I always try to figure out which direction the game wants me to go so I can try going the opposite way first.
It’s almost frustrating to play something with no intended path because it takes away my option to deliberately take the wrong one.
There usually is an intended path regardless. Signposting is definitely something that’s done even in open world.
Doom 2
Old school Armored core gamer here. This is me.
Oh crap. I do it too. It’s useful in Rayman Origins and Legends. (Maybe once)
Developer: here’s a fun little thing people will be excited to find!
Player: I will never trust anyone again
I love it, when Devs anticipate that players might break their levels and reward them for it.
E.g. when I played Supraland, I had it happen several times, that I managed to get to places that were obviously not intended to be reachable - you know the drill: Low poly terrain, low res textures, holes in the terrain, invisible walls everywhere,… You keep exploring that wasteland, carefully managing to not fall of, go around a corner and… There’s a chest there waiting for you.
Or some of the coin stacks in Super Mario Odyssey, that you’ll never really see or collect, until you do some crazy trick jumps or so to get on top of $building.
Donkey Kong Country…
This is the one.
This is the exact same instinct that drives us to run away from the obvious path first. “Clearly that’s where the final boss is. Let me just check what’s down this way first…”
“…oh no wait, there’s a point-of-no-return ledge here. Ok, so maybe that other way was actually where the secret was. I’ll go back…”
“…hmm, there’s another ledge on this side too. Let me just put in a save point and…ok, yeah, this one is the final boss. Let me reload and check the other path…”
“…ugh, it restarted me way back here? And respawned all the enemies when I reloaded? That’s frustrating…”
“…THEY BOTH. LED. TO THE SAME. EXACT. PLACE.”
WTF I don’t come here to be attacked like this
This is why I have 120 hours in 40 hour games.
This, plus looking at a tiny little toe-sized piece of unexplored minimap on the opposite side of the world and thinking, “but what if there’s something important there?!”
This, plus dragging every scrap of loot back to town to sell, no matter how bad the value/weight ratio is.
Oh this one’s not me. For the first hour maybe but I get really picky really fast because it’s more efficient to just find a new place to take the best loot from. Especially in something like Skyrim where the goons just respawn forever.
this is the first time I realize where that sentence comes from. jumped ship from Facebook so long ago I didn’t even know this was a thing
I play games this way too, but I feel like the bigger factor in my playtime way higher than necessary is that I don’t want to miss any dialogue so I talk to every NPC until they repeat themselves. Most of the time that’s the second time you talk to them so I definitely get a lot out of that.
In Breath of the Wild after the tutorial plateau, players are supposed to go between the two big mountains that are easy to see and easy to pass for a beginner. There they find a steed and this weird korok guy.
I on the other hand decided to go the direct route up a steep cliff where two guardians wait to tell you that this is not the way. After I snuck past them, which took me about 2 hours and like 20+ retries, I nearly stopped playing cause “the game was so hard”.
I have a bachelor in game design btw…There’s an old adage that says “doctors make the worst patients.”
I wonder if the same is true for game devs making the worst players.
And then the movie adaptation of Ready Player One acted like placing something before the starting line is some kind of super-sneaky hiding method.
Tons of games did this in the 2d side scrolling period.
James Pond 2 springs to mind.
Didn’t one of the Spring Yard acts in Sonic 1 have a spreedrunner-friendly red spring too?
B^U
Ngl, I’m kinda surprised ol’ B^Uckley is still doing comics
Lego Star Wars instilled this as well as leaps of faith
Every single waterfall I find I must check behind it, forever.
I still get irrationally upset when there isn’t. But, if a game gives me a waterfall find (or 2, or 3 like Avowed) it will rocket to the top of my list.
Lived in a place that had a koi pond and waterfall fountain years ago. I placed a small adventurer and treasure chest behind it. Wonder if it’s still there.
For me it’s waterfalls - have to check behind every single one for a hidden cave.
This has proven to be problematic in real life, like when I visited Niagara…
I didn’t know Jeff Buckley’s father also draws cartoons 🤭
Credit to Tim Buckley for briefly becoming one of the most widely mocked people on the internet and spawning a meme that lives on to this day but just rolling with it and continuing with his dream of making webcomics.
Iirc correctly there was something about somewhat scamming his patreons or so. Ny memory is hazy but something about a drawing tablet?
Ah well if true then that sucks. I’ll have to look into this.
He tried to discourage people from going to a penny arcade convention and to his instead, didn’t donate to charity like he said he would and bought a 3k artist tablet instead, iirc.
