Dear videogame designers:
Just so you know, nothing is more likely to prevent me from playing a game than your making it unnecessarily difficult to save. Depending on the game, I tend to save somewhere between four (Ōkami) and ten (Silent Hill 2 - this is not an exaggeration; that game scared me half to death and one of the few ways I could take comfort was in thinking that at least my progress was recorded. 'Right, that door has been marked as locked on my map. TIME TO SAVE') times per hour. If you make it necessary to use a consumable item in order to save, I'm not going to play. Why shouldn't I be allowed to save whenever I need (or irrationally want) to? Some people may even need to save for legitimate reasons, videogame designers. By limiting saves, you're making it impossible to pick up the game and play for a few minutes; you're saying 'NO SHORT BURSTS FOR YOU; YOU MUST SET ASIDE A GOOD FEW HOURS TO PLAY THIS', and that's just making inconvenient demands on the player's time.
(You shouldn't give me the ability to save at any point, though. Because then I'll spend all of my time saving and absolutely none of it actually playing the game.)
Do we understand each other? Good.
Yours,
Riona, who is sure that Breath Of Fire: Dragon Quarter is a lovely game but is almost certainly never going to find out. Stupid bloody save tokens.
(If there are any gameplay mechanics you particularly dislike, do share!)
Just so you know, nothing is more likely to prevent me from playing a game than your making it unnecessarily difficult to save. Depending on the game, I tend to save somewhere between four (Ōkami) and ten (Silent Hill 2 - this is not an exaggeration; that game scared me half to death and one of the few ways I could take comfort was in thinking that at least my progress was recorded. 'Right, that door has been marked as locked on my map. TIME TO SAVE') times per hour. If you make it necessary to use a consumable item in order to save, I'm not going to play. Why shouldn't I be allowed to save whenever I need (or irrationally want) to? Some people may even need to save for legitimate reasons, videogame designers. By limiting saves, you're making it impossible to pick up the game and play for a few minutes; you're saying 'NO SHORT BURSTS FOR YOU; YOU MUST SET ASIDE A GOOD FEW HOURS TO PLAY THIS', and that's just making inconvenient demands on the player's time.
(You shouldn't give me the ability to save at any point, though. Because then I'll spend all of my time saving and absolutely none of it actually playing the game.)
Do we understand each other? Good.
Yours,
Riona, who is sure that Breath Of Fire: Dragon Quarter is a lovely game but is almost certainly never going to find out. Stupid bloody save tokens.
(If there are any gameplay mechanics you particularly dislike, do share!)
