10 Games That Don't Respect Your Time

As a gamer with a busy lifestyle and limited time to spare, I find myself often frustrated by games that don’t respect my precious hours. These are some of the worst offenders I’ve encountered in recent years, each one testing my patience and commitment to the point of exasperation.

Have you ever encountered a game that seemed to disregard your valuable time? Perhaps it featured overly lengthy missions without significant rewards, relentless repetitive tasks, or frustrating game mechanics that made the experience less enjoyable. I think we can all relate to such experiences.

Sometimes, lengthy games may seem problematic, but it’s usually the way they are structured or designed that makes them appear longer, rather than their actual duration. Here are some games that tend to overstep their time allotment with you.

10 Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey

Level Gating Is Pain

10 Games That Don't Respect Your Time

In modern-day Assassin’s Creed games, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey stands out as one of the best, yet it struggles with a significant problem: excessive time consumption.

At specific stages during the game, progress in the main story temporarily halts due to level restrictions, forcing players to complete numerous side missions before moving forward with the primary narrative.

On multiple occasions, it took Ubisoft some time to acknowledge and implement an effective solution for this problem.

Nonetheless, it was a disappointing blow for those who purchased the game at its release, as it seemed like they were being disrespected. This sting was intensified by the excessive application of microtransactions that hastened the level-up progression, which felt particularly distasteful.

The game is fantastic, yet it seems like the secondary missions just keep coming, which can be entertaining initially. However, over time, the excitement fades as the quality starts to dwindle, leaving you with an overstuffed game that appears unable to stop expanding.

9 Death Stranding

Definitely Not ’30 Minutes Or Less’

At its best, Death Stranding could offer an exceptional gaming experience. However, at its worst, it’s hard to overstate how ungracious it can feel with your precious time.

It’s a fascinating visual experience, but the slightest slip-ups result in large amounts of time being wasted.

Since you’ll be carrying packages so often, you’ll have to maintain your balance.

If you successfully accomplish this task, be mindful that menacing BTs are lurking around. Should they spot you, they could sweep you away along with your belongings scattered everywhere.

This will result in a battle with the BT, but even if you win, all those packages must be retrieved.

It’s far too frequent an occurrence, this predicament, and it frequently steals away precious moments that I could be spending immersed in all the fantastic elements Death Stranding has to offer.

It can be challenging to truly enjoy a game if it seems to be squandering your valuable time instead.

8 Red Dead Redemption 2

Horse Back Riding Takes a While

In many aspects, Red Dead Redemption 2 ranks among the best games ever created. However, it falls short when it comes to valuing your precious time.

Traveling quickly isn’t readily available, making it necessary to endure lengthy periods of exploration instead of using the usual fast travel option.

Occasionally, the world may catch us off guard with an unexpected occurrence, yet such events don’t happen often enough to resolve this problem.

Essentially, it’s all incredibly lifelike, meticulous to the point of being excessive, and frequently time-consuming and rather monotonous, mimicking real-world tasks.

Realism is great, and it can really help place you in the world presented, but I’d much rather be robbing trains and shooting bandits.

Instead of strolling leisurely, you’ll spend your time mending fences, gathering liquor, traveling a sluggish carriage to town for tedious chores, and engaging in numerous monotonous tasks that are tiresome and not particularly enjoyable.

Experiencing Red Dead Redemption 2 can be enjoyable, but at times it seems as though the game disregards the value of your time.

7 Persona 5 Royal

Hours Before the Good Stuff

Persona 5 Royal could be described as the video game equivalent of a TV series that improves significantly after its initial season.

Essentially, it takes about 10 hours or so for the pace of this game to get really engaging, which is quite common in ATLUS games.

Initially, its pace is disappointingly slow, but once it picks up speed, it becomes one of the top JRPGs in this generation.

In simpler terms, The tasks you need to accomplish, the long, monotonous days spent on routine social activities, the overly repetitive mazes, and the absence of any dungeons during the first four hours of play in the game are noticeable.

In this case, it’s primarily a matter of building up to a satisfying conclusion, yet the preparatory phase involves some of the lengthiest gameplay that you could ever envision.

Many gamers find they can’t spare a full 10 hours to thoroughly explore a game before diving deep. However, for those who have the patience, it’s certainly rewarding to persevere through the initial, more leisurely stages.

6 Xenoblade Chronicles 2

Tutorials for Days

In simpler terms, “Xenoblade Chronicles 2” is an extensive, grandiose role-playing game (JRPG) with numerous mechanics. Once you grasp these many elements, it can be extremely enjoyable to play.

To get to that point, though, you’re going to be sitting through literal hours of tutorials.

Throughout the entire game, you’ll find yourself consistently learning new tutorials for various systems that are introduced rapidly and frequently.

Despite being entertaining, the gameplay is unnecessarily intricate, making it challenging to recall a large portion of what the game instructs you on.

As a gamer, I find it incredibly annoying when I can’t bypass the tutorials, especially since many of them seem to focus on features or systems I’ll hardly use in the game.

This game feels like an endless wait, and you’ll likely keep checking your clock, wondering how many minutes of your precious time it’s consuming.

5 Dragon’s Dogma 2

You Were The Chosen One

The sequel to Dragon’s Dogma was perfectly positioned for a big triumph. With the revival of a cherished series, a lengthy production period, and experienced professionals on board, everything seemed in place.

The game ended up being okay at best, and one of the most insane time-wasters imaginable at worst.

As a gamer, I can tell you, Dragon’s Dogma 2 seems to have no respect for my schedule. It’s as bold as brass and it flaunts this truth at every turn during gameplay.

Initially, the fast travel system leaves much to be desired. However, in Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen, this issue was largely addressed. Regrettably, for some reason, they seem to have regressed in this game, making navigation through the world needlessly challenging.

While running, your energy level steadily depletes, so you’ll find yourself frequently displaying an out-of-breath animation if you choose to move on foot.

As a gamer, I can tell you from experience, if you opt for the carriage ride, it’s likely to run into monsters 80% of the time, leading to its inevitable destruction. So, you might as well walk, and even finding that blasted carriage in the first place is no walk in the park!

In this attempt, Capcom aimed to create an engaging and immersive exploration experience, yet frequently fell short, resulting in excessive periods of wasted time. Consequently, it’s hardly surprising that most players trigger the game’s secret timed main story events.

4 Returnal

Aliens on Loop

Returnal” becomes captivating once you delve deeper, but prior to that point, it can feel quite disregardful towards your valuable time.

Absolutely, it’s intended that way because your role is repetitively experiencing the cycle of life and death. With each return, you gain a little more understanding or skill to navigate the challenges you encounter.

In the early stages of the game, it seems less effective as you struggle to compete with many of the creatures you encounter in combat.

Repeating the initial zone multiple times can leave a negative impact on players, prompting developers to include an extra function aimed at preventing players from abandoning the game due to exasperation.

It’s a hardcore experience for sure, but that doesn’t excuse the amount of times you’ll be replaying the same levels over and over just hoping things tilt your way the next run through.

3 No Man’s Sky

Resource Gathering isn’t Fun

In today’s world, No Man’s Sky offers an extraordinary and unique gaming experience, yet it’s undeniable that it’s also one of the most substantial time commitments out there.

In this version of the game, there’s an option to bypass resource requirements for many tasks. If you don’t use this feature, however, you find yourself caught in a recurring cycle of collecting resources, using them, then repeating the process again and again.

The process of collecting resources for the game’s different components isn’t enjoyable at all, and it can consume a significant amount of time.

In this game, the universe presents a fascinating realm to discover, yet often finds you fixated on a roughly textured asteroid, repeatedly blasting it with your mining laser, now more familiar than the back of your hand.

To construct everything within the game and power your journeys across the galaxy, it’s essential that you keep performing this action consistently.

To put it another way, while it may be possible, it’s also quite disregarding of the value of your time – this is one of the reasons why many people stopped playing when the game first came out.

2 Dragon Age: Inquisition

The Hinterlands Problem

In the Dragon Age series, Dragon Age: Inquisition stands out as one of the top games. However, it encounters a significant issue that remains unresolved to this very day.

In this region of the game, known as the Hinterlands, there are a plethora of tedious tasks that leave one astonished.

The issue arises from the type of influence or energy you gain upon finishing these tasks, and to access other sections of the battle strategy board, you need to accumulate this influence.

Spending extended periods in the initial zone involves tackling each side mission, defeating all enemy groups to take control of areas, and essentially engaging in tedious tasks until you manage to break free from the confinement of the Hinterlands.

Fortunately, other regions surpass the Hinterlands, yet there’s always a lingering sensation of wasted time. However, you still need to amass power to advance in the narrative’s unfolding.

It’s fortunate that the story is engaging, making it easier to endure the various sections as the game progresses.

Getting rid of this bloat was a massive priority for Bioware, and it shows with how much more compact things are in Dragon Age: The Veilguard.

1 Starfield

The Great Unknown Is Boring

Starfield has certainly sparked divided opinions among gamers, as it offers a unique blend of infinite space traversal, a simple narrative, and moderately engaging combat. For some players, these elements are captivating; for others, they may not resonate as much.

One thing is for sure though, and that is that Starfield has no regard for your time.

For instance, Bethesda’s success stories can be attributed to one common factor: exploration. This is why in Starfield, when you arrive at a new planet, you will be able to traverse it on foot, and there will likely be plenty of walking involved.

To put it simply, what you’ll be dealing with initially is quite bare-bones. At the outset, there won’t be any vehicles, and the game mechanics won’t include Quality of Life features to manage your stamina during sprinting. Essentially, it’s going to be a straightforward, unadorned experience at first.

The developers acknowledge that it can be dull at times, yet they maintain this is intentional, not a justification for consuming excessive amounts of players’ precious time.

As a dedicated fan, I’ve noticed that certain dungeons, such as the Cryo Lab, seem to be duplicated throughout the game. The layout of items and even the positions of the notepads are strikingly similar in each instance.

You can find yourself getting sucked into them just as easily, since it seems like discovering a fresh spot at first, but before you know it, you’re scouting and battling, only to suddenly think “I’ve been here before,” and before you realize it, another 45 minutes have slipped away.

It’s quite frustrating that Starfield often does this, yet there are enjoyable moments. However, no fun can compensate for how it squanders your precious time.

2024-11-16 18:09

10 Games That Don’t Respect Your Time