What are the worst tropes in video games?


OttoJokesRPG's avatar
The most over-used, fallback plot gimmicks in video games.
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stevemacqwark's avatar
Every generic bald (or short dark haired) white guy with no personality that saturated the market from 2007 to 2014. Seriously, they all look like Sam Worthington, who was the most generic action movie star of all time, even among other white action actors.

It's the reason why I welcome diversity in games. You can make whatever you want in games but the AAA industry choses not to because they love being boring.
DryBonesReborn's avatar
Unless a woman has some special skin, no need to show her bare in battle. I mean really must she be half naked to fight? That's a big trope I noticed.
When it comes to Japanese games. The moralistically idealistic 14 year old boy with a thirst for adventure from a quiet rural village who is inexplicably an experienced sword fighter. Probably has a mysterious past.

When it comes to Western games. A gruff buff white guy with short brown hair. Has past military experience and a tragic backstory involving a dead wife.
Pulcella's avatar
cobaltcrimson's avatar
Which is basically 99 percent of quests in games as a service crap like Destiny and Fallout 76 since it's nearly impossible to make content fast enough to keep people busy with new stuff.
Pulcella's avatar

Haven't played those games. But the fetch quests I've done were always like, "collect 100 (items)" and its always hard to find for some reason xD

cobaltcrimson's avatar

That's basically it in Destiny, it's always in order to get a high end gun too. Instead of just giving it to you they make you chase after the parts and materials. In Fallout 76 it's literally what nearly all the daily missions are, that or hunt so many enemies of this type and then when you're done for the day there's nothing to do. Even repeatedly beating the main boss is easy now as we're literally all walking war machines.

Redfoxbennington's avatar
Anything in Silent Hill 4 the room. 
AleVesper's avatar
I thought you liked that game? :?

Or am I mixing you up with someone else? Probably am.
Redfoxbennington's avatar

I love the game. It's just everything wrong with video games in the early 2000's.

cobaltcrimson's avatar
Probably doesn't count but cars that still run after 20 plus years when gasoline, modern gas thanks to additives, generally will go bad in less than a year. Skeletons that somehow are intact and sitting upright at desks or in cars instead of in piles the way skeletons really do things, if they were mummified or something i could see but this is a sin in so many games. Hell one game still had flesh on submerged corpses from WW2, how does that even work when there was sea life in the wreck. Oh and anything with a timer in it that isn't an outrun a bomb going off type thing. X-Com 2 with that stupid timer is a good example, when there's a half dozen ways to disable it online you know it's a mechanic nobody likes.
Hax-Dev's avatar
I personally hate the one where all the females fall in love with the player character. Not that it's bad, but because the player character usually isn't that attractive to begin with. Japanese games have this problem in particular. Really unrealistic.
GameTrek's avatar
Examples?

How do you know it is not a moment of passion?
Hax-Dev's avatar

Pretty much every jrpg or visual novel. Visual novels are a bit different since that's the point of the game, but it still bothers me that the character designer makes these really nice looking female designs, and then the main character just gets the usual brown hair and unremarkable face. It's like, really? Just a small pet peeve of mine.

Feel like adding more:

Wokeness in the military:

In general, being woke in a game is just bad, but what annoys me to no end is when women are inserted into special forces roles and the game tries to take somewhat seriously. Sorry, but Theres a reason behind that.

In the same exact vein,I find it really annoying when foreigners, mainly British, people are included in American special forces units. Seriously, In Crysis, I’m pretty sure the team was US Navy SEALs in experimental combat equipment. why the hell was there a british guy on the team?
Smithnikovat's avatar
Would you feel the same way if it's about historical Soviet female figures? Yegorva, Pavlichenko? 
No. If its historical or in the same context of a real person, thats fine. But if a games trying to be taken seriously, then there little to no chance that that a woman would be a SEAL.


For context, RE Operation Raccoon City went full retard with the backgrounds for the US special forces characters. If i recall, one dude was a biker who chose the military to avoid prison, one dude was a west african national, one was a woman in SFOD-D (not too offensive tbh) one was a british chick, and one was a computer hacker who got caught blackmailing a US senator.
Smithnikovat's avatar

Resident Evil? Oh man, you should have expected that; Two words, Rebecca Chambers.

I find the grating personality would be OK with her being a medical prodigy... but no chance in hell an 18 year old would be a cop.
Smithnikovat's avatar

A cop. A combat medic (?!). A helicopter mechanic.


But the series is so dang silly, really, I overlooked it, especially once Chris started punching boulders :P

GameTrek's avatar
We have this thing call skism??? a type of religion. Guy with a turban in the Military. It made the news in real life. British people look nice but they are really cruel
This is more the players than the game or trope, but in general, the over the top stupidly complex plot of Metal Gear Solid is annoying and needs to die. Its not clever or good writing, its just nonsense presented poorly.

Here are some more i thought of:

The Illuminati: ive only seen this done well in Deus Ex, but in general, the one guy who is able to undermine the system that apparently runs the entire US or the whole world single handedly is retarded and needs to stop. One of the worst offenders is RE6 Splinter Cell Conviction, and MGS.

“The Joy of battle.”: mainly just poor writing, maybe something that can be worded differently, but the motivation that someone loves war or specifically “battle”, because what’s more satisfying than having your life ended by a split second and random outcome, am I right?

Oh my god, how could I forget this one.

Anagrams: even if they are somewhat relevant to the story, its almost never done well. Either its too dumb to be realistic or I don’t care enough to figure it out.

In MGS4, the “good guy team” Rat Patrol 1 was leet speak for Patriot, the bad guy. And in Dishonored, the ship’s name was an anagram for Farewell Daud, but i guarantee nobody gave the hint of a fuck about it.
Smithnikovat's avatar
Hideo Kojima: A man who writes like someone who's only exposure to the outside world was through anime tapes, re-runs of the X Files, repeat viewings of Escape From New York, and conspiracy websites.