once the guy dies, she sort of locks up and then disappeared so presumably they were linked or something? In terms of a story its solid, I just felt like they kind of wasted an opportunity to get a bit more into good AI/bad AI/unknown objectives idea, and ultimately mis-timed the conclusion of that story. I'd have to go back and check to be sure, but after her story conclusion I believe it took me something like an hour to two hours to get to the final big bad. I wasn't rushing for sure, but the climax of her story, which is more or less the story that I was personally invested in for the majority of the game, became very decoupled from the climax of the game. To me all they would have had to do it improve the end of the game was just push those two climaxes closer together, and failing that just exploit their terrific buildup a bit more.

 

[happyninja42]

She was like a personal AI-assistant of one of the board members specifically, who I believe she was trying to save. The "not default vote" thing seems to be like a slight obfuscation in that it was true but also not her reason for wanting to save them. Once the guy dies, she sort of locks up and then disappeared so presumably they were linked or something? In terms of a story its solid, I just felt like they kind of wasted an opportunity to get a bit more into good AI/bad AI/unknown objectives idea, and ultimately mis-timed the conclusion of that story. I'd have to go back and check to be sure, but after her story conclusion I believe it took me something like an hour to two hours to get to the final big bad. I wasn't rushing for sure, but the climax of her story, which is more or less the story that I was personally invested in for the majority of the game, became very decoupled from the climax of the game. To me all they would have had to do it improve the end of the game was just push those two climaxes closer together, and failing that just exploit their terrific buildup a bit more.

Interesting. I had read her as Another employee that was just somewhere else in the facility, but since she was part of the medical staff, she had access to the insanely automated systems that the company had in place. And was basically just monitoring them from afar, trying to get you to hurry because she knew she couldn't keep them alive much longer. I totally did not get any vibes that she was an AI, so if that was the intended plot twist, or at least one of them, yeah it was poorly executed. Because I took her to be real, and just being The Guy In The Chair to my hero running around.

 

[Piscian]

I think most recently the text chats in Persona 5 where the characters essentially just repeat what was discussed in the previous scene. Through most of the game I paid attention to the texts assuming at some point they'd become humorous or insightful but they legitimately never do. You also never actually use the text function. You can't text people or anything. It never plays into the story. I ended up just fast forwording through texts. I sorta wonder in the dev had an idea to make texting key to the game and instead of finishing it they just auto-generated conversation and stuck it in to fill out the game.

Before that it was pretty much every moment if LOU2 but I'll call out a point early in the game where you get a horse and are told to explore, however at a certain point refuses to let you go in any direction other than the one that leads to the plot, even though you're not supposed to know what happens next. I've heard rumors that LOU2 was supposed to be an open world game, but that mechanic was abandoned mid-development. If it was going to be on rails I wish they would have just committed to that.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Before that it was pretty much every moment if LOU2 but I'll call out a point early in the game where you get a horse and are told to explore, however at a certain point refuses to let you go in any direction other than the one that leads to the plot, even though you're not supposed to know what happens next. I've heard rumors that LOU2 was supposed to be an open world game, but that mechanic was abandoned mid-development. If it was going to be on rails I wish they would have just committed to that.

I don't know if it was supposed to be open-world, it looks more like what a bunch of Sony first-party studios call 'wide-linear'. Where it's not open-world, it's just a smaller open area for the player to stretch their legs a bit. But in TLoU2 it just feels oddly placed. In God of War '18 it's used as sort of the hub world that every other level stretches out from, and in Uncharted: Lost Legacy it's to pad out the game. But in TLoU2 it's near the beginning of the game and is never revisited again, and the game is already crazy big even without that section, so there's no need for padding. That whole section could've just been designed in a linear fashion without really losing anything. I don't personally mind it, but it adds very little.

 

[Silvanus]

The entire idea of Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.

A beloved collectathon/ 3D platformer series? Let's strip away the basis of the gameplay people fell in love with, and turn it into a build-a-bear kart racer! We'll even throw in a line near the start about how people don't want collectathons anymore. And we'll redesign the characters to look blocky and jagged, too, because we might as well.

 

[BrawlMan]

The entire idea of Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.

A beloved collectathon/ 3D platformer series? Let's strip away the basis of the gameplay people fell in love with, and turn it into a build-a-bear kart racer! We'll even throw in a line near the start about how people don't want collectathons anymore. And we'll redesign the characters to look blocky and jagged, too, because we might as well.

That game was just a boss of the bad ideas. I never really hooked on to banjo kazooie, but I felt so bad for the fans. Microsoft were just being complete idiots. No one plays platformers anymore my ass. Like a lot of publishers and certain developers, they think they know everything, but they don't. Considering how platformers me to come back within the early to mid 2010s, it makes their argument look all the more dumber

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

I don't know if it was supposed to be open-world, it looks more like what a bunch of Sony first-party studios call 'wide-linear'. Where it's not open-world, it's just a smaller open area for the player to stretch their legs a bit. But in TLoU2 it just feels oddly placed. In God of War '18 it's used as sort of the hub world that every other level stretches out from, and in Uncharted: Lost Legacy it's to pad out the game. But in TLoU2 it's near the beginning of the game and is never revisited again, and the game is already crazy big even without that section, so there's no need for padding. That whole section could've just been designed in a linear fashion without really losing anything. I don't personally mind it, but it adds very little.

Plus the exploration in that area feels kinda check-listy and necessary in that you get narrative clues to head to certain areas. So it never really felt like the exploration was natural for the sake of it. It was basically ND saying, “Yeah, this is definitely the biggest game we’ve made yet; so big in fact you’ll need to ride a horse.”

I actually hope their next game is some crazy action thrill ride linear adventure with set pieces in the vein of Uncharted but also what they kind of wanted to do before they were more or less coerced into the TPS genre. Apparently water played a big factor, but it’d better have some damn good swimming mechanics if that’s the case.