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Discussion I'm bad at videogames

Wockio

Wockio

NSMB2 Millionaire
Pronouns
He
That's right. I'm bad at videogames. I love them but I suck at them.
With the amount of time I put into them you would think I'd be pretty good... but that's far from the truth.

I beat Metroid Prime for the first time last year with Remastered. Took me 35 hours at around 80 something completion. Average time for that game is half of that, even first time runs.
One of my most embarrassing gaming memories is the Three Houses DLC, that took me 40 hours to beat because I completely misinterpreted the requierements of a specific mission that meant the way I was trying to clear it was pretty much impossible.

Anyone else?
 
Some genres and games, yeah, I think I'm bad at them. However, I think part of that's because I don't want to play the way the game wants me to play. For the game to be fun for me, I'm going to need to zig, but to be successful, you need to zag. Something similar happens with games where you need to study and practice to be good and I just want to mash buttons.
 
I’m one of those babies that can’t play Souls games because they’re too hard. I love games but I’m pretty terrible at most of them, especially anything with twitch combat/action.
 
Hey, no shame in that. I have some good friends who are also bad at games. I root for the ones who make a genuine effort to properly engage with a game's mechanics, ask for help if necessary, and aim to understand where they're going wrong. On the other hand, I get irritated when I try to offer advice to some folks, and they insist on blaming the game and calling it shit, like some sort of DSP-lite (or quite famously, David Jaffe with his Metroid Dread moment). As long as you're in the former camp, you shouldn't allow your modest skill level to impede upon your enjoyment of a game (and it sounds like you don't!) Metroid Prime is a pretty easy game to get stuck in, so it's understandable.
 
YoboD said:
I’m one of those babies that can’t play Souls games because they’re too hard. I love games but I’m pretty terrible at most of them, especially anything with twitch combat/action.
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I love how Another Crab's Treasure has gotten so much positive buzz for making a bunch of accessibility options available to the player. It's really an ideal model of how Soulslikes should be designed, imo. I deeply enjoy their challenge, but I don't want anyone thinking that if you axe the difficulty, you may as well not play the game, 'cuz that's just not true. Bloodborne and Sekiro are a couple of my favorite games, and they have so much more to offer than their difficulty. Just peak atmosphere, art direction, music, lore, level design, etc. At least Elden Ring allows for a wider range of playstyles, so my hope is that FromSoft will be more open to offering similar options in their games going forward. These experiences should be widely celebrated by those of various skill levels, not gatekept.
 
i respect it, though realistically video games are so vast of a medium now i don't find it possible that you're bad at the medium itself ya know.

like im genuinely awful at shooters and a lot of metroidvanias personally. i was also dogshit awful at platformers for a long time to the point of having 0 platformers finished by age 20. but i can do them acceptably now just by raw experience.

one game type i was surprised but also found so nice that i was decent at is Adventure/Visual Novel type games. it's a strange thing to say you're 'good' at them, but i guess i've always found it very doable to reach like tough good endings and get through tight conversational situations with those.

like in Hotel Dusk, which given credit is a fairly easy game in these sections, you have these 'conversation battles' so to speak at certain points.

there, you need to carefully choose the direction of the conversation, asking the correct questions in a logical conversationally sensible order so that the person never becomes suspicious of you, and to get as much information out of them as possible.

i never ended up seeing a game over screen despite all of those and im proud of that. i feel like even that's worthwhile as a 'skill' in video games.
 
Same, shooters are the genre for me I am just bad at. Games beyond Halo's FPS speed are impossible for me

I just dont have the fast twitch reactions for something like CS

So I feel you OP, but games are measured by how we play them and it isn't a bad thing at all to not be the most skilled

Also I will unabashedly use guides if I get stuck in a game so don't feel bad about that either lol
 
I am absolutely terrible at fighting games. I'm passable with Smash because it's less reliant on combos/positioning, but that's my limit.

Everything else I'm absolutely average at.
 
multiple times i lost in multiplayer, to people that never played the game before, at my house, on a game that i owned
 
You got to enjoy one of the best games of all time for (edited) 35 hours.

You're arguably better at video games than all of us.
 
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Dardan Sandiego said:
You got to enjoy one of the best games of all time for 80 hours.

You're arguably better at video games than all of us.
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I think he means 35 hours for 80% completion, but still, I think you're onto something. More time spent in a game = more hours per dollar. Being bad at games can be beneficial, and some would even say fairly fucking economical.
 
Aurc said:
I think he means 35 hours for 80% completion, but still, I think you're onto something. More time spent in a game = more hours per dollar. Being bad at games can be beneficial, and some would even say fairly fucking economical.
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This is what I get for reading fami without having my coffee.

But now I get to read it twice so in a way I'm still winning.
 
Aurc said:
Hey, no shame in that. I have some good friends who are also bad at games. I root for the ones who make a genuine effort to properly engage with a game's mechanics, ask for help if necessary, and aim to understand where they're going wrong. On the other hand, I get irritated when I try to offer advice to some folks, and they insist on blaming the game and calling it shit, like some sort of DSP-lite (or quite famously, David Jaffe with his Metroid Dread moment). As long as you're in the former camp, you shouldn't allow your modest skill level to impede upon your enjoyment of a game (and it sounds like you don't!) Metroid Prime is a pretty easy game to get stuck in, so it's understandable.
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He would have really struggled with Super Metroid where you’re literally looking at the map and using bombs to experiment and try and forge your own path forward. I really like that in games. It’s like earlier Zelda games where dungeons didn’t always have massive obvious cracks to say ‘bomb here’, you had to hit the walls with your sword and listen for the ‘hollow’ sound. But you could infer where a bombable section might be through either a suspicious wall in a dead end, or looking at the map once you’d explored elsewhere and thinking ‘the natural place for a way through would be around here’. Same goes for Etrian Odyssey, here you can find shortcuts by checking each wall section. But if you’ve explored the whole floor map, you can massively narrow it down due to the games rules on tile placement and how there’s always a gap of one tile between corridors and rooms etc. it’s such a great feeling to pick a tile and think ‘if I were a shortcut, I’d be there as it feels right’, and be proven correct.

Handholding and directly telling the player ‘secret path here!’ isn’t always a good thing in games with exploration elements. I think the requirement to slow down and experiment, the patience, pacing and it’s sweet reward just stumps players who want to run through fast on a single run, or are streaming, or don’t want to stop and think and examine things.

While such exploration appeals to me, the game element that I find difficult is usually any kind of action game with a parry mechanic, as my reactions always feel a little off, I just seem to miss the window. Still, it’s usually about practice and recognising the enemy tells, and it didn’t stop me finishing BOTW/TOTK (although you can clear most of the games without using it).
 
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Wockio said:
One of my most embarrassing gaming memories is the Three Houses DLC, that took me 40 hours to beat because I completely misinterpreted the requierements of a specific mission that meant the way I was trying to clear it was pretty much impossible.

Anyone else?
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That to me sounds more like you have more patience and determination then I have.

If I feel something is bullshit/really hard where an hour or 2 of grinding would not help, then I would check the web. (Most of the cases I missed something, but if it's really that bs and there is no cheese strategy, then I stop there).

So... Is it fun? If yes, then that's all that matters :)
If not, you're not obligated to finish games or do them by your own, look at checking the web as a helping hand from colleagues on a task.
 
Wockio said:
That's right. I'm bad at videogames. I love them but I suck at them.
With the amount of time I put into them you would think I'd be pretty good... but that's far from the truth.

I beat Metroid Prime for the first time last year with Remastered. Took me 35 hours at around 80 something completion. Average time for that game is half of that, even first time runs.
One of my most embarrassing gaming memories is the Three Houses DLC, that took me 40 hours to beat because I completely misinterpreted the requierements of a specific mission that meant the way I was trying to clear it was pretty much impossible.

Anyone else?
Click to expand...
If you managed to beat Metroid Prime, you're pretty good, actually.
 
The point of games is to have fun. Not to be be good at them.
If you can have fun while being bad at them then everything is fine.
 
I think it depends on the genre for me. Strategic, more laid back games I would say I am decent at as it more uses my brain. But give me a shooter and I don't know left from right and vice versa. Nowadays, partly due to time, I play most games on easy or normal as well to just enjoy the experience it has. If I want to have more of a challenge most of the time I can always change it.
 
I'm quite "bad" at super twitchy first-person games - playing something like the newer DOOM titles on high difficulty is not something that is fun for me.

Don't mind games like Dark Souls though*, but a lot of me "getting better" at RPGs is having more patience to learn the various mechanics and how to best apply them.

*I don't consider Dark Souls to be that twitchy a game, people often mistake it for an action game but it's very much an RPG.
 
I got stuck in Metroid Prime and never beat it after going around the map like 6 times soo.....

I later looked it up and apparently missed 2 important items somehow, oops
 
As soon as it gets competitive and stressful, I suck. I could never win something like Fortnite or Tetris 99, I really tried but gave up. I'm an absolute victim in Hunt: Showdown, I like the game but I ruin my teammates stats. I am uncreative at Fighting Games. I can't handle racing simulators, everything that is more "real" than Burnout or Need for Speed is a chore.

OK, I can have my winning streaks in Mario Kart online, I remember being not that bad in ARMS, I am good company in Monster Hunter, Helldivers 2, yeah, I can contribute, I can beat harder games like Elden Ring but that's pretty much it. I like the laid back experiences more :)
 
While I think I'm actually above average at video games overall, I think I might be the worst in the entire world at stealth related games. Like, just unbelievably bad.

I tried playing Horizon Zero Dawn but I literally could not get past the tutorial section where you had to sneak up on the dinosaur. I have never played Wind Waker again because I was so traumatized by the opening fortress section. I got through it, but it took me hours to complete. In BotW, I had to brute force the Gerudo banana stealth section. I literally had to kill everything in the area. I had more luck with that than the stealth stuff. I'm just so impatient in games and I can't stand waiting for anything. So yeah.
 
oh yeah totally, same

but I don't think people should be like. good at video games. even people who enjoy them.

it's for the joy of it, you know? I suck bad at Souls games yet I play them for like 200+ hours because I like them, even if I screw up badly and spend 30 hours super lost or unable to proceed

plus like. How Long To Beat sucks (but is fascinating, but like existentially sucks).

it's an average made up of the kind of people who would self-report their time to complete on How Long To Beat... so there's some inherent bias towards the people who care most about that stat

just enjoy games as what they are to you. there's not really a "wrong" way to play a game. if your favorite thing to do in a game is walk to the same pocket and vibe out to the music... then fuck yeah!

enjoy whatever it has to bring you, let it meet you where you are.

don't fall for the comparative bullshit. just fucking play how you like.
 
OP, I only beat Prime after looking at a guide. I only beat Elden Ring cheesing like crazy during the last boos fight, was never able to beat any other souls-like game.
 
I never beat Sekiro, a game that I love to death, because I suuuuuuuck at it. I'm only ok-ish at platformers.
 
I’m very bad at games that require skill. I suck at Platinum games for example. I love NieR:Automata, but I play with auto-dodge.

But I beat Sekiro. I have no idea how that happened.
 
I got stuck in Prime at the tutorial level as a kid because I didn’t read or pick up that you had to use the scan visor for the longest time lol.
 
Here's the secret, pretty everyone is bad. Most of Fami probably has never seen their own character slip in Smash Bros. Brawl. That's how bad we are.
 
Suswave said:
oh yeah totally, same

but I don't think people should be like. good at video games. even people who enjoy them.

it's for the joy of it, you know? I suck bad at Souls games yet I play them for like 200+ hours because I like them, even if I screw up badly and spend 30 hours super lost or unable to proceed

plus like. How Long To Beat sucks (but is fascinating, but like existentially sucks).

it's an average made up of the kind of people who would self-report their time to complete on How Long To Beat... so there's some inherent bias towards the people who care most about that stat

just enjoy games as what they are to you. there's not really a "wrong" way to play a game. if your favorite thing to do in a game is walk to the same pocket and vibe out to the music... then fuck yeah!

enjoy whatever it has to bring you, let it meet you where you are.

don't fall for the comparative bullshit. just fucking play how you like.
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how long to beat has different categories tho, one is leisurely. In my experience it's been pretty good tho I agree with the rest of your post for sure
 
maybe it's because I grew up poor or whatever but like. it's always been an advantage for me to take a long time with a video game. the perfect balance of me being "bad enough to take a while" with the game being "enjoyable enough to keep coming back" is an absolute gift.

this was definitely my experience with a lot of games, including at least two Donkey Kong Countries.

I stand by it!
 
jirou said:
how long to beat has different categories tho, one is leisurely. In my experience it's been pretty good tho I agree with the rest of your post for sure
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well yeah. it's very good at what it does. but I figured it was kinder than saying "people suck on principle for getting weird about comparing themselves to the average time in How Long to Beat"

you're right though, definitely why I said it was fascinating, just... people are bad with self-comparison and it takes a lot of work to get out of it
 
It's okay, ultimately if you're having a good time taking things slow and being "bad" that's all that matters. I'd consider myself pretty good at most games, but there are genres and styles of games I'm terrible at like MOBAs and RTSes. I also personally have a problem in a lot of games where I can solve all the hard puzzles no problem, but then something that isn't even supposed to be a puzzle completely stumps me because I just missed the obvious. I remember in Skyward Sword's first dungeon there's a part you're supposed to jump in the water to swim under a bridge and flip a switch. It took me a solid 15 minutes to find because I kept missing the switch no matter how many times I swam in circles in the water.
 
Suswave said:
well yeah. it's very good at what it does. but I figured it was kinder than saying "people suck on principle for getting weird about comparing themselves to the average time in How Long to Beat"

you're right though, definitely why I said it was fascinating, just... people are bad with self-comparison and it takes a lot of work to get out of it
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Oh yeah I feel like many people use it to see if they have time for a game and I view the people who post theirs as helpful database gnomes. But I can see the self-comparison point as well
 
If you're having fun while not being good/losing at a videogame you're actually winning really hard.
 
I’m not very good at action combat. But love monster hunter and persevere. I think a lot of other action games I abandoned, if I had liked the themes of the game as much, I likely would have persevered with them too. As it took me a looooong time to be reasonable enough with a single weapon in MH to be able to solo G-rank combat. And I think that’s partially why Rise has more options like being able to play all the online content offline, and have a set of G-rank missions with an NPC party, or having a full party of pets accompanying you, that kind of thing. The games have become much more adaptable to the player over time, rather than the other way around.
 
Yeah, I didn't grow up with them, so I don't have any instincts for what a game is trying to communicate, I don't have good reaction time, and I didn't ever have time spent beating my head against a level as a kid, so I don't enjoy mastering games.

I don't engage with deep mechanics because I never assume my failure (which is constant) is a product of insufficient skill with advanced stuff and purely with a lack of mastery of the basics, which is almost always true. I will spend 10 hours beating the boss in a Mario game.

I enjoy them, so I keep playing, but it does make it feel like I don't have a place in the fan community, because my relationship to games is so different
 
I'm really bad at shooters, other than Splatoon which I am very good at for some reason 😅
 
Wockio said:
That's right. I'm bad at videogames. I love them but I suck at them.
With the amount of time I put into them you would think I'd be pretty good... but that's far from the truth.

I beat Metroid Prime for the first time last year with Remastered. Took me 35 hours at around 80 something completion. Average time for that game is half of that, even first time runs.
One of my most embarrassing gaming memories is the Three Houses DLC, that took me 40 hours to beat because I completely misinterpreted the requierements of a specific mission that meant the way I was trying to clear it was pretty much impossible.

Anyone else?
Click to expand...
Oh god I suck at most things I like to do. I just enjoy doing them and don't really expect to achieve any kind of brilliance. For example, since I started logging my board game matches I've won around 30% of the time. This year alone I've won only 20% of around 50 times I've played.
I must do a 100% completion every Metroid game (and yeah, I'll use guides if needed) simply because I'd get really murdered in the final bosses without everything. In fact just this week Mecha Ridley wiped the floor with me in MPR. Probably that's why I can't really resonate with soulslike.
But I don't care, I'll just play and enjoy it anyway :).
 
I have a hard time with RPG's and Fighting games, even with Smash, and I wouldn't say I'm overall good with shooters, but for me I am better at shooters than RPG's and Fighting games. And even tho I am bad in Fighting games, I still would like to play Smash, or like to try Street Fighter, King of Fighters, etc.

With Smash, I barely go online because I suck. Every time, I play against people who always beat me, and I feel so ashamed of that. I feel like they laugh at me for being so bad. I usually play offline against the CPU, and that's just fine with me. I do hope Smash returns a big adventure mode, like Subspace Emmisary. I like Smash for the big crossovers, and even with only that in mind, I really want CJ from San Andreas.

But even with some Shooters, I feel the hatred on me aswell, like I played CoD on my PC and I randomly decided for once to turn on the voice chat, and people were really annoying since they insulted me of how I play. While if I turn off the VC, I feel more relaxed and focused on what I do in a match. In Splatoon, it's the same, altho I admit I can be annoying against some of my teammates at times, but I keep that to myself. But even I can suck hard at Splatoon at times, that I blame myself. It was very hard for me to get used to the Gold Dynamo Roller, but I did not give up on trying to master it, and I follow some twitter accounts of people who, like me, are dedicated on that weapon, and where I am jealous of how much better they are then me.

But in the end, even if I am bad at a game or genre, if doesn't really matter to me. I mostly play games at a relaxed paced time, and I really am not into competitive play, because all that stress for winning a game or tourney gets me really mad, and sucks out the joy of the game to me. I play video games because they are fun and give relaxation, not because I need to prove myself or others. Especially after a hard day's of work, I play games for that relaxation.

I tend to play some singleplayer games, but I do that on an even more slower pace, just to follow through the story at an more enjoyable pace. Years ago, my brother advised me to play Red Dead Redemption II very slowly, and I did. I finished the story through a whole year, and I am so glad that I did, since every little piece was still big to me, and I could emotionally feel how characters were written. Since november I have Red Dead Redemption on Switch, and whaddaya know, I still haven't finished the story, while I am going to.

In my opinion, OP, you should not worry about being bad at a game, but be glad that you enjoy it nevertheless.
 
I’m decent to good at most games, I guess cause I grew up playing a ton, and had a very competitive brother who is super super good at games so I had to try and keep up with him.

I suck at strategy and card games though. I used to play the civ games in multiplayer with a friend and I would lose every single time. I think maybe I got a draw once?
And although I love it, I’m also terrible at slay the spire. It took me like 60 attempts to finally beat the last boss of that game.
 
it's like any hobby — do it because you enjoy it, don't turn it into a "grindset"

it's just like drawing, or sewing, or making little flash animations...

or, well, I guess more like reading books or watching a show, since there's less direct creation. but more agency!

don't be good at it, enjoy it! see where it takes you but focus on enjoyment!
 
I’m the guy that plays almost every game on easy mode lol. I don’t play games to “prove my skills to someone”, I play them because they’re fun. I’m abysmal at fighting games (excluding Smash where I’m in that awkward middle ground where I crush casual players but get crushed by competitive players so I have no one to play it with).

I’m really bad with platformers where I don’t play them unless they’re super easy (like Mario games) or super forgiving (like Celeste). I just could not get into classic DKC because of its difficulty.

I’m probably never touching a FromSoft game. That “git gud” “get filtered lol” community is just really not appealing to me.

I have to like the game to play it on normal mode and REALLY love it to play it on hard. A good example of the latter is Metroid Dread, an already hard game that I beat on hard mode because I played normal mode so much it wasn’t difficult anymore. I don’t usually do that.
 
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