Biggest bullshit in a video game

[Mooger Meng]

Final Fantasy XI didn't have any spawns quite that rare, but it still managed to pull some real world spawn bullshit. For example, consider Noble Mold (what is it with rare fungus monsters?); not only did it only spawn during double water weather in one zone, but this weather only came part of the time, at random, in one season in the in-game year. There were NPC weather forecasters, but they were worse than useless, because they weren't accurate but there was no warning of this, and most players wouldn't have spent enough time caring about the weather prior to this to notice. Even during the correct weather, it only spawned after 9-12 hours or so, and only if the (unmarked) placeholder mob was completely undisturbed the entire time (the placeholder morphed into the mob). Meaning that if some random idiot even so much as aggroed it, the timer would reset.

And since the game had no open-world PvP, there was absolutely nothing you could do to stop people from aggroing the placeholder. Naturally, if you attacked it, it would be claimed to you, but that would make it useless for spawning purposes. Of course, that meant that other players could grief you by deliberately holding the placeholder. You couldn't even rely on talking to people, because the same servers were used for the entire world including Japanese, French, and German speakers, and the "auto-translate" (basically a phrasebook) didn't have any terms to explain monster spawning mechanics because they were supposedly secret. For the same reason, attempting to call a GM on people who griefed you by deliberately killing the placeholder would just result in a stock response about how "we can't reveal game mechanics to players". And finally, the item drop wasn't even 100%! I knew a player who had to kill it 5 times to get its stupid hat (no achievement or even a title awarded).

Noble Mold wasn't the only such "live spawn" monster either, but its weather mechanic made it one of the worst. Voluptuous Vilma was another bad one, but mostly because it was the one-and-only double live spawn meaning that you had to let an (again, unmarked) normal monster called Overgrown Rose stay alive and undisturbed for up to 12 hours to morph into an elite mob called Rose Garden, then let that stay alive and undisturbed for another 12(?) hours to morph into Voluptuous Vilma. Again, no achievement or title awarded, but at least its drop was apparently 100%. I say "apparently" because the same item dropped off the intermediate spawn at a 5% or so rate and the hassle of keeping a monster alive in FFXI meant that most people just did that instead. I personally do not know even one single player no matter how literally autistic who even tried spawning Voluptuous Vilma. Even the name was a lie; it wasn't some hot girl, but a big green tentacle monster with bad breath.

Didn't FF XI have some kind of fetish for cramming retarded and arbitrary mechanics in at every possible opportunity? I never played it, but I seem to recall hearing about some trainwreck of a boss called Absolute Virtue...

 

[The Littlest Shitlord]

Didn't FF XI have some kind of fetish for cramming retarded and arbitrary mechanics in at every possible opportunity? I never played it, but I seem to recall hearing about some trainwreck of a boss called Absolute Virtue...

There are plenty of FFXI bosses without weird arbitrary mechanics. Absolute Virtue was notorious more for that how the dev team interacted with the players over those mechanics was a complete and total clusterfuck that bred massive ill-will and resentment. The only worse dev team interaction that I can think of that offhand was in that now-defunct Star Wars Galaxy MMO where players who had (whether knowingly, or unknowingly) game currency produced by cheating in their possession would suddenly be teleported into deep space and stuck there (if I remember correctly).

Basically every time the players beat Absolute Virtue, or even just almost beat it, the dev team would patch it to be immune to whatever the players did. Players drag it to a cliff (the "Wall of Justice"), where the height difference keeps it from attacking? It's deemed an exploit and they're banned. Players get a horde of Dark Knights with Kraken Clubs (a rare and very expensive weapon that does little damage but can attack up to 8 times per swing) and use Souleater (converts your HP directly into added damage per swing) to beat it down? Suddenly, the concept of Souleater resistance, which never before existed, gets introduced to the game and guess who has it? Players figure out that the otherwise worthless Scholar ability Modus Veritas stacks with itself and prepare a horde of scholars to Modus Veritas the boss to death? Dev team gets wind of it in advance, emergency patches in Modus Veritas resistance and nerfs the base ability for good measure (adding a miss chance) before it can ever even be tried.

Basically players were expected to figure out whatever obtuse mechanic they added and use that and only that, or else be punished for it whether individually or collectively. We never did, either. They showed a video of the dev team players fighting it to show that it was possible to beat it and give hints, but it didn't show us the most important part that we never uncovered. (Although it did lead to a joke about the secret being that you had to travel through time while zooming in on the chat log.) They kept telling us "you have to stop its regen" as if we didn't know, but that was the very first mechanic that we figured out! We even figured out the mechanic to lock its SP abilities (abilities with a cooldown of two hours when used by players, but AV could use every minute). But the problem was that once its HP reached a certain threshold, it started being able to spam-cast Meteor for colossal damage to the whole alliance and there was just no way to stay alive.

There were other bosses with obtuse mechanics that were never figured out, but workarounds were figured out and the dev team never did anything about it. For example, in the old version of Dynamis, before they Abyssea-ized it, there were animated weapons that would become annoyed and cast Warp on themselves to leave the battle never to return if you didn't do... something. It was never known for sure what, but everyone just had the Black Mage cast Stun on them in mid-Warp-cast to stop it and zerg rush it down. But suddenly they just decided that their precious pet monster was only going to be allowed to be defeated one very particular way, for no reason, and they never did anything like it before or since.

 

[JektheDumbass]

There are plenty of FFXI bosses without weird arbitrary mechanics. Absolute Virtue was notorious more for that how the dev team interacted with the players over those mechanics was a complete and total clusterfuck that bred massive ill-will and resentment. The only worse dev team interaction that I can think of that offhand was in that now-defunct Star Wars Galaxy MMO where players who had (whether knowingly, or unknowingly) game currency produced by cheating in their possession would suddenly be teleported into deep space and stuck there (if I remember correctly).

Basically every time the players beat Absolute Virtue, or even just almost beat it, the dev team would patch it to be immune to whatever the players did. Players drag it to a cliff (the "Wall of Justice"), where the height difference keeps it from attacking? It's deemed an exploit and they're banned. Players get a horde of Dark Knights with Kraken Clubs (a rare and very expensive weapon that does little damage but can attack up to 8 times per swing) and use Souleater (converts your HP directly into added damage per swing) to beat it down? Suddenly, the concept of Souleater resistance, which never before existed, gets introduced to the game and guess who has it? Players figure out that the otherwise worthless Scholar ability Modus Veritas stacks with itself and prepare a horde of scholars to Modus Veritas the boss to death? Dev team gets wind of it in advance, emergency patches in Modus Veritas resistance and nerfs the base ability for good measure (adding a miss chance) before it can ever even be tried.

Basically players were expected to figure out whatever obtuse mechanic they added and use that and only that, or else be punished for it whether individually or collectively. We never did, either. They showed a video of the dev team players fighting it to show that it was possible to beat it and give hints, but it didn't show us the most important part that we never uncovered. (Although it did lead to a joke about the secret being that you had to travel through time while zooming in on the chat log.) They kept telling us "you have to stop its regen" as if we didn't know, but that was the very first mechanic that we figured out! We even figured out the mechanic to lock its SP abilities (abilities with a cooldown of two hours when used by players, but AV could use every minute). But the problem was that once its HP reached a certain threshold, it started being able to spam-cast Meteor for colossal damage to the whole alliance and there was just no way to stay alive.

There were other bosses with obtuse mechanics that were never figured out, but workarounds were figured out and the dev team never did anything about it. For example, in the old version of Dynamis, before they Abyssea-ized it, there were animated weapons that would become annoyed and cast Warp on themselves to leave the battle never to return if you didn't do... something. It was never known for sure what, but everyone just had the Black Mage cast Stun on them in mid-Warp-cast to stop it and zerg rush it down. But suddenly they just decided that their precious pet monster was only going to be allowed to be defeated one very particular way, for no reason, and they never did anything like it before or since.

Jesus Christ that's some butt-grade faggotry. Those game developers better not step foot on my Minecraft server...

 

[The Last Stand]

When you THINK you've killed somebody in R6: Siege, then you look at their health bar and realize that they have an inch of health left and kill YOU.

 

[Just Here for A and H]

Blind jumps in platformers. Not as big a deal in stuff made in the last 10 years (there'll be some sort of hint that it's safe to make a blind jump, or blind jumps will be so rare that when you DO see one, it's assuredly safe in all but the cuntiest of modern games), but in anything made from the 80s-early 2010s, it was the bane of any platformer.

Anyone who buys into a games as a service that is not an MMO is a swine and should be ashamed of themselves.

Adding onto this, MMOs that have an upfront cost coupled with the subscription model. One or the other, please and thank you. Even more ridiculous when content expansions cost an additional upfront fee.

Another one from the original C&C - in one of the GDI missions the map is divided by a river, with your only forces to the south being 5 soldiers who need to destroy 2 turrets. Problem is that if the turrets kill them first, you're completely screwed. You can't build aircraft or transports, they're out of range of all your weapons, and whilst you can call in an airstrike, it will only do 50% damage at most, which the AI will immediately repair. All you can do is restart from the beginning.

Micro missions in base-builder C&C/SC-style RTSes are terrible, were never good, and will never be good.

 

[Love Machine]

When you THINK you've killed somebody in R6: Siege, then you look at their health bar and realize that they have an inch of health left and kill YOU.

Double tap dummy.

 

[Love Machine]

Blind jumps in platformers. Not as big a deal in stuff made in the last 10 years (there'll be some sort of hint that it's safe to make a blind jump, or blind jumps will be so rare that when you DO see one, it's assuredly safe in all but the cuntiest of modern games), but in anything made from the 80s-early 2010s, it was the bane of any platformer.

Adding onto this, MMOs that have an upfront cost coupled with the subscription model. One or the other, please and thank you. Even more ridiculous when content expansions cost an additional upfront fee.

Micro missions in base-builder C&C/SC-style RTSes are terrible, were never good, and will never be good.

Double post, but a janny will fix it im sure. But all MMO's that have ever been relevant besides runescape have an upfront cost, paid expansions and a monthly sub. If thats just the cost you have to pay for a "good" mmo, that just what you have to pay. People did complain about when BC and Wrath came out, or when Shadowbringers came out. If the games good a games good.

 

[An Ghost]

When you THINK you've killed somebody in R6: Siege, then you look at their health bar and realize that they have an inch of health left and kill YOU.

Nah dude. The game has hit icons, noises, text pops up saying how many points you got, and a banner for everybody else that says the kill and weapon and if it was a head shot, the banner at the top gets a red X over their character's icon, and something else pops up saying "5v4" or whatever. Theyre super obvious even on the far edges of my ultrawide. The only way it could be more obvious is if your character said a quip.

 

[Antarctic Hellbeast]

Teleporting hunters still bitching about anything they cant one shot and reeing en masse to nerf anything that isnt used by their class for the better part of a decade now (no Idea why theres no thread on the Hunter population of Destiny 1 or 2),

actual infinite HP cheaters,

and Stasis users in Destiny 2 Beyond Laughing (beyond light 100 to 2 fps when aiming at an enemy in pvp and sometimes pve stuttering they added in) Problems of Papyrus (Trials of Osiris)

All I need to say on that besides I dont play the game anymore.

 

[The Last Stand]

Nah dude. The game has hit icons, noises, text pops up saying how many points you got, and a banner for everybody else that says the kill and weapon and if it was a head shot, the banner at the top gets a red X over their character's icon, and something else pops up saying "5v4" or whatever. Theyre super obvious even on the far edges of my ultrawide. The only way it could be more obvious is if your character said a quip.

I see the hitmarkers, even the occasional blood indicator during the actions. I see points during downs, gadgets, and kills. Maybe it's just me, but I could've sworn my gunplay would warrant a kill. 6 out of 10, it's not the case.

 

[AnOminous]

I got all 700 achievements in the Master Chief Collection a few months ago and the multiplayer-exclusive ones were some of the most annoying.

I hate these and usually don't even bother. The worst are ones that require both of you or worse, multiple people, to basically collude to cheese them because they'd never happen normally.

 

[Bender]

I hate these and usually don't even bother. The worst are ones that require both of you or worse, multiple people, to basically collude to cheese them because they'd never happen normally.

I am 0% sure you even know what video games are, and the only way you can convince me otherwise is to play Trine with me.

 

[Van Darkholme]

Doom Eternal not having a pistol. Not having a sidearm combined with how severely they nerfed blood punch means wasting tons of ammo on weaker trash mobs and then being low on ammo when the bigger demons come out all the fucking time.

I didn't like Doom Eternal for a lot of reasons but that was one fucking trash ass design decision.

Funny how there is a fully coded working pistol in the game, but they never made it available via normal means, just via console command.

 

[Dante Alighieri]

I see the hitmarkers, even the occasional blood indicator during the actions. I see points during downs, gadgets, and kills. Maybe it's just me, but I could've sworn my gunplay would warrant a kill. 6 out of 10, it's not the case.

It's probably just you, you boomer.

 

[The Last Stand]

It's probably just you, you boomer.

Listen, how do I play Minecraft with Trumpers?

 

[Dante Alighieri]

View attachment 2058008
Listen, how do I play Minecraft with Trumpers?

2b2t, the oldest anarchy server in Minecraft

 

[SnowBall]

Speaking of Final Fantasy XI I remember the one on one battle with Maat that was required to unlock the level cap to 75 being full of bullshit mechanics and was either fairly easy or absolute hell depending on what job you tried to beat him was. The only saving grace was that you only needed to beat him once to fully unlock the level cap.

 

[The Littlest Shitlord]

Speaking of Final Fantasy XI I remember the one on one battle with Maat that was required to unlock the level cap to 75 being full of bullshit mechanics and was either fairly easy or absolute hell depending on what job you tried to beat him was. The only saving grace was that you only needed to beat him once to fully unlock the level cap.

I had to beat him on Red Mage, which was probably the worst and the most luck-dependent. Since Red Mages have an enormous pool of spells to choose from, and Maat chooses from them at random, pure luck in Maat's choice of casting makes a huge difference. Chainspell in the hands of an enemy is one of the worst 2 hour abilities to face, too, especially considering that monsters hardly ever run out of MP, which is a significant issue for player use of Chainspell. Red Mages have lackluster melee, but Maat can use Asuran Fists regardless of job because he is both your job and a Monk too, effectively having two jobs while the player has one and a half normally and only one while fighting Maat!

Also, the best strategy for Red Mage on Maat is sleep-nuke, and whether the sleep lands is random, so that's even more luck-based bullshit. I lost repeatedly because the sleep just didn't want to land; can't sleep-nuke when your enemy won't sleep. Then on the fight I won, all the randomness just went one-sidedly in my favor, and I absolutely crushed him. It was a huge relief but it didn't feel like an accomplishment.

 

[SnowBall]

I remember trying to beat him on Red Mage as it was my only job level to 70 at the time and it was a nightmare. It was so luck dependent and it could take one mistake to screw you over. Also Maat could spam Asuran Fists back to back. I remember being so close to beating him only for a sleep to miss and and getting slammed with multiple AFs to the face. I eventually cleared the fight on another job after my ls told me to just do it on something other than Red Mage. The fight was nerfed quite a bit over the years from what I heard though.

 

[Mary the Goldsmith]

In the Dragon Ball Xenoverse series in order to get certain transformations like the Kaio-Ken, you have to play a certain side mission, and in it defeat a Time Patroller, the thing is this guy doesn't always spawn he has a random chance of appearing, and if he does appear and you do defeat him he has a chance of dropping the item you want, so you literally have to deal with to R.N.Gs, I replayed the mission several times with the guy only spawning in 1/10th of those times and never once dropped the item I wanted, I ultimately gave up and used a save editor to just give me the item.