Games Which Expect Effort On Your Part

I've recently tried to get a friend of mine into Devil Daggers so we could get some competitive score chasing going, however the game didn't really gel with him considering the game didn't explain anything to him. When you press start on Devil Daggers, you are thrown right into the game, there are no tutorials, and literally nothing is explained to you in-game, aside from looking up the controls in the option menu. Rather, I'm sure this lack of explanation was meant to encourage players to watch replays in order to learn strategies and techniques, and band together as a community in order to unravel the game, on top of maintaining the harsh atmosphere of the game.

Now this got me thinking, is it an inherent negative if games explain absolutely nothing to you and expect you to put some effort in on your part to learn the game?

User-made guides can be used to speed up the learning process, but you can also just figure out things through experimentation and trial 'n error. After all, someone had to discover something on his own before talking about it in a guide. Alternatively, a game can teach you about the basics, but barely elaborates about advanced techniques necessary for high-level play much like Platinum games, so casuals can have fun playing on their own level while hardcore players need to work for their own fun.

A recently released game, Nex Machina, is much like that. From the outset it's obvious that it's a twin-stick shooter and that you have to move, shoot and not get hit, but the human chaining system is something you have to figure out on your own or by watching replays, which is even further encouraged by the many hidden secrets which encourage you to look up replays so you can incorporate them in your own route. But even if this is the case, the lack of explanation and communication of ideas to the players could be perceived as a negative in some eyes.

Do you suppose this has more to do with the challenge curve of a game, where at first you can mess around without dying as you practice the basics, but as you progress you're slowly expected to use the mechanics to your full advantage? I can imagine repeatedly dying in the first sixty seconds not being too fun for some people.

Not everyone is used to working for games in order to get some fun out of it, personally I don't mind investing time to git gud. But do you feel that not explaining shit at all in-game or being encouraged to look up outside information by the developers (e.g. replays) makes a challenge curve of a game worse, or does hating on this make you a filthy casual who needs to git gud?

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There should be a barebones explanation, but it should also let you be free to experiment to do absolutely crazy shit, letting you figure that out by itself

Any 4X/GSG
And yes disliking handholding does make you a filthy casual.
I still think some games could use some hints.
Like for example, older Megaman X games with the dialog it has could have subtle hinting at the armor parts hidden on the levels, or even a small ambiguous indicator after you finish a stage telling you you have yet to collect the parts in it.

So if you never found one you would never guess what that indicator or the subtle hints in the dialog mean, punishing you for being a filthy casual, especially at the end.

Games that leave things for the player to figure out by themselves is great, especially if it's an ability that you're given from the get go but is explained a while into the game or found by pure accident.
One example that I have in mind is Oddworld Abe's Oddssey, you aren't told what the chant can do or that you can possess enemies until halfway through the game, but figuring it out from the start opens up a lot of puzzles and secrets and is near mandatory for the good ending and is required for 100%.
Never, unless the game has some super important command bound to alt-F4 or some shit and it's never ever mentioned, but is mandatory for some areas. But come to think of it I can't really think of a game that did that. A game that sits your ass down and treats you like a retard, stopping you ever 5 minutes in your tracks to tell you in excrutiating detail what to do, where to go or where anything is means the games and by extention the developers think you're the biggest retard on the planet and as such have designed their games to be the least offensive, least challenging or intresting games just so people who are the beforementioned retards can play it.


GREAT…
…BUT YOU MISSED 10 BOXES
fucking love that shit

Megaman X bosses can still be beaten without it, but its exponencially harder and frustrating.
Overcoming obstacles and limitations that you have on the first few levels or your first playthrough is fuckimg glorious and satisfying as fuck

That shit drives me insane in the PS2 era Wild ARMses where there is a bonus boss and pretty good item that you can only get by opening every chest on the fucking planet, some of which are invisible, some of which are hidden in camera tricks, some which are invisible and hidden in camera tricks.

But seriously, Megaman X has tons of useless dialog shit to use on its pretty shitty story.
The first thing you get when you play Cyberspace in Megaman X is that you're being tested on each stage, but the thing testing you never tells you the grades you get every time you finish a stage so you might never get an S grade since a B grade makes you repeat the stage and an A grade gets you to the next stage.

That first dialog could easily tell you all the 3 existing grades without telling them what they do, so that you could work for it.

Sure, but then you fall into X5's trap of stopping gameplay every minute so that Alia can blabber on about whatever.
I still love X5's ost the most.

Devil Daggers doesn't require effort, at least not much of it.
It is one level game and you already should know how to shoot. It expects you to just play it. You will do fine by doing basics stuff but game make it sure to make more advanced stuff clear to you.
You are talking about game not explaining stuff. Minecraft doesn't fucking tell you all crappy crafting table recipes. Most games are giving you signals what you are supposed to do. Tutorials aren't only way to teach a gamer how to play the game.

What you are talking about here doesn't apply here. If anything Minecraft especially modded requires you to learn basics and more advanced stuff through tutorials on the web. Which is not that bad considering at this point you would need Lua tutorial in-game.

Tutorials are not the only way to teach a player things in-game. A great example is how in Metroid there are powerup rooms you can only escape by using the powerup you just collected. There's no tutorial pop-up or anything, and it's still a step up from not telling you anything at all.

Peace Walker is another good example with how there's lots of side-ops where you often improve or learn new skills or tricks, and they can carry over into other missions.

It wouldn't the hints could be put on the useless dialog/pauses that exist on X4 instead of all of it beint exposition

All of them by definition. If it doesn't, it's not a game.

I swear to god I cannot understand what anybody finds in this game
I get that you need to play for 50 hours to understand how the game works but everything about it screams "do not play for more than 30 minutes".

Games should place information within reach without cramming it down your throat. Back in the day we had these things called "manuals" that did precisely that.

I shouldn't have to sit through half an hour of "push W to move forward! Now push S to move backwards!" before actually being allowed to play the game I paid for, but at the same time I'd rather important information regarding gameplay come direct from the developer's mouth, and not from a potentially-unreliable third party like a community guide or wiki.

I think Rain World is a good and bad example of not explaining much at all. Important stuff like the "karma" system AND HOW TO NOT FUCKING DROWN WHILE SWIMMING MORE THAN 10 FT are not explained at all inside the game, but there are plenty of neat little tricks and nuances that you can discover while you venture into the unknown.
Instead of getting a metroid-style power up or cancerous rpg level ups, it's more like I'm getting better acquainted with the world and using my new knowledge to not fuck up so horribly. There was like a single tool tip outside the opening area, and it has otherwise been pretty closed box.
So I'm going to say that I prefer it when a game explains the very basics, but then leaves it up to you to figure everything else out.

It depends on the game.
For something like Devil Daggers all you need is the controls, since everything else has strong cues (weak spots stand out and react when shot, crystal drops don't look evil)
For something like most GSGs though, you need to read the fucking manual, and there is not a single fightan that hasn't benefited from having an SP mode or at least an AI/P2 option in the practice mode so you can get into the flow of the game.

As said, there are other ways of teaching the players the mechanics. While pic related, doesn't teach you a mechanic in itself, it makes sure that the player will be able to successfully jump over hole, since he already passed a similar platform but without the hole in which he can try over and over, without loosing lives.

Have you survived for 500 seconds?

ITS SHIT
Fuckoff casual

There was a time before tutorials, when you needed to read through a manual before playing. There was also a time before video games, where you would unfold the game onto a table and would be completely lost until you read the inside of the box. There was also a time before cardboard boxes, when the only way to learn how to play a game was to interact with veteran players. Now, I guess you're telling me we've regressed back to that era just to add some sort of artificial difficulty to a game? Well, I don't see how it effects the quality of the game, itself, but it says a lot about the laziness of the devs.

And a lot more about the laziness of the users.

I doubt everyone looks up a .pdf of the manual of the game they're emulating. I didn't need any stinking guide explaining the mechanics of the many PS1 JRPGs I played or games on the SNES (unless I got stuck, fuck you Wild Arms and that phobia of mice you had to exploit just to fucking talk to an NPC obstructed by other NPCs). There's plenty you can find out through experimentation and just mashing the buttons or looking at your control scheme in the options menu. It's useful when there's unusual inputs like doing uppercuts in Streets of Rage as doubletapping isn't the kind of input most people will perform on a whim, but you should be given the opportunity to learn through experimentation.

I can't put any effort into my shitty excuse of a life, what makes you think I want to put effort into a leisure activity?

You double loser.

Creatures was my shit

This is a flawed and ignorant point of view because, while video games are a living for developers, they are a leisurely activity for the users. Only one group is expected not to be lazy.

I don't get it.
Or everyone is screaming that games are too easy or that they are too criptic. If you want an easy game go just play some animal crossing or other shit.

Not every single game is meant to be played by "you".

Ultima Online and Everquest

I agree with that. But my point is right, too. What is the excuse for not including a tutorial or manual aside from not feeling like it?

The lack of any kind of tutorial or handholding could contribute to the atmosphere of the game, or instead encourage a community effort to figure the game out. Games like DMC had a dozen or so mechanics which were never explained everywhere, but you were expected to discover it through experimentation and some obvious tells.

CK2 literally has a tutorial to teach you how to play. I think you're just an idiot.

But DMC came with a manual tucked in the front cover.

Yes, but it didn't explain you could insta-kill most enemies who would show their weak spot if they performed a certain attack. Another note is that practically no arcade game came with a tutorial to really explain the ins and outs of the game. There were flyers, but how many do you suppose looked those up?

DCS: A10C
Better dive into that huge manual.

I don't know, usually I get manual in-game, but maybe that's just because i play at the moment on Wii U.

I think after a long time playing vidya you just get the tropes and sorting out what game is about doesn't take that much time, but if it does, maybe the game is just shit or you should try harder.

I just don't see it as a problem.

But OP is talking about games that throw you in without showing the basics. Arcade games had everything you needed to know printed right on the front.

Before 1996 maybe, but you tell me where one is supposed to print all of this: shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?t=351

Not all of that is necessary to get started. Can you confirm that info on the basic controls and menu options were NOT printed on the front of the arcade console for this game?

At first this was (supposedly) printed in front of the original cabinets, although nowadays the PCBs of most old arcade games are placed in the same type of universal cabinet. Basic controls were displayed, but you wouldn't know that stuff like dynamic difficulty exists unless you spent a fuck-ton of time with the game. Basically, a lot of the more advanced techniques are never told to you at all, and were only ever really discovered or explained by romhackers who took a look at the code several years later after the game was released. More modern arcade games also feature more complicated scoring systems where a basic control set-up won't explain shit. Look up a superplay of Espgaluda 2 or Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu and try to explain to me what's going on on the screen.

To be fair it's pretty terrible and outdated with all the DLC Paradox shits out.

Honestly God Hand doesn't explain dick in the first level, which I think is the main reason people consider it so hard difficulty curve wise.

This entire video is shit they never tell you in the game that some people get halfway into the game and don't really realize or understand.
Special mention goes to the hidden moves that are basically obligatory if you want to crowd control for shit.