Have you ever played through a game and completely missed a game play feature?

[ign0rantc0nsumer]

Viewtiful Joe, didn't know that you could hold down the punch button and slow down time and land a continuous series of punches. I just jumped and kicked the whole time. At the final boss fight my friends pointed out the slowed down "99 punches" move was the most powerful in game. D'oh. At least they were impressed i got all the style points without the best move.

 

[Richardplex]

I love these threads, I learn so much about my games.
I now can drink out of that toilet for Moira faster.
I can now swivel my camera around in same game/presumably F:NV to see my face.
Okay, not so much in this particular threads, but each time it comes up I learn at least 2 new things.

To add to them: You can see where enemies are in ME2/3 by doing that pause game thingie. third playthrough I learnt that.
Mass Effect 1, you can change the zoom of sniper rifles. 150 hours it took me to learn that. Only one playthrough did I not use a SR.
Jade Empire, I learnt that I can use my focus 20 hours in. Admittedly, it's unnecessary considering the ease of the game, but still.

I know there's more, but can't think of them off the top of my head

 

[King of Asgaard]

I went through the entirety of Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep without ever using D-Links.
They were bloody useless, though.
Also, an entire playthrough of Skyrim without ever touching the melee combat.

 

[AbstractStream]

In FFX, I didn't use the sphere system because I completely skipped all the useless (guess not) text that was a "tutorial." I was horribly underleveled, yet I somehow managed. It could have made my life a whole lot easier if I paid attention.

 

[necromanzer52]

That you can actually switch zoom levels of Sniper Rifles in Metal Gear Solid 1 + 2. Explains why i found the weapon to be pretty useless outside of boss encounters.

You can do what!? I had no idea. I also didn't learn until after my first playthrough that you can take some pills to steady your aim in sniper mode. I got completely pissed off during the sniper wolf fights for nothing.

 

[The Hero Killer]

Final Fantasy IX, I didnt know you had to equip stones to use the summon monsters. I spent the whole game wondering what happened to Ramuh.

 

[Quaxar]

I finished Saints Row 3 without ever upgrading any weapon I had. Not that it mattered that much since you can overkill anyway but holy shit was I surprised when I discovered I could improve my weapons in the middle of the second playthrough.

 

[Fijiman]

Damn, I know that my brothers and I have had a few cases of this but I can't remember what they are. I even remember thinking about how much easier a game would have been if we had known about something earlier, but not what it was nor for what game. Crap, this is going to bug all day now.

 

[Lt._nefarious]

I didn't find out about the extra options until my 2nd playthrough of SH3

 

[AceTrilby]

Mass Effect 3 uses Select on the 360 pad to quicksave.

WHAT?

Oh man, I wish I had known that! You sir, just blew my mind.

Back on topic, I never obtained the radio on my first playthrough of Deadly Premonition. If I hadn't had to go through all that terrible driving I might have loved the game even more...

 

[Fijiman]

Yes, commonly actually. Mostly in RPGs there's an entire section of crafting that I ignore because I find another to my liking, case and point in Oblivion and Skyrim I ignored smithing, in NWN1 and 2 I ignored all crafting entirely, as a matter of fact; I rarely enjoy crafting mechanics in games, and often am surprised to hear my friends chatting about how great the crafting system was in a game.

However, I absolutely love yogbox in minecraft. I don't know why I ignore crafting features so much and love a game that is primarily crafting as the core game engine.

Oblivions smithing I never touched. Skyrims is pretty good though, just a hassle to level up so that you can craft some of the more advanced armors and weapons.
However I do usually ignore stuff like that as well. Spell making I never got into same with Alchemy in The Witcher.

Oblivion didn't have smithing like in Skyrim. It had enchanting and spell making, but not smithing. The closest thing to Skyrim's smithing you could get was using repair hammers to fix your armor and weapons.

 

[DragonLordSerge]

I played through Metro: 2033 without knowing you could buy or upgrade your weapons..I played my whole first playthrough with the shitty weapons you pick up, and a sack full of moneyz

what. you can upgrade weapons in Metro 2033? Damn! That would have been helpful.

I have never used "throw gil" in any final fantasy game. i saw my brother do it and it was the most useless attack i've ever seen. I have however, used the 'bribe' skill in Final Fantasy 10, if only to get the rarest goodies from monsters.

In FFX i dint realise you could use the orbs to make your character stronger till i fought Yunalesca needless to say my hours of grinding payed off when i finally found it out

...but....but.... how!? (did you actually manage to get that far with characters you had left with 'level 1' stats. I can understand why you didn't know how to use the sphere system, i was smashing the 'o' and 'x' button as quick as i could through that boring text tutorial.

Well i just grinded alot i think i was around lvl 80 something in the zanarkland i think i spelled that right but i just thought it was meant to be a really hard game i had alot of potions and phoenix downs at all times and i allways kept all my armors as best i could i loged in that game over 120 hours lol

 

[The Wykydtron]

Pimp Stance in the first Dead Space

Helloween fan, huh?

Hey if the rest of the world subscribed to the Helloween School of Naming Things the world would be a much more awesome place XD

"Bob what shall we call this contraption?"

"Spiky Death Laser of Doom sir!"

"Very good Bob. Bob? Where ar- Oh no not again Bob! Why does all the murder keep happening to you!?"

 

[Skull Kid]

Doesn't seem as bad as some people here but I recently found out that you could sprint in the Mario games - never got very far with them. Also according to Steam I've put 162 hours into Skyrim without knowing about sprint.

I had logged many long days in Minecraft before a friend told me I can use L-shift to avoid falling off edges. That and sprinting. He changed my life.

Oh and apparently minecraft has the damn thing as well

 

[AgentLampshade]

When I was younger, I never used buffs on my party in JRPGs. I normally just waded in, trying to get the fight over ASAP. Nowadays I look back and wonder how the hell I did it.

 

[JediMB]

Nothing I can recall at the moment, but I taught my brother about the melee key right after he started his second RAGE playthrough.

EDIT: Wait... I didn't realize I could rotate the camera while in the combat menu in Mass Effect 1... until I'd played Mass Effect 2.

 

[Operation Genesis]

You can apparently aim down ironsights in Bioshock, something which would have come handy during some of the earlier parts of the game.

Wait....what?

Okay, I guess that's my answer to this thread, then.

 

[Gennadios]

The really long getting killed by a grapple animation in ME3 singleplayer were apparently quicktime events. I had no idea until I beat the game and played multiplayer.

Wait, what? Does this mean I don't have to just sit there and get my face eaten by a banshee? Explain how

Mash 'F' to not die.

 

[Odbarc]

My friend just asked me this on Facebook, and I want to see what you guys can come up with.

So, have you ever played through a game and completely missed a game play feature?

His example was: "I'm replaying Mass Effect 1 and I just learned that the vehicle has a canon and Right Bumper allows you to use abilities"

A guy from work played Skyrim for months and beat it without ever finding out about the quick-travel feature. He walked from point A to point B the ENTIRE game.

 

[Felipe Nurwandi]

The ability to mash out of fatalities in the original Killer Instinct.