Carrion
Arcane
I don't think New Vegas' hacking minigame adds anything to the game, and a simple skill check could've easily replaced it. The minigame itself isn't terrible, but it lessens the importance of character skill since there's practically no meaningful difference between a hacking skill of 25 and 49 — as long as you reach the required threshold, you will be able to hack anything despite whatever cosmetic differences your skill level might cause. It also makes the unfathomable yet very common mistake of freezing time, just like the lockpicking minigame does. I don't know why you'd do that, since 1) the tension that rises from the possiblity of getting caught is like the most obvious benefit for having such a minigame in the first place, and 2) making time a factor would've been a good way to differentiate between characters of different skill levels.But lockpicking and hacking minigames? Just give me a simple skill check and be done with it. The lockpicking and hacking in New Vegas would be a lot more fun if having a high enough skill level to open a lock or hack a PC would automatically open the lock or hack the PC, rather than forcing you through a trivial minigame that gets old quickly. Minigames like that are kinda fun for the first five times or so, but then they just grow samey and tedious, especially in an open world game with potentially hundreds of locks to pick. The longer such a minigame is, the more tedious it can become: hacking in Fallout New Vegas is at least quick, but in Deus Ex: Human Revolution? Way too long and involved, breaks the game flow when you're sneaking through vents and trying to infiltrate a heavily fortified research station. I don't wanna spend half a minute on a logic minigame to hack the security console when I'm dodging enemy patrols and exploring hallways.
On the other hand Human Revolution's hacking is really well made, and the only real issue I have with it is that it's so overused. It makes good use of character skill, isn't unpleasant to play and adds a dimension to the game that goes beyond what a simple skill check can do.
As long as they're called mini-games, i.e. can be separated from the "actual" game, they're not taking the genre forward in any shape or form.I actually like mini-games. There are many done very poorly, this is true. That aside, I feel like they are the only way for cRPGs to move forward. They need to better simulate challenges outside of combat, and mini-games are the way to do that.