Guide's Do they really ruin the gaming experience?

The Official Braid Walkthrough is brilliant!

http://braid-game.com/walkthrough/walkthrough.html

Seriously have a read of it.

I've never bought a Guide for a game before.
Never saw the point in it tbh.

Hulohot wrote:I think I used guides for Broken Sword 1 and 2. I was young you see. Didnt cripple my enjoyment at all. Without the guides I might have never finished them.

Ah, y'see back when I were a lad and stuck on Broken sword 1&2, I used the terribly expensive "Hint line" that was advertised at the back of the manual.
I got a right hiding from my dad when the bill came in.

I only read guides if I have been stuck on something for hours or I'm doing something that would otherwise be extremely tedius (looking for all the items, the locations of all the sidequests). I would never buy a guide, gamefaqs usually has the solution to any difficulties.

Never have owned a guide and never will. Really dont see point. Would only consider one for a fighting game where they listed all the moves but as for RPG's etc its a waste of money if you ask me

It bugs the strawberry float out of me when games are essentially designed in such a way that the guide is practically a nessecity.

Last edited by jambot on Mon Oct 22, 2012 4:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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LewisD wrote:I've never bought a Guide for a game before.
Never saw the point in it tbh.

Hulohot wrote:I think I used guides for Broken Sword 1 and 2. I was young you see. Didnt cripple my enjoyment at all. Without the guides I might have never finished them.

Ah, y'see back when I were a lad and stuck on Broken sword 1&2, I used the terribly expensive "Hint line" that was advertised at the back of the manual.
I got a right hiding from my dad when the bill came in.

I didnt realise anyone used them. Are they even still around now? They came on the back of cheat books, red with that woman in the tight shorts and the gun... Do they even do cheat/ guide books with magazines now?

Very sorry for mentioning Future, but does anyone remember N64 magazine giving away an A-Z of Majora's Mask? (NGC later reissued it). I know some of you will.

That was my favourite guide ever - as they pointed out then, it was perfect for dipping in and out of. As there were so many side-quests, overworld and character related parts in comparison to actual dungeons it worked really well, and it helped me find some bits I may have missed or never bothered with.

I really wanted them to do another one for the next Zelda games, but it wasn't to be.

Double edged sword this one, sometimes it can enhance the experience like for me in wind waker where i wanted to complete a lot of the side quests but did not know how to do them.

Sometimes it can hinder the experience and make games too easy, but for series like final fantasy or even gta side missions surely it is a neccessity, surely only a saddo would spend pointless hours finding and collecting everything to such extremes. I am not against being a completionist, its just that square in particular dont really think that a gamer can get every item in their games without a guide?

Guides are also useful for stuff the gamer may not know about, other guides such as the piggyback collection are just works of art imo.

I don't see how a guide can ever ruin the experience, unless there is a particularly vicious breed of guide that has hitherto escaped my attention and that burns its content into your unwilling brain.

As someone who specializes in writing and recording semi-professional video game guides, it's quite interesting to see peoples opinions on the subject. Personally, I think they can be an excellent accompaniment when produced correctly. Piggyback do a small number of very nice guides which are designed to work with the game and not just guide you through it.

Out of plain curiosity would anyone here who do buy guides, would you ever consider buying a well produced DVD guide instead of a paper-based one if it contained a wealth of extras along with it? I only ask as it was something I've seriously considered looking into, but I wasn't too sure of whether there was a real market for such a product out there. Obviously they'd have to be official (seeing as the 'fair use' policy wouldn't go as far as full motion video), so the overall quality would be of the highest order.

All thoughts on the topic would be greatly appreciated.

Andrew Mills wrote:
Out of plain curiosity would anyone here who do buy guides, would you ever consider buying a well produced DVD guide instead of a paper-based one if it contained a wealth of extras along with it? I only ask as it was something I've seriously considered looking into, but I wasn't too sure of whether there was a real market for such a product out there. Obviously they'd have to be official (seeing as the 'fair use' policy wouldn't go as far as full motion video), so the overall quality would be of the highest order.

All thoughts on the topic would be greatly appreciated.

Not personally, a book has the advantage of being there at your side when you just want to grab it and flick through whilst playing, a dvd would mean having to dump the game to look at it unless you had a laptop stuck by your side on the sofa, though I must admit I did this with the daughter's laptop whilst playing Lost Odyssey a while ago doing sidequests, so I guess it could be viable?

OLIN wrote:Not personally, a book has the advantage of being there at your side when you just want to grab it and flick through whilst playing, a dvd would mean having to dump the game to look at it unless you had a laptop stuck by your side on the sofa, though I must admit I did this with the daughter's laptop whilst playing Lost Odyssey a while ago doing sidequests, so I guess it could be viable?

It's a very good point, and obviously one that had crossed my mind. But when I thought about it, DVD has the distinct advantage of not only visualizing a solution to a problem/puzzle, but you can also structure it so you only need see the part(s) you want (i.e. chapter search). Where as in a written guide, it's all too easy to spoil it by reading the wrong part or even by flicking through it.

Andrew Mills wrote:Where as in a written guide, it's all too easy to spoil it by reading the wrong part or even by flicking through it.

Yeah, I've been there more than once.
Too often in fact.

I like guides, these days i can't be arsed figuring out where to go and how to solve the puzzle so while i'll play a game without a guide for the most part, if i get stuck im on gamefaqs pronto. Best of both that way

The sooner you finish the game and get everything out of it the sooner you can play the next game on your list.

I love collecting the Final Fantasy guides, they give a fantastic insight into the little details fo the game, all the secrets id never think of looking for. Not only that they have fantastic artwork

I generally do not buy guides for games, if i need help i have a plethora of information at my fingertips via the wonderful internet. I have got the odd guide for games like zelda wind waker, gran turismo 3 and final fantasy XII mainly for collection purposes and for finding out the extra information i would not normally know.

I do not think i would pay for digital guides though, i prefer a proper well produced hard copy that i can refer to now and again.

I tend only to look at guides after I've finished a game as I'd rather avoid spoiling upcoming events for myself. That said, I enjoy looking back through guides to see what I missed and what options I could have taken.

If there was - say - a collectors DVD set of every game in a series (such as all the main Resi Evil games, or Zelda games or MGS games for eg), would people be compelled to buy them for collection purposes? So each game would have something like a dual layer DVD with the guide + game specific trailers, secrets, extras etc.

I ask because a few people have mentioned that they like the collection idea of the guide more so than the actual guide part of the guide. So would 'complete' sets be more appealing?

LewisD wrote: Ah, y'see back when I were a lad and stuck on Broken sword 1&2, I used the terribly expensive "Hint line" that was advertised at the back of the manual.
I got a right hiding from my dad when the bill came in.

I've done the same for a few games. I got stuck in a dungeon in Link's Awakening for one. I called up about Pokémon Blue, and had an amusing chat with the guy on the other end of the phone. He called me sad for playing Pokemon at the age of 20, I called him sad for knowing the solution to my problem, implying that he had played the game previous. We both took it in good jest.

Me and a mate always said it would be a cool job to have, chatting away to some folk who were stuck, and helping them finish a game.

As for guides, I have a few. Mainly for RPGs. The latest I bought was the Oblivion guide, and it helped me immensely. The Piggyback guides are really well done, but I've always had a soft spot for Prima guides. Their Majora's Mask guide is really good.

Guide's Do they really ruin the gaming experience?

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