10 Modern Video Game Tropes Everyone Is Rejecting
The MCU-ification of game dialogue really sucks.
Like everywhere else in pop-culture, trends come and go within the world of video games. As developers and publishers alike experiment with different ideas in the hopes of innovation and giving us something new, we can see a shift in the games we play where the ideas that work stick around for a while. The more successful an idea is, the longer its likelier to exist for.
Some of these ideas like the introduction of an analogue sticks, rumble pads in controllers, and figuring out that the left and right triggers are more intuitive than face buttons for driving have forever changed the games we play for the better.
Likewise, terrible ideas like loot boxes, purchasable online passes, and ridiculously overpriced DLC like Oblivion’s infamous horse armour have since been cast aside (even if it took a lot of push back from players).
Sometimes, though, what once seemed like clever ideas can quickly overstay their welcome if they become overused. After a while, the innovation loses its sheen and we’re left with tired tropes that feel outdated and lazy.
The sooner developers leave these tropes behind, the faster the industry can take another step towards in the right direction.
10. The Shift To Tiny Side Quests
Side quests have been a common occurrence within video games for decades. Extra pieces of content that gave us more to do outside of progressing the main story, these can be found everyone in contemporary games.
However, developers have never been sure on the best ways to handle them. For years, a side quest consisted of completing tedious fetch quests or other meaningless pieces of busywork. They were lazy means of padding out a game’s length without adding anything of substance.
And then The Witcher 3 and Assassin’s Creed Origins came along and changed everything by transforming side quests into their own character-driven stories that tied into the overarching plot.
In both these games, side quests provided something new and interesting to experience. Hunting out these quests were now worth our time. But, for some unknown reason, developers have taken two steps backwards by making side quests even smaller than ever.
Whether it’s Mysteries in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla or Cyberpunk’s singular objective Gigs, extra content has been diluted to bite-sized chunks of largely forgettable interactions that don’t add much, if anything, to the overall experience.
A return to The Witcher-style of quests would be ideal.