Scrappy Mechanic: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

A sub trope for [[The Scrappy]]. It describes a game play mechanic in an ''otherwise'' fun/enjoyable game that generates a sizable hatedom. Perhaps it's out of character to the game, its quality is lower than the rest of the game, or it really exposes the problems in the game. Often the cause of [[Scrappy Level]] if in a video game. Also related to [[Unexpected Gameplay Change]] and [[Gameplay Roulette]]. Gameplay tactics do not count unless it's the exploitation of glitches and hacks. Otherwise, that's just abuse of an otherwise fair and good mechanic that causes the game to be played in a way that it's not supposed to. [[That One Boss]] is only related to this if a boss villain's status under that trope is solely because of a Scrappy game play mechanic.

For a sometimes overlapping [[Sister Trope]], see [[That One Rule]].

 

 

== General ==

* Mouseover that messes up (usually by obscuring) meaningful parts of the screen. A basic internet example: you accidentally roll your cursor over an ad and it expands to take up 95% of the screen. Almost always happens when you're reading what it covers. Or it starts making noise.

** Specifically unnecessary "#" (unless the browser is adapted to this bad practice) makes cache-friendly refresh more of a bother: if you click on the address bar and press "Enter" without changing it, the browser tries to send you to a named anchor, because that's how "#" is supposed to be used. same goes for sticking generic named anchor on every page a few lines below the start of page and automatically linking all the pages with it.

* Ads on [[YouTube]]. Not only do they play the same ones over and over whenever you watch another video of the same series/genre, but the more annoying ads can't be skipped. Sometimes the ads even jam the video.

* Any game (looking at you, Evergrace II) where all the characters you play have a shared life bar. This leads to frustrating moments, especially if some of the characters you control are played by the computer!

* Motion control on the PS3. Having to suddenly jerk the controller around runs counter to most gamers' instincts, and its detection is inconsistent and random, but first-party titles continue to shoehorn it in because it is a system feature and ''must be showcased''.

** Very few players even ''have'' a large interest in PvP, and most of those people are on one server.

** And due to the lack of interest in [[PvP]], the classes are largely unbalance. Paladins have a large inherent advantage against melees (especially PLD/RDM) and a skilled Red Mage can beat pretty much any class.

* ''[[World of Warcraft]]'':

** A perfect example would be the [[Wrath Of The Lich King]] xpac's Heroic or [[Hard Mode]] system, which separated ALL raid content into Heroic/Regular varieties, giving each variety its own separate lockout, and then separating FURTHER into 10man/25man varieties, meaning each active raiding guild could hit all relevant raiding content ''four times per week'', once 10, once 25, once 10 hm, once 25 hm. The exact same content slogged through ''four times'' each week. Raid rewards were based not only on individual boss-kill drops, but also on special tokens garnered per boss-kill - meaning in order to remain competitive, each raid was not so much ''allowed'' to hit this content four times per week as ''forced'' to. There are no words for how tedious and hated this system was, as it caused content to become old and tiresome ''four times as quickly'' and was, thankfully, phased out in the very next major content patch.

** [[Not Quite Flight|Fluzzard]]. Full stop. First of all, [[Waggle]] is in full effect - the bird is very annoying to control. Secondly, it is also something of a [[Replacement Scrappy]], of both the Red Star and Manta (which, though sometimes just as irritating, was generally fun to use). Finally, [[Unexpected Gameplay Change|one must wonder why exactly something that involves no platforming whatsoever is even included in a platformer]].

** Then there's the Comet Medals and Green Stars in the Fluzzard levels. You know those rings you went past? You have to go through them all, then catch the medal in mid air at high speed. One of said rings requires about a 90-degree sharp turn into a tunnel from the other side of the level. And Green Stars? They're extremely easy to miss even when Fluzzard is directed straight at them.

** The spring. In what just might be the worst Mario powerup ever, movement is very wobbly, you can't stand still while you're wearing it, and you have to have pinpoint precise timing in order to execute a high jump.

* ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'':

** On the plus side, however, Sonic's death animations from when he runs into practically anything appears to be a hilarious, gravity defying break dance.

** Hunting and fishing in ''[[Sonic Adventure]]'' (''especially'' fishing), though the quality of these games is subjective to begin with.

* The weapons in the original ''[[Dark Cloud]]''—spending weeks tediously building up weapons for six different PCs, only to lose all that progress by [[Breakable Weapons|having them break...]] especially sucky if you have just managed to clear several levels of a dungeon. This was thankfully fixed in the sequel, where broken weapons simply wouldn't hit, but could be fixed afterwards.

* ''[[Ultima VII]]''. The characters needed food to survive. However, instead of automatically eating, like in the previous games, they had to be manually fed whenever they got hungry. Combined with the clever but crude inventory system, feeding the party (not getting food, but putting it in their mouths) took up more game time than combat.

** Their Goddamn ''traps''. Invisible tiles scattered randomly around which do horrible, horrible things when stepped on. They drain your HP and MP, turn your valuable items into joke items, warp you randomly around the level, give you status conditions, and dozens of other problems that totally aren't funny. In a genre where [[Continuing Is Painful]], there is absolutely ''no reason'' to have them; they're [[Fake Difficulty]] incarnate!

** [[Nethack|You fall into a spiked pit! The spikes were poisoned! The poison was deadly! You die...]]

** The Aegis Cave mission in [[Pokémon Mystery Dungeon]] certainly counts, mainly because it's the most frustratingly tedious mission in the entire game. And, yes, it is mandatory. Basically, all you do is try to solve three word puzzles by spelling out the words ICE, ROCK, and STEEL. To do this, you have to collect stones with the correct letters on them from the Unown (Trust me, you'll run into [[Goddamn Bats|plenty of Unown]]). Unfortunately, the Unown that drops the letter you need must be randomly chosen for the list of available [[Mons]], then it has to randomly spawn, then you have to ''find it'', and then, after all that, it only drops the damn stone 1/4 of the time! Which basically means you'll be going through the same parts of the dungeon over and over and over again until you slowly lose your sanity trying to collect whichever stones you need so you can get out of the blasted cave.

* The ''[[Eye of the Beholder]]'' games and the first ''[[Lands of Lore]]'' game contain tiles that spin you around when you stand on them and require compass watching. The former game series has complicated spin tiles that turn you based on the direction you entered the tile and the latter is nice enough to have your characters verbally react to the spin each time ("Woah!").

** The level-up system. Namely, that it doesn't exist. What you have instead is [[Stat Grinding]]—the idea being that the more you use your various stats, the better they get—cast a lot of spells? Magic and MP go up. Get attacked a lot? HP and stamina rise! Sounds good...in theory. The practice is much different. Instead of having a gauge (Perform X physical attacks/deal X points of damage before next Strength boost or some such), stat boosts have a ''chance'' of being awarded after any given battle. And the chance is directly proportional to the length of the battle. Presumably designed to prevent rampant abuse and grinding low-level monsters indefinitely, but the end result is being punished for fighting battles efficiently. And the chances are still not that good—after fighting a dozen battles with Firion only attacking while the other party members idle in the desperate, futile hope of securing a STR boost for Firion—and never getting one—drastic actions are often taken, generally either starting to attack fellow party members or drop-kicking the gaming system. Or both.

** Getting HP boosts. The odds of receiving a boost to HP seem directly proportional to the difference in HP at battle end as compared to battle start. So, if, say, Guy is knocked into the red, but then is healed out of it, it doesn't count towards boosting his HP. But, if he loses ALL his HP and has to be revived, that also seems to reset the odds of HP stat boost. The margin of error ([[Luck-Based Mission|or just bad luck]]) here is very unforgiving.

** Fleeing ''from'' monsters. The odds of being able to run from a random encounter successfully are based on your agility stat. Getting boosts to that are, basically, a crapshoot. Combine this with that game having poor world map design, a ludicrous encounter rate, and [[Beef Gate]]s ''everywhere''...

** Inn price scaling. Wherever you go, the inn will cost the same, and that cost is based on how hurt you are. Seems fair. It also costs more to heal MP than it does HP. Still seems pretty fair...then, after about the midway point of the game, it turns out that almost the only way to grind HP and MP efficiently is to go from very high HP/MP to very low HP/MP as quickly as possible. This gets spendy, ''fast''.

** Esuna will only start getting rid of the really BAD status effects after level seven or so. Maybe.

** As you level your spells patiently, going from Fire 1 to 2 to 3 and so on, they cost more MP (a spell only ever costs as much MP as its level), become more powerful, and you lose all access to the lower-level but MP-cheaper versions of the spell. Prepare to burn double the MP strictly needed as you cast Blizzard 8 on [[Kung Fu-Proof Mook|Melee-Proof Mooks]] that would fall just as easily to Blizzard 4.

** Let's not forget the sadistic [[Let's Make a Deal|Monty Hall]] game that the game plays with you; in most dungeons, you will find a series of doors. Pick the right one, and you can proceed with your quest; pick a wrong one, and you'll not only end up in an empty dead-end room, you'll end up right in ''the middle of the room'' instead of by the door, and since you have no choice but to walk a few steps to the door and since the random encounter rate in these rooms is often pretty high, you'll end up getting attacked by monsters as you leave. Lovely.

** Healing magic, for whatever reason, would only ever restore a set amount of HP outside of battle. It could take several castings of Curaga or Curaja just to completely restore your party's HP. This was changed to be based on the caster's Spirit attribute outside of battle.

** After Level 70, attribute bonuses were random, meaning that you could get a decent amount of stats for a level up, maybe one or two in a certain stat, or your attributes could even drop. This was changed in the DS version to be based on the game's new [[Powers as Programs|Augment Ability]] system, but good luck trying to figure that out without having looked at [[Guide Dang It|any guide prior]].

* ''[[Battle Garegga]]'':

** The [[Dynamic Difficulty|rank]] system. Want to keep the last two stages possible? [[Power-Up Letdown|Don't power up]] and [[Complacent Gaming Syndrome|don't trigger special option formations]]! The rank scale for enemy aggressiveness is capped in the last two stages to playable levels, in a rare show of mercy by the developers. However, if you raise the rank to extremely high levels beforehand, there is no such cap, and you are treated to [[Unwinnable|literally undodgeable patterns]], especially on the Stage 4 boss and Stage 5 midbosses.

* ''[[Dangun Feveron]]'' never shows your total score during gameplay; it's only shown at the end of each stage, as well as after getting a high score and ending your game, which wouldn't be as big of a problem if the lowest default high score of 1.2 million wasn't difficult to obtain for new players. This caused a huge problem at a recent shmup tournament where many players who couldn't get on the in-game high score table either manually calculated their scores by hand or [[Rage Quit|simply didn't bother to submit scores]].

* ''[[Guwange]]'' has you collect coins to raise your score, while shooting enemies to keep the coin collection timer from running out (at which point your coin count drops to 0). And the chain timer is more lenient than ''[[Do Don Pachi]]'''s, so chaining in this game shouldn't be as big of a pain in the ass, right? Well, here's where the game kicks you in the face: your coin count carries over between stages, meaning that in order to obtain a very good score, you need to keep your coin timer from resetting ''at all'' throughout the entire game. Have it reset halfway through the game? Time to [[Rage Quit]]!

** Inverted with Yu-Gi-Oh! video games, where this rule becomes a Scrappy Mechanic because it asks you if you want to use the effect ''if literally anything happens in the game''.

** Back when the game first began, part of the power of cards like the Trap Hole set (which destroyed monsters on summon) was that you could block a monster from using its effect. However, because they activate when a monster is summoned and only destroy it (rather than actively negating its summon attempt), the monster is technically on the field first (this is the reason why it is impossible to destroy Jinzo, a monster which prevents traps from working for as long it's on the field, on summon with Trap Hole), so for some reason it was decided that the player should be able to use the effect of their monster regardless of whether or not it's about to be destroyed. This can result in some ludicrously powerful optional effects happening at a time when the monster should have been dead and buried, and is ''extremely annoying''.

** There's also the "Harpie Rule", which only really affects the titular monsters, but is still fairly annoying. To wit, there are several monsters with effects that change their name to that of another monster, usually while it's face-up on the field. However, most all of the Harpie Lady monsters past the initial 2 don't specify ''where'' their effects treat their name as simply "Harpie Lady". As such, Konami has issued the ruling that these monsters are treated as having the name "Harpie Lady" ''for all intents and purposes, including deck construction''. What does that mean? Well, you can only have three copies of a specific monster in your deck at any one time, so with the other Harpie Lady monsters being treated as "Harpie Lady" all the time, instead of being able to have three copies of each one of them, you can only have three of any combination of them (for instance, you can only have either one of the original Harpie Lady and two of Harpie Lady # 1, '''or''' two of Cyber Harpie Lady, and one of Harpie Lady # 3, but not three each of Harpie Lady, Cyber Harpie Lady, Harpie Lady # 1, and Harpie Lady # 3). This severely limits the potential of a Harpie Lady deck, even more so when you consider [[What Could Have Been|all of the awesome support they have]].

* ''[[Exalted]]'' had the Reactor/Perfect Spam/Lethality/Paranoia Combat/Overwhelming issue, which was a whole ''bunch'' of these. Elaborated: Reactor meant that with relentless stunting and mote regeneration Charms it was comparatively easy to come out of any given action with more motes of Essence and more Willpower than you started. These motes and WP were then spent to activate "paranoia combos", which were massive experience sinks containing every single [[Won't Work On Me]] power that could be accessed, including perfect defences. If you didn't activate your paranoia combo, you would die because of a preponderance of unpleasant "bad touch" effects, which would kill you, cut off your arms, turn you into a ferret, or otherwise make your life very difficult, not helped by the low health levels of these ''titan-killing god-kings'', which ensured that even if there weren't any bad-touch effects in the oncoming attack, it would still deal quite a lot of harm if it got through your overpriced armour. Overwhelming damage and Essence Ping ensured that armour was [[Armour Is Useless|largely unhelpful]]. Notably, the 2.5 errata tried to kill ''almost all of these''; combos became free, mote regeneration was nerfed in the head, stunt regen was dropped to once per action, Essence ping was killed, Overwhelming became far weaker, and armour got cheaper. More abstractly, some players dislike Charms, believing them to be either annoying, too limiting, or overemphasised, and attunement motes in the 2.5 errata were liked by exactly nobody, but the lethality/paranoia issue was the most widely complained about and the source of many fixes.

 

== First Person/Third Person Shooter ==

* And then there's the original ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'', with its perma-death rule. If one of your characters is knocked out and not revived within 3-4 turns, you can say goodbye to all the time and effort you put into building them. (Well, there is a way for another character to obtain their abilities, but still.) Compounding this is the fact that there's no way to restart the battle or load from a save from within the game, so you're stuck with either having to write off whichever character bit it or reset the game and sit through the whole damn boot sequence again. Gah.

** That's 3-4 turns for that character, which is actually generally plenty of time, unless that character happened to be the only character you had with access to a Raise spell, then it's a race against time as you try to kill everything before you lose your guy. No, the real Scrappy Mechanic in this game with death is the fact that the Raise spells, unlike every other healing spell in the game, has a chance to miss. Cast Raise on your dead guy every turn for 3 turns after he died and missed every time? Too bad, he's [[Lost Forever]] because of RNG.

 

== Web Tournaments ==

 

== Casino Games ==

 

== Real Life ==

** Another one: Irregular verbs. Most people can never remember "proved" versus "proven".

** And a non-English one: gendered Nouns. Not living things that actually have gender, but words themselves that have arbitrary genders. For example, in German (an otherwise highly efficient and logical language, as one might expect), a "Skirt", translated as "Rock". The word "Auto" is masculine in Spanish, feminine in French and neuter in German, and all in three languages means the same thing ("Car").

* Many people think that [[Killed Off for Real|death]] is a Scrappy Mechanic, seeing as how it not only permanently removes the person it happens to, but also dramatically affects ''everyone else''.

* Some people regard [[Standard Status Effects|Sleep]] as this, as they feel they could accomplish more if they had the extra X amount of hours.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Scrappy Index]]

[[Category:YMMV Trope]]

[[Category:Videogame Culture]]

[[Category:Unexpected Reactions to This Index]]

[[Category:Error Index]]