Great unnecessary detail in games.

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With the increased amount of stuff you can put in games, there's quite a lot of stuff that's present to entertain you if you see it, but for no other reason. It's neither the big setpieces of the plot, nor easter eggs that you have to do obscure things to find, just stuff to stumble onto. What's your favourite?

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 19 September 2005 14:39 (twenty years ago)

The direct reason for this thread was that I've been playing Fable, which is yon average Action/RPG game, except by Peter Molyneux's Lionhead studios. So all the villagers and townsfolk act more or less like real people, and they chatter away all the time. In order to spread your reknown, you have to get trophies from quests (head of giant wasp, etc) and show them to as many people in town as possible inside a minute. Preparing to hit everyone means watching the patterns of the town - when people go to work, when the kids gather in the schoolhouse, and when people go to and return from the pub. None of this is actually what caught me.

You also can buy titles, and someone will generally comment on whatever your current one is (you start out as "chicken chaser"). I bought the impressive Liberator when I arrived there, and the townsfolk started saying "Yay, it's the Liberator!" and "Calls 'imself the Liberator?" in their West Country accents. And the point when I stopped liking and started loving the game is when I heard one of the townswomen say "Lib-eh-ray-tor. Am I saying it right?"

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 19 September 2005 14:39 (twenty years ago)

Other main categories of this: Grand Theft Auto, general idle animations.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 19 September 2005 14:39 (twenty years ago)

-Warcraft units who'd get mad after you clicked them too much
-the idle thoughts of citizens in Tropico as they went about their daily lives
-the cute sarcasm that sneaks into the writing of SimCity

― kingfish superman ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Monday, 19 September 2005 14:43 (twenty years ago)

I love the animations you get on platform games when your character stands too close to the edge of something, and starts to flail their arms in an attempt to stay on (and there's no reason, because there's no way the game would make you fall off). Real sign of quality! Sonic games had a lot of this, and Decap Attack on the Megadrive had this fantastic Scooby-Doo-type animation if you did accidentally walk off the edge of a platform and hit the back button, where your guy would run in the air scrambling to get back on. The best thing about this though, was that he managed.

― melton mowbray (adr), Monday, 19 September 2005 15:45 (twenty years ago)

yeah, GTA is filled with this stuff.

GTA:SA & VC moreso than III, since then you could have either CJ or Tommy yelling shit at people they ran into. I thought it was perfect delivery when you'd either be in a race or getting to a gang war spot, you'd be flooring it and somebody would bump your car from the side, eliciting CJ's "Aw, fuck you too!"

also, CJ standing around, singing to himself, either the big daddy kane or rod stewart songs...

― kingfish superman ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Monday, 19 September 2005 15:52 (twenty years ago)

The dancing in WoW.

― The Ghost of Black Elegance (Dan Perry), Monday, 19 September 2005 16:09 (twenty years ago)

general idle animations

Mario 64! Leave him for a bit, he sits down. Bit longer and he lies down. Bit more, and he starts snoring. Long enough, and he starts, very quietly, talking in his sleep! "Ah, spaghetti....mmm, ravioli!"

― JimD (JimD), Monday, 19 September 2005 16:30 (twenty years ago)

Maybe this isn't exactly the same thing, but a big part of why I loved text-based adventure games was typing in random commands like "KILL SELF" or "KICK PRINCESS" or "HAVE SEX WITH WIZARD" or and seeing if the game had anything humorous to say about it. Those little extras made the games feel really interactive and immersive despite their graphical shittiness. The Sierra eye/hand/mouth/ear/question interface was almost as good, but a little more limiting.

― Laura H. (laurah), Monday, 19 September 2005 21:14 (twenty years ago)

Oh! Similar to the Warcraft one, on Sam and Max Hit the Road, pick something up which was physically impossible, Sam would say, "I can't pick that up!". Try again, and he'd say "I said I can't pick that up!". One more time, and he'd say "Read my lips. I... CAN'T... PICK... THAT... UP" (the joke being that the mouth animation in the game repeated the same few frames over and over again, and couldn't possibly be read). Of course, you'd try one more time after that, which made him cry, having to comforted by Max.

― melton mowbray (adr), Monday, 19 September 2005 21:41 (twenty years ago)

OK I have a copy of Fable and now I will have to play it Andrew it sounds fun!

Sims 2: random things that happen for no reason, like sometimes if you decide to fix the flooded dishwasher yrself, and it electrocutes you! And your dude goes BZZRRRT for a while then is all smokey and sooty and has hair all on end. And maybe he dies, maybe he doesnt.

― Trayce (trayce), Tuesday, 20 September 2005 02:13 (twenty years ago)

(If he doesnt you have to totally spend half the day cleaning/feeding/resting him tho, cos he loses all his health and hygiene)

― Trayce (trayce), Tuesday, 20 September 2005 02:14 (twenty years ago)

There are lots of ace little touches in Morrowind. My favourite is an instrument called a Fat Lute, which you stumble across in a bandit cave...

Best ever though, is in Dungeon Keeper. If you happen to be playing the game when your PC clock hits midnight, all your minions start dancing to 'Disco Inferno'.

― Zora (Zora), Tuesday, 20 September 2005 21:41 (twenty years ago)

I have Fable too. I am disliking it's pretty bog standard action rpg elements. i kinda dislike how the experience system is incredibly easy to mess up in order to rack up huge points but i guess i could simply have not used it. I do adore the little touches though. My character has huge scars down the right hand side of his face and i have no idea how i got them except maybe it's because i took on an evil quest just for fun and even though i'm almost fully good aligned it still had a negative/dark impact on me. i like that idea. i like the way the villagers react to me. i am unsure about the purpose of all the little social interactions i can perform but they are nice touches at least.

― jeffrey (johnson), Tuesday, 20 September 2005 21:57 (twenty years ago)

IK+ on amiga, which had a lorry load of little gags going on in the background. you could activate others too with certain key strikes.

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 12:54 (twenty years ago)

and the stormtrooper taking a wizz in Dark Forces, who can forget that?

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 12:56 (twenty years ago)

never saw that stormtrooper one.

also, the graffitti in Half-Life 2.

both in the tags, the pieces, and how the posters would change as the game went on. it really gave you a sense that there were people living there, with a culture.

― kingfish superman ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 September 2005 13:37 (twenty years ago)

yeah, GTA is filled with this stuff.

yeah kingfish don't get me started on the list. gta is pretty much made for exactly this though i think half the game relies on you stumbling across unnecessary details. if you just played the missions back to back in a straightforward manner you probably just seeing about 3% of the code.

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 13:43 (twenty years ago)

In Shenmue, Santa would appear and wander around the town on Dec 25th.

related: Holiday events based on the system clock.

― kingfish superman ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:17 (twenty years ago)

I'm always hoping for that, like a snow fall on a christmas day. but as yet i've never come across one.

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:20 (twenty years ago)

I'm still waiting for the day I get a game for Christmas, play it, and this happens.

― melton mowbray (adr), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:21 (twenty years ago)

somewhere there's a list of christmas-related easter eggs.

― kingfish superman ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:26 (twenty years ago)

is there an easter-related easter eggs list?

― s1ocki (slutsky), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:28 (twenty years ago)

omg kingfish i have to find this

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:29 (twenty years ago)

TFC on Christmas day!

I think we should arrange an ILX game of TFC for Christmas day.

― melton mowbray (adr), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:31 (twenty years ago)

is there an easter-related easter eggs list?

but of course!

― kingfish superman ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:32 (twenty years ago)

i also found a message board with lots of posts about games on christmas day. but the only game from the list i have is Nights on the saturn. and also unfortunately i cannot set the date on my system as the battery fucked up years ago. :(

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:36 (twenty years ago)

Oh, those batteries are very easy to replace! I bought one recently for about 50-60 pence online with free (or very cheap) postage, and it came with a piece of chocolate! I think it may well have been from here, but I might be wrong: http://www.battery-force.co.uk/

― melton mowbray (adr), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:40 (twenty years ago)

You can't set the date when you turn on the system? It won't save but surely you can set it for that particular session?

WoW had a really fantastic set of themed nonsense going on the week between Christmas and New Year's. There was a chain of quests that involved learning to make gingerbread cookies and playing Santa.

― The Ghost of Black Elegance (Dan Perry), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:41 (twenty years ago)

ah cheers, its the CR2032 right?

xpost, no it won't let you save it it just revers back to default

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 22 September 2005 14:45 (twenty years ago)

"Freedom fries" on the menu in some of the fast food places in San Andreas.

In fact, all the rubbish innuendo jokes on things like ice cream cartons in the 24/7 that nobody is ever going to see unless they wander around the map obsessively zooming in on everything and everyone with the camera.

― Cressida Breem (neruokruokruokne?), Thursday, 22 September 2005 19:05 (twenty years ago)

oh yeah dungeon keeper had a special level that was only available when there was a full moon!

― teeny (teeny), Thursday, 22 September 2005 19:35 (twenty years ago)

Animal Crossing has too many little details to mention but they are all wonderful.

― jeffrey (johnson), Thursday, 22 September 2005 19:48 (twenty years ago)

ah cheers, its the CR2032 right?

Yep, the one in the back-right corner under the flap.

― melton mowbray (adr), Thursday, 22 September 2005 23:17 (twenty years ago)

xpost Yeah, Animal Crossing is the king of detail and calendar-related greatness. I read that the new one (DS) is going to have wifi capabilities--Animal Crossing holiday parties!

― adam (adam), Thursday, 22 September 2005 23:49 (twenty years ago)

one year passes...

In Black and White 2, if you have a common christian name as your profile name the game will occasionally say it in the spooky "deeeeaaaath!" voice whilst you're playing. It freaked the hell out of my friend.

― Cressida Breem (neruokruokruokne?), Thursday, 16 November 2006 16:22 (nineteen years ago)

ooh that's good

― Ste (Fuzzy), Thursday, 16 November 2006 16:36 (nineteen years ago)

In MGS3, during the cutscenes, if you're interacting with a woman and you switch to first-person mode, Snake will always be staring at her ass.

― antexit (antexit), Thursday, 16 November 2006 17:21 (nineteen years ago)

Or her boobs if she's facing you. Doesn't matter how important/dire the situation is.

― antexit (antexit), Thursday, 16 November 2006 17:22 (nineteen years ago)

hahaha

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Thursday, 16 November 2006 17:41 (nineteen years ago)

I don't know if it counts as unnecessary detail, but the firts thing I thought of was the mission packs for Quake 1, which had a few funny little bits that you could easily miss - on one level, there was this high cliff that it was just about (but not quite) impossible to scale w/o cheating. If you did manage to get up, a message flashed on the screen saying "you're not supposed to be able to get up here" and all these flying mines appeared. There was another level, where there was a picture on a wall of some demonic face. If you happened to shoot it by accident, a bolt of lightning came out of it and hit you and the screen briefly flashed up the words "do not defy god".

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 16 November 2006 18:35 (nineteen years ago)

i'm sure this is well known, but there's a little tourist spot beneath the "golden gate" bridge in gta:sa. the informational plaque about the bridge is all about the code! like, MB used, man-hours in programming, etc

― geoff (gcannon), Thursday, 16 November 2006 19:00 (nineteen years ago)

I'm sure you guys have all seen the guy masturbating furiously in the background in Street Fighter 2, right? I think it's on Guile's level.

― stoked for the madness (nickalicious), Thursday, 16 November 2006 20:00 (nineteen years ago)

WAHT.

― c('°c) (Leee), Thursday, 16 November 2006 20:13 (nineteen years ago)

GTA is the king of great unnecessary detail.

― polyphonic (polyphonic), Thursday, 16 November 2006 20:27 (nineteen years ago)

the NOLF series was filled with these, too, as random semi-hidden jokes, or as magazine covers, conversations between hired goons, etc

― kingfish prætor (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 16 November 2006 21:25 (nineteen years ago)

I am enjoying the randomisation of the voice acting/lines in Oblivion, though I dunno if you'd call it *unnecesary* detail. But the kind of stuff that'll vary depending on the character you end up building. For eg, at the start when I'm in the cell, the guy opposite spits at me something like "bah, sour purse lipped pale-faced ghoul, you must be a breton, witch". Something like that. Having watched Nick play the same scene as a male imperial it caught me right off guard "omg how did he know what my character looks like wtf".

― Trayce (trayce), Friday, 17 November 2006 02:09 (nineteen years ago)

I noticed that, too! I started off as one of those creepy lizard monsters, because I thought they looked cool, then switched to Dark Elf when I realised I couldn't take the game seriously as Godzilla. All the time as the dark elf, people say "Greetings Dunmer" and whatnot, but when I was a reptile they didn't bat an eyelid! wtf?

― melton mowbray's APOCALYPTO! (adr), Friday, 17 November 2006 04:04 (nineteen years ago)

Also, I'm loving the little one liners in Gears of War when you hit a perfect reload or cut someone up with the chainsaw. It's sort of like Duke Nukem 3D only amplified because it's in subtitles too. The "dude, you're blocking my shots!" when you shoot a team-mate is brilliant too, compared to other games that do you over for accidental friendly fire (Call of Duty 2?).

I suppose none of this is unnecessary at all, but it adds tons of charm to the game in the way the stuff in GTA does.

― melton mowbray's APOCALYPTO! (adr), Friday, 17 November 2006 04:07 (nineteen years ago)

If you did manage to get up, a message flashed on the screen saying "you're not supposed to be able to get up here"

ha, cool. they had that in GTA3 didn't they. In the car park on the second island you could climb over a wall if you stacked a good sized vehicle next to it, there was a sign behind the wall that said something similar.

― Ste (Fuzzy), Friday, 17 November 2006 09:14 (nineteen years ago)

Duke Nukem 3D! Giving a dancer a buck to flash her tits! Little tissue holders on the walls in the pr0n cubicles! Taking a piss!

― ONIMO feels teh NOIZE (GerryNemo), Friday, 17 November 2006 11:29 (nineteen years ago)

Lego Star Wars II - "Slave" Leia does a belly dance when you press circle.

― ONIMO feels teh NOIZE (GerryNemo), Friday, 17 November 2006 11:34 (nineteen years ago)

HL2 again: The way the powerlines sway in the wind.

― you win again, gravity! (tissp), Friday, 17 November 2006 12:34 (nineteen years ago)

OMG the idle animations in Lego Star Wars II are so great, particularly Han Solo's.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Friday, 17 November 2006 12:57 (nineteen years ago)

Lego Star Wars II - "Slave" Leia does a belly dance when you press circle.

If you press "o" when she's near Lando he kisses her hand.

OMG the idle animations in Lego Star Wars II are so great, particularly Han Solo's.

So true. Don't know Han's, will have to check that out.

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Friday, 17 November 2006 13:49 (nineteen years ago)

Link's Awakening: You can rob just about every item from the village shop, but as soon as the shopkeeper catches you, your name changes to THIEF! Which puts a guilt trip on you for the rest of the game, because whenever anyone else talks to you, they say something like "Hi there, THIEF!", "How ya doing, THIEF!" etc, just so you don't forget what you did.

― eyeless in gazza (Phil A), Sunday, 19 November 2006 12:44 (nineteen years ago)

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