JonCole

How long will you give a game to "convince" you?

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Unless it's openly broken or painfully generic from the start, I'll play most games for at least 5-30 minutes, more if they seem promising.

I have very little patience for bad controls though. If something you'll be dealing with moment to moment through the entire game isn't fun, the rest (story/atmopsphere, larger gameplay choices) better be really good.

If the "good part" is apparently after the first 10-25 hours, I usually don't bother. Even a giant RPG has no excuse not to have an interesting first act.

There's a difference as well between games you've sought out and games that you stumbled across with no expectations. If I have no emotional investment in a game yet it has to work extra hard to grab me... especially if I'm trying to look at a bunch of games all at once (like checking out Ludum Dare or IGF games).

For a free indie game starting with a long non-interactive intro is the kiss of death. Cinematics are fine as a palette cleanser between gameplay - but an FMV or text intro is not going to tell me whether I want to play the game or not.

Sometimes I really try though. I gave Far Cry 2 a good 17 hours before I gave up on it. I enjoyed certain aspects, but eventually just got really bored with driving nowhere and getting run over by guards I killed 5 minutes ago.

Edited by Ninja Dodo

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