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"The Boss Health Bar is located at the bottom of the screen." New low in tutorial hints?

jett

jett

Community Resettler
Member
Oct 25, 2017
44,663
I couldn't help but notice this "hint" in the recent God of War gameplay leak:

A8Klv00.png


Is this a new low in tutorial hints? I mean, this is beyond some developers thinking their audience can't figure out anything on their own. They must think they're blind too.

We're getting really close to this becoming unironically real in a game one day

jpg


What other silly useless hints or tutorials have you encountered recently?
 
JazzmanZ

JazzmanZ

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,393
Not a hint but the crash Bandicoot trilogy box having to tell you its three games several times
 

Deleted member 17643

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,000
Man... the much, much, much more elegant solution is so obvious too:

1. Boss does scary intro
2. Name appears above Boss
3. Health bar fades in below name
4. Moves to the bottom of the screen.

It's very Zelda like.
 
ShinySunny

ShinySunny

Banned
Dec 15, 2017
1,730
Almost every FPS game.
Press E to interact.

Really now...
I guess COD is different, press F right?
 
Dogui

Dogui

Member
Oct 28, 2017
8,815
Brazil
I guess most big budget games does something like that.

I don't think it's a problem for the seasoned player, and can help some newcomers.
 
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chalkitdown

chalkitdown

Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,225
The Last Guardian is awful for tutorial hints. So much so that I think it must be bugged. Don't know if they eventually patched them out or not.
 
Fahzzy

Fahzzy

Self-Requested Ban
Banned
Jan 21, 2018
1,079
Hey as long as they let you disable that stuff I'm good. I'm of the opinion that hard difficulty and beyond should have that stuff off by default too.

The problem creating this is every developer typically designs their game so that even the newest player feels welcome. More games should take the Dark Souls approach and be more hands free with this stuff.
 
AztecComplex

AztecComplex

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,371
jett said:
I couldn't help but notice this "hint" in the recent God of War gameplay leak:

A8Klv00.png


Is this a new low in tutorial hints? I mean, this is beyond some developers thinking their audience can't figure out anything on their own. They must think they're blind too.

We're getting really close to this becoming unironically real in a game one day

jpg


What other silly useless hints or tutorials have you encountered recently?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I get you, OP but no it's not the lowest we've come. I'd rather have an unintrusive message that will go away on its own and doesnt interrupt my game than the shit Fi put me through in Skyward Sword.

My heart meter was low, its glowing with a red hue and has a beeping sound? Lets have a second beeping sound (thats Fi calling) so you can call her out which stops you in your tracks only for her to blurt out a text box that says "your heart meter is low, please replenish your hearts as soon as possible". Thats THREE warnings (low heart meter, red glow, beeping sound) Nintendo didnt think were going to be enough so the opted for a fourth and more intrusive one (Fi).

Same shit with the Wiimote batteries. Everytime they went down to 1/3 a permanent low battery meter would be plastered on the lower left corner of the screen but that wasnt enough for 2011 Nintendo so they had Fi emit a beeping sound so you can call her which makes you, again, stop in your tracks for her text box to slowly tell you "Replenish your batteries ASAP". FUCK YOU!

Thats the lowest amount of faith I've ever felt as a player from a game in my life and it wasnt even during a tutorial part. You'd still get that 70 hours into the game.

Heart+grate+by+inyuo+at+deviantart+gave+me+a+laugh_53d0a8_3999526.gif
 
reclaimerzzzzz

reclaimerzzzzz

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,136
I see nothing wrong with it, the witcher 3 manual had a page dedicated to every single hud element. The only difference here is that its on-screen. As long as it doesn't appear for each boss 2 hours into the game, I don't its insulting.
 
DrArchon

DrArchon

Member
Oct 25, 2017
15,485
They just know that people are going to have just gotten off Monster Hunter and might need a refresher on what health bars are.

Real talk, pretty ridiculous. I guess this is for people that literally never played a video game before in their life, but I didn't figure the new God of War would be the series for that.
 
Hong

Hong

Member
Oct 30, 2017
776
Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon
bU4gXxY.png


In all seriousness though, videogame tips can be really dumb. Some players can be really oblivious though; my dad for example.
 
SgtCobra

SgtCobra

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,865
This is basically for the people that yell "IS THAT HIS HEALTH??!!" when they get a controller in their hands and have to fight against a boss for a game they've never played.
 
DanteMenethil

DanteMenethil

Member
Oct 25, 2017
8,062
If you have to put a UI where you user would look to tell him to look elsewhere, isn't it indicative that your UI is bad? I imagine they focused tested enough to feel like they had to put this.
 
petethepanda

petethepanda

Saw the truth behind the copied door
Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,184
chicago
chalkitdown said:
The Last Guardian is awful for tutorial hints. So much so that I think it must be bugged. Don't know if they eventually patched them out or not.
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I started TLG soon after I finally went back to finish Ico, and going from the latter's blissful "figure it out yourself"-ness to the former's tooltip overload practically gave me whiplash.
 
Opa-Pa

Opa-Pa

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
8,810
There's one that's oddly prevalent in games and even dumber though, IMO: Press the left analog stick to move.
 
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Wowfunhappy

Wowfunhappy

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,102
These tips almost certainly exist because someone couldn't figure it out in playtesting.

There's really no need to be insulted. Now, if the tips reach the point where they are actively annoying, that's different.
 
reclaimerzzzzz

reclaimerzzzzz

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,136
Opa-Pa said:
That is indeed pretty stupid lol.

There's one that's oddly prevalent in games and even dumber though, IMO: Press the left analog stick to move.
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I don't think this is unreasonable. There always people playing video games for the first time. I remember my first PS2 game; I had to read the manual to know how to play spiderman, I also didn't understand how to accelerate a car in need for speed: hot pursuit because I didn't follow the instructions and didn't know i had to hold down X and just give it a light tap.
 
AfropunkNyc

AfropunkNyc

Member
Nov 15, 2017
3,958
Wouldn't it be nice to have boss wear and tear, where you can tell by the amount of damage the boss receive that hes close to death? or a throw back to Konami games where the boss flashes red j/k
 

Deleted member 3815

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
6,633
AztecComplex said:
I get you, OP but no it's not the lowest we've come. I'd rather have an unintrusive message that will go away on its own and doesnt interrupt my game than the shit Fi put me through in Skyward Sword.

My heart meter was low, its glowing with a red hue and has a beeping sound? Lets have a second beeping sound (thats Fi calling) so you can call her out which stops you in your tracks only for her to blurt out a text box that says "your heart meter is low, please replenish your hearts as soon as possible". Thats THREE warnings (low heart meter, red glow, beeping sound) Nintendo didnt think were going to be enough so the opted for a fourth and more intrusive one (Fi).

Same shit with the Wiimote batteries. Everytime they went down to 1/3 a permanent low battery meter would be plastered on the lower left corner of the screen but that wasnt enough for 2011 Nintendo so they had Fi emit a beeping sound so you can call her which makes you, again, stop in your tracks for her text box to slowly tell you "Replenish your batteries ASAP". FUCK YOU!

Thats the lowest amount of faith I've ever felt as a player from a game in my life and it wasnt even during a tutorial part. You'd still get that 70 hours into the game.

Heart+grate+by+inyuo+at+deviantart+gave+me+a+laugh_53d0a8_3999526.gif
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

You're over exaggerating, calling Fi was optional and she wouldn't pop out and interrupt the game just to tell you that your health is low.
 
Musubi

Musubi

Unshakable Resolve - Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 25, 2017
23,627
You have to realize God of War is a BIG budget game aimed at mass audiences some who might not play video games very much if at all. Putting accessibility features in your games isn't a bad thing. Not everyone has years of built in knowledge about how to parse information on a screen in a video game.
 
Ploid 6.0

Ploid 6.0

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,440
I saw something like that before in a game. This seems normal to me, not the newest "low" or anything.
 
AztecComplex

AztecComplex

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,371
Mr-Joker said:
You're over exaggerating, calling Fi was optional and she wouldn't pop out and interrupt the game just to tell you that your health is low.
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Yes she very fucking much would! If you wanted to shut her up you had to press her button and when she came out she most definitely would stop you in your tracks so she can blurt out her "heart meter low, replenish hearts ASAP" bullshit at you while Link just stood there until you could make the text go away.

Fi was the worst and I dont wanna hear anyone ever say Navi was annoying again. Fi made Navi look good in comparison.
 
Opa-Pa

Opa-Pa

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
8,810
reclaimerzzzzz said:
I don't think this is unreasonable. There always people playing video games for the first time. I remember my first PS2 game; I had to read the manual to know how to play spiderman, I also didn't understand how to accelerate a car in need for speed: hot pursuit because I didn't follow the instructions and didn't know i had to hold down X and just give it a light tap.
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Click to shrink...

404LinkNotFound said:
Actually this one i dont have an issue with . To this day people who dont play games sometimes struggle with controls that use 2 joysticks.
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I understand these points but I feel like they don't hold up nowadays, keep in mind that to even start a game you have to deal with a console's home menu where you'll likely be using the analog stick to navigate, already internalizing that movement is tied to the stick.

Still like I said these are inoffensive hints at worst, just something I find kinda silly and don't get in the way at all.
 
Quad Lasers

Quad Lasers

Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,542
Opa-Pa said:
There are many, many mechanical aspects of games we take for granted and should perhaps be explained to new players, but a health bar's location isn't one of them lol. If a new player doesn't find it at first they'll look at the rest of the screen until they do, that hint is dumb (though inoffensive too).

Actually, explaining what a health bar is in the first place would be far more useful.
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A theoretically new player's experience with the game is going to involve them being unfamiliar with the general video game iconography on a screen(like a health bar). I looked at the footage that Jett is complaining about and the health bar is a new concept that doesn't apply to the previous enemies that the player encounters, so it probably helps to onboard a player faster with the mechanics by explicitly pointing out what the UI element thing at the bottom of the screen is.

On the other hand, the player has already fought and killed minor enemies, so they're familiar with concept of doing damage, so explaining what exactly a "Boss Health Bar"(health already has an implication with the player hurting enemies) does is probably less important than just making clear the thing at the bottom is tied to the "health".

I can see where they were going with it.
 
reclaimerzzzzz

reclaimerzzzzz

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,136
Opa-Pa said:
I understand these points but I feel like they don't hold up nowadays, keep in mind that to even start a game you have to deal with a console's home menu where you'll likely be using the analog stick to navigate, already internalizing that movement is tied to the stick.

Still like I said these are inoffensive hints at worst, just something I find kinda silly and don't get in the way at all.
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Touché, I didn't consider the necessary task of using the sticks to get to the gameplay.
 
Opa-Pa

Opa-Pa

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
8,810
Mecha Suplex said:
A theoretically new player's experience with the game is going to involve them being unfamiliar with the general video game iconography on a screen(like a health bar). I looked at the footage that Jett is complaining about and the health bar is a new concept that doesn't apply to the previous enemies that the player encounters, so it probably helps to onboard a player faster with the mechanics by explicitly pointing out what the UI element thing at the bottom of the screen is.

On the other hand, the player has already fought and killed minor enemies, so they're familiar with concept of doing damage, so explaining what exactly a "Boss Health Bar"(health already has an implication with the player hurting enemies) does is probably less important than just making clear the thing at the bottom is tied to the "health".

I can see where they were going with it.
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Hadn't thought about it like that, you're absolutely right. Thanks for explaining your reasoning!
 
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