"Wait, I can do that?"

[megamanenm]

Legend of Dragoon, I never figured out what a certain item did, whenever I used it on an ally it did nothing. It turned out that this was the revive function pretty much. So I actually beat the entire game without reviving a single party member. I had so much fun fighting bosses with insta-kill attacks

In my defense I was about 10, it was my first RPG, and I couldn't read English very well at all.

 

[Spy_Guy]

There's a sprint button in Skyrim! O.O

This blew my mind when I first realized.

IT BLEW MINE TOO!

I noticed that there was a blocking perk that mentioned sprinting, so I checked the control menu and nearly yelped. This was 50 hours in.

After finding it, like 20 whole minuets later were dedicated to running around the place in joy knowing I no longer need to mildly jog around the whole of Skyrim. X3

...or constantly getting mauled by sabre cats.

My bro came in and went "you know you can sprint, right?" and I was like "Bwaaaaaah?"

My first moment like that was in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga. I didn't know you could attack Queen Bean's arms in order to make her drop her crown and be vulnerable to powerful attacks... so I just used hammers for one damage per hit for the entire battle.
Then I saw the following video:


As I said back then...
Fail on me.

 

[Jonsbax]

When I replayed Silent Hill 2, only to discover that you can control the camera a bit by pressing L2... Probably would have helped a bit to end frustration, even if I played through the first time without getting close to dying, had enough ammunition to turn 50 elephants into Swiss cheese, and enough medicine to make 50 elephants OD.

On that note, it appears that no one realizes that in SH2 and SH3, pressing both sidestep buttons makes the character do a fast 180.

This is IMMEASURABLY HELPFUL on a low-kill run.

Wouldn't it be easier to just turn the movement control to "2D"? Since that basically makes the game control like any action-adventure game, meaning James just walks at the direction you press with the stick, allowing for quick and precise turns unlike the 3D (aka. tank) control scheme.

I used the tank controls only after finishing SH2 and 3 both at least 3 times, just to give the games a bit of a different feel and some minor extra challenge.

 

[Dys]

I kept myself in the dark to everything related to Skyrim and sorta went through the game like a mad man granted I sank in over 200 hours and counting but it wasn't until 150 hours in or so I found out the game has fast travel, yeah so I quickly realized that my 200+ hours are easily brought down to 30 hours at most.
No wonder I wasn't liking this game like everyone else

I'm guessing you've never played the Elder Scrolls before?

Morrowind never had fast travel (the silt striders/boats where, but they still forced a reasonable level of exploration).

When I realised that not destroying the AI eyes in AI war made me not die horribly it was a pretty big discovery.

 

[Some_weirdGuy]

I found out after quite a while in soul calibur 3 that you could actually guard against colossus' attacks. Made it much easier to fight him, though the experience felt somewhat cheapened...

A giant statue whose fist is larger than my body, yet i can block his attacks so that instead of taking damage I just flinch? No, something that big should plow right through my guard and give me a thorough smack down for even trying such foolish shenanigans >.<

I mean, you can dodge to the side and circle around his feet, so it's not like it's that hard without being able to guard, his attacks are even in slow motion.


... oh well.

 

[Hattingston]

Didn't know Morrowind had a main quest. Just explored, still spent dozens, if not hundreds of hours playing though (xbox). Never did find the main quest.

 

[Ddgafd]

I played through Red Dead Redemption and never noticed that you could buy ammo in stores.

 

[Ziame]

jedi outcast. pillars in last level. squashed boss. reaction of mine:

Spoiler

 

[TitanAtlas]

Half Life 2 Ravenholm....

The first time i played that section of the game... i didn't knew anything, barely had ammo, and the fast zombies scared the shizzles out from me.

But then i discovered i could hide under the saws for example... or make cars drop on zombies... or even shoot the fast zombies has they are climbing the pipelines of a building...

Ravenholm became much less scary... now i just do it has easy has everything... but in my first time passing through... goddam...

 

[illas]

Any new Mario Kart game yields the following revelation for some: "wait! you mean I can fire shells backwards?!"

 

[The Dutchess]

I just found that Skyrim does actually have hotkeys, after 101 hours of playing. In my defence, it seems like no one else realised this either ("wah, Bethesda sucks and didn't even let us use hotkeys!").

Wait you can use hotkeys? Good thing I'm not very far in ... guess this is my answer to the topic! lol

 

[phantasmalWordsmith]

Oh I have a lot of stories like theses...

Monster Hunter (FU) - Didn't realise I could use items with the the weapon unsheathed with the sword and shield.

Fallout 3 - Flashlight, water drinking and companions besides Dogmeat. Oddly enough, when I learned these things, I continued to not use them until NV where I went around with Rex and Boone, the water stopped being irradiated and...Actually, I still don't use the flashlight

Bayonetta - Halo Farming eluded me for a while so I was unable to get a hold of Alt weapons and the accessories

Dark Souls - A lot of Dark Souls was this for me; Kindling being one example. And what's this about double estus flask or something?

God Eater Burst - I just learned, literally minutes ago, that I could command the rest of my party by pressing select twice. Would have made multi-boss missions a lot easier...

 

[lacktheknack]

When I replayed Silent Hill 2, only to discover that you can control the camera a bit by pressing L2... Probably would have helped a bit to end frustration, even if I played through the first time without getting close to dying, had enough ammunition to turn 50 elephants into Swiss cheese, and enough medicine to make 50 elephants OD.

On that note, it appears that no one realizes that in SH2 and SH3, pressing both sidestep buttons makes the character do a fast 180.

This is IMMEASURABLY HELPFUL on a low-kill run.

Wouldn't it be easier to just turn the movement control to "2D"? Since that basically makes the game control like any action-adventure game, meaning James just walks at the direction you press with the stick, allowing for quick and precise turns unlike the 3D (aka. tank) control scheme.

I used the tank controls only after finishing SH2 and 3 both at least 3 times, just to give the games a bit of a different feel and some minor extra challenge.

Well, I personally prefer tank controls, and when I tried the 2D ones, I kept getting stuck in "derpy dance loops" with some of the camera changes (where you take a step, the camera changes, you automatically take a step back, camera changes back).

 

[Brandon237]

This was my friend actually, but he played through the entirety of Dead Space without knowing about stasis.

But... what... HOW?! I thought that it was required to get through a crap-ton of broken doors and that stupidly invincible regenerating thing! If he either managed that all just without those functions through skill or glitches, he deserves a medal.

In fallout 3, where you press the button to drink water? Hold it down. You keep drinking. The amount of bricks I shat when I first found this out. Last year. November. I've been playing Fallout 3 since the month it came out. The amount of time I've spent pressing buttons to drink water for radiatio n when I could have spent more time in VATS with my fists.

I feel so incredibly stupid now >.<

 

[Vorlayn]

The very first Command and Conquer. I got to mission four (with EXTREME difficulty) before I realised that useless looking MCV thing allowed me to build stuff...and that an APC could drive over infantry.

 

[HellRaid]

In Sonic & Knuckles, in the Doomsday Zone. I didn't realise that you could press A, B or C to gain a speed boost. I failed several games (using all my collected lives and continues) on that level trying to do it without the boost... for at least 4 years.

 

[Snowblindblitz]

I went through most of the Riddler object challenge...thingies in Arkham City without even realizing that you can hold down the pressure plate with exploding gel.

Did not know this, didn't wanna look it up, but damn, that's obvious.

I have to say, the first time I figure out some cut scenes are shippable in games. Especially after watching them 5 or 6 times during one of those pesky "save before a boss fight" moments.

edit: The Robot boss fight in Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay. I kept getting my ass kicked, before a friend watching said "hey, just shoot those barrels passing by up top to fall on it"

FACEPALM

 

[Treblaine]

Played all the way through Halo and never used the pistol, I immediately switched it out for the rifle and consistently ignored it right through to the end.

Turns out it was the most powerful weapons in the game...

I only had two weapons to carry at a time, and COME ON, the pistol is ALWAYS the weak starting weapon just there pretty much to say "wow, you are so starting as the under-dog, you pistol is just a desperate weapon to get better guns". It jsut defies logic that such a small weapon should be so powerful, accurate and fast!

 

[Vanitas likes Bubbles]

Well I got my xbox 360 with mass effect 2. Having never played any of the games before I didnt realise you had powers. Then when I started my second playthrough I found about the powers. Therfore with the addition of the powers it made the game incredibly more fun for me and have gone from hating Mass effect 2 to loving the series.

 

[ObsessiveSketch]

I had a similar experience with SimAnt. Something to do with flying and propagating in other yard-squares.

Also, watching Jimquisition on "Angry Birds" I was shocked to see the various abilities displayed by the different birds. I had always bashed AB for having no basic gameplay innovations, and here it was staring me in the face. Turned out I'd never played enough of the game to realize the birds had abilities.

Also, I've been told that Portal 2 has lots of these moments. Stories are everywhere of how a puzzle seems impossible....only because you forgot you were holding a gun that shoots portals. With all the new mechanics and puzzle elements, the portal gun was sometimes forgot in the shuffle (even though it's sitting in front of your gob the whole time.)