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[Barnabot]

If they're not actually killing your interest then do they really ruin your gaming experience? At all?

I've decided to create this thread because of what I saw in the other Death Stranding thread. People were afraid of seeing some spoilers in some youtube thumbnails like it's was going to ruin their entire experience or something like that.

I personally don't mind spoilers. I've played and finished Yakuza 6 first then I've Jumped into Yakuza 0 next and I'm enjoying the game. Had playing Yakuza 6 before Yakuza 0 hampered my expectations on the game? Hell no!

Did you lost interest into buying the Resident Evil 2 Remake knowing the Leon and Claire still managed to defeat William Birkin and escape the Raccoon City? Hell no.

Are you going to lose your interest into buying Death Stranding just because you saw a spoiler about the story on Youtube?

My point is: You shouldn't be afraid about knowing a spoiler or two about the story of the game you want to play. Even three spoilers, or even four ...five... fifteen ... let's make it fifty. If you are so losing interest about playing a game because you know one thing or two about the story of the game because it was spoiled to you on YT then you should thank the guy who did that because that showed you that the game is not that good enough for you to play just because you believe you need to play that game blindly. Those who decided to play games blinded are the ones mostly likely to get scammed. Example: Metal Gear Solid 2. Don't you think it was better to know you're not supposed to play with Solid Snake the entire game and you were going to play with a rookie called Raiden instead? People would be become less pissed about the game at that time knowing about that fact beforehand. It doesn't mean people were not going to buy the game regardless.

Some GAF people always showed concerns about spoilers but I think they never bothered themselves to explain their fear of knowing something about the story of the game beforehand.

So please tell me GAF your fears and why you think they are valid.

 

[Fuz]

Depends on the game, but as a general rule spoilers heavily ruin the experience for me. I need to be surprised by the storytelling, not knowing what happens in advance.


And yet, I'm always clicking on the "spoiler" buttons in this forum.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

No, not really. I try to avoid them when I can (and this is pretty easy by avoiding the pre-release hype and the Day One fervor) but if something gets spoiled I don't care too much.

 

[drganon]

Depends on the game. Knowing the ending to gone home killed any interest in me playing the game.

 

[Flauros89]

No, for me the "how" is most important than the "what"

 

[Barnabot]

The two posts below:

Depends on the game, but as a general rule spoilers heavily ruin the experience for me. I need to be surprised by the storytelling, not knowing what happens in advance.


And yet, I'm always clicking on the "spoiler" buttons in this forum.

Depends on the game. Knowing the ending to gone home killed any interest in me playing the game.

Which game was the worst offender? What else that game was offering to you besides the storytelling?

 

[Shai-Tan]

it depends on what the spoilers are about. The red wedding in Game of Thrones is one of those instances where the enjoyment would be lower with foreknowledge but other revelations in plot either don't matter that much or can't be put into context where it would spoil enjoyment of the plot.

 

[Hinedorf]

I love spoilers just from the pretense it could be totally real and total bullshit at the same time. I love to read any all spoilers/theories and speculate with other tin foil hat wearers. I was pretty obsessed doing so with Game of Thrones for years.

I find that when you actually know the ending you are able to look for lots of other minor details but I'm also of the mindset that you should totally respect peoples wishes to not have things spoiled.

I'll spoil any fantasy ending for myself but if somebody tells me the score of some sports I'm recording I'm liable to ghost them for a year (sorry Dad)

 

[drganon]

The two posts below:




Which game was the worst offender? What else that game was offering to you besides the storytelling?

Probably gone home. At least heavy rain has variations on the ending, has actual gameplay, and lasts longer than an hour.

 

[Hinedorf]

it depends on what the spoilers are about. The red wedding in Game of Thrones is one of those instances where the enjoyment would be lower with foreknowledge but other revelations in plot either don't matter that much or can't be put into context where it would spoil enjoyment of the plot.

I had no idea about Game of Thrones till a coworker told me about it just before the start of Season 3. I watched the first few episodes and fell in love and immediately ran to the books with virtually no spoilers.

The 2 most shocking sequences in the books I found were Ned's beheading - it happens so fucking quickly I had to reread it a few times thinking to myself 'WAIT WHAT?!'

Far and away the most shocking sequence in the books was Tyrion finding his love Shae in bed with his father. I have never been so twisted/angry inside from reading anything that I literally started yelling "NO" at the book in complete disbelief.

The red wedding actually felt on point when you considered how the Frey's had previously been disrespected

 

[Barnabot]

Probably gone home. At least heavy rain has variations on the ending, has actual gameplay, and lasts longer than an hour.

Ok. And if you didn't know any spoilers about the ending of Gone Home and you played it until the end. Would you still think that game was a good game and worth of your time of playing it?

Just a heads up: Gone Home and Heavy were two games that I never got any interest into playing them. Never will. Both games in terms of gameplay were not meant to me.

 

[DonF]

It all depends on the game. Spoilers for an arcade game, I don't care... But a game that has a strong narrative element, of course it will ruin the experience!

The story is one of the ingredients of the game!

 

[Nymphae]

Surprises are nice but not experiencing them doesn't diminish the quality of a piece of work in my mind.

I read an article once about how people counterintuitively reported enjoying something they hadn't seen yet a lot when they had some level of foreknowledge (ie. someone spoiled something major). It's satisfying in a different way to know certain things will happen, and see how the story gets you there. I think the Final Destination films touch on this, and why they are very popular even though each one is almost literally the exact same movie as the ones that proceed it (and I don't mean this in a derogatory way - this series revels in delivering on expectations)

 

[royox]

If it's a game with heavy storytelling and I am very very hyped for it, yes, it can kill my interests on playing it. It actually happent in the past.

I'm the kind of person that's very weak against "launch hype" but If I manage to survive the launch of that game without buying it I can forget that game for the rest of my life.

 

[AV]

Spoilers are awful across the board. You have one chance to experience something with no prior knowledge; once you've experienced it, you can never experience it for the first time again. Why anyone would want to eliminate that opportunity entirely is beyond me. Once you know that something is coming, you're anticipating it, or trying to work out how they're going to get to that place.

As a recent example I'd have been furious if anyone spoiled Once Upon a Time in Hollywood for me, because the way I watched that movie changed entirely the 2nd time around.

 

[Ivory Blood]

No. I pretty often go on TVtropes before buying a game, reading a book or watching a movie, to know all the juicy bits.

 

[ViolentP]

I think that I think it does, but it probably doesn't.

 

[Barnabot]

Surprises are nice but not experiencing them doesn't diminish the quality of a piece of work in my mind.

I read an article once about how people counterintuitively reported enjoying something they hadn't seen yet a lot when they had some level of foreknowledge (ie. someone spoiled something major). It's satisfying in a different way to know certain things will happen, and see how the story gets you there. I think the Final Destination films touch on this, and why they are very popular even though each one is almost literally the exact same movie as the ones that proceed it (and I don't mean this in a derogatory way - this series revels in delivering on expectations)

I'm with you on this. The first time I've played The Last of Us it was the the Remastered version on PS4. Meaning that I knew how the game was going to end and I knew beforehand that Joel would give the middle finger to the entire world and yet I still bought the game because I wanted to see how he would ended up like that.

 

[xrnzaaas]

It always depends on a game. There are games for which I don't want any spoilers and reading them makes me furious (however not up to a point of ignoring the game). Sometimes reading a spoiler on purpose can peak my interest of picking up something I wasn't so sure about buying. I always want it be my decision though, I've used uBlock to disable all youtube recommendations, because they're the worst source of spoilers and youtube doesn't fucking care about fighting it.

 

[bhunachicken]

Absolutely.

Those moments are things you'll only get to experience once, and so I feel it's be to do so in the moment and context of the medium, whether that be a book, movie, game, etc.

I read The Deathly Hallows the weekend it came out, so no one could spoil it for me.
I bought a 10am ticket for Endgame, so it wouldn't be ruined for me.
I fully intend on going on a gaming website blackout when The Last of Us, Part 2 lands (hell, I'm not even looking at screenshots, trailers, or anything!)

The only thing right now I'm reading all the spoilers for is Rise of Skywalker, as I really couldn't give two shits about the sequel trilogy anymore.

 

[Northeastmonk]

It makes me upset if I wanted to wait and accidentally see it somewhere. It is the same logic behind who Darth Vader actually is or a Harry Potter book.

Here’s what I don’t get. If a game is 30+ hours long then why do some people upload the entire playthrough on YouTube the day it comes out? That makes the whole launch day thing feel meaningless. It fools the consumer. At least with books there pages to actually read. TV, movies , and video games depend on who owns a copy.

I think it doesn’t serve a single purpose to post an entire playthrough online the day of the game’s launch. How can a consumer feel like they paid $65 for something that’s just spoiled or unraveled.

You’re giving someone else the chance to enjoy it for you. I hated knowing who the Dark Knight was. The person on Twitter didn’t need to say it underneath a Dark Knight trailer at IGN. I didn’t need that person picking and choosing a place to post a spoiler. I honestly think it is super rude and immature to give away a plot or something without asking or giving a warning first.

Summary: Fuck Spoilers

 

[spandexmonkey]

Spoilers don't bother me. I find with good storytelling the build up to the shocking moment is more important than the moment itself. Knowing how Braveheart ends doesn't change how grueling the sequence is. I had the Battle of Marineford spoiled in One Piece, but it had little to no effect on my experience. The battle itself was tense and nail baiting all the way through. Once I'm engrossed in the story the overall experience is more important than individual plot points.

Personally I feel if spoiling the shocking moment ruins the experience, it was a hollow experience to begin with.

 

[June]

Spoilers effect me most when I care about the story or think the work is of high quality enough to be invested in.

It's for these reasons why I care much more about spoilers in tv and film than I do in video games, because video games tend to have shit stories anyway.

Death Stranding in particular? I don't care too much, because I don't care about the game. It looks like boring open world shit that I won't be playing any time.

But with all that said, -spoilers almost always lessen my enjoyment of the work. If I can help it, I'd rather never be spoiled.

 

[WindomURL]

Getting spoiled in terms of story, except in rare instances, isn't really a thing for me. If the gameplay is tops, I can put 100+ hours into a game even after being completely spoiled as to the ending or serious plot twists. Many games don't have very good writing as is, so nothing much is lost in those cases.

It's all about the gameplay. Like a favorite book or movie I'll go through a game a dozen times or more if it compels me.

There have been times when elements of gameplay or progression have been spoiled where I've felt a pang of disappointment, but even then I just want to get there.

 

[Fuz]

Which game was the worst offender? What else that game was offering to you besides the storytelling?

Hard to say. I care for story surprises in story driven games, I play a lot of P&C adventures and that's usually the whole point, but even in Dark Souls games I don't want to know what's waiting for me and it could possibly ruin the experience. Some of the worst offenders were FFVII (a friend spoiled Aeris' death, I was furious and wanted to kill him) and recently TW3, because I'm dumb and I've read about the Baron quest in advance. In the end, that high-praised quest didn't do much for me.

 

[Farawayfromhell]

I like surprises and I want to enjoy the game without knowing anything about what awaits me, that's the beauty.

Spoiler: Don't!

Spoilers ruin the atmosphere, I avoid them like the bubonic plaugue.​

 

[HE1NZ]

A movie that is ruined by spoilers is a bad movie to begin with. Video game is even worse.

 

[synchronicity]

If I have even the slightest interest in a game - no matter how old - I go out of my way to avoid all information about it. I prefer to experience a game as if it was on its release day, if possible. There are plenty of game discussions that I'm really interested in that I avoid altogether, no matter how tempting.

Granted, it's hard to avoid everything in this day and age, but I do a pretty good job keeping clean. And it doesn't necessarily apply to all games/genres - just generally speaking.

 

[Saber]

Nope.

On the contrary. Thanks to spoiler I see if the game its worth or not.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

they don't but they can prep me in a way i would otherwise not be prepped for.

for instance MGSV was spoiled for me about halfway through the game. it didn't ruin the game but it let me look for clues, and I kept seeing them. just as well, when the ending hit, i wasn't raging like the people that spoiled it for me, i could see it for what it was, not some imaginary thing i wanted it to be. maybe it made me like it more than i would have. maybe it didn't. i'll never know, cos some jackass got butthurt and wanted to ruin the experience of others because of it.

 

[SmoothRunningGun]

Yes.

 

[Barnabot]

Yes.

You need to spoil me your story about spoilers if you wanna join the conversation. A simples 'yes' as an answer will not make me buy this.

 

[TheDuskwalker]

No since I usually buy video games for the gameplay and the experience. If I think the gameplay is ass I wouldn't be reaching that spoiler on my own in the first place.

 

[HeadsUp7Up]

I barely finish games anyway. My gaming time is limited and sometimes it can be weeks before I’m able to pick back up where I left off. I’ll often forget what happened or even the controls so I mostly end up reading spoilers.

I do the same for movies. If it’s mildly interesting but not worth finishing I’ll read through the plot on Wikipedia and go make better use of my time.

 

[Shrap]

Probably gone home. At least heavy rain has variations on the ending, has actual gameplay, and lasts longer than an hour.

I wish someone had spoiled Gone Home for me so I didn't buy that pile of trash.

 

[Pejo]

If the main focus of the game is Story, maybe a little. I can't help but feel that most times it's the spoilee's fault for getting spoiled though. It's pretty narcissistic to enter a thread or article about said game and expect everyone to have the same definition of what constitutes as a spoiler as you have. On stuff I'm trying to avoid spoilers in, I don't read anything about it until I either beat the game or get bored of it and want to find out what happens.

Then you always have the assholes in really popular games that will spam spoilers in unexpected or hard to avoid places. They should get punched in the mouth.

 

[dust bunny]

Heavily depends on the game. Many of my favorite moments in games is when they surprise me with something I didn't expect. Or games where figuring stuff out, solving riddles, finding secrets or exploring unknown places is the fun part. I want to emphasize how these examples are not story related. The plot is just one out of a million different things a game can surprise you with where knowing about it beforehand can hurt the experience.

On the flip side, I don't really care about spoilers in games where the engaging part is mastery of the game itself (competitive games, racing games, shmups, puzzle games, etc).

I think that when people say they either care or don't care about spoilers it means their preference in games and the games they typically seek out are very different.

 

[michaelius]

Depends on the game - for something like Danganronpa spoilers would be really bad and could kill whole fun of discovering whose the villain for something like TLOU not really since getting there is best part of experience.

 

[Fbh]

Depends on the game, if it's story heavy and there's some big twist or event that gets spoiled then it's not like I don't want to play the game anymore but it's definitely a bummer.

But I do think some people are way too exaggerated when it comes to spoiler and get upset about every tiny detail that gets "spoiled".
Also if the game is like 20 fucking years old I think talking about it openly is fair game.

 

[Lupin3]

Depends on the game and what kind of spoiler it is. If it's a story based game, I'm usually staying away from it until I can play it. If the story is secondary, I guess it doesn't matter all that much. But still, hard to say, really.

Earlier today my almost 5 year old son came to me with the tablet and tried to explain the ending in Luigi's Mansion 3 (which he saw on Youtube), the game we are supposed to be playing in 2 days together. That's a kind of game that can't be ruined by "spoilers", I think, and he was nothing but excited anyway.

 

[Guardian's Light]

If they're not actually killing your interest then do they really ruin your gaming experience? At all?

I've decided to create this thread because of what I saw in the other Death Stranding thread. People were afraid of seeing some spoilers in some youtube thumbnails like it's was going to ruin their entire experience or something like that.

I personally don't mind spoilers. I've played and finished Yakuza 6 first then I've Jumped into Yakuza 0 next and I'm enjoying the game. Had playing Yakuza 6 before Yakuza 0 hampered my expectations on the game? Hell no!

Did you lost interest into buying the Resident Evil 2 Remake knowing the Leon and Claire still managed to defeat William Birkin and escape the Raccoon City? Hell no.

Are you going to lose your interest into buying Death Stranding just because you saw a spoiler about the story on Youtube?

My point is: You shouldn't be afraid about knowing a spoiler or two about the story of the game you want to play. Even three spoilers, or even four ...five... fifteen ... let's make it fifty. If you are so losing interest about playing a game because you know one thing or two about the story of the game because it was spoiled to you on YT then you should thank the guy who did that because that showed you that the game is not that good enough for you to play just because you believe you need to play that game blindly. Those who decided to play games blinded are the ones mostly likely to get scammed. Example: Metal Gear Solid 2. Don't you think it was better to know you're not supposed to play with Solid Snake the entire game and you were going to play with a rookie called Raiden instead? People would be become less pissed about the game at that time knowing about that fact beforehand. It doesn't mean people were not going to buy the game regardless.

Some GAF people always showed concerns about spoilers but I think they never bothered themselves to explain their fear of knowing something about the story of the game beforehand.

So please tell me GAF your fears and why you think they are valid.

Depends which is the game

For a Kojima game, yes, 'cause mindfucks and plot twists are like 90% of the awesomeness in its operas

For other ones, not so much, not at all in some instances, I could even know how a game ends, and I still crave to play it, the gameplay experience remains intact

For example, I had fun reading all the theories spawning from God of war ending and overall plot, when I wasn't interested in it, and it became one of my favorite games on ps4 and the most mind blowing experience so far, once I finally decided to buy and play it

Same will be for days gone probably, altough I don't know much of the plot, I accidentally stumbled in ending spoilers, but I don't care, I'm sure I'll like it anyway when I'll play it

 

[Jigsaah]

Just about as much as "Spoilers" in thread titles make me uninterested in the thread. I just get paranoid. Don't respond to this post...I'm not coming back.

 

[brian0057]

Not really.
Unless we're talking about Naughty Dog games not named Crash Bandicoot, where you can watch a complete playthrough of them on YouTube and not lose a single thing about the hackneyed story while saving $60 better spent on superior games.

 

[Daniel Thomas MacInnes]

I'm sure there's some kid somewhere who won't want to play Ms. Pac-Man after being shown all the cut scenes.