Here's some things that piss me off:

1) When you find an item that you've been trawling the whole level for, and guys with guns inexplicably show up and take it. I'm looking at you, Uncharted. How did you bastards get in here? I had to climb up a cliff face, hang by my fingertips off a ledge then swim through 200ft of water somehow, and now I have the Super Awesome Thing, you pricks are somehow here also.

2) Making me wait until I can move after a cutscene. You show me a huge boss with a cinematic camera angle, then he charges at me with fire billowing from his ears, and you make me stand there for 19 seconds before you return control to me.

Or, you show me a bad guy, he gets in a car and starts driving off.............................. 7 seconds later, you return control to me and tell me to shoot him! JUST LET ME PLAY RIGHT AWAY AND I'LL SHOOT THE PRICK BEFORE HE DRIVES OFF!

3) Switching buttons for a particular thing for no reason. Grenades = RB, but then you're swimming and suddenly Grenades = LB, which used to be Run. So I drop grenades everywhere.

4) Rocket launcher ammo, machine gun ammo, 8 health packs, grenades... I think a boss is coming up!

I agree with most points about this article. Especially the incomprehensible puzzles, it took me awhile to figure somethings out in halo because of them. And for #1, I hate games that don't let me skip cutscenes, especially if I'm playing through again.

On the other hand, Clueless AI can be really funny. And I also prefer if the game actually ends because I like to play through games more than once.

ReCaptcha: bleak pleurisy
umm i actually had to look pleurisy up in the dictionary... It's definition is weird...

I got some good advice for those who keep complaining about the same thing over and over again about these mistakes (including all of you guys at Gameradar who keep repeating these things every few seasons under different names):

DEAL WITH IT!!!

No matter how many times you complain, no matter how many times you get pissed off, 95% of the companies won't listen. They really don't give a damn about what you say here, they only see the bottom line. This goes to other gaming sites as well.

You are only a few thousand voice vs. millions of mindless customers who will buy their stuff no matter how crappy the design is.

At this very second, those companies who do read these websites like yours will laugh at you guys bitching and mourning about the same thing over and over again and they will do the same 10 thing you bitch about again and again.

It is an unstoppable circle. You bitch about game design, the game designers will laugh at your bitching and mourning, and will do the same crappy designs so you can bitch and mourn at them 6 months later and repeat.

The only way you can hurt them and send them a message that you mean business is to hit them where it hurts: their wallet. Once their series flop badly, then they will lisetn to you. Otherwise, back to the same top 7/10 crap for you.

And besides, since you guys been playing games for a long time and been writing about them for years, you guys of all people should know better and should know how to get around these flaws. The real flaw in gaming design is really YOU, the gamer.

Gamers have gotten worse and more impatient then ever. This "I want it quick and I want everthing now" generation just don't have the balls to tolerate this mess. A real gamer won't bitch about this s#!@ and face it head on.

These problems have been around ever since the beginning, do you guys really expect that everyting will change in a year? It didn't take them 2 years to be in this mess, and it ain't gonna thak the 2 years to get out either.

Go ahead and make fun of these flaws and designs again and again. Unless you go to their face, eye to eye, or make them broke, they will keep laughing and just do it again until you guys ran out of material. You can't do this kind of stuff forever.

The more things change, the more they remain the same.

Half-Life and its sequels is really bad about stupid NPC characters getting in your way.

Good article. One thing I hate with Far Cry 2 is that you have to save so often. I probably spend half my gameplay running to my house and saving. Yea that is soo much fun, not. A little auto save here and there wouldn't hurt, same with Mass Effect. As for the complexity thing I thought of Halo Wars. So what there aren't a lot of units to chose from, they're all unique and have neat special abilities. Non the less, they are fun to use.

Heh, amen pikachu 2000. QTE aren't the biggest piss-off, they just suck when you're letting your fingers finally rest. Unskippable cutscenes piss me off though. I died...now I have to watch the whole goddamned thing over again? The worst part about it is when the story just...outright sucks. Stupid AI or stupid co-op partners can be fun, as long as they don't glitch up running into the wall. You guys do know that there is a 'tells' in that certain boss battle in RE5...the device starts to static and arc more and more the closer the battle is to being over. Difficult battle though--I killed her...quite a few times with bad aim.

You win! NOW GET OUT. LOL

I feel like a tool for admitting it, but I really do enjoy these top ten style lists you guys do. Since you said you could go into the 20's and 30's with this, why not a second helping, eh?

unskipable are the worst espechally when your not intrested in em

I hate games that get a dumbed down version for the handheld or last-gen systems. Just cause you can fit a game onto a DS doesn't mean you should, and no, not all games are created equal.

Wow I just watched the whole Eternal Sonata video and died a little inside. Great article Tyler.

reCaptcha: in wizardry

yeah, i watched that video for like, 5 seconds before i got bored out of my skull.

who the hell is going to sit around for nine minutes watching a list of names scroll by at the speed of drying paint?

not me, thats for sure

Personally, I disagree with number 7, at least for the examples you gave. I really enjoyed the insertion of story in Left 4 Dead. Unnecessary, sure, but it gave the game much more personality than other games like Unreal Tournament (which has some kind of story, I'm sure, but I've never encountered it) where I have very little if any motivation. It doesn't get in the way of the fun, so why lose it? The same goes for Halo. One of the reasons I was so intrigued by Halo was the degree of grandiosity present in the story. It felt very epic (if not wholly original) and made the game much more interesting to me. Shitty story can certainly hinder a game, but well done story elements can make it that much more fun to play.

I completely agree especially with numbers ten and three. There have been puzzles in games I've played where I literally run around for, like, twenty mintues trying to figure out what the hell I'm trying to do.

I also hate games that scare me into saving every eight seconds. Bioshock did that to me; it was fun, but I was paranoid out of my mind.

I wonder if anyone mentioned how MMO's(World of warcraft is one) that really havent figured out number 6. You get all these great skills only to get to a boss or elite mob and your complex combat boils down to Bonk bonk, heal, bonk bonk, heal,etc.. Pathetic.

u dont press x to win in resident evil, u have to press x and y.

The checkpoint save system is by far the most annoying thing in games. I know platforms have had this "feature" for years now but I was raised on PC gaming- save anywhere is in my DNA. It is so frustrating to play an initially fun game only to have the experience destroyed by no quicksave option. I'm looking at YOU Rainbow Six Vegas and Gears of War!

This article can be also known as a reference to Alone in the Dark(what terrible,......terrible game)

I hate resident evil 5, and those are the reasons why.

ugh Assassins Creed is SO guilty of number 1

I just want to get right to the action but instead I have to sit through 10 minutes of some old dude "reveiling" shit that wasnt even all that interesting in the first playthrough