10 Things Video Games Really Need To Stop Doing

1. My Superhuman Protagonist Can’t Do Stuff I Can Do

I’m putting this one at number one not because it’s the most irritating thing video games do or because it spoils video games that include it, but because it’s my favourite tiny annoyance, it’s pretty entertaining, and it comes up a lot.

Of course video games have to put limits on what our protagonists are capable of, otherwise we’d just breeze through games, but when our incredible mutant Witcher or Souls hero can’t step over a three foot fence it’s hard not to notice.

It’s instances like this that make games like Breath of the Wild and Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey stand out as refreshingly different as everything is sensibly surmountable. Commander Shepard and Geralt’s inability to step over rubble or climb ledges or, in Geralt’s case, get himself out of water and onto a shore without a ladder or very generous ramp to help him get his footing is pretty annoying. Add to that things like Minecraft Steve’s inability to climb two blocks without a ladder, The Last of Us’ packed stairwells blocking whole floors, chest-high walls deeming areas inaccessible to you in Dark Souls 2, and instances in games like Silent Hill or Resident Evil where a glass window or wooden door blocks your path even though your backpack is chock full of firepower that could take care of it.

I don’t expect video game characters to be able to do everything but if an unfit gamer like me can do it, there’s got to be something we have to revisit there.