Do you play games you don't enjoy?

[LetalisK]

An update, though I'm not full of myself enough to think anyone cares: I think I figured out my issue with DA:I. Way too much talking. When I'm out on a combat heavy quest, time slips by and all of a sudden I realize I'm 2 hours past when I should have gone to bed. But because I'm a completionist, I will still talk to everybody and try to optimize my moral choices. Which is weird because I typically enjoy the talky bits of games.

There is one game that I play off and on and will eventually finish, but don't have that strong urge to power through it as soon as possible: Fallout New Vegas. I will go a couple months without touching it and then jump right back in and know exactly where I am and what I'm trying to do as if I played it yesterday. I credit it with having elegantly simple yet engaging story lines that are easy to pick up and put down.

 

[StoleitfromKilgore]

An update, though I'm not full of myself enough to think anyone cares: I think I figured out my issue with DA:I. Way too much talking. When I'm out on a combat heavy quest, time slips by and all of a sudden I realize I'm 2 hours past when I should have gone to bed. But because I'm a completionist, I will still talk to everybody and try to optimize my moral choices. Which is weird because I typically enjoy the talky bits of games.

Well, that's one of the reasons why I don't post here a lot. It often seems that people simply seem to post their opinions as opposed to engaging in conversation. That's ok, but I often feel like there is no point to actually posting, because I never know if anybody gives the slightest f***.

As far as your point on Dragon Age is concerned: I had a similar experience with the first one. At first I thought there was just too much combat and sure there was, but I also didn't really enjoy most conversations. It's hard to explain, since just like you I usually tend to play RPGs for the dialogue moreso than for the combat. There is still no better way for me to explain it, than that DA:O is quite polished, but simply isn't very interesting too me. It just feels a bit soulless to me. It's also the worst offender in terms of having put in far too much time for far too little enjoyment. That hasn't really happened to me in other cases.

I never used to force myself to play through something. For example I remember trying both Icewind Dales and the first Baldur's Gate, but quickly stopped playing again, because I realized that they were not at all like BGII or simply were lacking in some ways in comparison. On the other hand I have recently retried Icewind Dale and spent a lot of time on playing through it, in spite of not always being all that motivated. Still, I wouldn't say that I didn't enjoy it, it was just a bit of a slog, especially large parts of the first two chapters and also the last chapter. Nowadays I try to give all games a fair chance, so that I play some of them for quite a while before stopping. That's often quite a bit longer than I would for simple enjoyment. Somewhat recent examples would be "Clive Barker's Undying" and a attempt at replaying the first "Max Payne". I still have a lot of older games lying around and I got quite a few more from gog, so sometimes it's simply a case of a game having aged badly. It's especially bad when I know that a game is long. Even games I like are often simply too long to stay enjoyable.

In many cases it's probably a case of there being just a little more about the game which you enjoy than what you hate. It was like that with DA:O for me. Plus, there was a gap between my lack of enjoyment and my ability to explain it.

 

[IamDraven]

I do! When I start it's fun but in the meantime I get bored and then play just to finish it

 

[Pr0]

Seeing as I'm not a cleavage cammer on Twitch, theres absolutely no reason for me to play games I don't enjoy.

That would literally be the only reason I could think of to play something I didn't actually enjoy.....dolling up for tips on Twitch.

 

[EscapeGoat_v1legacy]

I can't say I usually play games I don't enjoy to completion, no. I do have that weird compulsion to play bad games for the sheer hell of it, yes, and these games I typically don't enjoy but most of the time I just try them out to see what the fuss was about and then ditch it, like when I tried the 2 PS2 Drakengard games which I played because of some expertly written and hilarious Let's Plays of them but when I played them I realise just how pathetically stodgy and dull they were.

There are only a few examples I can think of where I've played games I didn't enjoy till the end. Like, say, Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus, a drastically badly designed third-person shooter starring the eternal brooder, Vincent Valentine and the crap Final Fantasy VII characters (Cait Sith. Why.) with boring gunplay, dreadful stealth sections, a draw distance of about 3 feet, some of Tetsuya Nomura's worst character designs (why is there a guy who wears a jockstrap over his mouth) and a story so incomprehensibly poor that it's pointless to try and care about it. I can't think why I beat it but I did and then promptly put it on the shelf and forgot about it.

Another one: Mirror's Edge. I picked it up because I wanted to try it and it was on the cheap during a PSN sale. While it looked lovely and the basic idea was interesting, the actual gameplay made me devolve into mindless angered grumbling because what looked like a ledge was actually scenery, or Faith didn't want to grab hold of it, or because the game plonks you in a room full of armed guards and you just have to trial and error your way through countless deaths. Oh, also, the story is threadbare at best and the Flash animation-style cutscenes were miserable to watch. Again, don't know why I beat it but I've never touched it since.

 

[aozgolo]

The only time I can see myself doing this is if I intend to play a sequel to a game that has story continuity or "save bonuses" for importing previous game saves.

I do enjoy Baldur's Gate, but nowhere near as much as Baldur's Gate II, however if I want to get my character just the way I want, I play through Baldur's Gate so I can import them.

My experience thus far with what little I have endured of the Witcher series hasn't really been the most enjoyable as of yet, but considering how much I want to like the series and want to enjoy The Witcher 3 I really want to push my way through the first two games.

 

[Barbas]

Well, yeah...just not for very long. Super Meat Boy was a good example - it's a well-made game, but the controls on PC were just pure arses. I think about 18 minutes was all I could manage.

 

[mrdeclandeadly]

I played through the Gears of War series, which I hated, but only because my friends loved it and I usually like playing co-op with them. But I didn't enjoy it.

I can't imagine playing a single player game that I don't enjoy no, what's the point?

I think I gave Far Cry 4 about 10 hours though, before I wanted to stick a soldering iron into my ears.

 

[Zendariel]

I play a pretty large number of games I don't really enjoy that much. Some of the games might be good but just part of a genre I generally dislike, some might be flawed some ways or another. It's a good way for a game developer to learn and avoid many poor design choices you might not think about without experiencing them beforehand. Or to try to think how those could be improved. But if the game is really long I often feel inclined to drop them when i feel i've seen all they have to offer.

I rarely pass by a concept that interests me even if I'm unlikely to enjoy it that much. Nowadays i play a lot less AAA games and tend to favor the indies because they generally do more interesting stuff for better or worse.

 

[CaitSeith]

I used to, just for completion sake and to try different games (or at least to feel I didn't waste my money). One is Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate. I played Monster Hunter Tri by mere casualty, but I loved it. However MH3U is a little more than a port with a worst multiplayer hub. I keep playing it just because I never completed Monster Hunter Tri.

 

[happyninja42]

No I don't, other than that first time I play it where I learn that I don't enjoy it. Though 2 exceptions, the recent Tomb Raider reboot, and the Thief reboot. I finished both of those games, despite being very pissed at them about half way through. I kept playing, hoping they would get better, and redeem my high expectations for them. (I'm a huge Thief fan, and I enjoy stories with strong female leads, if they're done well).

Sadly, neither game did that, and were just frustrating piles of refuse that I never plan on touching again. I really wanted to enjoy them, but the games made that impossible.

 

[MechaSlinky]

I do, but usually only for research. Or a good laugh.

 

[Timeless Lavender]

No, normally if I know I would not like a game, I would simply not play it. But if the genre of the game (horror, action, hack n slash, visual novel etc. ) is something I like, then I will struggle to play it. For example I struggled to play God of war series due to my love for hack n slash but I ending up disliking it.

 

[Astralwyrm]

Enchanted Arms... I felt I needed to give it a chance because some JRPGs have to get going before they get interesting. Enchanted Arms wasn't that game. The battle system was probably the highlight and even then it wasn't anything special or exciting. It's been sometime since I played it, I don't really remember much of the story. Many characters seemed to be really awfully shoehorned tropes or I just found them completely unlike-able.