I just recently finished Desperados: Wanted Dead or Alive. Honestly, it was quite frustrating, with the game being not just really difficult, but also sometimes just straight up cheating. But I persevered. I decided I will do this, I will win this game without looking up any strategies or hints, I'll beat this. And so I did. Untill the penultimate mission. Where I was defeated. By a door.

After 23 missions and over 24 hours of accumulated gameplay, I could not for the life of me figure out how to open a door. After a whole day of trying I caved, looked it up online, turns out there was a panel in the floor nearby I was supposed to stand on. And so, my almost triumphant struggle to beat Desperados fair and square on my own came to a most inglorious end.

And now it made me wonder if any of you had similar things happen. Overcoming some great odds in a game, or achieving something really clever or impressive, only to fall flat on your face because of something laughably easy?

Edit: Yes, I know there's a spelling error in the title. I'd ask a blue to fix it, but it actually feels quite appropriate.

well..... nvm

too much

Easy difficulty total war campaign, failed during the first real encounter. That says enough right

Things like that happen quite often in adventure games.

On the top of my head, in Under a Killing Moon had to open the safe. On the wall next to it was such oriental segmented painting with cranes (screenshot) and I spent like 30 minutes or so trying to deduce code to safe from this painting because I was sure it must be there. It turned out that code was on the paper under the table which I missed.

It was my birthday last week and I gave out ten copies of Genital Jousting - only two people had it wishlisted.

I never played Under a Killing Moon, but I can totally see myself doing the same thing :D In adventure games it's easy to everthink stuff like that. I sometimes wonder how many things in point & clicks I played were intentional red herrings, and how often it was just me.

Relevant recent Viva La Dirt League video on this very topic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMFk_RyTL80

I've fallen prey to the "can't find the switch/lever" many times, Usually when they're right there, just weirdly placed like this video indicates or your door floor panel you allude to.

More recently, I ran into a stupid one of "You can't continue further in this side quest until a later primary quest is achieved, the NPC lied."

Thanks for that video, it was very relateable :D Though what made that floor panel so frustrating form e was not even where it was placed, but the fact that everyting else in Desperados you can interact with makes the mouse coursor change to indicate it - you know, a hand for picking things up, a lockpick to open locked doors etc. But hovering over that panel did nothing, so I just ignored it. Ah, an NPC being full of shit. I remember I once had an NPC in Morrowind tell me to go in the exact opposite direction of where I was actually supposed to go for his quest (can't remember what that was). There being no indicators on the map in Morrowind, just the directions you're told, I wasted so much time going the wrong way before I finally checked on line to see why I can't find anything. The funny thing is I wasn't even really mad. For one thing I couldn't feel stupid about it - it was not my fault at all, and for another it was almost fun to have something liek that happen. In a modern game with all the quest markers it never would, but it was so refrechingly realistic and goofy at the same time - the great hero gets wrong directions and goes nowhere fast!

This last couple of weeks I played the Broken Sword saga. All was going more or less well until I started playing the 4th game. I could not, for the life of me, progress past the beginning of the game. I had to read (over and over again) a walkthrough to be able to go beyond the first chapter. The mix of obnoxious steps to progress, the minimal change in the pointer when pointing at interactable objects, and certain degree of fatig¡ue after having played the other games of the series; frustrated me a lot.

I don´t forget the "puzzle" in which, in a hotel, a person is locked (by a mafia guy who was watching the door from some distance) in a cleaning tools storage room. The lock is one of those security keypads that require a number code to be able to open the door (yeah, the room where brooms and bleach are storaged). The solution was to pass a felt tip pen and a piece of paper under the door to the locked person who was tied. Said person writes the code of the door, and passes the paper and felt tip pen back under the door. And that way the player gets the code. The door is opened, the locked woman is very angry, and the gangster guy who was watching and was armed, flees scared of the woman.

After the first chapter of the game, I didn´t need to use the walkthrough anymore... until I faced another obnoxious puzzle at the very end of the game.


After enjoying the series overall, the 4th game left a bad taste in my mouth.

This reminds me of something I've heard about Unlimited SaGa. In that game, many players would find themselves stumped by treasure chests, as opening them was not simple in that game. Or there's "can't continue the main quest unless you trigger this event first".

I'm reminded of one playthrough of the Super NES Final Fantasy 2 (really a simplified FF4, not the "real" FF2 that Japan got) in which I forgot to pick up the TwinHarp before going into the Magnetic Cave. At the end of this cave, there's a boss that you can't win (the fight is scripted so that you lose); if you don't have this item, the boss will physically attack for 9999 damage (rather than using spells for survivable damage), and a party wipe is an actual game over (instead of the next scene being triggered). All because I forgot to trigger a certain cutscene in town.

There's also cases of JRPGs not letting you continue until you talk to everyone; I remember Dragon Quest 6 doing this at least twice, for example. I remember the PlayStation version of Final Fantasy 5 having a mistranslation that ruins the hint for a certain dungeon where you split your party, and one side you shouldn't use physical attacks, and on the other side you shouldn't use magic.

Dragon Warrior 4 (though this is more an example of a cheat backfiring):
* Decided to play with Game Genie, using an infinite HP/MP cheat.
* Got to the Keeleon fight in Chapter 4. You are supposed to lose the fight, and it turns out that this boss casts Healall (Fullheal in modern translation) to prevent the player from actually winning.
* Realized that there's still a way I could lose. There are two party members, Mara and Nara. (And a third, but he's a guest party member, and if he's the only one alive, it's considered a party wipe.) Nara has an item called the Silver Tarot Cards, that does random things, and using it could instantly kill the party.
* Used it, and got the worst possible result in this situation; it killed Nara (the one with these cards), but spared Mara (so the game over did not appear).

Incidentally, I've also gotten stuck exploiting glitches (but that's to be expected), and in Final Fantasy 6 I once softlocked in a battle in a glitchless manner (various design decisions combined to prevent a battle from resolving).

Edit: Why the low rating?

You've got more stamina than I have. I gave up on Desperados in level 10 or so. Can't say I enjoyed the game, imo it has a lot of bs level design.

Could not find enough loot to complete a mission in The Dark Mod, because I missed the entire apartment with three possible entrances in a small quarter of the city. :D

The 4th game is seen as a low-point in the series. I haven't played 5 yet - shaping up for a run through the entire series again. I'm probably looking forward to 3 the most - not the best adventure game out there, but something about it that I just really like.

tbh I thought it was pretty unfair from early on. One real bs moment for me was a level where you're not allowed to raise an alarm (it's instant game over if you do). I left some poker cards on the ground to lure a guard away...and he came looking at them, and then raised the alarm...so I lost the level for having dropped some poker cards on the ground. Seemed like rather flawed design to me.
I suppose Desperados 3 isn't as unfair (though it apparently has weird abilities, with that vodoo lady in your team who can mind-control enemies). Haven't played it myself, and doubt I will. I did play Shadow tactics and its expansion, and imo it's the best of that sort of game after the original Commandos (pretty hard though).