Tiny, insignificant details in games that really bother you

BrawlMan

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Still have PS3 Slim.
Good. Go to Amazon or your local second hand retailer whenever you get the chance. Or download everything on PSN. Make sure to download Part IV: Nirvana to get the true ending of the game. That is the game's major flaw. The final chapter and true ending was cut and sold off as DLC. The DLC is really cheap by now, so no big.
 
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The automatic lock-on system in Genshin Impact that makes it difficult in some fights to target the enemy that you actually want to. Most obviously Cicin Mages, but also if you're fighting two enemies with shields at once and broke one shield, when you attack the one that still has a shield and the other guy regenerates his, it's pretty frustrating. And Zelda did it right in 1998, and the zoom button for archers does nothing for anyone else. Why not just let me manually control my lock-on with that button?
 
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happyninja42

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This is one I've noticed a lot in Farcry 4 recently.

When a game makes an "unclimbable" slope to make you go around on a road/path or whatever......and the slope is CLEARLY something a halfway decent athlete, or fucking 12 year old kid, could scrabble up with zero issue. I don't mind if you want to make a slope unclimbable, that's fine (though I question the validity of it considering my own experience as a climber of random shit), but at least make it fucking steep! Not a slight fucking incline at like 45 degrees damnit! That's just silly!

On a related note, games that give you the ability to mantle up surfaces (like roof ledges to climb on top), but there is ZERO consistency to what roofs can/can't be climbed. Is it only the ones with dangly ropes off the edge to indicate "Climb here" ? No, apparently not, sometimes just a regular looking roof works. Ok so....then why is THIS regular fucking roof not letting me climb it damnit!?
 

hanselthecaretaker

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This is one I've noticed a lot in Farcry 4 recently.

When a game makes an "unclimbable" slope to make you go around on a road/path or whatever......and the slope is CLEARLY something a halfway decent athlete, or fucking 12 year old kid, could scrabble up with zero issue. I don't mind if you want to make a slope unclimbable, that's fine (though I question the validity of it considering my own experience as a climber of random shit), but at least make it fucking steep! Not a slight fucking incline at like 45 degrees damnit! That's just silly!
Well to be fair, if actually 45 degrees that’s half of completely vertical. So unless it’s a rubber tarmac or something it could prove difficult to impassible, depending on the footwear, gear carried, terrain type, wet/dry, etc. But certainly Ubisoft never took the physics that far.
 

happyninja42

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Well to be fair, if actually 45 degrees that’s half of completely vertical. So unless it’s a rubber tarmac or something it could prove difficult to impassible, depending on the footwear, gear carried, terrain type, wet/dry, etc. But certainly Ubisoft never took the physics that far.
Sure you could say someone in flats might have trouble...but this guy is simultaneously climbing vertical cliffs, mantling up lips of ledges and rooftops, base jumping, and a plethora of other activities, so I find it unlikely he's wearing inappropriate footwear, and is physically incapable of the feat. I mean I've clambered up shit that steep in just regular sneakers as a kid, and it wasn't hard. And since the gear he's carrying doesn't impact anything else when it comes to traversing the map, it just irks me. Every time my brain is like "ok I can scale that, that's totally doabl....oh...no...no apparently it's not doable."
 

Gordon_4

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The apparently rare ability for games to segregate their save game files. Mass Effect and Dragon Age do this properly, separating out each game started as a career/saga or something on its own and having all the saves in there. But Cyberpunk 2077 and Deus Ex for example are incapable of this in any meaningful way. So if I wanna start playing my street kid again, I gotta squint and make sure I choose the right save.
 

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The apparently rare ability for games to segregate their save game files. Mass Effect and Dragon Age do this properly, separating out each game started as a career/saga or something on its own and having all the saves in there. But Cyberpunk 2077 and Deus Ex for example are incapable of this in any meaningful way. So if I wanna start playing my street kid again, I gotta squint and make sure I choose the right save.
Well, on the bright side, at least they have multiple save files. OTOH, Konami did us all an inadvertent solid by making Metal Gear Survive so craptacular nobody would want to buy a second or third save slot. So yay Konami?

 

hanselthecaretaker

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Well, on the bright side, at least they have multiple save files. OTOH, Konami did us all an inadvertent solid by making Metal Gear Survive so craptacular nobody would want to buy a second or third save slot. So yay Konami?

Major Zero….is what its sales hopefully are for that crap. It’s almost like Konami went all-in on the Biggest Train Wreck train.
 
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This is one I've noticed a lot in Farcry 4 recently.

When a game makes an "unclimbable" slope to make you go around on a road/path or whatever......and the slope is CLEARLY something a halfway decent athlete, or fucking 12 year old kid, could scrabble up with zero issue. I don't mind if you want to make a slope unclimbable, that's fine (though I question the validity of it considering my own experience as a climber of random shit), but at least make it fucking steep! Not a slight fucking incline at like 45 degrees damnit! That's just silly!

On a related note, games that give you the ability to mantle up surfaces (like roof ledges to climb on top), but there is ZERO consistency to what roofs can/can't be climbed. Is it only the ones with dangly ropes off the edge to indicate "Climb here" ? No, apparently not, sometimes just a regular looking roof works. Ok so....then why is THIS regular fucking roof not letting me climb it damnit!?
Isn't the dude in Farcry 4 carrying like 14 guns at once along with hundreds of rounds of ammo? Yeah, anything more than a slightly steep hill really might be unclimbable.

I mean, it's one thing to mantle onto an elephant with ease while carrying 200 pounds on your back, but an incline? Yo that's unrealistic.
 

happyninja42

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Isn't the dude in Farcry 4 carrying like 14 guns at once along with hundreds of rounds of ammo? Yeah, anything more than a slightly steep hill really might be unclimbable.

I mean, it's one thing to mantle onto an elephant with ease while carrying 200 pounds on your back, but an incline? Yo that's unrealistic.
And scaling 50+ meters of rope, swinging like fucking tarzan, swimming with all the stuff instead of sinking to the bottom like a rock, running non-stop, close quarters shanking dudes to death, the list goes on and on. But, a slight incline?! THAT'S CRAZY TALK !!

That's the crux of my issue. He displays inhuman capabilities of physical dexterity and strength, in every other aspect of the game. Despite saying he's no soldier, he's immediately skilled at stabbing dudes to death from cover, every firearm and explosive he gets his hands on, flying helicopter cars, atvs, fucking ELEPHANTS. The ludonarrative dissonance is really high with this game.

It's hardly the only game to do this kind of thing, but it's really glaring to me this time around. I think because of just how much of the map is tiered mountains, with paths snaking around everywhere. My brain is looking at a slope going "ok so I could just go straight up to there, cut across, then scale that, etc etc." But the game is like "NO! ALL THAT IS OFF LIMITS!! Walk the path like the pleb you are!! You chosen son of kyrat with maybe mystic powers and illogical skill with things you shouldn't!"
 
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Asita

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And scaling 50+ meters of rope, swinging like fucking tarzan, swimming with all the stuff instead of sinking to the bottom like a rock, running non-stop, close quarters shanking dudes to death, the list goes on and on. But, a slight incline?! THAT'S CRAZY TALK !!

That's the crux of my issue. He displays inhuman capabilities of physical dexterity and strength, in every other aspect of the game. Despite saying he's no soldier, he's immediately skilled at stabbing dudes to death from cover, every firearm and explosive he gets his hands on, flying helicopter cars, atvs, fucking ELEPHANTS. The ludonarrative dissonance is really high with this game.

It's hardly the only game to do this kind of thing, but it's really glaring to me this time around. I think because of just how much of the map is tiered mountains, with paths snaking around everywhere. My brain is looking at a slope going "ok so I could just go straight up to there, cut across, then scale that, etc etc." But the game is like "NO! ALL THAT IS OFF LIMITS!! Walk the path like the pleb you are!! You chosen son of kyrat with maybe mystic powers and illogical skill with things you shouldn't!"
Related gripe: Carry Weight. To be perfectly blunt: It's usually implemented quite idiotically. Applied logically, your character will almost always end up carrying several times the carry weight that they should be able to well before hitting their weight threshold - even ignoring the actual question of how they're carrying them (the only time I can recall seeing that even remotely well handled was Death Stranding) - so the simple act of including weight as a mechanic is kinda in an odd place to begin with.

But what gets me is the hamfisted implementation. More often than not there's no functional difference for the player when they're at anywhere from 0 to 99% of their carry weight threshold, but then you pick up a teacup and boom. All of a sudden you're walking in super slow motion (if you can move at all) because you went from 99% to 100% of your capacity. If you're going to do weight as a mechanic then commit to it, damn it! Slow them down as they pile on more weight, not all at once at the end!
 
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hanselthecaretaker

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Related gripe: Carry Weight. To be perfectly blunt: It's usually implemented quite idiotically. Applied logically, your character will almost always end up carrying several times the carry weight that they should be able to well before hitting their weight threshold - even ignoring the actual question of how they're carrying them (the only time I can recall seeing that even remotely well handled was Death Stranding) - so the simple act of including weight as a mechanic is kinda in an odd place to begin with.

But what gets me is the hamfisted implementation. More often than not there's no functional difference for the player when they're at anywhere from 0 to 99% of their carry weight threshold, but then you pick up a teacup and boom. All of a sudden you're walking in super slow motion (if you can move at all) because you went from 99% to 100% of your capacity. If you're going to do weight as a mechanic then commit to it, damn it! Slow them down as they pile on more weight, not all at once at the end!
It makes me appreciate games like Uncharted more, where what you see is what you get, but of course other genres are full of stuff to find and don’t have that luxury of simplicity. Which is where it gets pointless to imbue a sense of realism involving carry weights. The more stuff a game throws at the character, the more there should be an appropriate system in place for it all. Also the more fantastical or mystical a game is, the more it should apply that same “logical” fabric to inventory. If a game insists on including a carry weight for items that can never even be physically represented on the player model, then there should be something like a Soulslike “bottomless box” that can be summoned from anywhere outside of boss rooms or specific story encounters. Or like MGS4’s Mk2/Drebin, or MGSV’s Fulton system.

Case in point, any game genre can have their own unique way of handling inventory, but it must be handled in a way that enhances the intended experience vs detract from it.
 
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After playing the Early Castlevania games, an older trope comes to mind. Auto-scrolling levels.

You don't see this much anymore and it seems to have died out a decade or so ago(as far as I know) for the most part, but the whole idea of being forced to progress not because something is chasing you, not because the ceiling is dropping from above and not because the death floor is rising. The screen just moves and if you end up on edge of the screen when it moves you die. And it's not justified most of the time especially since there's often a ticking timer that's making you hoof it anyway.
 
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BrawlMan

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After playing the Early Castlevania games, an older trope comes to mind. Auto-scrolling levels.

You don't see this much anymore and it seems to have died out a decade or so ago(as far as I know) for the most part, but the whole idea of being forced to progress not because something is chasing you, not because the ceiling is dropping from above and not because the death floor is rising. The screen just moves and if you end up on edge of the screen when it moves you die. And it's not justified most of the time especially since there's often a ticking timer that's making you hoof it anyway.
Only Nintendo and sometimes Sega still do Auto scrollers. Sega did it recently with Sonic Forces on one of the classic Sonic stages and it sucks hard. There are some indie games that do auto strollers but not many. I hate auto scrollers too. Especially if they're in a Castlevania game.
 
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Xprimentyl

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Not sure if I'd call this a tiny detail as it was quite prevalent early on in gaming and less so now, but games that count incidental, physical contact with an enemy as damaging. If a guy is coming to kill me, and we accidentally rub elbows in the process, how am I injured? Existence isn't a weapon; give your enemies actual attacks/weapons and let us battle it out on equal footing seeing as I don't see the enemy being equally hurt by physical contact with me.
 

happyninja42

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When a combat system allows for the npc's to literally defy the laws of physics, and change direction after already committing to a leap, to hit me. Like they leap at me, in the direction of 180 degrees on a compass, but after that, I've rolled to say 235 degrees or more to the side....and they just....float and rotate midair, to land their leap on my ass over to the side. This is especially annoying because of course the game never allows this to work for ME. If I have a leaping attack and they dodge, even if I have a fucking lockon mechanic....so sorry, you miss, try again.
 

Xprimentyl

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When a combat system allows for the npc's to literally defy the laws of physics, and change direction after already committing to a leap, to hit me. Like they leap at me, in the direction of 180 degrees on a compass, but after that, I've rolled to say 235 degrees or more to the side....and they just....float and rotate midair, to land their leap on my ass over to the side. This is especially annoying because of course the game never allows this to work for ME. If I have a leaping attack and they dodge, even if I have a fucking lockon mechanic....so sorry, you miss, try again.
This was one of my biggest complaints during my first playthrough of, sorry, @happyninja42, Dark Souls. Ornstein has a particularly annoying attack wherein he can spear you from across the arena, and he's flying for all intents an purposes, though it's telegraphed as a leaping attack. Sucks the most when he opens the fight with it as you've just come through the fog gate, trying to orient yourself, and he's already in mid air on a rail directly for you. Talk about a disheartening way to begin a tough fight.

Or how enemy arrows in Dark Souls shamelessly home in on you. They've the actual gumption to put a contrail on each shot so you can see how the arrows curve to find you. Meanwhile any arrows you fire fly straight as, well, an arrow.

And another thing! Why is it enemies can fire arrows at any degree of the protractor while the player is for some reason handcuffed to a very limited range?? You can't fire straight up, straight down or anywhere close. Example, the archer in the Duke's Archives at the top of the long ladder near the bottom of the shortcut to the bonfire; the angle from him to you at the bottom is probably about 10 degrees. He can hit you while you're standing on the ground at the bottom of the ladder, but the camera restrictions absolutely forbid you from achieving such an angle to return fire. Basically, you have to accept you're going to catch an arrow to the ribs should you find yourself needing to climb up the ladder. Yeah, you could argue that not using the "zoom in" function, you're afforded a bit more leeway, but at the expense of not being able to aim at ALL! In my many playthroughs, I've tried to figure out the mechanics of firing arrows consistently without zooming in, but that's about as exact a science as guessing which color car is going to pass by your house next.
 

happyninja42

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This was one of my biggest complaints during my first playthrough of, sorry, @happyninja42, Dark Souls. Ornstein has a particularly annoying attack wherein he can spear you from across the arena, and he's flying for all intents an purposes, though it's telegraphed as a leaping attack. Sucks the most when he opens the fight with it as you've just come through the fog gate, trying to orient yourself, and he's already in mid air on a rail directly for you. Talk about a disheartening way to begin a tough fight.

Or how enemy arrows in Dark Souls shamelessly home in on you. They've the actual gumption to put a contrail on each shot so you can see how the arrows curve to find you. Meanwhile any arrows you fire fly straight as, well, an arrow.

And another thing! Why is it enemies can fire arrows at any degree of the protractor while the player is for some reason handcuffed to a very limited range?? You can't fire straight up, straight down or anywhere close. Example, the archer in the Duke's Archives at the top of the long ladder near the bottom of the shortcut to the bonfire; the angle from him to you at the bottom is probably about 10 degrees. He can hit you while you're standing on the ground at the bottom of the ladder, but the camera restrictions absolutely forbid you from achieving such an angle to return fire. Basically, you have to accept you're going to catch an arrow to the ribs should you find yourself needing to climb up the ladder. Yeah, you could argue that not using the "zoom in" function, you're afforded a bit more leeway, but at the expense of not being able to aim at ALL! In my many playthroughs, I've tried to figure out the mechanics of firing arrows consistently without zooming in, but that's about as exact a science as guessing which color car is going to pass by your house next.
Yes this does seem to be very common in souls-like games. I noticed it a lot with God of War, and with some of the various souls clones I've tried out, like The Surge, and Nioh 2. It's very annoying.

Another thing I hate, is when the enemies will time attacks exactly right to prevent you from healing, or from being able to get up fully, or any number of interrupting things, that they somehow time perfectly...almost like there is a computer calculating and tracking the timing windows for the various actions, and having them wait for maximum trollage.
 
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Xprimentyl

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Another thing I hate, is when the enemies will time attacks exactly right to prevent you from healing, or from being able to get up fully, or any number of interrupting things, that they somehow time perfectly...almost like there is a computer calculating and tracking the timing windows for the various actions, and having them wait for maximum trollage.
Sometimes, enemies are programmed to read your inputs for maximum frustration. If you're both blocking, and you hit "X" to heal, they're "trained" to attack within the seconds of the healing animation. It trains the player to distance themselves before performing any actions that might make them vulnerable to enemies in close proximity or enemies with ranged attacks that can capitalize on "sloppy" play. Not saying it's fair or fun to learn, but, I've learned it.
 
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happyninja42

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Sometimes, enemies are programmed to read your inputs for maximum frustration. If you're both blocking, and you hit "X" to heal, they're "trained" to attack within the seconds of the healing animation. It trains the player to distance themselves before performing any actions that might make them vulnerable to enemies in close proximity or enemies with ranged attacks that can capitalize on "sloppy" play. Not saying it's fair or fun to learn, but, I've learned it.
The problem is that plenty of them are ALSO programmed to just fucking follow you, and they invariably move faster than you, have lunge attacks that cover half the continent, thus never actually giving you space to breath and heal.
 
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