Video games depend on players knowing what will happen when they press a button, which is what makes the complete lack of standardization around what buttons do during cutscenes so frustrating. This should be a solved issue, but it’s still a frustratingly open question what will happen when you reach for the pause button in any given game.
I started playingDead Island 2last week and I’m having a good time so far, in spite of it including solution for this issue that’s worse than the problem itself. During the opening cutscene, which sets up each of the playable characters, the zombie puree simulator leaves the “Skip” prompt on screen for the entire cinematic.
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This is fairly common in games now and I hate it. For all the talk we get from gamers and developers alike about the medium’s capacity for immersion, there’s nothing that quite breaks my connection with an interactive story like leaving a button prompt on screen to remind me I can opt out of that story the second I feel bored. On purpose or not, leaving the button prompt up during the cutscene encourages you to view these moments as unimportant. If I went to a movie theater and big, white text that read “Feel Free To Take A Bathroom Break” started flashing during a heartfelt conversation between two characters, I would be inclined to think the scene wasn’t all that essential to the filmmakers. So, when games throw a Skip prompt on screen during a cutscene, it feels like the developers are communicating the same thing. You probably aren’t here for the story, are you?
This is part of a broader problem with the lack of standardization across the game industry. When I stream a movie onNetflixorHBO Max, I know that playing, pausing, exiting, fast forwarding and rewinding will all work the same way. And those platforms handle it in essentially the same way that DVR and Blu-rays did, and the same way that DVDs did before that. VHS tapes didn’t come with a menu, but otherwise the basics haven’t changed since the ’70s.
But, say you’re playing a game and hit an important story moment just as your partner gets back from the store with a car full of groceries. If it’s your first time attempting to pause the game during a cutscene you have an equal chance of achieving that goal or skipping the scene entirely. And, unless the game specifically lists controls for cutscenes in the settings menu, the only way you’re going to find out is by testing it out for yourself. Not that you can check that menu without hitting pause anyway.
I’m calling for standardization across all genres and all games. If I hit the start button during a cutscene, it should pause the game. It should never skip ahead without asking first. When I pause, the option to skip the cutscene — if the developers even want you to be able to skip cutscenes— should be available there. Of course, once you’ve seen a cutscene, you should be able to skip it in perpetuity. No one wants to watch an unskippable cutscene each time they tackle a tough boss fight.
All of this seems obvious, but games haven’t entirely figured it out more than 40 years into home consoles becoming widely available. Games often look to movies for inspiration, but in this case, they should look to the humble DVD.
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