Decline What is the single worst, most annoying design choice in a game?

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

1. Level scaling: Leveling simply for the sake of leveling instead of leveling to overcome obstacles, in order to progress, is lame. This is the main reason why I can't enjoy Bethesda's CRPGs anymore.
2. Trash dialogue: Dialogue should be utilized to improve world building or somehow be of importance to an objective. NPC farmer Bob talking about his farm life is not good world building.
   
3. Shit itemization: Doing a side quest to obtain a unique legendary item, only to find a better higher level common item five minutes later, is incredibly infuriating. I rage quit D:OS 2 for exactly this reason.
   
4. Respawns: Simulation is not irrelevant. Enemies respawning out of thin air, for absolutely no reason at all, is not particularly enjoyable, because it removes the feeling of accomplishment.

 

[Agesilaus]

bad camera angles (first-person or very close, over the shoulder third person).
Trash mobs trash mobs and more trash mobs (w/respawn so you never finish taking out the trash)
level scaling

 

[Glop_dweller]

RTwP combat

Could you get past that for BG2?

I much prefer turn-based combat by far, but have to confess that in BG the RTwP doesn't bother me at all.

What bothered me in the BG series, was the combat actions being conformed to the dice rolls—not the dice rolls themselves. An example of this is a moving PC targeted with an arrow that then flies like a curve ball, as it follows the PC to make the impact.

In Icewind Dale series... the AI was all knowing, and so if an invisible PC [turned visible] was spotted on one edge of the map—but became invisible again, then the entire enemy population would march in a bee line towards the party's spell casters on the opposite side of the map, regardless of obstructions.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

The problem with TB combat is that I never feel a sense of urgency. In RTwP, if one of my characters is near death I use my entire party to prevent it in some way. I'll use stuns/knockdowns from melee, heals, crowd controls from spellcasters, and consumables or self-heals on the injured person and what have you.
I'm sure it's possible to create that sense of urgency in TB, I've just never really seen it done. I wouldn't be surprised if people who give me examples end up listing almost exclusively phase-based or some variant thereof.


I have a feeling that a "turn-based" system with such a feature would end up being quite similar to RTwP except perhaps more elegant. In reality, it wouldn't be that much different from a RTwP game with autopause on action ended including the ability to interrupt a character's turn to redirect them, except with better UX than RTwP games typically have. Which is usually their biggest issue.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

RTwP combat

Could you get past that for BG2?

I much prefer turn-based combat by far, but have to confess that in BG the RTwP doesn't bother me at all.

What bothered me in the BG series, was the combat actions being conformed to the dice rolls—not the dice rolls themselves. An example of this is a moving PC targeted with an arrow that then flies like a curve ball, as it follows the PC to make the impact.

In Icewind Dale series... the AI was all knowing, and so if an invisible PC [turned visible] was spotted on one edge of the map—but became invisible again, then the entire enemy population would march in a bee line towards the party's spell casters on the opposite side of the map, regardless of obstructions.

It seems logical to me because they were meant to be PC adaptations of an existing tabletop product. There's certain expectations many people buying the product due to it being based on/adapting an existing product would have.
The illogical part is games which are inspired by them that include the same idiosyncrasies despite not being beholden to the rules and expectations of adapting material from a separate medium.

 

[Faarbaute]

What just turns you off completely from a game?

Like a deal breaker full stop - almost irrelevant what *else* is in. You find it *impossible* to enjoy the game if this one thing is in.

What is the single worst, most annoying design choice?

Procedural generation.

 

[curds]

Lengthy, unskippable intro sequences/tutorials in open-world games. For example, Oblivion/Skyrim/Fallout 3/4.

Weapons and armour having level requirements. There's no point for a low-level, weak player to explore in the hopes of finding some epic loot, since they won't be able to use it for 20 levels anyway.

Artificial stat bloating of enemies that are higher level than the player. This prevents low-level players from having the satisfaction of defeating a tough foe through sheer resourcefulness and cleverness.

In games which feature moral choices, they player is treated as evil for doing things such as asking to be paid for a job. Even the mighty Fallout 1 suffers from this at times.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Almost everything has been picked but:

• Verbose useless descriptions for every other useless background detail. (non verbose would be useless already)
• Dumbed down versions of good systems (i believe they call that "evolution")
• Repeated encounter design (or the lack of) over and over.
• Cool-downs

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Weapons and armour having level requirements. There's no point for a low-level, weak player to explore in the hopes of finding some epic loot, since they won't be able to use it for 20 levels anyway.

I don't even like equipment having attribute requirements of any kind.
"You can't use this axe without having 50 strength!!!"
why?
just make it attack slower and do less damage unless your strength is at or above 50

 

[Not.AI]

for long time i thought that level scaling was the worst design choice

then aod was released and i realized that i hate teleportation more

then poe was released and i realized that i hate braindead combat

then ... then ...

honestly it's hard to pick one

I started making a poll and thought it would be around 10 dealbreaking "factors". Then thought about last decade and realized there might be more like 50. Maybe even 100. Then realized I don't really wanna type 100 poll options and still miss some.

Spoiler

The handholding one from above is an example. Missed that one. Corridor exploration is another - forgot about those. (Yeah - Risen 1 was much better than 2 and 3.)

Yeah, maybe it should be a poll with more than one choice.

After all, a bad game only needs 1 dealbreaker in it per se, but the worst possible game would have all 100 dealbreakers in it? Which is common enough: they tend be correlated.

Spoiler

So there is a deep philosophical question ... If a game with 1 dealbreaker in it is already screwed per se, then what about a game with 50 dealbreakers in it?

Is it just *equally* bad? Or is it worse - which would be what?

Almost everything has been picked but: ...

I think we can get to 100. And that's just dealbreakers or close to dealbreakers. Bright people every year sit in rooms and think hard, apparently, to invent new ways to make games worse than before.

 

[Sunri]

Turn (sleep) based combat, so boring zzzzZZZ

 

[Funposter]

Long-form tutorials.

It doesn't matter how good the game might be once you're out of the tutorial. If you're wasting a significant amount of my time teaching me to play the game when I can intuit 99% of its mechanics within five minutes, then I'm going to be annoyed and turn the game off. Oblivion is a notorious example of how obnoxious this is, and I still remember being told by a friend that Final Fantasy 13 "got good" after it opened up around the 30 hour mark. I'm honestly willing to put up with sub-par mechanics in other parts of the game if you just let me get to the fun bits and play the fucking video game.

 

[Morpheus Kitami]

The worst thing that any RPG can do is make trash mobs tedious to fight. Not every encounter can be a winner, sometimes there has to be generic orcs getting slaughtered in some random cave. Their lifespan should not be numbered in a higher number of seconds than there are enemies. And even then, there is an upper limit to the number of enemies before this gets tedious. If every combat encounter is some long-haul tactical situation or even just watch dudes whack each other for a few minutes, its going to get boring very quickly.
Respawning very quickly is a close second, but very few RPGs do that, whereas more are tedious.

 

[MasPingon]

For me, there is nothing worse then first person perspective "cutscenes". It makes me automatically uninstall the game. Half Life did it good, you had total control over your character, since then it's continous decline. Metro is a great example of this terrible design, where even opening the door is fucking 2 seconds cutscene.

 

[deem]

Level scaling. Many have mentioned it in this thread already, many more will. I cannot think of a non-cynical reason to include it in a game.

Tutorials. I think they are a sign of lazy and unintelligent design. A good game, IMO, is a tutorial in itself. You learn new mechanics, tactics and threats as you progress. Good design will guide you while being invisible, instead of front-loading boring information.

Taking away agency from the player. Many incarnations of this shit philosophy. From camera moving on its own, to switching to walking during important moments, to arbitrary restrictions on how to complete a mission. Favorite tool of the designers with inferiority complex who want to make movies, but due to being talentless hacks, could never succeed in that field.

Cut-scenes masquerading as game-play. You're not fooling anyone.

Bad voice acting. I think the level of voice acting in video games has always been atrocious but there is one trope that irritates to no end. It is when you are interacting with a character that is supposed to have lived harsh life, and there is no grit nor character in VA performance.

There is lots more, but these are a few things that I can list off the top of my head.

 

[Rinslin Merwind]

From top of my head I can recall four horsemen of annoyance and boredom (just list, without ranking):
1) Level scaling
2) Endlessly spawning enemies
3) shitty controls
4) Weapons and armour having level requirements in singleplayer game

Now to explanation:
Level scaling - nuff said. People were shitting on Oblivion for many autisitc reasons, but this one flaw is reason why I wasn't able to feel comfortable at all in this game and tried to mod out it as much as I could. But no matter how you can try to mitigate such disastrous design decision - aftertaste still remains, because game was designed this way.

Endlessly spawning enemies - I can enjoy the game if it has only 1-2 levels/maps with spawning enemies (while clenching my teeth with annoyance), yet my eyes will roll every time when I have to slog through this part of the game.
I can play and finish the game if levels contain endless respawns (like System Shock series) and recognize good qualities of the game, but (it pains to admit it) I would think twice before replaying such game and my mind will annoy me with questions "from where these bastards even come from?" I also would try to finish such game faster, just to spare myself from prolonged exposure to such "immersive" feature.
"Honorable" mention deserve also respawns in Wizardry 8. People had many problems with speed of combat, meanwhile I quickly became annoyed and infuriated by sheer fucking amount of encounters without option to avoid, which respawn on top of that and wasn't able o bring myself to finish the game.


Shitty controls - if I am not comfortable with controls, I most likely will not play the game, unless I force myself to do this (I do not recommend playing console 3d platformer games on keyboard, this brings pain even after a year past completion, especially rainbow/carpet level in Italian plumber game, knowledgeable people will understand what I am talking about)


Weapons and armor having level requirements in singleplayer game - one of most idiotic things invented in history of mankind, if MMOs using this method as one of many crutches to economy (why nobody invented something better already ffs?) it does NOT means single player games should have this shit too.



At first, I thought adding RTwP combat to the list, but I considered several things:

1)there exist game with RTwP combat that I liked - Planescape: Torment, even though I liked it despite RTwP combat. And there pre-defined companions.

2) there exist series with RTwP that I cannot bring myself to hate - Icewind Dale series, never finished any game in it, but you can create our own party from start (which warms my long jaded heart) and it feels more like adventure than Bioware's crap, snowy maps is bonus.

3) I heard there exists a game with good RTwP combat (47 Calibre, I think?), never played it though

Still would play any future releases only if there Turn-based mode and mercs, because I can forgive devs of earlier games for trying blindly catch undeserved success of BG games, while new devs should know better than their predecessors.

Also, honorable mention of Might & Magic: World of Xeen, for making me starring blankly into my reflection on black monitor, while comprehending "what I am doing with my life".
Because this game has aging system and visiting shop takes 1 day and training yard takes +1 day per character in party. Look, I know that some people like shopping, but 24 hours is a bit much and it does not bring me joy knowing that every time when I forget something in shop - my characters 1 day close to death. It brings thoughts about my aging and demise, not very bright thought to have while playing game.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Controls is the tops. Depending on type of game this can be sort of an issue to absolutely destroy my enthusiasm. Camera and mouse countrols in FP are usually an issue but some are bad in 3/3, platform-like, and even eagle eye top down.

This usually councides with the damn interface. If a game is so fucking hottible I might try to map it via a third party program or to gamepad even.

Next would be pacing and time. If it feels like you're moving yurtle the fucking turtle and the game has hundreds of these walking forever quests I might just say fuck it. God I hate some of that slo mo walking speeds.

 

[Glop_dweller]

Weapons and armour having level requirements. There's no point for a low-level, weak player to explore in the hopes of finding some epic loot, since they won't be able to use it for 20 levels anyway.

I don't even like equipment having attribute requirements of any kind.
"You can't use this axe without having 50 strength!!!"
why?
just make it attack slower and do less damage unless your strength is at or above 50

Barring magical restriction [like Thor's hammer], it's because the PC cannot heft the weapon (or wear the armor) to make practical use of it; ie with any proficiency; so... any skill bonuses would not apply. It would basically be like attacking with a duffel bag full of rocks, or defending while wearing that duffel bag around the neck.

In the case of finesse items, those lacking the finesse to use them would probably break them, or not benefit from them.

*Still valid peeves though; as per topic. I agree that they should be able to try... at great penalty.

The problem with TB combat is that I never feel a sense of urgency. In RTwP, if one of my characters is near death I use my entire party to prevent it in some way. I'll use stuns/knockdowns from melee, heals, crowd controls from spellcasters, and consumables or self-heals on the injured person and what have you.
I'm sure it's possible to create that sense of urgency in TB, I've just never really seen it done. I wouldn't be surprised if people who give me examples end up listing almost exclusively phase-based or some variant thereof.

I have a feeling that a "turn-based" system with such a feature would end up being quite similar to RTwP except perhaps more elegant. In reality, it wouldn't be that much different from a RTwP game with autopause on action ended including the ability to interrupt a character's turn to redirect them, except with better UX than RTwP games typically have. Which is usually their biggest issue.

In theory, turn based mechanics are to segment the (fast) concurrent actions into discrete steps for the player to analyse; it's all taking place during the same few seconds. In practice there is the anomaly of walking a PC across the screen (past other threats), or using several healing items (ostensibly during) the opponent's melee strike. Not all turn based systems exhibit this problem in equal amounts.

The tension of turn based combat is not like NASCAR racers avoiding death, it's the tension of playing Checkers to the death; by guillotine.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Weapons and armour having level requirements. There's no point for a low-level, weak player to explore in the hopes of finding some epic loot, since they won't be able to use it for 20 levels anyway.

So many options to choose from, but this I loathe most.

 

[Tyranicon]

Did anyone else mention whatever that horrible armor system in DOS 2 was?

That. I hate that.

Also painting the combat zone with ouchie elemental tiles. Don't like that.

 

[Starwars]

I think mine is a sort of mix of modern itemization, modern crafting system and modern UI.

When you mix those things together, you get one big system that just seems to sucks all the fun out of the game. It's like an "out of the box" solution for game-devs, perfect for those devs that just don't care about the systems. And you see it in a lot of games, not just RPGs.

And it's instantly recognizable, when you start looting and you get loot represented with a gear icon, or items that get folded into the "junk" section of the UI. Ugh.

 

[Ulysa]

Trying to write a fucking novel in each scene description or dialogue instead of a video game.

In the same line, dialogues with companions that feel like a psychiatrist appointment. Do you start asking strangers about their past the first day you meet them? No. First show your characters by their actions and then I might be interested in them or not.

 

[Lady Error]

Anime weaboo graphics - not even once

Railroading - if it is hidden well enough like in Disco Communism, it may be okay to play once

MMO's - literal cancer

 

[ElectricOtter]

making ur game an rpg xd

 

[agris]

RPG games