I Hate Tutorials in Games!

[aerigon]

dark soul's tutorial......... wait dark souls had a tutorial in which i died over seven times trying to fight that boss .but then I found the solution.So its great tutorila to teach me two things one about me that i may be a complete moron and the other about the game that is gonna be tough so controoling your swearing while guest are around is a must

 

[Marik Bentusi]

Like cutscenes, I prefer my tutorials skippable if they're not weaved into the rest of the game really well, which usually isn't the case. One should recognize that and think about returning old chap Mr. Tutorial Button to the main menu, or adjusting the length of the tutorial to the difficulty level selected.

 

[Loonyyy]

Certain Tutorials piss me right off. Borderlands 2 has an extremely obnoxious set of starting missions, and I've given up on my second character for the moment because I'm really not that interested in doing the same section again.

Skyrim's tutorial is barely interactive and takes forever, while being completely on rails.

AC 2, Brotherhood, and 3 (Haven't played Revelations yet), all have terrible tutorials, typically spending a portion walking around as Desmond the Dull. There's a base setup sequence in pretty much every one. At best, they're mediocre, but most of them fall far below that.

I think the problem is that most of these tutorials assume the most inept new player, and spend a long period teaching basic skills and genre conventions. Which is completely unnecessary to games which are formulaic in their approach to the genre or series. They need a skip button, and for story games to not integrate the story into the tutorial (As if you could skip the tutorial in ACIII, the story would take a hit).

I restarted Deus Ex: HR to respec and stealth properly, and the intro sequence for that is pretty obnoxious. Some good information, but lots of boring walking, and lots of shoutouts to the previous games which are rubbed in my face, which I don't get.

Hence, the three commandments of Game Tutorials:
1.)Games which are relatively simple approaches to convention, with simple mechanics, need simple tutorials.
2.)Games with more complex ones, should have more complex tutorials.
3.)Tutorials should be optional if they're not short.

 

[Bat Vader]

When I first played Mass Effect I got mad because I died like five times trying to defuse the bombs on Eden Prime. First and only game where I died playing the tutorial.

 

[Fuzzed]

I have a love hate relationship with tutorials. If it flows with the game and the story then go for it, but if the main character is already supposed to be a professional killing machine then why the hell does he/she need to be going through a tutorial? I mean I know why game developers put them in there, but it's like...could you not?

 

[Freaky Lou]

I have a love hate relationship with tutorials. If it flows with the game and the story then go for it, but if the main character is already supposed to be a professional killing machine then why the hell does he/she need to be going through a tutorial? I mean I know why game developers put them in there, but it's like...could you not?

That is not what "love/hate relationship" means.

Anyway, the answer is simple: skippable/optional tutorials. You could also go back to the days of putting the "how-to-play" information in the manual and designing the game around the assumption that it was read, but this has two issues:

1. People don't read. I'm not sympathetic at all to anyone who complains for this reason, but
2. People who import the game to a country that doesn't speak English/whatever will have an extremely hard time learning how to play.

 

[Fuzzed]

I have a love hate relationship with tutorials. If it flows with the game and the story then go for it, but if the main character is already supposed to be a professional killing machine then why the hell does he/she need to be going through a tutorial? I mean I know why game developers put them in there, but it's like...could you not?

That is not what "love/hate relationship" means.

Sometimes I love them, sometimes I hate them. How's that Professor Lunar?

 

[FFP2]

Final Fantasy 13. Yahtzee wasn't kidding when he said that the tutorial was 20 hours long.

 

[Mordekaien]

I like tutorials, if they are optional. Like Neverwinter Nights did it. Remember that awesome game?
Basically, the first chapter was tutorial, yet you could skip those parts you wanted, or, you could skip the entire tutorial.

The only thing I don't like are tutorial on rails, without complementing the story in any means. Borderlands has this kind of thing, and it pissed me off. Two Worlds 2 tutorial is boring as hell too, and you can't skip it.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

I like games that have tutorials as pop-ups... You can ignore them then..! Far-cry 3 had the right idea, press start on the pop-up to see it more detailed, otherwise just ignore!

I also like ones like Ace Combat, where it is optional! Well... until they made an achievement for it! :/ As an AC vet, that was really boring!!

 

[Laluune]

I dislike hand-holding. Tutorials are okay as long as they aren't constantly starting and stopping me in game "Press A to jump" *jump* "Hold down right stick to look around" etc. In this new day and age I believe those sort of controls come naturally to a player now. I can't say I've played a game which didn't have a tutorial where I was like "omagerd what am I meant to do!?" now this is different to level design, where I give up because the game hasn't told me where I'm going or what I'm meant to be doing. Epic Mickey 2 I'm looking at you.

 

[farscythe]

im going to have to nominate eve online's tutorial it's a slog and a half to get trough( at least it was a few years ago when i played) by the time i got to the end of it i'd forgotten half of it again.

but then..eve's complicated.

 

[soul_rune1984]

I hate long unskipable tutorials and cutscenes. I love Skyrim but having to go though that long opening before I can make my character is a pain.

 

[TehCookie]

I hate tutorials, I liked manuals. It didn't interrupt the flow of the game at all, you had the option to figure things out on your own because I find it fun to see what you can do. Then if you get stuck you can read it and learn all sorts of new tricks. The best part is it's never forced down your throat. Not to mention they make great bathroom reading material.

 

[Dethenger]

Kingdom Hearts games are slow as balls to get into. The tutorial should either be optional or brief. Even the Call of Duty games do that right. In CoD4, the tutorial actually gave you a time to beat and was engaging.

EDIT: The Bard's Tale had an amusing tutorial, with the player character actually listening to someone tell him to press the A button to jump.
"Button? What button? Whatever, I'll humour you, old man."

 

[The Lunatic]

I find tutorials to be very annoying.

Especially if they're forced and you have no option to skip them.

For the most part, they're simple to an elementary level and treat the player like a complete idiot.

 

[Brutal Peanut]

I enjoyed the Fallout - New Vegas tutorial.

"Here are the very basics of shooting. Want to know more? No? Okay get outta here." Me: "=D BAI!"

I also echo the Skyrim sentiment - love the game, hate the opening. Every time? Come on.

 

[WanderingFool]

One bad tutorial isn't an indictment of tutorials as a whole. I like tutorials as I don't particularly like being thrown into a game without the slightest inkling of what to do.

It's gotta be done right of course.


Takes less than five minutes to complete and you're taught the basics. Short and sweet, good tutorial.

That was a good tutorial, short, sweet, and to the point.

Tutorials I really hate though are the ones that you have to go through, like the Vault in FO3 or the prison escape in TES4 (and the escape in Skyrim as well.) One of the first things I do is make a save game for the sole purpose of skiping that crap. Great the first time through, but after that, just sucks to have to go through again and again.

Off-Topic: This brings up a quick question, why do people miss manuals?

 

[Doclector]

Assassin's creed 3 has terrible tutorials. The only thing that makes the massive amount of time sunk into tutorials tolerable is the fact that Haytham's a badass, a war of independence James Bond with the witty remarks to match.

Oh, and the plot twist which genuinely took me by surprise.

Spoiler

At the end of that tutorial period, it's revealed that you've been working for the templars for this part of the game. It's a well executed little twist, even if it ultimately means little.

It's kinda a shame. Once the game opens up, and you finally get a grasp of the multitudes of side quests available, it's really good. Special mention to the ship battles, probably the closest I've come to the feeling of being a pirate ship's captain since "sid meyer's pirates!". I kinda hope they make a full game building on that. But, while I don't find him quite as unengaging as many reviewers have said, Connor is still a pretty lacklustre protagonist, especially when compared to Ezio, or even Haytham.

 

[Doclector]

One bad tutorial isn't an indictment of tutorials as a whole. I like tutorials as I don't particularly like being thrown into a game without the slightest inkling of what to do.

It's gotta be done right of course.


Takes less than five minutes to complete and you're taught the basics. Short and sweet, good tutorial.

That was a good tutorial, short, sweet, and to the point.

Tutorials I really hate though are the ones that you have to go through, like the Vault in FO3 or the prison escape in TES4 (and the escape in Skyrim as well.) One of the first things I do is make a save game for the sole purpose of skiping that crap. Great the first time through, but after that, just sucks to have to go through again and again.

Off-Topic: This brings up a quick question, why do people miss manuals?

Well, the manual for assassin's creed 3 is in game, an increasing trend these days. It's not that bad an idea, if well done. The manual for AC3 is not. There is no simple controller layout page, forcing you to scroll through tiny text to find whatever button you forgot. Personally, I always felt that paper manuals were better. Being able to have the controller layout right in front of you if you had gotten rusty that you could check at a quick glance, instead of having to pause the game, find wherever the manual was, scroll through god knows how much text to find what you want.

X-com enemy unknown had a pretty good tutorial. Sure, it goes on for ages, at some points I wondered when, I'd be able to freely look around my base without being limited to whatever the game wanted to show me next, but it makes up for it by making the majority of the tutorials story based. Some of the game's most unsettling parts come up here, to the point that when the handholding ends, you'll kinda miss it.

Red dead redemption was another good one. Again, many things to teach, and the lessons go pretty far into the game, but you're not limited to it. Beyond the first few missions, you're free to go do something more action orientated. Sure, you have to complete the tutorials eventually to progress, but at least it gives you the option to take breaks from them.