Button-Mashery and Analog Stick Rotisserie

[Glorb]

First things first: I know, "rotisserie" is not the right word, "rotation" is, but I wanted something to rhyme with "mashery". Anyway...

If you've played any modern video game, chances are you've encountered a "quick-time event", or something where you mash a button or wiggle/rotate an analog stick in sequence. Shenmue started the trend, but ever since God of War implemented it, most action games have them. From outrunning boulders in Resident Evil 4 to lifting weights in GTA: San Andreas to fixing bikes and punching crotches in Bully, it seems like every game has them. My question is, then: Are they really that necessary? I realize that, to get a challenge out of a certain part in a game, you can't just have it happen in a cutscene, but it seems like developers are relying too much on the formula. Instead of, say, hacking into a computer by matching numbers or something else resembling hacking, instead you have to match some button inputs. And rather than holding down a button to run, you now have to mash it like crazy. It's tiring on thumbs, and potentially damaging to controllers. I'm all for immersion, but I hope future games will implement a more varied version than simply hitting a button over and over again.

[The Chef]

I think that might be one of the reasons the Wii was made the way it is. Too bad the developers haven't really figured that out yet.

[Glorb]

Yeah...I think that quick-time events in a Wii agme would be, if handled correctly, highly awesome. That's assuming they don't do the same thing with buttons, though.

[BP]

A similar thing has come for the Wii: Shaking the remote like a maniac.
Button mashing > stick rotating. I don't think there's anything wrong with button-mashing... It makes sense for button-controlled Microgames or RPG attacks in which you must fill a meter for the action command...

[MaxVance]

First things first: I know, "rotisserie" is not the right word, "rotation" is, but I wanted something to rhyme with "mashery".

"Mashery" and "rotisserie" don't rhyme. Otherwise, I agree with you.

A similar thing has come for the Wii: Shaking the remote like a maniac.

Well, I think that's understandable for when it's used (in SPM, if you get swallowed by something, you shake the remote to escape) because if you got swallowed by something, you would shake like a maniac to get out, right?

[Robert]

"Mashery" and "rotisserie" don't rhyme. Otherwise, I agree with you.
Well, I think that's understandable for when it's used (in SPM, if you get swallowed by something, you shake the remote to escape) because if you got swallowed by something, you would shake like a maniac to get out, right?

Did you have to place a spoiler warning on "get out"? But I do agree with you.

I'm all for button mashing, as long as that's not all you do in the game. Button mashing can sometimes build tension and/or bring excitement to a situation, like in LoZ:TW or RE4. It would be cool to see more games use the Wii-mote in those "quick-time" events, though.

[Glorb]

"Mashery" and "rotisserie" both end with an "ee" sound, which is good enough for me.

Anyhoo, I guess the problem I have with it is that developers rely on button-mashing for things that shoudln't require it. Running I understand, because that's a fast, repetitive motion, but filling a meter?

[BP]

Well what, you want it to be EASY to blow up someone? There has to be some challenge...

[PaperLuigi]

I agree with Glorb on this one. WWE: Smackdown vs. Raw is riddled with mini-games that require button mashing.

[Glorb]

I think that filling up a meter should be done in some way other than pounding on a button. Maybe, and this is off the top of my head, getting successive attacks in a row, or whatever. Think about it: if you were a wizard, would you charge up your attacks by pounding your fists on something? Hopefully not, unless it was a Moogle or something else annoying. I think that a Guitar Hero-eusqe minigame where you hold down certain buttons to charge up the meter quicker would be awesome. However, things like unscrewing screws by rotating the stick is cool, because you're doing something that resembles something on-screen.

[Fwirt]

I think that filling up a meter should be done in some way other than pounding on a button. Maybe, and this is off the top of my head, getting successive attacks in a row, or whatever. Think about it: if you were a wizard, would you charge up your attacks by pounding your fists on something? Hopefully not, unless it was a Moogle or something else annoying. I think that a Guitar Hero-eusqe minigame where you hold down certain buttons to charge up the meter quicker would be awesome. However, things like unscrewing screws by rotating the stick is cool, because you're doing something that resembles something on-screen.

Maybe pounding your fists on something could be part of the attack....  Glorb, do you pound your controller with your fists?

I always liked the "push buttons in the right order" approach.  The two best examples I can think of right now are most of Vivian's attacks in PM:TTYD and the sword fighting duel game in MP2.

I hate button-mashing.  Certain games make your fingers fall off from mashing buttons (yes, my fingers will break before the controller.)  The button mashing stage in Mischief Makers is preventing me from getting all 52 golds, the soda guzzling game in Chrono Trigger was quite annoying, and the button mashing in the Crane Game in MP2 is just as impossible.  The stick rotations are just as bad.  Have you ever tried to play with a dead (not springy) joystick.  Not fun.  But what's even more annoying than joystick rotation is D-Pad rotation as in several special moves in SMRPG.  That hurts your thumbs.

Didn't Nintendo have to provide gloves for people when they claimed that the joystick rotation in MP was scraping skin off of their hands?

[Glorb]

Yeah, I hate the rotation in the MP games. When I said rotation to unscrew screws, I meant however fast the player is going; if the rotation is fast, the the unscrewing takes faster, and so on. The rotation in the MP games is insanely fast, and is only possible by using your hand. In fact, my friend is so used to doing it that way that he uses that method when wiggling the analog stick in RE4 and Dead Rising, even though you don't need to be that fast.

[BP]

I use my palm to do the action command for Ms. Mowz's slap attack in The Thousand-Year Door... to iterate, what you must do is move the stick left and right until you're full of power.

[Kojinka]

I also do that for one of Koops' attacks.  You gain power for it the same way that you do for Ms. Mowz's slap attack.

[Fwirt]

For those attacks (and Bow's in PM) I just grab the analog stick between my thumb and forefinger and jiggle it back and forth.  By the way, I just noticed that my CT is gone (I never understood it anyway)