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Tell me your stories of realising something about a game you played in the past years after the fact. Whether it's finding out that some sweet weapon could mince a boss you spent forever trying to beat or discovering about game-play mechanics which would have made your experience more forgiving, let's hear it. I'll start. I only just realised, while reading about the SCUMM games that 'Day of the Tentacle' had voice acting. I played through it, maybe 14 years ago, on a PC which had a busted speaker system. Of course, becuase of the style of the game and my general naivety with PC gaming I didn't stop to think twice about the lack of sound. At the time I loved the game but felt it lacked personality in a way I couldn't describe, and now I know why. Further back in terms of the gap between the "oh poo poo" moment and me starting the game, but when I first played Tomb Raider 1, I got up to level 4 (Tomb of Qualopec) before my dad pointed out you could walk to the edge of a drop without falling, before attempting to jump past it. Given the square based style of the platforming in that game things were made a lot easier when you weren't trying to gauge the success of a leap as you were running. Oh, and a much more recent and probably more common one - I didn't realise that in Dark Souls, there is a bonfire hidden behind an illusory wall in the Darkroot Garden. It'd be nice if someone had written that helpful orange message before the umpteen attempts I had trying to kill the Moonlight Butterfly. 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:05 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 06:50 |
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I didn't know about the store in the first Paper Mario where you could trade in Star Crystals (I think that's what they were called) for badges until just before the final dungeon. At least I could afford some pretty sweet stuff by then.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:08 |
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I never knew that Andross had a true form in Star Fox 64. I never had a Nintendo 64 myself, but one of my friends growing up did, and that was the only game that I was ever interested in playing on the 64. Super Mario 64 sucked balls, what is this 3D poo poo? Anyway, I can recall beating that game many times, always with the same outcome. Get to Andross, beat him down, he turns into a weird robot, beat that down right quick, fiery escape, roll credits. Fast forward to about a year ago, when I pick up a 3DS for myself. Star Fox 64 in 3D is at the top of my list. Play though, but this time make it to the satellite at the top. My buddy had always told me that you get to skip Venom by going that route, and go straight to the Andross battle. Like a back door, essentially. I guess I'd never made it through that route. Imagine my surprise when Andross turns into a loving FLYING BRAIN, and not only that, but when you make the fiery escape you are joined by Fox's dad. Awesome. I felt like a kid again.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:20 |
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That you would never be able to build a mass driver or anything else promised in Outpost. That coupled with the colonists still lining me in spite of everything going bad made me realize this is a bad game.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:24 |
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When I first started playing WoW I got to, like, level 50 before spending a single talent point (back when talents were actually important). One day I was showing my friend my hunter and he asked about my spec. "My what?" I was just running around siccing my pig on things while autoattacking. 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:37 |
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I played FF6 religiously as a kid, but I never realized you could save shadow, nor had I ever suplexed a train. It's surprising that I beat the game a good 5 times before looking up secrets on the internet.Skeleton Ape posted:When I first started playing WoW I got to, like, level 50 before spending a single talent point (back when talents were actually important). One day I was showing my friend my hunter and he asked about my spec. "My what?" I was just running around siccing my pig on things while autoattacking. Oh jeez, I had a friend who was in that same exact position back in early vanilla.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:44 |
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Once my friend convinced me to try WoW so we spent the afternoon running around "leveling up". When I reached level 8 I had the horrible realization that we were just doing the same basic quest over and over, getting slightly better versions of equipment we already had.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:45 |
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It took me a long time to come to terms with the Day of Reckoning scenario in Majesty is literally impossible without starting off in exactly the right spot, and other luck factors.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:46 |
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Skeleton Ape posted:When I first started playing WoW I got to, like, level 50 before spending a single talent point (back when talents were actually important). One day I was showing my friend my hunter and he asked about my spec. "My what?" I was just running around siccing my pig on things while autoattacking. I wouldn't feel so bad about this, many players do this today.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:50 |
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marauderthirty posted:Super Mario 64 sucked balls, what is this 3D poo poo? You were an rear end in a top hat when you were a kid.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:50 |
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In Resident Evil 4 there are these nearly invincible, slow walking, enemies that grow spikes out of themselves of stab you when you get near them. The game gives you a thermal scope for your rifle so you can see a weak spot on their insides and shoot that. I apparently wasn't paying attention when the game explained where to find that scope, so I defeated all of them and beat the game by just unloading clips into them with my automatic rifles until they died. I also played Skyrim for like 15 hours before realising you could sprint.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:54 |
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I managed to get past the first few bosses in FF8 without knowing what the junction system was, so I would only use the standard attacks and items. Finally got frustrated and gave up. Years later, picking it back up I realized how stupid a kid I was.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 16:58 |
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 As a young kid i spent ages on this game because i hadnt figured out how to save a game (DOS commands). So i had to start over every time i died, without the internet or game guides to help. I get the 3 magic items, about to finish the very end of the game and the king wants you to come closer, as he's dying. I spent about an hour trying to climb the few steps. Never managed it, never completed the game, still don't know wtf you're supposed to do. But learning how to save a game can help. Makes Leisure Suit Larry easier. nimh fucked around with this message at Feb 8, 2013 around 17:12 |
| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:00 |
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Not mine, but my best friend told me about how he beat Sonic 3 and Knuckles, which was his favorite game as a kid. In Carnival Night Zone there's these weird hovering platforms that kinda float up and down. I was watching him play through it, maybe about five years ago, and he starts doing these weird jumps and stuff. I'm like "what're you doing?" and he's like "Well, Sonic 3 and Knuckles is an incomplete game or something so the only way to get through this level is to glitch through these." So he's trying to glitch through and he just can't. He tells me about how it can take awhile, but it's possible. I had no idea - I was an SNES kid - and so this was my first time seeing the game. Frustrated, he gets up to go to the bathroom and I'm like "can I try?" and he says sure. I do it and when he comes back I reveal that I quickly figured out that to move the platforms, you just hold up or down and it goes in that direction. The end. Everyone died.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:02 |
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Little Mac posted:Sonic 3 and Knuckles ... weird hovering platforms Oh God those loving things. 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:04 |
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Back when I played Dota 1 I had many many games before I realized that you can use hotkeys to activate your abilities, rather than clicking with the mouse. Optimus Prime Ribs posted:I also played Skyrim for like 15 hours before realising you could sprint. I'm still not sure how to do this outside of the shout.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:06 |
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computer parts posted:I'm still not sure how to do this outside of the shout. On PC you hold shift. On the 360 it's one of the triggers (left one I think). Don't know how it's done on PS3.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:09 |
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^^^Wha? I guess a mod must have changed mine.computer parts posted:Back when I played Dota 1 I had many many games before I realized that you can use hotkeys to activate your abilities, rather than clicking with the mouse. Hold the Alt button. If you're playing on a console, purchase the PC version and then hold down the Alt button  .
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:11 |
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Ramagamma posted:Day of the Tentacle Speaking of, here's one for me and several people who played the game: I didn't realize until close to the end of the game that you could transfer items between the three kids by dragging and dropping items onto their pictures in the status bar, I would always manually walk both characters to the Chrono-John and transfer items that way (there were two different animations it would do to show the two characters moving to/from their respective Chrono-Johns, then it would just auto-do it with a flushing noise). Even better, the mechanic for doing this is intelligent and won't let you transfer items if one of the two characters isn't physically able to get to the Chrono-John (e.g. the first third or so of Laverne's scenario if you're not in the courtyard).
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:14 |
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univbee posted:Speaking of, here's one for me and several people who played the game: Now that you mention it, I have a vauge memory of walking back to those toilets every-time I wanted to transfer an item.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:23 |
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:24 |
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Makanovy posted:I managed to get past the first few bosses in FF8 without knowing what the junction system was, so I would only use the standard attacks and items. Finally got frustrated and gave up. Years later, picking it back up I realized how stupid a kid I was. I played basically the entire game this way. It was the worst.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:29 |
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I played all the way through FF8 thinking that getting everyone to level 100 and using my summons as the main damage dealers was the easiest way to play it. 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:31 |
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When I was very young (first grade ish) my brother was in High School and brought home a box of 5 1/4" floppies with pirated copies of a bunch of amazing games. I had one in the mix called "The Bard's Tale" which I was never able to get anywhere in despite realizing that I had to go get "grape juice" from the cellar under an inn.. I was totally unable to cast spells (and thus couldn't progress because I could only heal by returning to inns) because I was unaware until a good decade later (when a friend got the NES version) that the spells were all gibberish words which had to be referenced and then typed in manually from the game manual, which I'd never known existed.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:34 |
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Can-O-Raid posted:^^^Wha? I guess a mod must have changed mine. Now that I think about it I may have just re-bound mine. Shift is the default walk-toggle key I think. v  v
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:35 |
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Similar to FF8 junctioning (which I had no idea how it worked but was aware of it), I didn't fully understand that certain materia in FF7 would effect your stats negatively and the whole thing is just a big balancing act until I recently played through it again. I remember always having issues with several bosses that were a complete joke once I figured all that stuff out. I had no idea I could pick up weapons in Mirror's Edge until literally the second to last stage. That was a loving nightmare. Oh yeah, I also had no idea that in HL2 you lead your rockets with the laser pointer, so when I did the light tower fight against the big flying guys I kept shooting a rocket and then ducking back in without tracing it. I actually managed to get through the whole thing that way 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:37 |
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The PC Gamer reviewer for the PC Port didn't get Junctioning either, and I think the game got like a 47% score or something because of how frustratingly bored he got spamming summons with long animations to kill bosses.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:40 |
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Little Mac posted:Not mine, but my best friend told me about how he beat Sonic 3 and Knuckles, which was his favorite game as a kid. In Carnival Night Zone there's these weird hovering platforms that kinda float up and down. I was watching him play through it, maybe about five years ago, and he starts doing these weird jumps and stuff. I'm like "what're you doing?" and he's like "Well, Sonic 3 and Knuckles is an incomplete game or something so the only way to get through this level is to glitch through these." So he's trying to glitch through and he just can't. He tells me about how it can take awhile, but it's possible. I had no idea - I was an SNES kid - and so this was my first time seeing the game. Same for me. 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:55 |
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I didn't realize you could fast travel in Oblivion until I was about 20 hours in.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 17:55 |
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In Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, I didn't know you could move the bat up and down during a Wing Smash until a year or two ago when I decided to watch a TAS of it. I knew you could do it in the Saturn version, but I thought it was one of those perks of that port considering the Wing Smash is also infinite until you run into a wall in that version. I have no excuse, though since I've played through it literally dozens of times. Even if it's absolutely worthless to execute for me since I do nothing with speed runs.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 18:05 |
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When the Legend of Zelda first came out, my best friend and I rented an NES and that game and played it for about five hours before we realized that you needed to go into dungeons to advance the story. We also got to the old man on top of the waterfall with the White Sword who said something like "Prove that you can use this" so we spend 15 minutes showing off all our flashy sword moves to try to convince him to give us the sword 
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 18:09 |
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Several people posted:FF7 & FF8 core mechanics issues.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 18:39 |
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SixtySix posted:We also got to the old man on top of the waterfall with the White Sword who said something like "Prove that you can use this" so we spend 15 minutes showing off all our flashy sword moves to try to convince him to give us the sword HOW THE gently caress CAN I "MASTER USING THIS" before you give it to me that's a catch 22 old man jeez. As a child I felt sort of betrayed to discover that video game stories didn't need to have their own internal consistency, and event flags could be tied to visual or verbal signifiers in illogical ways. You didn't get how the items worked?
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 18:41 |
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swamp waste posted:
coyo7e fucked around with this message at Feb 8, 2013 around 18:48 |
| # ? Feb 8, 2013 18:44 |
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I'm wondering how many players went through Dark Cloud 2 upgrading their weapons with only crystals and gems before hitting a difficulty wall and either quitting the game or finding out that they'd ruined their weapon and would have to spend hours making one the right way.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 19:05 |
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I played every pokemon game up to Diamond and Pearl before realizing that trained pokemon have higher stats than captured pokemon of the same level. I used to just box whoever fell behind in levels and replace them with someone I'd just caught, all the time. I also didn't realize that some pokemon were just inherently BAD, I thought all of them had the potential to be as good as any other(except legendaries). And now I have to grind everyone up to the same level before every significant battle section in the game. And I can't use pokemon I actually like because they're mechanically terrible. It was more fun before I had to grind pokemon I dislike using to be good at playing.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 19:07 |
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Oldstench posted:I'm not trying to be an rear end here, but didn't you even glance at the manual? Isn't that information in there? I think the problem is that this is when games started doing the whole telling-you-how-to-play-as-you-started thing (because gamers kept losing their goddamn manuals), and the importance of junctioning wasn't well explained in-game, at least in the English and European versions of the game, and was a complete gameplay mechanic departure from other RPGs up until that time, including Final Fantasy VII a.k.a. the game before this one in the same series. Similarly, Romancing Saga was panned initially in Japan because its monster difficulty mechanic was designed in such a way that grinding was a bad thing, which was opposite to every RPG up until that point (in RS, every 100 fights would change the monster encounters to stronger creatures and you had to power up your party by going through as much as the storyline as possible before that happens).
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 19:20 |
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I was wondering how many post's this thread would go until Carnival Night Zone popped up. I didn't realize there were multiple stars in each level of Mario 64 until I was way in. I thought I'd nearly completed it. I thought the numbers on the doors and stuff were just a weird take on the SMW map screen. And then I was all like '...oh'. Although in fairness, I'm not sure the realization that there's 'lots more Mario 64' was particularly 'horrible'.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 19:29 |
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univbee posted:I think the problem is that this is when games started doing the whole telling-you-how-to-play-as-you-started thing (because gamers kept losing their goddamn manuals), and the importance of junctioning wasn't well explained in-game, at least in the English and European versions of the game, and was a complete gameplay mechanic departure from other RPGs up until that time, including Final Fantasy VII a.k.a. the game before this one in the same series. Similarly, Romancing Saga was panned initially in Japan because its monster difficulty mechanic was designed in such a way that grinding was a bad thing, which was opposite to every RPG up until that point (in RS, every 100 fights would change the monster encounters to stronger creatures and you had to power up your party by going through as much as the storyline as possible before that happens).
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 19:33 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 06:50 |
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univbee posted:I think the problem is that this is when games started doing the whole telling-you-how-to-play-as-you-started thing
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| # ? Feb 8, 2013 19:37 |
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