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After seeing Nour Polloni's walkthrough of the tech demo the other day (and your response), it's clear that I wasn't the only one to be impressed by the footage of Alone in the Dark 5. No doubt about it, Eden games has done a fantastic job of piquing our interest for their upcoming survival horror sequel. Now comes news with a horrific twist of its own, and it involves a feature in the game that I don't recall ever seeing before now -- the ability to "wimp out" and skip the hard parts. OXM got the interview with Polloni, detailing the game, and were kind enough to share it with us. Most of it smacks of familiarity, but this one detail took the cake: "Another achievement is linked to whether or not the player skips. We want everybody to be able to finish our game, so one of the other new features we've added is the ability to skip sections using a DVD-style menu if you get stuck, but always at a cost, and achievements is one way to reward players who don't skip." I really don't know what to say about that. Making sure that your game's difficulty level is balanced enough so that people have a reasonable chance of seeing the closing credits is great. Giving them the option to skip past the parts that prove too challenging? Not sure I like the sound of that one, at all. Since you can always choose to play through the game as usual, nothing is lost. Still, it ranks as one of the most unorthodox ways of using the Xbox 360's achievements yet. How do you feel about this revelation? Is it a cool new feature, or complete waste of development time?
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I wish shmups had this feature. God I hate Moai heads.
I think it would best be applied such that if this feature is used at all, the ending will mock the player and challenge him to do it all if they want to try the last level at all.
I wonder if they'll give you an achievemnet for being a pussy and skipping the hard parts?
I was gonna make a joke about skipping every single section of the game and beat it without playing it.
But...I'm a little dumbfounded about this feature.
"We want everybody to be able to finish our game,"
At the cost of them not actually playing it I suppose.
I can't really consider one beating a game unless it's actually...you know....played.
Uhh, tough call. Only way I whould use that, is to show someone a cool part of the game, without playing 2 hours to get there.
Real endings only count if you beat the actual game?
That would probably work a bit better.
Thats sooo fucking weak. I hope the achievement says "Ultra Pansy" -40 points.
Bad idea. Some people are simply going to ruin their experience, and thus their opinion/view of the game, by using said "feature". It's like making a great, balanced and fun RPG, but putting in a hidden super weapon that makes the rest of the game trivial - for any player that finds it and figures it's par the course, he's going to say the game was easy and boring. Yes, it's a good idea in theory, but you have to protect the gamer from the game itself - on both ends of the spectrum.
Another way to think about it, what if putting on god mode was as simple as going into options and enabling it? And how many of you have cheated at a game before and then felt a distinct lack of fun/accomplishment thereafter? It makes a huge difference, even if only subconsciously.
Furthermore, it's a shitty cop out to just making the damned game difficulty balanced and I'm surprised they even think this is worth PR'ing about. Sounds about on par stupidity-wise with the "we're not going to have pause so our game is intense" idea that other developer was raving about.
i think it's nice that the developers give gamers a choice instead of forcing you to just keep playing or give up if you suck.
Thats a copout, IMO. I wont be using the skip feature
They're going to let you just entirely skip a part of the game? That's stupid as fuck. God damnit, I hate this ribbon for everyone society we live in today.
On the one hand, there is the theory that if you pay for an expensive piece of software, you should be able to access it all without fuss.
On the other, what's the cunting point buying it if you're not going to play it?
Definitely a feature for pussies, though I wonder if this means the devs will be lazy as shit about balancing the game now. :-/
atleast do what guitar hero 3 did, after you fail it X amount of times, ask if you just want to stop trying and skip.
stupid expert slash.
@Jim Sterling
They could just do difficulty levels; having an Easy difficulty makes a game more accessible to people. Oh wait, that would take some effort on the developers' part, which is obviously something they don't want
very gay indeed.
I suppose some people may like it but in a way it might annoy me.
Like when my mate says he's completed MGS3. I tell him "No you haven't!" It just doesn't count if you play it though on Very Easy with an unlimited tranq gun that has enough kick to bring down a fucking elephant and all the enemies/goons are near blind.
Lame. Sounds like a copout in exchange for proper difficulty balancing. If a player reaches a point where it's impossible for him to continue due to difficulty, and I know I've had one or two moments like that in my time, give him a lower difficulty setting, or, god forbid, a cheat code or two. Make the game take note of 20 deaths in a row and in response lower the enemy health or attack damage a bit to compensate or something.
A "DVD-style skip menu" just sounds like a huge fucking lazy solution to proper balance.
Pussies.
I think they should change this feature with something like in game difficulty switch. Rather than simply letting you skip it they let you lower the difficulty of that section so that you can actually beat it.
They might even make it so that you cant switch the difficulty unless you die three times in a section. AT least that way people aren't simply bypassing the game.
This sucks, it reminds me of the instant travel in Oblivion, but with a little more suck thrown into the mix.
Should I decide to rent the game and decide that I don't like it all that much I could at least see how it ends before returning it.
I don't like it, but I see where they're coming from. I'm sure that the moment the player skips a section is the moment they their "Wimped out" Achievement worth only 10 points and they aren't allowed to get any more achievements.
I think if used properly it could be a great feature, granted not much different from using any cheat codes in the past. Getting to a boss fight you just can’t beat which is enough to make you walk away from the game forever can now be skipped to carry on with the story at the cost of losing the achievement. I think its a great idea if used properly. On the other hand, simply saying “Skip chapter 2” would be a stupid idea because as Tino said, you want everyone to finish the game at the cost of not playing it? Great idea, possibly terrible execution. We’ll have to wait and see.
I don't know how difficult these games typically are so I won't say "omg anyone who uses this is a huge pussy lolz" but it is strange. I'd be hard pressed to get the same experience out of a movie if I skipped a chapter or two and it seems like the same thing here. I could see this becoming slightly more common in the hopes it will lure in casual gamers but I'm not a fan.
laym...i don't feel like i've finished a game's campaign/story mode unless I go through the entire thing myself, even if I DON'T get all the campaign achievements. It would have been better (if not already) to have co-op mode for the harder difficulties like Halo or Gears. But I don't know much about AITD so I could be full of hot gas..
This makes no sense. This is a survival horror game - not some Barbie Horse Adventure, where I could see skipping a valid tool for those who play it.
If you want to make something more people can "get through," make a movie.
That's quite a good use of achievements I guess but why buy the game only to skip the hard parts?
If this is implemented well, as in you were offered to skip a particularly tough firefight after numerous failed attempts, how the hell can it be a bad thing? This is like complaining about games having an easy difficulty, or fanboys complaining about games coming out on other systems as well as their own. If you don't like an optional feature of a game, don't use it. I personally would never use something like this, when I continually suck at a section, I take it as a personal affront and it makes me even more determined to beat it, but if it lets more casual players enjoy the game, what possible harm?
I'm not even reading all the other comments to find out if I'm the only wimp here or not...but I think this is awesome. It's no different from closing your eyes during a scary movie.
Yeah.... No thanks, there, AITD. I like to EARN my credits, thanks.
Good god people It's only a option. Don't use it and let the people who need it use it. There are plenty of games that after you died on a boss for the 3rd time for example, you were able to drop the difficulty. Not really that much different. Doesn't affect you in anyway. And I'm sure the achievement is "Don't skip any parts of the game"
You know I think it'd find this acceptable if when you opted to skip a section of the game, the game instead showed a video of a better player going through and beating it on the hardest difficulty while audio that said "YOU FAIL AT LIFE" repeated over and over, and the video itself was unskippable.
It's definitely a clever alternative to difficulty levels.
Shut up, Topher. You're not allowed to talk here, shmuphead. :)
I don't think it's a horrible feature. As long as they penalize players significantly for doing it, then it should be fine. It's obviously not necessary, though.
Please - it's a fantastic feature.
I can't tell you how many times I've given up on a game because I can't get past a part. It's not that I won't TRY - I just don't care enough to continue wasting my time. It's an OPTION, what the hell do you care if OTHER PEOPLE "ruin their experience"?
As the gaming mainstream grows beyond that of hardcore gamers, the gap between the most and least skilled players widens. I think this is a fantastic way to handle that issue.
Some people are more interested in the story than they are in grinding against a boss for 12 hours.
They should put this in WoW. Skip all the stupid grinding. Maybe I'd bother playing it then.
Word B. I have a level 70. Let me just make a level 70 with crap gear.
Yup definatly something for pussies. However, there are a lot of lazy asses out there that if something is to difficult they would rather skip it and this should definatly appeal to them. But probably not to most of the readers on this site.
Aren't features in a game meant to make one feel excited about it. This news does not excite.
The only games I ever got stuck on were NES and SNES games as 3 lives and no continues was, I swear, spawned by the devil.
Newer games don't have this problem (I find) as after a few tries everything works out fine thanks to saves.
How is this new? You can enter cheat codes in lots of games (ex: Half Life 2?) and skip ahead in a DvD style fashion?
It's kind of sad that you'd care whether somebody else skipped part of a game they were stuck on or just plain weren't enjoying to move the story forward. But it's expected in the current environment of "hardcore" gamers who actually take a thing like 'gamerscore" seriously...as if it isn't just the gamer geek equivalent of clipping Betty Crocker points off of cereal boxtops.
After thinking about it for a few minutes, I have to say I really like this idea. Having a wife and a job, I would love it if some games had a "sit back and enjoy the story" mode. If the story and presentation is good enough, why not let someone with bad coordination play through it like an interactive movie? So what if they don't get the same experience you do, it's not like someone else's experience lessens yours.
I think most RPGs should have an adventure mode anyway. 1/10th the encounters with boosted drops and exp. Let you replay a game again without investing another 80 hours. Let busy people enjoy the new Final Fantasy. Show more casual gamers the joy of RPGs. They'll sell more RPGs, we'll get more RPGs... where's the problem?
Well, I certainly wouldn’t use it, but it’s an interesting idea to allow a more widespread audience to play through the game. But seriously, they should have “good” and “bad” endings, with the latter being the one that people who skip any part of the game end up seeing.
is this game A BILLION times harder than the last Alone in the Dark? it sounds like it's A BILLION times harder if there needs to be a "puss-out" button
So it's like Half-Life, but you don't have to unlock them? Meh. I'll play through it normally.
Well, it's a feature that I'd say 99% of people won't use or care... but I hope it won't be a lame excuse for not balancing the difficulty well.
"What do you mean that throwing at you a dozen of rocket launcher armed megazombies it's unfair ? If you are a puss just skip it, no ?"
Okay. Lets think about it like this.
I play the game. I get to a part I can't beat, no matter how many times I try. I can't skip it. I put it down, and never play it again. I sell the game to GameStop.
I play the game. I get to a part I can't beat, no matter how many times I try. I skip that part, and complete the rest of the game. I may or may not sell the game to GameStop, depending on how good it is.
Seeing as they theyre aiming for like a primetime serial show style like Lost or Supernatural(?), it sounds alright for players who want a more seamless cinematic(even those are TV shows but whatever) experience.
But it depends on the situation like if its a timed sequence,stubborn boss, or an escort scenario then I wouldnt even hesitate to skip that shit. If the games gonna be as easy as Bioshock which had those same brisk cinematic vibes than thats good enough.
@Doomtrain : Well put, my thoughts exactly.
Furthermore, it seems the enjoyment of a game (or at least memory of enjoyment) totally increases when you have beaten it (even if you pussed out). You associate the sense of achievement with this game and then are interested in buying the next one.
You don't have to use it, something extra is always a good thing (take a transexual for example).
On the flip side, it will be good to have an achievement you can ridicule someone about.
eek, i DARE me to make less sense.
I may have condone this for the pansies if the game wasn't a survival horror. How can you be scared when you have something like this?
"Cover your eyes and press A to make the bad things go away!"
Is there a Pussy achievement? Come on, what is the gaming world coming to?!? This is just plain stupid!
Maybe it's just for the people who play the game for the story?
I dunno, I've got nothing.
I think it's brilliant. Perhaps creating too much of a temptation for those struggling that would have other wise persevered but anyone with self control won't have much issue with that. But I think it shows real confidence in the game and makes me think there will be very little "filler" gameplay considering it's episodic nature and that the developers know the player can skip at any time.
This could be a good thing, they may make the game very tough for those of us who want a hard time at it. Like difficult boss battles, or mindbendingly difficult puzzles, that sticky tape looks like it could be used in some interesting ways.
Then allow the newer players to just skip through (which is lame, but not rediculous)
I would hope theres parts of the story that you will miss out on by doing it that way. So that playing the game from beginning to end is a better experience.
....the fuck!?
File this under pussies thing i've ever heard. This speaks volumes about the type of people games are being catered to now, and I dont like it.
"""We want everybody to be able to finish our game,"
At the cost of them not actually playing it I suppose."""
Couldn't say it better myself.
I've got SO many games i've got stuck at, tried repeatedly to get past the part... then gave up. I'll never play them again. Achievements has helped a little to fix this, but if a game is stupidly difficult (or i find it so), i'll ditch it.
For people like me, it means i can carry on with the game if i get stuck to the point of putting the game aside.
I've been in game stores when people have taken a game back for being too difficult. You (i'm not that good at games so i'm not classed in this) hardcore gamers might live breathe and eat games, but the general public aren't as good at it, for them this is an interesting feature. Especially as i know a couple of people who cheat from the start of a game, just so they can experience the storylines, without the frustration of dying lots of times.
That is a soft-cocks approach. Cmon be a man and play the game. Stop pulling your dick and wimping out.
What a terrible idea.
seriously dudes? Could the word "pussy" be used more in comments, like, ever? I feel like the silent minority here screaming "IT'S A FUCKING FEATURE! LET THE PEOPLE WHO CAN'T BEAT IT NORMALLY SEE THE FUCKING END OF THE GAME! QUIT BEING A WHINY BITCH ABOUT THE PEOPLE WHO WON'T EVER COMMENT ON THIS SITE NOR BOTHER YOU ABOUT IT IN REAL LIFE BECAUSE YOU WOULD NEVER ASSOCIATE WITH THOSE NUBS!"
'nuff z'nuff.
How about they just tone down the difficulty and make an Achievement for playing on the hardest setting? This is stupid. Gamers are becoming wussier and wussier every day.
They better not give an achievement for skipping the hard parts. That would piss me off. This whole concept pisses me off actually. If you suck at games you shouldn't be playing them.