Game Mechanics – The Mental Attic

Role Playing Grumbles – The Worst Tropes in RPGs

UPDATE: I went on a bit of a rant with the Powerless Power-Ups section and didn’t make my point very clear. I’ve now edited that.

I’ve been playing RPGs for a long time. I wouldn’t say I started playing this genre as a child, I really didn’t. I got seriously into RPGs with Final Fantasy VII when a friend loaned it to me—though that isn’t my favourite title in the series—and since then I’ve gone through dozens of titles in the genre in a variety of platforms, from the original NES to current gen systems. And my interest in RPGs goes beyond video game but also into tabletop. I play D&D and many other games—though not as many at the moment, sadly.

Role-playing Games, like any other genre have common elements between them. Some of these tropes are very good and even form the basis of the RPG genre in itself, but there are others that I wish I could forget and force others to do the same so we may never see them again in any video game.

This article is about the latter, the sins. Though as a disclaimer, I’ll say that this is my opinion only. They’re my beliefs. Continue reading Role Playing Grumbles – The Worst Tropes in RPGs

Awesome Game Mechanics – Pickups

In the past I’ve spoken of Annoying Game Mechanics, of those that we find in games and after so many uneven implementations we instinctively groan when we see them again. But not all game mechanics are annoying, not all have good and bad moments. Some mechanics are just freaking AWESOME!

These Awesome Game Mechanics don’t need further tweaking. They’re the pinnacle of innovation and refining. Sure, you can build on them and add new features, but there is nothing left to fix about them. They are nearly if not completely perfect.

The first one of these I’ll talk about is Pickups:

Best Examples: Doom, Tomb Raider, Mario Bros, The Binding of Isaac and many others. Continue reading Awesome Game Mechanics – Pickups

Novel Games – The Dresden Files

There are many games out there with worlds based on works of fiction. From The Witcher games, based off Andrzej Sapkowski’s books, to the Sherlock Holmes titles and even such adaptations as American McGee’s Alice.

Novel adaptations as games have become a common thing, sometimes more prolific than even film tie-ins, offering a deeper and more compelling experience than those. Novel-based games often have a thoroughly crafted universe to draw from in terms of plot, characters and gameplay design options.

Last time we took a short at Simon R. Green’s Nightside. For this second issue we’ll look at another popular Urban Fantasy series, The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. You will see that while their fiction genre is the same, the two would be completely different as games! Continue reading Novel Games – The Dresden Files

Novel Games – Simon R. Green’s Nightside

With the release of The Witcher 3 I decided to revisit this little idea I had a few months ago, about writing down the basic design for a game based on a novel. If you’re wondering what that has to do with The Witcher, then you might be surprised to learn that the games are inspired by the works of Andrzej Sapkowski—a Polish fantasy author.

But the trilogy isn’t the only one based on novels. From the Sherlock Holmes adventure games to Amercian McGeee’s Alice, the video game industry has looked to published work for inspiration for at least a decade now and it will continue to do so in the future.

So, let me take a shot at it and see what kind of game I can design based on Simon R. Green’s Nightside series. Do note that this is a simple design, just stating genre and main mechanics. Continue reading Novel Games – Simon R. Green’s Nightside

Annoying Game Mechanics – Platforming

What are Annoying Game Mechanics? It’s those mechanics that when you encounter them you can’t help but groan. You’ve seen them at their best and worst, but a part of your is just, well, annoyed!

If you find the series name familiar, then you might remember it from its 1001Up days. But now, after careful and hard negotiations (not really, the 1001Up crew are lovely people), AGM has made its move to The Mental Attic. Hope you enjoy it here as much as you did before and make sure to visit AGMs former home as well!

This week the mechanic I’m having an issue with is Platforming!

I’m not talking about platformer games, not Mario, Sonic (no matter how bad some Sonic platforming gets) or even Shadow of the Colossus and Assassin’s Creed. No, what I mean is platforming in games from other genres. Most commonly, you see them in action adventures, to serve as a break from the adventure and/or action elements.

When done right, they can enhance the game’s experience by giving you an additional challenge to overcome or simply be a break from the overall gameplay and give you something fresh and exciting! The problem implementations are those that lack any form of challenge or more specifically the risk of failure. If there isn’t even a chance you might mess up, there’s no excitement possible. You’ve seen these, the obligatory climbing sequences on rails. If something bad happens it’s because you deliberately failed or it was scripted to happen, as the game attempts to use the platforming to enhance its cinematic side and not the game’s experience.

Then there’s Lazy Platforming, where your character does it mostly on its own, jumping over gaps and obstacles without needing your input. These aren’t necessarily bad but they are very tricky.

The staple of an annoying mechanic is that it’s seen both good and bad days. The following are some of the best and most disappointing uses:

Good:

Overall, the Legend of Zelda uses Lazy Platforming, but Skyward Sword gave it an interesting twist: Stamina. When you run, climb or performing any platforming you have to pay attention to your stamina. If it runs out you’re in for a long and painful fall or left out of breath and helpless, until it refills.
- The Handheld 2D Zelda titles though have been using Active Platforming ever since Link’s Awakening, by means of a jumping item. Call it a feather or a cape, you often need to time and perfect your jumps to progress and really master them if you plan on collecting secrets.
Even with the Autograb feature, the LAU Tomb Raider games have amazing platforming because there is a great degree of challenge involved. You’re never just climbing, but also avoiding traps, making tricky jumps or even leaps of faith when the camera won’t do what you want it to. It keeps it exciting.
Even more so than the previous example are the Core Tomb Raider games, the ones developed by Core Design. In these the platforming was superb and without autograb you had to make sure the jump was spot on and collecting secrets was extremely challenging.
The Batman Arkham games use a mix of active and lazy platforming. Lazy for running and jumping but active for everything else, and in a game where everything is a hazard and everyone is out to kill you, the platforming damn well works. The best part of it is the gliding, a twist to platforming by giving you limited flight.
Speaking of limited flight, Soul Reaver invented that mechanic. Gliding as part of platforming was one of Raziel’s signature moves and possibly the hardest thing to master in these games.
In an already difficult game, Dark Souls keeps it going with some very tricky platforming. With varying running speeds and environmental hazards, the game will make you dread the idea of jumping a gap. But then again, Dark Souls makes you dread every other sequence as well.
InVerbis Virtus does platforming really well. Not only do you have your usual moving platforms but with the use of its spells, the platforming becomes another puzzle you need to solve. In this case platforming isn’t a break from the overall gameplay but it part of it.
- Having said so, there is a degree of frustration when the voice recognition doesn’t pick up what you’re saying.

Bad:

Resident Evil, from the 4^th installment onwards started using Lazy platforming and for what it adds to the experience they might as well have cut it out. Worst of all are the high-action chase sequences that are nothing more than quick-time events disguised as platforming.
Thief (not the original series but the reboot) is guilty of the worst kind of Lazy Platforming, the one that adds nothing to the experience. You’ll climb pipes and ledges in 3^rd person but there are completely bland and could’ve been replaced with something a bit more exciting, maybe some grappling and climbing like they did in Far Cry 4.
The Castlevania Lords of Shadow series—excluding Mirror of Fate—also features plenty of worthless platforming, especially climbing sequences where you only press UP, before something big, dramatic and entirely cinematic happens.
Platforming in Devil May Cry is a mess and rarely works well. When it does it’s brilliant but more often than not it stumbles and just frustrates you. In this series’ case the problem mostly lies with the fixed camera, as it will often obscure the ledges or items you’re jumping towards. And as is always the case with fixed camera your directional input changes with the angles, making it even more frustrating!

Ugh…that jump…

Fly Link Fly!!

The zip-cord added a lot of challenge…and finicky controls

Stamina changed the game for Skyward platforming

These games had hardcore platforming

Pretty much how you’ll overcome any obstacle

Fixed camera angles and platforming do not mix!

At least these segments are short…

Just push the directional keys and you’ll get through this, no challenge whatsoever!

Annoying Game Mechanics – Flooding Puzzles

What are Annoying Game Mechanics? They’re those that when you find them you can’t help but groan. You’ve seen them at their best and worst and now they just annoy you on principle!

If you find the series name familiar, then you might remember it from its 1001Up days. But now, after careful and hard negotiations (not really, the 1001Up crew are lovely people), AGM has made its move to The Mental Attic. Is it permanent? Who knows, but in the meantime I hope you enjoy it here as much as you did before and make sure to visit AGMs former home as well!

For this relaunch of Annoying Game Mechanics, I’ve chosen one that I’ve recently seen while on my Classic Play series: Flooding Puzzles.

You’ve seen them in almost every game imaginable. Those sequences where you have to raise or lower the water levels to open new areas or to make puzzle-related objects float. Exactly what the puzzle entails depends on the game but it’s almost become a staple of adventure games, especially action-adventures.

My problem with the mechanic is there are so many things you can do with water: you can alter its states, shifting from gas to ice and back to liquid in a fantastic chemical puzzle; you can use water levels to fill containers for weight-puzzles; you can have a fire & water puzzle, where you use one against the other; piping puzzles to direct the flow of water in the direction you want, among others.

Yet despite those examples, and the many more I can’t even begin to imagine, the implementation we most often see in video games is using flooding. Now every time I see this mechanic, I instinctively sigh and think “not this again.”

The staple of an annoying mechanic is that it’s seen both good and bad days. The following are some of the best and most disappointing uses:

Good:

The Water Temple from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time defined this puzzle for the modern era. A sprawling labyrinthine dungeon where you must raise and lower the water to open new areas, reveal treasures and gain access to previously impossible to reach ledges and doors. The Water Temple is famous—or infamous depending on whom you ask—and is one of the hardest Zelda dungeons to date.
- A close second is the 2^nd Dark World dungeon in A Link to The Past, which also featured levers to raise water levels.
The Tomb Raider series loves this mechanic, but no other game does it more often than Tomb Raider Anniversary, with almost back-to-back water-level puzzles.
- The first one is in Greece in the Poseidon room. A vertical shaft where you must raise and lower the water a few times to get a raft to the exact place you need it to reach a ledge. This one also involves a fair dose of box pushing, pulling and underwater levers.
- The second one is the previous example on steroids, this time not a vertical room but an entire ancient sewer/waterway. With long drops that will instantly kill you and checkpoints at the most inconvenient locations and times, this is a pain in the arse to play to be honest, but it is well designed and has a right way to do it…and the way I did it the first time around.
- The third one involves flooding an entire room, then lowering the water to shoot some scarabs to open grates and then re-flood the area to escape. It’s not really complex but flooding plus platforming make it interesting.

Bad:

The Resident Evil series is famous for using these,notasbrainteasers but time-wasters. Simple crank puzzles to flood or drain areas.
- Resident Evil 2 has the perfect example: Go into a canal, arrange boxes in a straight line, raise water level and go through.
- Resident Evil 4 is another perfect example. The sewers under Salazar’s castle have a flooded section and the challenge of it all is making it through the area and its many one-hit-kill enemies to the crank you need to drain the water.
Wet-Dry World in Super Mario 64 is not one of my favourites. The initial height of the water depends on how high you jumped into the level and you raise or lower the water with coloured crystals, seven of them in total and spread throughout the environment. It’s a pain to find the exact one you’re looking for and if the water level’s high enough, it’s going to be a long swim down to the crystal you need. Hope you don’t drown!

There are many more examples of this annoying mechanic at work, but I can’t list them all. Do you have a favourite flood puzzle, or one you just can’t stand? Let me know in the comments and be sure to come back in two weeks for another issue of Annoying Game Mechanics!

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