What's the lamest thing you've seen in a video game?

[indigoasis]

So I recently got Forza Horizon 5, and it's been an absolute blast; probably one of the best racing games I've played in a good while, but I'm not very hard to please in in that regard. The visual car customization isn't as extensive as Need for Speed, but I can look past that with how many more cars are available (and Forza actually has Toyota, lol). Oh, and you can actually change the view to see what's in the cockpit of each car, which is absolutely awesome. Great attention to detail.

Except in some cars. See, when the driver changes gears, you'll see their hand move to shift the transmission, which is typically what I've come to expect out of stick shift. It looks cool and feels cool. But then when you drive some of the more modern cars, they have these little buttons on the steering wheel to change gears. Not a stick shift, just... buttons. On the steering wheel. That's probably the lamest thing I've ever seen not just in a video game, but in a car. It might be more practical, but like... stick shift is so much cooler.

And this leads me to ask: What's the lamest thing you've ever seen in a video game? Or just a lame thing in general?

[Zapp Branniglenn]

I'm playing this new pokemon and a lot of things fit the bill. But chief among them is the clothing options. I dove into about a dozen clothing stores looking for shirts and pants to replace the dorky school uniform on my character. There's clearly greyed out tabs for shirts and pants, and yet every outlet was selling accessories. Frustrated, I google searched the issue and it turns out you're stuck with the uniform and its four variations. But you've got a hundred choices for what you want your socks to look like 

[Original Alear]

I dunno about of all time, but I've been playing Guardians of the Galaxy, an enjoyable game, but at one point my character looked in a mirror and did an air guitar pantomime. I dunno, I thought it was kinda lame.

Even though I love the Metal Gear Solid Series, I feel like some of the dialogue has hilariously untrue interpretations/understandings of the truth. Like dominant genes being superior by default, or the idea that paramedics have their names from parachuting down to provide medical care.

[vanguard333]

2 hours ago, indigoasis said:

Except in some cars. See, when the driver changes gears, you'll see their hand move to shift the transmission, which is typically what I've come to expect out of stick shift. It looks cool and feels cool. But then when you drive some of the more modern cars, they have these little buttons on the steering wheel to change gears. Not a stick shift, just... buttons. On the steering wheel. That's probably the lamest thing I've ever seen not just in a video game, but in a car. It might be more practical, but like... stick shift is so much cooler.

That's an actual thing; it's called a semi-automatic transmission (more commonly referred to as a "flappy-paddle" transmission). It's mainly used in a lot of expensive, fast cars designed more for going around a track than on a road.

 

For me, the lamest thing I've probably seen is the light-attack/heavy-attack system in games with weapons-based combat. It's "Do this quick attack for less damage or do this really slow and dumb-looking attack for more damage when, in reality, they'd both do about the same damage because you're using a bladed weapon". It's lame.

[Fabulously Olivier]

1 hour ago, Zapp Branniglenn said:

I'm playing this new pokemon and a lot of things fit the bill. But chief among them is the clothing options. I dove into about a dozen clothing stores looking for shirts and pants to replace the dorky school uniform on my character. There's clearly greyed out tabs for shirts and pants, and yet every outlet was selling accessories. Frustrated, I google searched the issue and it turns out you're stuck with the uniform and its four variations. But you've got a hundred choices for what you want your socks to look like 

You know, it really is like the Pokemon franchise is walking backwards. The one game in which your characters look atrocious is the one with next to no ability to change that.

[Sidereal Wraith]

I still wake up in a cold sweat at night to this very day. So we're going to be defeat the final boss by singing at him? What an exciting way to end the game!

[indigoasis]

1 hour ago, vanguard333 said:

That's an actual thing; it's called a semi-automatic transmission (more commonly referred to as a "flappy-paddle" transmission). It's mainly used in a lot of expensive, fast cars designed more for going around a track than on a road.

Thanks for teaching me something new today. It's still freaking lame, but not as lame as:

2 hours ago, Zapp Branniglenn said:

I'm playing this new pokemon and a lot of things fit the bill. But chief among them is the clothing options. I dove into about a dozen clothing stores looking for shirts and pants to replace the dorky school uniform on my character. There's clearly greyed out tabs for shirts and pants, and yet every outlet was selling accessories. Frustrated, I google searched the issue and it turns out you're stuck with the uniform and its four variations. But you've got a hundred choices for what you want your socks to look like 

this is the sacrifice for an open world pokemon game

[Perkilator]

When a particular fan base is so zealous about a game they like they’ll happily sabotage other. Case in point, right now the Game Awards Players’ Choice vote is going on and two of the choices are Sonic Frontiers, and…Genshin Impact. Right now, both fanbases are at each other’s throat for Players’ Choice, but the Genshin side in particular is acting pretty lame because they’re convinced it’ll net them more gacha materials.

[Lord_Brand]

Three examples come to mind:

1. The Zero parts side quest in Mega Man X2. Going out of your way to fight the X-Hunters and collect Zero's parts rewards you with...skipping the boss fight before Neo Sigma. Not unlocking Zero for play and getting to demolish Fake Zero with him, but just skipping the battle altogether. A big letdown for one of the game's signature additions.
2. The armor parts in Mega Man X5 and X6. Specifically, the fact you have to collect all four parts before you get to use any of them. That drastically reduces the amount of mileage you get out of them, especially in the cases of Gaea Armor and Shadow Armor.
3. Just about all the changes made to the item infrastructure of Mega Man 8. No E Tanks or W Tanks, just a crappy Rush Bomber variant that forces you to scramble for all the health pickups. No Rush Coil or (freely playable) Rush Jet, just a crappy motorcycle with exactly one practical use in an early stage. No Beat or Eddie except as powerups for the underwhelming shmup segments on Rush Jet. Not even a new version of the Super Adapter despite the fact Bass gets a new Super mode. Mega Man 8 is one of the most disappointing sequels and installments in the series, which is especially bad since it was supposed to celebrate the series' 10th anniversary. Why did they feel the need to change just about everything that worked in the past six games?

Honestly, there are a lot of lame things the Mega Man franchise has done, but these three stand out in my mind.

[Armchair General]

8 hours ago, Perkilator said:

When a particular fan base is so zealous about a game they like they’ll happily sabotage other. Case in point, right now the Game Awards Players’ Choice vote is going on and two of the choices are Sonic Frontiers, and…Genshin Impact. Right now, both fanbases are at each other’s throat for Players’ Choice, but the Genshin side in particular is acting pretty lame because they’re convinced it’ll net them more gacha materials.

You know that this entire maelstrom started over someone posting an meme, right?

[SoulWeaver]

On 12/6/2022 at 2:29 PM, Perkilator said:

the Genshin side in particular is acting pretty lame because they’re convinced it’ll net them more gacha materials.

...I seem to recall FEH doing something when they won an award the first year, if my memory is correct that's not even a bad assumption. If I'm wrong then whatever, pretty much any gacha fanbase is willing to hope for free materials, that's hardly lame, just sad.

[AnonymousSpeed]

Story.

[Perkilator]

On a lesser note, I was kinda disappointed when the customization feature and Objectives from Kingdom Hearts 0.2 didn't make a return in Kingdom Hearts III. Hopefully they'll revisit those in the future.

[Fabulously Olivier]

On 12/6/2022 at 2:44 PM, indigoasis said:

Thanks for teaching me something new today. It's still freaking lame, but not as lame as:

this is the sacrifice for an open world pokemon game

Why should it be? Open world games have had rich wardrobes for over a decade now. Any hack fuck developer can make a semi-competent open world game these days, so why can't the literal biggest media franchise in the world?

[indigoasis]

3 hours ago, Fabulously Olivier said:

Why should it be? Open world games have had rich wardrobes for over a decade now. Any hack fuck developer can make a semi-competent open world game these days, so why can't the literal biggest media franchise in the world?

e x a c t l y

it's one step forward, and then like eight and half steps back

[BrightBow]

Map Affinity.

Edited December 8, 2022 by BrightBow

[Tempest Trials]

Lamest thing I'VE seen in a videogame? Try the AI and Dice rolling in every DnD mobile game ever? I got more fails in an hour than I got in two IRL sessions. Also how they handled S supports in FE:3H. I get that they're your students, they're too young, war war war blah blah blah- May I remind you we've been allowed to support OUR OWN FRIEND'S KIDS BEFORE!? (I'm guilty of this myself, cuz I've supported Nah and Asugi before) I really wish child units were a thing in FE:3H, cuz that was one of my favorite things about FE:A and FE:F C/B/R