We Still Make These?

In Far Cry 5, there's a mission where your character, the deputy is kidnapped by the game's antagonist, Joseph Seed…

Okay, that doesn't really narrow it down.

Early, in the game when the deputy is kidnapped and then freed by his allies, you're picking up weapons to follow NPCs near a Cliffside road before sprinting across a bridge to then wait for Helicopter extraction.

It was looking upon this view that my eyeballs threatened to pop out of the screen in bewilderment.

I'm not playing Far Cry 5…

I'm playing Tower of Power…

But worse.

There isn't a swarm of enemies, just a handful of AI goons charging one at a time into my emptied magazines.

The bridge itself is far longer so there's no punishment for missing, or possibility to be overwhelmed. Not unless I had the precision aiming of my dog.

Finally… there isn't sixteen players yelling over 24kbps microphones.

That's something they can't do much about.

Fair enough.

However, for the previous two points, I just can't believe this type of mission design is desired by other players or even designers. This strikes me as something done out of desperation, lack of time, or having a grand idea that didn't pan out, and needed something to replace it.

Because I mean…

Look at this.

Is this seriously something people want to play?

Picking off zombies from a mile away with enough ammunition to arm a Militia?

Where's the tension? Where's the context? Where's the danger? Where's the power trip? Where's the power vacuum? What's to fool me that I'm doing something other than what I'm literally doing when playing a game?

I'm not a stickler. I'm not picky.

Whether it's done 2D, 3D, serious, goofy, story driven, sandbox driven, open-world, linear, 4k, 8-bit, whatever.

Pac Man, and Tetris are some of the most timeless video-games of all time.

I'm still playing Doom!

But this?

Mission design like this. Where the player is doing quite literally nothing but sitting there and clicking on far away targets…

It sucked in Bad Company 2…

It sucked in Battlefield 3…

It sucked in Battlefield 1's war stori- okay, you get the point.

Point is, it won't be that long before I've been playing these types of missions for twenty years, and it's never once been enjoyable.

There's no magic formula to making a great video game, but I think there might be an easy test for scripted linear missions like these.

If your handcrafted level's worse than Tower of Power…

Start over.