What is considered unfair in games?

Their is such a thing as bad game design, if we say its all subjective n it only depends on the player then we will just get shit lazy design.

Bad design, unbalanced games n bugs lead to unfairness

@birdman As in a 1hit mode where u must be hit n cannot avoid it I was saying. So imagine vanquish with that was my point. I'll need to find actual examples.

Theirs other ways a game can be unfair. Non action games. I'll look into that.

I'm better at prompting responses than giving examples n well written arguments so I'll let u guys talk for a bit ill come back with examples for non action game unfairness.

Also sometimes games r called unfair when its actually something else, some other poor design things that r maybe just tedious than unfair.

Do u have an example?

I like to see bullshit unfair modes too, it's novel to see players deal with it.

Deliberately unfair games have their niche n appeal like I wanna be the guy n other trial on error games that r pretty damn unfair is part of the charm, oh how could I expect that to happen, that's the point of them I see the value of it n respect that too.

Makes for funny videos on them since they troll games.

Unfun is what many would call unfair instead,that's my note. A potential reason for the wrong label.

Something may be called unfair but is just something else n the player doesn't like it so they call it unfair when it's other design issues like insane mob life pools.

I think I seen u mention shadows of the damned issue before haha.

Nier has that issue for hard early on but u can be op with some spells n late game weapons n some items. Nier as in nier not nier automata.

Whoops accidentaly edited your post Birdman, sorry!
Yeah you can outrun them or shoot them out of the sky. But in that scenario they were above me and I was cornered, bad position to be in haha.

So what is unfair for puzzle games?

So what is unfair for puzzle games?

I only ever played the original tetris, so I cannot comment haha!

That said I have a new example of the most broken thing I've seen in a while. Hope Birdman reads this too since it sort of hooks into what we were discussing on the Evil Within Thread. Yakuza: Kiwami has some of the most broken encounters I have ever seen in a videogame. The combat mechanics are set for dealing with around 3-5 enemies at once in large areas. The title borrows a lot from Zero but changes some core features. A lot of specials are hidden away behind meter-usage which is now a lot more strict and weapons and items are more rare. Yet enemies have taken it to the next level. In the previous game the enemies had a limiter, they would not gang up on you too much and unless you screwed up most fights were you versus another guy with some others in a distance.

NOT SO IN THIS GAME


I cannot tell you how broken it gets. You can't block from behind, and some boss fights have you facing upwards to 8 enemies and a boss at the same time all with max aggression. They won't hesitate to all attack at once. What ends up happening is you'll try to attack a foe and he'll hyper armor through (all enemies can, at will, counter all your attacks and attack through them, grab you or dodge automatically even if you attack from behind), he hits you and during that hit two others will shoot you which stuns you and then you get grabbed and during the grab all 8 will chew your hitpoints away. I am not making this up, I've had my entire lifebar disappear from me attacking a guy who then hyperarmored through while in hitstun. It is...bonkers.

What results in that I now play the game insanely safe and boring. One hit and dash out. It's more strategic sure but I'll be damned if it isn't boring as all hell.

@roy;that sounds cheap as piss haha, see what I mean? At what point is it the players fault or poor game design which forces you to be super lame out of fear of a gang banged at a moments notice, which seems rather counter intuitive for such an action game. Like it or not it smells like bullshit.

For real is it bullshit or are you a scrub and it gets easier later on with upgrades? #royisascrub.

I think you need to do the gambit of the majima anywhere system to unlock dragon of dojima style fully, so get used to lots of wacky majima boss fights haha.

EDIT:Seen some footage it looks pretty dodgey with those boss plus mook gang bangs.

I beat yakuza 0 about late April I think, did all the style quest stuff and more and never found a gang bang situation like kiwami, barely died on hard actually.You seem to be at such a significant disadvantage you don't seem to be able to reliably do anything except maybe heat moves.

See I call bullshit on things like that in games, things that are unjustified in their punishments, not unbeatable or genuinely challenging just cheap and needlessly punishing. What would you say to that Roy? Just keeping it to kiwami it really does vary from game to each difficulty mode. I'm all for giving games the benefit of the doubt but sometimes you have to point the finger at the game at least a bit.

Sounds horrible. Any idea why they made it like this? How could it get through testing?
Are there any crowd control moves?

I don't mind the forced play-style you had to use to survive, but not when it's forced because the game is so broken that you can't play normally. If it's solved with upgrades that's just as bad.

I've haven't looked around enough to confirm if it's a known issue but footage seems a bit cheap. Never looked into kiwami much but I'd rather play them in release order so I can understand the story and gameplay progressions, kiwami is a Frankenstein mash up of tons of asset reuse so I'd rather start from the beginning. I've already beat 0 and I don't really want to unlock the styles again it takes away the novelty of 0 gameplay. I'd rather play it after the original.

To help draw a verdict:











Is this too many vids? This guy has a whole playlist of kiwami and more.

Sounds horrible. Any idea why they made it like this? How could it get through testing?
Are there any crowd control moves?
I dont mind the forced playstyle you had to use to survive, but not when it's forced because the game is so broken that you cant play normally.
If it's solved with upgrades that's just as bad.

No more heroes 2 has some infuriating use of hitstun, you can easily be stunned and knocked down and even hit while down for with an unreliable chance to recover, you fights groups of 5-10 foes or more and many have guns and armour on their moves.
Something like that is cheap bullshit. I take issue with those things in games. Players should be punished for being hit but sometimes the penalty is too much.

I say the slower and well telegraphed the attack is the greater the punishment, as a keen player should have picked up on the attack and reacted accordingly. So say a romanov uses a chest beam and it instant kills you that's fine as it is so obvious due to how slow and loud it is the player has ample time to react, especially since they tend to do it at range. This is a typical action game design, especially for vanquish, which I never found to be need,essay punishing, especially bosses who always gave me enough feedback to react accordingly, bogey bosses where really fun and tense due to this, as they where the only foes I had to contend with as opposed to swarms of various mobs in regular battles.
I actually found regular battles to be way harder and not too fun as so many gorgies could hit me a few times and I would die, but gorgies still do less damage per hit but make up for this in numbers.

The faster the attack the less punishing it should be usually. Like how bosses tend to deal big damage per hit as they are bosses, regular foes tend to deal much less damage. Like how in ng1 mobs do more damage per hit than ng2 as they are fought in large groups in 2 to compensate.

To construct, major complain in ng sigma 2 is how mobs and bosses grabs are nearly always instant kill, this can make a near perfect and seemless battle end suddenly and frustrate players due to being grabbed by a fast regular mob. especially compared to ng 2 which doesn't have the same grab issue as those grabs originally did less damage as that was the original design intent for them, I take the excess damage is due to less mobs per fight, same as their increased life.

Oddly enough sigma 1 grabs do less damage than ngblack, I haven't actually checked could someone confirm this? I heard seraphim17 say this in his sigma1 guide.

Level design is also a factor, as a games combat may be designed for a certain space size and structure but certain enemy types and numbers may not complement that leading to poor and frustrating design forced upon the player.

So roy is the issue with kiwami is that it makes too many design choices that are against the player, making for the result of your actions to be unreliable? How much control is given to the player to change the situation.

A lot of what makes action games fair is giving reliable information and options to the player, making things clear to the player.
I always know what an enemy will do and what my weapons and moves will do in re4 because it's design is so clear to the player; shoot regular enemy they get stunned briefly, shoot an enemies leg while running they fall.

Can't simply blame the player for everything, that's how you get complacent. I know I'm speaking generally but I'm throwing things into question, I'm better at prompting responsive than finding examples and answers.

I have the same view here as with EW grabs, which is, if it can be avoided without damage, it's fair.
If damage is guaranteed, then it's probably badly designed and would rate as unfair.

@birdman; how does kiwami factor into your view? Vanquish also.

I addressed Kiwami. Judging by Roy's description, the game sounds like shit to be honest.

I dont mind the forced playstyle you had to use to survive, but not when it's forced because the game is so broken that you cant play normally.

Could you to elaborate on this please. I'm having trouble comprehending it.

Like sometimes you have to adopt a certain strategy for specific situations, like an enemy type, of a group of mixed types, etc. But if the game is so broken that everything is unusable to the point you're left with nothing but one tactic, that's just bad design and unfair.

Project Altered Beast on PS2 is a good example. I played that to death. You can't dodge or cancel anything at all, you're slow, and every move has pretty horrible recovery.

You can't attack groups without being hit. If you're surrounded, you can't even get off a chain of attacks without being interrupted. It's horrendous.

All I could do was hit and run with the werewolf, which had this combo where he slashes twice then dashes forward with a headbutt (or maybe he's biting, I don't know). You could slightly turn the dash part so I'd frequently do that to escape, wasting that final hit as means of avoiding being attacked during recovery.

The human from has a running slide attack that knocks some enemies down, so I had to resort to that to build up beast meter.

Against weaker enemies on normal it's ok, but hard mode was near impossible in certain areas. It was designed like shit.

This is what I mean. A whole game forcing you to do things like this. Having said that, trying to find ways around these issues was actually fun and I got quite a lot of hours out of this game on this aspect alone. I do like a lot of things about it, like being able to become all these beast forms, and returning to previous areas with new abilities to find secrets. If it only had a dodge cancel I'd consider it a top action game.

It is 'fair' but only to a point of boredom. The second to last boss has two aids to help him out. Let me give a small description.

You're fighting a boss who can fire a gun (which stuns you if hit) and throw grenades. The gun only has a visual cue but no audio, so if you don't have him in your sights you will get hit. The grenade has no cue, the throw is insanely fast and if you are close to him you will just get a random explosion. The explosion has no friendly fire so his allies are 100% safe. If you hit him from the front he will either auto-dodge and punish you or tank the hit and hit you. If you attack him from behind he might get hit, but usually dodges out of it after one or two hits and cancels into a shot. So you're not going to damage him a lot. Every 20% damage he'll activate a healing-phase so you have to burn some meter to cancel that, if you don't have the meter he'll fully heal.

His allies are two mini-bosses in terms of health and damage resistance. They have a gun and knife and thus can't be blocked, you have to dodge or weave (kind of like the updodge of God Hand). They will auto dodge all your attacks unless they are in an animation (and even then might cancel their attack with a dodge). The only way to hit them is from behind with one attack before they auto dodge to your back and combo you. Their range is insane as well. To make matters worse the boss will revive them once after they die and then they become even faster.



(around 6:45 for the boss)

What's bad about it is that it all becomes really easy if you are maxed out. The Dragon of Dojima Style has a lot of broken moves but to get it to max you have to 100% the game. I didn't, as did a lot of others, so we were really gimped here and in all other fights. I cannot imagine doing this on NUR. I might give the game another go and completely level up all styles etc. But I'd rather do that with Yakuza Zero which was a much better game I feel.

I dont mind the forced playstyle you had to use to survive, but not when it's forced because the game is so broken that you cant play normally.

I mean that you can't use anything outside of Rush Style's Square Triangle without running the risk of being pounded. If you use anything else in bosses you will get slammed HARD. Which is a damn shame.

So it's designed around leveling up or upgrades?

Bit of both. You level up by beating enemies which gives you experience which you can use to buy new moves. But the Dragon Style is tied to a mini-game in which you have to hunt down a special enemy and beat him over and over again and complete side quests about him in order to unlock those powerful moves you see them using (and even then are getting stomped hard). 

The biggest annoyance is just that you can barely play the game in these fights. You are forced to suddenly not be this bad-ass but to be a guy who punches once and backs off because they'll just i.frame through you and knock you dead. Doesn't help that on the highest setting checkpoints are disabled, so if you die there you have to beat nearly 30 minutes of combat again before you can get another try.

Thanks for the responses guys, these where the things I was trying to get at. It's all really beyond my comprehension and I'm struggling to comprehend just how multifaceted this discussion is. I'm also trying to not denote a just a negative or positive connotation to unfair as it has its value for better or for worse. I have a big comment saved up, I'm trying to prompt responses and apply various thinkings of what's unfair to various games of various genres. It depends on so many factors it's all well beyond me haha. I'm about in agreement with you guys but I'm trying to apply and test certain understandings.

Well, as I said, I barely consider anything I've ever played unfair. Unfair isn't when something is super tough or you just don't like what's happening. This Yakuza game, from what I've heard so far, isn't unfair if you fully power up. Would that be accurate Roy?

If so, then would not doing this essentially be a challenge run?

Problem is lines become blurred. I need something to challenge your view, it seems too specific and depends on the game and it's genre. It sounds like your giving too much credit to a games design.
Roy what would you say about all this?

I can only speak for what I've played.

To call it a challenge run is to say that if you don't find all keys in Evil Within you're doing a not-all-keys challenge run or that if you don't do all the riddler trophies in Arkham you're severely gimping yourself. Again the side content is insanely large.

Even with the hidden style though enemies are still broken in their design. They will still hyper armor through everything and auto-dodge like mad. The only reason the Dragon Style makes it easier is because it has a very strong counter attack. So you just wait and punish.

This thread has some thoughts: https://www.reddit.com/r/truegaming/comments/4jeajy/what_is_the_slight_difference_between_challenging/

Too whiny and boils down to 'I don't like/couldn't deal so it's unfair'.

Sure, some games are broken but unless we focus on them specifically, we're just talking theory.

If damage is guaranteed, then it's probably badly designed and would rate as unfair.

What genres are you applying this to?

So many genres like shooters(hit scan shooters typically) and turn based rpg you will get hit unless you get lucky and/or play in the most specific way only. It's the factors that cause guaranteed damage that's unfair.
Is this what you mean?

Some games it has to be accepted that damage is garenteed at some point, fps games tend to give you regenerating life or life pickups as a way to compensate for guaranteed damage. That's why seldom no damage fps runs exist, it's not possible for most as the games aren't designed to allow for it so no death run is the only achievable substitute.

It's a matter if a game is designed to allow for no damage. Arcade games in general are typically designed for no damage, hence 1CC runs.

So many genres like shooters(hit scan shooters typically) and turn based rpg you will get hit unless you get lucky and/or play in the most specific way only. It's the factors that cause guaranteed damage that's unfair.
Is this what you mean?

Ok. I was only thinking of the action genre.

Cool. Still so many action games are practically impossible or next to impossible to not get hit, so I don't mind that if it's not to a game breaking extent.
Imagine trying that for vanquish, mgr and ng2/3 outside of certain encounters/bosses that allow for no damage. They would only be possible if you play in the most limited way to beat them. At some point you are fighting against a games design ya know.

You can beat mgr and ng2 no damage though more so mgr but ng2 is pretty bulllshit only that Chinese player has done it and they relied on the most exploitable moves to win, it's pretty impressive.

Edit: don't know if I'm done editing this comment haha, gotta sleep. Consider puzzle games also, they very different from action games same as point and click games.

Views?

This guy is an outright twit and needs to stop pushing his poorly conceived narratives, he speaks in broad general terms without clarifying with detailed examples and worst of all he clearly doesn't play games on the highest modes like the vid title suggests, so he has no place speaking about the particulars of them if he hasn't even bothered. Instead of informing us on what the title indicates he forms a biased argument that seems outright against higher modes.

Controls=Difficulty: Well he kept going on about controls making a game more difficult, but he flip flops from meaning the external input layout and the games internal controls, which are 2 very different things. He clearly isn't used to a games internal controls, he quips about more realistic animations effecting the game, I think he means animation priority. His argument seems to be based on realism determining difficulty. This seems to be the crux of his argument(even though he said we play games to escape reality in the S rank vid).

Bayo/arcade games=button mash fest: well he's not really a "arcade gamer" as he says if he thinks this. He disregards all the actual changes to its higher modes, those like many other action titles being remixed enemy placements with altered and faster move sets that deal more damage, maybe whole new bosses and enemies to face. He says his experience with bayo on higher modes is little to no different, which is a matter of him not playing different and just mashing as he blatantly admitted. To be fair, bayo is very lenient compared to other action games, I beat bayo 1 infinite climax(haven't played bayo 2 so I can't say) recently and it was pretty easy. If this where DMC3 DMD he'd stand no chance without items/exploits(no chance still), likely wouldn't get past Cerberus.

Witcher 3 is harder than bayo 2= He seems to not really understand the intricacies of bayo, I can't say on the difficulty of witcher 3 but it's a different game that requires different things, and this guy said he doesn't play witcher highest mode as he deemed it 'impossible', so what kind of comparison is this? He keep going back to geralt controlling more realistically but doesn't explain how that factors into gameplay, he says witcher is more tactical than bayo because of how geralt moves. He doesn't seem to understand timing or mechanics and wants to blame the game.

Fair/unfair difficulty= I suck: He can't handle hardest modes, don't make a vid about the changes on highest modes. I've no clue what he's saying by this, hardest modes are balanced for higher skilled players, that's the point of higher modes, you play on a lower mode until you are comfortable and skilled enough at a game to graduate to the subsequent higher mode, they force you to be more efficient with your play and necessitate a better understanding of a games mechanics, learn enemy patterns and so on. If you can't handle the higher modes don't play them, your choice. He seems to think that if he can beat it or understand it on some level then it's fair. He says souls have a good approach to difficulty despite not having difficulty modes except NG+, and souls are a joke compared to any other action games highest mode. Games with difficulty modes offer a greater range of balance than any souls game, too hard on NG or DMC then play on ninja dog or auto easy modes, the fact that these 'uber' hard games have modes below easy speaks volumes about how much the creators cared about accessibility.
This vid isn't supposed to be about fairness in games, he mentions fairness but his statements are completely unsubstantiated and nonsensical.

I'm genuinely struggling to understand his message it's so incoherent, what is he even on about? He should come back and actually explain what changes for games on the highest modes, because he doesn't seem to play them in the first place so he isn't qualified to speak on the matter. Games can change he says, but clearly he hasn't and blames the game like bayo for not changing on highest modes(even though it does). Truly baffling I must say. I've in fact learned less from this, I've unlearned.

Hahaha epic response. Wasn't expecting that much but I agree. These are after all, from the 'before you buy' dude.

There is one other video of his that might be worth discussion. I'll link it when I get home in a new topic unless I find an existing one that suits it. Don't want to keep making topics for each of these videos.

Great reply Gabriel, pretty much sums up my whole opinion on the matter. I honestly wanted to just grab your comment and post it there haha. Videos like his really polute the whole medium, especially his "before you buy" crap. If he was a bit more analytical it would have been fine, but he portrays his (bad) opinion as fact which can get pretty tired.

Funny, we talked about that guys vid on what hardest modes change. And yet Roy already did a piece on that, which crosses over into examining fairness also, just reading it now:http://www.stingermagazine.com/2017/04/difficulty-settings-way-it-was-meant-to.html#more

I was always pretty happy with that one. I've been able to use it in a lot of discussions too which is great.

Read about a game that switches the jump button when the player does a minigame. Seems unfair.

I think that's a good example of 'initial' unfairness. The first time it's a trap, and afterwards you know about it and never fall for it again.

That said from what I'm reading it's more bad design haha.