7 ms·

This is made worse in my mind for games that are essentially single-player yet have some sort of online element that means you cant just hit pause or save & exi

This is made worse in my mind for games that are essentially single-player yet have some sort of online element that means you cant just hit pause or save & exit whenever you want. You have to keep on going for longer than you want until it is "safe" for you to stop. In the old days you could just exit out to the pause menu or save so you could go to the toilet or answer the phone or talk to your family and your in-game activities were safe. You could pick and chose when and how you wanted to play. Now you cant stop when you want, because if you do you'll just be left "idle" in-game. This means that you're prey for other players or NPCs in game, and you risk losing your character's progress and you're back to the start (sometimes there is a significant time-investment to this progress so understandably you dont want to risk it). You can only stop when you get to some sort of safe-place in-game, which means you have to play longer than you want to. So you get situations like where if I am playing a game and my wife asks me to come and see something or make a cup of tea or something, I have to ask her to wait until it is "safe" for me to stop. I feel like I am prioritising the game over my wife (and I guess I am to an extent). I dont like this. I really wish games would allow you to just quit whenever you want without risking your in-game progress.

icebraining 8y ago
Is this a widespread thing?
OberstKrueger 8y ago
Do you have any examples of games like this? I know there are singleplayer games that require you to be online even when playing solo(i.e. Diablo 3), but when you're solo, you can still pause the game. Curious to know what developers don't allow such actions.
- Drakim 8y ago
  Only ones I can think of is Dark Souls and Resident Evil 6, as other players can invade your single-player game to try to kill you.
  - stouset 8y ago
    In Dark Souls, you can just quit the game and resume exactly where you were in a matter of seconds.
  - slazaro 8y ago
    How is it a single-player game then? I think I'm out of touch with newer games...
    - crummy 8y ago
      Imagine it's kind of a shared singleplayer experience. You play a game by yourself against computer controlled enemies, but you might see notes left from other players, and the ghosts of their last moments. Later you can use special items to hop into a game (co-op) or invade a random player's game (pvp).
    - mattlondon 8y ago
      They're single-player in that you play on your own, but you play on your own with a lot of other people playing on their own. So you could be on a server doing your own thing, and if you see another character whilst playing, that could be a human person doing their own thing, or it could be a NPC doing their own thing (but with the option of interacting with other human players - chat/trade/fighting etc) It is essentially a single-player experience but on a shared playing area. If that makes sense! Its kinda cool, but this forced you-can-only-quit-when-we-say-so thing is not cool. Why you cant just safely despawn when you pause or exit I don't know. I guess it is there for "realism"
      - ericdykstra 8y ago
        Let's say your in a game with PVP, are you saying you should just be able to "safely despawn" to avoid a fight that you think you're going to lose? Just because you personally have a problem with the way some games work doesn't mean every single game designer needs to shape their programs to your preference. If you don't like it, play a different game.
- mattlondon 8y ago
  Elite Dangerous and Rust are two particular examples I had in mind when writing this.
  - gruez 8y ago
    both are actual multiplayer games, so it doesn't match parent's description
    - krageon 8y ago
      Elite can be played solo, in which case it (obviously) isn't multiplayer.
- jackewiehose 8y ago
  Another example is Assassins Creed Origins. It gives you (optional) tasks that are only available for some time, e.g. 1-40 (real) hours. That's too much stress for me, I don't want games to interfere with my real life.
ericdykstra 8y ago
There are tens of thousands of games you could be playing, and only a fraction of single-player games have anything like this. If you don't like the small fraction that do, choose other games. I can't even think of any single-player game off the top of my head that I can't pause or save and quit progress at any time.
- hiccuphippo 8y ago
  I think the only ones like that are the Dark Souls series. But I wonder if they'll add pause to the Switch version since it's a mobile version. Every game in the 3DS pauses when the player closes the lid. It should be the same with the Switch.
  - dmead 8y ago
    If you try to close your switch it will break.
  - Doxin 8y ago
    On the switch you can just go to the home screen and the game is suspended.
  - kibwen 8y ago
    Dark Souls doesn't quite fit the above complaint because you can save and quit whenever you want, including in such bizarre circumstances as falling to your death (you'll load on the last safe ground you stood on) or in the middle of combat (enemies will be reset when loading).
  - manfredo 8y ago
    In dark souls you can quit any time you want save for when you're being invaded. And you can get rid of invasions by playing offline, or leaving yourself in undead (or unkindled) form.
tw1010 8y ago
Game companies optimize for sustained gameplay, often without ever thinking about the people that lie behind the bits. What you described is one of the best strategies there are. I see no counter force, other than regulation, that would prevent this process from just keep getting worse and worse.
- feocco 8y ago
  You jump to regulation as the only thing to solve this? You could just not play those games. There's literally thousands upon thousands of alternatives that don't do this.
  - fastbeef 8y ago
    It’s an addiction. Unless the business self-regulates it’s a prime target for regulation. See also - tobacco, alcohol, drugs.
    - feocco 8y ago
      By this logic, we better start regulating sports and exercise too! After all, it's an addiction!!! * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_addiction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_addiction I would equate trying to regulate against "sustained gameplay" to trying to regulate/force timeouts in all basketball games, tennis games, etc. It's absurd. I think vice laws aim to accomplish good but needlessly limit freedom. More importantly, I think comparing gaming to addictive substances seems very naive.
      - anyfoo 8y ago
        If people were all reasonable all the time we wouldn’t need laws that prohibit them from driving under influence, stealing or plain murdering people. If excessive sports and exercise were a problem on any large scale, I would advocate for regulation, too. My feeling however is that people rather tend to need incentives for exercising at all, so I’m not holding my breath on that one. Freedom is not absolute if you are living as part of a society.
jackewiehose 8y ago
> I really wish games would allow you to just quit whenever you want without risking your in-game progress. I love how the Nintendo Switch allows you to pause any game, any time immediately. Even during load screens! And you can suspend the console. Although I don't know what happens when the battery runs out. I which they would enforce something like this for PC/steam games. But of course it won't help much with online "real-time" games.
- Kihashi 8y ago
  > Although I don't know what happens when the battery runs out What you'd expect- you lose any unsaved progress. Some games have autosave, though, so it's not like you usually lose a huge amount. Also, the battery life in suspend mode is pretty long, IME. Generally several days at least.
hans0l074 8y ago
I get what you mean, but I have "strengthened my will" against this, I suppose. There are games like the Dark Souls/Bloodborne series, where you can "quit" anytime, and if you restart, you are in the exact same spot as before. In the worse case, you get killed by roaming enemies/other invading players (it's mainly a single player game with multiplayer elements) - but I die in these bloody games anyway, so I don't care so much. I rationalize it by saying that all you lose are some in-game "souls" (currency) - so yeah I go make that tea for the missus. In games like The Division/Battlefield 4, where you are part of a multiplayer team and trying to complete a "mission/quest", it's a bit more difficult. It's annoying for the other players if you bail out or go AFK (Away From KBD). So you have to pre-book your game time in short batches ("I'm doing this mission - 45 minutes"). Of course you can leave if you are playing with strangers. Usually the games automatically pull another online player in. Most other games I play are single-player RPG's (e.g All Bioware / Bethesda RPG's e.g Dragon Age, Skyrim etc) allow you to save or pause. I can't remember anymore, but even in WoW it wasn't that big a deal to just bail out when needed.
- dwringer 8y ago
  In WoW it was often a nightmare of dooming between 3 and 39 other people to twenty minutes of trying to find a replacement instead of actually playing the game. Not a big deal for the person who quits, admittedly.
ahakki 8y ago
Halt execution
DEADBEEFC0FFEE 8y ago
I can relate. I have taught myself to judge the impact of the StayAndPlay behavioral, and if necessary Alt-F4, walk away. Getting the shopping out of the car when my wife gets back is not more important, but not helping my wife is perceived as rude, and that is important. I'm trying to teach my boy this. Fortnite is absolutely gaming crack designed by psychologists. Powerful shit.
- DanBC 8y ago
  My child enjoys Fortnite Battle Royale. I wanted to buy him Fortnite until he somehow got a free trial for a few days. All the loot boxes really put me off it.
  - bwbw223 8y ago
    Fortnite is free. The lootboxes, as far as I know, are mostly cosmetic and don’t give an advantage.
    - krageon 8y ago
      But they are inherently addictive (as in, they are meant to be and it is widely known that they are). You generally want to limit children's exposure to addictive things that bring them nothing at all. It's their formative years, after all.
- beenBoutIT 8y ago
  Why doesn't someone form an NGO or non-profit that assigns addicictveness ratings to games? These things can easily be quantified and labeled in a way that parents could easily understand.
jetti 8y ago
This isn't a new thing though. When the SNES Classic came out I picked one up because it had Secret of Mana on it. I completely forgot about not being able to just turn off the game when I want to stop since the only way you can save is by staying at an inn. I honestly haven't played a single player game that came out in the past 5 years (other than Secret of Mana remake) that would prohibit me from stopping whenever I want. My big issue is multiplayer games (namely FIFA and Rocket League). If I just stop mid-game I lose rank, which means I may be stuck in a match longer than I would like to be.
Sylamore 8y ago
I actually remember this being worse on games from the 80s and 90s because some of them didn't even have a save option at all (say River Raid) so you had to start over from scratch any time you stopped playing. Or games like Metroid or Zelda on the NES where you had to be at a save point or you'd lose all your progress since the last save. Today it's always online games, if you're in the middle of a level/mission the only option you have is to quit which if it's a competitive game leaves your team at a disadvantage, plus some games penalize you if you habitually quit early. In some games, like BF1 or the recent CoDs someone can immediately come back in to take your place if you are playing in a casual game mode, but the more competitive game modes won't allow someone else to join (Breakout in Halo 5 for example).

icebraining 8y ago

Is this a widespread thing?

OberstKrueger 8y ago

Do you have any examples of games like this? I know there are singleplayer games that require you to be online even when playing solo(i.e. Diablo 3), but when you're solo, you can still pause the game. Curious to know what developers don't allow such actions.

Drakim 8y ago
Only ones I can think of is Dark Souls and Resident Evil 6, as other players can invade your single-player game to try to kill you.
- stouset 8y ago
  In Dark Souls, you can just quit the game and resume exactly where you were in a matter of seconds.
- slazaro 8y ago
  How is it a single-player game then? I think I'm out of touch with newer games...
  - crummy 8y ago
    Imagine it's kind of a shared singleplayer experience. You play a game by yourself against computer controlled enemies, but you might see notes left from other players, and the ghosts of their last moments. Later you can use special items to hop into a game (co-op) or invade a random player's game (pvp).
  - mattlondon 8y ago
    They're single-player in that you play on your own, but you play on your own with a lot of other people playing on their own. So you could be on a server doing your own thing, and if you see another character whilst playing, that could be a human person doing their own thing, or it could be a NPC doing their own thing (but with the option of interacting with other human players - chat/trade/fighting etc) It is essentially a single-player experience but on a shared playing area. If that makes sense! Its kinda cool, but this forced you-can-only-quit-when-we-say-so thing is not cool. Why you cant just safely despawn when you pause or exit I don't know. I guess it is there for "realism"
    - ericdykstra 8y ago
      Let's say your in a game with PVP, are you saying you should just be able to "safely despawn" to avoid a fight that you think you're going to lose? Just because you personally have a problem with the way some games work doesn't mean every single game designer needs to shape their programs to your preference. If you don't like it, play a different game.
mattlondon 8y ago
Elite Dangerous and Rust are two particular examples I had in mind when writing this.
- gruez 8y ago
  both are actual multiplayer games, so it doesn't match parent's description
  - krageon 8y ago
    Elite can be played solo, in which case it (obviously) isn't multiplayer.
jackewiehose 8y ago
Another example is Assassins Creed Origins. It gives you (optional) tasks that are only available for some time, e.g. 1-40 (real) hours. That's too much stress for me, I don't want games to interfere with my real life.

ericdykstra 8y ago

There are tens of thousands of games you could be playing, and only a fraction of single-player games have anything like this. If you don't like the small fraction that do, choose other games. I can't even think of any single-player game off the top of my head that I can't pause or save and quit progress at any time.

hiccuphippo 8y ago
I think the only ones like that are the Dark Souls series. But I wonder if they'll add pause to the Switch version since it's a mobile version. Every game in the 3DS pauses when the player closes the lid. It should be the same with the Switch.
- dmead 8y ago
  If you try to close your switch it will break.
- Doxin 8y ago
  On the switch you can just go to the home screen and the game is suspended.
- kibwen 8y ago
  Dark Souls doesn't quite fit the above complaint because you can save and quit whenever you want, including in such bizarre circumstances as falling to your death (you'll load on the last safe ground you stood on) or in the middle of combat (enemies will be reset when loading).
- manfredo 8y ago
  In dark souls you can quit any time you want save for when you're being invaded. And you can get rid of invasions by playing offline, or leaving yourself in undead (or unkindled) form.

tw1010 8y ago

Game companies optimize for sustained gameplay, often without ever thinking about the people that lie behind the bits. What you described is one of the best strategies there are. I see no counter force, other than regulation, that would prevent this process from just keep getting worse and worse.

feocco 8y ago
You jump to regulation as the only thing to solve this? You could just not play those games. There's literally thousands upon thousands of alternatives that don't do this.
- fastbeef 8y ago
  It’s an addiction. Unless the business self-regulates it’s a prime target for regulation. See also - tobacco, alcohol, drugs.
  - feocco 8y ago
    By this logic, we better start regulating sports and exercise too! After all, it's an addiction!!! * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_addiction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_addiction I would equate trying to regulate against "sustained gameplay" to trying to regulate/force timeouts in all basketball games, tennis games, etc. It's absurd. I think vice laws aim to accomplish good but needlessly limit freedom. More importantly, I think comparing gaming to addictive substances seems very naive.
    - anyfoo 8y ago
      If people were all reasonable all the time we wouldn’t need laws that prohibit them from driving under influence, stealing or plain murdering people. If excessive sports and exercise were a problem on any large scale, I would advocate for regulation, too. My feeling however is that people rather tend to need incentives for exercising at all, so I’m not holding my breath on that one. Freedom is not absolute if you are living as part of a society.

jackewiehose 8y ago

> I really wish games would allow you to just quit whenever you want without risking your in-game progress. I love how the Nintendo Switch allows you to pause any game, any time immediately. Even during load screens! And you can suspend the console. Although I don't know what happens when the battery runs out. I which they would enforce something like this for PC/steam games. But of course it won't help much with online "real-time" games.

Kihashi 8y ago
> Although I don't know what happens when the battery runs out What you'd expect- you lose any unsaved progress. Some games have autosave, though, so it's not like you usually lose a huge amount. Also, the battery life in suspend mode is pretty long, IME. Generally several days at least.

hans0l074 8y ago

I get what you mean, but I have "strengthened my will" against this, I suppose. There are games like the Dark Souls/Bloodborne series, where you can "quit" anytime, and if you restart, you are in the exact same spot as before. In the worse case, you get killed by roaming enemies/other invading players (it's mainly a single player game with multiplayer elements) - but I die in these bloody games anyway, so I don't care so much. I rationalize it by saying that all you lose are some in-game "souls" (currency) - so yeah I go make that tea for the missus. In games like The Division/Battlefield 4, where you are part of a multiplayer team and trying to complete a "mission/quest", it's a bit more difficult. It's annoying for the other players if you bail out or go AFK (Away From KBD). So you have to pre-book your game time in short batches ("I'm doing this mission - 45 minutes"). Of course you can leave if you are playing with strangers. Usually the games automatically pull another online player in. Most other games I play are single-player RPG's (e.g All Bioware / Bethesda RPG's e.g Dragon Age, Skyrim etc) allow you to save or pause. I can't remember anymore, but even in WoW it wasn't that big a deal to just bail out when needed.

dwringer 8y ago
In WoW it was often a nightmare of dooming between 3 and 39 other people to twenty minutes of trying to find a replacement instead of actually playing the game. Not a big deal for the person who quits, admittedly.

ahakki 8y ago

Halt execution

DEADBEEFC0FFEE 8y ago

I can relate. I have taught myself to judge the impact of the StayAndPlay behavioral, and if necessary Alt-F4, walk away. Getting the shopping out of the car when my wife gets back is not more important, but not helping my wife is perceived as rude, and that is important. I'm trying to teach my boy this. Fortnite is absolutely gaming crack designed by psychologists. Powerful shit.

DanBC 8y ago
My child enjoys Fortnite Battle Royale. I wanted to buy him Fortnite until he somehow got a free trial for a few days. All the loot boxes really put me off it.
- bwbw223 8y ago
  Fortnite is free. The lootboxes, as far as I know, are mostly cosmetic and don’t give an advantage.
  - krageon 8y ago
    But they are inherently addictive (as in, they are meant to be and it is widely known that they are). You generally want to limit children's exposure to addictive things that bring them nothing at all. It's their formative years, after all.
beenBoutIT 8y ago
Why doesn't someone form an NGO or non-profit that assigns addicictveness ratings to games? These things can easily be quantified and labeled in a way that parents could easily understand.

jetti 8y ago

This isn't a new thing though. When the SNES Classic came out I picked one up because it had Secret of Mana on it. I completely forgot about not being able to just turn off the game when I want to stop since the only way you can save is by staying at an inn. I honestly haven't played a single player game that came out in the past 5 years (other than Secret of Mana remake) that would prohibit me from stopping whenever I want. My big issue is multiplayer games (namely FIFA and Rocket League). If I just stop mid-game I lose rank, which means I may be stuck in a match longer than I would like to be.

Sylamore 8y ago

I actually remember this being worse on games from the 80s and 90s because some of them didn't even have a save option at all (say River Raid) so you had to start over from scratch any time you stopped playing. Or games like Metroid or Zelda on the NES where you had to be at a save point or you'd lose all your progress since the last save. Today it's always online games, if you're in the middle of a level/mission the only option you have is to quit which if it's a competitive game leaves your team at a disadvantage, plus some games penalize you if you habitually quit early. In some games, like BF1 or the recent CoDs someone can immediately come back in to take your place if you are playing in a casual game mode, but the more competitive game modes won't allow someone else to join (Breakout in Halo 5 for example).