10 More Pointless Video Game Mechanics Nobody Used

It's always great to see a video game that introduces a truly groundbreaking mechanic - one that fundamentally reinvents how we play a certain type of game and is then endlessly imitated by its genre successors.

But not all mechanics are created equal, and while players will never forget a game that introduces a truly unique feature, often games implement mechanics that are, well, fundamentally pointless.

These 10 video game mechanics, from fancy alternate fire modes to traversal abilities, vehicles, and even dead features that literally did nothing, all failed to offer a reason for their own existence and in turn were used by basically nobody.

Maybe, just maybe, you tried them once out of morbid curiosity before quickly realising that these features didn't offer a gameplay advantage or, worse still, simply weren't much fun at all.

The lesson here? There are more important things than trying to come up with hot new mechanics that can be featured extensively in a game's marketing - sometimes that backfires horribly, as it did with some of these games.

In other cases, the mechanics were such non-entities that many players didn't even realise they existed at all...

The latest entry into the Call of Duty franchise, Vanguard, confirmed the series' ongoing struggle to continually innovate its well-trod shooter gameplay, as players en masse mocked its inclusion of a totally random blind fire combat mechanic.

In theory, blind fire allowed players to shoot indiscriminately into the open without revealing themselves - a seemingly strategic combat option to help players fend off enemies in a pinch, right?

Except, upon the game's launch, players took to social media to question why Sledgehammer Games even included it at all, given how few opportunities there are for players to use it in a practical way in both the single-player campaign and multiplayer suite.

More to the point, even when it is a viable option, it's fiddly and awkward enough that you'll probably end up getting killed by an enemy who isn't messing around with blind fire.

Considering how little blind fire even figures in the game, you couldn't be blamed for spending dozens of hours playing Vanguard without even realising it was a feature.