Playing rpgs before strat guides

[kainemaxwell]

Anyone else remember the days when you bought a rpg for your console system and you had to play without a strategy guide? Before the internet and gamefaqs when you were lucky if the game was featured in Nintendo Power or other game magazine?

[horseboy]

You don't "play" a game with strategy guides. It is more like following instructions.

[defklf]

I remember those days like it was yesterday. Oh wait, it was yesterday.
I tend not to use strategy guides, at least not on the first playthrough.

[eskobar]

I loved those days, it was a great feeling when you finished one game with your own skills.

Even games like The Legend of Zelda were focus for discussions with friends at school to give ourselves hints and tips to finish them.

Today i still prefer to play without guide but i have been tempted a few times to uncover some secrets like in Final Fantasy Tactics when i unsuccessfully tried to get Cloud .... until i checked a magazine :P

[MeTmKnice]

Strategy guies to me are kind of like using cheats. You do not do it the first time, but if you need/want to when playing the game again its alright.

[skaar]

"FAQ-ing out" is the term I've used for when someone gives up and goes to a FAQ for how to do something. Generally I'd beat my head up against something until I figured it out or spend hours trying different things. If I couldn't get it I'd ask friends for advice or put it away and come back another day.

Good game design for me means you should never have to refer to a FAQ to complete something. I was incredibly frustrated recently by a sequence in Bionic Commando 360 where it is impossible to hit a helicopter without using the rocket launcher's lock-on feature. Notably, this feature was never mentioned anywhere in game - though I suppose I could have checked the manual in hindsight.

After talking about it with a friend I remembered a similar sequence in Metal Gear Solid... and having figured this out, completed the whole boss fight easily since at that point I knew the whole area inside and out.

Modern RPGs with the "collect 5,000 secret stars" and the like are practically unattainable without playing through the game 20 times... and at that point I have to use a FAQ or sink another 40 hours into a game. And it feels dirty. The ones with "recipes" are the worst for this. You can either waste all of your best equipment or just FAQ out.

For the first time, I bought a guide for an RPG the first time I played it - Dragon Quest 8. With the hint book, I had recipes for equipment that made the game a breeze. And looking back, I wish I'd skipped the guide entirely. I spent the whole time resisting its charms, then sneaking a peek now and then and feeling horrible for it. It was like sleeping with an ex-girlfriend you'd broken up with time and time again.

[Ace Comics]

skarr said what I wanted to better than I could.

Older RPG's didn't really require a guide to 100%... now it's as though the games are made with too many unrealistic (for a game) secrets... the "How would I ever think to do that without a guide?" types.

[norkusa]

I usually gave up when I got stuck but talking with kids in school was a big help. I remember half of the boys in my 7th grade class were all playing Shadowgate at the same time and we'd always meet up during recess to discuss our progress.

There would be parts everyone would get stuck at. Like throwing the blue orb into the lake to freeze it and clicking on the crack in the waterfall to move behind it. Eventually someone would figure it out though or call the Nintendo tip line and pass the info along. I kinda miss that.

[chrisbid]

it takes me back to dragon warrior on the nes... i tried every combination possible to make the rainbow bridge across the channel. i used the stones of sunlight and the staff of rain over and over again. i kept going to the cave in the south, only to have the old man kick me out before i had a chance to read what he said. i finally found the hidden man in castle town behind the barriers that gave me the location of erdrick's token and away i went. but dam, that crap took me weeks

final fantasy on the other hand, was a longer game, but i managed to finish it a week before the NP strategy guide arrived in the mail

[MASTERWEEDO]

I'm still stuck playing Beggar Prince.

[kainemaxwell]

I usually gave up when I got stuck but talking with kids in school was a big help. I remember half of the boys in my 7th grade class were all playing Shadowgate at the same time and we'd always meet up during recess to discuss our progress.

There would be parts everyone would get stuck at. Like throwing the blue orb into the lake to freeze it and clicking on the crack in the waterfall to move behind it. Eventually someone would figure it out though or call the Nintendo tip line and pass the info along. I kinda miss that.
My friends and I would do the same thing with Shadowgate. :)

[Pantechnicon]

Hey kiddies, stop googling your tweeters for a minute and gather `round old Grampa. I’ll tell you what it took to get an RPG hint way back in the old days of the Spring of `92.

Back then, `tweren’t no books or FAQs or websites to help you out. You either sussed it out on your own or you had to call something called the “hint line”. I remember having call Nintendo’s 1-900 hint line during my first time playing through Final Fantasy Legend II for the Game Boy. It cost something like $3.50 a minute. To make matters worse, I was in the military at the time and didn’t own a phone (and cell phones were still too expensive for a grunt back then). So I had to use a phone credit card for the call, from a payphone (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payphone)*, with Game Boy in hand. Took about three minutes to explain where I was and get the solution to the problem. Suffice to say I really needed that hint.

* - And to which, per the cliché, I had to walk uphill a quarter mile in the dark to find. No, seriously.

[Rob2600]

In 1988, my friends and I used the maps and tip sheet that came with The Legend of Zelda. We also used the maps in the black Official Nintendo Players Guide and the maps in Nintendo Power #1.

We did the same thing with Metroid, Dragon Warrior, and Metal Gear.

At the time, we were used to straightforward arcade-style games like Pac-Man and Super Mario Bros. and saw nothing wrong with using various resources to guide us in those large, sprawling games...especially if some of those resources came inside the game box, like Zelda, Dragon Warrior, and Metal Gear.

[BydoEmpire]

My brother and I each played Might & Magic separately - I played on the Apple 2 and he played on the c64. He came home from college for Xmas and had almost the entire game mapped out by hand on graph paper. There are TONS of dungeons in that game, it must have been a huge effort. Not quite a strategy guide, but almost.

For most of those older computer RPGs I just mapped things out as I went along, as-needed, which is probably why I finished very, very few of them. Definitley Dungeon Master on the Amiga and maybe The Bard's Tale on c64 - that's about it.

On consoles I pretty much relied on either talking with friends, old school brute force, or the very rare call to a help line (I only remember doing this to find that hidden final dungeon in Miracle Warriors on the SMS - no way you could find it without some help - it was in the middle of the desert). Console RPGs were much easier to finish then the traditional 8-bit computer RPG. Much more linear, and they gave you a lot more direct hints, which was actually really refreshing at the time.

[Flashback2012]

I remember so many RPGs that I've played w/o guides because they didn't exist for that game or didn't exist as a mainstream item yet. I would have killed for a strategy guide for Phantasy Star 1. It was a treat for me to see the sequel came packed with a mini-guide. I remember my brother and I wearing out that book until it was a ragged lump of paper. ;)

It mildly dumbfounds me at how many RPGs I played with no guide in sight. There was Neutopia, Golden Axe Warrior, The Magic of Scheherazade, Lunar: The Silver Star (there was a guide made for it but I didn't pick it up till years after), Cosmic Fantasy 2, Super Hydlide, Ys Book I & II, and the list goes on and on....

[mobiusclimber]

I miss the good old days when I had the TIME to figure everything out in a game on my own. I'll still try to now, but I only have very limited time to play games at all, so I really can't spend the time wandering around trying to figure out what I'm supposed to do. Takes away some of the fun, sure, but I also now have a lot more money than I did back then, which means I have a mountain of games to play, rather than being stuck with just one (which also meant I used to force myself to play bad games as long as I could stand to).

[Rogue]

I've never used a FAQ.

[betamax001]

I love guides! If you dont use the guides thats cool. I used to get guides, but now i'm too cheap and then they go out of print. Oh well. Plus alot of them have some neat pictures : D Like my FFXII guide book had a spiffy double sided poster of the world map and the license stuff and a neat artbook.

"I really should actually play more than an hour of it..."

[j_factor]

I always thought of FF7 as kind of "popularizing" strategy guides (despite being one of the easiest RPGs), but I've been surprised to find out how many older games had them. I found an official strategy guide for Heimdall on Sega CD, and that game's downright obscure. I also only recently noticed that Crusader of Centy has a form in the back of the manual to send in for the official strategy guide. I wonder how many copies of that strategy guide are floating around -- if that was the only way they sold them, it's not many. Although, if you're talking all the way back to the 80s, then I'm sure few if any had them.

I don't generally use strategy guides, but they have their place for certain games. I definitely prefer a "real" strategy guide to an FAQ, but I don't buy many.

[Arkhan]

to this day I only buy strategy guides if theres a poster in the back. Then I cut the pictures out of the guides and hang them on the wall or glue them to binders and crap, lol.


god damn was I pissed when the star ocean "poster" was just a stupid ass crafting chart.

the only strategy guides worth purchasing , poster or not, were the Working Design ones because they had other interesting stuff in em like interviews/facts/stuff.

and stickers!

I always found it pointless to play a game if you have a magical book telling you where to go. Why even buy the game, just buy the strategy guides and read them.

[googlefest1]

I'm still stuck playing Beggar Prince.

so am i - i think there was a missing translation or a few

so far this is the only game id like a guide for -- i feel using guides is cheating - but in this case i think there is an error some where and im became stuck

[BetaWolf47]

I prefer not to use guides myself, but when I get stuck, it seems that the answer is so cryptic and twisted that I'd be surprised if anyone had beaten the game before guides came out. Even today, there's no way in heck I'm beating Phantasy Star without a strategy guide.

Then again, it's almost as annoying when a game spoonfeeds you directions the whole way through. For example, in contrast to Phantasy Star, Phantasy Star IV literally tells you where to go and what to do in every cutscene. It's almost like playing the game with a strategy guide, without actually using a strategy guide.

Developers really had to strive to achieve balance between being cryptic and holding your hand. Not an easy feat.

[WhatsMyUsername]

I don't like to resort to guides if it is at all possible. However, like it has been said a lot of modern RPG's almost require you to use a guide. It often bothers me because I'll be stuck either spending hours figuring things out or get a guide and get the answer right away. Another thing is I find it ridiculous when there are situations where you can either go without a secret item or area and have a much harder time in the game or use a guide to find it. Often these secrets are so ridiculously hidden finding it is near impossible. That's why I often end up using guides a fair bit for the newer RPG's but try to avoid them unless I am absolutely stuck with the older ones. At least for my first playthrough, if I do a secondary playthrough I'll use a guide and try to get and do everything there is to do. For instance right now I am playing through Lufia and the Fortress of Doom for the first time (I know I am a little late :D ) and with this first playthrough I am avoiding the use of a guide completly unless I get stuck at some part later in the game.

[Ace Comics]

I don't like to resort to guides if it is at all possible. However, like it has been said a lot of modern RPG's almost require you to use a guide.

Especially those with miss-able side quests. Like (theoretically) where you need to talk to the king's daughter... after you leave the castle, but before you leave the city. If you don't... the cut-scene won't trigger... and well, you're still 20 hours into the game... not like you're going to restart.

[Sherblock]

The only time I see using a guide as "okay" are in games like Pokemon, where the they can ease some stress, as well as giving very helpful hints. The second is games like CoDMW2, so you can easily get hints, and do things like learn how to unlock new avatars and perks.

[Sosage]

I only have one thing to say: graph paper. Lots and lots of graph paper.

[fahlim003]

It can be argued that games that don't require strategy guides for completion are too easy or simply designed well, although I think games that do require them when speaking for myself are to save time. I don't have a tonne of time which suffice to say should almost eliminate RPG's from my schedule but at the same time some games seem interesting so regardless of genre I follow my gut.

As for RPG's I've used guides with?
FF7 (only after completing the game, I used the guide to obtain a gold chocobo)
FF3 (FF6, used it to solve the code for Edgar's Chainsaw in Zozo)
Xenogears (got lost near the end of disc 2, plus many years between plays)
Fire Emblem 7 & Advance Wars 2 (both have some challenging missions, so I think although I didn't use guides so much as watching youtube clips)
FF Tactics (not really sure how much I used a guide but this game is very tough for me and so I expect to use guides/replays for this in the future to be sure)
DQ8 (used it to check boss HP values, that's it although recipes would be nice)

FE/AW and Xenogears are slightly disappointing but I guess I'm not up to specification or as mentioned elsewhere they weren't balanced properly when they were designed. My intention won't change though, no guides until a serious road block comes up for any future games.

[Mr.Platypus]

I remember this. I remember playing SwordQuest on the 2600, and having no idea what was going on, or what I was supposed to do. There was no internet, no 1-800 number. Nothing. The game was just one big mystery, and you would just have to accept it. Lots of games were like this for me. Raiders of the Lost Ark on 2600, Wing War on Coleco, Maze-A-Tron for Intellivision. Part of my deep fascination with video games was just how profoundly mysterious these things were. Usually I was just blindly poking at walls, getting nowhere. But sometimes, occasionally, something magical would happen. I never knew what to expect. I felt like anything could happen in those games.

I remember later renting Shadowgate and Phantasy Star, and getting stuck in all the predictable places. Sometimes you would take a game home for the weekend, and you would just get stuck. I would spend an entire Saturday playing a game, and not make any progress at all. Sometimes there were friends or Nintendo Power to help, but probably not. Sometimes I would just return the game, and accept that I could never finish it. Every game I rented carried the same risk. Imagine if you can, going to the video store and renting a movie, knowing that there was a possibility that the movie could suddenly and seriously freeze up. And unless you were clever or lucky enough to figure it out, it would remain forever unresolved. And imagine there was nothing you could do about it. And then imagine every movie on the shelf could be like that.

That's how I remember the days before FAQs and Internet and the like. I had to learn when to just give up, and accept the loss. But also it felt really good to preserver and be rewarded with progress. This is something that today's generation doesn't encounter, I don't think. I doubt anybody gets stuck renting some PS2 game, fights with it all weekend, and just returns it without hope. It's too easy now to just go online and end the frustration. Am I right? Does anyone ever just give up in adventure games anymore?

Also I wonder if this generation is somehow missing out on something. Is it better to play games in a world where you have almost no help? Does it make the reward more satisfying? I know that Phantasy Star and Shadowgate had a kind of awe-inspiring mystery about them. There were always games around me that would be eternal riddles. I don't feel that way anymore. I kinda feel like something has been lost.

[Arkhan]

man sword quest. That game was lame EVEN if you had the comic book it was designed to be played with.


Graph paper is your friend. Wizardry 1 and 2 without graph paper is just insane!

[Mr.Platypus]

Actually, I thought SwordQuest was really awesome at the time. My friend had the game, but he promptly lost the instructions and comic book. Everything about this game was mysterious to me. There was this scary minotaur on the cart, and there were strange symbols and sometimes that rainbow would fill the screen and show you some inscrutable numbers. I thought the game was just too advanced and complicated for me, and if I could just figure it out, there was some grand adventure in there.

I never got anywhere, but I was sure that the game was awesome. Now that I'm older and I better understand what's going on, Swordquest doesn't carry quite the same charm it did. I was better when I didn't get it

[BydoEmpire]

I would spend an entire Saturday playing a game, and not make any progress at all.I could put up with that when I was younger, but there's no way I'm doing that now. If a game does anything close to that now it's going back on the shelf never to be played again. I simply don't have time - there are too many other games and too many othe things to do.


I only have one thing to say: graph paper. Lots and lots of graph paper. Amen to that.

I did pick up a strategy guide for FF 12 because I stopped playing the game for about six months and I had a hard time remembering what I was doing when I wanted to pick it up again. It's just a time saver.

Also, I loved the Swordquest series. I had them all loose, so no instructions or comic books, and never came remotely close to finishing them, but I thought they were still fun and engaging games.

[Aussie2B]

Considering my love for Japanese imports and the fact that I've written some guides myself, I can't reasonably look down on anyone that turns to a guide. I know guides have helped me enjoy imports that I otherwise couldn't play or wouldn't consider buying in the first place, and I think my guides on Japanese games have allowed the same for others. And since I often like to obsessively do every last little thing in a game, guides help me out with that. Unless a game is Japanese, I generally don't bother with walkthroughs much. I more often refer to in-depth guides that focus on one aspect of a game that would usually be ridiculous to figure out on your own. With actual strategy guide books, I like owning them, but there are few that I've used to any great extent. They're nice for looking at art and what have you.

Of course, with all the obscure stuff that I play, I'm frequently in the position where there is no guide to turn to even if I desperately wanted one. But even with that option, I appreciate a hard-earned accomplishment and will try to do things the "old school" way whenever I can. Even in this day and age, I'm still quite happy to take handwritten notes and meticulously draw my own maps. Just doing those things in and of themselves feels like an accomplishment since I know so many others with buckle under the slightest resistance a game puts up.

And I'm guilty of using those hint lines back in the day. :) I remember I was hopelessly stuck on finding the 5 golden leaves in Link's Awakening. I also called when I got to the mandatory temple in Lufia II with the scrambled graphics, which totally confused the game counselor, haha. Can't remember exactly what he told me, but none of it was useful, obviously, considering it's a glitch in every cart. I think he was suggesting that I tried doing that section of the game again to see if it was the same, but I think he was also wondering if my game was dirty or defective. All I could do was randomly press directions until I made my way through. Thankfully it's fairly straightforward. I remember Nintendo also had an automated line with commonly asked questions for the time, and I'd use that on occasion.

[Trebuken]

I have never used a strategy guide. I have browsed FAQs and walkthroughs for certain parts of games -- generally I do that before I lose interest because I am stuck, or impatient. I often find myself simply wanting to finish a game so I can start another.

Truely though I started with back in the day with graph paper as well. Commodore 64, and an early PC. Might and Magic I and II were insane. Also Bards Tale series and the gold box AD&D games. You had to graph them to find all the secret spots. In the old says there were no hints or shadows where secret doors were, you had to check every spot...

[mobiusclimber]

I forgot about this but some strategy guides are really just awesome reads. Casey Loe (or Loye? Lowe?) for instance has written a couple that are just great fun because there's all these little secrets and tidbits scattered about. For instance, the unofficial FF7 one had little sidebars about graffiti in the game and things like that. Also the RE3 one was like that, full of humorous asides every other page just about.

[kupomogli]

I don't buy strategy guides at all. What's the point in playing a game if you're going to have everything spoon fed to you?

Now I will admit lately there are some games that have secrets that are so ridiculously hidden or cryptic that I had to use a strategy guide, but that's about the only time I'll look one up(example: almost all end game secrets in FF10.) There aren't many I've actually used a guide with at all though, to completion or not. Also, unless it's something impossible to figure out or near impossible, I won't use a guide at all before game completion.