Dick Moves in Gaming

[Catfood220]

I got another one.

Sega: "So did you like Valkyria Chronicles?"

Me: "Yeah, in fact its one of my personal favourite games of all time."

Sega: "Would you like a sequel?"

Me: "Yeah, that would be awesome."

Sega: "Well here's the thing, we at Sega are illergic to money, so we're going to release both sequels on the PSP where it can't possibly make us any. Tee hee, we're not sorry."

Me: "FUCK YOU SEGA!!!"

 

[Dalek Caan]

Putting in Command posts in Brink. They themselves are OK but its the fact that I have to listen to my leader saying "They captured a Command Post! GET IT BACK!!" Every 5 seconds just pissed me off.

 

[General BrEeZy]

NOOB
F**KING
TUBING

it NEVER
GOES
AWAY!!!!!!!!!

 

[Vault101]

DRM..I mean BAD DRM

oh you want to play our game? you must have internet..which we will proceed to eat up just like your money!

oh and limited installs...SERIOUSLY if you buy a product for like $90 (new release price Australia) you would at least want it to be usable as long as possible (granted in the world of tech its very upgrad centric....but still)

oh and when carachters start morally berating you (that doctor guy in the corner in theme hospital...you know what? YOU run the fucking hospital...see how much you like it)

 

[Fantasy-Squall]

Azazel and NANCY-MI847J from Tekken 6, That was a dick move. My friend had to spend four and a half hours on NANCY-MI847J. Having to restart the entire arcade mode when it beats you.

 

[James Crook]

I did a search for this, but the thread that came up was 3 years old, and I'm not familiar with The Escapist's stance on thread Necromancy.

I don't know what the goosestepping ducks is wrong with me, but I read that as "thread Necrophilia"...
OT: The Railworks DLC. Some of it is more expensive than the game itself, and all of it, put together, rounds up to about 1,400 dollars. Really, WHAT THE HELL.

 

[Sampsa]

Not quite sure if this fits into topic but Mafia 2's Joe's adventure should have been in the game not some DLC. Now the main game was painfully short. Curse the ability to easily send large files...

 

[Vault101]

What would you prefer, a little slideshow, or to go around the world and see what you had done?

A longer slideshow that actually explains what happened to all of the major factions and people I met on my journey and gives proper closure.

You know like what New Vegas did?

The thing with Fallout 3 is that the only significant thing that happens is the BoS start a pure water business and if you insert FEV then a couple of people get sick. Nothing big changes, almost everything is the same and even after Broken Steel there are still Enclave located in the game that keep respawning.

you could just put that down to it being...a GAME things go on as they do..enemys respawn, I mean you dont need a slideshow to indicate what happened after the main events...you can guess that for yourself

anyway Im thankful that broken steel fixed the original ending because it sucked and for somone who was REALLY emotionally invested in my charachter it was a let down

 

[Killclaw Kilrathi]

Some of the end bosses in Cryptic games can be a *****. Kigatilik is one of them, fought in the open game world with however many players choose to join in, meaning no co-ordination whatsoever. Which would be fine, except whenever he kills a player, or a player's pet, or destroys a player's summon he's instantly healed for 40,000hp. So any player who joins in without knowing this will probably end up throwing down summons and helping him. Much rage in Zone chat ensues.

 

[Rassmusseum]

Thi

I did a search for this, but the thread that came up was 3 years old, and I'm not familiar with The Escapist's stance on thread Necromancy.

Anyway, the best way I can describe what I'm talking about is moments in games where the developers do something that is completely needless, pointless, and yes, dickish. To use the example Yahtzee does in his Braid review: 1 key, 2 doors, one breaks the key making you start the level over, no way to tell which is which.

The example that prompted this thread is the Landsmeet in Dragon Age: Origins. You spend numerous hour just prior to the Landsmeet gathering evidence to turn the nobles against Loghain. However, once you get into the Landsmeet if you mention Loghain's daughter, the sequence jumps forward and won't let you present any more evidence. There is no indication that this will happen, no warning, and no way to go back and present more evidence. They jump to the vote, and if you didn't present enough evidence the Nobles side against you. Dick Move.

To make matters worse, you need to make sure you saved the game manually before entering. If you've been relying on autosave, you're screwed because the game autosaves immediately after this happens. If you win, however, Loghain challenges you to a duel, but the game doesn't autosave. Meaning, if you lose you have to do it over again. Dick Move.

In short: It's possible to lose by unintentionally jumping the scene forward to the vote (no indication) and not be able to reload. However, if you win, you might have to do it all over anyway. Fantastic.

Any other Dick Moves in recent gaming Escapists?

This may have already been pointed out by now, but that isn't actually what happens. In that level of Braid, moving to the right makes the timeline advance forward while moving to the left makes it advance backward. Unless you've actually played the game, that may not make sense, but just imagine that you can control your character freely, while moving in the directions I said makes everything else move forward or backward in time.

Anyway, in the level with the "2 doors, 1 key" scenario, the key you use is glowing green, meaning that it isn't affected by time. It has it's own timeline and there is no way to reverse this line basically. Anyway, the door that "breaks" has to be approached from the right, so therefore, you're moving to the left as you put the key in the door, meaning that the door just goes backward in time to the point it was closed. Since the key isn't affected by this mechanic, it's "broken."

So my point is that the developer of that game didn't put that situation in as you claim they did. Yahtzee just didn't understand the mechanics well enough to realize what had happened.

To answer your question, I agree with your point about the Landsmeet, and I've been screwed by relying on autosave in Dragon Age 2 in a similar matter (e.g: the game autosaves immediately after an unintentional choice I'd just made). Really though, that's my own fault for not saving often enough; hell, the game even reminds you to manually save often during loading screens sometimes!

 

[Rassmusseum]

EDIT: Sorry for double post.

 

[ChupathingyX]

you could just put that down to it being...a GAME things go on as they do..enemys respawn, I mean you dont need a slideshow to indicate what happened after the main events...you can guess that for yourself

That is a poor excuse, the ending of Fallout 3 was bad because the whole game basically changed very little and the actual ending slideshow barely told you anything about anyone. In NV the ending tells you what happened to nearly every major faction, person and companion you meet, so why din't F3? The ending just didn't give you enough closure, I wasn't angry about the fact that I couldn't play past the main quest, I was angry because the ending was so bad and gave no closure.

anyway Im thankful that broken steel fixed the original ending because it sucked and for somone who was REALLY emotionally invested in my charachter it was a let down

The fact that there was such a mistake in the first place was bad enough, and the only thing Broken Steel fixed was letting your companions activate the purifier. Being able to play past the ending just opened more problems.

 

[Vault101]

you could just put that down to it being...a GAME things go on as they do..enemys respawn, I mean you dont need a slideshow to indicate what happened after the main events...you can guess that for yourself

That is a poor excuse, the ending of Fallout 3 was bad because the whole game basically changed very little and the actual ending slideshow barely told you anything about anyone. In NV the ending tells you what happened to nearly every major faction, person and companion you meet, so why din't F3? The ending just didn't give you enough closure, I wasn't angry about the fact that I couldn't play past the main quest, I was angry because the ending was so bad and gave no closure.

anyway Im thankful that broken steel fixed the original ending because it sucked and for somone who was REALLY emotionally invested in my charachter it was a let down

The fact that there was such a mistake in the first place was bad enough, and the only thing Broken Steel fixed was letting your companions activate the purifier. Being able to play past the ending just opened more problems.

OK I DO agree that the original had very little closure,in fact I dont even mind not being able to play past the end of the main mission, I liked broken steel because it continued the story and really it ment that my charachter (whom as Ive said a million times, emotionally attachteched to) didnt have to die for stupid/tragic reasons

I guess with broekn steel there isnt much closure....but you can sort of "play out" what ever happned after wards..your charachter went on a journey to point lookout..got abducted by aliens or took a trip to the pitt...eather way its pretty obvious he or she made a life in Megaton (or ten penny tower)

but then again a slideshow "new vegas" style would have been nice, I would have liked to have known the fate of Vault 101...if you ever did return

however my problem with the NV slideshow..was that I didnt really want to know EVERY detail of all my companions lives...that was kind of depressing for some weird reason (but thats jsut me nitpicking..great game anyway)

anyway we could argue over weather or not FO3 sucked or not but that would be compltley pointless

 

[6_Qubed]

Games that build entire levels as a series of disconnected platforms over a massive sudden-death pit.

 

[Castian Blake]

Soul calibur's always perfect counter AI

 

[ChupathingyX]

I guess with broekn steel there isnt much closure....but you can sort of "play out" what ever happned after wards..your charachter went on a journey to point lookout..got abducted by aliens or took a trip to the pitt...eather way its pretty obvious he or she made a life in Megaton (or ten penny tower)

I refuse to accept Mothership Zeta's existence, I like to think that Wild Wastleand in NV retconned that.

however my problem with the NV slideshow..was that I didnt really want to know EVERY detail of all my companions lives...that was kind of depressing for some weird reason (but thats jsut me nitpicking..great game anyway)

So you didn't like the fact that it made you depressed to see what had happened to your companions? Isn't that a good thing if a game manages to evoke a sense of sadness to the player when it is trying to?

anyway we could argue over weather or not FO3 sucked or not but that would be compltley pointless

Not necessarily, discussions can lead to people from both parties learning different things and can increase your debating skills. As long as both parties remain civil and give logical reasoning discussions can actually be quite...fun.

 

[Vault101]

I guess with broekn steel there isnt much closure....but you can sort of "play out" what ever happned after wards..your charachter went on a journey to point lookout..got abducted by aliens or took a trip to the pitt...eather way its pretty obvious he or she made a life in Megaton (or ten penny tower)

I refuse to accept Mothership Zeta's existence, I like to think that Wild Wastleand in NV retconned that.

however my problem with the NV slideshow..was that I didnt really want to know EVERY detail of all my companions lives...that was kind of depressing for some weird reason (but thats jsut me nitpicking..great game anyway)

So you didn't like the fact that it made you depressed to see what had happened to your companions? Isn't that a good thing if a game manages to evoke a sense of sadness to the player when it is trying to?

anyway we could argue over weather or not FO3 sucked or not but that would be compltley pointless

Not necessarily, discussions can lead to people from both parties learning different things and can increase your debating skills. As long as both parties remain civil and give logical reasoning discussions can actually be quite...fun.

1. yes I know how you feel about mothership zeta...thats bseide the point I was making

2. the NV slideshow was fine, as I said its just me....I like the Idea of "the adventure go's on" type thing, BUT I like knowing what happened afterward even better

3. I guess but it boils down too each person has their reasons,and essentially arguing over weather or not FO3 as bad is subjective in alot of areas

 

[The Noble Shade]

No More Heroes: Rank 2 boss battle (Bad Girl).
She's kneeling on the ground, seemingly stunned, and visually wide open for an attack. Give in to this temptation, and you get a nice cutscene of her knocking Travis down, mounting him, and whaling him on the head with her bat; it's an instant kill attack. I raged so hard when I had this happen to me.

Not sure if this is on topic, but Resident Evil 5.
Die on the first level, and you are shown a cutscene of a first-person perspective of the Majini mob raping your corpse before the "You Are Dead" frame shows up. What other game insults you for dying on the first level?

 

[Krantos]

snip

1 if you win, the same thing happens.

What?
If you win, you duel Loghain. If you lose he attacks you with his guards. The game auto-saves in the latter case, and does not in the former. How is this the same?

2 logain is a joke in a fight anyway.

He does moderate damage, has good defense, and great armor. He also has War Cry, Shield Pummel and Onslaught which he will use to incapacitate you, allowing him to kill you without giving you time to use potions.

With a two-handed specialist using Indomitable, yeah, it's not bad. He's a fair challenge for a sword and shield character. And pretty brutal against a dual-wielder since they have no protection for knockdown or stun.

A control mage with Paralyze, Horror, Sleep, etc. should do alright as well, as he doesn't have much mental resistance, but a DPS mage is likely to be put down pretty quick.


And it still does not address the game's willingness to jump to the vote w/o giving you a chance to give evidence.

I think I understand why they did it though. They wanted to make it possible to fail the Landsmeet, but collecting the evidence is essentially forced on you, making it impossible to fail normally. So, they did this. That doesn't make it any less a dick move, though.

 

[chris_ninety1]

Some of the old adventure games back in the day used to pull off the incredibly dickish move of making the game unwinnable if you didn't perform some seemingly arbitrary action at the start of the game that you'd probably not have thought of doing at the time but only letting you know you'd screwed up towards the very end (often without telling you how you'd screwed up). Return to Zork did it, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, a couple of the Space Quest and King's Quest games did it too. Could you even imagine if modern day developers put that into a game now.