I’ve played a lot of games in my lifetimes. I say ‘lifetimes’ because I have lived many different lives, all of which have been incredibly uneventful and have mostly revolved around playing different games.
Features are what make a game. Many people are saying this. If you talk to any game developer and ask them, “What makes up a video game?”, they will tell you, “Features.” Go on, ask any of them. If they don’t have this answer, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m just spitballing here. Sometimes, I just say stuff. It’s whatever.
If you haven’t got a game with features, what have you got? I dunno, a movie? But even movies have special features if you buy the DVD, Blu-Ray, or Ultra HD 4K Blu-Ray. Sometimes in those special features, you’ll find games. It’s funny how life works like that.
Anyway, I’ve played a lot of games and enjoyed a lot of features in games. On that note, I’d like to tell you the features that I think every game should strive to have included in their experience, based on the games that I have played in my many, many lifetimes.
I don’t ask for much from you, I simply just ask for the love of God that you take a look.
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An ugly little guy that is annoying and everybody hates
You see this in video games all the time. A little guy that is just terrible to look at, usually with a grating voice, and always with a lot to say. I believe that while it already exists in many games, a horrible little asshole should exist in every video game.
I propose this guy. His name is Beremy, and he would be the most common character in the game. He is incredibly rude, always around, will give you advice that doesn’t actually help in any way, and there is literally no part of the game that he is not in. Also, he is in love with you.
Pressing a button to scream
Do you know how in Dog’s Life, there’s a button that lets you shit/fart? I think that’s great. However, I think it’s definitely gotten a bit old, and every game having a shit/fart button would probably be a little isolating for anybody that doesn’t shit/fart.
That being said, I think that every game should have a Scream button. Why not? There isn’t a single game that wouldn’t benefit from having the option to just start screaming. Not only would it be a relief in games that are stressful, but it could also be used to scare things away in a desperate time of need.
Realistic auto-play
Idle games are all over the Auto-Play feature, and I think it’s really overdone and unrealistic. These Auto-Play modes seem to always benefit the player, and most of the time do not reflect how a player would actually play the game.
Due to this, I believe that games with and without an Auto-Play feature should have Realistic Auto-Play, which automatically plays the game really badly. I also think that there should be a warning beforehand that says, “WARNING: This is how we believe you would play the game. If you are hurt by this, maybe you should give playing the game a try.”
Unavoidable calls to your personal mobile from the worst character in the game
Remember how Overwatch 2 wanted people to be required to add their mobile numbers to their accounts? I think this is a great idea, purely for the purpose of this feature. I think all games should include 3-hour unavoidable phone calls on your real-life phone with the worst character in the game (refer to Feature 1).
In this phone call, you have to respond audibly to the character with things like, “Wow!” and “That’s really insightful!”, and you have to mean it. The 3-hour phone call will consist of the character talking about a putrid growth that has appeared on their inner thigh, and they will go into great detail about all the ‘natural remedies’ they have been using on it that have not been working. You cannot hang up.
This story originally appeared on Kotaku Australia.