Rant -Saving your progress in console games

[tk149]

You did realize ever Toad you encountered saved your game for you if you asked, didn't you?
There are quite a few - front hall, balcony, shed, bathroom, etc...

Y'know, I knew that, but for some reason I forgot, and only used the balcony once. My fault.

Anyway, I'm stuck on the Bowser battle, and the nearest save point is the front hall. The basement hallway still has a few ghosties, and you can't skip Boo's speech or the Bowser cutscene.

 

[purbeast0]

the real question here is ... why are you playing Luigi's Mansion? that game was pretty terrible.

 

[AstroManLuca]

Anyway, like I said, I prefer to be able to make the decision myself on whether to save or not. Back when I had more time to play games, sometimes I would intentionally not save a game more than once per level/area. You don't have to save a game if you want to artificially ramp up the difficulty.

To each his own, but I don't agree with this. When the game designers give you a quicksave, they generally intend for you to use it. And how often did you actually avoid using the quicksave in order to make the game harder? It's just too hard to resist IMO. I guess it can work if you're very disciplined.

I do, however, strongly agree about games that don't give you enough save points. Case in point, the Metroid Prime series. Ugh. I gave up on Metroid Prime 3 because it didn't give me enough save points. It literally takes 30-60 minutes to get to the next one. You're not likely to die on the way to it (you get a lot of health), but it's just tedious and boring. It's like the game wants you to stop playing early instead of trying to lure you in. Every time I managed to get to a save point in that game, I was tempted to shut it off because I was afraid I wouldn't get to the next save point in time.

I guess it's okay if you have a whole day off that you can dedicate toward playing the game, but if you have other obligations, it makes it basically impossible to play the game. Have a spare hour? You might make it to the next save room in time. If not, better be prepared to leave your Wii running overnight or just throw out the last hour of progress!

 

[purbeast0]

can we all agree that the WORST save system in the HISTORY OF VIDEO GAMES is Dead Rising?

not sure how it is in part 2, but part 1 ... wow.

 

[fatpat268]

The problem of the real world intruding can be 100% solved by letting the player pause the game, quit game, and later resume from where they left.

Yea, I would love it if this were available in most, if not all games. It's the one thing that makes the portables interesting to me... that you can just suspend your game whenever you need to.

 

[artemicion]

LoL if you think games these days have too few save points, try beating Rygar on the NES without using emulation save states.

 

[tk149]

the real question here is ... why are you playing Luigi's Mansion? that game was pretty terrible.

A friend loaned it to me three years ago. I figured it's about time I returned it.

Don't judge me too harshly. He borrowed Zelda Wind Waker at the same time and hasn't returned it yet.

 

[tk149]

I do, however, strongly agree about games that don't give you enough save points. Case in point, the Metroid Prime series. Ugh. I gave up on Metroid Prime 3 because it didn't give me enough save points. It literally takes 30-60 minutes to get to the next one. You're not likely to die on the way to it (you get a lot of health), but it's just tedious and boring. It's like the game wants you to stop playing early instead of trying to lure you in. Every time I managed to get to a save point in that game, I was tempted to shut it off because I was afraid I wouldn't get to the next save point in time.

I guess it's okay if you have a whole day off that you can dedicate toward playing the game, but if you have other obligations, it makes it basically impossible to play the game. Have a spare hour? You might make it to the next save room in time. If not, better be prepared to leave your Wii running overnight or just throw out the last hour of progress!

Gah! I am just now catching up on my GameCube games, and believe it or not, Metroid Prime (the first one) is next on my list! Oh the huge manatees!

 

[AstroManLuca]

Metroid Prime 1 didn't seem to be quite as bad, but there were still issues. There's a boss that's pretty far from a save room - first you have to fight your way to him, then after you beat him, you have to fight your way back. Get killed, and you have to beat the boss again. Most bosses are right next to a save room but not all.

I didn't play 2, but 3 was definitely worse than 1 with regards to save rooms. I despise the idea though. I really would have liked for them to put about twice as many save points in the game, or better yet - give you the ability to save whenever you want. Save rooms also restore full health and missiles, but they could have added the ability to save without restoring your health.

FWIW I enjoyed MP1 a whole lot more than MP3. I mean, I actually beat the game rather than quitting in frustration. However, my bullshit tolerance has gone down since I played MP1 so I don't know.

 

[tdawg]

If I took 20 minutes walking to a place and get killed right when I walk in then I would be upset. Just using that as an example of a certain type of game where easy saves don't ruin the game in my opinion.

This is what made me stop playing GTA IV.

 

[fatpat268]

This is what made me stop playing GTA IV.

They fixed that in the GTA4 episodes where if you died during a mission, it would fast track you back to the mission if you wanted.

 

[ioni]

This would be brilliant, but do any games exist that use checkpoints and "resume state" after quitting?

New SMB Wii does this. I've played plenty of other games that do this as well. Just can't remember their names.

I'm a big fan of save anywhere anytime. Although it does tend to make the game easier, the convenience is just too nice.

 

[Pia]

I respectfully disagree. Doom, Quake, Half-Life, Starcraft, and Knights of the Old Republic all worked wonderfully with save-at-will.

Doom and Starcraft are neatly split in levels and work fine by just playing a level in one go. I have beat both not saving. (Might be reasonable for Doom to preserve the equipment you entered a level with, though.) Free saving could easily be removed from these games. Half-Life has checkpoints, and I played it originally intending to not manually save, but it has a couple of very random, sucky sections which got me to use a handful of saves. HL would absolutely become better if saving was removed which would also force them to improve the problematic sections.

This would be brilliant, but do any games exist that use checkpoints and "resume state" after quitting?

Nethack uses resume state. (What I'm advocating isn't checkpoints specifically, but resume states and some choice of save system that is not the cop-out of free saving.) I don't play handhelds but I'd think games on them would have resume state?

 

[mizzou]

I've abandoned several games in frustration due to fake difficulty + saving checkpoints.

 

[waggy]

I've abandoned several games in frustration due to fake difficulty + saving checkpoints.

I don't mind hard games. but ones that make it harder do to idiotic saving is annoying.

 

[TheVrolok]

Meh.

*goes back to Demon's Souls*

 

[Golgatha]

Actually I prefer the checkpoint system. Game's are way too easy if you can just quick save constantly.

I agree to some extent. I personally would like the console itself to put in a gamestate type save system, where you could essentially pause the game, turn off the console, and pick up where you left off. I'd complete a lot more games if they implemented this feature.

 

[kamikazekyle]

Anyone remember Steel Battalion? One save game per character, and if your character died in battle the save game was erased. To make matters even more fun, the save game was copy protected so you couldn't back it up on an unmodded Xbox.

 

[MikeMike]

tk149, resident evil was first created on PSX back in 96 and it used the ribbon system to save. it added to the survival horror aspect of that game. you had very limited everything in that game, and that is what made it difficult to survive. you had to play smart and save smart or else you could end up screwed.

man that game owned so hard when it came out ... still remember getting scared shitless when the dogs broke through the window early on.

omg, that game...

96 means i was 10 when it came out... my buddy would have been 13...

we pitched a tent in his back yard, ran an extension cable, brought out a TV, PS, and RE... played the game in the pitch black, outside, from like 9pm till like 5am...

that may have scarred me for life, but my god i still remember it like yesterday, fucking epic game.

 

[tk149]

Just wanted to add another game to my rant.

"The Adventures of Cookie and Cream" for PS2.

Average time to complete a level = 20 mins
Number of levels between bosses = 4
Boss level = 5-10 mins

Save points available? Only after boss dies. Granted, it's for the PS2, but still!

Grrrr...

 

[Pia]

Anyone remember Steel Battalion? One save game per character, and if your character died in battle the save game was erased. To make matters even more fun, the save game was copy protected so you couldn't back it up on an unmodded Xbox.

I have been wanting to play that game ever since I read this review.

http://insomnia.ac/reviews/xbox/tekki/

 

[Raduque]

Anyone remember Steel Battalion? One save game per character, and if your character died in battle the save game was erased. To make matters even more fun, the save game was copy protected so you couldn't back it up on an unmodded Xbox.

I always wanted to play that game, but I could never find a copy for less than $200.

 

[Pr0d1gy]

I hate autosaves because of Dragon Age. I got all the way to the final boss battle with the dragon and it autosaved when I walked into the final bosses' room, meanwhile I had no healing supplies and my last non-autosave was about 5 hours earlier. Yeah, I got pretty mad and never played the game again. Never beat it, never bothered with DLC.

I swear these companies do not test their games anymore.

 

[Thraxen]

I hate autosaves because of Dragon Age. I got all the way to the final boss battle with the dragon and it autosaved when I walked into the final bosses' room, meanwhile I had no healing supplies and my last non-autosave was about 5 hours earlier. Yeah, I got pretty mad and never played the game again. Never beat it, never bothered with DLC.

I swear these companies do not test their games anymore.

That sucks, but in that situation where would you be without the autosave? Seems like you would be back at your manual save 5 hours earlier, right? So it seems like it's a combination of your fault (not enough manual saves, too few supplies) and the game not having any way to gear back up after starting the final fight. Not sure I'd say it's a problem with autosaves themselves.