Unexpected discovery of new tech

Wasn't sure what to call this topic. I'll change it if anyone has a better idea after reading this.

I was just watching Raeng's action game talk again. Go to around 24:40 for the part I'll now discuss.



He talks about coming up with most of the MGR stuff and goes on to mention still learning from other players. That someone who is playing for the first time can sometimes come up with something new and you think 'How did I miss that?' 'Why didn't I think of that?'

I've mentioned this Transformers story before but I'll do so again for any who missed it.

I have this button mashing friend. He is a lifetime masher. Never improves. Never tries to improve. Won't listen to advice. He's 37 like me and we've both been playing since our teens. He would play pretty much anything but always did the same thing.

So we're playing Transformers (the PS2 one with mini-cons based on Armada) which he really loved. He was fighting Megatron and I was, as usual, utterly disgusted by his gameplay. He'd die constantly and return to HQ to change his Mini-cons.

Megatron is kind of tough and back then even I was still learning how to consistently beat him without trouble. There's not much that can stop him from constantly attacking and moving towards you.

So my friend equips the Grenade Launcher, one of the weakest weapons. It's good on light enemies because it launches them and they take damage from falling or flying into walls, and it doesn't use much meter so you can get a lot of shots in. The many shots was the reason he chose it, his logic being that more shots means more damage. Which was extremely faulty because the only reason he wanted more shots was because the more powerful blasters and heavy weapons use a lot of meter. But the meter loss was always his fault as he would unload everything without thinking. I mocked him ruthlessly.

So he gets back into the fight and I saw the grenade actually stop Megatron and cause a very short hit-stun. It also completely canceled his attack. I made this high pitched squeal. Then my brain overloaded with possibilities of stunlocking to set up more powerful weapons like the charge up blaster.

I never expected this guy to be the one to, even accidentally, discover the ultimate strategy to stun lock and no damage Megatron. And it wasn't just Megatron. I was able to develop new strats for Starscream too.

I never bothered taking the grenade launcher into to those fights. At the time I just didn't consider it because the majority of enemies would be launched so you wouldn't see any hit stun. It's use only became apparent because my friend wasted all his meter and wanted more shots. He found it by playing as awful as possible.

From that day forward I kept a close eye on his gameplay. I also started watching videos of randoms playing games I play even though their gameplay wasn't good just to see if the same thing would happen.

This kind of situation is very specific but have you ever had something like this happen?
I don't mean stuff you found while purposely exploring mechanics yourselves because we could list tons of discoveries we've made. I mean like how Raeng describes when someone new or like my friend who sucks just pops up says something to try or accidentally finds something crazy while playing like shit.

Never really discovered anything major, since I play in a pretty standard way most of the time, but when I was a kid I managed to kill the giant boss in R&C2 with a weapon called the Sheepinator, which only worked on normal enemies and transformed them into sheeps. Was probably a glitch and didn't try to replicate it on subsequent playthroughs, but I still vividly remember that moment.

I've had this happen in NG:B, which I honestly never thought would happen since that game has been analyzed to death for nearly two decades.

Awakened Alma is one of the game's most hard bosses, and I decided to toy around with different weapons only to find out that she has a guaranteed opening when using the Kitetsu's XXY. Nobody had ever used this tech, to the point that even JTB and Bigalski noted its discovery. In the end some other techniques are still prefered since they are so ingrained, but they are 'unsafe' while this one is 100% safe and true.

I remember you talking about that. Delicious.

Why do you think no one considered using that weapon? Similar reasons I didn't consider the grenade launcher for Megatron?

Have you ever had something happen like the situation you described in the video (new player suggests just running to the right) or like the one I posted (button masher finds something insane accidentally by playing badly)?

I've experienced it once in MGR:R, where a player Ninja Ran through Excelsus's double-sweep. This has Raiden dodge through them, which is a unique animation. I had NEVER seen that before and always thought you had to block/dodge that move, but you could also just do that.

Regarding the NG:B trick, I think it was mostly since you get the True Dragon Sword in that chapter which is the best weapon in the game (barring the UF, which is hidden), and lorewise the TDS is also the anathama to fiends like Alma, so a lot of players just use that weapon.

Another thing I found in that fight was that the Warhammer, a nearly never-used weapon, has a nearly 100% damage bonus against her which is super wacky haha (and not too useful, since it's not a great weapon).

>I've experienced it once in MGR:R, where a player Ninja Ran through Excelsus's double-sweep.
Do you know if they already knew about it, or did they do it completely by accident?