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{{trope}}
{{quote|'''''[[Most Annoying Sound|"HEY! LISTEN!"]]'''''|'''Navi''', ''[[The Legend of
Videogames often suffer from [[Take Your Time|a lack of a real sense of urgency]], which can be jarring when the enemy's supposed to be rolling up in their supertank or the evil sorcerer taking over all the lands of the world by midnight. You don't want to [[Timed Mission|use an actual timer to make the player advance]] since that can be frustrating, you'd have to be a total [[Jerkass]] to just suddenly tell the player "oh, looks like the [[Big Bad]] finished taking over the universe while you were dawdling about, [[Game Over]]" and actually creating a branch into the plot where the villain succeeds ''without'' ending the game is just too much work...so what can be done?
Well, one modern solution is to have the player be radioed or otherwise contacted ''constantly'' by [[Voice
The trope is generally a combination of a [[Exposition Fairy|slightly overbearing help system]] and an attempt to avert [[Take Your Time]]; typically, the result only ''emphasises'' that there's no hurry, since the player is likely to rapidly realise that nothing will happen if they don't hurry up other than that they'll become progressively more irritated with the support character reminding them. In less severe cases, the character might simply remind them of an optional gameplay mechanic during any downtime; this is most common in sandbox games.
Frequently used in modern "realistic" linear shooters. Usually used to keep the player on-task so they don't scour the map [[No Sidepaths, No Exploration, No Freedom|looking for secrets that don't exist]] and encounter an [[Invisible Wall]] or the [[Insurmountable Waist High Fence]]. Can easily result in the player failing an ''actual'' [[Timed Mission]] since the game has been [[Crying Wolf]] so much they're used to not taking it seriously. See also [[Stop Helping Me!]], for when this occurs when something ''is'' happening.
A nightmare when combined with [[Now Where Was I Going Again?]], where you're told to hurry up but not told where to go.
{{examples
== Action Adventure Games ==
* ''[[Shadow of the Colossus]]'' features a minor example; if Wander is taking his time killing a Colossus, Dormin will chime in with a cryptic clue regarding the boss' weakness. If he takes longer, Dormin will chime in with a much, much less cryptic clue.
* As shown by the page quote, Navi from ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
** However, ''often,'' there are [[Sidequest
* This happens in ''[[Beyond Good
* In the first level of ''[[
** He's a [[Drill Sergeant Nasty]], they're all like that you worthless maggot. Now drop and give me fifty.
== Action Games ==
* This is the worst part of the game ''[[Ghost Recon]] Advanced Warfighter 2''. Throughout the last half the player's commander constantly appears on a video screen to remind you to "Stop that nuke, dammit!" As if you had forgotten. The worst part is that the constant berating and atrocious voice acting mar a game that is otherwise darn near perfect.
* This trope gets played with in an early part of ''[[God of War (
* Used, but not in a bad way, in ''[[
== Card Games ==
* Starting in the 2008 version of ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]] World Championship Tournament'', if you don't do anything during a duel for a few seconds, your opponent will tell you to hurry up. They apparently have less patience than duelists in real life.
== Fighting Games ==
* If you lose a fight in ''[[Rival Schools
{{quote|
'''[[The Stoic|Nagare]]:''' You're still breathing, so you can do it!
'''[[Delinquents|Edge]]:''' What the hell are you doing? If you aren't better the next time, I'M going to beat you up!
'''[[Eagle Land|Roy]]:''' Wake up! Aren't you mad that you lost?
'''[[Brainwashed and Crazy|Wild Daigo]]:''' The mission isn't over, so you don't have the right to lie down! }}
== First-Person Shooter ==
* An interesting variation on this occurs in the ''[[Marathon
* The 2010 ''[[Alien vs. Predator]]'' game has this for all three campaigns (the Marine's is the only one that berates you in a language you can understand though), which is especially grating since you are also encouraged to explore the levels and find hidden items.
* ''[[Call of Duty]]'': "Martin! Over here! Get in the car!"
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* ''[[Haze]]'' extends this to every NPC doing it all the time.
* ''[[Killzone]] 2''.
* ''[[
** Deliberately [[Averted]] in ''Half-Life 2: Episode 1''. The developer's commentary says that they originally had AI sidekick Alyx take the lead and pester the player to keep up to provide a sense of urgency. Playtesters hated being nagged when they wanted to explore, so Alyx's behavior was changed to let the player take the lead, provide a limited amount of hints and prompts but shut up and wait when the player isn't ready to move on yet. The result is perhaps a little unrealistic that Alyx doesn't get impatient watching you play with the gravity gun rather than getting on and saving the world, but it makes players much less likely to shoot her in the face.
*** But then it seems to be deliberately revived in ''Episode 2'' with Dr. Magnusson, to make him as annoying as possible.
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** [[STALKER|"Get out of here Stalker!"]]
** In the un-modded game he even says it when you're leaving.
* ''[[
** Actually it is used once by Atlas. If Jack takes too long before making the Lazarus Vector, which will bring back the plants that give Rapture its oxygen that Ryan just killed off, he will say, "Would you kindly get this thing crafted already. Air's only getting thinner down here."
* Averted in ''[[Metroid Prime]]'' 3. You have about 7 minutes to restart the 3 power generators for the anti-aircraft guns before the comet slams into the military base you are trying to defend. The other bounty hunters and computer constantly remind you of this but there's no onscreen timer. Heck, you can see the comet in the upper atmosphere, seeming somewhat stationary. The thing is, it isn't-the comet really is moving and if you start wasting time it will arrive and collide, killing everyone and everything on the base.
** Later in the game, just before Samus fights {{spoiler|Ghor}}, reports are transmitted from her ship at a regular basis showing increasingly bad damage. The ship, however, is never completely destroyed and it is always ready to fly again at the same point in time.
* In ''[[System Shock 2]]'' [[Mission Control]] tells you to speed up at various points with lines such as "You must move faster. Your mind cannot conceive of the stakes we are dealing with" regardless of your actual speed (being triggered by preforming mission critical actions or passing fixed points). Given that {{spoiler|said [[Mission Control]] is SHODAN}}, it's kind of justified for her to be rude like that.
* In ''[[Halo 3: ODST]]'', in the mission where you have to blow up the bridge in the beginning instead of fighting the wraiths shooting at you, if you do not set the charges, you are reminded to do so, but if you still don't (and choose to fight the wraiths), your partner will set the charges...when first placed, you are under the impression that you must set the charges quickly or the bridge will be overrun and any attempt to fight the wraiths will be fatal.
* Happens the whole damn time in ''[[Resistance]] 2''.
* Played by the book in ''[[
* In ''[[
* Played to an annoying extent in ''[[Home Front]]''. Connor will bitch you out if you take a few seconds longer to do a task, despite the fact you are pinned down by enemy fire, or some other danger.
* In ''[[Call of Juarez]]: Bound in Blood'', your brother constantly tells you to hurry up and do whatever your objective is, no matter the pace you're taking.
== MMORPGs ==
* ''[[City of Heroes]]'' had begun to implement something along these lines a couple of issues before it shut down in 2012 -- an increasing number of new story arcs included missions in which your contact or some other character would [[Mission Control|contact you to prompt or urge you]] further into the mission. Some of your contacts would also act like this if you spoke to them while you still had an incomplete mission assigned.
== Platform Games ==
* The 1980 arcade game ''[
* The ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' series likes to do this with Sonic's idle animations, where he gives the player a stern look for not moving onward, even making a "go forward" pointing motion in ''[[
== Puzzle Games ==
* ''[[
== Real-Time Strategy ==
* ''[[
** Initially, they're comments like "Commander, you haven't built a transport yet. Is there a problem?" but later on it moves to outright aggravating territory with stuff like "Maybe you should check your objectives, commander."
** Not only is it often ridiculous (basically to the tune of "Hey, Commander, it's been 5 minutes and you haven't destroyed the enemy's huge base yet, is there a problem?") but sometimes downright aggravating given that it's combined with Trial and Error gameplay, with objectives changing and new threats appearing as soon as you clear your current tasks. Good thing you hurried and took out that weak enemy, oh, guess what? There's now an army led by experimentals headed for your base. Don't have enough defenses? Too bad, you should have built some up!...
* ''[[Command
== Role-Playing Games ==
* In ''[[Avalon Code]]'', if you pause the game and leave it sit, the active spirit will start pestering you. Some are polite about it ("Are you thinking about something?"), others not so much ("Hurry up!").
* Player characters in ''[[Sacred]]'' 2 will start complaining if you leave them standing around too long, usually breaking the fourth wall in the process. The game also tends to give you lengthy books of lore, and doesn't pause while you read them, leading to your Seraphim thinking aloud that it's a good thing she's immortal and has time to waste.
* In [[Rogue Galaxy]], when you're taking too much time exploring or just [[Level Grinding|trying to get stronger]] so the effin' [[That One Boss|Next Boss]] won't [[One
** On the plus side, the phrases DO change a little, depending on the mission you're currently in, and at some point in the game you can swith between allies so when you get tired of one guy's complaining you can simply summon another one to hear different complaints.
* In ''[[Kingdom Hearts]] 2'', during the Hydra boss battle, Phil helpfully reminds you to GET UP ON THE HYDRAS BACK. He will repeat it with no breaks in between.
* In ''[[
** Under similar circumstances to the [[
* In ''[[
* In ''[[Fallout]] One'', there is a very real time-limit. In ''[[Fallout]] Two'', there is no real time-limit, but you constantly get psychic messages from your village shaman telling you that you need to find the G.E.C.K. quickly and hurry back to the village, because there is not much time left. Supposedly they got rid of the time-limit in the sequel because fans had complained about it in the original, even though it wasn't particularly onerous and did add real drama.
* In ''[[Dragon Age Origins]]'', it's possible to recruit Oghren and then abandon his quest, go back to camp, do sidequests or entirely different main quests, etc. If you try to talk to him before you complete [[Marathon Level|Orzammar]], he'll just angrily tell you that you are wasting time.
* Frequently crops up in ''[[Alpha Protocol]]'', with [[Mission Control]] often shouting in Mike's ear that he needs to hurry before his target gets away/the bad guys storm the gates/the bombs go off. The number of genuine [[Timed Mission
== Simulation Games ==
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* ''[[Freelancer]]'' does this. "We need to fly faster!"
** Juni will tell you this ''even if you're actually ahead of her'' and thus waiting for her and the others to catch up, if you somehow manage to reach the waypoint in advance. Quite possible if you're using a mod that increases the Cruise Speed and you know the missions well.
* ''[[Star Trek: Bridge Commander]]'' has something like this. Your first officer will tell you what needs to be done next, even if you're already in the process of doing it or you haven't had the 2 seconds necessary to tell your helmsman to go to warp.
* ''[[Harvest Moon]] Animal Parade'' has Finn reminding you that you've got to go visit the Harvest Goddess whenever it's the next step in the plot.
* In ''[[
== Stealth-Based Games ==
* ''[[Assassin's Creed]]'': "HEY! EZIO! Over here!" Leonardo says this ''constantly''.
* [[
== Third-Person Shooter ==
* Your AI buddy in the ''[[Army of Two]]'' games will frequently do this if you've cleared out a room and don't instantly make for the door.
* The first game based on the ''[[Transformers (
* The various [[Rogue Squadron]] games have the people the player is told to protect/guide/blow things up for constantly radio in if you start dicking around. This has a perfectly sensible in-game reason - you're part of the military and these people ''will die'' if you don't follow your oaths and orders - but to players, it can be aggravating.
** Especially since it plays when you are busy dogfighting TIE fighters.
{{quote|
* ''[[Crackdown]]'' has the voice of [[Mission Control]] constantly urging you to go kill bad guys and [[Stop Helping Me!|repeating the same gameplay hints endlessly]].
* This happens a lot during the driving missions in ''[[James Bond]]: Everything or Nothing'', although it actually ''improves'' the Pontchartrain Bridge motorcycle chase sequence. John Cleese's increasingly frantic voice acting ("Only four miles left! HURRY, 007!") considerably ups the tension. (Also consider that he's counting distance, not time.)
* The first [[Destroy All Humans!]] game would have Pox telling you to pay attention to your mission objectives. You had to be ''seriously'' wasting time to get him to do that though.
== Wide Open Sandbox ==
* In ''[[Red Dead Redemption]]'', each quest-giving NPC has a few lines of dialog telling you to quit hanging around and go do the mission. This is triggered whenever you get near them, and thus is always triggered as soon as you exit the cutscene that introduces the mission. This means that you're being constantly derided for not doing a mission before you've even had a chance to take one step away.
* ''[[Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas]]''. Certain events -trigger- allies into harassing you into continuing the mission. Such as if you ...accidentally kill your Las Venturas casino employee girlfriend. Yeah, accidentally. That's the ticket.
* ''[[Grand Theft Auto IV]]'' rather infamously expanded this idea into a whole social networking system seemingly designed by developers who were either living in mortal fear of the player getting bored, or trying to irritate the player any time they weren't on a mission. What made it worse is that when you refused to go with them, they would be pissed off and decrease your friendship meter with them. This can be avoided however by accepting the mission, then calling them to cancel it.
** To make it more annoying, they were actually calling you to make you ''stop'' playing the main game, and to go hang out with them.
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[[Category:Acceptable Breaks From Reality]]
[[Category:Gameplay and Story Segregation]]
[[Category:Show, Don't Tell]]
[[Category:
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