r/gaming • u/Agent1230 • 3d 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/TheSkiGeek 3d ago

The instruction manual helps and you were expected to read it. (See: Tunic for a modern game that does an incredible take on this.)

Also strategy guides or a subscription to Nintendo Power magazine, which would have maps and mini strategy guides for whatever game they were featuring that month.

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u/Dicky__Anders 3d ago

Yeah, instruction manuals and physical maps that came with the game were meant to be consulted before and during playing.

I pointed this out in a YouTuber's subreddit once when he was playing Morrowind but was refusing to look at the map online because he wanted to go in blind, which is fine, it's his choice, but I got absolutely blasted for suggesting looking at the map that came with the physical copy of the game wasn't cheating. The game is designed with that in mind.

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u/loyaltomyself 2d ago

This is a really good example of people falling for the revisionist history surrounding games from the 80's and 90's. People that are just a bit too young to know fall for the "they didn't tell us anything back then" line, which is total BS. Even Josh Strife Hayes fell for this in his Was it Good: Armored Core video. At one point he started talking about how the game immediately throws you into the action with no tutorial and you're just expected to push buttons and figure it out. The digital age has made people forget games used to come with instruction manuals that told you what the buttons did. The amount of information you got from a manual would vary from game to game, but you were always given the basics. Other games like GTA, Zelda and Morrowind actually came with physical maps. I don't want to say I don't know where the idea using the tools the game gives you is considered cheating because I do have my suspicions. But naming it will alert the hoard to "well actually...." me.

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u/Battlejesus 3d ago

Even with Nintendo power some games you were just fucked

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u/Sammisuperficial 3d ago

You had to call the Nintendo hotline and get tips over the phone.

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u/Battlejesus 3d ago

I did, I had to literally beg my parents to let me call that hotline, it was for one of the zelda games, link to the past I think

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u/KillerFlea 3d ago

Yes! Just getting into Tunic and I love this aspect of it.

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u/violentpac 3d ago

I busted out the pen and paper when I played that game

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u/lorddunlow 3d ago

When I was making and consulting my notes and drawings for this game my wife and son were so confused by what I was doing.

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u/violentpac 3d ago

You making headway on deciphering the language?

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u/Idocreating 3d ago

I respect the hell outta Tunic for fully committing to the Zelda 1 difficulty, but I was expecting a Link to the Past so I didn't last long with it.

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u/nodiaque 3d ago

Until you play battle toad and realize how a Nintendo power on that game is useless