What Ruins a Game For You?

[Nargleblarg]

My first thought is that I honestly believe I would have enjoyed Too Human if not for its utterly hideous controls. THE F***ING R-STICK IS FOR THE CAMERA TOO HUMAN!!

*Breathe*

....anyway other than being unable to actually play the game the only other real thing that can ruin a game for me is if Characters are just badly written or stuck to a stereotype it's very annoying.

 

[Fidelias]

Sudden difficulty spikes are the worst for me, especially in RPG's. This happens a lot in the Final Fantasy games, you'll be playing the game, destroying random encounters AND bosses, then you get to a boss that demolishes you. As in, you can't even land a friggin attack. Then you're forced to spend hours grinding up your levels just for it to happen again.

When a game forces you to wander around to find the next objective. I don't mind if you have to, say, find an exit to a haunted forest. But if you have a game with a large world and the game just tells you 'EXPLORE!' and doesn't give you hints about where to go for the main quest, that ruins it for me. I like exploring in games, but I want to be able to get to the next plot area quickly once I get bored.

 

[shrekfan246]

bad PC ports(looking at you binary domain, WHY WOULD YOU NOT USE ENTER AND ESCAPE AS MENU BUTTONS)

What, you're not even going to mention how the mouse controls exactly like an analog stick would, making it practically pointless to not use an Xbox 360/PS3 controller while playing anyway? Yeah, don't get me wrong, as a cut-and-dry third-person shooter I've been having fun with it, but the PC controls are terrible.

OT: Hm. It's a hard thing to decide, really, because it's never really the same thing for me. I don't mind how lengthy and bloated the cut-scenes are in the Metal Gear Solid series because they're still usually amusing/interesting and the gameplay is phenomenal (in my opinion, of course), but the endless amount of cut-scenes and boring, bloated dialogue in Final Fantasy XIII certainly helped kill it for me.

Massive difficulty spikes are probably the only universal thing that will kill my interest in a game. If something has its health and damage artificially beefed up for no reason other than to be a bullet/arrow/magic sponge (depending on whether it's an RPG or FPS, etc.) then it really frustrates me and saps away my will to keep playing. For instance, the ridiculous spider robot in the ... second chapter? in Vanquish. I might go back and try that fight again some day, but it really made me feel like never playing the game again when throwing everything I have at the thing over and over again seemingly makes no dent in its health and then it crushes me in one or two hits.

 

[BENZOOKA]

Broken scripts. If there's something even remotely logical I do and I cannot continue the objective because of bad design, that ruins a lot. Especially in the beginning.

 

[Hydro14]

Hit-box to graphic dissonance in action games. As far as I'm concerned if the game is going to revolve around me moving the avatar out of the path of an enemy swinging a sword, I expect not to to take damage when the graphics don't collide. I have had this crop up in action RPGs more times than I'd care to mention.

Also, needless padding out of sections that does nothing except artificially lengthen the game. Yes, Xenoblade Chronicles, I'm looking at you. Worthy of a dishonourable mention is poor or no camera control as a few others have stated; it's not quite enough to ruin a game for me on its own though.

 

[MrHide-Patten]

I could not stomach the blatant misogyny in Metroid Other M. It was so bad that it tore down the dry wall and I saw an almost unconscious hatred/extreme fear of women by Nintendo.

Why does Zelda have to dress up like a man to be productive? Why did Samus's (Samuses?) gender have to be ambiguous in the first place? Why when Princess Peach gets a video game her powers come from this weird feminine thing called 'emotions'?
I could be here all damn day, sure big tits on a character isn't doing women a service, but this crap is downright evil.

 

[skywolfblue]

1) Bugs. Nothing like a crash, freeze, or characters bugging out on terrain to ruin your gaming day.

2) Bad Controls/Gameplay.

I'll forgive pretty much anything else, but those two are absolutely the worst.

 

[Smeatza]

A feeling of progression. If I feel like I'm achieving nothing I'm not going to be playing very long.

 

[Judgement101]

References to other games or a different form of media.

Spoiler

Prime example of this is The Witcher 2, you need to find a ring and then an entire scene is just a LotR reference

 

[Mikhael Angelo]

Okay. First and foremost, bad voice acting. That's something that gets me. When they sound like they're reading an essay on the dangers of Global Warming to the polar ice-caps and they just want to go home, I can't play the game. I don't feel like I'm into it because they aren't.

Then secondly and finally, lack of originality. The series that comes to mind is Call of Duty. It's the same game over and over and over. You're essentially paying $60 for an expansion pack when you get the game and it irritates me to no end.

Those are usually what turns me off to a game, but that's just me.

 

[teebeeohh]

bad PC ports(looking at you binary domain, WHY WOULD YOU NOT USE ENTER AND ESCAPE AS MENU BUTTONS)

What, you're not even going to mention how the mouse controls exactly like an analog stick would, making it practically pointless to not use an Xbox 360/PS3 controller while playing anyway? Yeah, don't get me wrong, as a cut-and-dry third-person shooter I've been having fun with it, but the PC controls are terrible.

I didn't mention it because having the mouse behave like a controller(i especially love it if the deadzone is not removed and the advantage of my 5600dpi mouse goes to waste) is in every bad port but it has been a long time since i saw somebody fuck up the menu that bad.

 

[Johann610]

Sudden gameplay changes: In Super Paper Mario, you experience a block-puzzle (okay) that can only be solved with a typing simulator! In Wild 9, you have to "carry something fragile"! In Return to Castle Wolfenstein (and No One Lives Forever*), it's instant-fail stealth levels! In Mystical Ninja 64, it's Impact, the glitchy bug-ridden FP-fisticuffs robot!
If I spent the game developing a style of play, why the hell are you taking it away and making me re-learn, from scratch, how to play!

*Technically does not count, because I just cheated and moved on.

Any grind of repetitive, pointless action over 3 days long: The reason Zynga can F.O.A.D.

 

[marobidoux]

Objective compasses. I can't stand them! It seems like just every game to come out these days uses them, too. This really hurt Skyrim for me. Human Revolution, too, although there were... other things wrong with that game, which I won't go into now.

This. I always end up following a little dot on the map or compass instead of exploring and enjoying the scenery...

For the same reason, I think Fast Travel kinda ruins the game for me. Just having the option to teleport from quest to quest ruins my experience.

I never, EVER understood this. If you don't like it...

DON'T USE IT

Like I said earlier, I'm not against all forms of fast travel. It's just that I'd prefer it to be integrated to the game world instead of simply being a teleport button to anywhere. Also, I don't mind showing major quest locations with a marker on the map, but if I'm supposed to search for something or someone in a medieval or low-tech environment, I don't expect to be assisted by UAVs and laser targetting.

I'd love to turn off the compass, but unfortunately I can't. So I'm stuck playing hide and seek with a GPS telling me where everybody is, whether I like it or not.

 

[ThePenguinKnight]

Grinding.
Lack of story.
Forced love interest.

 

[Nazulu]

Millions of things can go wrong. Most common I've found is crappy controls, poor dialogue, too much dialogue or too many cinematics, lack of different challenges and not challenging enough.

 

[DeathSwitch109]

Under...water...levels...

Unless it has this song

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7boeDmPBZX8

Then I'm getting mad while listening to a relaxing score...kind of counter intuitive. =P

Edit: Oh and escort quests. RE4 felt like one big escort quest but it was fitting, a cheap way to add suspense but it made sense. Plus you can tell Ashley to hide in a dumpster.

 

[malestrithe]

Not knowing where the story is. That was my problem with Oblivion and Skyrim. I kept playing, but often times I seem to skip parts of the story.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

The number 1 thing that will put me off a game before anything else is poor controls and the inability to rebind controls to whatever I want. No matter how good everything else is, I have to use those controls ALL game and even something tiny is going to eventually drive me insane. This most often comes up with lazy ports to PC that bind 30 things to 1 key and won't let me change it.

 

[arnoldthebird]

Poor game play. If I don't like what I am doing, I have no interest in everything around me.

And PC games that don't allow you to reassign keys, what is the point if you can't personalise?

 

[Grivahri]

Skyrim

Boring characters that you don't care about.