Strategy Guide Compulsion

[zakthedodo]

I guess the general discussion is although all the info you need is free online, if there is a guide out there such as a Bradygames or Prima The artwork is usually great and just expands on the feel of the game.

Are there any games that you might have missed 100% completion without an online FAQ or guide?

I certainly would not have found all the secret areas in Return to Castle Wolfenstein without a few hints.

[JSoup]

Reminds me of a story from the GFAQs contributors board from the PS2 era.
Final Fantasy 12 was out and guides were going up. About a month or two following release, a huge companion guide was put out that included the convoluted method to earning the Zodiac Spear. The thing was, one of he GFAQ authors included this in his guide for the game. This started a multi-board discussion about how copyright works, what's fairuse, how GFAQs feels about guides using information that has been confirmed to only come from one source, etc.

[Tanooki]

As a habit I download faqs for any game I own that one has been made for, and I've had a habit of picking up 1st party Nintendo guides for the SNES era stuff and a little beyond. I find no matter how someone writes stuff in text, you end up still losing quite a bit of substance depending on the game. Something like a FPS or a racing game it's fairly easy to use crude ASCII art or general descriptions of the stage/track and you'll know what they're getting at. The thing is when you get into deep and convoluted stuff like a Zelda style or a RPG type game it just really is never enough. It's very easy even with someone saying go south, road splits, go east, to still get lost, but picture guides have map pictures and that helps get the feel. It's a great time saver when you don't have dozens of extra hours to get murdered in the game over so you can still enjoy it, or because for years now since really 3D games got going people have been making so many games essentially require a free guide or they prefer a paid guide to get it all, sometimes even things you need which stinks. I rarely will buy a video game that is a Zelda or RPG type anymore unless there is a guide, or at the very minimum a well detailed internal map (like new3DS Xenoblade has) as I don't like feeling lost or like something is being left out that'll screw me over later.

[zakthedodo]

Reminds me of a story from the GFAQs contributors board from the PS2 era.
Final Fantasy 12 was out and guides were going up. About a month or two following release, a huge companion guide was put out that included the convoluted method to earning the Zodiac Spear. The thing was, one of he GFAQ authors included this in his guide for the game. This started a multi-board discussion about how copyright works, what's fairuse, how GFAQs feels about guides using information that has been confirmed to only come from one source, etc.


Wow, I hadn't even thought about copyrights.
i suppose that would be like copyrighting a food recipe in respect to steps being taken for an end result.

[zakthedodo]

As a habit I download faqs for any game I own that one has been made for, and I've had a habit of picking up 1st party Nintendo guides for the SNES era stuff and a little beyond. I find no matter how someone writes stuff in text, you end up still losing quite a bit of substance depending on the game. Something like a FPS or a racing game it's fairly easy to use crude ASCII art or general descriptions of the stage/track and you'll know what they're getting at. The thing is when you get into deep and convoluted stuff like a Zelda style or a RPG type game it just really is never enough. It's very easy even with someone saying go south, road splits, go east, to still get lost, but picture guides have map pictures and that helps get the feel. It's a great time saver when you don't have dozens of extra hours to get murdered in the game over so you can still enjoy it, or because for years now since really 3D games got going people have been making so many games essentially require a free guide or they prefer a paid guide to get it all, sometimes even things you need which stinks. I rarely will buy a video game that is a Zelda or RPG type anymore unless there is a guide, or at the very minimum a well detailed internal map (like new3DS Xenoblade has) as I don't like feeling lost or like something is being left out that'll screw me over later.

I have been hung up on a couple of bad FAQ's, however, obviously some games have been released with the intention of selling a guide as well.
I agree though, making parts of a game so cryptic that the enjoyment is somewhat lost for a level or so is a bit of questionable call.
Sure, some players are more inclined to want to turn over every stone by themselves, especially in the old 8 & 16 bit games. The tornado in Castelvania is the first example I can think of.
I had to do WHAT?@_@

[Tanooki]

No doubt, if it wasn't for NP mag and the fold out poster I'd have been screwed for a long time if not given up for good on Castlevania 2. I hate those games, more and more this century which are designed to sell strategy guides. A good earlier one on the GBA I can think of is Golden Sun. They hid 2 of the magic djinni in the game you need to do the best spells in random crap spots on the map and there's no mouthy AI clue in a town anywhere, but if you bought NP Advance it told you right where they were on a big pretty map. It seems the more and more games have gone into 3D and/or collection of items the more and more guides have become necessary because of how some of them are hidden a bit too well and/or obtusely.

[The 1 2 P]

There was a time when I use to use physical strategy guides but gamefaqs made them pretty much obsolete. And then youtube tutorials came out and made gamefaqs pretty much obsolete except in the case of some import games and games so niche that not enough people played them for an online guide to have been created. But up until a few years ago strategy guide collecting(even when I didn't need them) was made all the more easier because of places like Best Buy, Toys R Us and Gamestop pennying them out. I have over 100 strategy guides that I paid a penny each for during those days. I wish stores would continue that practice. But today I no longer pick up strategy guides unless it's second hand and cheap at a yard sale or Goodwill.

[Tanooki]

I don't buy them new either it's a ripoff. They're like $20-30 a piece and really don't have enough useful information and maps to be worthwhile in most cases. I'll usually hit the used books stores and find the things for like $5~ on average, sometimes as much as $10 though I'd rarely pay that, and then there's the stuff that falls into the $1-2 clearance. The only stuff I've paid more for are the SNES era stuff from Nintendo as I like the layouts, the quality images and some of the other fluff inside.

[bioshockfan]

I have been collecting game guides for close to 10 years now. I have over 1000 guides and really enjoy looking at the artwork of the games. Someimes i really don't see a use for some but they are made anyways. I NEVER pay retail for my guides. I usually spend 5-8 dollars per guide. When I am out game hunting and find some I usually pick up a guide along with a few games. I know they aren't worth much but I like to have them with my games. I have found a few that are really hard to find but don't command much $ either. As far as downloading faq's I think that is a great way to get through the games u are playing I just like having a physical copy of the guide in front of me in case I need it.


Bioshockfan

[kupomogli]

I don't own many guides and the only time I purchase any is to just flip through and read about a game when I can't play it. I only use a guide if I have exhausted all possibilities and can't find out where to go or what to do, so that's the reason why. If I do need help them it's Gamefaqs, and like Tanooki stated, sometimes it isn't clear what they want you to do, an example is getting the real ending on Bloodborne by finding the workshop which you need to walk off a very specific area to land on platform with a door below.

One guide that I'll say I'm grateful for is the Final Fantasy 12 guide. I was flipping through the guide and saw the foldout map of the license board and also read the tips and tricks section. Final Fantasy 12 is a game I've given several chances because I like a lot of what the game has to offer, but the game does its hardest to set a barrier to the enjoyment simply because the lack of describing anything, and I'll give an explanation below.

The license board is one of the worst implementations of a skill system I've experienced in Final Fantasy 12, because you can have a party that's completely useless. When you unlock something in the license board it lets you see all the skills that are next to the skill you've unlocked. The thing is, after three attempts to get into the game, every time I'd hit the middle of the magic board, and I'd see white, black, and time all together, so I assumed that everything on the license board was completely random and there's really no rhyme or reason. I didn't really notice that all the skills, weapons, etc were all at the same place on the board, but if they atleast had everything greyed out that you couldn't learn, but showed you where everything was at, the least the player could do would be have an idea what they're building their character towards.

Additionally there are other things that the game doesn't tell you. All abilities like MP burst, etc, in Final Fantasy 12 have no MP usage. So you're immediately under the assumption that it's a useless skill unless you happen to stumble across that "all" skill abilities cost no MP. You're given a tutorial about the limit breaks but you're not given a clue how to use them. You're not told that each limit break skill you have learned that you also earn an additional MP charge meaning you can have double or triple the MP, and that's not including something like the Zodiac Spear, that's just stuff that would be useful to know. While Final Fantasy 12 has a lot to like, but it's like they put up a barrier to make getting into the game harder than it should be.

So after reading through the tips and tricks section of the guide and after seeing the license board, I think I may finally be able to actually get into Final Fantasy 12 now that I know there are things to make it easier, making the game become less of a grind with skills like Thousand Needles, MP burst allowing you to recover MP when it's low in battle, etc, and not having to grind as extensively as it felt like I had to at certain parts. There are other issues with Final Fantasy 12 underlying the lack of pointing out important stuff to the player, but that's a major issue that should have never been in the game and it's ridiculous that I had to actually look through I guide to find that out.

[Tanooki]

Surprised I never linked this -> http://tanooki.byethost16.com/strategyguides.html

That's what I have.

Now that I've got back into 90s Gameboy and Ive picked up Dragon Warrior III (at home now) and bought DW1+2 today online, now I want to get those Prima guides back. Fantastic games, but they're dated and I don't like feeling lost, nor with a little kid do I have time for that either.

[BlastProcessing402]

Additionally there are other things that the game doesn't tell you. All abilities like MP burst, etc, in Final Fantasy 12 have no MP usage. So you're immediately under the assumption that it's a useless skill unless you happen to stumble across that "all" skill abilities cost no MP.

I'm finally getting around to playing FF12 now, and it absolutely does tell you that abilities don't cost MP. It's easy to miss if you don't pay attention, as it doesn't hand hold you and force you into a too long tutorial that makes it impossible to not find out, but it is there, in the game. And if you do happen to miss it, after using early skills like Libra or Steal a few times, you should be able to figure it out.

Yes, there's stuff the game could explain better, I will admit that, but sometimes games explain too much, too often, so it's not entirely bad to have them err the other way a little.

[JSoup]

Wow, I hadn't even thought about copyrights.
i suppose that would be like copyrighting a food recipe in respect to steps being taken for an end result.

Well, sort of. GFAQs operates under a general definition of plagiarism. Simply, we're basically regurgitating already available information and there are two requirements that have to be met to avoid the title of plagiarist. One, the way the information is displayed has to be different than that of wherever/whoever we borrowed it from. Two, we must have permission. The problem arose when it was found that the Zodiac Spear unlock information was reviled exclusively from one source and was then transcribed to a free guide. There was no way to claim that permission was granted, but there was a very solid argument that information can't in of itself be controlled like that.

[lendelin]

I love and collect guides from the first Super Mario and Zelda booklets on.

1) They give you information (optional)
2) They are documentations of the games
3) After playing they give you the opportunity to relive your game experience
4) I'm just a guide nut

About 4): When the guide business was in ist infancy, I drew maps of NES games myself, sometimes maps with walkthroughs (Shadowgate). I still have 3 binders full of maps of 8bit- and 16bit - games drawn with a simple Wordperfect line system, semi-professional and very informative. Once a guy sent my maps of Solstice and Castlevania 3 to a German game Magazine (without me knowing) and they printed it.

I even bought guides (very cheaply) for games which really don't require guides: Gran Turismo and Gran Turismo 2. I just wanted printed information about the game, tracks, cars and so on in order to document them.

Otherwise guides for RPGs are for me almost a must, and if they are so wonderfully done like the guides by Working Designs or Doublejump they can be really appreciated.

Online information or printed information? Certainly only in print form. There is nothing better than lying in bed after you played for three hours and beat a difficult Boss and you can read about in a printed guide. :)

And if I ever will play Crystalis again, I'll certainly first look it up in one of my binders. :)

[celerystalker]

I loved strategy guides as a kid/teenager. When I first found GameFAQs, I was enamored of it, mainly because of the astounding Symphony of the Night FAQ that at the time was absurdly comprehensive. However, I found myself using it on everything, and it was taking away from my satisfaction. So, now, in general, I only use old print magazines or guides if I want help, and I find I'm happier that way. I'm not saying GameFAQs is pointless, as I might use it from time to time now in a pinch, but it's worked out better for me to tailor the experience to what it was for me growing up.

I rarely pay anything for a guide, though, especially now. Prices are dumb. The ones I have I certainly did not pay full price for.

[Tanooki]

I'll pay up on a guide to a point, a point many would consider a bit much, yet the more or even moderately rabid would consider me a tight fisted cheapwad. I'm looking at Prima's Dragon Warrior 1+2 and the DW3 guides for the GBC right now that I got those games back in my possession. I don't have time to get lost wandering around these dated gems but I want to experience them again. The problem is the BIN trolls on ebay want like $35-40+ for them, but when they roll through they seem to bottom out around $18-25 shipped and the higher end being nice ones. There's a (was a yesterday?) DW3 guide up there with a warped and bent cover front and back for DW3 at $25 and I can't pop on it. I also still have yet to get a Super Mario RPG guide too by Nintendo which sucks, but not as much as people trying to bang out $75 on Tales of the Abyss for PS2 (which I'd use for the 3DS straight port.) Most guides to me for the maps alone are worth $5-10, maybe a little more depending how big and extensive.