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Games that lock the last level / ending behind tedious bullshit
- Thread starter Phediuk
- Start date
If we're going to list arcade games, I think one of the more absurd titles has to be the Cave shmup Progear No Arashi.
The basic ending isn't difficult to achieve. You just have to beat the final boss, and you can use as many continues as you want.
HOWEVER
There is a special ending. In order to achieve it, you have to raise the pilot & gunner's affection level to 5.
This is accomplished via three factors: SAFE, ACTIVE, LOVELY.
SAFE is not just staying alive, it's keeping the screen relatively clear of enemies while optimally positioning the aircraft.
ACTIVITY is tied to obtaining the most valuable jewels. Jewels are earned by blowing up enemies so that the explosions catch all nearby bullets, converting them into shiny goodness.
LOVELY is the affection level itself, which is determined by the adding the values of SAFE & ACTIVE together and then dividing them by 2.
It's a lot to absorb, and this is a shmup, so for many many MANY play-throughs all you can really do is try to survive.
Now there is an alternative method for getting the special endings.
All you have to do is beat the game on the second loop.
You reach the second loop by beating the game with 1 death or less AND not using more than 2 bombs.
Naturally, the second loop is far more difficult, adding more enemies, new boss-patterns, revenge bullets, and CHECKPOINTS.
So yes, dying outside of a boss battle will send the player back, sometimes as far back as the beginning of the stage.
The basic ending isn't difficult to achieve. You just have to beat the final boss, and you can use as many continues as you want.
HOWEVER
There is a special ending. In order to achieve it, you have to raise the pilot & gunner's affection level to 5.
This is accomplished via three factors: SAFE, ACTIVE, LOVELY.
SAFE is not just staying alive, it's keeping the screen relatively clear of enemies while optimally positioning the aircraft.
ACTIVITY is tied to obtaining the most valuable jewels. Jewels are earned by blowing up enemies so that the explosions catch all nearby bullets, converting them into shiny goodness.
LOVELY is the affection level itself, which is determined by the adding the values of SAFE & ACTIVE together and then dividing them by 2.
It's a lot to absorb, and this is a shmup, so for many many MANY play-throughs all you can really do is try to survive.
Now there is an alternative method for getting the special endings.
All you have to do is beat the game on the second loop.
You reach the second loop by beating the game with 1 death or less AND not using more than 2 bombs.
Naturally, the second loop is far more difficult, adding more enemies, new boss-patterns, revenge bullets, and CHECKPOINTS.
So yes, dying outside of a boss battle will send the player back, sometimes as far back as the beginning of the stage.
The ending to Space Chanel 5 is locked behind beating Space Chanel 5, which is completely unreasonable.
the whole Metroid Prime Trilogy.
they lock the last boss behind a big fetch quest over the whole game. it was bad in 1, got worse in 2 and then they made some pieces optional in 3 but it's still bad if you don't know ahead of time where to use the items in the most efficient way to not need them all.
they lock the last boss behind a big fetch quest over the whole game. it was bad in 1, got worse in 2 and then they made some pieces optional in 3 but it's still bad if you don't know ahead of time where to use the items in the most efficient way to not need them all.
Metroid Prime. Don't get the praise for this game either. Combat is slow and boring, few enemy types, backtracking is not fun in this game as it is too slow overall and then they want you find some artefacts hidden in the world so you can face the final boss.
Never again. I hope Prime 4 fails miserably and they delete the series from their company history. Only 2D Metroid games from now on, thanks.
Never again. I hope Prime 4 fails miserably and they delete the series from their company history. Only 2D Metroid games from now on, thanks.
What was the tedious bullshit? Until I did 5, it was the only GTA that I'd finished off!
Sonic Heroes
Have to play through all 14 levels 4 times and then do the special stages 7 times (and those special stages are horrid to play).
Still never seen the true ending
Have to play through all 14 levels 4 times and then do the special stages 7 times (and those special stages are horrid to play).
Still never seen the true ending
Territory battles. You had to repeat taking over territories and get a certain percentage complete before accessing the last mission.
I guess in my original playthrough I did enough of that organically, but on repeat I didn't do much since it's awful, and then the game tells you to go grind this shit.
The backtracking doesn't work without the insane speed and game breaking abilities you get in the 2D games. So much of the game seems designed to waste the players time. The auto aiming shifts enemy design to puzzly/spongey, the easy platforming means placing enemies to knock you down, and the back tracking combine to create a game that I didn't enjoy at all.
Had to take a break and consider whether I actually cared to finish the game once I realized I was going to have to do another lap around the game to finish it.
In the first you can only get maybe a handful before the last few areas of the game.
Wow, fuck off dude what an incredibly idiotic thing to say.
1. Your joke/sarcasm post isnt quite clear enough.
or
2. "wah I dont like it therefore it sucks". That's what your post reads like. Just so you know, not everyone will like everything, so while I get your complaints, the tone has them come across as petty, as opposed to constructive. Plus your last line is just petty on another level, which makes me think this is a joke.
Oh this is a good one.
Also, Grandmaster Galaxy in Super Mario Galaxy 2. No, I'm not going back through all those levels to arbitrarily hunt for Green Stars. Just tedious padding.
Green Hill Zone is so out of the way in Sonic Adventure 2 that I knew people who grew up with the game that weren't even aware it was something you could find.
Donkey Kong 64 gating the ending behind the arcade coins is truly brutal, it kept me from doing it for a super long time
Donkey Kong 64 gating the ending behind the arcade coins is truly brutal, it kept me from doing it for a super long time
I can actually explain this one! You probably damaged the flash where the save is stored. The game has a 256KB flash memory chip for storing the save game, but unlike a lot of GBA games it actually makes a sanity check on this memory whenever it boots up, and if it finds it damaged or otherwise is not what it expects it goes into a failsafe mode where saving is disabled, but also everything is unlocked as you aren't getting everything with no saving. This actually was the bane of early GBA emulators as they usually set the save allocation to the maximum of 512KB since it covered all possible save sizes, but SA2 would see 512KB and the sanity check would fail because it was expecting 256KB.
I got to the final boss ten years ago. Tried about five times and gave up. If they re-release it on PC I'll probably play it, I'm not dragging out my Dreamcast and it's impossible on emulation due to the extremely narrow time window for moves.
I was going to mention this. Even after they did the big rework of the end game, I noped out of it when I saw that I needed to capture something like 25 or 50 strongholds or whatever the hell that was, and just went on YT to see the ending cinematic.
Doing the strongholds meta game while playing naturally was quite fun, but no way in Mordor I am grinding that x 5 times just to see a cinematic.
If you are talking about the legendary qeustline, the problem with it was that it did not properly backtrack everything you've done until you've reached it. A great idea, IMO for a game that wants you to go out and see the content it offers, but they should have tracked everything you've done until that point. That was the design miss, in my opinion.
Oh god I never knew this because I never actually managed to get that far...
Might watch a full playthrough instead, knowing this now...
Tunic went from Zelda+dark souls for 90% of the game to the Witness at the very tail end of it. Couldn't finish the game because of this tediousness to unlock what I assume was the true ending.
Ironically, the opposite of the thread's premise happens as a result of getting the true ending. The final boss is skipped as part of the true ending. I absolutely loved the game regardless.
Oh yeah that's why I didn't want to beat the final boss. In essence the puzzles became the final boss.
I've disliked the trend in some platformers where you need to have a specific amount of a certain collectible to progress forward in the game. I feel like beating the levels should be enough.
Some Nintendo platforms games locks the last levels on the amount of itens you've collected trough the game. I remember been super frustrated when I saw the last levels of Yoshi Crafted World locked on the number of flowers collected in the game. The same thing happens on Mario 3D World, the last world is locked on the number on stars collected.
I cheeses him. If you went on the skell he does an attack to drop your fuel to 0. But you have enough time to make and attack and dismount the skell. I just did an attack and dismounted lmao
Now that I've been recalled of 2D Metroid, Zero Mission locking the stronger version of the final boss behind 100% would be fine…if getting 100% in that game wasn't horribly tedious. Collecting all of the items right when the (easier version) final boss is just moments away just doesn't feel that worth it for me, particularly power bombs, and yet there are some annoying puzzles they want you to do for item expansions, all just so you can get to fight the harder version which isn't a pushover. You're not that desirable to 100% for something beyond an ending card, 2D Metroid.
I'd rather hunt for Chozo artifacts in Prime 1, a more chill experience making a last trip around areas at the very least.
I'd rather hunt for Chozo artifacts in Prime 1, a more chill experience making a last trip around areas at the very least.
Ah, I couldn't remember the details exactly as it was back on the Wii U, but I was doing a 100% playthrough at the time so it must have been for the stamps.
I applaud your bravery. I don't feel that strongly about it, but I don't get the Prime hype either.
Bloodborne expecting anyone to figure out how to get the true ending is wild. Like it's SO specific that without guides or the internet it'd be an urban legend.
It is not as bad, but I hate the trend in recent Square RPGs to lock some good content out for NG+ or Hard Mode.
Like it is almost impossible or not really worth it to grind to the max level in Rebirth. It is designed so you can only hit that in the end game or hard mode. Same with certain items and things. I just hate I can't grind myself more easily or have everything in one go.
Like it is almost impossible or not really worth it to grind to the max level in Rebirth. It is designed so you can only hit that in the end game or hard mode. Same with certain items and things. I just hate I can't grind myself more easily or have everything in one go.
Jet Force Gemini for sure - still can't believe they actually made you do that.
Wind Waker - it's a big reason why I'll never consider it a great Zelda game. It's beautiful and charming, but man alive, what a chore.
And I get the gripes with Metroid Prime, especially after my last playthrough, but it's still my favorite game of all time. I think it doesn't bug me as much because you're able to get upgrades and see things you missed the first time as you go. I do wish there was a better way to get hints as to where they were. That part's not fun. I don't want to have to go back to that little shrine thing to know where to go next.
Wind Waker - it's a big reason why I'll never consider it a great Zelda game. It's beautiful and charming, but man alive, what a chore.
And I get the gripes with Metroid Prime, especially after my last playthrough, but it's still my favorite game of all time. I think it doesn't bug me as much because you're able to get upgrades and see things you missed the first time as you go. I do wish there was a better way to get hints as to where they were. That part's not fun. I don't want to have to go back to that little shrine thing to know where to go next.
Sonic games during the Adveture era.
You essentially had to play every scenario it had to offer before unlocking the true final stage and ending. Shadow the Hedgehog was probably the peak of this, as I think it was like, 13 playthroughs before you got the real final stage and ending?
Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2
It's about 4 - 5 playthroughs (I don't remember), where you have to do something different each time to unlock the true final stage(s) and ending. I'll go to bat for this one though, because while you do go through the same stages and fatigue from that can set in, the game at least tries to mix it up:
- you have access to different characters (or don't) and weapons (Zangetsu's sword power-ups) depending on the playthrough, including unlocking the rest of the original cast feom the first game
- the bosses get extra moves by the second and subsequent playthroughs.
-the final boss changes depending on the playthrough (the original one, the second one (and a nice Easter egg for Ritual of the Night) and true end boss).
-the final playthrough is the most ambitious: you pick the stages Mega Man style, you unlock the various characters per stage, get a new transition stage with a different gameplay style and finally, a new final stage and boss.
You essentially had to play every scenario it had to offer before unlocking the true final stage and ending. Shadow the Hedgehog was probably the peak of this, as I think it was like, 13 playthroughs before you got the real final stage and ending?
Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2
It's about 4 - 5 playthroughs (I don't remember), where you have to do something different each time to unlock the true final stage(s) and ending. I'll go to bat for this one though, because while you do go through the same stages and fatigue from that can set in, the game at least tries to mix it up:
- you have access to different characters (or don't) and weapons (Zangetsu's sword power-ups) depending on the playthrough, including unlocking the rest of the original cast feom the first game
- the bosses get extra moves by the second and subsequent playthroughs.
-the final boss changes depending on the playthrough (the original one, the second one (and a nice Easter egg for Ritual of the Night) and true end boss).
-the final playthrough is the most ambitious: you pick the stages Mega Man style, you unlock the various characters per stage, get a new transition stage with a different gameplay style and finally, a new final stage and boss.
This one I really enjoyed as well. Granted it was repeating content but they did put a nice twist on a number of the sections plus the different characters really switched things up. I think I still have one final playthrough left to get the true ending...