SECRET CONTENT: HOW HIDDEN IS TOO HIDDEN?

author=Feldschlacht IV
They absolutely will. How do you think most stuff is found? SaGa Frontier is like 15 years old and people are still looking and finding secret stuff in that game.

If you enjoy a game, you'll play it, and everything that entails.

Quasi-relatedly, if you want to see crazy discoveries in games Zelda Ocarina of Time is constantly being torn apart by speed runners. Skipping the first dungeon by bouncing off a wall, skipping the next two by backflipping through the door of time, skipping the first three temples by glitching geometry to enter the Shadow Temple early (the endgame only cares if you have the Shadow and Spirit Medallion), to writing to the memory addresses so you acquire the last two medallions, to just skipping all that and glitching straight into the end credits. I'm not sure what the current records are but the game has been abused so much you can sit down with the game and beat it start to finish in about an hour and a half iirc, live without any significant mistakes.

I personally don't try to fret too much over hidden things, so when I design my games I don't bother making cryptic stuff that people will never find. If I don't do it in a AAA game, then I won't do it in a RM game. Almost everything you can find is pretty obvious and clued in. Sure there might be a side quest or weapon you might miss, but you don't need it. I'd rather just make things challenging.

Not to me, no. Sure, it adds replay value, but replay value is a pretty fringe concept to me most of the time. For the 95% of games I'm only going to play once no matter what, I would like to not miss out on any parts of the game while doing so.

If part of your game is worth playing, I want to experience it when I'm playing the game. Giving me something to find later is just a nice way of saying I have a chance to miss it the first time. I don't really want to have a chance to miss things.

If the only things that are really hidden are simple rewards, then like I said before, that's fine. But if you are trying to create nonlinearity by creating hidden dungeons and hidden characters, I'd much rather you just give me clear choices of what my options are. I really hate having to waste time looking for the gameplay before I can actually play the damn game.

Not in RM games. Most people only play them once, not multiple times.

author=Locke
The fact that some people have found things is not evidence that most people keep looking until they find everything, or even evidence that most people look at all. The fact that it took them fifteen years is actually pretty solid evidence that most of them weren't really looking that hard back in 1997. You are just talking out of your ass based on what you personally do in games; not everyone is like you, and you shouldn't assume they are. Achievements are a great measure of how many people find hidden stuff in games, and have shown that most people do not even finish games and that most people who finish games miss or skip the vast majority of optional content.

Who said most people? Even some people are a still an audience of your players. And no, I don't personally do it either, nor was I talking out of my ass (wtf rude much?). The point that I'm trying to illustrate is that you'll always have a part of your player segment that'll sniff out everything there is to know about a game. And yes, they're a valid segment or your playerbase like anyone else.

In the case of SaGa Frontier, a large part of the reason why things are being found now as opposed to back in 1997, is because a lot of the tools they're using just wasn't really avaliable back then, or not really known, or the culture was different, etc etc. If you play a game and miss something, great, play it again. If you play it only once or don't even finish it, you haven't lost anything, except you wasted your money I guess in principle?

author=Locke
Not to me, no. Sure, it adds replay value, but replay value is a pretty fringe concept to me most of the time. For the 95% of games I'm only going to play once no matter what, I would like to not miss out on any parts of the game while doing so.

This is one difference between you and me. I am 99% absolutely certain I'm busier than you/90% of the population here, so my game time is limited, and I still never understood the concept of playing most games once. Okay everyone is different I'm not judging or whatever, but I definitely love replay value, I see movies I enjoy more than once, I eat food I like more than once, I see favorite episodes of the shows I like more than once, basically, if I enjoy something, I'll do it again. Games are even more suited to this due to concepts such as New Game+ and replay bonuses and whatnot.

It's not a new concept that if you missed something, the game is there for you to try again. A lot of games aren't really made in mind with the concept that they'll be played once ever. Skyrim is a good example of a game that's packed to the brim with stuff to do, that can't really done in one playthrough. You will miss things in that game simply because of how massive it is and the way some quests are styled. The game has to be replayed to get everything there is to get. It's that huge.

If you are upset about missing stuff in a game like that, then that's pretty silly, and you shouldn't have bought it in the first place.

Typically, I play trough a game first without looking for optional content. Once I've beaten the game I will make a second playtrough where I do get the optional content, provided the game is good enough. However, I'll look in a walktrough rather than in the game to find those optional content, I don't like searching blindly.

One exception to that rule is Kingdom Hearts. The reason I liked searching trough that game is because near the end of the game, all areas suddenly have their monsters scaled and/or changed to end game stuff, so I could level up for the optional bosses and get synth materials while searching for all those secrets. Had I still fought monsters that gave single digit exp, I would have been less trilled about looking for hidden goodies.

I don't reply a game to compulsively get the stuff I missed. I reply a game because it's fun and want to redo the experience.

I mean I'm starting to think that this convo is sort of redundant, I mean, discussion is fine, but the concept of hidden content for the most part is COMMON SENSE SHIT (with notable exceptions such as the Zodiac Spear, and even then, not having that doesn't impact the game at all and it's not even the most powerful weapon/option) and more of a point of discussion rather than a point of contention, this is the only place I've ever witnessed actually pondering too deeply on the subject.

Who cares if I missed something along the way or not? Why is that so important in the first place? How many players are that OCD?

author=Craze

Feldschlacht IV
Who cares if I missed something along the way or not? Why is that so important in the first place? How many players are that OCD?

Almost all of my casual-but-still-actively-gaming friends are. When they play a game, they fucking PLAY THE WHOLE GAME. (It drives me nuts.)

Yeah, I like to do this too, and feel that I'm missing out on the game by skipping part of it. I don't always do every optional thing, but if I enjoy the game I usually will try to. Like if people weren't really supposed to do that stuff, it wouldn't be there, right? (I realize that's not always actually true but it's how my brain works when playing a game - the game presents a challenge so I complete it.) As a result in RPGs I tend to be rather overpowered since most of this optional stuff increases my power and it only takes like 25% of the sidequests to increase it beyond the point where the final boss is remotely threatening. Which is part of why I dislike playing games with lots of sidequests in general and just prefer playing linear games now for the most part (or at least games that have hard modes balanced around the expectation that you'll do this).

author=Locke
Yeah, I like to do this too, and feel that I'm missing out on the game by skipping part of it. I don't always do every optional thing, but if I enjoy the game I usually will try to. Like if people weren't really supposed to do that stuff, it wouldn't be there, right? (I realize that's not always actually true but it's how my brain works when playing a game - the game presents a challenge so I complete it.)

As a result in RPGs I tend to be rather overpowered since most of this optional stuff increases my power and it only takes like 25% of the sidequests to increase it beyond the point where the final boss is remotely threatening. Which is part of why I dislike playing games with lots of sidequests in general and just prefer playing linear games now for the most part (or at least games that have hard modes balanced around the expectation that you'll do this).

That sounds like the exception, and hardly the rule. I'm not belitting the way you play games, but I wouldn't construct a design doctrine from it, especially for a mainstream game.

author=Trihan
How would you guys feel about something along the lines of a message that pops up upon leaving an area that alerts you to anything hidden you might have missed there, asking if you'd like to go back and look for it? (obviously with an option to not go back and also not receive these notices in the future).

Feels too micromanaging and blatant like, and it erases subtlety. Worst case scenario I can see it damaging immersion. I can appreciate a message saying 'Hey you can't come back to this location once you leave *hinthintwinkwink*', but something like 'HEY GUYS UH-OH THERE THERE'S HIDDEN STUFF HERE YOU MISSED SOME SHIT BETTER GET ON THAT'

i mean come on im a grown ass man i don't need that shit.

author=Feldschlacht IV

author=Locke
Yeah, I like to do this too, and feel that I'm missing out on the game by skipping part of it. I don't always do every optional thing, but if I enjoy the game I usually will try to. Like if people weren't really supposed to do that stuff, it wouldn't be there, right? (I realize that's not always actually true but it's how my brain works when playing a game - the game presents a challenge so I complete it.)

As a result in RPGs I tend to be rather overpowered since most of this optional stuff increases my power and it only takes like 25% of the sidequests to increase it beyond the point where the final boss is remotely threatening. Which is part of why I dislike playing games with lots of sidequests in general and just prefer playing linear games now for the most part (or at least games that have hard modes balanced around the expectation that you'll do this).

That sounds like the exception, and hardly the rule. I'm not belitting the way you play games, but I wouldn't construct a design doctrine from it, especially for a mainstream game.

Oh God, I know. My distaste for nonlinearity is super weird. I loved FF13 for the first 40 hours, but hated it when you got to Pulse. I'm not sane. I don't think completionists are a group you can just pretend don't exist though, especially if you're making an RPG. They're not the bulk of the audience - as I said the bulk of the audience will skip most of the optional stuff - but they do exist. And I think they're probably the ones who care the most about your game; I have no real evidence for this argument, but it makes sense in my mind that people who spend more time on your game will be more likely to care more about it.

Regarding Trihan's idea: if you're leaving an area and can't come back, I think a better idea is to add a second chance to get the item later, that only exists if you missed it the first time. (If the item is just some generic junk that gets replaced later then this isn't necessary.) If you can come back any time, I think a completion percentage is a nice way of doing it; I've seen lots of games that tell me map completion percentage and/or treasure chest completion percentage for each dungeon. And when that number is visible, I never leave the area until it's at 100, unless I'm about to run out of healing items/MP or I'm intentionally trying to become less powerful for some reason.