[X] My Assistant

[SilverLugia456]

Everyone has their own Personal Preferences when picking out a video game that they want to play or looks interesting in playing, out of curiosity what are some of the things you look for when picking out the next or new game you want to play? and why?


For me there are actually a few things I look for, for the longest time the only games that actually caught my attention where Yu-gi-oh, Pokemon, Digimon, and bowling games stuff like that. Then I started to get more into adventure games and rpg games especially when I heard about how good Persona 3 Portable was from a friend who was already a fan of the Persona Series. I started to play Persona and slowly I started to like the series and now its one of my favorites. Well after that I expanded view on games I liked when I saw a few playthroughs from the Tales of Series.

So now i have built up from games I have played some preferences some things i look for are:

Gender Choice - (even though there are some games that don't offer that but I still play them) for me its always nice to have gender choice, cause being a female I like to play as a female character.

Customization of Character - I haven't played many games with this but the few I have play i really like the fact you can customize the character you play to your liking instead of a default. But some games you can change your outfit within the game but start out with a default which is alright too.

Your own view - This is a new preference I just to look for after seeing the first part to Fire Emblem: Awakening and Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology. The fact that you can play as your own character and then go on an adventure, interact, and battle antagonist with characters from a game series or something like that instead of playing the main character hero from that series. (For example in Radiant Mythology you create your own character and then there is a storyline completely separate from the tales of games but in this game you get to go on a adventure, interact and battle alongside characters from the other tales of games.)

Good/Interesting Storylines - I also look into games for interesting or good storylines ones that maybe go ito depth a little, good amount of action, emotion, you know the basics.

with that being said I'm actually currently looking for games for the PSP that have these preferences because I noticed i didn't have much games for the PSP.

What about you?

[ShrapnelStars]

-I like games to be colorful. They don't have to be neon bright and flashing, but I like games that actually make use of the color wheel.

-When character customization is involved, I want it to be fleshed out. Nothing is more insulting that being presented with the option to make your own character, then being presented with: a handful of ugly models, certain clothing items or colors only being available for certain models, or lack of item layering. Here are some examples.

• Thrillville (PS2): Want to play as a girl? You can't wear a hoodie. Want to wear long, striped pants? You have to wear your hair in pigtails. Want your stripes to be orange? You have to wear a skirt. Want to wear a striped skirt as a little girl instead of a teenaged one? You can't. Want to wear headphones? You have to play as a teenaged boy, specifically.
  
• Any Tony Hawk Game (PS2): Want to wear a hat with your emo hair? You can't. You have to select a hat, then you have to choose from the three generic styles of "Hat Hair": short, medium, and long. Want to wear those funny boxing gloves with your sweet spiked wristbands? One hand item set at a time. Want to play as a girl? Play a different game series.

-Cutscenes must be skippable at least on the second playthrough. Kingdom Hearts and BW/BW2 are the worst violators by far, and Kingdom Hearts 2's ability to skip cutscenes only further drives the issue of eternal cutscenes home even further. If you know the story, you shouldn't be forced to sit through a feature length movie every fifteen minutes. In KH2, if you skip a cutscene, you can end up suddenly on another map with missing or different party members. That's how long and involved the cutscenes are.

In Pokemon, this is becoming a big problem, and arguably worse, because cutscenes go on for only two lines at a time, and you have to click through each new line. Conversational dialogue is now scripted with timers, too, which pads out the scenes even more. Now, not only do you have to scroll through novels, but you have to wait for dramatic pauses from other characters, as well. Coupled up to this was the fact that Gen 5 was annoyingly fond of not letting your character go two steps in a town without a flurry of cutscenes, and a scene would not end unless every character on screen had said something to you and walked away, now matter how pointlessly obvious. All I did was enter a new town! Can I be extended the courtesy of curing my dying team before lunging into the plot, please? I've often forgotten to cure my team and ended up in losing battles because a cutscene distracted me and dragged me halfway across the map!

-Story isn't that important to me, but if you went through the trouble of writing one, make your characters likeable. This goes triple for the protagonist. There's nothing I hate more than dull -or worse: annoying- characters. LittleBigPlanet has no story, and it's one of my favorite games ever. It didn't need a story. (Technically, there is one, but it's extremely small, simple, and shoved into the background, but very cute nonetheless.) Most games go for prominent stories, though, so the importance of good characterization is hammered home even further. If you make me hate the guy I'm controlling or spend a fair amount of time with, I'm putting down your game. And yes, you actually have lost, because I'm selling it back, not buying the sequel, and I'm telling other people how bad it was so they won't waste their money on it.

-Soundtrack and sound effects are a big part of gameplay for me. I'm particularly odd in that I can't stand overused stock sound effects. There are a few punch, crash, scream, and water effects in my head that I've heard in multiple games, and I wish the sound team had either found different ones or gone out and recorded their own. It isn't too hard to scroll past page 1 on SoundRangers, is it?

For music, there have to be enough songs in the game to keep the list from looping too tightly. For looping tracks, the track has to be long enough to prevent it from looping too tightly. 2-3 minutes is the minimum for a looping track to not be godawfully annoying.

-ActTuning. Unlike the apparent "true" gamer, I don't like getting stuck on particularly difficult sections. If the game notices me struggling on a certain part, allow it to show me a bit of mercy after a certain number of attempts.

That's about it for me. If I remember anything else, I'll edit it in.

This post has been edited by Indoor Survival: Mar 22 2013, 03:32 AM

[monkfishlover]

What I look for:

-Good music: Music HAS to be at least tolerable or else I will be forced to play with the sound off(like with Yugioh the falsebound kingdom). I find that games with excellent music tend to be more enjoyable and set a better mood than games with average or below average quality(according to me) music.

-Fun game mechanics: If combat is a central point of the game, then the combat has to be fun. If level-grinding is required, it should not be to a ridiculous degree. Turn-based combat should be unique. If combat is difficult, that difficulty should be due to a complexity that demands strategic thinking(and not mindless button-mashing, ie you need to know when it's the right time to attack an enemy and also which attacks will work best) rather than enemies just dealing out massive amounts of unavoidable damage.

-Customization: This includes things like skill trees, item-crafting and upgrading, the ability to level up things that aren't playable characters(ie like in the new pokemon mystery dungeon game where you can level up moves by using them more often), level and object editors, etc. Customization is at it's best when you find yourself spending several hours upgrading various things(even when it isn't required to progress in the game) just because of how addicting it is.

-Interesting exploration and/or an open/sandbox world: I like to be able to explore interesting environments, and don't want to deal with having to explore boring locations. This is the main reason why I like games in 3d environments more than games in 2d environments. I also like games that let you do whatever you want, whenever you want, without forcing you to follow the story/plot/game progression all the time.

This post has been edited by monkfishlover: Mar 31 2013, 11:39 PM