How Strategy Guides Affected Gaming 352
Heartless Gamer writes "2old2play has another great story up looking into how games have become more complicated due to strategy guides. From the article; "Strategy guides have affected gaming by making games harder for all of us. That's right, it's not a typo — strategy guides have created more difficult games. Lend me your eyes and attention spans, and I'll explain. Admittedly, it may be a rambling explanation, but bare with me and we should get there eventually." Ya know I always find a strategy guide for things like Final Fantasy just because some puzzles are just ridiculous and I have no interest in trial & erroring for an hour when I'd rather kill monsters. But there really is somethign to this.
No Death (Score:5, Informative)
I think not being able to die in Monkey Island (and other Lucas adventures) was a big part of this. It limits the problem domain. In some of the Sierra adventures, if you hadn't done just the right thing early, you could literally be trapped with no way to proceed and no way of even knowing this was the case.
Space Quest 2 was the worst offender that I can recall. In the first scene of the game, if you don't notice a particular item and grab it, then at the end of the game you're screwed, with no idea why. You have to start over. From the beginning.
The LucasArts adventures were just so well-written and well-executed. Solvable but challenging puzzles and not being able to die are both aspects of this.
Come on, LucasArts, give us more!
latest /. story server already dugged. (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:They remove responsibility from developers (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not really their problem (Score:2, Informative)
I remember when... (Score:5, Informative)
For many games, the separation of what used to be expected in a robust manual into a separate "strategy guide" with the manual, if any, included with the game often little more than a basic introduction to the UI seems to be more of a way of restricting nominal price increases (as more of the work and cost is separated out into a different product) and narrowing the manufacturer's activities to their core competencies, than an excuse for making games more complex.
Sure, games are more complex, because newer computers can handle more complex games, and there is a market for them to fill. But its not strategy guides that have caused this,
Re:Follow the money? (Score:2, Informative)
But I also remember when strategy guides were just that - strategy guides. They complemented the information in the game's manual (yes, I can remember when games had manuals - REAL manuals - some even had fancy binding and everything!)
Nowadays though, most strategy guides hit the shelves months before the actual game even arrives - and in many cases you'll need the guide simply because it contains information that should have been included in the game's documentation in the first place!
Even then, some print "guides" still pale in comparison to the stuff you can find online. I remember this one Lucas game about the afterlife. It was a SimCity-esque game where you had to manage heaven and hell. It was cute, but darn impossible unless you knew the sooper-sekrit-information that was only found in the online guide about what made a "good" layout for your heaven and hell. Without this critical information it was impossible to really get anywhere in the game because you'd end up creating a happy hell, and a miserable heaven - and have no idea why. That was one of the few games I wasted money buying the strategy guide on, only to find that it was little more than a highly illustrated version of the information contained within the game's documentation and tutorials.
Perhaps that's how consoles are going (Score:3, Informative)
Perhaps it's just more of a PC gamer thing, but I can think of plenty of hit PC games (say The Sims) which are quite complex and certainly aren't interactive movies.
KOTOR is possible no matter what (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Follow the money? (Score:3, Informative)