Survey: Are adventure games the easiest type of games to play?

Gemmalah · Wed 07/01/2004 09:22:34

OK heres the thing after playing tonnes of games I have found they are easiest to play, not in content but control systems and interface.

For example Toombraider, and any skateboarding or fighting game has tonnes of buttons, but point and clicks are easy, point here click there no problem. Except grim fandango, i'm stuck because I can never renember what button is pick up! Any stratigy game has menus all over the place.

Is this true, what is the easiest game to play?
Does frogger beat it, can be played with good timing and the foreward key.
Umm... over to you.

(edit) just another thought, is it just me or is there more than one way to play an adventure game, for example when a friend plays I always hang around and suggest answers to puzzles. but neither of us could complete it on their own.

Darth Mandarb · Wed 07/01/2004 09:27:24

Quotewhat is the easiest game to play?

Tetris ...

I have to agree with you about the simplicity of point and click style games though. I got a gameCube for Christmas and I just can't figure out which buttons to push! There's like 125 buttons on that thing!

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Privateer Puddin' · Wed 07/01/2004 09:29:33

The GC controller has (iirc) the least buttons of the current 3 consoles (gc, ps2, xbox)

Gilbert · Wed 07/01/2004 09:42:19

Well...

Columns... (I recently played it with my PC engine, it was so boring and I finally gave up when I got past level 100 and realized that it would never end otherwise).

Meowster · Wed 07/01/2004 10:01:02

They are pretty simple alright. Platform games, too, are quite simple.

I think that Keyboard Controls tend to complicate things, but then they can also add an element of control that isn't there with the mouse.

Layabout · Wed 07/01/2004 11:43:34

1st person shooters.

jaz · Wed 07/01/2004 15:40:27

Quote from: Darth Mandarb on Wed 07/01/2004 09:27:24
Quotewhat is the easiest game to play?
Tetris ...

Pong! Up and down. Amazing.

It would be more appropriate to say that adventure games are easy to control as they may be just about the most difficult genre to play and finish.

Duck · Wed 07/01/2004 17:39:49

Well, yeah, I'd have to say that adventure games generally have the most simplistic controls, but that doesn't nescesarally mean that they're the best. Personally, I don't like the default AGS interface control scheme. I don't want to have to press the right mouse four times and the left one once just to open a bloody door. I'd rather just press a key or something.

On the other hand, although there are a lot of keystokes and bottons involved, action games and the like are very intuitive, in my opinion. More than on a gamepad for some console (consoles suck). Move the mouse, look. Left, shoot. Right, use or whatever it does. WASD, move. R, reload. It comes perfectly naturally to me.

In all honesty, I generally like action games more than adventure games. However, my favorite oldies are all adventures. Old Sierra adventures will always hold a special place in my heart, and that's why I like to come here.

DarkRiver Design · Wed 07/01/2004 18:30:09

Adventure games can be simplistic in control, but they do vary. For instance, Gabriel Knight 1 had quite a few action buttons, yet King's Quest 7 had no action buttons, just a simple cursor that would glow over a hotspot.

Pirate Jack- I think a lot of first person shooters are becoming more and more complex. I miss the days of Doom - direction keys, control button, space bar. That was all you ever had to worry about.

Inkoddi · Wed 07/01/2004 18:33:20

I think old platform games like Super Mario and such are very easy to play; one button to jump, one button to fire/run.

The hardest games are flight simulators with controls all over the keyboard and you accidently turn the engine off for the umpteenth time instead of firing a missile...

jaz · Wed 07/01/2004 20:38:38

In fact, I almost stopped to play any action games since I always found out that it implies to memorize about zillion keyboard commands to get the maximum gaming experience, not to mention that some of these games are plain unplayable without mastering their complicated controls. I too miss the days of Doom or Sensible Soccer with their one or two action buttons. But maybe IÂ´m just getting old.

DarkRiver Design · Fri 09/01/2004 04:16:18

I don't think so. I don't know what the average age is around here, but I'm seventeen. I wouldn't call that too old, yet I still miss those days.

TheYak · Fri 09/01/2004 04:27:02

I, personally, like semi-complex controls. For most everything modern, I use mouse/keyboard. On the keyboard, I like a control set that's got around 10 buttons to configure. I don't have an issue with memorizing it and like the additional control it gives you. I look at it this way. Space Quest 3 was awesome but had semi-complex controls. You had to move with the arrow keys (or mouse) and type in commands. They moved to the more streamlined icon-system which gave you a few options to choose from with the same character control system. Later on, they did Phantasmagoria & KQ7. Both of which had the click-to-move and 1-click-does-all system. I hated those, it was almost like watching a movie where you have to hit a button to go to the next scene. I like my FPS's & RPG's the same way. I like to have controls to run, crouch, duck, lean, use, etc. Just as long as I'm not using 1/4 of the keyboard to do it. I liked Gabriel Knight I's system. Various icons for various actions. It kept it specific (almost like in the parser games) without making you guess which command did what.

InCreator · Fri 09/01/2004 05:41:23

If "simple" stands for amount of controls, yeah.
If "simple" stands for easiness of completing the game, hell no! It's always screwed up. Too non-solvable puzzles or just too many ways to die.

Actually, if it's possible to die in an adventre game, there's usually 1001 ways to it.
(See: KGB, The Adventures of Willy Beamish, Space Quest 1, King's Quest 1-3, etc)

Gilbert · Fri 09/01/2004 06:14:18

Heh, but then there're some adventure games that there're only one way to die (Conspiracy of Songo, MI1(?))

Gemmalah · Fri 09/01/2004 10:36:25

Yeah but i'm not arguing a point but adventure games can be real easy if you let them, you can follow a walkthrough exactly on these games. Unlike tombraider for example where it says jump to this kill this pick up this and fall down this and by that time you are dead!

but i think using walkthroughs all the time is cheating!
though i like games were there are about 3 or four buttons and directions, i can't renember more than that.