10 Irritating Video Game Tropes That Refuse To Die
Out with the old, in with the new.
Isn't it about time that developers wise up to the fact we're no longer living in the industry's equivalent of the Dark Ages? Granted, change is a slow process, but it's hardly asking the world to expect a modicum of progress to have been made in bringing interactive storytelling and game design up to 21st century standards.
Yet here we are, berating our most beloved and respected creators for taking the easy route, content to fall back on worn-out cliches that drag down otherwise modern advancements in the medium.
We're all big boys and girls now, formulaic boss battles with weak points as subtle as an eardrum-bursting foghorn just ain't going to cut it anymore. The same goes for mass-produced heroes suffering from nasty bouts of amnesia, misplaced stealth missions and borderline torturous fetch quests - they're tired, boring cliches that need chucking on a barge and shipped off never to be seen again.
It'd be foolish to expect wide-reaching changes overnight, but baby steps - that's all it takes to prove that you know we're not stuck in a time bubble circa the 1990s.
10. Amnesiac Protagonists
Of all the nasty afflictions we humans are susceptible to, amnesia's a relatively rare one, but in video games, it's an epidemic plaguing a very specific demographic.
Is it genetic? A hereditary trait? Perhaps a result of one too many benders after a hard day's work kicking ass? No, those three backstories - which took 10 seconds to conjure up - would actually give our forgetful heroes somewhat of an excuse for misremembering literally everything about their lives (except the name, that's conveniently always spared) and that's no good. What room would that leave for scriptwriters to take the lazy route to storytelling?
After all, why bother wasting fresh ink coming up with meaningful exposition and world-building prologues when the best way to bond a player with its vessel is via making them both as clueless as each other.
On the upside - were it not for the yawn-inducing premise, Ken Levine wouldn't have been able to blow our puny minds with BioShock's tongue-in-cheek jab at the trope.
Now, would all amnesiacs kindly vacate the writer's room? Thanks.