items/etc. without purpose in games

[pragmatic insanester]

i think i-mockery or encyclopedia obscura did a small article on this, but it was all or mostly nes games. can anyone throw a few up that were pointless (not just crappy, without a use).

[Kuros]

One item I can think of is the Flute in Might and Magic 6. Does nothing other than play a tune when you hold it and click over a character portrait. The flute in MM8 on the other hand, has a use.

[pacmanhat]

Seanbaby covered a few of these. My personal favorite:

The Cloak of Darkness in "Wizards & Warriors". I've never seen a more useless item in a game, or even in real life. It's just...so, so pointless.

[Kuros]

Seanbaby covered a few of these. My personal favorite:

The Cloak of Darkness in "Wizards & Warriors". I've never seen a more useless item in a game, or even in real life. It's just...so, so pointless.

But it was cool IMO.

Did nothing, OTHER THAN MAKE YOU COOL!

Should have called it the Cloak of Coolness.

[pacmanhat]

Seanbaby covered a few of these. My personal favorite:

The Cloak of Darkness in "Wizards & Warriors". I've never seen a more useless item in a game, or even in real life. It's just...so, so pointless.

But it was cool IMO.

Did nothing, OTHER THAN MAKE YOU COOL!

Should have called it the Cloak of Coolness.

Yes, if by cool you mean COMPLETELY INVISIBLE AND UNABLE TO SEE WHAT THE HELL YOU'RE DOING.

In which case, yes, it's EXTREMELY cool.

[Kuros]

Seanbaby covered a few of these. My personal favorite:

The Cloak of Darkness in "Wizards & Warriors". I've never seen a more useless item in a game, or even in real life. It's just...so, so pointless.

But it was cool IMO.

Did nothing, OTHER THAN MAKE YOU COOL!

Should have called it the Cloak of Coolness.

Yes, if by cool you mean COMPLETELY INVISIBLE AND UNABLE TO SEE WHAT THE HELL YOU'RE DOING.

In which case, yes, it's EXTREMELY cool.

Didn't it have the little sparkle things around it when activated?

[pacmanhat]

Seanbaby covered a few of these. My personal favorite:

The Cloak of Darkness in "Wizards & Warriors". I've never seen a more useless item in a game, or even in real life. It's just...so, so pointless.

But it was cool IMO.

Did nothing, OTHER THAN MAKE YOU COOL!

Should have called it the Cloak of Coolness.

Yes, if by cool you mean COMPLETELY INVISIBLE AND UNABLE TO SEE WHAT THE HELL YOU'RE DOING.

In which case, yes, it's EXTREMELY cool.

Didn't it have the little sparkle things around it when activated?

Not from what I remember, but I could be wrong. Either way, considering the other items you can't have if you want to keep the CoD (feather fall comes to mind), I'd say it's pretty damn useless.

[robotriot]

In Dreamweb (adventure game) you can pick up pretty much any item lying around, and most of them don't help you getting any further in the game.

[pragmatic insanester]

oops. it was seanbaby.

[Julio III]

Shenmue has quite a few of these. However you can discount a lot of them as collectables or presents/mementoes given by other people. There is one item remaining however - The White Leaf. No-one knows what its for and you even have it if you start a new Shenmue II game (you can find the leaf in the first game, ie. you can miss it).

[joshnickerson]

Everything in Donkey Kong 64. LOL

[norkusa]

The pack of smokes in Golgo 13. As soon as you grab them, you puff away for a few seconds and that's it. I think maybe your life may have gone up or down but I can't remember. At least you looked cool doing it.

[Vectorman0]

The shaver in MGS2 didn't do anything other than take away "Pliskin's" beard in the cutscenes. Pretty useless as far as gameplay goes.

[Damion]

What about the pack of smokes in metal gear (the first one) you can't even smoke them (not in the US release) It just makes the screen flicker. whoopie freaking do.

[Griking]

It's not an IN game item but in Diablo II there's a gem in the main battle.net area that you can click. When you click on it it says "gem activated" or "gem deactivated" but nobody's ever know what it did if anything.

[Crush Crawfish]

Heh, what about that thing you get from Orange Kid in earthbound? You the give the jerk $200 and all he gives you is some crappy thing that does nothing and breaks as soon as you use it. :/

[Ed Oscuro]

Lots of stuff in System Shock 2 is only useful for fleshing out the environment - mugs and magazines (magazines add a little bit to the backstory, use the ? tool, which you should be using on everything, by the way) can be recycled for nanites (one each, I think).

The red jewel in the Uninvited game (NES version, at least) - ARGH, I hate that thing. I hate it. Makes me die so many times without knowing WHAT is happening, AND I CANNOT DROP IT IN THE YARD.

I hate that the concrete planters at the beginning of one of the levels (third I think?) of the SNES Ninja Warriors game can't be carried or thrown over far enough to keep them when enemies appear. :(

[Lemmy Kilmister]

What about the pack of smokes in metal gear (the first one) you can't even smoke them (not in the US release) It just makes the screen flicker. whoopie freaking do.


You can use them to see the infra red beams if you don't have the goggles. Other then that they're pointless.

[Ed Oscuro]

You can use them to see the infra red beams if you don't have the goggles. Other then that they're pointless.
Hideo and Co. love bitching about social ills invented in America, it seems LOL

[suppafly]

The Kiss on river city ransom...in one of the stores its on the menu

[Sylentwulf]

What about the pack of smokes in metal gear (the first one) you can't even smoke them (not in the US release) It just makes the screen flicker. whoopie freaking do.


You can use them to see the infra red beams if you don't have the goggles. Other then that they're pointless.

No, he said the first metal gear game, not the 3rd (or 4th or whatever MGS was)

[o2william]

What about the pack of smokes in metal gear (the first one) you can't even smoke them (not in the US release) It just makes the screen flicker. whoopie freaking do.
During the final sequence, after you kill Big Boss and have to escape the building before the timer runs out, you can use the cigarettes to add some extra time. It may the only circumstance where smoking will extend your life.

And the Cloak of Darkness had one cool function: toggling that bouncy, upbeat music. I wish I had a sparkly outfit that came with its own theme song.

[o2william]

(Double post due to forum hiccup)

Nothing to see here, move along...

[The-Bavis]

How about Karuba's (sp?) Shoe in SMB3? It was useful, but you can only use it in the stage you find it in and you don't have to use it. Pretty fun to get and play around with, though.

[Slate]

Try the Death glove In Poy Poy. It DOES Do stuff, But it kills you, And does NOT kill your opponents. (At least from MY Experience)

Also, I forget the name of the game, But i do know that there was cheese lying on the floor in a certain game. The designer was intending that you'd pick it up for cheat codes later, But the codes were disabled before the game was released..

[c2000]

Pink undies in Shining Force III. Say something like 'More serious' oh and the flower bouquet as well..pointless afaik.

[goatdan]

There is something in Earthbound, I forget what it is, that if you get it you cannot get rid of it and it just eats up one of the spaces in your inventory. The only point of it is to force you to manage your inventory even better.