Games that you felt were ruined by one game mechanic

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

The kill streaks and the oversaturation of weapons in CoD games, the lack of battle personality in FF games(If I want a WRPG fully customisable team I would play a WRPG), planet exploring in ME1 but that was due to over reuse of horrible horrible eyesore textures. I know graphics aren't that important but compared to everything else it was just so jarring. There is no need for something like that unless it is for performance online which it wasn't.

 

[Crimson_Dragoon]

The inability to grind in Eternal Poison, the controls in RAD, and the lack of story in all "modern" FPSs.

I thought the controls in RAD were what made it unique and cool. They were strange, and they did take some getting used to, but they felt like you were really controlling a giant robot, rather than a normal character that had a large model. Also, holy crap, someone else has played RAD!

OT: The Dead Rising series and its time limits. In a game where just screwing around is the most fun thing you can do, forcing the player to not screw around if they want to see the story was idiotic. Never did beat the story of the first game because of that.

 

[The Wykydtron]

The map system in Far Cry 2

It forced you to spend half the time squinting at 3 difficult to read maps when there was a perfectly good satnav in every car that sat unused. Every fork in the road had me stopping the car to pull out the fucking map to check where the fuck i was meant to fucking go... There are many forks in the road in Far Cry 2

I imagine it was like sitting in a traffic jam irl.
/rant

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Fallout 2. Fallout 2, Fallout 2, Fallout 2.

Why the hell can't I hit anything in Fallout 2? If I start a game and immediately get into combat with scorpions that can kill me in a few hits, making me run around in endless dodgy circles for literally 10-20 minutes per enemy is not going to tell me this game is good. It's going to tell me that the developers really love giving me the shaft. Honestly, I'm going to say that accuracy in any game should never be below 50%. Making my attacks have tiny damage, okay, fine, I can at least measure about how long it's going to take to kill a big enemy with my tiny poky stick. But giving me a 10% chance at best of hitting anything just makes me want to demolish your game with a hammer.

 

[Ca3zar416]

I can't stand quick time events so that always makes me a bit angry with a game.

One specifically for me was the way magic was done in Kingdom Hearts 2. I used to just keep my MP low and get hit and whack stuff to recharge MP. Then they changed it to the cooldown time thing and I hated it because it meant there was a time where I couldn't use spells. Sure items probably took that problem out of the equation but bleh..... I preferred the old system by a lot.

 

[CleverNickname]

Mining in Mass Effect 2

I fully expect ME3's minigame to be Excel sheets.

hey, some of us would like that! it would bring back memories of WoW before they dumbed it down. speaking of which, OT: the homogenization that occurred in WoW during Lich King. did they not understand that for a huge percentage of the "hardcore" player-base, min-maxing was the whole point? god, i used to have almost more fun playing around with the talent trees and gear simulators than with the actual game. then they took that away

Wow, really? I never played WoW, but I played an MMO that wasn't quite as popular but from the sound of it equally dumbed down: Star Wars Galaxies. It used to have 32 professions, of which you could master 2 and a half of. The combinations, especially with that halfway profession, were a science and playing around with character-builders was more fun and exciting than grinding to get that build.
Then they got scrapped and replaced by 8 classes. One of them Jedi. No mix'n'matching.

That literally ruined SWG.

 

[Gizmo1990]

Final Fantasy XIII. Now I hate everything to do with this game but If I have to choose one I would say the inabillity to change your party leader in battle. I did not like the cobat system they introduced in XIII but I could have lived with it if it were not for that. Each charactor has their own personal summon called an eidalon,but you can only summon the eidalon of the party leader. This was really frustrating as by the time In the crapy story I got the summon I wanted the charactor that summons it was crap compared to the party leader I had been using for the crapy hours of crapy gameplay and crapy storyline (sorry got carried away there).

Also the weapons system. Three guesses what I throught of that!

 

[Ranchcroutons]

Mirrors Edge. The free running was almost impossible at times. I guess that was pretty much the whole game but I really enjoyed the story and atmosphere. Maybe next time around they will nail it.

 

[Terminal Blue]

The skill system in every Elder Scrolls game so far.

I mean.. what kind of a system gives you more rewards if you randomly and arbitrarily grind 10 points in some random skills which have nothing to do with your character class before levelling one (and only one, try not to actually fight or do anything fun as that might accidentally level more) of your class skills to gain a level. Especially since everything scales and being relatively high powered for your level is a lot more useful than being high level.

Come on Bethesda.. either do away with levelling altogether and give characters complete freedom to raise and use their skills without worrying about optimized levelling, or use the level system properly in the way which works and has been proven to work across countless RPGs since pretty much the dawn of time.

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Speaking of Gizmo's objection to "no party leader change" systems, I wouldn't say this ruined the game at all, but Persona 3 and 4 had that infernal "if your party leader dies, everyone dies" thing. Baldur's Gate did this, too.

Seriously, guys. If I have a revive item, let the allies use it on the party leader. Seriously. It's just game-breaking and mind-bending if you don't. Same with "cutscene death" "Aeris Dies" type stuff. Call it 'unconsciousness.' Don't call it 'death.' It just breaks flow when you can't use the Phoenix Down on Aeris.

Alternatively, Go Big or Go Home: do what Valkyria Chronicles did, and have your party members be able to permadie if you screw it up too badly.

 

[DEAD34345]

Mining in Mass Effect 2

I fully expect ME3's minigame to be Excel sheets.

Cool! It'll be like Aurora.

OT: Dead rising's humans. Hmm, every human in the game can block bullets, can take more damage than a tank, and can instant-combo-kill the PC? Why doesn't every game have this!?

 

[Dorkamongus]

Deus Ex and having the crossbow take about half a minute to knock someone out, giving it no value as a nonlethal stealth weapon as an enemy could easily trigger an alarm.

you have to hit the guys in the head or neck to knock them out almost instantly, or just shoot them multiple times. but yeah, it is a little hard to use right.

 

[Daxter343]

... I know there have been plenty of games in which this has been the case. Trouble is, I have a critic's taste, so I only own and/or remember the games that I really like. I don't remember what it was, but there was a game that I played for about 30 minutes before I returned it. It had the most infuriating control system that was somehow also incredibly bland.

It may have been one of the early Medal Gear games. It was definitely something similar to it, if not that.

 

[RachelKitten]

The skill system in every Elder Scrolls game so far.

I mean.. what kind of a system gives you more rewards if you randomly and arbitrarily grind 10 points in some random skills which have nothing to do with your character class before levelling one (and only one, try not to actually fight or do anything fun as that might accidentally level more) of your class skills to gain a level. Especially since everything scales and being relatively high powered for your level is a lot more useful than being high level.

Come on Bethesda.. either do away with levelling altogether and give characters complete freedom to raise and use their skills without worrying about optimized levelling, or use the level system properly in the way which works and has been proven to work across countless RPGs since pretty much the dawn of time.

I totally agree with you on that!

 

[Et3rnalLegend64]

And now let's send this thread into a complete 180.

Final Fantasy 8: Triple Triad. Amazingly fun fun amazing minigame. Also results in a deliciously broken game if you card every monster, play Triple Triad a lot, and refine all those cards into overpowered magic and items.

 

[maffro]

Gears of War. Who the hell ASKED for a cover system?

 

[beema]

QTE's in RE4. I wouldn't say it ruined the game for me, I still loved it, but without them it would of been perfectly perfect.

The gun/ammo/armor mod system in ME. What kind of idiot designed that?

The floaty jumps and movement in LBP.

Not sure if this is technically a game mechanic, but the lack of dynamic save loading in the MGS series. I always try to go for a Foxhound game (no kills/ no alerts), and it is really f'ing obnoxious to have to do a hard reset every time you want to reload a save. Also the lack of the ability to move while crouched in MGS1-3. Why the crap did it take them so long to figure that out?

The retarded game of SIMON in Indigo Prophecy. Well, I guess that's what made me hate it before the plot of the story made me hate it more.

Finally, the lack of dedicated servers in any online competitive multiplayer game = fuck you. I guess that's not technically a game mechanic either.

 

[King Kupofried]

Any game that uses Humans, Dwarfs and Elves with their standard archtypes, particularly thinking of Dragon Age at this moment. Meaning:
Humans are the 'newer', diverse and quickly expanding race.
Dwarfs are the underground race and renowned for having the best craftsmanship and alcohol.
Elves are the ultra magical guardians of nature race, were at one point immortal but eventually lost it.

I am more forgiving towards older games, but newer games I just hate it, it has reached a point where using them just showing a disgusting lack of creativity.

 

[Mr Thin]

I think the Mass Effect series takes the cake for me, the planet exploration/mining was just so damn tedious and unnecessary.

It almost feels like they stuck them in just to give the player more random crap to collect.

 

[starkiller212]

ME1 - Mako
ME2 - Planet Scanning
Far Cry 2 - nearly instant enemy respawning
Gears of War 2, Black Ops - takes over 10 minutes to find a game, I am constantly disconnected
Total War games - siege battles (hopefully Shogun 2 really improves this)
Oblivion - levelling enemies
GTA IV - poor driving controls/handling, lack of mission checkpoints
WoW - everything being made easier/faster/cheaper/automated/"casual" (even more than before)

I've heard that SWG's Jedi and Planetside's mechs literally killed those games, I never got to play them while they were still active unfortunately