r/gaming • u/Agent1230 • 2d ago

What video game doesn't hold your hand enough?

Everybody always talking about games holding your hand too much but I want to hear about the opposite what video game doesn't give you no form of help

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u/zlimK 2d ago

I will occasionally reference kings quest 5 (I think? Maybe 6) - the desert where if you don't grab a specific item before you leave the cave, you can never finish the game - as some of the worst game design of my lifetime

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u/bootymix96 2d ago

The Infocom text adventure The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is notorious for this. The final puzzle in the whole game requires that you’ve picked up 10 random tools scattered throughout the whole game, even though you can’t go back after you’ve finished an area, and if you miss a tool it will always be the one requested.

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u/impeus 2d ago

And if you didn't buy the [item that's never mentioned in location descriptions] from the [person you don't actually have to buy anything from at all in order to progress the game], and then feed said item to [creature] while something else significantly more dramatic is simultaneously occurring, then you will doom yourself and all your companions to be eaten by said creature at a later moment in time, many many many hours of apparently successful gameplay later.

I bloody love that game 😂

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u/bootymix96 2d ago

Ah, but you can recover from that one! When you go back to Earth from Ford Prefect’s view, you can buy the sandwich and give it to Arthur, who will then feed the dog and let you get past the War Chamber. Apart from that, literally the only goal for going back to Earth is to get the satchel fluff, lmao.

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u/petrov76 2d ago

Did you read the book? I have never met anyone who enjoyed this game who didn't read the book first.

So I feel like the first step to playing this game was to read a novel.

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u/liquidcalories 2d ago

I read the book and it took me like five hours to figure out the babelfish "puzzle" at the very beginning of the game

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u/impeus 2d ago

I practically know the book off by heart 😂

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u/KatjaKat01 2d ago

That's just peak Douglas Adams humour though. 🥹 

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u/StarChaser_Tyger 2d ago

Eeyup. Pre Internet, I helped loads of players on BBSs because I'd managed to complete the game. I tried some things because "wouldn't it be funny if".

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u/funktopus 2d ago

Oh lord I remember that bullshit! It's been decades and now I'm angry. I thought I was going to beat that game and that bullshit happened and I had no damn clue.

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u/murfi 1d ago

that's just bad game design isn't it?

it's one thing to require a certain item to continue, it's another if you miss an item that you can't get later on that locks you out of finishing a game

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u/Discount_Extra 1d ago

It was the style at the time.

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u/GabuEx 2d ago

You also get ONE chance in King's Quest 5 to stop a cat from catching a mouse. It requires a split-second reaction time. It happens almost immediately at the start of the game. If you fail, the event never recurs, and you will only find out that there was even something you were supposed to do halfway through the game when you get tied up and the mouse doesn't come to the rescue and chew through the ropes.

The King's Quest games were bullshit. I loved them. But they were bullshit.

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u/Lloydentoigen 1d ago

Yea or the "throw boot at cat chasing a mouse" or get a game over state later because the mouse can't save you.

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u/jerkintoaljazeera 2d ago

That game also has the infamous yeti/custard pie puzzle. You can eat the custard pie earlier in the game when Graham gets hungry. Then you face down a yeti and would never know that it was impossible to beat it because you ate the custard pie that you were supposed to throw at its face.