• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

The 'I hate short games' thread

O

Oblivion

Fetishing muscular manly men in skintight hosery
By that I mean games that you can beat on a bathroom break. Ever since Miyamto said games are too long nowadays, it filled me with a bitter taste. I'd rather have long games than games that leave me yearning for more. Yeah, I would probably not mind the 5 hour games that Nintendo's been making recently, if they were like $10. No way in hell I'm gonna pay $50 for a game that I could beat in an afternoon.

Yall feel me?
 
The length of the game doesn't neccesarily translate into a better gaming experience.

Super Metroid is proof of this.
 
I like good games, I don't care if they're long or short, as long as they're designed well. I tend to replay short games much more than long games like RPGs, and as long as they're designed that way, I'm happy.

I'd rather have 5 hours of great fun than a badly paced 20 hour game that I have to force myself to complete.
 
Nah, not really.

I like short games. It's fairly rare to have a 20+ hour game without feeling like I need to push myself through a few dull parts. Doesn't happen very often in a 10 hour game.
 
I dont mind short games if they're really really good or have incentives for me to replay the game

Games like Zone of the Enders 2, Ace Combat 4 and Viewtiful Joe are pretty damn short, but I probably played each of them more than a single game that takes 20 hours to beat
 
Culex said:
The length of the game doesn't neccesarily translate into a better gaming experience.

Super Metroid is proof of this.
Click to expand...

Of course. I'm just saying that a game that's long, and not JUST long to artificially lengthen the time (i.e. WW), is better than some really short ass game. And as far as games go, I'm speaking of games nowadays, so it's not fair to compare it to SNES games and whatnot.
 
I knew this'd be Nintendo before I entered the thread. You (and perhaps one or two others here) are on an anti-simplicity crusade apparently. Its not a brilliant idea in every case, but that isn't to say its not suitable sometimes.

So I can't say I'm with you. Their recent games, notably the short Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, the shorter-than-usual-for-a-Zelda Wind Waker game, Minish Cap, and umpteen simpler offerings on DS are some of the most fun things I've played in years. There's a fair selection of longer games available on Nintendo machines from First and Second parties too.

I gotta wonder if this thread would have come up if it were THQ, Activision or SEGA or something we were talking about... I don't know if its because of 20 years of Nintendo setting the bar high, but peoples likes to moans.
 
I don't mind "short" games at all, as long as their great games. A game like God of War, is only about 10 hours long...But it's 10 hours of epic, emotion, action packed gameplay worth every minute of it.
 
radioheadrule83 said:
I knew this'd be Nintendo before I entered the thread. You (and perhaps one or two others here) are on an anti-simplicity crusade apparently. Its not a brilliant idea in every case, but that isn't to say its not suitable sometimes.

So I can't say I'm with you. Their recent games, notably the short Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, the shorter-than-usual-for-a-Zelda Wind Waker game, Minish Cap, and umpteen simpler offerings on DS are some of the most fun things I've played in years. There's a fair selection of longer games available on Nintendo machines from First and Second parties too.

I gotta wonder if this thread would have come up if it were THQ, Activision or SEGA or something we were talking about... I don't know if its because of 20 years of Nintendo setting the bar high, but peoples likes to moans.
Click to expand...

This goes for all developers.
 
Fair enough...

My opinion stands as is though. I think its suitable for the game sometimes... and as others have said, longer games can be a more daunting undertaking when it comes to replayability. Some of us might play the shorter titles more often.
 
Another Code was really too short, it could be such an awsome game.. but just when you start thinking "man this game is one of the best games I've ever pl...." whoops.. game over.
 
Games that are like that (Another Code) and such are not the kind of games one should be splurging full price admission for, knowing that they will be walking easily into what could be a 30 minute showing.
 
I'm in the "I don't mind if its short if its good" camp here. Sierra adventure games, some of my favorites of all time, are invariably short. For an RPG, if its only 8 hours, there coul dbe problems. I could only imagine if I paid the full $60 for Rhapsody (I lucked out and found it for $20 a few years back) or Arc the Lad 1 (The original Japanese release outside of the collection.) RPGs should be long, but shortness isnt always that bad, just look at any Ys game for proof of that.

And BTW, my favorite Sierra Adventure game (Space Quest 4,) I can beat in a half hour, but I still enjoy it.
 
10 hours is actually quite a long time for people with regular jobs and whatnot. People say "Yeah, I bet God of War over the weekend, it's too short". Yeah fuck ass because you played it for 7 hours a day.
 
I'm fine with short games, but I'm getting annoyed with games that use a really basic level design, but do not go all out with it.

For example: Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, DK: King of Swing, and Kirby: Canvas Curse. Each have a level design which is really simple, almost to the point of where you could use a "level builder" and create your own. Yet the games never try and go that extra mile and add a shit-ton of levels into it.

DKJB had, what, technically around 30 levels. I mean, you could have plenty of those jelly-levels in there.

DK King of Swing is HARD, but satisfying to finish, but there are only 20ish levels in all. The levels are SO basic, you could add 100 in there without a sweat.

Kirby again, has a basic level design, but it's all over pretty quickly. There was, like, one level that utilised wind? Keep going guys! Make 5 of them! They also seemed a little restrained since at least one section of each level had to be completable with as little ink as possible.

I'm afraid Pac 'n' Roll will be really short too, despite the levels looking like something made out of a Tony Hawk Skatepark creator. Anyone played it / finished it? How many levels in total?
 
Reilly said:
10 hours is actually quite a long time for people with regular jobs and whatnot. People say "Yeah, I bet God of War over the weekend, it's too short". Yeah fuck ass because you played it for 7 hours a day.
Click to expand...

I knew someone would bring up the 'well, I've got work/school/a life/etc." argument. So here's my question: If you BOUGHT the game, can't you, you know, beat it whenever the hell you want?
 
I'll buy short games, but I can't stand to quit playing a game just because I realize it will be over in an hour.
 
Depends on the game, of course.

I just beat Chronicle's of Riddick and loved the experience, but I'm glad it was only 10 hours, any more and it would have been overkill.

And the way they did it (minimum gunplay) was brilliant, you didn't get bogged down just upgrading your guns the whole game and clear room after room. You get a few guns, then you lose them, happens again and you realize that you're not going to get a BFG1000 and clear more rooms with that.

I really liked the game...very kewl.
 
I hardly ever finish my games anyway, so it doesn't make a lick of difference to me. I grew up with the Genesis, and every game was 4 hours long. I was happy being able to play through four games in a weekend.
 
Oblivion said:
Ever since Miyamto said games are too long nowadays, it filled me with a bitter taste. I'd rather have long games than games that leave me yearning for more. Yeah, I would probably not mind the 5 hour games that Nintendo's been making recently, if they were like $10. No way in hell I'm gonna pay $50 for a game that I could beat in an afternoon.

Yall feel me?
Click to expand...

Not really.
 
I am all for a long game, but most of the LOOOOOONG games in history are usually exercises in patience. Look back on what are generally considered the best games ever and most are not terribly long.

I think a solid 10-15 hour game is sufficient. It isnt too long as to feel like a chore, but its not so short that you feel ripped off. Length shouldnt matter if the core of the game is solid, look at God of War as an example of that.
 
What do you guys prefer:

50$ on a 30 hours game that 20 hours are boring or
50$ on a 15 hours game that is awesome back to back?


Except some RPGs, i've pretty much never seen 30 hours games that does not have weak parts and filler stuff. I have nothing against short games if they are good.

That could also be a solution for cost next gen. Devellopers just make shorter games but put more effort in it. Those would be less costly to produce and our gaming time will have a better use. It would be a win-win situation imo.
 
If it's a game that has excellent gameplay, is pure fun and i have an amazing time playing it; then I don't care whether it's only 8hours. I end up playing it 10 times over because of how good a game it is; Jungle Beat for instance is a great example of a more recent title.
If a game is say 30 or 40 hours long....a lot of the time I will play the game once and then move on to something else. If it's an amazing game I will play it again......but there are only a handful of games that make you want to go back and experience it again (not even factoring in the amount of time I have available to spend on gaming; which would make extremely long games even more pointless).
Then there are other times when I just don't get to complete a game because of various reasons/combination of; available time for gaming, release of new games, boring sections within a game, starting another and not going back to previous game, etc.
So what you end up with is; enjoying a game that is 8hours many times over and hopefully getting to complete a great 30hour game once or maybe twice.

I welcome more games that give me an amazing experience and can be played many times over retaining that same experience and fun factor. But at the same time, it's important to also keep outputting games that are long and give you great adventure, aslong as its fun throughout and has great flow.....else there's no point of having it be that long.

Ninty has said that they would still be doing both, i think what they mean when talking about shorter games is that they wanna cut out all the worthless crap that just slow the flow and is just not fun to do compared to all the other parts of the game. I'm very interested in seeing exactly what they do with them.
 
Guys, I'm not against games that are less than 40 hours. I'm trying to say that a game that a game has to be a good enough length to be satisfying. I could beat Super Mario World in a few hours, and I still love it to death. But games for the CURRENT generation need to be a significant lenght. I guess games that are 15 hours are perfectly dandy if they make you feel it's worth it. It's just that I've seen quite a few games that are reallyl short this gen. and just don't even have any replay value or anything. And that's what annoys me.
 
I hate long games that are really short games on the inside with TONS OF PADDING to make them long because of threads like this.
 
Oblivion said:
Guys, I'm not against games that are less than 40 hours. I'm trying to say that a game that a game has to be a good enough length to be satisfying. I could beat Super Mario World in a few hours, and I still love it to death. But games for the CURRENT generation need to be a significant lenght. I guess games that are 15 hours are perfectly dandy if they make you feel it's worth it. It's just that I've seen quite a few games that are reallyl short this gen. and just don't even have any replay value or anything. And that's what annoys me.
Click to expand...
Read your thread title and 1st post again and wonder why we were lead to believe differently.
 
EternalDarko said:
Read your thread title and 1st post again and wonder why we were lead to believe differently.
Click to expand...

Sorry, I meant ridiculously short games, like DK: JB. The main game takes like what, 4 hours?
 
Sonic_3_&_Knuckles_GEN_ScreenShot2.jpg


I love short games, actually
 
I really like 10 hour games. I don't have time to finish 20-30 hour ones.. About the only game I did close to 30 hours on in the last few years (in single player) is Resident Evil 4. Oh, Advance Wars I've probably put 300 hours into, but that's kind of a different class. The actual single player campaign isn't 30 hours.
 
No, not really. I've been backlogged since the start of this generation, and there are seriously just so many good games coming out, for me, there is no "gaming dought." I'm too busy trying to finish the ones I got while piling on more games when they come in. Being a gamer is a time killer, being a multi-console game is a damn near life waster.
 
Why old games does not count? It's ok to be short because it's old or something?

Those old games are the proof that lenght does NOT equals fun and replay value.
 
Wyzdom said:
Why old games does not count? It's ok to be short because it's old or something?

Those old games are the proof that lenght does NOT equals fun and replay value.
Click to expand...

I mean because those old games were kinda standard to be around that length. Modern games should be longer than those. Well, some anyway....
 
It's funny how everyone disagrees with this guy. But yes, I am also in the short games camp. It's gotten to the point where I will not even consider buying games if they are going to take 80 hours or whatever to complete, I just don't have the time. 10-15 hours is about perfect. As for the whole price thing...just don't buy games at full price. :P Since I have so little time to play, I have a huge backlog anyways. By the time I get around to buying the good games, they are $20.
 
I refuse to pay full price for short games. Take POP:Sands of Time. AAA game, which I picked up used for like $12. I totally got my money's worth, but I beat the game in like 3 days. If I'd paid $50 for it, I would've felt ripped off.

I paid $34.99 for MGS 3 new, and I got at least a week or two out of it the first time, plus all the bonus stuff for getting the tranq kills on the bosses. My first run through was about 24 hours, but I probably spent 3 times that unlocking everything.

It really boils down to time amortization. POP at full retail would've been like $5/hr. I can get PPV porn at a better rate than that! MGS ended up being like $0.30/hr because of all the time I spent on it.

Nathan
 
I hate long games that are really short games on the inside with TONS OF PADDING to make them long because of threads like this.
Click to expand...

Grandia 3 was like that. I spent 8 hours on disc 2 levelling. If I didn't stop at the last boss, I probably would've had to do another 5-8 hours just to beat it.
 
Oblivion said:
I mean because those old games were kinda standard to be around that length. Modern games should be longer than those. Well, some anyway....
Click to expand...

??? The more time advance, the more games are supposed to be long ??

A game should be good and have replay value. A movie that is good (then you watch it again) only last 2 hours and you buy it 20$. How about a good 10 hours game with nice replay value that you pay 40$ ?
 
God of War is a great example of a game that is short yet very entertaining, however I think a little more length could help in most cases. $50 is a lot for 10 hours of gameplay, although it can be replayed. Metal gear Solid 3 was about the perfect length I think, if not a little too long. It did drag a little at the end. Hmm. Maybe 15 hours is perfect. Unless its an rpg.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Geoff sucks and I hate his overselling
2 3
102
497
RSLAEV replied
[Rumor] [MLiD] PSSR 2 Reportedly Doesn’t Have Frame Generation in the Plans: "developers hate it, hate it, hate it."
Rumor  2 3
107
1K
S0ULZB0URNE replied
Need a short (20-30 hours) chill game
2 3
105
862
poodaddy replied
Does Ubisoft hate it’s past catalog, why haven’t they brought these games forward?
2
51
525
rodrigolfp replied
The gaming nostalgia thread.
47
761
Alexios replied
Top Bottom