Video Game Manuals - Where Did They Go?

[Shoggoth2588]

It's sad...We have freaking tree farms and you can make paper for game manuals out of hemp if you really want to conserve the trees.

I think a big factor though, other than the ecological one, is how everything is digital. Don't know what a Paladin is? Don't know how the conquer the Swamp Beast? Don't know what spells you learn as you level up? At this point you can go to one of tens-of-dozens of websites and find every last scrap of information you could ever need.

 

[MammothBlade]

It's sad...We have freaking tree farms and you can make paper for game manuals out of hemp if you really want to conserve the trees.

I think a big factor though, other than the ecological one, is how everything is digital. Don't know what a Paladin is? Don't know how the conquer the Swamp Beast? Don't know what spells you learn as you level up? At this point you can go to one of tens-of-dozens of websites and find every last scrap of information you could ever need.

Walkthroughs and game wikis are rarely official, though. That, and the point of manuals isn't really to hold your hand through the game, but to give you a basic idea of what you'll be in for, important things you should know about gameplay, something to wet your appetite, etc. Manuals don't even do that nowadays, and all that's left is a CD, a case, and a decorated health and safety booklet.

All superficial of course, but I think the finished package should be a part of customer service. Then again, often the game on the shelf isn't even the end product, and games usually require alot of patching from their original retail version.

 

[StarCecil]

It's sad...We have freaking tree farms and you can make paper for game manuals out of hemp if you really want to conserve the trees.

I think a big factor though, other than the ecological one, is how everything is digital. Don't know what a Paladin is? Don't know how the conquer the Swamp Beast? Don't know what spells you learn as you level up? At this point you can go to one of tens-of-dozens of websites and find every last scrap of information you could ever need.

Walkthroughs and game wikis are rarely official, though. That, and the point of manuals isn't really to hold your hand through the game, but to give you a basic idea of what you'll be in for, important things you should know about gameplay, something to wet your appetite, etc. Manuals don't even do that nowadays, and all that's left is a CD, a case, and a decorated health and safety booklet.

All superficial of course, but I think the finished package should be a part of customer service. Then again, often the game on the shelf isn't even the end product, and games usually require alot of patching from their original retail version.

I agree. A manual isn't a world-shatteringly vital thing to have, it was just really cool to have a nicely done one.

 

[ChaosEternal]

Yeah, I noticed this too. For example, when I played TES:Arena recently which was made in 1994 or so, I couldn't figure out how to attack or do much besides moving and jumping. There were no ingame tutorials. I had to find a manual online to figure out how to play the game. Now instruction manuals only tell you how to operate the main menu.

(As for guides, I don't bother anymore. Plenty of good online ones and I like to figure things out myself. Only good for 100% completion sort of tasks to me. >.>)

 

[Something Amyss]

Name some games with a small manual and a strategy guide out. Do it now. If you can't name 3 games with manuals under 5 pages and big selling strategy guides, admit this is a retarded point and say you're ashamed you typed it.

I'm not going to confess to a "retarded" point simply because you have set up arbitrary and frankly ridiculous standards to go by. Sorry, but if you really want to play that game, get a job for Fox News.

If you have to slant crap that far (five pages? Come now), then you don't have a point at all.

 

[MysticToast]

Oh man, I loved a nice, chunky manual so much. Now this completely retarded push to "go green" (I hate that phrase) has gotten rid of them almost altogether.

 

[Something Amyss]

Ah, I see, you know you can't, so when someone calls you out on the bullshit

If you call your making up my standards "the bullshit," Then yes.

But then, you had to lie to get there, and you got nothing. So I'm not too terribly concerned by your standards for "bullshit." They're probably just as made up as your standards here.

 

[Something Amyss]

Oh man, I loved a nice, chunky manual so much. Now this completely retarded push to "go green" (I hate that phrase) has gotten rid of them almost altogether.

Those two really aren't related.

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

Man I miss them...it gave me something to read on the car ride home.

 

[Iron Glorfindel]

I love manuals. The manuals were very good bathroom reading material, as others have mentioned. I don't have a smartphone or any of that stuff, so I can't "just look it up on your phone". I have a PC, which is on an entirely different floor than my Box and Cube. And I always seem to get a little stream of endorphins when I see a manual in the freshly opened box, but then I am usually disappointed once I see that it's only about three or four pieces of thin glossed paper.

 

[MysticToast]

Oh man, I loved a nice, chunky manual so much. Now this completely retarded push to "go green" (I hate that phrase) has gotten rid of them almost altogether.

Those two really aren't related.

You sure? I've seen it explicitly stated on modern "manuals" that companies are slimming them down in order to save the environment or something to that effect. It's one of the biggest reasons game manuals have almost disappeared

 

[EmzOLV]

I've been known to do this myself. Not only that, but I've also been known to grab a game case to read the back and admire the artwork while I'm on the can, if no other material was readily available.

I've done that too...
And I used to do it with album artwork and lyrics sheets on the insides of CDs.

I'm not sure whether I'm saying this with pride, or about to hang my head in shame.

 

[Something Amyss]

Only a tiny, tiny manual would be so small that it would leave out vital information that would need to be in a strategy guide. (Fact 1)

And you're lying on fact one. That's ridiculously disingenuous, and to try and hold me to that is just dishonest. So...Are you going to keep trying to assert lies, just to try and make me refute a claim on standards that are false?

Probably.

 

[Something Amyss]

You sure? I've seen it explicitly stated on modern "manuals" that companies are slimming them down in order to save the environment or something to that effect. It's one of the biggest reasons game manuals have almost disappeared

They've been slimming since the early 90s with no such notice. Many of the recent ones say no such thing. Probably most. most likely virtually all.

You know what's more probable than environmental friendliness? Cost-saving. Because even if you don't give a damn about the environment, you probably give a damn about money as a company.

Streamlining costs is a big deal. And a far more probable example of why companies are cutting back on manuals.

 

[Trivun]

Not only great bathroom reading material, they also were nice to satisfy you on the way home from the purchase until you could get to your platform of choice.

Exactly. I used to love reading the manual on the bus home after buying a game, I recall when I bought Alan Wake a while back I spent the journey home reading up on the Taken and all the characters, and when I bought the walkthrough guidebook I did the same thing then. What annoys me though is when developers spend time and effort making manuals that are interesting and a part of the gameplay experience, then suddenly stop. For example, Ubisoft. The first two AC games had little notes written in them from Lucy and Rebecca and Vidic, and it was almost as if the game manual was an actual Animus manual written, complete with emails, from Abstergo or the Assassins. Then for Brotherhood, I open it up eager to see what there is to add to the game experience, and find nothing but a brief rundown of the controls and a note saying that for a full manual you have to access it virtually, in-game. No fictitious emails, no extra backstory, not even any character descriptions. Just gone, to 'save paper'. I'm all for saving the environment, but seriously, how many trees are going to be chopped down for just a few extra pages per booklet? Couldn't they just use recycled paper instead?

 

[Jezzascmezza]

If video killed the radio star, then internet killed the game manual.

 

[Hein Rebel]

Best. Manual. Ever. !.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/7856600/Fallout-1-Manual