Walkthroughs

[Symphony]

I'll start the thread with the story of mine that made me give some thoughts about this topic. It's rather lengthy, but nonetheless interesting (I guess).

[StartRant]
[spoiler]

When I was a kid, me and my father spent months playing Kirby for the N64. Every time our file got deleted, we just went and did it again. If you're not familiar with the game, aside from the standard kirby platformer, you had those crystal shards to collect. Some of them were found lying on a higher platform, others were obtained after you defeat a boss and others were trapped in segments that were locked with color patterns.

Each of the powers you can swallow have a color and you also have the ability to combine two powers to generate a completely new one. Since they carry over stages, we often found ourselves on quests to obtain the specific combination to crack a door and get a shard.

However, there was this one door, right after an underwater segment on a beach level that we simply couldn't get the shard. You had to open it with a Stone + Cutter (it allowed you to take shape of an stone owl, bird, fish and some sort of rabbit) and the shard... well, lemme show you:



If it's not clear:
[spoiler] Imagine it as a U shaped tube. The door was at the bottom of the U and it had a small segment of water and a platform up to 20% of the way up. We spent days trying to use the fast but weak bird and the slower but resistant owl to get up there. It let us a kirby-away from the shard, but nothing more than that. [/spoiler]


We had finished the game countless times, defeating what we thought was the end boss, but we ALWAYS left that shard behind. Our save files had a frustrating 99,9% after it.

On a random weekend I was spending at my family's house last year, my sister decided to get the 64 so she could show me for the 72638723th time how she would fail beating the Elite Four on Pokemon Stadium (Yes, I haven't finished that game after all these years. The standard pokemon moves suck and my friend that used to lend me the Pokemon Red Cartridge sold it.).
I then realized I could search the internetz on how to get that shard. And so I did. To find out that the rabbit was a squirrel. And squirrels can climb rock walls. *sigh*
I got the shard and went to the most epic nostalgia boss I had in the past years.

[/spoiler]
[/EndRant]

Sooooo, after remembering that little story after I finished playing Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (actually, I'm on the last boss as I type this) I've made up the following thoughts about walkthroughs:

1. Walkthroughs are helpful, no doubt about that. However, where's the limit (or.. is there a limit?) between using a walkthrough and having fun with the game?
I have friends that only play games with walkthrough open while they run. They stop at every segment in order to know what to do next (one of them linked me to a 300 page + walkthrough on OoT he was using). Heck.. even I had to do this while playing Legend of Grimrock. For some weird reasons, the dungeon style made me take scares at each corner. So I had the need to know if something was going to pop up.
And I must say, even using a walkthrough entirely, I found the game to be extremely fun. It might be because the fights were mine to decide, and so was the character upgrades, but I don't really know.

2. As I grew up, I found myself with less and less time to spend on games. I still spend a lot of time, but I just won't let myself stare at 'x' point in a game where I'm stuck and try to find out how to progress. If the answer isn't clear, and if the game doesn't get me that involved, I will simply hop to gamefaqs and get the answer. However, if the answer is too obvious, I will feel bad, seeing as I could've find out if I had tried a bit more.

3. To what extent is acceptable for a game to require you to use walkthroughs? I mean, you could tell me 'Heck, walkthroughs are for lazy gamers. I don't use walkthroughs' but the point is (unless the game is ridiculously easy) you can't get 100% of the game by yourself (and I really mean 100%. With every-fucking-thing available).
For me, old games like the Kirby I mentioned, even though the game itself was fairly easy, lacked some sort of explanation on how stuff works. I would've never figured out I could climb walls with that rabbit if I hadn't read. IMO, if the game is making you use alternative sources to find out how their stuff works, it has failed somewhere.


==========================

So, what do you think about them?

[retrolinkx]

I think walkthroughs are acceptable to use if you did everything and don't know what to do.

But it's not when the game you're using is very easy.

I knew I guy who used a walkthrough for Pokémon Diamond, there were no words, just judgmental eyes.

Right now, I use a walkthrough for Zelda 2, but not all the time, only when I don't know where to go, and want to find stuff, but apart from that I don't use Walkthroughs unless I'm stuck.

[Xannidel]

I use a walkthrough for Fallout New Vegas but it is mainly to focus on what stats I should work on and that's about it...Well maybe if I am lost on where to really go but the DLC should provide to be very interesting due to there not being an official walkthrough out for all the DLC.

When I was younger my mom and I used to play a TON of adventure games and because I was so young I really was not very helpful when it came to puzzles and what not so she would normally order walkthrough books and I still have plenty of them from Myst to Rive to Lighthouse to Frankenstein ect. and I guess it sort of just stuck with me.

Also a walkthrough guide for Pokemon exists? I mean I sometimes look at bulbapedia to get an idea of what type of a pokemon it is so I can try to find an advantage but that is about it.

[Zaliphone]

I used one for LA Noire just because I'm terrible at finding clues and questioning...basically the game itself. I also used one to find a few intel in Black Ops. They hid those things pretty good.

[SERIOUSLY THOUGH]

Used one of those guides you used to get in magazines to help me with the trades in Link's Awakening DX
Good times

[BumblebeeCody]

It really depends on the type of walkthrough
When I was younger I would get stuck in Zelda OoT/MM/ALttP so I would use a guide to help me. Now that I'm older I understand the thinking behind a Zelda game and know what I doing. (I never used a guide for TWW, TP or SS). However I did buy a walkthrough guide (many months after I bought and completed the game). Walkthroughs nowadays are great collectors items. I have a guide for every Zelda game. I love the artwork, posters CDs, special promotions that you get with guides. They're extremely well written and looks great in a large collection.
Even if I don't end up using a guide at all, I love to collect hem. I recently bought Final Fantasy XIII-2, Gears 3, Zelda SS guides. The special editions of Gears 3, FXIII-2 and Zelda SS all come with added bonuses such as: CDs and posters but are also written on different higher quality paper and are all hardback with special designs.

Other walkthroughs like achievement guides from TrueAchievements/x360a are helpful for those who want help on how to obtain a certain achievements, especially the "secret achievements". They often help you on where to find certain collectibles or what task you need to fulfill.

As a fighting game fanatic I buy all the guides that I can. For us they are there to understand frame data and Hit/hurtbox data. This information is crucial if you ever want to get good at fighting games so it's kind of necessary.

The only game at the moment I find myself going back to is this guide for The Witcher 2. I want to progress with the story/quests but sometimes the objective is unclear. I don't see it as cheating because it saves you from getting annoyed wandering around trying to find the objective, then getting frustrated and not going back to it.

[Nuudoru]

Frame data is for nerds - Mike "MikeRoss" Ross

[retrolinkx]

(08-13-2012 08:35 AM)BumblebeeCody Wrote:  It really depends on the type of walkthrough
When I was younger I would get stuck in Zelda OoT/MM/ALttP so I would use a guide to help me. Now that I'm older I understand the thinking behind a Zelda game and know what I doing. (I never used a guide for TWW, TP or SS).

How the hell did you get all the Pieces of the Triforce without a guide, did you just constantly play?

[elizasteave]

Well, to be frank I have never used walkthroughs, because I never knew about them. I just knew about the cheat codes and for these codes I didn't knew how to access them. The only option for me was just to get escape anyhow and to win the game, otherwise just be killed ! I still want those walkthroughs to play the games for an easy win.

[BumblebeeCody]

(08-13-2012 04:34 PM)Nuudoru Wrote:  Frame data is for nerds - Mike "MikeRoss" Ross

I'm Mike Ross who plays MvC3 because Hulk and one move that an 8year old (Shots fired) can do and I only progressed in EVO because my opponent killed himself. Of course he doesn't need frame data.
Granted I don't use frame data too much but it can be handy if you're having a problem on how to punish a certain move.

(08-13-2012 05:24 PM)retrolinkx Wrote:  

(08-13-2012 08:35 AM)BumblebeeCody Wrote:  It really depends on the type of walkthrough
When I was younger I would get stuck in Zelda OoT/MM/ALttP so I would use a guide to help me. Now that I'm older I understand the thinking behind a Zelda game and know what I doing. (I never used a guide for TWW, TP or SS).

How the hell did you get all the Pieces of the Triforce without a guide, did you just constantly play?

It's kind of simple really. The only people/creatures who decode charts are Fishman (Hoy small fry) and Tingle (as he does in Majoras Mask). Once you go to Tingle and get the locations, all the Triforce shards have a much larger aura with a pillar of light. I'm pretty sure he does mention he specialises in chart decoding.

[retrolinkx]

^

No not that, I remember there is so much shit to do, like doing a side quest to get a deed to a house, so you can search inside for a chart, I remember it being long and confusing.

[Ouberry_13]

I actually only use walkthroughs or the like when I literally cannot think of what to do in order to progress. That said, I've only had to resort to a walkthrough for about 3 games. I usually am very good at figuring out puzzles, but when I got stuck in those 3 games, I felt terrible. Anyway, I don't care if someone uses one in order to play, but I prefer to do without. I like figuring things out on my own and having fun. Plus, I usually only buy guides for the art and extra story bits in them.