What makes an awful adventure game?

[ginanubismon]

In an counterculture action I was wondering what makes a bad, or downright awful, adventure game.

For me, it has ANYTHING, I do mean ANYTHING, to do with sliding things like puzzle boxes and plates. In example:

Spoiler

While not an adventure game in Resident Evil 4 when you take the role of Ashley you have to solve a sliding puzzle that drove me insane and only solved it by random chance and a walkthrough. But I did tough that one out because I am a RE whore.

But another game I had just gave up on was Murder on the orient express, getting stuck on the crime scene I ran to the walkthrough I found out that there would be a difficult puzzle box AFTER I solved it to gain an important item. After that I had just gave it up, uninstall the game and toss the thing aside.

[close]

And that is what makes a bad game for me.

[Greg Squire]

That's the big one for me too.  Puzzles that are just too hard, too obscure, or too complex, and there's not adequate hints given to solve it.  I also hate "pixel finding".

[Akatosh]

"That's a good idea, but... maybe later."
"I can't do that now."
"That would probably work, but I don't feel like doing it."

You'd better have a damn good reason, main character...

[zabnat]

Game where you have no idea what you have to do (or what you can do) and why. All the puzzles are illogical, obscure and hard. Also you have sudden death and walking deads lurking around the corner, so when you eventually find something you can you, you are afraid to do it in a fear of becoming walking dead.

[DanielH]

Actually this came up in my mind recently. In the First Episode of Tales Of Monkey Island you have to go through a maze- simple enough, I've no problem with mazes. But then, you have to go through the maze again, only slightly differently. The rest of TOMI I enjoyed thoroughly, but the use of the maze twice really irritated me. Seemed like an obvious way of making the game feel longer, tis all.

So I guess my point is, repeating the same puzzle without reason.

But don't get me wrong- this is a double-edged blade. For example, using the same puzzle twice can be done for effect- like the main character needing to do a puzzle at the beginning of the game and then needing to do a very similar puzzle near the end. It can be used to teach the player, as a hint for a future puzzle. What comes to mind is finding the ingredients for Largo LaGrande's voodoo doll at the beginning of MI2, and finding the ingredients for LeChuck's voodoo doll at the end.

[Abisso]

I personally hate when you have to do something (worse even if it's something that doesn't look important) to trigger an event. Like in Gabriel Knight, where you have to deal with time-blocks: a day passes only if you did everything the game requires, but sometimes you'd rather just wait, and you can't. For example, if you give some ancient text to a professor, who says will give you the translation tomorrow, I want to be able to choose if I'm gonna wait or if I'm gonna do something meanwhile.

Well, let's just say that I don't like time-blocks.

[Esseb]

Logorrhea.

If you want to write a novel, just write a novel.

[Galen]

1. Unintuitive / plain confusing puzzles
2. Pixel hunting

Everything else is just an annoyance.

[TerranRich]

1. Random deaths - where nothing you do triggers the death... it's just random and entirely unfair.
2. Walking deads (or whatever they're called) - where you missed something earlier and are now stuck in the game and have to restore/restart in order to fix it and continue. It's sloppy design.

[blueskirt]

I personally hate when you have to do something (worse even if it's something that doesn't look important) to trigger an event. Like in Gabriel Knight, where you have to deal with time-blocks: a day passes only if you did everything the game requires, but sometimes you'd rather just wait, and you can't. For example, if you give some ancient text to a professor, who says will give you the translation tomorrow, I want to be able to choose if I'm gonna wait or if I'm gonna do something meanwhile.

Well, let's just say that I don't like time-blocks.

I liked how Dave Gilbert got around this problem with Emerald City Confidential. One could say those little gems at the bottom of the screen listing every goals you had to achieve were only there for casual players, but at least it told you up-front what you had to do before the next time block. I wish Gabriel Knight had such thing.

[HillBilly]

Bad writing. If the writing sucks then who cares.

[Igor Hardy]

The only things that make an adventure game awful are (in the order of importance): general boredom (in lots of games), reused assets or/and puzzles (Kyrandia 1, episodic Sam & Max), walking deads (every masochist should try Kyrandia 1 and Leisure Suit Larry 2), complete lack of hints for difficult puzzles

Sometime there are also really stupid puzzles that can drive you crazy, like pushing buttons in specific order and rhythm (Fahrenheit, Galador)

Time-blocks are great (if they're properly announced by the game of course). I loved watching the game world change in Gabriel Knight and Discworld

[Abisso]

I personally hate when you have to do something (worse even if it's something that doesn't look important) to trigger an event. Like in Gabriel Knight, where you have to deal with time-blocks: a day passes only if you did everything the game requires, but sometimes you'd rather just wait, and you can't. For example, if you give some ancient text to a professor, who says will give you the translation tomorrow, I want to be able to choose if I'm gonna wait or if I'm gonna do something meanwhile.

Well, let's just say that I don't like time-blocks.

I liked how Dave Gilbert got around this problem with Emerald City Confidential. One could say those little gems at the bottom of the screen listing every goals you had to achieve were only there for casual players, but at least it told you up-front what you had to do before the next time block. I wish Gabriel Knight had such thing.

Mmmh, never played that game... but, yeah, it seems that knowing what to do could fix the problem, for sure.

Time-blocks are great (if they're properly announced by the game of course). I loved watching the game world change in Gabriel Knight and Discworld

The world can change without the need for time-blocks (and actually the real world changes THIS way): in The Colonel's Bequest, at least, the time passed by without the need to do something specific (changing by half an hour a time).... I know this can be frustrating, but at least you don't have to wander helplessly until "you find you actually didn't ask that person about that '1 on a thousand topics possible'!".

[Akatosh]

Dead ends, especially if they're not immediatly (and I mean immediatly) obvious.

Also, not being able to skip dialogue. Some people read faster than the voice actors talk, you know.

/EDIT: Whoops, I totally forgot I already posted in this thread. Sorry. Damn you, 10-hour codeathons, you and your effects on my sanity.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

I think walking deads are pretty much a thing of the past, honestly.  I don't know a single person who actually thinks it was ever a good idea to have the player need to pick up a pickle from the sidewalk at a park to use at the very end of the game on a guy allergic to pickles without any kind of prompt.  I think this is one design approach that has gracefully disappeared.  Designers understand enough now to tell you to take certain things you'll need before progressing or just have the character automatically pick them up.

As for the time passing issue, I really don't like games where time is counting down against you and limiting your possibilities.  It's more like the game is playing you than you're playing the game.  I definitely prefer Gabriel Knight's approach, though it could have done with a to-do list in the inventory you could check of things absolutely necessary to advance the day.  I don't really like having my hand held through a game, but when you need to visit certain people inexplicably because the game just wants you to talk to them in order to make headway it would be nice to have a note about it (or a call from that character on the phone asking you to visit).

[Dualnames]

I say time can sometimes yes be a bitch, but not always. For example in a trial and error game time sequences can really work out (not better than timed ones). As for dead-ends yes indeed they're a thing of the past. Damn Progz you put into a lot of thoughts about H2G2 now..

[DazJ]

I hate games where the very beginning is just an endless amount of exits leading off to rooms full up with too much inventory all the time not knowing what your mission is.

[Igor Hardy]

I hate games where the very beginning is just an endless amount of exits leading off to rooms full up with too much inventory all the time not knowing what your mission is.

Any game examples?

[shinymans]

Games with abolutely terrible graphics really draw me out of the game and bug me as I think of prettier adventure games I could be playing

[DanielH]

Games with abolutely terrible graphics really draw me out of the game and bug me as I think of prettier adventure games I could be playing

Conversly, games that sacrifice gameplay for the sake of better graphics irk me. I'ld rather suffer the sub-par looks and have fun with the game than have the best graphics and be bored with the game.