points by bombcar 2 days ago | 0 comments
There are real QoL changes that simply make the game better - but there are also QoL changes that simply remove the game. It's an extremely delicate balance, and easy to get wrong in ways you don't notice until it's too late.
For example, quest tracking in modern games is phenomenal, and people used to add addons to do that - but there's really a way in which "figure it out yourself" and/or read the guidebook/talk to people was better. Same with pug tooling - no need to find a group anymore, the computer does that for you, but you also don't develop relationships with those around you.
[–] scottLobster 2 days ago
[–] parineum 2 days ago
Blindly exploring parts of the game and talking to npcs that you would have run straight passed towards the quest beacon doesn't sound as terrible as you're making it sound.
[–] scottLobster 2 days ago
I wasn't "exploring" in the spiritual sense or "talking", I was brute-force-searching the entire map to find whatever stupid magic button or item or conversation the devs were forcing me to have so I could keep playing the game.
Completely immersion breaking.
[–] bombcar 2 days ago
That's exactly it, really, amazing games are degraded by the modern over-hand-holding; but the average game is much better for it.
Going to have to disagree on this one. Perhaps if you have an extremely well architected game that will organically guide a lost player in the right direction it can work, but I have many painful memories of just blindly exploring entire maps and clicking on every NPC because the obvious route of progression wasn't doing anything. Sometimes it would be an actual quest bug and I'd just be wasting my time.
Particularly in large open world games like GTA/Witcher 3/etc, quest tracking of some sort is mandatory.