Short attention span?
You write in your FAQ: Short attention span? No problem, our games are designed to be finished up over a weekend or in a few evening sessions, so you'll get that sense of satisfaction in completing what you've started. No long, frustrating stretches of being stuck, either. In our games, the characters increase their power of suggestion if they detect you're stuck. Yep, they really are that smart.
This is a BIG problem for me...:mad: I feel that a majority of new games has been dumbed down alot! and one of the thrills with Monkey Island was the fact you could get really stuck from time to time, the more the hurdle the greater reward when solving it. The general public ain't stupid, I will feel cheated of the experience if the characters start blabbing about what I should do next if I get stuck for a while. That's like having a built in spoiler, or someone on a cinema who has seen the movie starts yapping about what's going to happen.... :mad::mad::mad:
I do hope you prove me wrong, but after reading the FAQ my excitement really dropped.
This is a BIG problem for me...:mad: I feel that a majority of new games has been dumbed down alot! and one of the thrills with Monkey Island was the fact you could get really stuck from time to time, the more the hurdle the greater reward when solving it. The general public ain't stupid, I will feel cheated of the experience if the characters start blabbing about what I should do next if I get stuck for a while. That's like having a built in spoiler, or someone on a cinema who has seen the movie starts yapping about what's going to happen.... :mad::mad::mad:
I do hope you prove me wrong, but after reading the FAQ my excitement really dropped.
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No offense I'm just very disappointed right now.:(
When looking back at the old games, people often mistake the thrill of *finally* figuring something out after a long period of being stuck, for enjoyment over being stuck. Figuring something out is fun. Not knowing what to do and being stuck isn't fun -- it's frustrating. Our games are designed to give you more "a-ha!" moments without forcing you to sit through the agonizing days/months/years of not knowing what to do next. (Or, to put it another way, without forcing you to turn off your game, go online, search out a walkthrough, read what you're supposed to do, and say "How on earth was I ever supposed to figure THAT out?!")
This isn't new - all of Telltale's games are designed this way. It's a different design philosophy than the adventure games of the 1980s / 1990s, but since most players have neither the time nor the patience for getting stuck that they had twenty years ago, it tends to work out okay.
My thoughts exactly. Some of the puzzles in LucasArts adventures (though the games as a whole are very good) are extremely hard to figure out and very illogical, and there's nothing enjoyable about that. I haven't found any of those in the Telltale productions and that's one of the reasons they're so great.
Now I just have to get past my ego if I really need help. Because while it's nice to have hints at those really frustrating parts, it's also nice to say, "Yay, I iz smart!" and stroke your own fragile self-esteem.
...Not that I'm speaking personally, of course.
If not then I too am a bit worried about this.
I don't want to feel like I'm racing to complete a puzzle in order to beat it without hints.
With that being said, I'm glad you can turn the hints off. I know some people didn't like getting stuck, but I actually enjoyed that in the old MI games (and I have to disagree about old MI puzzles not being very logical, they all had their own logic, sometimes native to the game, but you could figure it out).
Hint systems are useful, though, in situations where a) a developer references something that they believe is "common knowledge" to solve a puzzle but might not be to everyone, b) you actually do know how to solve the puzzle but didn't know you could interact with something in the background which you needed for the puzzle (was annoying back in the pixel-hunting days).
In my subjective point of view, Season 1 of Sam&Max was exactly right in terms of game difficulty. I had exactly the kind of a-ha-moments TTG obviously aimed at.
I am normally not very competitive, still I feel that different degrees of difficulty or an in-built help system which can be turned off was never my kind of feature: If I set the difficulty too high, I might by all means fail; if I set it too low, I always think: I should be more intelligent than that, every real adventure fan should play it on hard/without hints, my IQ is far above average, I went to a university and was praised by my professors...
...well, you get my idea. ;-)
So, the hint system in S&M2 was not my thing. The general level of difficulty was obviously raised in the second season, and the hint system made up for this. I'd prefer a system without anything to be turned on or off or more difficult/less difficult; one where persistence alone would automatically elicit more clues concerning the present situation. A system in which gamer A would have to be around the crime scene for two minutes to get the idea, while gamer B, after thorough investigation, might get that extra clue he needs - an additional information for looking at things twice, an additional conversation option for nagging at people long enough, you get the idea.
My view is, of course, entirely subjective. That's probably the reason why it's so hard making good games everyone likes.
SBCG4AP was a steep drop in the puzzle regard, with Wallace and Gromit being a bit inconsistant. I hope that working with an Adventure Game franchise and adding in inventory combinations will help Tales climb back up to and perhaps beyond Sam and Max Season Two when it comes down to overall quality.
Don't get me wrong, because I second that with all my heart - save the difficulty part.
Oh! And another reason I love Season Two: The Music. It was great in Season One, but Season Two just really outdid itself in that regard, too.
The problem with this is that it encourages you to race against the hint system, where if you don't figure it out fast enough people who don't want hints at all would get punished by being given a hint. Some people don't want hints at all, which is why you always needs an off option.
Additional conversation options for "nagging" is interesting. Though, I don't see how it would be different than an on and off system. Instead of turning it on and getting a hint, you know if you talk to someone 5 times instead of 2 you get a hint, and to avoid doing that to not get a hint. It just seems like a more convoluted method of going about it.
Hope you don't mind that I added "- save the difficulty" to my post. You were just too fast with your answer. Yet I have to add: This difficulty level gave TTG the chance for more elaborate riddles. The hint system pushed you to the a-ha-experience, which I didn't like; still, the a-ha moments were there and, if experienced without a hint, just a tad more wonderful and satisfying than they were in Season one. Which, yes, made for a great, great, great Season 2.
And yet another edit: I'm a nut for video game music as well, and JEJ has really done a terriffic job on season 1 and 2. I do not as of yet own the soundtracks, but they are on my personal wishlist.
The main problem might be: What does one see as an unwanted "hint" and what not? What I was after was a system that is an organic part of the game and doesn't feel like an artificial help. If you're stuck, you'd automatically look at things twice, if you're not, you wouldn't. In real life, the same thing applies. If you get the clue in minute one, you wouldn't continue interrogating the same man for hours, and you would't delve into a thorough, repeated investigation on some objects. After all, you get "hints" in every single adventure game to solve the riddles, that's the nature of adventure games. The question is, which ones do you want as a gamer and which ones not, which make the game too easy, and when and how would you like to receive said hints. As the answer might again be a very subjective one, I'm not sure if a consensus could ever be reached that fit ALL gamers!
I think this is a self-defeating argument, for if the puzzle wasn't that hard, then where would be that enjoyment of solving it? Being stuck might not be fun but it is a challenge. I've played many games for the challenge, not for the leisure fun, and adventure games provide the fun in the locales, characters, and storylines, not the puzzles, which are placed for the challenge. I think the harder the puzzle the more the enjoyment had when it is solved.
However, I get stuck frequently, frustratingly, and evilly in TT games so I don't understand what you guys are complaining about.
np: Jackie Leven - The Crazy Song (The Haunted Year: Winter - Men In Prison)
Phew tough hehe
IMO
Idunno. The first few Sam & Max episodes were pretty breeze-through when I played them. I'm working on the fourth episode now, and I'm told it gets harder from there, so I'm looking forward to that. But if the difficulty of ToMI is about the same as the early S&Ms, I'll definitely be a "no hints" kinda player.
I personally see the hints as a way for new players to get into the thing. Think of Infocom's "Introductory Text Adventure" Wishbringer from 1985. This game is made to introduce people to the adventure genre by helping you out. It's pretty easy to beat by Infocom standards, with two solutions to every puzzle and the game giving you hints all the way through. It also will help you to correctly use the text parser.
For example, you are told there is a sign in the area. If you say "Look Sign", the game will say:
(Presumably you mean "LOOK AT" the sign, not "LOOK INSIDE" or "LOOK UNDER" or "LOOK BEHIND" the sign.)
...And then proceed as though you had typed the appropriate LOOK AT SIGN.
Telltale's difference being that they're just building this "introductory" functionality into ALL their adventures with the Hint system. It's not meant for seasoned adventurers with puzzles in their blood.