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Insomniac Games responds to the QTE criticism in Spider-Man for PS4

S

Seventy70

Member
I'm not sure why people feel the need to be offended on behalf of Insomniac. They showed some gameplay, people weren't fans of some aspects of that gameplay, so they came out and clarified that what they showed was not the main loop.

All of this "now people can shut up" stuff is overly aggressive. Sorry everyone didn't get on their knees and blindly praise this game as the second coming...
jacks81x said:
The cynical part of me thinks a lot of these complaints are coming from haters who's mad that this game is exclusive. I'm quite certain that Insomniac had already addressed the QTE question multiple times at various interviews during E3.
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It works the other way too. Getting mad at others for having their own apprehensions and not having blind faith is a very fanboy thing to do.
 
C

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
jacks81x said:
The cynical part of me thinks a lot of these complaints are coming from haters who's mad that this game is exclusive. I'm quite certain that Insomniac had already addressed the QTE question multiple times at various interviews during E3.
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Hi, PS4 owner, I didn't really like the look of the QTEs. Not everyone who isn't a fan of very video gamey looking QTEs are xbox fanboys. To me they look very video gamey juxtaposed against the otherwise incredibly realistic lighting work. I feel that modern games have become much better at hiding this by making the QTEs stick out way less. And since these were all based on the web, instead of a flashing colored circled, they could go with the symbol for webs and for the large part, people would know what to press.
lDNzZ3e.png


Like what they do in Uncharted.

3kSvsU1.gif


this to me is preferable over the obvious video game color coding if there's no option for them to auto complete.
 
C

chadtwo

Member
Timeaisis said:
I mean, a QTE is a QTE. It's not like it magically isn't when it's in setpiece.

It doesn't really bother me, it's just this answer amounts to literally nothing, and I'm surprised this is even a thread.
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The point isn't that the setpiece makes the QTE not a QTE, it's that because the QTE occurred in the context of a setpiece it is ostensibly not a major component of normal gameplay.
 
X

xenorevlis

Member
Servbot24 said:
Yeah now this is something actually worth being concerned about. I hope Spider-man combat requires more much more skill and thought than Arkham, which was mainly just braindead punching.
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I think we must have been watching completely different gameplay of Spider-Man, and suddenly the older Spider-Man games that pre-date the Arkham games don't exist :p
 
G

Gravy Boat

Member
Servbot24 said:
So ridiculous they had to respond to this idiotic criticism. It's as though people have never played a game released in the last 10 years. There is always normal gameplay with the occasional set piece.

"I saw a QTE so that must be the entire game."
"I saw four areas in Mario Odyssey so that must be the entire game."

That is literally the thought process of a small infant who doesn't understand that things it doesn't see still exist.



Yes you absolutely can blame people for thinking this. Unless the intelligence of the gaming audience does not deserve even the slightest modicum of respect.
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I don't think anyone thought that the whole game was going to be literally nothing but QTEs, it's just that for some, any QTEs at all is too many. How many big set pieces are there going to be? 3? A dozen? More? We don't know. But so do know that QTEs in set pieces is enough to severely dampen my excitement for this game.
 
Shifty1897

Shifty1897

Member
You can't tell me the game designers, producers, directors, and marketers looked at this vertical slice and no one said: "Think we went a little overboard on the QTE's in this part?"

m2QGbb.gif
 
K

Kickz

Member
CJY said:
I think that's just patently absurd. I'm not trying to defend QTE as I believe sometimes they are done badly... but I think if anything, the phraseology of "QTE" needs to die, because if you break it down, every press of a button in certain genres of games are QTEs. Take Fighters for examples, you need to input a series of commands in quick succession to make your character do something.

Bottom Line: Saying QTEs need to go means that you want games to cease to exist as a medium. Maximal Absurdity.
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What a damn reach this was 😂😂😂
 
Allonym

Allonym

There should be more tampons in gaming
Man that guy's comment was really rude. I would've told him to fuck off and not buy the game since he perfectly understands what they're doing from such a small snippet of the game.

Shifty1897 said:
You can't tell me the game designers, producers, directors, and marketers looked at this vertical slice and no one said: "Think we went a little overboard on the QTE's in this part?"
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But how else would they do that segment of gameplay with Spider-Man saving the citizens from a falling crane with the player having complete control of the scene? Any ideas? Just asking. Would it have been better if the player didn't interact with the controller at all and instead watch as Spider-Man did all these cool things?
 
R

RichiRamjag

Member
Seventy70 said:
I'm not sure why people feel the need to be offended on behalf of Insomniac. They showed some gameplay, people weren't fans of some aspects of that gameplay, so they came out and clarified that what they showed was not the main loop.

All of this "now people can shut up" stuff is overly aggressive. Sorry everyone didn't get on their knees and blindly praise this game as the second coming...
Click to expand...

No one has to praise anything, but they addressed it early on and people still kept harping on it. There's a point where you're just being willfully ignorant.

Wereroku said:
It's such a poor showing that it has the most watched trailer of the entire event. Going by those metrics every other game trailer must have been a trash fire.
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What I'm saying. At times, it feels like half of gaf has the mentality of eeyore.
 
C

chadtwo

Member
Gravy Boat said:
I don't think anyone thought that the whole game was going to be literally nothing but QTEs, it's just that for some, any QTEs at all is too many. How many big set pieces are there going to be? 3? A dozen? More? We don't know. But so do know that QTEs in set pieces is enough to severely dampen my excitement for this game.
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I didn't know people had such huge problems with QTEs.
 
P

phanphare

Banned
until we see more footage of the game I do think the QTE criticisms are odd

like yeah, be concerned but maybe hold off judgement until more of the game is shown. chances are they just wanted a set piece moment for the E3 trailer.
 
K

keltickennedy

Member
Servbot24 said:
Yeah now this is something actually worth being concerned about. I hope Spider-man combat requires more much more skill and thought than Arkham, which was mainly just braindead punching.
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That was the great thing about the combat in the Arkham games in my opinion. Their key goal was to make the player feel like Batman at any skill level. The combat gets as deep as the player wants to make it. More XP is rewarded to players who use a variety of attacks and abilities.

As for the QTEs in Spider-Man. I see a lot of people complaining about them but no real answers on how they should instead be handled during big set piece moments. Saying, "just give me full control" doesn't really mean anything. How should the player have full control over webbing up a falling crane over a city? Should it just be a scene the player watches? Or should they just get rid of things like that?
 
R

R_thanatos

Member
The only game were i trully was annoyed by QTE was bayonnetta ( PS3 ).
Since then , most of them were manageable.

Spider-man QTE , have ample windows of execution so they are harmless to me.
 
S

Servbot24

Banned
Gravy Boat said:
I don't think anyone thought that the whole game was going to be literally nothing but QTEs, it's just that for some, any QTEs at all is too many. How many big set pieces are there going to be? 3? A dozen? More? We don't know. But so do know that QTEs in set pieces is enough to severely dampen my excitement for this game.
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Why though? Are Uncharted 2 and RE4 severely compromised games because you see button prompts on screen a few times?
 
Z

Z3M0G

Member
CJY said:
There you go.

QTE in set pieces only.

Much better than just sitting and watching a cutscene.
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Wait... this was a concern? It was pretty clearly "set piece only"...

Vorg said:
That really depends on what happens when you fail the QTE. If it's an insta-kill, they can fuck right off.
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Valid point. If you must do 5 QTEs during a scene, and you fail on the 5th one, you better not need to repeat the entire sequence.

I'd be perfectly OK with needing to only repeat the last 3 QTEs. Would be cool actually... say a scene has 20 QTEs, but if you fail at one, it would restart from 3 QTEs back. Not a complete restart if you fail, but also a small degree of punishment.

Actually I realize that wasn't quite the point you were getting at, but I like my idea too. But that is a lot of failure animation to produce, that may never be seen. But that is the cost of doing QTEs in the first place.
 
D

Dunlop

Member
I don't get the rage for QTE's is a freaking Spiderman game

Do you expect do do those scene's in real time? It does a great job of portraying his superhuman abilities.

It would be this or many cinematics, I'll take some interaction
 
B

BassForever

Member
What's more embarrasing is the people in this thread going with thier holier then thou "well it was obvious anyone who hates qtes or thought this game would be full of them are idiots.

Clearly enough people walked away from this showing worried the game would be a qte fest that insomniac has had to clarify "no its just for rare set pieces" otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation.
 
G

Gurish

Member
You can't do a big Spidey set piece without QTEs, if someone can imagine or show me how it would be nice to hear/ see.
 
D

darkinstinct

...lacks reading comprehension.
Torgo said:
During my E3 appointment for this game, they confirmed that the only QTE moments in that whole demo was the crane scene lol. People need to relax.
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Didn't most people complain about the button prompts during fights, and not because of that crane scene?
 
P

Primethius

Banned
BassForever said:
What's more embarrasing is the people in this thread going with thier holier then thou "well it was obvious anyone who hates qtes or thought this game would be full of them are idiots.

Clearly enough people walked away from this showing worried the game would be a qte fest that insomniac has had to clarify "no its just for rare set pieces" otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation.
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Eh, I dunno. With Internet hyperbole at an all-time high, I don't buy that reasoning. 35 seconds in a 9 minute demo making people think it's a QTE fest?

Yea, I'm going with hyperbolic reactions.
 
P

Puruzi

Banned
BassForever said:
What's more embarrasing is the people in this thread going with thier holier then thou "well it was obvious anyone who hates qtes or thought this game would be full of them are idiots.

Clearly enough people walked away from this showing worried the game would be a qte fest that insomniac has had to clarify "no its just for rare set pieces" otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation.
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Yeah and that doesn't make any sense when under a minute of the showing had QTEs
 
M

mlclmtckr

Banned
Wereroku said:
It's such a poor showing that it has the most watched trailer of the entire event. Going by those metrics every other game trailer must have been a trash fire.
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Right and now PS4 defenders have Spider Man to point to when people say Sony had a bad e3. Saying this game looks bad cuts a fanboy to the quick because it means that Sony really blew it at e3.

It's much more important for Sony warriors than for Nintendo or Xbox or PC warriors. It's like Breath Of The Wild last year, the focus of hope for a legion of fans.

Which is all well and good and the game did look great, except for the QTEs, which were rightfully criticised. Unfortunately that criticism has really, really set some people off.
 
J

Jay Sosa

Member
RichiRamjag said:
People are going to still keep bringing it up though.



What reason would we have to not give them the benefit of the doubt? They're a pretty straightforward company.

Infantile is a bit much for what you're describing.
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I just used it because of the post I replied to. All I'm saying is that people should be a bit more wary of pr people. What is he supposed to say? 'fuck you, we'll put as many qte's in the game as we want to'?

one dude who is paid for making the company look good says what people want to hear and suddenly everyone is like: 'see, I knew it!' you're all a bunch of idiots!'
 
S

Sn4ke_911

If I ever post something in Japanese which I don't understand, please BAN me.
Well they have responded to those kind of questions since E3, yet people seem to still don't get it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 
H

Harmen

Member
CHC said:
Bitching about QTEs seems so 2010. I can't remember the last totally egregious use of them - most developers have managed to reconcile them just fine with actual gameplay.
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This, I love having them as interactive cutscenes every now and then in main missions (if they are properly designed). Especially in open world titles where you'll have all the time in the open world to play regular gameplay.
 
CJY

CJY

Banned
MKIL65 said:
And what if I fail the button prompt? Do I have to watch the cutscene again? Or will something alternatively happen?

The former wouldn't be fun.
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That's an interesting point you make about fail states in QTE sequences. It would be amazing if you fail to hit any of the 3 QTEs on the crane, it would cause increasing levels of damage to the building, or if you fail the QTE for the hook of the crane, it would smash into the building more vigourously. Failing any QTE should not result in having the play the sequence again IMO, but instead result in different outcomes. Spidey could just as easily continue his pursuit of the helicopter if he failed the QTEs.

I don't expect any of this in Spiderman but it goes to show that more thought, consideration and better design can go into developing better QTEs, instead of the attitude of all QTEs being shit and that they need to go.
 
S

Servbot24

Banned
BassForever said:
What's more embarrasing is the people in this thread going with thier holier then thou "well it was obvious anyone who hates qtes or thought this game would be full of them are idiots.

Clearly enough people walked away from this showing worried the game would be a qte fest that insomniac has had to clarify "no its just for rare set pieces" otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation.
Click to expand...

Number of people believing something (or pretending to believe something) doesn't equate to having a well thought out position.
 
S

Soul of the Beast

Member
Primethius said:
Holy shit.

No, if your using Order as a defense, you are absolutely in the wrong.
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I hit submit too early, please look at my edit. I have been a long time Insomniac fan, and I think they know how to make a fun game. All the game they made previously are fun as fuck and worth playing at least twice.

What I am saying is, people who are concerned about QTEs shouldn't be laughed at, especially after The Order shitshow, I think people are not ''wrong'' to be concerned. This game is of course nothing like The Order, that's not what I am saying.

But wouldn't you be happier if the game has less QTE and more real time gameplay? The game is still in the makings, it's not too late to make it more fun. If the openworld is mostly gameplay and the main story quest is mostly QTE then it's gonna be a bit annoying to progress the story in this game don't you think?

Why not make it all gameplay? It's not like set pieces can only be fun with QTEs...it can be fun in gameplay too!
Uncharted 4 is the perfect example of good GAMEPLAY setpieces, minus the boring climbing parts, UC4 is the best when it comes to playable set pieces.
 
G

Gurish

Member
I hope btw that the core loop of the game also consists of puzzles, exploration, some Peter Parker gameplay besides the obvious points of combat and traversal, it needs to be varied just like how the Arkham games feels with all the different mechanics and things that you do there.
 
S

SomTervo

Member
chandoog said:
Unpopular opinion time.

I wish Insomniac also add an "auto QTE" option for the game for accessibility, similar to how Capcom added an auto QTE option in Resident Evil 6. If it's a 'set piece block buster' moment. I'd rather eliminate the 'miss and repeat' aspect that usually plagues these kind of QTE's completely to enjoy the set piece in it's full glory.
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Wouldn't be surprised if they do that.

Even Uncharted 4 gave you an option to 'hold' the action button instead of rapidly tapping it.

Allonym said:
Man that guy's comment was really rude. I would've told him to fuck off and not buy the game since he perfectly understands what they're doing from such a small snippet of the game.
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And ruin your company's credibility and customer relations. Amazing idea!
 
S

Seventy70

Member
Primethius said:
Eh, I dunno. With Internet hyperbole at an all-time high, I don't buy that reasoning. 35 seconds in a 9 minute demo making people think it's a QTE fest?

Yea, I'm going with hyperbolic reactions.
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Saying this is completely missing the point. The reason QTEs are despised is because they break the the momentum of the gameplay. So, the length of time QTEs were on screen does not matter. I don't think anyone was saying that literally every second of the game would be a QTE.
 
G

Gravy Boat

Member
Servbot24 said:
Why though? Are Uncharted 2 and RE4 severely compromised games because you see button prompts on screen a few times?
Click to expand...

You did not play RE4 is you think there were only a 'few' QTEs.

But yes, they are. I love RE4 in spite of the QTEs. I'd love it alot more without them.
 
A

Alienous

Member
I feel like the "see, it's only a small part of the game" is a strawman target. Like, of course it is. I can't say that I've seen anyone saying that the game is mostly QTEs. I also think it's a misleading way to look at it - the car chase in Uncharted 4 is only a 'small part' of the game, but it's also a significant part. It's the equivalent of a boss battle in the ebb and flow of the experience. Having those sequences being QTE dependent takes a way a lot more from an experience than just how much of it there is relative to other parts (i.e. 'it's only 5%).

xenorevlis said:
Well then I vehemently disagree with you. QTEs can be done well, like in Shenmue, where failure to interact means things can still play out, but now in a different manner. Not just a passive moment.

In the case of Spider-Man, for instance, failing some of the QTEs could result in a different outcome for the civilians caught in the situation, and thus lower rewards or a different outcome in the major narrative application of the game. Designing around core mechanics is one thing, but limiting yourself to just those and not allowing epic scale for a property such as Spider-Man in which moments take place that the core mechanics cannot sufficiently cover is no reason to cut them out when you can still make them interactive.
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I'd argue that QTEs are Shenmue's core mechanic. But besides that I understand where you're coming from. For me QTEs just feel like a missed opportunity to do something that might be less spectacular but also more involved, as I value involvement much more than spectacle in a game.
 
P

phanphare

Banned
Sn4ke_911 said:
Well they have responded to those kind of questions since E3, yet people seem to still don't get it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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I think the people worried aren't going to not be worried until they see more from the game

it'll work itself out in time

show don't tell and all that
 
JP

JP

Member
Next, they'll be telling us that the game is actually longer than nine minutes and that we'll actually be able to control the game ourselves rather than just watching an Insomniac team member playing it.

In reality, I'd much rather developers didn't feel the need to comment on this sort of thing, this won't be the last we see of the game before it launches and I'll make a decision based on all that I know about the game when it launches*.







*not strictly true, it does seem almost impossible that I won't be buying it as soon as I can.
 
Y

Yukinari

Member
I dont feel like its unfair to say that QTE's should only be used for things that cant be done in-game. While it would be amazing to do the stuff from the spiderman footage in-game it would probably be more time spent that could be used to polish the combat and web swinging.
 
RoadHazard

RoadHazard

Gold Member
Crossing Eden said:
Hi, PS4 owner, I didn't really like the look of the QTEs. Not everyone who isn't a fan of very video gamey looking QTEs are xbox fanboys. To me they look very video gamey juxtaposed against the otherwise incredibly realistic lighting work. I feel that modern games have become much better at hiding this by making the QTEs stick out way less. And since these were all based on the web, instead of a flashing colored circled, they could go with the symbol for webs and for the large part, people would know what to press.
lDNzZ3e.png


Like what they do in Uncharted.

3kSvsU1.gif


this to me is preferable if there's no option for them to auto complete.
Click to expand...

That part in Spidey isn't even a QTE. The symbol just shows what you will attach to if you webzip, and seems to always be there when you're looking at something you can zip to. It's part of the regular gameplay. The Uncharted one, on the other hand, is a QTE.
 
G

Guymelef

Member
chandoog said:
Unpopular opinion time.

I wish Insomniac also add an "auto QTE" option for the game for accessibility, similar to how Capcom added an auto QTE option in Resident Evil 6. If it's a 'set piece block buster' moment. I'd rather eliminate the 'miss and repeat' aspect that usually plagues these kind of QTE's completely to enjoy the set piece in it's full glory.
Click to expand...

You can bet they are going to do this.
 
P

Primethius

Banned
Seventy70 said:
Saying this is completely missing the point. The reason QTEs are despised is because they break the the momentum of the gameplay. So, the length of time QTEs were on screen does not matter. I don't think anyone was saying that literally every second of the game would be a QTE.
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Complelty missing the point? If a game shows 35 seconds of QTEs in a 9 minute demo, how is this missing the point when the complaint is that it's a QTE fest?

And breaking the momentum? I disagree, especially in a game like Spiderman.
 
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