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The 7 Commandments All Video Games Should Obey

By David Wong April 29, 2008 3,395,307 views
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#5.
Thou shalt not force repetition on the player.

Violators:
Resident Evil 4, the God of War series, Heavenly Sword, No More Heroes, Dead Rising and every game with save checkpoints.

Here's a very simple rule:

Humans only find repetition enjoyable when they choose it.

Let's say you sit on your bed one afternoon and, out of boredom, fling playing cards at a hat for two hours straight, just to pass the time. You amuse yourself trying to hit 10 in a row.

Now imagine it's later in the evening and you're about to have sex with your girl. Suddenly she sits up, her boobies hanging out, and says, "Wait! We can't do it until you fling 10 cards into that hat over there! It's a rule in the obscure religion I practice!"

Will you enjoy the card flinging this time? No, and in fact the repetition you found enjoyable before will become maddening, as you flip cards around your frustrated, wilting manhood.

Well some video games are like tossing cards: sports games, fighting games, racing games. The fun is in repeating and practicing them. But other mission-based games are like having sex. There's a specific progression and goal in mind, and repetitive interruption only ruins the mood.

Such as ...

Having to replay levels due to limited save points.

This is a throwback to the arcade/NES days when physical limitations in the system wouldn't allow you to save your progress just anywhere. There is no reason for this now. None. We're busy. We've got work, appointments, phone calls. We shouldn't tolerate an inability to save our progress in any piece of software.


DAMMIT I JUST WANT TO FIND A SAVE POINT SO I CAN GET TO BED

Half Life 2 did this perfectly--it auto-saved every few minutes, behind the scenes. You didn't have to worry about it and you didn't have to re-fight enemies you had already defeated.

There are people who say that preventing saves adds to the "tension" of the game. Sure, in the sense that the fact that your 360 could catch on fire at any moment also adds to the tension. Face it, if the only way you can think of to add suspense to your game is to disable a feature of the hardware, then you suck at making games.

This is almost as bad as when you ...

Force us to watch cutscenes repeatedly.

This should be the law: If you've programmed your cutscene so that we can't skip it, then you should have your game programming license revoked. If you have placed your cutscene right before a spot where we're likely to die, and given us no ability to save after it, then you deserve a beating.

God of War: Chains of Olympus does this. And you'd better hope you don't die during the long-ass Bowser fight at the end of Mario Galaxy, because you've got to listen to his fucking monologue every fucking time you start over. Unskippable cutscenes killed Nights: Journey of Dreams, as sure as a bullet to the back of the skull.


Oh, shut the fuck up.

Seriously, what could be worse than this? Oh, wait ...

Instant failure quicktime events.

This has got to be one of the most diabolical inventions in the history of gaming. If you're not familiar with the term, this is when in the middle of a cutscene, suddenly the words "HIT THE A BUTTON OR DIE!" flash across the screen.


If you fail to hit the right button in that split second, the consequence isn't that you lose damage points. No, the consequence is that you have to watch the fucking cutscene again.

And again.

Until we turn off the game, get in our car, and drive to your office to deliver your beating.

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350 Comments

Ragnarok - I think he was picking on it because of the laughing voices, and how they sound absolutely pathetic.

While the game was a marvel, there were definitely bits and pieces that could be easily made fun of.

Hilarious article, and I agree with every bit of it.

7/2/2009 11:49:16 AM
tdug1991

I mostly agree right up to the last bit, where you picked on FFX.

That scene was just over a minute long, how can you attack the story of that game from watching thet little scene? FFX has over 100 hours of gameplay, hell, then main story of the game takes over 30 hours to complete.

So please, try and know what you're talking about next time, or else you just look like jackasses.

6/28/2009 9:43:37 AM
Ragnarok05

I think that this has been pointed out before but the sole reason why the Wii or the Nintendo DS have outsold all others is because of their lower price. That's why Toyota Yaris has sold way more cars than BMW Series 7 models. Wii also has the worst games out of all consoles, if you don't trust me head over to http://www.metacritic.com/games/wii/ and compare it's games to other systems. Even tho I agree entirely with everything you've written about I just can't agree that the Nintendo has sold more because it's more fun, it's just aimed at poor-er people.

6/23/2009 9:07:23 PM
Broloc

they think its bad that oblivion had a huge map? or any game thats like that? thats what made them awesome! sandbox games arent that great. open worlds are amazing! thats why games like oblivion and fallout 3 got game of the year!

6/22/2009 9:14:34 PM
atheistnation

There is hope though. Look at Fallout 3, which I believe to be one of the best games ever made. The only commandment it breaks is the lack of multiplayer, which it was really never designed for anyway. The team AI is limited to a single person, but it's fairly intelligent, the world is huge and hiking can take a long time, but there's just so much stuff to do between destinations.

Oh, and if you're looking for "bullets that create wounds", there isn't a better game out there. Hell the game even slows the bullet down so you can see it rip the guy's arm off in slo-mo. How cool is that?

6/11/2009 1:16:44 AM
One_Above_All

Epic article. for #3, the solution to keeping "tension" is to have a suspend & save system, where you can suspend at any time (quitting your game), but when you start it up again, the suspend data is cleared so the tension is still there.

In the 360's case, the suspend data shouldn't be cleared, for obvious reasons ;)

6/10/2009 11:32:23 AM
headcase88

lollll, i'm on my wii looking at this article and when i scrolled down to the screen shot of, i think it was, gears of war, a message popped up that said something about not enough memory. ironic.

5/26/2009 1:15:21 AM
elkatieface

A few other things I think are f*****g horrendous in games: Sewer levels, this isn't like a strict rule or anything, it's just that I've still to play a sewer level that I actually enjoyed; they should give what they advertise, remember the advert for Heavenly Sword, the one where you see her do a massive triple flip whilst sliding down a rope then kicking the ass of a million guys, they said that it was "actual game-play," but they didn't tell us that it was all executed with a single button!

5/18/2009 3:14:57 AM
microhendy

@asdfzxc920

Be that as it may, you're gonna get s**t for that.

5/13/2009 10:48:53 AM
PeakJ

I only agree with 1 and 2. Everything else is clearly written by somebody who has NO IDEA how games are developed.

4/29/2009 3:41:41 AM
asdfzxc920

There should be a rule like this about MMORPGs:
"Thou shalt make a MMORPG that have more than just PvE, PvP, leveling up and getting better equipment, AND anything related"

Because, let's face it. MMOs like WoW, Warhammer, Silkroad and anything else based in good graphics and killing the hell out of everything in sight is just a big pain in the ass. It's no wonder people like to hop from MMO to MMO.

4/28/2009 11:22:33 PM
Yaridovich

funny , i will uploaded this to tall dating site ___Tallmingle.com____ to share with my best friends,especially the hot models.

4/28/2009 10:16:55 AM
Shirleyxx

Thank you for the multiplayer comment. I can live with GTA4 for not being multiplayer.

What gets me are the FPS's. Oh sure their "techniqually" multiplayer... but guess what?
I don't have any freaking internet access in my basement!!!
Medal of Honor: Rising Sun let me and one of my friends duke it out with computers on split screen. Or even me alone if I wanted to.

Now what do I get with this generation?!? Running around an empty field picking up weapons and dreaming of shooting 59 other guys...

...I can only replay levels so many times.

4/24/2009 3:20:30 PM
ijpowers

It was good.
Get rid of that surplus watch, books, car, toaster, sewing machine, or clothes by the selling format of Uploaded.TV. Simply shoot a video of the item that you want to sell and upload it in www.uploaded.tv. Now relax, watch your video on real TV, and see how people queue up worldwide to show interest to buy your belonging.

4/20/2009 5:27:20 AM
debasree

I'm sorry, but if you aren't killing nazis or nips then you just aren't killing.

4/19/2009 1:46:24 PM
zombies!

one of the best games i have ever played involved dicking around o horseback for ages to find the next 'boss'. the game was shadow of the collosus and it was absolutely brilliant. i once spent five hours on ecstasy trying to make one jump over a chasm. totally fucked it up every time. came down. did it in one go. i still count those five hours as some of the best five hours of my life. so slagging a game with travelling sequences off just aint right

4/18/2009 8:26:17 PM
fireprism

And, at the end, an ad for "CIVONY": "A WORLD YOU HAVE NEVER SEEN BEFORE, A STORY HAS NEVER BEEN TOLD, A CAMPAIGN YOU REALLY SHOULD FIGHT WITH, A HOMELAND NEED YOU TO PROTECT!"

4/18/2009 1:03:43 PM
tydaeus

Yeah, in fairness it was EA who screwed the pooch on the PS3 port of Orange Box. Proof that the biggest publishers/studios aren't always the best. Otherwise this article was spot-on.

4/14/2009 2:44:12 AM
DasBroose

Heh, Hl2 is pretty good, you just don't like the style

4/10/2009 11:59:26 AM
LCP

EA developed the PS3 port of Orange Box, not Valve.

4/9/2009 7:09:45 PM
yournamehere

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