Starfield Thread - now with Shattered Space horror expansion

[Decado]

In conversations about Starfield I have frequently referenced Elite, because that is currently the only game that gets spaceflight "correct" in my opinion. That level of detail and complexity is likely too much for your average Bethesda-enjoyer, but they certainly could have learned a few lessons from Frontier and built their space-flight portion of the game with a more deliberate focus, especially for a game called "Starfield."

The on-foot exploration of planets and environments is a different beast altogether. You cannot procedurally generate your way out of the chief design problem, which is that if you want a bunch of walkable and interesting planets to explore, you need designers to handcraft them or, at least, hand-finish them.

 

[Yosharian]

Elite Dangerous is hardly perfect either, there's fucking drag in space according to FDev

Sound also travels in space apparently

 

[Gargaune]

It's fascinating watching how some design flaws persist for decades across a product line. I just had this weird curiosity and checked out another Gopher Starfield video that appeared in my feed, and noticed how he was managing Andreja's inventory... Click on the "let's trade gear", she spouts off a long response line ("I have never been one to shy away from shouldering my share of a heavy load", not making this shit up), and then the inventory UI pops up.

This sort of substandard interaction queing and prioritising has been a problem in Bethesda games since forever. Basically, the game wastes your fucking time. Consider how annoying it is when Fallout 4 pulls the same crap when you engage a farming settler in conversation - they SLOOOOOOWLY put their crap away, wipe their hands and get up, and then you can finally talk. Same thing applies to sleeping NPCs, you're just standing there for ages while their dumb asses get out of bed. In fact, there was a mod for Fo4 that corrected this behaviour by having conversation initiate immediately, and the animation state change while you were already talking, but apparently it triggered some bugs (in a Bethesda game, inconceivable, I know). For another example going further back (tangential but still part of the same flawed approach), I remember my rifle jamming with a Super Mutant bearing down on me in Fallout 3, and I'm mashing the shotgun's hotkey but the game's stuck playing loops of trying to reload the bloody rifle due to its poor condition. And Skyrim had a mod that just quickened up your pointlessly-long dismount animation.

Going back to the starting example, the implementation has actually gotten worse since Skyrim because of the written line - Lydia would just gripe that she was "sworn to carry your burdens" so it was relatively quick, but now this Andreja doorknob subjects you to her life story before you get to do routine stuff. It's idiotic, the line doesn't add anything and there's no reason not to display the UI right away and have it play in the background.

I know that it's a relatively small thing to gripe about in the sea of fail that Starfield seemingly is, but like I said, it's gotten to the point it's fascinating to observe. I've speculated that it might be due to an overfamiliarised QA crew that just stops noticing this shit, but this is a very long time to be using the same staffers in testing... I can't tell whether the point of failure is in the feedback or the receiver.

 

[Child of Malkav]

I know that it's a relatively small thing to gripe about

It's always the little things that push you over the edge.

 

[Kiste]

The - whatever it is, let's call it modularity - fits perfectly well with open world wandering, emergent gameplay and small interesting quests you stumble across, but when something is presented as an MQ or a major SQ in a Bethesda game, you kind of feel it's just a module that's been slotted into the game

That's because that's exactly what it is. The MQ in Bethesda games is just a module that's been slotted into the game and into the open world, like any other quest, whereas most other CRPGs construct their locations (more or less) around the central main quest narrative.

 

[Iucounu]

Going back to the starting example, the implementation has actually gotten worse since Skyrim because of the written line - Lydia would just gripe that she was "sworn to carry your burdens" so it was relatively quick, but now this Andreja doorknob subjects you to her life story before you get to do routine stuff. It's idiotic, the line doesn't add anything and there's no reason not to display the UI right away and have it play in the background.

I know that it's a relatively small thing to gripe about in the sea of fail that Starfield seemingly is, but like I said, it's gotten to the point it's fascinating to observe. I've speculated that it might be due to an overfamiliarised QA crew that just stops noticing this shit, but this is a very long time to be using the same staffers in testing... I can't tell whether the point of failure is in the feedback or the receiver.

This has annoyed me in a few games as well (not just Bethesda's). I suspect developers are in love with their animations and voice actors, they can't fathom that the player just wants to trade and so want to force the player to watch their cutscene masterpiece.

If developers really want players to pay attention to such generic NPC lines, there needs to be variation with lots of different lines every time, not the same tiresome one always. But even then the UI should indeed be accessible right away.

 

[gurugeorge]

It's fascinating watching how some design flaws persist for decades across a product line. I just had this weird curiosity and checked out another Gopher Starfield video that appeared in my feed, and noticed how he was managing Andreja's inventory... Click on the "let's trade gear", she spouts off a long response line ("I have never been one to shy away from shouldering my share of a heavy load", not making this shit up), and then the inventory UI pops up.

This sort of substandard interaction queing and prioritising has been a problem in Bethesda games since forever. Basically, the game wastes your fucking time. Consider how annoying it is when Fallout 4 pulls the same crap when you engage a farming settler in conversation - they SLOOOOOOWLY put their crap away, wipe their hands and get up, and then you can finally talk. Same thing applies to sleeping NPCs, you're just standing there for ages while their dumb asses get out of bed. In fact, there was a mod for Fo4 that corrected this behaviour by having conversation initiate immediately, and the animation state change while you were already talking, but apparently it triggered some bugs (in a Bethesda game, inconceivable, I know). For another example going further back (tangential but still part of the same flawed approach), I remember my rifle jamming with a Super Mutant bearing down on me in Fallout 3, and I'm mashing the shotgun's hotkey but the game's stuck playing loops of trying to reload the bloody rifle due to its poor condition. And Skyrim had a mod that just quickened up your pointlessly-long dismount animation.

Going back to the starting example, the implementation has actually gotten worse since Skyrim because of the written line - Lydia would just gripe that she was "sworn to carry your burdens" so it was relatively quick, but now this Andreja doorknob subjects you to her life story before you get to do routine stuff. It's idiotic, the line doesn't add anything and there's no reason not to display the UI right away and have it play in the background.

I know that it's a relatively small thing to gripe about in the sea of fail that Starfield seemingly is, but like I said, it's gotten to the point it's fascinating to observe. I've speculated that it might be due to an overfamiliarised QA crew that just stops noticing this shit, but this is a very long time to be using the same staffers in testing... I can't tell whether the point of failure is in the feedback or the receiver.

I think it's alright like the first couple of times you do x, to have it animated in detail and all that, because the first time you play you're engrossed in the immersion of it, it feels like a real world, etc. At least it's like that for me, and I think probably for most people who play games. First time's charming. But it's a developer sin to not make those things easily skippable - by the time you're going back and forth busy doing shit, that level of detail is a waste of time.

But of course a lot depends on how well the puppet show is done. If it's nicely done, you can enjoy it a few times, if not, then it's even more of an intrusion. Bethesda have just never been very good at the puppet show side of things.

I was reminded of that just the other day when I saw a YT vid where someone talked about Troika's old vampire game in passing, and remarked on how good the facial animations are even to this day - and it's true, they're head and shoulders (ahem) above anything Bethesda has done.

 

[kites]

I think QoL stuff like those “small” gripes (that add up, but easily could be fixed) is due to QA being given less importance, and maybe even that teams have become so large that nobody really feels a sense of ownership over the what they are making any more. It’s just punching the clock; less enthused hobbyists, more corporate lifers who only care about the holy $$. Even in the bigger companies of the 90’s like Interplay, you have lots of people who want to play the newest build of FO1 on their own time and give feedback to the small crew to help make it great.

Another piece of the pie also probably that instead of going “gold” and creating something mostly immutable you’re able to easily push out the release of what should be considered the beta - then only patch out the game-breaking bugs people are loudest about and quickly move on to hyping up the next big thing..

 

[I eat frozen vegetables]

Bethesda tried to make their own version of No Man's Sky and they fucked it up. Unlike No Man's Sky, there's no redemption in sight.

It's fascinating watching how some design flaws persist for decades across a product line. I just had this weird curiosity and checked out another Gopher Starfield video that appeared in my feed, and noticed how he was managing Andreja's inventory... Click on the "let's trade gear", she spouts off a long response line ("I have never been one to shy away from shouldering my share of a heavy load", not making this shit up), and then the inventory UI pops up.

This sort of substandard interaction queing and prioritising has been a problem in Bethesda games since forever. Basically, the game wastes your fucking time. Consider how annoying it is when Fallout 4 pulls the same crap when you engage a farming settler in conversation - they SLOOOOOOWLY put their crap away, wipe their hands and get up, and then you can finally talk. Same thing applies to sleeping NPCs, you're just standing there for ages while their dumb asses get out of bed. In fact, there was a mod for Fo4 that corrected this behaviour by having conversation initiate immediately, and the animation state change while you were already talking, but apparently it triggered some bugs (in a Bethesda game, inconceivable, I know). For another example going further back (tangential but still part of the same flawed approach), I remember my rifle jamming with a Super Mutant bearing down on me in Fallout 3, and I'm mashing the shotgun's hotkey but the game's stuck playing loops of trying to reload the bloody rifle due to its poor condition. And Skyrim had a mod that just quickened up your pointlessly-long dismount animation.

Going back to the starting example, the implementation has actually gotten worse since Skyrim because of the written line - Lydia would just gripe that she was "sworn to carry your burdens" so it was relatively quick, but now this Andreja doorknob subjects you to her life story before you get to do routine stuff. It's idiotic, the line doesn't add anything and there's no reason not to display the UI right away and have it play in the background.

I know that it's a relatively small thing to gripe about in the sea of fail that Starfield seemingly is, but like I said, it's gotten to the point it's fascinating to observe. I've speculated that it might be due to an overfamiliarised QA crew that just stops noticing this shit, but this is a very long time to be using the same staffers in testing... I can't tell whether the point of failure is in the feedback or the receiver.

Bethesda should have taken notes from other games and allow you to move through conversations at your own pace. I've seen mobile games get this right.

 

[Gargaune]

This has annoyed me in a few games as well (not just Bethesda's). I suspect developers are in love with their animations and voice actors, they can't fathom that the player just wants to trade and so want to force the player to watch their cutscene masterpiece.

But of course a lot depends on how well the puppet show is done. If it's nicely done, you can enjoy it a few times, if not, then it's even more of an intrusion. Bethesda have just never been very good at the puppet show side of things.

I don't think it's either. In the examples I gave you, there's nothing stopping Fallout 4 from already engaging the conversation while the "get up" animation is playing (if anything, it'd look better with the dialogue camera), nor would you lose anything of value - animation or writing-wise - in covering Andreja's generic blathering with the inventory panel (or just having her say "Okay"). There's no benefit in the slow dismount animation in Skyrim, no one's ever said "boy, this Witcher 3's pretty neat but I wish Geralt took his time getting of his horse."

It just boils down to negligent UX design which is commonplace for Bethesda. Just like that other example I gave you with Fallout 3 not letting me swap weapons during a jam reload loop or how in Fallout 4 pumping water reduces thirst one level at a time, even though it's an infinite rad-free source. You can just about get away with crap like that in some dozen-hour movie-game like The Last of Us, but in titles whose main appeal is "play for a hundred hours (and then call it shit)", it's borderline criminal and part of the reason Bethesda's got a reputation for "jank."

 

[Yosharian]

Negligent design in general is commonplace for Bethesda

 

[Child of Malkav]

Just like that other example I gave you with Fallout 3 not letting me swap weapons during a jam reload loop or how in Fallout 4 pumping water reduces thirst one level at a time, even though it's an infinite rad-free source. You can just about get away with crap like that in some dozen-hour movie-game like The Last of Us, but in titles whose main appeal is "play for a hundred hours (and then call it shit)", it's borderline criminal and part of the reason Bethesda's got a reputation for "jank."

This reminds me of the criticism raised against RDR2 for having a bunch of detailed, long animations for every action of the main character. While that's nice, having to see them for the entire duration of the game, over and over became maddening at some point.
Far Cry also had this issue with gathering plants and skins and searching enemies but in FC4 they added an option to just tap or hold a key to just loot the "containers" while completely skipping the animations, in other words that option disabled the animations for looting. And those animations weren't long but they were associated with actions that the player performed so often that it drew mountains of critique towards it. They listened to that and added that option in the settings.
This is also the reason why I despise mini games for lockpicking/hacking/etc. now. Nothing but a waste of time. Games like Thief 1 and 2, Deus Ex 1, Dark Messiah, VTMB1, The outer worlds and others have done it well. No mini games just a certain duration or resource check to unlock something.
For NV and FO4 there are mods that check to see if your skill i high enough to unlock a locked door/safe/terminal etc and then if you do you just press a rebindable hotkey to just instantly unlock whatever it is you want to access or go through. Saves so much time it's unreal.

 

[Cologno]

This is also the reason why I despise mini games for lockpicking/hacking/etc. now. Nothing but a waste of time. Games like Thief 1 and 2, Deus Ex 1, Dark Messiah, VTMB1, The outer worlds and others have done it well. No mini games just a certain duration or resource check to unlock something.
For NV and FO4 there are mods that check to see if your skill i high enough to unlock a locked door/safe/terminal etc and then if you do you just press a rebindable hotkey to just instantly unlock whatever it is you want to access or go through. Saves so much time it's unreal.

Kingdom Come was bad about this too. But it was the other way that the mini game was so piss-easy as to be pointless. Really, lockpicking amounted to nothing more than how well you draw a circle with your mouse.

 

[Bulo]

It's fake quality. Rhinestone polish. Bethesda bolster their games with gimmicks because they know that they have nothing else to offer. (Really, it's more likely that they just have poor taste, but I like my characterisation more.) Imagine pressing E on a locked chest in an (unmodded) Elder Scrolls game and having it open instantly? How hollow it would feel? Odd, because most RPGs have done it that way since forever

Related, I played through Mass Effect 2 recently, and the first and only mod I installed was one which skips the hacking minigame. Someone should make a mod that skips the main quest

 

[Camel]

Emil and Todd clearly like """"epic"""" quests with high stakes and plenty of cinematic action, but I think shit like Dawnguard proves that you can do that in a non-intrusive way that isn't forced on the player.

The Morrowind's MQ is also non-intrusive and you can ignore it without the game even nudging you to complete it.Only the final stage has reactivity and you can play after finishing the MQ.

 

[Gargaune]

For NV and FO4 there are mods that check to see if your skill i high enough to unlock a locked door/safe/terminal etc and then if you do you just press a rebindable hotkey to just instantly unlock whatever it is you want to access or go through. Saves so much time it's unreal.

Kingdom Come was bad about this too. But it was the other way that the mini game was so piss-easy as to be pointless. Really, lockpicking amounted to nothing more than how well you draw a circle with your mouse.

On that topic, they're all iterating on Fo3's lockpicking mechanic, all the way to the latest Starfield "digilock" or whatever. I'll give Bethesda this much, at least theirs was a bit of a time waste but not too annoying (KCD's I found very annoying and dunno about Starfield). But, quite ironically, the inspiration for Bethesda's implementation is probably the best lockpicking mechanic ever - the one in Thief: Deadly Shadows. Same idea as the original Thief, your primary resource is time to avoid detection, but it better involves the player in the act. But avoiding detection is rarely a factor in looting in Bethesda games so having it play out real-time wouldn't do anything and they decided to swap to an inventory resource. You could make Beth's mechanic work better if lockpicks were super rare, but I imagine that wouldn't play well with general audiences.

 

[Child of Malkav]

the best lockpicking mechanic ever - the one in Thief: Deadly Shadows

How is it any different from than any of the other minigames? The minigames in bethesda games also involve the player.

 

[Gargaune]

the best lockpicking mechanic ever - the one in Thief: Deadly Shadows

How is it any different from than any of the other minigames? The minigames in bethesda games also involve the player.

I actually wouldn't call either of them "minigames", not Thief 3's and not Fallout 3's, I see them as action mechanics. Like iron sights or cover or water arrows. When you say minigames, I think of something more involved, like DX4's hacking, which would probably be a fun thing to play on your mobile waiting at the barber's, but I hate when it's distracting me from playing what I really wanna play - Deus Ex. Fo4's hacking is another example, where you have to actually stop playing the game and start doing word puzzles instead.

As to how the lockpicking in T3's different, I think the key is that it was an organic evolution from T1/2. You think back to the Dark Engine implementations, all the elements were already there - you were "fighting" against time to avoid being caught, and there was a very minor randomness factor in your selecting the correct pick the first time around and not knowing how many swaps you'd have to go through ahead of time. The rest was just sitting there waiting for the process to complete, like hacking in the original DX. With T3, you know how many stages you've got when you engage the lock, but the variability is shifted to the player's luck and speed in finding those sweet spots. It gives you something to do in the process, while not taking you out of the core gameplay experience at all, you're still looking out for the guards, might have to back away etc.

I assume you know it, but for everyone who isn't familiar, here's a video:



When it comes to Bethesda Game, the way the gameplay loops are set up, time to detection would very rarely be a factor, so it's taken completely out of the equation by pausing the game. The resource here are those breakable lockpicks, but they're such a common drop that it becomes a complete non-issue past the first hour of play. You can't really tighten the sweet spots any more than they already were in Fo4 because it'd just get too frustrating. Tightening the drop rate would work, but might make casuals complain too much that they need both the skills/perks and a rare resource.

It doesn't really bring much over a simple threshold system, but it's not too distracting either. It's less annoying than Oblivion's was, at least, and probably among the less offensive such implementations when you consider the "competition" - BioShock's plumbing, DX4's hacking, Fo4's hacking, even CBP's hacking...

Again, I can't say for Starfield, but at a glance it looks to me like it's a step back and would involve more of a distraction than the old Fo3 lockpicking.

 

[Child of Malkav]

As to how the lockpicking in T3's different, I think the key is that it was an organic evolution from T1/2. You think back to the Dark Engine implementations, all the elements were already there - you were "fighting" against time to avoid being caught, and there was a very minor randomness factor in your selecting the correct pick the first time around and not knowing how many swaps you'd have to go through ahead of time. The rest was just sitting there waiting for the process to complete, like hacking in the original DX. With T3, you know how many stages you've got when you engage the lock, but the variability is shifted to the player's luck and speed in finding those sweet spots. It gives you something to do in the process, while not taking you out of the core gameplay experience at all, you're still looking out for the guards, might have to back away etc.

Yeah I see what you're saying but I really prefer the classic system regardless.
Or they could add an option in the settings to toggle on or off the whole thing. Who enjoys this can keep it and who doesn't can skip it. Just like in Far Cry.

actually wouldn't call either of them "minigames", not Thief 3's and not Fallout 3's, I see them as action mechanics. Like iron sights or cover or water arrows. When you say minigames, I think of something more involved, like DX4's hacking, which would probably be a fun thing to play on your mobile waiting at the barber's

They're all the same to me.
I did like in Dx3 and 4 the hacking minigame, seems like they put a lot of effort into it and it was pretty good plus the software types you could use if you explored. Yeah, it was fun...for the 5 or 6 times you did it but considering how many times you have to do it it quickly got boring and then annoying.
At least you had multitools or disposable picks or whatever they were called. They're another good alternative to the settings option I suggested above.

 

[Spukrian]

With T3, you know how many stages you've got when you engage the lock, but the variability is shifted to the player's luck and speed in finding those sweet spots. It gives you something to do in the process, while not taking you out of the core gameplay experience at all, you're still looking out for the guards, might have to back away etc.

There are actually limited set of patterns for sweet spots, memorizing them makes lockpicking maybe a bit too fast...

 

[Bad Sector]

Or they could add an option in the settings to toggle on or off the whole thing. Who enjoys this can keep it and who doesn't can skip it. Just like in Far Cry.

IMO this is bad design. If a mechanic is such an option that it can be toggled off without affecting the rest of the game then it has no purpose in the first place.

 

[Child of Malkav]

IMO this is bad design. If a mechanic is such an option that it can be toggled off without affecting the rest of the game then it has no purpose in the first place.

Well yeah but if we can't decide one way or another....you gotta pick one or add it as an option. There are people who like the mini games and people who are tired of them. Again, FC did that and it worked although those were animations not mechanics.

 

[Bad Sector]

Well yeah but if we can't decide one way or another....you gotta pick one or add it as an option.

If you can't decide one way or another then IMO there is something wrong with the design, as i wrote, gameplay elements should have a purpose. For example in the case of lockpicking if the purpose of the mechanic is to deplete your resources, check the player character's skills, introduce some form of time delay that lock the player in place and vulnerable, check the player's own skills or similar things, these are all things that can affect the rest of the game and its design and not things you can just toggle off - otherwise they'd be pointless and shouldn't exist in the first place.

So, to continue that example, if the purpose is to deplete your resources, disabling it would affect the resource economy of the rest of the game. If it doesn't then the mechanic failed at its purpose and/or the economy is inherently broken (which would also make the mechanic pointless).

If the purpose is to check the player character's skills, disabling it would cause those skills/stats/etc irrelevant (or less relevant) and in turn affect the entire character build. Again, if it doesn't then it failed its purpose and made having those skills/stats/etc pointless in the first place.

If the purpose is to introduce some form of time delay to lock the player in place and leave them vulnerable to enemies/hazards/alarms/whatever, disabling it would affect the entire flow of the level/area, any potential encounters that may be set up and the game's difficulty. Like before, if disabling the mechanic doesn't cause this to happen then the mechanic has no real purpose aside from wasting the player's time.

If the purpose is to check the player's own skill, disabling it would again affect the flow of level/area and the game's difficulty - it'd be like disabling enemy encounters or other roadblocks in the game. If that isn't the case and the game isn't affected, having that mechanic in place would be superfluous.

In all of these cases disabling the mechanic would either affect the rest of the game negatively or reveal a flaw either in the game's design or the pointlessness of having the mechanic in the game.

There are people who like the mini games and people who are tired of them. Again, FC did that and it worked although those were animations not mechanics.

TBH i don't remember which part of Far Cry you refer to as it has been some time since i played any FC game, but if these were just animations that didn't affect the gameplay then that at least wasn't what i had in mind.

 

[Beastro]

the best lockpicking mechanic ever - the one in Thief: Deadly Shadows

How is it any different from than any of the other minigames? The minigames in bethesda games also involve the player.

I actually wouldn't call either of them "minigames", not Thief 3's and not Fallout 3's, I see them as action mechanics. Like iron sights or cover or water arrows. When you say minigames, I think of something more involved, like DX4's hacking, which would probably be a fun thing to play on your mobile waiting at the barber's, but I hate when it's distracting me from playing what I really wanna play - Deus Ex. Fo4's hacking is another example, where you have to actually stop playing the game and start doing word puzzles instead.

As to how the lockpicking in T3's different, I think the key is that it was an organic evolution from T1/2. You think back to the Dark Engine implementations, all the elements were already there - you were "fighting" against time to avoid being caught, and there was a very minor randomness factor in your selecting the correct pick the first time around and not knowing how many swaps you'd have to go through ahead of time. The rest was just sitting there waiting for the process to complete, like hacking in the original DX. With T3, you know how many stages you've got when you engage the lock, but the variability is shifted to the player's luck and speed in finding those sweet spots. It gives you something to do in the process, while not taking you out of the core gameplay experience at all, you're still looking out for the guards, might have to back away etc.

Nothing to do is precisely why Thief1/2s lockpicking is better. Instead of an annoying task to focus on that becomes simple once you're used to it, you're left with nothing to do but watch the handle shaking as you keep an eye out for guards.

The result is more tension with no way of venting it or finding a distraction from it.

 

[Child of Malkav]

If you can't decide one way or another then IMO there is something wrong with the design, as i wrote, gameplay elements should have a purpose. For example in the case of lockpicking if the purpose of the mechanic is to deplete your resources, check the player character's skills, introduce some form of time delay that lock the player in place and vulnerable, check the player's own skills or similar things, these are all things that can affect the rest of the game and its design and not things you can just toggle off - otherwise they'd be pointless and shouldn't exist in the first place.

So, to continue that example, if the purpose is to deplete your resources, disabling it would affect the resource economy of the rest of the game. If it doesn't then the mechanic failed at its purpose and/or the economy is inherently broken (which would also make the mechanic pointless).

If the purpose is to check the player character's skills, disabling it would cause those skills/stats/etc irrelevant (or less relevant) and in turn affect the entire character build. Again, if it doesn't then it failed its purpose and made having those skills/stats/etc pointless in the first place.

If the purpose is to introduce some form of time delay to lock the player in place and leave them vulnerable to enemies/hazards/alarms/whatever, disabling it would affect the entire flow of the level/area, any potential encounters that may be set up and the game's difficulty. Like before, if disabling the mechanic doesn't cause this to happen then the mechanic has no real purpose aside from wasting the player's time.

If the purpose is to check the player's own skill, disabling it would again affect the flow of level/area and the game's difficulty - it'd be like disabling enemy encounters or other roadblocks in the game. If that isn't the case and the game isn't affected, having that mechanic in place would be superfluous.

In all of these cases disabling the mechanic would either affect the rest of the game negatively or reveal a flaw either in the game's design or the pointlessness of having the mechanic in the game.

Good answer. Keeping this rationale, what would toggling on or off the hacking minigame in DXHR/DXMD accomplish? Under what category would it fall? Resource depletion? Player vulnerability? Testing player skills?
What's its purpose?
At what point, when the player is able to complete the challenge easily, does it become a chore and a waste of player's time?
A problem with the above example in DXHR and DXMD hacking is that if you don't hack you won't get any extra resources from it. And since there are so many hacking terminals you would be at a disadvantage by not engaging and extracting the resources after a successful hack. This is an issue as it makes interacting with the mechanic, excessive.