unfair game moments

[lenko]

these can be either on purpose (intentionally done by the designers etc. to infuriate the player), or simply bad decision making. a good example of this is that stupid barrel from sonic 3, which made many players get a 'death by timeout' due to no instructions being provided on how to operate it (not only that, but the logical solution to jump up and down on it doesn't work).

a recent one i came across was in one of the game boy zeldas, oracle of seasons. the very nature of zelda games is to explore and therefore you get rewarded for exploring. however, at one point before the sixth dungeon you come across a hidden entrance to a typical grotto with a stock zelda style old dude inside. oh cool he's going to give you something helpful or maybe some clues right? NOPE he fucking takes all your rupees (which might be as many as 999) off you for 'breaking his door'. bastard

another one i can remember is a certain pit in the mystic cave zone on sonic 2. there's a pit with spikes at the bottom, but unlike every other pit like this, you can't jump out. so even if you're super sonic or have invincibility or whatever you'll still die in that pit (to add insult to injury, the devs placed an invincibility box nearby, almost knowing this would end up happening)

[sev]

any game with stun of any kind. stun is not fun, will never be fun. it breaks all control and disrupts the link between the player and the game, which is what makes gaming unique from other entertainment mediums and directly influences the emotions of the player. it can be used briefly to frustrate if that's what you're going for, but chain-stun or any stun longer than like, 1-2 seconds is fundamentally broken and not enjoyable, at least to me

also i love cave story to bits but the back to back quintuple boss fights was pretty bullshit

[Kött]

Fukken this^
A goddamn stupid wall from the game Okami which had to be defeated by drawing dots in a certain pattern and in a special order on its body. It might sound simple but it was really frustrating sometimes... especially the last one for the final bead (in case anyone knows what I'm talking about)...

Also pretty much all of the special bosses from the Disgaea series. Japs must have too much time on their hands...

[sev]

elements of tedium as an attempt to supplement for lack of difficulty or general length of content, like in no more heroes with the giant open world that serves no purpose

[cipher]

You guys need to play dark souls, or even the witcher 2 (sort of). You don't even know the meaning of unfair yet.

Also I ended up beating that final block guy (the optional one) by just taking a picture of my screen with my phone hah

[ZennyPLUS]

Any KOF end boss, if you wanna see unfair.

[Ashington]

Any total war game where you think you have your opponent on the run then suddenly 2 huge block armies come out of nowhere and mash you

[emanhattan]

[ZennyPLUS]

LOL Mario is looking and probably thinking; "Well shit."

[naturally]

every boss in metal slug is nearly impossible if you try to beat them without dying so you can actually get a score (or maybe i'm just bad at metal slug)

and near the end of the first silent hill game when an important character dies and you find out that the only way you could have saved them was to get an item that there was no way you would've known about on your first run. kind of like cave story, actually. except i liked it in cave story. either way i replayed both.

also i love cave story to bits but the back to back quintuple boss fights was pretty bullshit

this is still the sole reason i haven't seen the best ending. i can't beat hell and i refuse to look up the ending on youtube. i'll beat it someday, though.

[Shida]

I think I Wanna Be The Guy counts as an unfair game entirely (but it was designed to be like that!)
But definitely rubberbanding AI is unfair
Also front viewing cameras while being chased by something so you can't see whats ahead (I am looking at you Crash Bandicoot)
and any time trial involving underwater controls (which are notoriously shit)

[lenko]

Any KOF end boss, if you wanna see unfair.

you just brought back a lot of horrible memories

also, jinpachi and azazel in tekken 5 and 6 respectively. fuck those guys. you can play your very best but they always pull out some cheap invincibility thing or throw a projectile at you (this is in tekken, the one fighting game WITHOUT projectiles). i think some designers need to figure out the difference between 'challenging' and 'fucking stupid. stuff like megaman is the former, whilst most fighting game bosses are the latter

since eman posted mario kart, in the original SNES mario kart you are always designated a 'rival' who tends to perform better than the other CPU racers. the CPU racers also could only use one item ever (some that were unique to them), for example yoshi threw eggs and bowser threw fireballs or something. however, mario and luigi both used the star (the best powerup in the game). if you pick koopa troopa your rival is luigi, and no matter how well you drive, he'll spam his powerup even when he's close to winning and generally be a complete asshole. since koopa troopa was by far one of the best characters it made the game even harder to beat cuz you usually had to pick someone else. the game also has that stupid rubberband AI where the CPU characters seem to magically 'catch up' which is also a pain in the neck

[SHADOWFOX2]

LMAO Mario Kart 64 was one of the worst offenders of catch-up/rubberband
That game wouldn't even register being hit if the computer was far enough away from you (hitting them with a shell would only reset their speed to 0, not launch them in the air, make them tumble, spin out, or any other stun animation)

That brings me to Pro-Am, where at certain points of the game, there was a time where a certain yellow AI would tap into its hype reserves and go on perfect autopilot at 2x regular speed

Games like Tekken and DOA I don't even wanna go into
Also, Supreme Commander 2, and any other RTS where the AI can build and upgrade things faster for no reason.
Sure, I can go along with being able to build 3-4 things simultaneously because you are a computer but please pretend you are bound to the same need of minerals as I am

[rtil]

Also, Supreme Commander 2, and any other RTS where the AI can build and upgrade things faster for no reason.

this is sadly how most rts/tbs games deal with difficulty - handicaps. be it a boost in resources, production speed, or strength, instead of making the AI more intelligent they will simply make the computer have any number of unfair statistical advantages over you.

[cipher]

It's pretty easy to get into an infinite stalemate in the advance wars games if both you and your opponent have the same amount of income

if that counts

[redmongoose]

the final stage of megaman x4 when you have to fight sigma like a hundred goddamn times

[sev]

nightmare in soul calibur 5 is fucking bullshit

[BluPhoenix]

a couple immediately come to mind

starcraft 2- playing insane AIs: computer knows where everything currently is

splinter cell- final gunfight between you and georgian security personnel

fifa (any year)- playing on professional, teams go full on and attack the shit out of everything, start losing to even the shittiest teams (im looking at you blackburn)

persona 3 & 4- die, game redirects you to main menu (not really unfair, just fucking annoying)

knights of the old republic 2- final boss: you vs. darth traya & 3 floating lightsabers; battle is reduced to a clusterfuck of spamming the strongest spells (+ regenerating force + healing self) and running away from said lightsabers til you loop around for another cheap shot on traya

ninja gaiden(xbox)- everything

[Greenkitten]

Superman64, those controls shit me and once you manage to fly through the rings it gives you no instruction on what to do next so you fail anyway.

[BluPhoenix]

elements of tedium as an attempt to supplement for lack of difficulty or general length of content, like in no more heroes with the giant open world that serves no purpose

they fix that in nmh2