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What's the point of Special Stages?


MetalSkulkBane

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1 hour ago, Despatche said:

Simply incorrect. Most of my post above was either plain fact (no opinion behind it) or assumptions based on my own research and long talks with others (still not opinion). At no point am I concerned with "I like/dislike this" except when I mentioned that I dislike a number of aspects of classic Sonic, entirely as a sidenote, because it was offtopic and I didn't want to get into it.

Except for these statements-

On 6/30/2016 at 6:55 AM, Despatche said:

It's unfair that you get to speak for all the people who do like special stages.

 

On 6/30/2016 at 6:55 AM, Despatche said:

How negative. How about, instead: "Here are some optional challenges to break away from the main game; if you complete them all, you unlock some secrets".

 

On 6/30/2016 at 6:55 AM, Despatche said:

How cruel. I don't know which self-respecting game designer would call this "artificial difficulty" and "filler", but I wouldn't trust them to make a good and varied game, that's for sure.

 

On 6/30/2016 at 6:55 AM, Despatche said:

You don't need to be all that great at the actual game to knock out the special stages.

 

On 6/30/2016 at 6:55 AM, Despatche said:

Lives are absolutely not an outdated concept, it's just that so many game designers have forgotten how to use them properly. Arcade game designers were usually pretty good about life system design.

 

On 6/30/2016 at 6:55 AM, Despatche said:

It's not a good alternative because there's not much to finding them; they're just kinda... there.

 

On 6/30/2016 at 8:54 AM, Despatche said:

It seems awfully presumptuous to make such a massive conclusion from a one-and-a-half-page thread on a very specific forum

 

On 6/30/2016 at 8:54 AM, Despatche said:

I posit that the vast majority of criticism against Sonic 2's special stages would only come from foolishly playing the Sonic+Tails mode single player

 

On 6/30/2016 at 8:54 AM, Despatche said:

Lastly, I think Nepenthe's "special stages are fundamentally pretty easy to understand" needs to be repeated.

 

Literally none of these statements are based in fact.  And none of these are just random asides.  They are very the central idea of their respective paragraphs. (Some of them even from the same paragraph)  And they certainly don't have any basis in intrinsic game design.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

The terms are inherently negative because the world has always assigned them negatively. The entire point of the term "artificial difficulty" is that something about it is supposed to be "inorganic" and somehow cheats the player. The entire point of the term "filler" is that it's taking up "space" that could be used for other things, or taking up people's time. These are not my definitions as I don't even use these words; these are the time-worn definitions that have been used for countless years now by everyone else on the planet... except for certain people in this thread, apparently.

You can't claim that they're inherently negative regardless of actual context and then later say "I guess we have different definitions of 'self-contained'" later on in this very post.  You're very blatantly attempting to interpret things in your favor.  By this paragraph, you still have no reason to assert that the content in SA1 is "self-contained" by any definition of the term.

 

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

ou misunderstand what's happening, and this is exactly what happened to lives, by the way. It takes a very specific kind of person to actually stick with a game and get good at it beyond the resources given. This did not used to be the case, because we used to live in an era where people were given a reasonable amount of resources to play a game with. Resources were trivialized so long ago that noone really remembers what it's like to design resources well. Challenge means nothing except to speedrunners and other so-called "hardcore" gamers; nowadays, you slog and grind through a game once, and maybe play it again in some distant future, largely based on your very specific first impression more than anything else

Ignoring that this is once again, based in opinion, I have literally no idea what you're talking about, because we must have grown up in two completely different nineties and even present times for that matter.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

So, the idea of getting through on one chance is completely out because noone really cares. Resources now matter. Giving you three chances would make it more difficult because you would have to actually learn to play and to play well, rather than blasting through the game every time you boot it up until you get bored. The game is already "repetitive and stale", and your entire experience is running on the fumes of your fundamental "like" of the game (again, based largely on things like first impression, peer pressure, etc).

You're making some VERY wide-reaching assumptions here.  You haven't shown how lives entice a player to be better.  You've only said that they do, and so far that I've seen, lives don't change how a game is approached if the level design and mechanics entice the player to do that on their own.  Again, forcing me to go back to Emerald Hill won't help or encourage me to do better at Metropolis Zone.  Because one is literally designed to be easy, and thus will always be easy, and the other is not.  The difficulty is rooted in level design, and while early levels can (and in a well-designed game should) prep you for the challenges of the later levels, it doesn't help being forced to go back makes the experience relatively alien.  Again, that's not adding difficulty.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

TMs and especially HMs were never a good idea no matter how it could possibly be rationalized. By itself, it irritates the item issue you're talking about, and both makes balance much more complicated (usually resulting in balance being affected negatively).

Again, opinion, not fact.  And second, that's not even where the balance issues reside.  Different moves now do different amounts and types of damage to specific types, the chances of status ailments afflciting a Pokémon are different now, Pokémon are now stronger or weaker against certain types that weren't even available in previous generations.  That's where the balance issue ultimately lies.  It has nothing to do with TM's or HM's.

I agree that the HM system is a bad idea, but not even because of battle.  But because it slows the progression of the game down and allows the developers to dictate how and when you get to certain areas.  Not to mention, it takes up a move slot that could otherwise be used for an actually useful move, which is more than a little vexing.  But again, that does nothing for the actual issues of balance.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

Pokemon single player was always as easy as it is now, it's just that in gen 1 you had things like Psychic and Normal. The basic single player "campaign" of defeating the champion is a very small part of both what Pokemon is and what it's meant to be.

Also an opinionated statement, and I disagree.  If I can beat ORAS in a week (and that's taking procrastination into account and times when I couldn't be arsed to pick the game up) despite Pokémon being severely underleveled, but at least twice as long to beat gen 1, 2, or 3 with higher level Pokémon with a type advantage, I think that demonstrates that at least from my experiences, the games were much more difficult, though not always in a good way.  Not to mention, the former literally just outright gives you a legendary from the start.  And in Black/White, you can catch the legendary on the box in literally only one or two or Ultra Balls, whereas in previous generations, facing the legendary was almost guaranteed to set you back by quite a large amount, even when it was at low HP.

The campaign is only a small part of the game, yes, but I wasn't talking about the main marketing point of the game.  That is, the catching them all and trading and battling with friends/online strangers that use action replay.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

Resources given has very little to do with specific level design. No amount of lives will save poor level design; it is usually argued that an abundance of lives is meant to "fix" poor design. Wow, yet another reason why this "resource inflation" is a terrible idea. The purpose of resources is to allow an alternative to forcing players to play perfectly all the time; with resource design, you get levels of skill, wiggle room, baby steps on the road to being skilled. Note that "resources" also refers to things like, say, items in monitors.

Neither adding or reducing lives could be used to "fix" level design.  My point was that if a game is poorly designed, the developers might limit lives to artificially lengthen the game.  That is, in the case where the level design is bad in a way that makes it easier.    Different from games like Sunday Funday, where extra lives are needed the level design is so abysmally bad that it causes you to die frequently.  Whereas a game that doesn't have lives and can be bulldozed through was probably made by someone who doesn't give a fuck either way.  Granted, I never argued that all resources should be infinite.  If Sonic games handed out rings, shields, invincibility boxes, etc. like a surplus sale, then of course that would negatively impact the difficulty.  Lives, on the other hand, just don't.

In the context of a platformer game, I'd argue resources have a lot to do with level design.  In Sonic games, the rings must be placed in a location that is strategic so players will make the decision as to rather or not they want to risk getting them.  Putting invincibility boxes next to a part with no enemies or environmental hazards to use them on (which retro games for some reason seem to get a jolly out of doing) would count as bad level design.  How you interact with the things within the level is an important aspect of the level design as much as geometry and enemy placement.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

People have been bred to hate "trial and error" and "memorization". They have created new game-specific definitions for these terms, completely ignoring their core definitions for the purpose of video games. In doing so, they throw out any foundation in their ranting about "skill" and "cheapness"... when it really just boils down to them not really wanting to be good at the game, because they've been bred to believe that being good at games doesn't "matter".

I can not remember a single time in the history of gaming where forced memorization and trial and error were ever seen as positive traits.  I can only remember certain aspects being tolerated because there wasn't anything else out there.  Can I also make the argument that you've been led to believe anything that doesn't coincide with your opinion is the result of some kind of cultural shortcoming?  It wouldn't have any more or less validity than you just throwing out random psychology and an ironic display of presumptuousness.

1 hour ago, Despatche said:

At the end of it all, you say that you have problems with Special Stages, but are they simple dislikes, or do you legitimately challenge the developer's better judgement? As I said earlier, I take issue with the frequent confusion of these two things by what seems to be every other human being in existence. It goes well beyond Sonic, and it definitely goes well beyond video games. It's impossible to have a serious conversation about anything when you're constantly having to puzzle out whether someone's just mad at a thing, or whether someone is legitimately trying to explain and solve a problem. It matters even more because this is the Sonic community, where problems tend to be meaningfully solved in ways that very few other series can attest to, because the healthy fangame and hacking aspect can make solutions real.

You're creating a false dichotomy where emotions and experiences are mutually exclusive to design principles when one is instrinsically based on the other.  It's even harder to have a serious conversation when you're denying legitimate points because they don't fit your extremely specific criteria.

The answer to your question is yes.  Because both answers are true.  They are both simple dislikes and I legitimately challenge the developer's better judgment.  I simply dislike being forced to memorize things and have to repeat the same thing over and over again, even when that thing is something I legit adore.  I also question the developers' judgment, because I think it's really backwards that you would be forced to memorize a piece of the game that, at the time of release, could not be easily revisited in order to get the memory necessary in the first place.

Meanwhile, all I've seen you do so far is get mad at people for expressing opinions in a way that doesn't necessarily fit to your liking, and then pushing off arbitrary and opinionated statements as intrinsic facts baesd in game design, when, again, I've yet to see any of that.

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2 hours ago, Despatche said:
 

It seems rather silly to compare the results of a TAS to any particular thought on stage length like that. You have to consider that the Special Stages aren't really "designed" for the absolute expert player who can tear through levels in ridiculous times (if they were, you'd REALLY hate Special Stages). After that, you have to consider that there are tons of zips and other weird tricks in all the games; just have a look at the beauty that is Marble Zone Act 3.

You're still spending a half hour getting blue balls spheres.  

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1 hour ago, Phos said:

You're still spending a half hour getting blue balls spheres.  

Okay, first of all, not all of that extra time is actually playing special stages - a majority of an any% TAS's playthrough is zipping, which you can't do when you need to collect every special stage ring possible along the way. It's not so much the length of the special stages themselves so much as it is the concept of "clipping through the floor and skipping the entire fucking level". The actual difference is a little more than 10 minutes off the top of my head if you play a zero Chaos Emerald run zip-less.

Secondly, it's a bloody 100% playthrough what part of you actually expected it not to take a lot longer to complete

 

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I generally enjoy special stages, though some can be frustrating. The reason I bothered clicking on this topic is because the Sonic Advance Special Stages are pissing me off right now haha. I realized recently I've never 100%ed the game, and am trying to do so now...but I've found some rings impossible to get in the very first stage, making it so I cannot get a single Chaos Emerald.

What I would like to see in the future is to be able to unlock the special stage in level select once you get there the first time so that you may try it again and again whenever you want instead of having to restart and get back to the same part of the level, replay the level with x number of rings (or a key in Heroes' case, though those were easy enough I didn't really mind), or collect special rings and get to the end in the case of Sonic Advance 2.

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Just now, BradAric said:

What I would like to see in the future is to be able to unlock the special stage in level select once you get there the first time so that you may try it again and again whenever you want instead of having to restart and get back to the same part of the level, replay the level with x number of rings (or a key in Heroes' case, though those were easy enough I didn't really mind), or collect special rings and get to the end in the case of Sonic Advance 2.

Sonic 4 does this...but they still be bad business.

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1 minute ago, StaticMania said:

Sonic 4 does this...but they still be bad business.

Not quite...you have to BEAT the Special Stage in order for it to appear in level select, meaning you still have to play through an entire level again just to make another attempt.

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For me Sonic 3 had the best special stages. They were the funnest and easiest to me, I feel like I very quickly mastered them when I was young. Well, as I got older and I try to play them I have problem with the background and all the moving objects while Sonic runs, my eyes aren't able to keep up. I don't have problems completing those, I just seem to get confused easier by the visual style...I mean...those things are some psychedelic stuff. All special stages.

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On 4.07.2016 at 3:38 AM, BradAric said:

Not quite...you have to BEAT the Special Stage in order for it to appear in level select, meaning you still have to play through an entire level again just to make another attempt.

You do know about restart button in Sonic 4? You can restart Special Stage in any moment, as long as "Game Over" screen didn't appear. It kinda makes them a joke (I'm 100% sure it's true about ep 2, don't remember first one),

Also, I had same problems as you with Advance 1, but with patience and watching videos on youtube you will eventually succeed. Advance 2 on the other hand...

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10 minutes ago, MetalSkulkBane said:

You do know about restart button in Sonic 4? You can restart Special Stage in any moment, as long as "Game Over" screen didn't appear. It kinda makes them a joke (I'm 100% sure it's true about ep 2, don't remember first one),

Also, I had same problems as you with Advance 1, but with patience and watching videos on youtube you will eventually succeed. Advance 2 on the other hand...

No, I didn't know that...I'll have to check next time I play.

It's funny, I hear that a lot about Advance 2, but I have 5 chaos emeralds in that game and none in Advance 1 lol.

 

2 hours ago, BlueFlare said:

For me Sonic 3 had the best special stages. They were the funnest and easiest to me, I feel like I very quickly mastered them when I was young. Well, as I got older and I try to play them I have problem with the background and all the moving objects while Sonic runs, my eyes aren't able to keep up. I don't have problems completing those, I just seem to get confused easier by the visual style...I mean...those things are some psychedelic stuff. All special stages.

While I normally don't have a problem keeping up, I recently discovered the DS version stutters a LOT during those stages and it makes it way more difficult. Either way, I agree with you that those are the best style.

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1 minute ago, BradAric said:

No, I didn't know that...I'll have to check next time I play.

It's funny, I hear that a lot about Advance 2, but I have 5 chaos emeralds in that game and none in Advance 1 lol.

Congrats. Now you only need 23 more to unlock Amy

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Just now, MetalSkulkBane said:

Congrats. Now you only need 23 more to unlock Amy

Well, less than that as I meant 5 with one character haha. I have 2-4 with the other 3 characters. But yeah I don't really care to unlock Amy, I just want the true ending and such haha

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11 hours ago, BradAric said:

While I normally don't have a problem keeping up, I recently discovered the DS version stutters a LOT during those stages and it makes it way more difficult. Either way, I agree with you that those are the best style.

The DS version in general, while the best handheld version of the game, is pretty stuttery and suffers from graphical nuances, as do all the games in that particular collection.  So yeah, it's pretty hard to do Blue Spheres in that particular version of the game.  Would make someone who doesn't even suffer from motion sickness a little bit on the squeamish side.  In general, though, they're probably my favorite special stages.

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Depends on the game. Dimps' games tend to have special stages that start off fairly manageable...yet the last one tends to spike up the difficulty.

No build-up. No preparation. Just the first few are manageable and then suddenly, BAM! You gotta avoid traps you weren't prepared for.

Look, I get making the last one the harderst, but at least put in some proper build up. I only managed to beat those by pure luck, and that's after quite a few tries.

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On 7/5/2016 at 10:07 AM, MetalSkulkBane said:

You do know about restart button in Sonic 4? You can restart Special Stage in any moment, as long as "Game Over" screen didn't appear. It kinda makes them a joke (I'm 100% sure it's true about ep 2, don't remember first one),

Confirmed for episode 1, but in the later stages all my deaths are due to those freaking exclamation points that instantly end the stage and I've found it impossible to hit start by the time I hit it, so it's ultimately useless :/

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  • 1 month later...

I tend to enjoy special stages except for a select few. However it's easy to see why people don't like them. To be totally honest I think the reason why I tend to enjoy them isn't so much because they're fun, but because I like the out there distorted worlds you get sent to in the special stages. Sometimes the gameplay is so out there it feels like a huge chore to play through a game getting all the emeralds. Sometimes just getting to the special stage is a huge chore like in the Advance games. I know generally when I play Sonic games, I try and beat it with the emeralds at first, then on subsequent playthrough's I'll be like fuck that and just finish it with the bad ending.

I think the best solution is to just make a quick obstacle course for you to get through while still using the game's normal mechanics. Like imagine if Generations had special stages, an example is that they could function something like these missions.

Just imagine instead of a goal ring at the end it's an emerald. I think something like that would make a fine "get to the emerald" challenge. To be honest I'm kind of surprised this hasn't been done before. With the way the boost games function it could easily make for a makeshift special stage challenge.

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The point of special stages is to ensure that you've lost all semblance of hope in your ability to ever complete the game, should dying and getting kicked back to the beginning of the game over and over again not sap you dry of your patience quick enough.

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