Misplaced Mechanics

Hello readers, and welcome to our newest feature. A Wednesday feature, Misplaced Mechanics will bring you three gameplay mechanics each week that just didn’t work that well with their games. This doesn’t mean the games are necessarily bad of course, in fact some of the featured games are quite good. I just want to share with you my personal experiences with bad game mechanics that drove me insane. Or at least tried to.

So without further ado, let’s see the first one!

Hitman 2: Silent Assassin – Real hitmen never rush

Let’s start off the list with a relatively underplayed game. Hitman 2, a sneaking game for the hardcore sneaking fans, sporting a handful of brilliant ideas that make it appealing for even those who aren’t too fond of the genre. I mean, who wouldn’t want to sneak into a party disguised as a waiter and poison an unsuspecting military general’s drink?

So what’s the one thing that doesn’t work in this game? Running. You see if you run, people get suspicious. While it is realistic, we can’t forget that this is a game we’re talking about here. Agent 47 moves incredibly slow while walking and even the most patient player will find it necessary to just run sometimes. However, the minute an enemy guard sees 47 running, he will instantly see through 47’s perfect disguise and start shooting at our favourite hitman, alerting everyone in the process. Sure 47 could just equip his trusty .45s, but getting the rank of Psychopath isn’t something a professional assassin would aim for now, is it?

Resident Evil Outbreak – Kick the door!

Outbreak was one of those unsuccessful RE spinoffs that – apart from a few good reviews – never got anywhere, even though it had a handful of good ideas. Some of you may not now, but RE4 wasn’t the first game which allowed you to realistically kick in doors if you came across them. In fact, Outbreak is technically even more realistic, seeing how the only doors you can’t kick in are automatic heavy security doors and such.

The function was obviously included because of the online play, after all, accidently leaving behind a key in a zombie-infested area could lead to disastrous results when the players’ infection ratings were already very high near the end of a level. So to not have to backtrack in a game that limits you on how much time you can complete each level in, this was invented. The problem? Kicking a locked door in takes about as much time as going back for the key itself! Seriously, you can kick a door twenty times non-stop and you won’t get anywhere. If it weren’t for weapons’ destructive power, the mechanic for breaking down doors would be entirely pointless. As it is now, you only have to waste precious ammo to break doors open.

SWAT 4 – There’s no bad cop

SWAT 4 is a tactical FPS game, where you take command of a five-man SWAT unit to resolve various situations from bomb threats to hostage standoffs. It wasn’t a perfect game, but it was very unique and fun, although infuriatingly hard as well, given the fact that it tried to be way too realistic. It was meant for those gamers who could really think things through.

So how far did the realism go? Well, let me tell you. The player would get his points penalized if he did something that was against the rules. The one that always annoyed me was the „unathorized use of deadly force” penalty. You see before you could start shooting anybody, you had to call out to them to put down their weapons. Sure enough in the first levels they dropped it instantly, but later when you’re up against suicidal bombing terrorists, you’ll be extremely lucky if they even consider dropping it. What really makes this bothersome is of course the fact that having to call out to everyone means that they’ll always shoot you first before you have a chance to shoot them. On a certain level I had to ask myself: “Why can’t I just shoot an AK-47 wielding satanist who buries people alive?”

Alright folks, that’s it for this week, tune in next week, same time, same site!