This topic is all about video game conventions you like and video game conventions you don't like. For me:
Likes
- Checkpoints. It’s nice when you only need to backtrack a minute as opposed to half an hour. In my last mission of Grand Theft Auto IV, for example
- Thoroughly differentiated classes. Not every combatant should be able to heal/cast spells/summon/fight/use stealth.
- Multiple available fighting styles and ways of winning any particular fight.
- The ability to choose between original vs. dubbed audio and the ability to toggle subtitles.
- A long, densely packed main story line. Side missions are fun too, but they are rarely as interesting as the missions that unravel the main story.
- Your main character having his/her own personal story.
- Fast travel systems.
Dislikes
- Starting off the game as powerful as you could ever hope to be, losing it all after the first mission, then spending the whole game just getting back to the same level or less than that.
- Cut scenes you can’t skip.
- No upgrades.
- Overusing the same setting. Europe in World War II and England in the medieval era have been explored more than enough times.
- Having the story told through long, silent, ignorable, scrollable text.
- Stereotypical characters.
- Only one available save slot. I see no advantage to this whatsoever.
- Fixed cameras.
Likes
- Checkpoints. It’s nice when you only need to backtrack a minute as opposed to half an hour. In my last mission of Grand Theft Auto IV, for example
I had to drive a long distance, follow a car for a long distance, have a cover-shootout outside, cover-shoot my way through all the floors of a building, cover-shoot on the roof, chase a man in a motorcycle, successfully drive up a ramp and get enough air to reach a helicopter, shoot a boat from the helicopter while dodging missiles, and then have another shootout. And if I dare screwed up a single one of those mistakes, I would have to do the whole thing over again.
- Multiple available fighting styles and ways of winning any particular fight.
- The ability to choose between original vs. dubbed audio and the ability to toggle subtitles.
- A long, densely packed main story line. Side missions are fun too, but they are rarely as interesting as the missions that unravel the main story.
- Your main character having his/her own personal story.
- Fast travel systems.
Dislikes
- Starting off the game as powerful as you could ever hope to be, losing it all after the first mission, then spending the whole game just getting back to the same level or less than that.
- Cut scenes you can’t skip.
- No upgrades.
- Overusing the same setting. Europe in World War II and England in the medieval era have been explored more than enough times.
- Having the story told through long, silent, ignorable, scrollable text.
- Stereotypical characters.
- Only one available save slot. I see no advantage to this whatsoever.
- Fixed cameras.