What happened to instruction manuals?
>>724753434I think one came with my copy of No More Heroes 3...?
>>724753434its called the internet, unc
>>724753434It's now inside of the game.
I'm sad that they don't even come with digital manuals any more.
>>724753434Man I miss that shit.>save for months>get mom to bring you to the store>buy game>excitedly read the manual on the way homeGames like SA2B had huge thick manuals too.
Gamers got too good to need them
>>724754221More like every game feels samey so unless you are new to gaming period there’s little to be confused about. There’s a few games that go out of the way to have funky controls but that often adds to it’s charm.
I love how they’d include a notes section you’d never actually use.
>>724753434It's called the "tutorial" in the game now. It was made mostly irrelevant simply because anything it could possibly tell you is now outright explained in-game or through the tutorial instead of just throwing you into the game.
>>724753434Hardware got powerful enough that games could have tutorials and actual cutscenes to show the player the backstory instead of having them read physical pages.Also this >>724754221. Most players nowadays can look at a screenshot of a game and have a good idea on how to control it.
>>724754221They just make the first 6 hours of the game the tutorial now
>>724753434people stopped reading
>>724754065This shit kills me. I understand that you can figure out a lot of stuff on your own but sometimes devs are just fucking lazy and at least with a digital manual you may have something to explain a certain control or mechanic.We can save screenshots and videos no problem but writing our own notes or a basic manual? Nah too much work
>>724755736Yeah, the main advantage of a manual was the story and the controls, both of which are done in-game now. If they added any stuff like in-game enemies or scoring that's all on wikis now and things change post-release anyway.
>>724753434ran out of paper
>>724754065What's the difference between a digital manual and a help section in the pause menu?
>>724754180Did anyone else love opening a plastic game case and sniffing the inside? That shit smelled amazing.
>>724753434They were replaced by forced tutorials in every game. Hope you enjoy being told the most obvious shit you could have easily learned yourself by just pressing/testing the buttons, spread out over an hour or two at the start of every game.
Replaced by online wiki
>>724753434Too much hassle, now you don't even OWN the game, just rent it from online service.You will own nothing and be happy
>>724755361Almost like paper is nigh free
>one of the last devs who adds books to their games>not available in Europe fuck you too
>>724762353We all did, anon. You bought something tangible, it was a feast for the senses. Opening a brand new sealed game was a ritual in itself
>>724753434Haven't you heard? People are borderline illiterate now
>>724753434
>>724753434Unnecessary cost for physical media that can instead be integrated into the game itself and made mandatory instead of optional, massively bogging down the gaming experience because it forces you to sluggishly learn all of a game's essentials for the first several hours of its playtime in order to make sure you can soak up everything per the game's demands, rather than doing so on your own time before starting up the game, or better yet, figuring shit out by yourself, a talent that 99% of people today don't have.
>>724766664>Old good new bad
>>724753434are the gamecube zeldas any good, or do better versions exist?
>>724753434expecting people to be able to read wasn't inclusive enough
>>724753434Games today don't need instructions.What annoys me though is that they didn't add anything in their place. They should put like little artbooks there or mini-posters. Something. Not just leave a fucking empty case.
>>724767451too much effort, goy.
>>724755481This.
>>724753434we have more toilet paper now
>>724754221More like too dumb to read
>>724767451Limited RuN Games add those.
>>724755481>>724755736I'm reminded how the Halo 2 manual had in universe descriptions of all the weapons and the like and how the special edition had a different manual which covered the same content but from the Covenant's perspective.Nowadays that info would just be dompted into an in-game glossary that nobody would read..=
>>724771946I like the ones that help player immerse in the game's world more. A journal, Diary, Scrapbook, Guide.Shame gamers are no longer treated like customers, but like Cash cows.
>used to have full colour manuals>then greyscale manuals to cut back on costs>now no manuals to cut back on costs despite games further increasing in cost even though distribution is easier than ever
>>724755361Well, manuals are usually multiples of 4 pages long because of how they're bound, so if you've written a manual and you have some left over blank pages at the end what do you do with them? You could throw in some art or whatever but it's easier just to throw in 1-3 notes pages and be done with it.
>>724753434cost-cutting enshittification
>>724777358>companies sink millions into making products that are not even complete on release, including physical copies, they dont even have proper boxes you could proudly display on your shelf.please, vidya industry, collapse!
Remember that period of time when DVD cases had big holes right behind the disc's surface?
>>724777764BluRays did it too, or at least the other approach where the plastic is thinner at spots. Thank fuck that never carried over Playstation games.
>manual is diegetic and referred to multiple times in-game>you're expected to flick through it to figure out how to solve certain problemsSuch a great touch.
>>724777806Wii U games had cases like this too, after everyone switched to the updated design you mentioned.
>>724777884>manual was the mcguffin
>>724778013>manual got more worn out looking with each sequelSoul.
>the manual is in another language
>>724778113i have european versions, this is just a photo i found on internet, ruined but extra icon and INSTRUCTION MANUAL because gamers are apparently dumb
The in-game tutorial became standardised and ultimately makes more sense from a game design perspective. If something is interactive, why not present a tutorial to the player interactively, rather than through a separate out-of-game booklet?Producing an instruction book is ultimately a cost. It costs money to make them and their value was continuing to diminish from a design perspective, which led to them being made cheaper (no colour, fewer pages) which in turn led to their minimal artistic value being gone too.The artistic value they once had can now be provided through a more limited and cheaper release that doesn't waste resources if people want - you want the official art? Get the game that comes bundled with an artbook.>>724754065Digital manuals are a worst of both worlds situation. They lack the physical appeal of owning a book that relates to the game you like, while also still not actually being in the game itself naturally, making them worse than an in-game tutorial.
>>724778225You knew Sly 4 was going to be shit the second you opened the PS3 case up and saw there was no manual.
>>724778398there is no sly 4.
>>724754065Vita did it the best. Sony mandated every release have a PDF-like digital manual included, easily accessible from the game's LiveArea page on the OS and usable while the game is running.Then PS4 came out and they relegated it as optional, using its shitty browser, to URLs that are often dead because no one bothered to update them since Sony wasn't self-hosting them to ensure a minimum standard was met.
>>724771946>Nowadays that info would just be dompted into an in-game glossary that nobody would read..=Yes just like how nobody read the manual's
>>724766579>Own everything and be miserable
>>724778601oh we did, on the shitter because cellphones didnt have browsers yet
>>724778665So you're willing to read the manual in a physical form but not the in-game glossary, clearly then the issue you not the industry.
>>724753434rolled up into tutorials and help screens>>724754065>>724757402manuals are fucking lame. you can lose them or the host may go defuncthaving a help system built into the game that's available from the start menu is much better
>>724753434Paper costs money and they need to make a digital manual for the online downloaded version anyway, so might as well just make the manual digital for every copy. That way, you just need a piece of paper with a warning of how far to shove Nintendo's dick up your ass and don't need to spend any more on physical copies.
>>724778732maybe we're just romanticizing old stuff because we were young and less jaded
They were replaced with hour (or longer) forced tutorials.Actually a blame Canada moment because they forced copies in multiple languages instead of accepting the english ones. What the fuck good is a french manual going to do for someone playing FFIX in english?
Reading the Metroid Prime manual before playing it was so comfy
>>724778839Have you tried not doing that >>724778870>Canada is to blame >Not Europe Everything had to come in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish at a bare minimum
>>724757402People played Silksong for weeks before anyone realized there was a taunt on R3.
>>724753434not worth the paper or inkyou wanna learn how to play? turn the game oninstruction manuals are for dumb people like boomers who need everything written down for them to understand
>>724779185actually it's the opposite, now games are dumbed down because people are illiterate and/or dont have enough attention span to sit down and read a tiny booklet before starting a game
>>724771946A well done glossary/codex is underrated. I still remember a game called Colony Wars for the one it had.Trying to fill in one completely can be a fun scavenger hunt and help you know you missed things.
>>724778163>that note
How much bitching would you think it would happen if a game released nowadays without a tutorial nor in menu help and only a digital manual?
>>724781626That's basically Tunic.
They went out of fashion. Flash games never had any. Mobile games didn't have them. Indies rarely bothered. Regular games stopped having them, too.Lots of games go with an exploratory roguelike approach. You go in blind, figure out stuff as you play, occasionally encounter unwinnable odds, which is where you restart and try to do better.Also, yellow paint. Why explain when you can make things super obvious in the first place.
>>724781626Worked for Minecraft.
>>724782828>yellow paintugh, handholding to the extreme, making people feel like they are dumb children
>>724753434SoS Grand Bazaar has one fixed up as the Zephyr Town travel brochure. Very cute little touch.
>>724785457https://www.youtube.com/shorts/40M8qDs5MVoMarvelous likes to make them. Too bad I'm from poo poo country that does not deserve them.
>>724785457https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDbqUiU-eFobetter link.i hate shorts
>>724787859They did a great job with it. It's really cute and clever having it be a travel guide.
>>724789480>Rune Factory: Guardians of Azumaimagine this being in actuall envelope
>>724789774it's like i'm reading something private
>>724753434>publishers reduce pages>gamers say nothing>publishers start printing them in black and white only>gamers say nothing>manuals turn into nothing but a legal notice>gamers say nothing>manuals disappear completely>gamers say nothingIt's because no one cared as it was stripped from them, just like game ownership. Gamers are cattle who are only passive aggressively against things like this when its far past the point of return.
>>724790174Cash Cows.we exist only to be milked out of our money
>>724790174I'm mostly surprised that we haven't gone back to this case size for optical discs after all these years. Although if they did, for the love of fuck use the current plastics, not the brittle ones of the days of yore.
>>724783898>minecraftwould have languished in obscurity without wikis, and endless mountains of mods
>>724753434Donkey Kong Country 2 was the peak.
>>724753434Why are so many used copies of older games without manuals? What the fuck did these people do with them? Wipe their ass?
>>724753434niggas jus caint read no mo
>>724793270The wiki is essentially a digital manual.
>>724753434Too expensive and too much effort and you'll buy the game anyway without them
>>724778732Yes, there are times when I'm not playing video games, in those I would sometime like to read something.While I'm playing video games, I want to play the video game and if I'm going to sit in front of a screen with a video game two or three button presses away then why would I not want to play the game instead of reading?
>>724761482You can look at a pdf before/while installingOr even better you can read the starcraft manual on the can when ur 8. That thing is dope.
>can't read manuals while shitting anymoregaming sucks now
>What happened to instruction manuals?The developers realized that most people buying digital games are retards. So, they forced tutorials into games and extended the duration two hours or so
>>724753434A good game doesnt need a manual.
>>724796501Swedes will have ass, tendieshitter.
>>724796057scroll tiktok instead, it's fun!
