Things that every game should have

[Axolotl]

You're wrong that was an awful tutorial. It introduces you to walking but thats something you can expect most people to be able to do. Beyond that all it tought you ispunching and shooting. Nothing on stealth, lockpicking, hacking, repairing/crafting or using drugs. It also doesn't introduce any of the games key ideas/features, there's nothing on multiple quest solutions, nothing on karma and nothing on exploration. All these just get dropped on you in the game proper, good tutorials should help introduce these elements.

But worst of all it takes between 30-60 minutes to complete and you have to do it for every playthrough and it plays the same each time, now that's pretty much uforgivable.

My point was that it's ingrained into the game and not a white room with text that just states "This is a tutorial. Press [key] to move left. Press [key] to move right." etc.

Most games do this. Take say Bad Company, it's integrated into the game and gives you instructions to heal yourself, navigate out of a ditch and blow up a building. This takes unhder 5 minutes and introduces everything the game revolves around.

As for the whole multiple quest solutions and learning about stealth and such, that's all part of playing the game and learning as you go along.

Then why have an half-hour long, unskippable tutorial?

Not Being told every little detail of how to play at the very beginning of the game. That would be like at the beginning of any war game like Call of Duty or so and the tutorial is a gun range with targets being the enemies you'll actually be going up against, telling you every move they'll make before you even start the game.

No. It doesn't need to tell you everything (all weapons/enemy types) that's not what I said, but it needs to tell you the basic mechanics the gameplay runs on. Hell CoD's another good example, it teaches you how to shoot, stab, sprint and throw grenades, which are the fundemental parts of the game. In Fallout 3 not only are the elements I listed fundemental to the game (certainly more important than learning how to punch) but they aren't covered by the tutorial at all. Deus Ex is an example of a good tutorial for an FPSRPG, it's optional, in introduces you to the setting (something else Fallout 3 does not do) and it explains all the basic mechanics of play (shooting, stealth, explosives, hacking etc).

Back on point though, it doesn't take 30-60 minutes to play the F3 tutorial. If you know what you're doing, the longest part is making your character's face. You can skip the G.O.A.T test and save yourself a fair amount of time. shortest it's ever taken me is about 10-15 minutes, and that's only because NPCs walk so slowly to get everywhere

I was counting until you leave the vault since that's where the little popup comes along to tell you you're ready for the game proper. Now if you're get everything, it takes up to an hour and maybe you can do it in 15 mins if you know what you're doing but that's still 15 minutes of the player's time wasted reteaching something they already know.

 

[Byere]

Skippable tutorials are a must if they are built in at the start of the game instead of being a different option on the man menu.

Now, see that's something we agree on. From a designer's PoV, tutorials MUST be included in the game. However, from a gamer's PoV, I agree that there must be an option to skip tutorials if you've played before.
The problem with this is that there are people out there who think they know it all. They're the ones who tend to buy a new game and straight off the bat they skip the tutorial/s and then do really crap when trying to play the game. Then they have the gall to go online an ***** about how terrible a game is to play just because they couldn't play it properly because they never did the tutorial in the first place.

It's really one of those problem decisions developer's have to make. Either force a boring tutorial every time the game is played and risk annoying people into not liking the game, or give the option to skip it and risk bad reviews for being a terribly difficult game.

 

[Physics Engine]

Fully customizable controls. Always.

I don't want to stretch my finger over to the "G" "B" or "N" key for a key gameplay function. I have a whole bunch of buttons on my mouse, I can use those if you'd bloody let me! Who was the genius to map important functions to the "L-Alt" key? How am I supposed to effectively hit that key in a bind while still keeping my left hand on the "WASD" keys? With my dick?

Lazy, lazy, lazy devs.

 

[mjc0961]

Skippable tutorials are a must if they are built in at the start of the game instead of being a different option on the man menu.

Now, see that's something we agree on. From a designer's PoV, tutorials MUST be included in the game. However, from a gamer's PoV, I agree that there must be an option to skip tutorials if you've played before.
The problem with this is that there are people out there who think they know it all. They're the ones who tend to buy a new game and straight off the bat they skip the tutorial/s and then do really crap when trying to play the game. Then they have the gall to go online an ***** about how terrible a game is to play just because they couldn't play it properly because they never did the tutorial in the first place.

It's really one of those problem decisions developer's have to make. Either force a boring tutorial every time the game is played and risk annoying people into not liking the game, or give the option to skip it and risk bad reviews for being a terribly difficult game.

There's a really simple third option: Make you play it the first time start a new game, and then allow you to skip for every new playthrough. I don't see why they couldn't; if they can lock me out from playing the hardest difficulty until I beat the game once, they can lock me out from skipping the tutorial until I beat the game once.

Or for a series, they could search your HDD for save files (or maybe achievements) for other games in the series. Since I was already thinking of Gears, I'll just use #3 as an example. They could put a thing in Gears 3 that scans my achievements and progress in Gears 1 and 2 (they are already doing this anyway for multiplayer unlocks), and if they see that I have beaten both games, they could say "Well, this guy knows what he is doing. Let's let him skip the tutorial right away rather than making him play it the first time."

Completely unrelated to the above, I thought of another thing every game should have. An in-game brightness adjustment setting. I hate when one game decides to be too bright or too dark, and then makes me go adjust my TV or monitor settings (screwing up how every OTHER game looks) because it decided it was too cool to conform with the "included brightness adjustment in the options menu" crowd.

 

[Byere]

-snip-

Fine. Seriously, what the hell do you want me to say? I picked a game that I personally thought had a good tutorial that taught the basics of what NEEDED to be learned early on (how to use guns/attacking, how to use V.A.T.S, how to move and spending your S.P.E.C.I.A.L. points and giving a slightly easy way to ease you into the combat of the game by letting you fight against a few humans and a handful of roaches). You didn't need to learn how to use stealth, lockpicking, hacking, etc as it wasn't neccessary to complete the game. You could have liturally gone through the whole game just picking up any weapon you find, using it till it breaks or you find a better one, and then just rinse and repeat.
Admitted, it would have been nice to learn how to hack and lockpick as the first time I tried it I couldn't figure out what to do... I had to actually look through the manual to see what to do (another little resource that is technically part of the tutorial of any game).

In essence, while nowhere near perfect, it did exactly what it was supposed to do as a tutorial. Teaches you everything you need to know about playing a game from start to finish. Anything else that you can do along the way is part of the learning experience of the game.

 

[Byere]

There's a really simple third option: Make you play it the first time start a new game, and then allow you to skip for every new playthrough. I don't see why they couldn't; if they can lock me out from playing the hardest difficulty until I beat the game once, they can lock me out from skipping the tutorial until I beat the game once.

The problem is that unless you have a "New Game+" option, which in many cases you don't (most prominant in RPGs), it'd be difficult to make it so the game knows when it's been played through one or more times.
Say you play Gears of War. Now, I'm not a fan of those types of games so I can't say I've played it and thus I don't know if it has an option to save after completing the game to make a New Game+ option, but let's assume for a moment that it doesn't. You play it, complete it and even decide to keep the final save (just before the final boss, let's say). If you then decide a few months later that you want to play it through again, you start up a new game. Now, the game doesn't know that you've completed the game beforehand. It's only knowledge of a previous playthrough is the save that stops right before the final boss. So as far as it's concerned, you haven't completed the game and thus won't give you the option of skipping the tutorial.

Again, refering to a previous post of mine, it's a problem that developers have to make. Boring tutorial or risk bad press from those who choose to skip it.

EDIT: Totally didn't read the rest of your post on the whole Gears of War thing xD
Still, not all games use an achievement system so while it might work for Gears of War and maybe Call of Duty and such, it wouldn't work for every game. Add to that there's a chance of achievements either being lost (your console hard-drive crashing) or not being gained in the case of multiplayer (just as you do something, your wireless or the game server crashes and you don't gain the achievement). The latter of which has happened to me a number of times on Fallout: New Vegas, though we won't go there, what with the current hatred for F3 going on anyway...

 

[Allan53]

A journal for RPGs, or at least some summary of what's happened before or what's happening now. I frequently get busy with life stuff, and have to put the game away for a few days. So by the time I come back, I've forgotten what's happened, and sometimes that can be enough to kill the game (I'm thinking of FFVII here)

 

[Byere]

A journal for RPGs, or at least some summary of what's happened before or what's happening now. I frequently get busy with life stuff, and have to put the game away for a few days. So by the time I come back, I've forgotten what's happened, and sometimes that can be enough to kill the game (I'm thinking of FFVII here)

Agreed. At least some way to look back on what's happened over the course of the game up to when you last played. I tend to play a few games at once and unless I know the game, I tend to get a little lost on RPG stories sometimes. It'd be nice to be able to see everything that's happened, even if only in short-form writing.

 

[Durxom]

FUCKING CHECKPOINTS!

Failing that, the ability to save anywhere you want to, at anytime, Half-Life 2/Bioshock style.

No they shouldn't. Some games and/or most games work out a lot better without an infinite quicksave. Stuff like Bayonetta or DMC, where being able to save anywhere, would just overall ruin the whole point, playstyle, and fun of the game. Heck somehow games like Dead Rising get points taken off of them because you can't quicksave....=S The ability to save or how you should be able to save all depends on type or style of game you are playing.

 

[ultrachicken]

A good tutorial. Without a good o'l tut, their wouldn't be a large fanbase and would discourage new gamers.

No tutorials please! Old school games hardly had any but unfortunately today's games do. One of modern games' most annoying issues eva!

Depends on the game really. Some games really don't need tutorials, but as some games are more complex tutorials are a must.

Yes, you are correct in some games. But I don't like to call them "tutorials" (such an ugly word); the exception of games that have done well teaching players would be Portal, Super Mario Galaxy, and Super Meat Boy.

Portal's tutorial took up 3/4 of the entire game, and was dull as watching paint dry. Not a good example.

Why don't you like the word "tutorial?"

OT: Difficulty levels, skippable tutorials, and some damned closure in the endings! I'm sick of all the sequel bait.

 

[Axolotl]

-snip-

Fine. Seriously, what the hell do you want me to say?

I don't want you to say anything, I want you to understand that you're wrong and that Fallout 3 does not have a good tutorial.

I picked a game that I personally thought had a good tutorial that taught the basics of what NEEDED to be learned early on (how to use guns/attacking, how to use V.A.T.S, how to move and spending your S.P.E.C.I.A.L. points and giving a slightly easy way to ease you into the combat of the game by letting you fight against a few humans and a handful of roaches). You didn't need to learn how to use stealth, lockpicking, hacking, etc as it wasn't neccessary to complete the game.

The first proper quest you get outside the vault is The Power of the Atom, of the key elements it involves missing from the tutorial include: Speech, Karma, multiple quest solutions, exploration, explosives and drug use. Another quest you can get early is The Wasteland Survival Guide, it includes: Stealth, radiation, hacking, lockpicking, exploration and multiple quest solutions.

You could have liturally gone through the whole game just picking up any weapon you find, using it till it breaks or you find a better one, and then just rinse and repeat.

Really? You can get through the whole game withou using armour or healing yourself? And yes you can do that. But that's not what the game bases itself on, they didn't include the 15 non-shooting skills just for fluff did they? Even as a basic shoot things run you still want to understand repairing, hacking and lockpicking.

Admitted, it would have been nice to learn how to hack and lockpick as the first time I tried it I couldn't figure out what to do... I had to actually look through the manual to see what to do

And yet you still thought the tutorial was good?

(another little resource that is technically part of the tutorial of any game).

If the tutiorial still leaves you needing to check the manual, then it's failed. Sure the manual should be used as an in depth explanation of how the mechanics/stats work but if you have a half-hour tutorial and people still need to RTFM in order to play then you've gone wrong.

In essence, while nowhere near perfect, it did exactly what it was supposed to do as a tutorial. Teaches you everything you need to know about playing a game from start to finish. Anything else that you can do along the way is part of the learning experience of the game.

No. The fact that it takes 30 minutes to teach less than pure FPS tutorials can don in under 5 shows it's bad. The fact that it doesn't teach you anything on the basic principles of gameplay that the game bases the whole experience in shows it's bad. It doesn't even introduce the player to the setting because it all takes place in a bubble completely sealed off from where the rest of the game happens.

 

[mjc0961]

The problem is that unless you have a "New Game+" option, which in many cases you don't (most prominant in RPGs), it'd be difficult to make it so the game knows when it's been played through one or more times.
Say you play Gears of War. Now, I'm not a fan of those types of games so I can't say I've played it and thus I don't know if it has an option to save after completing the game to make a New Game+ option, but let's assume for a moment that it doesn't. You play it, complete it and even decide to keep the final save (just before the final boss, let's say). If you then decide a few months later that you want to play it through again, you start up a new game. Now, the game doesn't know that you've completed the game beforehand. It's only knowledge of a previous playthrough is the save that stops right before the final boss. So as far as it's concerned, you haven't completed the game and thus won't give you the option of skipping the tutorial.

Again, refering to a previous post of mine, it's a problem that developers have to make. Boring tutorial or risk bad press from those who choose to skip it.

EDIT: Totally didn't read the rest of your post on the whole Gears of War thing xD
Still, not all games use an achievement system so while it might work for Gears of War and maybe Call of Duty and such, it wouldn't work for every game. Add to that there's a chance of achievements either being lost (your console hard-drive crashing) or not being gained in the case of multiplayer (just as you do something, your wireless or the game server crashes and you don't gain the achievement). The latter of which has happened to me a number of times on Fallout: New Vegas, though we won't go there, what with the current hatred for F3 going on anyway...

Okay, first off, I don't have Fallout 3. Just its opening section. The rest of the game I love (I just wish I hadn't bought it for PS3, but that's a different can of worms). I just wanted to point that out so there's no confusion.

Anyway, the new game + thing or whatever. The game can still save data to a separate "options/settings and game data" file, or however they want to make it work. It doesn't need to just look at your save files. Gears itself locks out the hardest difficulty until you beat the game once. It also does not have new game +. Killzone 3 does the same thing, no new game +, but you can't play on the hardest difficulty until you beat it once. So it doesn't need new game +. Thus both obviously have ways of knowing that you already beat the game once to let you choose the hardest difficulty. They could use that same tech to say "Okay, no more tutorial is needed. Add the skip button."

As for the achievement scanning thing, that was just one example too. Especially on consoles, it should be easy enough just to check for save files. The Ratchet and Clank series would check for save files from the previous games, and if you got far enough in said previous games, it would give you free or discounted weapons in newer titles. So there are ways to do it if the developers are creative and plan ahead. It's not some foreign concept. It can be done, and there are multiple ways to do it.

And yeah, losing your saves or achievements somehow does suck. But that alone isn't an excuse not to add such features. If you lose all of your save data for Killzone 3, you would have to play and beat it again before it lets you back into the hardest difficulty again. But, they still implement such a system of locking you out anyway. Losing saves in general sucks, but we shouldn't eliminate ways to make replays easier just because the saves might be lost.

 

[Byere]

and some damned closure in the endings! I'm sick of all the sequel bait.

Oh yes... a winrar is you, as they say online...
I don't doubt that some games should have a slightly open ending, the storyline of MMOs for sure. One-off games that, should they have a sequel made it's about something totally different story-wise (even if it runs on the same sort of mechanics to its predacessor), should have complete closure on the story as if the developers don't intend to make a sequel in the first place.
Now, I'm pretty sure anyone who has played it to completion with agree when I say that Legend of Legaia is an actual good example of that. It has a closed ending and even though a sequel was made, it was about totally different people in a totally different world and everything was different... except the style of the battle system (one of the USP, Unique Selling Points, of the game). If you haven't played LoL, think of Chrono Trigger.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Lets see...

-Nolan North, starring as Nolan North
-Quick Time Events
-Regenerating Health
-Zombies
-A plot about getting revenge on the space marine who killed your family, destroyed your hometown, kidnapped the president AND your girlfriend.
-Online Multiplayer with grind-tastic RPG elements
-Rescue-Escort Missions that end in the characters having awkward sex
-Music by Phil Collins
-Sequel bait, cliffhanger ending (it cannot end! It CANNOT!)
-And is published by Electronic Activision

...Wait. Things games SHOULD have?

 

[burgbrand22]

A good tutorial. Without a good o'l tut, their wouldn't be a large fanbase and would discourage new gamers.

No tutorials please! Old school games hardly had any but unfortunately today's games do. One of modern games' most annoying issues eva!

Depends on the game really. Some games really don't need tutorials, but as some games are more complex tutorials are a must.

Yes, you are correct in some games. But I don't like to call them "tutorials" (such an ugly word); the exception of games that have done well teaching players would be Portal, Super Mario Galaxy, and Super Meat Boy.

Portal's tutorial took up 3/4 of the entire game, and was dull as watching paint dry. Not a good example.

Why don't you like the word "tutorial?"

OT: Difficulty levels, skippable tutorials, and some damned closure in the endings! I'm sick of all the sequel bait.

Don't know why I hate that word, but I guess from boring experiences, anytime I hear that a game has a "tutorial," I wanna scream "NOOOOOOOOO!!!!".

But I liked Portal simply because I was learning the game while just playing it; alot of games don't do that; they just present you with a bunch of boring tips when you can learn by just being thrown to the wolves.

Anyways, I don't have a complete solution to this whole tutorial issue. I wish that games would keep tutorials short and simple. I just prefer games to let me enjoy the experience and let me learn from my mistakes.

 

[Jake0fTrades]

A reliable auto-save feature, I remember going through Mass Effect 1 on Insanity and throwing my controller through a window.

 

[Radoh]

Working eyebrows. Not even being sarcastic, I remember one and only one game where the characters models had eyebrows that moved, and since I'm all for animated conversation with full interactivity with a character that blew me away.

 

[King Kupofried]

The ability to pause while offline.
Not many offend this anymore but a few.. *looks at Demon's Souls* It is just baffling that this is still a problem.

 

[FalloutJack]

Cheat codes, of course.

 

[Asuka Soryu]

A save zone in the middle of a game, so when you lose all your lives you can go to the middle of the level instead of restart the entire level, due to cheap deaths.