Are online guides ruinnig our gaming experience?Follow

I talked about this with a friend of mine and wanted to know what you all think. I feel that online guides have reduced the "time" someone spends with the game. My opinion is that games like FF where there are tons of different things to do, you really do need a guide. But for other games I feel that the experience is much less rewarding if using a guide (i.e. games like Jak and Daxter, Socom, Hitman, etc.). Plus the value (in terms of money) doesn't seem worth it either. I mean what's the sense of buying a $50(U.S.) game when you can go online and beat it in a week or less....and potentially never play it again?

Looking forward to your thoughts

Not worried about anyone in general, just my wallet :) ..but as I said I agree that games like Final Fantasy really do need these kind of guides. What I think we don't need are guides for the games that really aren't as "involved" as Final Fantasy and reduce it's "rewarding" factor when finally beaten.

Edited, Mon May 10 23:19:09 2004 by Skinman

In a sense, yes, game guides are ruining the time people spend playing games.

(And this isn't meant to be a FFXI post, I think, but as a question about GAME GUIDES, it naturally will include FFXI, along with other FF's, and other games. Not every post that includes the words Final Fantasy makes it a stupid-post.)

I've heard (hearsay only) that actually - if you talk to enough NPC's, you'll get all the information you need to know about where to go and what to kill.

In most RPG's, I've noticed, if you have the patience, someone, somewhere, will let you know what you need to do. It may not tell you what the reward is, and for people who know that Aspir is out there, they want to get it and they want to get it now. That is also a reason why I think people in FFXI advance "too fast" for themselves. Instead of doing all the quests possible in a town to get all the possible items... they just do the ones they want (then wonder why they don't have enough fame to do other quests).

For other games, we tend to buy the game guide - but, my husband insists on beating the game one time through by himself, to discover everything there is by himself, to be surprised, and the like, and then he'll go back and beat the game again with the guide to get all the fun hidden things he couldn't find the first time.

Other games, non-RPG games, I don't really see how having the guide can hurt anything but your wallet. In Diablo II, we have the game guide, just to look through it and read about the characters, to look at all the items that never drop for us, and the like. You don't really need a game guide to get you through that game though.

We have the Animal Crossing game guide to let us know about what special days are, what to look for, what furniture sets there are, and what to fish and when.

I'd like to get the Harvest Moon game guide, too. :P

But, overall, I think getting a game guide is a symptom of our personalities.

Some people are happy doing it themselves and want to do it themselves. And they will spend the required hours figuring out what to do and how to do it, fighting and dying several times until they succeed, and then leave feeling a sense of great satisfaction.

Other people know that dying over and over without them figuring it out will merely frustrate them to no end, and so they go with the game guide, look up everything and are like Batman, prepared for every thing that could happen to them, and they beat the game or do the quest and leave feeling a sense of great satisfaction.

I generally refuse to use guides unless I'm completely stuck on something. I have much more fun and a feeling of accomplisment if I figure something out on my own.

To me, it depends on the type of game, and the type of guide.

I have never seen the point to a guide for a single player type game. For the most part, in those types of games, the challenge is "completing" the game/mission/whatever. The whole fun is figuring it out. If you use a guide, then what's the point?

I remember waaaay back in the day when Riven came out (sequel to Myst). I played that game for a few weeks straight. I thought it was a great game and well worth the money. At one point, I remember stumbling across a usenet group that was discussing the game. There were a bunch of people slaming it because the puzzles made no sense. In ever case, they had followed an online guide (or had purchased one). What they didn't seem to get was that the puzzles in that game were of the "oh yeah!" variety. If you "figured it out", they made sense and many of them were literally of the head slapping variety. You would know *why* you clicked on levers in a certain combination, so the game made sense (and had an amazing consistency and theme to it if you took the time to learn it). If you just followed a guide that told you where to click and in what order, you would have absolutely no clue why you needed to do those things, and you'd never "get" the game.


That was a prime example of how a guide ruins a game totally. Other's aren't as bad, but I still don't generally like them. I know people who couldn't complete a Doom level back in the day without a guide, and forget Half-life and the like. Guides ruin games like that IMO.


On the other hand, for games with a primarily multiplayer aspect, guides are just fine. A guild in EQ doesn't really make you a good player. In most of those other games, the whole challenge is figuring out how to do something. In EQ, it's not. In EQ, it's gathering the right people and gaining the right levels to you can do something. Knowing where things are is only half the challenge. You still have to do it. In the case of EQ specifically (and I imagine FF and all the other MMORPGs), there are sooooo many different things you can do, and game mechanics that you have to understand, that guides of some sort are almost necessary. Certainly, sites like this one are. Basics are all that's needed, and guide sites like this one provide that info.

I feel they've ruined me sex life too!

Yes I agree thou.... the guides has killed off all those mind numbing, endless hours of searching for some mod to spawn in about an hour or two! I mean, thoses guides has given me too much time to be spent ENJOYING the game!

Bottom line.... hehe...and will hate meself for saying this, cuz is so obvious, if ye no like the guides.... ....dang it... don't read em!

I agree that FFXI (and other MMORPG's) are full of things to do and without pages like this and people who know what to do, things we be alot harded to accomplish.

But sometimes I wish that I had no idea how to unlock some of the advanced jobs...just to get that sense of accomplishment when you run across that NPC in Sandy that mentions Dragoons and you freak out because after days of searching you finally found it...and then to finally get it and be a Dragoon and everyone knows that you didn't just span requests to get help with it, you actually put time and effort into getting that job. I dunno, I like all the help, but sometimes it almost seems like you are cheating yourself.

For single player games, I play without any guide or looking things up the first time through. The only exception is if I have been agitated spending 10 hours or more on one problem, then I will eventually feel defeated and look it up to move on.


For online games, I have much less tolerance and patience. If I am stuck, I will look it up. If others I know are going to go do an event, I should look it up to find out about it beforehand, so I am prepared for the fight.

The same when I played EQ, I feel that I needed to look up fights before going to do them, so I am aware of what to expect and will not let anyone else there down. That's the difference really, I don't want to ***** up with other people because it disturbs their gameplay, whereas in a single player game I can do whatever I want with no reprocussions to anyone but myself.

Games like Lunar though, need to be played without any guide the first time through, to truly enjoy the story element and let yourself get immersed in the game.