Are You Gonna Finish That?
Posted by
Nechrol
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A game is perhaps one of the few things that many of us never end up sticking with to its completion. We’ll finish a meal until we’re satisfied or unable to cram another sweet piece of cake into our already bursting gullets. You don’t go into a restaurant and pay for a three course meal but then decide as they are bringing out the dessert you don’t want it. You eat the dessert. You don’t run out of the place with your hands clamped over your ears whilst blindly knocking over the waiter in a panic.
So why then do some of us decide that after putting X amount of hours grinding, collecting items and completing quests that the game just isn’t doing it for us? There are many reasons I believe and the food analogy works a treat.
It may be that halfway through your meal (game) it’s going well, the food isn’t great but hey you paid for it so shovel it down and shut up. Then, from round the corner someone brings out something that looks, and tastes infinitely better in your eyes. Do you finish the meal, one bitter mouthful after the next, or do you discard the garden salad (Final Fantasy XIII) and chow down on a burger (Dragon Age: Awakening)?
The burger all the way in my case, it tasted better, I finished it and felt satisfied after gorging myself on it. The salad just couldn’t sate my gaming hunger.
We don’t always leave games to collect dust because they are in some way particularly bad either. I played Final Fantasy VII back in the day and put over 80 hours into the game and then, just stopped. I’m not even sure why. Perhaps a shiny object got caught in my periphery and I spent the next few months staring vacantly at it until my brain turned to yoghurt. It was most probably the fact I was an annoying ten year-old at the time. I had been hyped up on so many E-numbers and chocolate milk nothing could hold my attention so I ran around until an enforced ‘time-out’.
When I grew older there should really be no excuse for not finishing games which you know deep down in your gut are great games. The games I end up not seeing through are in the RPG genre and they require a lot of time investment to complete. If you leave it for as little as a week you can forget the long-winded story and advance equipment/spell menu that forces you to spin the controller around your head like a lasso.
The strange thing I find is I will always play the game to death until I’m about ninety percent of the way through. After this invisible threshold my mind will for some reason find a new distraction. The thought of coming back to the game when I have a shiny new one in front of me is a fate worse than death. But why I hear you cry, and I can’t tell you. Perhaps I played a game when I was younger and at the end a scary clown leapt out of the TV and throttled me. Maybe my brain is shielding me from a lengthy cut-scene and poor resolution after my days of time-investing.
On the other hand, I find the beginning of the games I play to be one of the most enjoyable parts of the experience. Everything is (hopefully) fresh and you’re finding your legs in a new and exciting environment. More often than not a game can begin to lag during the middle or take an inordinate amount of time to pickup (ala FFXIII). As with anything, whether it is literature, films, games, we need a effective dramatic arc. Freytag’s pyramid is the classic structure with a proven formula: Exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and denouement.
This is a difficult structure to get correct for ninety-minutes, just think how hard it is to sustain for over twenty-five hours of gameplay. It’s no wonder that RPG’s fall prey to the trappings of blowing ones ‘climatic load’ either too often or too late, or failing to build it enough. With something simple like boss fights you normally notice they become bigger and nastier as you progress through the game. Not only does it make sense but there is the feeling of achievement. Who wants to save the universe from a fly? You want to end things by jettisoning into a beast the size of a small moon armed with a weapon so big the recoil rips your arms off.
A game like Bayonetta, while lacking in story and dialogue builds dramatically throughout. As a result I hammered it and finished the game. Although it does trick you by battling a smaller boss near the games climax, then it throws you to do battle with a giant demoness. It was a welcomed slap in the face for ever doubting it.
There are two sides to my propensity to not complete games. On one side I can blame the game. In most cases this is why I chose not to see it through. However I believe this is not a valid excuse for games that I know are good. Let me apologise, I never meant to abandon you. I just need to suck it up and lock myself in my room until I’ve seen it through. Like how I got over my crack addiction.
On the other hand it’s the games companies fault for their game which I hated so much I smothered the console with a pillow until it overheated. If you’re not enjoying a game you shouldn’t feel obligated by some sense of console honour to see it through. There’s enough of that in the real world.
For those of you out there who will buy and finish every game I tip my imaginary hat to you all, you are better men and women than I ever could be.