What frustrates you in games?

[Cloudane]

Super Mario Bros looks frustrating (language warning):

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or poker player tuff_fish dubbed over the same thing:

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[skateblind]

Lack of nudity, very frustrating when you are an adolescent

[Zetr0]

Controlls & Visual feedback
Poorly implemented "fixed" controlls or worse - poorly implemented character movement - this is epically important for Platform games

Random Battles/Enemies/Encounters
While I love random battle encounters (I am all about the GIL and XP) it can get a bit much in some games when you do need to get-somewhere (see FF8) - personally I like see a more finer balance - where by some areas have higher encounter rates etc.

anyway - back to the grips

AI
bad AI makes for a bad Game - especially if there is no 2 player to the game - then the AI really needs to step-up to the plate as they say.... a lot dont =(

this leads me onto -

Cheating AI
Okay argably unless we talk neural nets then all AI is a form of cheating - however some games are blatant cheats!! its unforgivable!


Bad Scrolling
Lets face it... when you are presented with poor jerky scrolling where it feels as though you have wait for five days for the screen to finally update - this cripples a game - and no I am not singling out any particular game that might be about deities here, theres quite a few high-profile nasties out there.


Random Death / Bad Sprite Collsion
Yeah.... lets be honest these games, y'know the ones where a pixel enters a 12 foot radias of you avatar and - BLAM..... your dead...

Some of these games are so bad that they should be wrapped back up and shoved so hard up the developers rectum as to enforce what collision detection really should be!
(lube is option but no recommended)


Random Buggy/Must install new update patch to play
The former "buggy code" is a bit of an anoyance for me, as I am sure it is for every one...from small graphical glitches to insane unforgivable loss of multiple-hours of play!!
normally because some one hasn't tested a save routine or was programming by braile - still - wheres the product testing!? --

If your car suddenly crashed or engine developed a serious glitch then one would be onto watch-dog in a heart beat!


The "must install update to play" is really part of the newer consoles - yeah you can argue the toss with the PC - but atleast for the most part those games try without it - but if you have a PS3/XBo360 - you suckered into waiting 20 minutes before you can play.... and the next time you sign in... they have nerfed with the game again GRRRRrrr!!!! ... yeah....I have issues.

Long Loading / Short Game times
This really pickles my patience! you install a game for about 15 minutes.... you then click on its icon or start it up.... wait for the updates and then you finally get to see the "un escapeable" credits list of everyone and their dog - only to then get into the menu system - tap one details in... select a controll method...hit play.... and then promptly wait at the loading screen untill your 5 year old starts university for the game to load.

there is one worse - not mentioning a "life thats halved by 2" in this matter - but in part - early in the game....you have a 4 minute load sequence.... 40 seconds of play.... and then another 4 minuite load sequence!!!!!

how this never phases the devleopersis beyond me!

[cosmicfrog]

yep ever game should have cut the crap button to proceed

when I play a game its sposed to be fun not want do x,y and/or Z just so I can have a laff and some fun

not to sure on newer games but on some old mutilplayer over the network games where its only you and your friend (if you have some ) Game dos`t let u add any bots but if you play single player there is lots of computer players to go up against

As Zetro said random buggy code, will it happen in our life time that dev`s will write some code that dos`t need an update. Crumbs this industry is 40 years old, in terms of aviation we have done low and high earth orbit, man on the moon, probs heading out of our galaxy, supersonic flight, fly by wire.... wonder if that need`s an update too just before take off ......

[deicidal]

Games that are rushed out to beat the competition, Sin was a god example of this.

Games where you cant skip the video sequences or cut sequences.

Cut sequences that are far to long, I am all for games with a story but sometimes they make you start to loose the will to live, FF7 was a good one for that.

Respawning monsters.

Games where they have spikes and stuff but the monsters can quite happily stroll through them

[deicidal]

Games that are riddled with bugs but are so good you cant stop playing them, Halflife was a good example of this, oh look im stuck in a wall again, oh the ladder or rope has just vanished thus leaving me runnign arround trying to figure out what to do and making me think im missing something.

[Nostalgeek]

"Cheating" AI for sure...

And also games where you can be stuck after HOURS of playing because you missed an item early in the game. This turns me mad.

[gimbal]

Game over isn't bad; in fact it is what makes a game a game - you can lose. It is the current development of people not liking to lose at a game that has made them all of the sissy-"Don't worry, I'll show a bright red arrow to show you the way and NPCs will moan what you should do next at every corner"-level (with a few notable exceptions of course).

I have had moments in gaming history where I saw the dreaded GAME OVER! or YOU LOSE! and I was still very much satisfied in stead of frustrated - as long as the gaming experience up to the game over is a heck of a lot of fun, I don't mind losing all that much. Ah I know some Age of Empires 2 multiplayer sessions where I was actually having fun getting my arse kicked. It was just a highly enjoyable battle.

[Cloudane]

Another one I thought of - crap endings. "I played all the way through the game for THAT?"

Originally Posted by Zetr0

Random Battles/Enemies/Encounters
While I love random battle encounters (I am all about the GIL and XP) it can get a bit much in some games when you do need to get-somewhere (see FF8)

FF8 is actually one of the lesser evils for that, as with a bit of effort you can get Diablos (and therefore Enc-None) as soon as you get the cursed lamp when starting your first SeeD mission. Unlike various others where you either get it right at the end of the game if you grind for it, or not at all.

FF10's Mount Gagazet, however, is enough to make me want to punch the TV through the wall.

[Jgames]

I'll start with western RPG's as it's my favorite type of games:
(In Order of severity)

0) Zetr0, for blasphemy against the Gods.
1) Turn based combats
2) Button mashing type combats
3) 3rd person non tweakable camera view
4) Bad designed dungeons, or simplistic
5) Bad designed outdoors
6) World that are too huge
7) Repetition
8) Too many quests and side quests active at a time
9) Too many quest givers NPC's
10) Huge amount of items (20 mushroom types, 100 knife types, 200 scroll types, 300 herbs types, etc...) very very annoying, clutters the inventory, and makes a mess of everything.
11) Underpowered and almost unusable weapons
12) Situation of non return, or difficult to return, (Oblivion hero changing to vampire)
13) Childish dialogues

[gimbal]

Originally Posted by Cloudane

FF10's Mount Gagazet, however, is enough to make me want to punch the TV through the wall.

The whole of the game makes me want to do that actually. No matter how hard I try, I just cannot find any enjoyment in it anywhere. And I do generally like Final Fantasy games :/

[Zetr0]

FF10 sucks so hard it put the milky way on a new axis when it was released... ugh...

Now dont even get me started on Kingdom Hearts.... I fear they had no choice but to make it so that they could return the normal axis of the milkyway - however because Kingdom Hearts sucked even harder than FF10 - it then brought the axis to far in the other direction so they had no choice but to bring out Kingdom Hearts 2 so that it could be sucked back on its proper axis...

@Jgames

Yes.... I have angered the gods..... but magic pockets epically sux! yeah... I was playing (loosely using that word here) Magic Pockets - I have more fun just listerning to the intro... man that game sux.

[AndyLandy]

Originally Posted by Zetr0

Random Death / Bad Sprite Collsion
Yeah.... lets be honest these games, y'know the ones where a pixel enters a 12 foot radias of you avatar and - BLAM..... your dead...

Some of these games are so bad that they should be wrapped back up and shoved so hard up the developers rectum as to enforce what collision detection really should be!
(lube is option but no recommended)

Absolutely! Clipping errors! The most prominent one I remember is the Captain Planet game that came with Cartoon Classics. On one of the levels you control a submarine and you have to guide it down a passage that's narrower than the submarine sprite! You have to guess where the sprite can overlap the walls. Get it wrong and death awaits you.

Also, something of a minor thing, but I never cared for big bosses at the end of a level on a platform game. I like platform games, I don't care for silly boss fights. The worst example being Sonic 2 for the Megadrive. Seriously, three bosses in a row? That's completely inconsistent with the rest of the game!

[Cloudane]

Originally Posted by gimbal

The whole of the game makes me want to do that actually. No matter how hard I try, I just cannot find any enjoyment in it anywhere. And I do generally like Final Fantasy games :/

It's the Marmite FF. I love it (apart from Gagazet), in fact I find difficulty in deciding which gets top place, X or VII!

To be fair, probably VII, for the voice acting.

Both are unfortunately very tedious if you want to do the hardcore stuff (X's Pokemon or VII's master materia sets for example) but the flip side is that it feels very rewarding when you do finish it. Same philosophy that many MMOs (especially EQ1) go by.

[cosmicfrog]

Originally Posted by gimbal

Game over isn't bad; in fact it is what makes a game a game - you can lose. It is the current development of people not liking to lose at a game that has made them all of the sissy-"Don't worry, I'll show a bright red arrow to show you the way and NPCs will moan what you should do next at every corner"-level (with a few notable exceptions of course).

I have had moments in gaming history where I saw the dreaded GAME OVER! or YOU LOSE! and I was still very much satisfied in stead of frustrated - as long as the gaming experience up to the game over is a heck of a lot of fun, I don't mind losing all that much. Ah I know some Age of Empires 2 multiplayer sessions where I was actually having fun getting my arse kicked. It was just a highly enjoyable battle.

well said gimbal

theres got to be a challenge and we can`t be winners all the time or we never learn to do anything different

[BrooksterMax]

My personal gripes are around loading and saving.

Loading - excessive loading, it is necessary and longer on older systems but I dislike things where you just move a screen to the left or right and have to wait ages! Particularly if you moved by mistake. Recent example - Yakuza 3 on the PS3!!! I run up a street and dang! More loading - in the 21st century!

Lack of saves or infrequent opportunity - nothing worse than going far into a level or game but not quite enough to get that precious resting point!

[deicidal]

@BrooksterMax

Agreed also the excessive time like in cannon fodder to format the save disk to its special format.

[PowerPie5000]

Getting juggled in the air by AI opponents in fighting games. Dead or Alive 4 on the Xbox 360 is a prime example! Your opponent will hit you up in the air and continue beating the snot out of you while you can't block! The only time you touch the ground is at the beginning of the fight and when you've been KO'ed

Oh yes and clipping errors make me mad!... I've been shot, stabbed and blown up in Battlefield: Bad Company 2 after getting stuck in a bit of the scenery or a wall

[Cloudane]

Originally Posted by BrooksterMax

Lack of saves or infrequent opportunity - nothing worse than going far into a level or game but not quite enough to get that precious resting point!

Looking at FF yet again, very much this in combination with the random battle days of old. I guess me and that series have a love/hate relationship

01:00am - Just let me... *random battle*... get to.. *random battle".. the next... *random battle*... damn... *random battle*... save point... *random battle*... argh there must be... *random battle*... one somewhere!... *random battle*

02:30am - OMG SAVE POINT!!!!!!!!!

08:00am - Yawn.... morning, boss...

[skateblind]

I didn't mind the random battles that much when I first played the FF games, but now they almost make it unplayable for me.