Over the course of the
summer I played the following action/platform games on PS3 all within
a short span of time.
God of War 3 (completed
regular difficulty)
Heavenly Sword (completed
regular difficulty)
Ratchet and Clank:Tools of
Destruction
Devil May Cry 4 (completed
regular difficulty)
Bayonetta
Ninja Gaiden 2 (completed
once, can't recall which difficulty)
I like all of these games,
and for different reasons. Ninja Gaiden 2, Devil May Cry, and
Bayonetta are a different kind of gameplay from God of War and
Heavenly Sword, and Ratchet & Clank is yet another kind of
gameplay. The thing that I noticed the most from playing all of
these games in the same timespan is that you can't jump in Heavenly
Sword, and that Bayonetta and God of War use two different buttons to
get into the item menus. The problem with the item menu didn't take
too long, but the other thing really got me noticing how ubiquitous
the use of the X button to jump with is (or A, if you're playing on XBox/XBox 360.)
I think that I only own a
few games that have a jump mechanic where it's mapped somewhere
strange. On the first Devil May Cry, they mapped the jump button to
triangle which I never got used to. I was so glad that they fixed it
in Devil May Cry 2 that I overlooked a lot of the game's other flaws. I wonder
if they changed it for the HD remake? On the game "de Blob"
for the Wii, they mapped jumping to swinging the Wiimote. In one
case, it was workable but I had to think about it a lot. In the other
case, I didn't have to think about it that much but it was largely
inaccurate for me. I think Onechanbara for Wii has the jump button
mapped someplace strange also, but you don't jump in that game enough
for it to matter.
In general, I found it nice
for the games that I listed at the beginning here that I didn't have
to think about jumping. It kept me engaged in the game and not
perpetually having to run back and check the controls in the menu. I
presume that the same sort of thing happens with FPS games, where
people have a certain expectation of a control layout and it's nice
not to have to think about it so they can just play the game. With
fighting games, I'm used to having to adapt a little for each
character, so it's not so bad with different games having different
button layouts but I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a preference.
In the event that there
isn't a standard, ubiquitous layout, I have to say that I really
appreciate the times where there are visual cues or on-screen
reminders available, especially for context-specific controls or
buttons that see only occasional use. God of War does that fairly
often, and I have to say that it's nice to jump back into a game
after not having played it for a while and be able to open up a
treasure chest right when I walk up to it and not worry that I'm
about to accidentally use a magic attack on it by mistake. I just
started playing Arkham Asylum in the last week and like the little
touches like seeing (R1) right next to the little reticle that shows
you what ledge you can grapple up to, or the little reminders in the
corner about how to use the explosive gel once you equip it.
I have complained about
bad controls before, so before I launch into a tirade about those I
would just refer people back to my old post about Suda51 and Killer7.
Familiar controls (or at
least intuitive controls) can help make a good game great, and in a
lesser game can keep a help player interested long enough to care
whether they finish or not.
