Exploring a game world

exploring a game world

crawl your way into a hidden place you feel like you weren't supposed to see

feel like you stumbled into something secret and unique

game pops up an achievement, a +1 secret location found notification, puts up the place's name on the screen etc

cool sensation ruined

Why does being acknowledged by the devs suck so much

Gamers are retarded and games are designed for retarded people. I knew a special needs guy who was genuinely illiterate and he loved Assassin's Creed.

You wanted to find nothing at all?

Why does being acknowledged by the devs suck so much

I takes you right out the immersion of the moment, into an " ah, I'm on a scripted railroaded pathway everybody else that plays this experiences"
it's immersion breaking, but modern games don't give a fuck. The numbers guy said you wanted achievements, you got achievements.

This is the mentality of someone who was abused as a child and enjoys hiding away. For most people the reward is the literal loot/achievement/effect/bonus etc of being in that secret.

that's already your average ac fan though

The literal loot? Literally? Genuinely the literal loot? Unironically?

You must have really hated The Stanley Parable

Yes.

As opposed to the figurative loot of map completion, achievements, an angle to attack from, etc?

Acknowledging the hidden place turns it from something that feels like an actual secret to yet another collectible dev scattered around for everyone to find and "complete"

Secrets are collectibles. You should be incentivized to find them. They are not some ethereal concept that exists only in your head. By that logic every single location could be considered a "secret" if it's only value is in your mind. Things in videogames need purpose, otherwise they should not exist.

You have a poor soul

I think we'll both survive.

You will not survive the soulstorm

find secret area in game

it has a treasure

treasure doesn't do anything, it's just something you can stare at in the treasure collection menu

never try to explore again and just follow the main path

so the target audience DOES exist

whatever point you're trying to make is autistic but I thought this thread was gonna be about that rare 'real secret place' feeling and I wanted to say I've played tons of games but have only gotten that sensation from souls games. specifically ash lake in 1, going down the pyramid thing to fight elana in the ds2 dlc, and untended graves in 3.
what other (preferably fantasy) games have areas like this? something far off the beaten path that feel ominous and mysterious and forbidden

I reverse engineered my going into games machine so I could have a taking things out of games machine and got the literal loot

Soulstorm was so fucking bad and soulless
Oddysee and Exoddus are the only good ones

Not everything is aimed at you, anon. Get over yourself.

But it's apparently aimed at you specifically. Alright.

This is the mentality of someone who was abused as a child

Interesting. Would you mind giving some examples on that?

Yes.

Because giving you a notification that you found it means that it'll be on the games wiki by the end of the first day, week at most, since completionists will go looking for stuff they are missing.

"completionists" are just regular people anon. Do you regularly abandon games without completing them? Just ignore game mechanics or strategies or routes or items? Just deprive yourself of game?

Do you regularly abandon games without completing them

I don't treat games as something to "complete"

I finish a game when I run out of content that is fun. That usually includes the main story campaign, and it never includes collecting 500 feathers

find secret location

easter egg was patched out

I beat the game knowing that I missed some content. I do that intentionally because that means I have something new to look forward to the next time I play it.

Pathetic.

alt. you realize it was actually the way you were meant to go and the

obvious

progression path was actually the secret and now you cant go back.

Subtle game experience design is a lost art, now everything has to be an on-rails Disney ride where even the """secrets""" are part of everyone's experience

intrinsic vs extrinsic rewards, basically you want the first but are getting the second instead. Some people won't explore around unless there is a reason for them to do it, others will explore every corner of the game even if there's no point on doing so other than self satisfaction.
Good designers how to incentivize the player to explore without being to obvious about it.

Achievement notifications ruin all vibes. It's like a fly landing on your screen and going REMEMBER THIS IS A VIDEOGAME MAKE SURE TO COLLECT YOUR TOKENS!!! Yes I know it's a game but I don't always want that in the forefront of my mind. That's what immersion is. When you can actually be lost in enjoyment and not remind yourself what a fucking loser you are for playing games.

Nice

Game I'm working on has a potential solution for this in the GDD.

Lots of areas are unexplored by the denizens due to being too dangerous past certain points. Player has an always present companion NPC along with two others that are created by other players (Dogma-like game, I guess). These NPCs that travel with you help record cartographical information as you travel, and the player references these maps by hand Far Cry 2 style. Higher quality maps can be made by turning in high quality skins, pelts, and other mapmaking materials appropriate for the time.

When the player discovers a location of some significance, they can name it themselves using a sort of keyword system, similar to the Souls message system but more specific and with more options. Since these areas would have been completely unknown, all future maps would reference the names given by the player. That way the player can make the world more in their image, and feel like they have a larger impact.

Also had an idea that NPCs could speak the player's name by allowing the player to have some kind of adjustable AI voice generation parameters when inputting the name in character creation, so that even weird or uncommon names sound consistent across NPCs. Could do the same for the names that the player comes up with for areas; would actually be easier to account for since it would be a keyword system.

ash lake in 1, going down the pyramid thing to fight elana in the ds2 dlc, and untended graves in 3.

Never got that feel in 3, but in DS2 it was the Dragon Memories.
youtu.be/FxaNt-NVo1c