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[Kyolux]

I never was stomped by that barrel in Sonic. It's the one where you gotta stand on it and push up and down alternatviely, right?

But the first time I played MGS I had to rent it, had no case, had no memory card... that 140.85 took a while to find by trial and error...

 

[Morrigan Stark]

Earthen Peak in Dark Souls II... -_-

"Try torch"

Okay, that's totally how I found out. I wonder if I would have figured it out by myself without the hint. Hard to say. It's not that bad though, it just makes the boss harder if you don't do it.

A better example from Dark Souls 2 is from the 2nd DLC:

Spoiler

the game encourages you to use the Smelter Wedges in the ashen idols, but purposefully keeps 1 of those after killing the boss that would have required them. Basically, if you explored carefully and didn't purposefully leave at least 1 idol alone, you were stuck with a buffed boss. If you were sloppy in exploring and missed one statue, you had an advantage. Really lame. Fortunately the 3rd DLC fixed that and encouraged you to explore everything, and rewarded you for it.

IMO Dark Souls 1 was the worst though. How are you supposed to know that you need to quit and reload to spawn the golden golem with Dusk inside after killing the hydra? And reload again to spawn her loot? Stupid. Another case where the game rewards you more for being bad at it. The first time I played, after killing the hydra I had few Estus left (because I was bad), so I retreated to the bonfire to refill and resumed exploring the lake, and the golden golem was there. Okay, cool. Freed Dusk, saw her sign. Didn't occur to me to revisit the lake to see if something else had appeared there, I don't even remember how I found the Crown of Dusk.

Later, with a new character, I took out the hydra effortlessly, so I continued on deeper into the lake... only to see no golden golem. Needless to say, I was completely baffled. At least Dark Souls 2 stopped with that quit-and-reload crap.

Oh yeah, World Tendency in Demon's Souls too. Just overly obtuse stuff, should have had more in-game explanations.

Dark Souls - How the hell was I supposed to know where and how to enter the Abyss?

Read the item descriptions and listen to what Ingward was saying.

The silent hill 3 shakespeare puzzle was quite something. I can't be bothered to explain it, so will just quote google

Yeah, that one pissed me off back in the day. Played on hard and got stuck for so long. I think we finally gave up and looked it up, which we are loathe to do. A game's puzzle shouldn't rely on one's knowledge of literature to be solved.

 

[KojiKnight]

Sierra games /thread

 

[HiiiLife]

the thread.

Fuck this level. But that catchy music. And the ice cap zone music.

 

[Man God]

Dang my post got bottomed of the page.

Anyways In Blaster Master the manual that came with the game clearly told you which areas were connected.

 

[Sn4ke_911]

how to get to the secret world in donkey kong country 3

 

[eot]

My vote would be Super Metroid. I never played that game as a kid, just as an adult. It seems like the strategy for that game is "put bombs everywhere, scan everything, shoot missiles at everything". I did not enjoy wandering around too much in that game.

I thought the game was generally quite good about suggesting where you might want to bomb/shoot. The one exception being the pipe (which is a cool surprise) and if you don't go into the map room in Brinstar before jumping down the shaft you might not know where Kraid is and it's impossible to know where you need to shoot a Super Missile.

 

[Delta Assault]

Metal Gear Solid: The back of the CD case? Da fuck?

Prince of Persia 08: There's one section with the Enchantress boss where Elika gets whisked away and you're on this platform trying to fight the boss and nothing's getting accomplished. I couldn't hit her at all. It took watching a walkthrough to find out that I was supposed to leap off the edge to my death in order to get Elika back and continue the mission. Doh.

 

[Cave Johnson]

the thread.

I knew it the moment I saw the thread title. Surprisingly, I've managed to decipher this relatively quicker as a kid.

Did you know, you can contact Meryl 4 times after the Ocelot bossfight to automatically register the codec no?

 

[LordOcidax]

Simon's Quest. Easily the most notable.

Come here to say that. lol

 

[HiiiLife]

I've never played an old-school Sonic before, but let me guess: the "obstacle" is actually part of the background and you could just drop there?

All you had to do was hold up/down on the dpad. But most of us just kept jumping up and down on it trying to push the barrel down far enough to squeeze into the next area. More often than not, jumping didn't work. Lol.

 

[3bdelilah]

This was my moment:

As a nine year old, I tried and tried and tried to get some fire to burn it, but I just couldn't do it. I even went back to the rooms with fire, sprinting towards the web, only to see the fire extinguish right before my young eyes. Turned out you had to jump from above to crack the web... D'OH

 

[BuddyL33]

How to get through the Bamboo Maze in Leisure Suit Larry 3

 

[DedValve]

Borderlands 2 Tiny Tinas DLC the dwarven quest.

Lets put a marker just beyond this locked door, surely you must find a way to open it right?

Nope you need to go the OPPOSITE direction, across an incredibly long distance and fight enemies until a door opens that leads all the way around the map. I got stuck for an hour before youtubing to find out that near everyone that played the dlc had the exact same issue

 

[khaaan]

What was the trick here? I don't recall ever looking this up, doesn't it just happen pretty naturally?

I think it's in reference to how if you wanted to get the Zodiac Spear you had to have known that there were four completely normal looking chests that you can't open.

 

[Windom Earle]

They are also called DSP moments.

 

[KojiKnight]

Did you know, you can contact Meryl 4 times after the Ocelot bossfight to automatically register the codec no?

I wondered how I eventually got the code, because I knew I never looked it up on the back of the case and was confused how one time I suddenly DID have the code.

 

[fwpx]

the thread.

I don't get what this picture is trying to tell me?

 

[mcz117chief]

12 year old me wasn't thinking I'd have to physically check the game case for something in-game. Nothing has ever done that, so why would I start? I never skip cutscenes first playthrough.

I too spent hours looking through everything. Then my brother did.

I was in my 1st year of highschool so also around 12 and I didn't have any trouble with it, I immediately knew where to look even though it is pretty unusual for a character in a game to refer to something in real life, it just didn't surprise me.

playing this on release day in the US the first thing I did was check the back of the jewel case- it was pretty clear

now explanations for basically anything in Demons Souls was pretty awesome..as in wiki required-

Word, mate. Demon's Souls is the best, especially since the whole story is hidden in item descriptions and the tiny bits of monologue you get from characters. There was a really good youtube channel with great explanations about the individual locations in Demon's Souls but I can't find it anymore

 

[Interface23]

the thread.

Exactly what I was going to post, like seriously how was I supposed to know? I ended up jumping my way up...

 

[ViewtifulJC]

I've never played an old-school Sonic before, but let me guess: the "obstacle" is actually part of the background and you could just drop there?

Carnival Night zone is full of barrels like this. You jump on them, they go down a little then raise back up. Sonic is a pretty simple game when you get down it, you do everything but jumping on it, spindashing, or running.

So SUDDENLY

you're in this vertical room with a really high ceiling and one barrel, so you assume, "OK, I'll just jump on it up and down, that's what the whole game has been teaching me is the main mode of interacting with the environment". You can do that til your time runs out and game overs, if you like. It goes up and down when you jump on it like ALL THE OTHER BARRELS IN THE STAGE, this seems like what they want me to do, right?

What you're ACTUALLY suppose to do is press up and down while standing on the barrel. Because for some reason you can control the barrel by standing on top of it? Something the game has given you zero indication is a thing you could do, and will never use the d-pad method for any other set piece/environmental interaction again as far as I can recall?

Its just...there's no in-game logic like Sonic maybe pulling a lever like an elevator, no precedent set by previous Sonic games and their respective level design and game mechanics...its just fuckin' bizarre game design.

 

[kewlmyc]

Blue Earth in the final battle of Tales of Graces f's future arc.

No seriously, I can't think of anyone who didn't look that up.

 

[BigFwoosh]

Wait...was that was actually solved with 100% accuracy?

Not sure if it was completely accurate, but the solution in this video has worked every time for me.

 

[Mexican Sting]

Hey i was 12 years old when this game came out (1999), give me a break. You can easily overlook that.

I was 12 too... Baker explicitly states that it's on the back of the CD case. You were probably just spacing out during the cutscene.

In Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, in order to see the true ending, you have to complete a set of tasks that the game never tell you to. That's fine because if you are a completionist, you'll eventually do it.

But the worst offender is that after you complete this prerequisite, you have to return to the very first Extra Ops (which you have no business at this point) to find a character who was not there before in a place you don't usually go.

And the game never tell you one iota of that.

?
I don't remember this being a problem. I ffelt pretty well led through it...

But what does piss me off about Peace Walker is the fact that you have to keep looking for tapes and finishing all of the side ops before you can get to some core story elements.

I actually had spent probably 20-30 minutes stuck in this lower section of Uncharted 2 completely confused about where to go. Then I figured out that there was a red pipe over on the red-brown brick wall that I could climb up. I was so pissed.

 

[Crayolan]

the thread.

Fuck this thing, worst part of an otherwise fantastic game.

I've never played an old-school Sonic before, but let me guess: the "obstacle" is actually part of the background and you could just drop there?

No, worse. You have to stand on the cylinder and hold up as it goes up and down as it goes down and eventually, it will go down low enough to lead to the next path. Only problem is, there is nothing to tip you off to this, and even worse, if you jump on it repeatedly it will start to bob up and down, but not quite enough to reach the next area, making it seem like you're doing the right thing.

 

[SerTapTap]

I think it's in reference to how if you wanted to get the Zodiac Spear you had to have known that there were four completely normal looking chests that you can't open.

I meant SotN, I know Zodiac Spear is one of the most bullshit things in bullshit history. I don't recall getting lost in SotN more than any other Metroidvania.

 

[taybul]

I've never played an old-school Sonic before, but let me guess: the "obstacle" is actually part of the background and you could just drop there?

I don't get what this picture is trying to tell me?

It's the one and only time the game forces you to know how this barrel works. You hop on it, and it slowly bounces back in place. What's not immediately obvious is that you can control the movement of this by pushing up and down. Most people would frantically try to jump on this to get it low enough to escape the room but would eventually run out of time and die. There's no other way through the level.

The game does tell you about this little detail though...in the manual.

 

[johnbone]

the thread.

Kept me from completing Sonic 3 as a kid....a real shame!

 

[Zatoth]

Throwing the magic powder at the raccoon in Link's Awakening.

I don't even want to know how many hours I wasted trying to get the key for the first temple in that game.

Is there even a hint in the game that you have to do that?

 

[joecanada]

Destiny - The Thread

With all these new games is this becoming part of the experience, being forced to wiki or go on to a game's actual website?

Warframe is another notable example, very deep progression system, tells you nothing

 

[Starwolf_UK]

Somebody will respond with how to get out of the first house in Pokemon. This is why they added arrows when walking in front of the doorway in later gens I feel.

Using the Magic Powder on the Racoon in Link's Awakening was one for me (edit; thanks traube pleased to know I'm not the only one). Mainly as I missed the cave leading to the mushroom to get the magic powder. Also the second boss of that game as it being my first Zelda game I had not figured out that using dungeon item on a boss is useful.

If you Zelda fans are SMH about that now look away now this one is worse; I knew people who couldn't figure out how to walk up to Nayru in Oracle of Ages (that is right at the start of the game and the creatures are blocking your way...I guess it is meant to be a hint that you should talk to all NPCs).

Sorry if those toe the line a bit.

Most Tales of the Abyss sidequests.

What do you mean you don't check every town and every NPC to find a new sidequest every time you got to a new area or otherwise activate an event trigger? Thing is PS2 era JRPGs were rife with that shit. It was like they wanted you to buy the guides...

Remember X-Men for Genesis?

For anyone that doesn't know (details)

Spoiler

you get to a screen with the message ''reset the computer''. The room you are in seems to have no way to progress so you hit reset thinking the game has broken and BAM!!! Actually it would seem most people hit power instead of reset thus thinking the game was broken after they spent ages looking for a computer.

 

[tcrunch]

In Dark Souls, the sequence of things you have to do to save Solaire, and the sequence of things you have to do to access the DLC.

 

[OnPoint]

In Blaster Master, after getting the hover ability from the 3rd boss, I never knew where the fuck to go afterward. You'd think the entrance to area 4 would be somewhere in area 3, but no, instead you have to go all the way back to the start of area 1--the very beginning of the game--with a fully-powered hover gauge, and then jump up and use all your hover energy to just barely reach a hidden platform, and then jump up to several more hidden platforms above it until you find a door way above the starting point that contains the entrance to area 4.

There is not a single hint in the game that you have to do that, so the game effectively ended for me after area 3.

Post more.

Really? Did you not have any curiosity as a kid? Even if that wasn't the way to go, when I unlocked HOVER, the first thing I did was say "I'm gonna go see if something's up there!!"

 

[BrassDragon]

 

[Agraavan]

the thread.

That made my young self think there were no way to do that level by yourself, always relying on Tails to lift me off the ground.

"Don't open this, this and that treasure chest in the first 10 minutes of the game if you want the best weapon at the end of the game."

...............WTF FFXII....

A blatanty way to benefit those who had the official guide. That game had so many god awful choices (many that have been fixed on the international version) that I can't look past those and enjoy it as it is.

I know what you're talking about... but are you sure the game never tells you? I think if you listen to the optional tape recordings (which are like LONG) there's messages in there that tell you the requirements.

I don't think it's completely hidden, but the hints are all buried deep in optional stuff that you need to go back to that one mission.

I can't remember any tape mentioning that, and I listened all. I could be wrong, but if it is there, it is very well hidden, excessively obtuse.

 

[Ulthwe]

In Prince of Persia 2, the original not sands of time, you had to let the end boss kill you in a certain way.

Quite a way to get stuck.

Right in the feels! Getting to the last boss of PoP2 (a quite difficult but enjoyable game) and not knowing how to beat it, only to learn MANY years later that you had to let him kill you and wait (not pressing a key) for you to resurrect.

You can imagine my face upon learning that.

 

[ElFly]

Dark Souls - How the hell was I supposed to know where and how to enter the Abyss?

Ingward, the one talking NPC in the New Londo ruins tells you to find Artorias. The Artorias ring that let's you abysswalk is in his grave. The abyss is behind a fog door so a player may be interested in jumping down -something you probably did while exploring the catacombs-.

It is not clear, but it is not completely obscure.

 

[Skux]

All of Cole's character development in LA Noire.

 

[vypek]

Not sure if it was completely accurate, but the solution in this video has worked every time for me.

Wow. Had no idea. Thanks for the link

 

[zephervack]

This was my moment:

As a nine year old, I tried and tried and tried to get some fire to burn it, but I just couldn't do it. I even went back to the rooms with fire, sprinting towards the web, only to see the fire extinguish right before my young eyes. Turned out you had to jump from above to crack the web... D'OH

To me, it was before that, where you have to light your stick on fire, I was trapped in the room for 20 minutes and then I did it by accident and my mind was blown, never saw a game do a thing like that before.

 

[Mexican Sting]

Did you know, you can contact Meryl 4 times after the Ocelot bossfight to automatically register the codec no?

What? It should register the first time you call Meryl... at which point you already have her number, because you've clearly just called her...

 

[Diablohead]

The rental I had once actually photocopied the box, they obviously knew it was important.

The game tells you to look at the back of the box at some point i'm sure, but anyway if you don't contact her after a while you get's in touch with you instead.

 

[ViewtifulJC]

Remember X-Men for Genesis?

That got me as a kid, too. The game wanted you to reset your Sega Genesis? 1. How the fuck was I suppose to know that and 2. Won't that RESET my progress like every other video game known to man when I press reset?

 

[Morrigan Stark]

From Professor Layton and the Curious Village:

fuck this shit seriously

Oh wow. I just read your solution and... yeah, that's tortured as fuck. Did the in-game hints help any?

dark souls. After I got out of the prison, and got to fire link shrine, I kept going downstairs and running into these skeletons that kept respawning after I killed them. I wasn't really feeling the game anyway so I deleted it. I was watching a walkthrough a few months later and apparently I was supposed to walk around a ledge and go the opposite way to continue on.

How the fuck was I supposed to know that


Also the way to kill the skeletons required a special weapon that I couldn't get until later on.

How the fuck was I supposed to know that


Im not asking for hand holding, but at least give me some indication of whats going on

Is this a joke? In case you aren't joking... uh... you were supposed to explore a bit, if monsters are too tough you go into another area. Seriously, even the biggest noobs figure out how to reach Undead Burg, it's not really hard nor is it hidden. And the skeletons thing, there are two instances of NPCs that explain how divine weapons work.

Dark Souls does have some obtuse/"how was I supposed to know" moments (I listed some above, and also, the storyline to save Solaire and complete Siegmeyer's quests are obtuse as hell), but these were certainly not among them.

 

[whiteninja]

I remember being stumped by a puzzle in the second dungeon of links awakening where you had to kill some enemies in a specific order. I think there was hint about it but I didn't place it together at the time.

 

[GhaleonEB]

Destiny - The Thread

Huh? Destiny has waypoints in every mission and it's accessible my using the touchpad on the PS4.

I played through the story and the strikes, got to level 20, and am still baffled at how most of the game systems work. My items, the various reputations and vanguards and marks and whatever else. No idea how that stuff works. I know there are guides, including some good ones here on GAF. But very little is actually explained in the game. There's no in-game explanations for its own systems.

To the OP, the original Phantasy Star required you to cobble together disparate elements to reach and defeat the end boss, but actually finding him was the cherry on top. At the very end of the game you get dumped into a small dungeon with no exit. To find the door to the last boss, you have to turn and face one specific, unmarked wall and the door will appear. But there is no hint anywhere in the game that you have to do this, and it's a mechanic that is used only there. I remember getting there and being lost for months before seeing the hint in a gaming magazine for the solution.

 

[thecouncil]

The Legend of Zelda had some of those moments.

So did Super Metroid.

If I ever have to hit up an FAQ to progress in a game, I'm not necessarily having fun.

 

[matrixman92]

just recently, a lot of stuff revolving the nemeses system in shadow of mordor. I learned more about it from Gaf than the game taught me.

 

[The Albatross]

This fucking game

Beating level 1 was so fucking complex and you had to .. like spell out your friend's name or something to do it, otherwise it was blocked with no explanation and you just died.

 

[schaft0620]

Having to plug the controller into the 2nd port to bear Psycho Mantis MGS