Several games have done a "push X to shoot your mom" sorta thing. It has some value as a stark (non)choice plot thing, I guess
It can be done well or done badly, but my point is that it can be done well, even if it is usually done badly. I like the concept of the denial of choice as a gameplay mechanic.
it beats video game choices but is still an annoying reflection of the severely restrictions on plots that also make interesting games
Which isn't qtes fault, but oh does it grind my gourds
Reposting since thread happened before I edited it in.
In my mind, QTEs go bad when they replace player agency, and a "good" QTE is one that enhances something you were already going to do. Like, you were already going to stab that enemy during that opening, and it was probably going to make him fall over from that last bit of damage anyway -- so why not turn it into something cool for having just a bit better timing? Big overblown sequences of QTE are bad because you're really just playing Simon Says while a cutscene plays.
The worst QTE I've ever seen was probably the cutscenes in Mortal Kombat X. Not only are they a bit pointless to begin with, but they end up having literally zero impact on the actual battles that follow. It's basically that scene in Kung Pow where Master Tang talks about a) dodge and kick the bad guy or b) take the claw in the face then roll over on the ground and die, but without the part where he actually dies.
That's a legitimate complaint when there actually is an obvious route to save both that the game jsut doesn't let you do because the writers didn't run it past an 8-year-old kid first.
^^^^ I feel it's most interesting when the choice is metanarrative rather than purely intradiegetic.
Which is to say, I like when there's a situation where the character might be limited in their choices because of the ones that you made for them, but you, as a player, have a choice as to whether to engage with the trap you've set yourself or reconsider your decisions.
That's a legitimate complaint when there actually is an obvious route to save both that the game jsut doesn't let you do because the writers didn't run it past an 8-year-old kid first.
Curiously enough
most of the time the complaint ends up being "WHY CAN'T I SAVE THEM BOOOOTH" and not "I wish the reason for having to choose was better constructed"
It's frustrating because so often "bad video game choices" are really "this game won't let me do whatever I want without consequences"
"but why CAN'T I save both x character and y character! This scene doesn't make sense for z reason! I want both characters to survive!" Tedious.
I hope it is understood that I don't mean that silliness
My issue is that games with plots are largely movies with the action sequences replaced by interactive combat games. Most qtes are just an acknowledgment that the game abstraction cannot handle an action that the movie character would perhaps perform. They are a re entering of the movie from the action scene.
In some cases as in undertale and mgs3 this can be exploited to act as a demonstration of a character's lack of choice. This is clever, but still reflects how limited plots can be. Annoying.
That's a legitimate complaint when there actually is an obvious route to save both that the game jsut doesn't let you do because the writers didn't run it past an 8-year-old kid first.
Curiously enough
most of the time the complaint ends up being "WHY CAN'T I SAVE THEM BOOOOTH" and not "I wish the reason for having to choose was better constructed"
I'd say the solution here is, if you want to force someone to make a hard moral choice, you make it so there really is no feasible third option. Present the possibility in theory, and then demonstrate how it would not work, or how the character is not in a place where they could see how it would work or make it work. Tie up your loose ends, firm up your foundations, metaphor your similes and so forth.
I'd say one of the best examples of a forced hand in a video game is the scene where the player has to use white phosphorus to proceed in Spec Ops: The Line. Because that situation was obviously labored over intensely to really feel like you had to do it to proceed, to where the only conceivable way around would be to just... pack your bags and leave the situation entirely, which at that point in the game wouldn't even seem like an option to the overwhelming majority of players so it makes sense why it isn't there.
And wouldn't you know it but players complained anyway because dammit, that scene is sad and it makes me do a thing I don't agree with or want to do so obviously it must be a writing fault. Tedious.
That's their problem, though. Your problem is what you can see, and what your testers can see that you couldn't. As a designer, your objective should be to create a game that you yourself would respect and enjoy, so as to speak to people with similar or congruent aesthetics at the very least and, hopefully, many others as well.
well yeah, I know, but this is just a complaint about a lot of gaming culture and discourse, or really just media discourse in general, where anything sad or frustrating immediately gets pinned on bad writing and not a genuine attempt to be sad or frustrating
well yeah, I know, but this is just a complaint about a lot of gaming culture and discourse, or really just media discourse in general, where anything sad or frustrating immediately gets pinned on bad writing and not a genuine attempt to be sad or frustrating
A lot of people don't like having to think about *why* a story does something. They just want to be entertained. Which is fine, but not every story is going for that. There are also, naturally, people who want to have their cake and eat it too with the the "games are art" argument, which is another matter.
well yeah, I know, but this is just a complaint about a lot of gaming culture and discourse, or really just media discourse in general, where anything sad or frustrating immediately gets pinned on bad writing and not a genuine attempt to be sad or frustrating
A lot of people don't like having to think about *why* a story does something. They just want to be entertained. Which is fine, but not every story is going for that. There are also, naturally, people who want to have their cake and eat it too with the the "games are art" argument, which is another matter.
There's several sides to this, because a lot of games clearly are meant to entertain, first and foremost. Spec Ops: The Line is not one of those games, but it presents itself as one initially. It put players in a bad situation and they chose to do bad things in response, if they wanted it to be nicer or 'fairer' then, i hate to be condescending but, they just didn't get what it was doing. That doesn't make it objectively a good game or anything like that, but clearly changing it in that respect would defeat the point.
OTOH @Kexruct i kind of don't agree that it's 'tedious' or risible when players complain that the game didn't give them the option to take an apparent solution to the problem at hand, and instead forced them to pick between two bad ones. Most players don't have a background in criticism so of course the complaint is going to be 'why couldn't i do x?' rather than 'why wasn't sufficient reason supplied to justify my inability to do x?'
A lot of people don't like having to think about *why* a story does something. They just want to be entertained. Which is fine, but not every story is going for that. There are also, naturally, people who want to have their cake and eat it too with the the "games are art" argument, which is another matter.
There's several sides to this, because a lot of games clearly are meant to entertain, first and foremost. Spec Ops: The Line is not one of those games, but it presents itself as one initially. It put players in a bad situation and they chose to do bad things in response, if they wanted it to be nicer or 'fairer' then, i hate to be condescending but, they just didn't get what it was doing. That doesn't make it objectively a good game or anything like that, but clearly changing it in that respect would defeat the point. OTOH @Kexruct i kind of don't agree that it's 'tedious' or risible when players complain that the game didn't give them the option to take an apparent solution to the problem at hand, and instead forced them to pick between two bad ones. Most players don't have a background in criticism so of course the complaint is going to be 'why couldn't i do x?' rather than 'why wasn't sufficient reason supplied to justify my inability to do x?'
It's a misdiagnosis of what the problem is, though, that's what my problem with the argument is. And while some of those people don't have a background in criticism and while that is a perfectly valid reason for me to not, say, bring up a random person's tweet and start skewering them for their Obviously Stupid Opinions, that lack of background is part of what makes the conversation so tedious and frustrating for obvious reasons.
There were a couple places in the later Mass Effect games where they actually did clean up the loose ends first. The Omega reactor comes to mind -- you're literally in an isolated room with a Big Red Button and thirty seconds to do something.
Of course, that game also has perfectly valid complaints about how playing the straight-laced Paragon only really bites you in the ass exactly once (Chambers) and even that time the Renegade option isn't really Renegade so much as "I understand how witness protection works".
They have plenty of background in games. They are used to accepting invisible fences and invincible doors as implicit game rules demanded by technical restrictions. But the implicit rule that all game actions must conform to a pre designed plot is more odious. It is complex and frequently unintuitive. But worst, plot actions are presented as taking place in a free world, not the game world. A restriction on plot actions is a reminder that this is false, and that the plot is mechanically a few button presses broken up by much more dialogue. This goes some way towards invalidating the player's transfer of game concepts (eg moral lessons) to their real life, among other things.
that lack of background is part of what makes the conversation so tedious and frustrating for obvious reasons.
Sure, i get that. But then, i think you tend to see more of the uninformed complaints when stuff is handled badly (outside of more ambitious games like the aforementioned SO:TL where yeah, i can see this type of complaint becoming frustrating)
i suppose for me this is kind of a case-by-case thing. Like, i think the reason people didn't mind the choices in the ME games was because, for the most part, you were given the options to do the things you might reasonably want to do under the circs, and sometimes bad things happened either way but at least then it felt like you weren't forced into those situations. There are points in the ME games that handled it better than others, i have seen complaints about, for instance, whether or not a character survives a particular injury depending on whether they're loyal to you. Point being that not all choices are equal, you don't necessarily expect to be able to predict the outcome of every choice you make, but you would normally hope there to be a link between cause and effect. But setting aside very specific instances, the games handled it well enough that people didn't complain.
The decisions that usually piss me off are more along the lines of choosing to kill the bad guy or save the hostages. Because more often than not, you have firearms and can do the former in less time than it took to even have the conversation presenting the choice, then go save the hostages anyway.
I honestly didn't care for a lot of the weird mechanics in 2's Suicide Mission? Because there's no diegetic reason why Shepard wouldn't do the loyalty missions; it's a choice that only makes sense to the player
okay yadda yadda yadda I'm sure there can be some justifications but point is, there's pretty much no reason why a Paragon or Renegade Shepard would go into a dangerous mission with a functionally infinite amount of time to prepare and then... just not prepare.
The decisions that usually piss me off are more along the lines of choosing to kill the bad guy or save the hostages. Because more often than not, you have firearms and can do the former in less time than it took to even have the conversation presenting the choice, then go save the hostages anyway.
Oh yeah, it's kind of unsatisfying when your choice is between two things that, within normal gameplay, you could clearly do both.
Exactly. Like, at least bother cleaning up the loose ends and say the hostages have life-monitor bombs tied to the leader's vitals or something.
Of course even that's tricky because if he went that far he might as well just make it remote too, then kill the hostages anyway after he gets away. And then that would penalize Paragon because then you lost the hostages AND everyone tending to them.
They have plenty of background in games. They are used to accepting invisible fences and invincible doors as implicit game rules demanded by technical restrictions. But the implicit rule that all game actions must conform to a pre designed plot is more odious. It is complex and frequently unintuitive. But worst, plot actions are presented as taking place in a free world, not the game world. A restriction on plot actions is a reminder that this is false, and that the plot is mechanically a few button presses broken up by much more dialogue. This goes some way towards invalidating the player's transfer of game concepts (eg moral lessons) to their real life, among other things.
This is a good point.
The analogous complaint in books or movies would i guess be 'why didn't they just do x? it's what i would have done'. Which can, obviously, cause people to dismiss concepts and moral dilemmas as invalid. In games it's more frustrating because in theory you are the one in control.
The thing about books and movies doing that is "the character was panicking and didn't think of X on the spot" is a perfectly valid reason unless X is screamingly obvious.
In a game, it holds less water because clearly the character (you) did.
Also like there's something that feels uncomfortably coercive about being forced to 'choose' to do something you don't want to do.
i mean sure you can turn off the console, but if there *really is* a better solution in plain sight, you want to be able to take it.
Obviously i'm not talking about instances where there's good reason you couldn't choose differently, where you're presented with a genuine moral dilemma.
ah, I see my complaint was misplaced. According to this lore manual, sneeple are allergic to plasma weapons, so I couldn't have told my sneeple follower character to guard us during the night, thus preventing Princess Hal's kidnapping.
By which I mean, that just restricts you as a writer uncomfortably. truly discrete choices are rare in life and we usually lack the information required to truly eliminate a course of action from our future.
If video game technology was up to the task, I'd love to have a free space to make choices without being railroaded into specific camps. But that's not really doable save for very abstract games or very small game spaces.
I'm not... necessarily a fan of BioWare-style choice, insofar as I think the emphasis on volume of choices to make leads to a cheapening of the device and makes a lot of the thematically interesting choices feel inert and unfocused, and because BioWare doesn't seem to get the difference between choice and roleplaying. But when I say "construct your scenarios in a more sound way" I don't mean "give numerous diegetic reasons for why your player has two big moral choices that amount to ticking "A" or "B" and are immediately obvious in their implications and consequences."
I mean that as games are currently, anything more elaborate than an A/B decision is nearly impossible, so you need to make the A/B-ness feel natural and not overtly "video games." Spec Ops was good at this, especially because it contrasts more naturalistic choices (even ones that don't feel like choices) to overtly gamey moments like when you're choosing to shoot a prisoner or a soldier.
This is totally irrelevant but the phrase "bat in [x] belfry" makes me think of the version of The Joker from The Batman, the one with green dreadlocks.
I think it was an interesting take on the character in retrospect and while it is not as widely acclaimed as BTAS or Brave & The Bold, I still think it's pretty good.
Comments
it beats video game choices but is still an annoying reflection of the severely restrictions on plots that also make interesting games
Which isn't qtes fault, but oh does it grind my gourds
Which is to say, I like when there's a situation where the character might be limited in their choices because of the ones that you made for them, but you, as a player, have a choice as to whether to engage with the trap you've set yourself or reconsider your decisions.
I hope it is understood that I don't mean that silliness
My issue is that games with plots are largely movies with the action sequences replaced by interactive combat games. Most qtes are just an acknowledgment that the game abstraction cannot handle an action that the movie character would perhaps perform. They are a re entering of the movie from the action scene.
In some cases as in undertale and mgs3 this can be exploited to act as a demonstration of a character's lack of choice. This is clever, but still reflects how limited plots can be. Annoying.
I'd say the solution here is, if you want to force someone to make a hard moral choice, you make it so there really is no feasible third option. Present the possibility in theory, and then demonstrate how it would not work, or how the character is not in a place where they could see how it would work or make it work. Tie up your loose ends, firm up your foundations, metaphor your similes and so forth.
A lot of people don't like having to think about *why* a story does something. They just want to be entertained. Which is fine, but not every story is going for that. There are also, naturally, people who want to have their cake and eat it too with the the "games are art" argument, which is another matter.
That.
being reminded that it is a movie, and that any opportunities for changing anything are carefully limited by the designers, is frustrating
Even if the event in question is well written as a movie
Oh, yeah, that was brutal, i actually felt really sorry for the bastard.
Yeah...
I think I like being emotionally kicked in the gut for some reason.
OTOH @Kexruct i kind of don't agree that it's 'tedious' or risible when players complain that the game didn't give them the option to take an apparent solution to the problem at hand, and instead forced them to pick between two bad ones. Most players don't have a background in criticism so of course the complaint is going to be 'why couldn't i do x?' rather than 'why wasn't sufficient reason supplied to justify my inability to do x?'
Sure, i get that. But then, i think you tend to see more of the uninformed complaints when stuff is handled badly (outside of more ambitious games like the aforementioned SO:TL where yeah, i can see this type of complaint becoming frustrating)
i suppose for me this is kind of a case-by-case thing. Like, i think the reason people didn't mind the choices in the ME games was because, for the most part, you were given the options to do the things you might reasonably want to do under the circs, and sometimes bad things happened either way but at least then it felt like you weren't forced into those situations. There are points in the ME games that handled it better than others, i have seen complaints about, for instance, whether or not a character survives a particular injury depending on whether they're loyal to you. Point being that not all choices are equal, you don't necessarily expect to be able to predict the outcome of every choice you make, but you would normally hope there to be a link between cause and effect. But setting aside very specific instances, the games handled it well enough that people didn't complain.
The analogous complaint in books or movies would i guess be 'why didn't they just do x? it's what i would have done'. Which can, obviously, cause people to dismiss concepts and moral dilemmas as invalid. In games it's more frustrating because in theory you are the one in control.
i mean sure you can turn off the console, but if there *really is* a better solution in plain sight, you want to be able to take it.
Obviously i'm not talking about instances where there's good reason you couldn't choose differently, where you're presented with a genuine moral dilemma.
I think nerds hated it because it wasn't part of the DCAU and kept Batman villains out of JLU