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

[HKFortyRevan]

I was on my third Mass Effect playthrough before I realised the Mako cannon thing.

It also took me until my second Mass Effect 3 playthrough (and reading a GameFAQs post) that I realised you could re-map the "Y" power.

 

[ReservoirAngel]

Completely missed the VATS system in Fallout: New Vegas. It wasn't until I saw my brother playing the game that I knew such a feature existed. Would have made those up-close combat situations much easier...

 

[Mird]

When I first played Oblivion, I managed to walk around for about half my playthrough not even realizing there was a map feature.

 

[StriderShinryu]

ME3, didn't learn till the final battle for earth that you could revive your squad mates without medigel.

lol for me it was the opposite. I really can't recall if I used medigel in the previous games but, if I did, it wasn't often. So in ME3 I played through the entire campaign up to London never using it but only reviving my teammates directly if they went down. It wasn't until the really tough battles in London that I was like, hey I have this medigel stuff, maybe that would help. /doh

 

[I Have No Idea]

Mass Effect 2.

I was halfway through the suicide mission when I realized I could press "Back" on the Xbox 360 controller to holster my weapon. Not really useful in combat, but it surprised me nonetheless.

And I HATE how they took away that feature in ME3. Honestly, I feel like a complete idiot walking around with my gun pointed straight in front of me during during the entire course of a combat mission. "Hey, I killed all the guys! Can I put away my gun? No? Well then I guess I'll just walk around looking like Paranoid Joe, ready to shoot at absolutely anything.

Hold B or X(I think).

*SMASHES HEAD AGAINST WALL*

This is what happens when there's no manual, EA.

 

[shimyia]

the demon doors in Fable: the Lost Chapters - were never used by me (and i didn't even know u could open them) in the first few playthroughs (aside from the one in which u have to find the archeologist)

 

[FinalFreak16]

The one that comes to mind most is Sonic Unleashed on the Wii. Completed the entire game without doing the side quest stages which give you extra lives. Comepleted the entire game with a maximum of 3 lives (it was easy fall off the map in that game) Last level was incredibly frustrating.

 

[Lordmarkus]

Holding A in Fallout 3 & NV allows to drink continuously.

And this just blew my mind. After hundreds of hours in both games, I never knew you could do that until right now. o_0

Well, at least this'll make getting irradiated for Moira in Fallout 3 go a bit faster from now on...

Damn, now I have to test this as well. It took so much damn time getting my health restored. And getting sickly radiated isn't that hard. There is radioactive dump just behind Springvale School that is super effective for that quest-line.

A lot of things I missed has already been mentioned. Upgrades in Mass Effect (although I think I found out about them on Feros), aim-down sights in Bioshock never crossed my mind and precision aiming in Fallout 1 & 2. Took the trait that removed them but the first I played them I had no idea what I was doing anyway.

 

[noble cookie]

In Resident Evil 4 I never knew you could do a quick 180 turn around by pressing down and the run button simultaneously until I had completed it like 3 times

It helps a lot, especially when you need to GTFO of there! I later applied this to Resident Evil 5 too.

 

[RustlessPotato]

Well I recently discover that pressing B in Red Dead Redemption for Xbox 360 you can greet NPC's . Not really essential, but i really like non essential things in games . It adds a little flavour.

 

[Senaro]

I beat Yakuza 4 about a week ago, and only just discovered Golf and the Karaoke bar.

 

[jetriot]

My wife got halfway through American McGees Alice with only the knife because she didn't know you could change weapons. It is what made me fall in love.

 

[bliebblob]

Another skyrim one here! But not the sprint function this time.
It was unlocking/upgrading shouts. I couldn't immediatly figure out how to do it so I assumed the greybeards would teach you at some point.
But when I suddenly found myself standing in front of the final boss and I still hadn't unlocked anything but fus ro dah I was starting to feel some doubt...
Facepalmed pretty hard when I saw it says push R to upgrade right in the friggin UI!

 

[RC1138]

I found out a few weeks ago you could ADS in BioShock. Still haven't reinstalled to try it out.

 

[TheTurtleMan]

Holding A in Fallout 3 & NV allows to drink continuously.

I was looking at this thread smugly thinking how great I was for not glossing over game features while I laughed at all the inferior people and their mistakes. Until I noticed your post and realized that I missed something that simple in the two games that I have devoted the most play time to. I think I'm going to take a couple months off school and video games to do some serious soul searching.

 

[smeghead00]

assassins creed 2. The ability to learn new moves, such as throw sand or sweep with long weapons. Couldn't work out how to get some of the achievement until i saw a friend playing, had thought the place where they could be bought was just a fighting tutorial area

 

[Arkley]

I was halfway through my second ME3 playthrough and had a multiplayer N7 rank of almost 200 before I learned how to grab enemies over cover to insta-kill them.

 

[Sarge034]

Um... pretty much everything in Dark Souls. I have a lvl 93 and I still don't know how most of the technical stuff works in that game. The big three that really confuse me are covenants, reinforcing armor, and reinforcing weapons. Reinforcing stuff is the worst though. Why can I only get this to a +5 but I can get this to a +15? My best guess... Just cause Dark Souls.

 

[Arkley]

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.

Those are QTEs? Like when a Banshee kills you?

Yeah. Im surprised how many other ppl had no idea, Bioware fucked up somewhere.

No. Banshee, Phantom, Brute and Atlas grabs are not QTEs, you can't escape them by button mashing. If you're quick, you can escape them by detonating Tech Armour or Barrier, but that's it. If you don't have either of those or don't hit the button in time, your only chance of escape is if your team mates kill or stagger the enemy before the animation completes.

Only the Husk grab is a QTE.

 

[Seagoon]

Holding A in Fallout 3 & NV allows to drink continuously.

OH MY GOD, YOU KIDDING! Why was that not explained?!