When I hear about a new game, I usually read the first sentence or two on Wikipedia. I rule out games described as certain genres or types, like soulslike or online-only multiplayer games. Then, I check reviews on a site like Metacritic. If the critic or user reviews (doesn’t need to be both) are good enough, I add it to a list to play.
I also do this with movies and tv. Obviously, with sequels/series I know a little bit more about the games/movies/shows but I still go in as blind as possible.
I look at genre, average review, and watch maybe 30 seconds to a minute of a game play type trailer. If it looks interesting, I’ll add it to my wishlist and buy it when I can afford it. I’ve been let down a few times, and absolutely lost my soul to a few games that I knew nothing about prior.
Hello my twin!
Quick, everyone, spoil all media for OP!
I’ll start. The Bible doesn’t end well for that Jesus fella.
Turns out the devil did it
Yeah, it’s one of those cases where it seems like it’s a cliche until you find out that’s where the cliche came from!
(Wait, damn, it’s from the fanfiction, isn’t it? Damn expanded universes…)
you didn’t get to the end of that chapter huh
Snape kills Trinity with Rosebud.
I saw a meme on R*ddit and it was a screenshot of Life is Strange showing a choice between bacon and eggs or pancakes (it’s been a while idk) and I thought that it would be funny to make those random choices. I bought know just that choice. I played the game and cried multiple times during play, it was such a good story. Ever since then I play most games without seeing any gameplay hoping to recapture that feeling of discovery.
Now I want to try that game to see the outcome of those choices. I’m assuming it won’t change much but I’m curious nontheless.
Don’t know how much you want me to say about the choices so I’ll spoiler it out. It’s about how the choices are presented I won’t say anything of what the choices are.
Tap for spoiler
If there are BIG choices you will know, the screen gets blurry and shakes a little bit. Some other choices just say “This action will have consequences” which will make a pretty badass tattoo.
The next section will say the core game mechanic I did not know of going into the game
Tap for spoiler
I did not know the game had a time travel mechanic. It blew my mind that you could change some choices
It is a very good game. And I highly recommend it to anyone who plays games for the story. Also the prequel “Before the Storm” is also really good and I cried more playing that game knowing what happens in the first game.
I’ve been meaning to buy that one. I’m just bitter they “remastered” it and jacked up the price
It’s always nice when this happens. Like I was recommended Outer Wilds, and didn’t even look at the screenshots before starting it. I was actually pretty disappointed at first tbh, but then it started to grow on me, and grow on me, and grow, and then >!it was just a constant rollercoaster of wonder and discovery and mystery!< as I discovered more and more about the lore and mechanics
I was going to bring that up too, though I think Outer Wilds is a game that kind of requires going in completely blind, even some of the trailers I’ve seen show wayyy too much information.
I had kept on hearing people praise the game and it finally went on sale or something, so I grabbed it and gave it a go. The initial part was kind of, “Huh. I guess this is kind of ok, a bit too cutesy, not really game of the year material or anything, I don’t see what the big deal is… huh, what’s that weird music…”
Well, it seems I am putting Outer Worlds on my list now.
Be aware that the Outer Wilds and Outer Worlds are different games
I did that, not so much anymore after Rockstar published State of Emergency on the PS2 (Am I showing my age? lol) and it was absolute dog shit. Now I tend to wait after day one just to be sure.
I take it one step further. I get pirated versions of the game to try them as a demo. After about an hour of gameplay I can usually tell if I want the game then I’ll delete the pirated version and purchase it if I liked it.
I would never steal stuff… but let’s say I know people who pirate things…
Ithey think it’s different to download a song vs a whole game.I don’t consider it stealing. I don’t play it more than an hour or two before I make my decision, then delete it. I consider it a less than legal demo.
I’ve been playing Another’s Crabs Tresure. It’s a souls like but you’re a crab. It’s been pretty fun and challenging so far. Never been a souls fan but a new game at $30 is hard to pass on
I am pretty much the opposite. I have been burned in the past… things like difficulty (esp. co-op games not really adapted at all for single-player), inventory/loot, hunger etc being annoying. Or sometimes games start out fine and then just eventually lose me.
In fact for some games without much replay value I’ll just watch a let’s play of it and get 90% (or perhaps better because it’s not me dealing with nonsense) of the experience.
Then again, I also just have mostly stopped buying games. And the last thing I bought off Steam (in 2020) was one of those things I wanted for a while and it ended up being a disappointment for me.
The only thing I’ve been burned on with difficulty is souls style games. Anything else I can handle.
Some of it is probably just me sucking at games or not being focused enough. Even though often times I already feel like I’m taking things slowly enough as-is (and trying to exhaust my options).
Though I also think some of it is how razor-thin margin-of-error can often feel, unforgiving (or as I’ve said, annoying) mechanics, the downsides of randomized/generated content, and also just a big lack of player agency or more specifically good options (like how most games just decide the single-use items you buy are gonna be expensive and selling stuff is barely worth it aside from making room in your inventory).
If a roguelike(/lite) game really kicks my ass almost every time and then I have one really good run where I win (likely due to luck), I probably am not going to want to play that game for a while (if ever) again.
I used to get some very good games out of discount bins and off the bulk used shelves. Lots of games that didn’t get the a-list treatment in advertising or were from smaller studios. You could pick up 5-6 games for $30 so it was worth the risk of buying them based solely on the cover.
When GameStop purged their 360 and PS3 titles I drove around to so many stores lol. Got so many awesome games at $1-5ish
Sometimes games are so bad that they’re so good. It’s hard to explain… but sometimes it’s true lol
I do the same thing. I just finished the game “Stray” without watching any trailers or video reviews. Just the steam written reviews.
I really enjoyed it.
Adding this to the list.
The Stanley parable is worth picking up
And then put down for 5 years… then pick up again.
what a fun little adventure it was.
Pick up 6 years later… so you don’t accidentally do it too soon
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I did this with The Forgotten City… I was VERY happy I did. Yahtzee was just like “play it, I’m not telling you about it just PLAY IT NOW”
so I did
Adding this to the list.
The handful of times I went into movie theaters and randomly picking a movie off the board without knowing anything about them were good times.
That sounds like a great idea!
I don’t like getting spoilers, but I’ll read the reviews, the description of the game by the publisher, and 2-5 minutes of let’s play footage (in the middle) to make sure I’m not wasting my money. That strategy worked well with The Witcher 3.
I’ll occasionally pull up videos if I’m unsure. But I just look for like 10 seconds of gameplay to see how it looks.
