The Best Worst Mechanic in Gaming

this video is sponsored by Opera GX so this browser is pretty special I've been using upper GX for a little under a year now and I really wanted to work with them again because I actually love what they have going on here as a gamer you probably already know that it has these limiters to keep your PC games from lagging and twitch and Discord Integrations in the sidebar but what you might not know is that you can also download these little animated wallpapers right off their add-on store or that you can easily use any Chrome extensions you want with it even your settings bookmarks and browser history from your previous browser can be quickly imported over with the quick import tool another cool feature they've added is the GX profiles tool that lets you build a custom browser to fit what you need if you stream a lot and don't want your tabs making rackets you can build a GX profile for that if you're studying and trying to focus you don't want to be flooded with notifications why not quickly make a GX profile for that as well oh and my personal favorites the GX Corner which compiles all the upcoming game release dates and sales so so that I can keep track and budget for everything I want to get hyped for or catch up on Opera GX is completely free by the way and if you click my link down below you'll get an exclusive feature in your GX corner where you can find my latest 12 videos for your convenience let me know in the comments what PC games you are playing right now and be sure to use my link below to download Opera GX for free today thanks again to Opera GX for sponsoring and with that said let's start the show it's 12 42 a.m you are laying in bed wide awake you have an alarm set for 6 30 a.m and you have to leave your home at 7 00 am you take a deep breath close your eyes and sleep still does not come to you try to relax you tell yourself you pretend that it's raining outside you like the rain sleep still does not come you look back at the clock it is now 103 am anxiety begins to set in the pressure to fall asleep begins to weigh down on you you start doing math if I fall asleep in five minutes I'll get 5 hours and 22 minutes of sleep 104 am 5 hours and 21 minutes this is not relaxing time will not wait for you to fall asleep every second that passes is irredeemable and thinking about this only amplifies your stress making your goal of falling asleep all the more difficult [Music] how can we put this in a game [Music] escaping from planet zebes running errands in termina while the sky is literally falling that one fight against Okumura whom's hatred in the Persona 5 Community can only be rivaled by the passion and the best girl debate timers countdowns time limits these are all mechanics that originally saw a lot of use in older titles but are very much alive and well nowadays not unlike other mechanics there seems to be a split between people that think that they add something to the experience and others that will literally drop a game because a timer is a major component you might find the 30-day countdown at Pikmin to be the perfect way to keep pace and feel a little bit of heat whenever you make a decision but then again that ever dropping moon in Majora might put a damper on your exploration and force you to play at a pace that you wouldn't ordinarily play a Zelda game with and what I find interesting about this is that it's not just games where the timer is clearly there to create stress its timers in general I put some feelers out there on Twitter and it seems some people simply avoid games where this is a major component as soon as they catch wind of it one comment I saw mention that even the 20-hour daylight timer in stardew Valley simply being there made them super anxious in what is supposed to be a Zen relaxing game they couldn't settle in presumably because the finite daylight added a pressure to maximize their time and this is what I really want to talk about today how the presence of a timer regardless of the genre of game or really even the genre of everyday activity clouds our judgment and warps our Focus I've got a little research for you as well as examples of how it ties into games when timers work well when they don't in two games that I personally think are some of the best ways games have ever taken a countdown and done something really juicy with it so without wasting a second more welcome to it is a truth universally acknowledged that a gamer in possession of a new game must be in want of playing said game and when said game has some form of time limit whether it be for the entire game or simply a small portion of that game Suddenly by the very fundamental nature of the software the game is now limiting how much of itself can be played in one go what I mean is one big turn off of countdowns is that they make you prioritize how you spend your time so if you are the type of person who likes to search every nook and cranny of a dungeon for bonuses you may not be able to do so because you're on a tight schedule now you've got to start making tough decisions okay do I have time to grab that item should I try to fight this guy can I finish this before Sundown is this side quest really worth my time decisions that are only necessary due to that little ticking clock and that's kind of the point timers make us prioritize which presumably is the developers in but incidentally they also distract us from being able to do so efficiently you see prioritization is a process we do in our working memory if you don't know what working memory is it's essentially the part of your memory that you use as a mental sketch pad is what you are immediately thinking about if I show you a series of numbers and shapes and then take them away they're now sitting in your working memory for you to play with and will remain there until something else a thought a song Someone asking you a question more numbers and shapes really any stimulus takes its place if you're doing math you might pull a squared plus b squared equals c squared from your long-term memory but our working memory is what hangs on to these numbers for a second plugs them into this equation you've just recalled and decides what to punch into a calculator and as you can imagine your working memory is doing backflips when you play a game you're flooded with prompts decisions health bars DPS values Buffs debuffs status effects chips badges obstacles potential mixes enemies friendlies Keys locks moral conundrums and yes sometimes a time limit which for a lot of people adds an additional layer of stress and as I'm sure you are acutely aware if you've ever taken a standardized exam your working memory is highly sensitive to interference from stressors it's so sensitive in fact that a handful of psychologists gave this phenomena a bougie name attentional control theory according to this Theory anxiety hinders our working memory specifically by disrupting our ability to control attention making us much more vulnerable to distraction essentially intrusive stressful thoughts about task irrelevant things Cloud our working memory if you are taking an exam and you begin to struggle on a question an important thought would be okay I know it's not B probably not D let me go from there task irrelevant thoughts might be why did this topic have to be on here why does it feel like all the hard ones are at the beginning why were the last three questions all C did I get those wrong should I go back and double check those and timer only pours gas on that fire according to intentional control theory since our working memory has its limits stressors sort of clog our immediate thoughts and make it tough to keep the actual important information in front of us this leads to presumably a worse cognitive performance you're not as efficient and you're not as effective particularly on complex tasks and uh but they still want to be done to look for the kill reference going to come in and Brock's gonna kill front of that one yes this is something we've probably all experienced in one form or another maybe you're worried you weren't doing enough damage to win in time but instead of thinking of a new strategy or making a key adjustment the thought all this time will be wasted if I fail sneaks in and you have to spend energy dealing with that if you're playing Mario party and you really need to win this minigame you might get so distracted looking at the other person's screen appreciating just how far behind you are that you completely neglect to focus on actually catch back up you might be so shaken by that mistake that you hyper focus on how many times you can afford to fail and this distracts you from actually playing well enough to win you see the timer adds an inevitable threat and a stressor to what is usually already a very complex set of actions and decisions taxing the working memory to a degree that is extremely uncomfortable usually when we play a game a handful of things are important at any given moment how much health you have which way you plan to go if you should block or attack but when we add in a time limit suddenly all of the things become important at once or at least that's how it feels your working memory tries to put things in order of importance but then these stress compounds with every decision every death is sweatier every mistake Cuts deeper every hesitation is unforgivable and every decision is heavier now obviously not everyone is this affected by timers and the research reflects this the difference in subject performance in timed versus untimed exams for example based on a lot of research I found was more a factor of individual traits like introversion anxiety perfectionism and stressor perception than just the timer if countdowns don't bother you it may be because you don't feel the need to perfectly maximize your time for you this is just a challenge and you're here for it another thing to consider is that not all timers are created equal the timer and overcooked does not bring the same dread that the timer and say Lightning Returns or outer Wilds does one is intended to manifest comedic chaos the other is to communicate an impending doom or something I still haven't played outer Wilds neon white makes you hit certain times on every stage to progress but you can instantly retry and you'll want to same with any 2D Mario they're as forgiving as they are inviting the stakes are low whereas other games might be much more punishing if you fail to get the job done in time or they might just be seen as an annoyance more than an obstacle like in Pandora's Tower where if you were running out of time you have to skedaddle back out of a dungeon Midway through to feed your girl the Flesh of monsters so that she doesn't transform into a demon we've all been there for my wife is Chick-fil-A prize in other games like Dead Rising the timer may be so generous that it doesn't really affect you Fire Emblem 3 houses was technically on a timer much like Persona you're limited with how many calendar days you have to work with but there's so many days to go around that you might find yourself wasting time just to advance the game you have plenty of opportunities to maximize so for those reasons not all timers stress all people there are folks that welcome a little bit of excitement from being on the clock and there are others who are uncomfortable with timers and farming Sims however there is one countdown that I think does get players just a little bit frazzled in the best kind of way foreign there's a little Game Boy title that nowhere near enough of you played we've all hopped on the back of a Yoshi but only a select few of us have used an allergic reaction to avoid taking the stairs Wario Land 4 is one of the biggest hidden gems out there and in my opinion it has almost the perfect execution of a countdown you see in this game you have to hop into these little sub stages to hunt down a handful of things a ghost key to open the next stage a collectible CD lots and lots of money of course and four of these gym shards to unlock the boss of that area essentially each dive into a level is a loot run and you can play it multiple times if you missed something you'll make trips into each stage grab some goodies and once you find one of these frog pedestals the portal will open for you to come back to the hub area cool here's the catch the frogs that let you into the stage are sweet the frogs will let you out of the stage are strapped so every time you reach the end of one of these areas you have to make an Indiana Jones style Escape Before Time runs out or you lose everything you've found much like the ghost and Spelunky that hunts you down if you stick around too long in an area you play a really tight-knit risk reward game of exploring more of the level for more goodies or just getting to the exit safe and sound but it doesn't stop there because sometimes the stage is built such that you can't get all the shards or the key until you hit the timer sometimes parts of the stage open up once the bomb is lit and now you're overloaded with the thought oh dear God did I miss something or will I see it on the way out oh and hey in case you're fragile to this kind of thing don't worry because when you start the timer Wario comforts you with some words of encouragement then you're hit with this diabolical Banger of a song all in all it makes for one hell of an adrenaline rush now you might be thinking okay well at least I can catch my breath and start the timer whenever I'm ready I can stop here and mentally prepare until I'm good to go that's where you're wrong did I mention that in one level the portal opens right above the bomb so you immediately start on the timer forcing you to go full speed from the start or that other levels will hide the switch out of sight so that you accidentally activate it without warning this game loves to cleverly toy with you in between some of the level design and the presentation all together it clogged your working memory with thoughts like come on man please just sneeze on me already wait have I gone this way no no no no no what the hell is that but somehow it generally feels completely Fair because much like an old Mario level you can just retry without losing a ton of time if you lose all the goods that sucks but you can still go get them you weren't locked into a terrible ending the stakes are there but it isn't so punishing that it's off-putting plus since usually the countdown starts after you are super familiar with the stage and its mechanics you feel prepared to handle the route back and I think this is when timers feel okay when they're spicy enough to actually influence how you play without being annoying but they don't have so much bite that they cause you to get completely overwhelmed as we've established everyone is different but I feel like Wario Land 4 is convincingly The Sweet Spot for this mechanic something that is however not in the sweet spots and I mean that as a massive compliment is a game called uncited in this game both your character and all of your new friends are doomed there was a power source called anima that essentially gives all of the inhabitants of Arcadia Consciousness without it automations become uncited Primal and rabid forever lost to violently wander in search of more anima there is no turning back for those that become unsighted and in your journey to restore the source of the anima and save all of your friends you will be asked to confront both a horde of enemies and the clock to keep both yourself and as many fellow automations alive as you can with what little anima you do find when you speak to a character their remaining life expectancy is displayed you can check on them all at any time from the pause screen and anytime you enter a new room you are reminded of your own life expectancy at all times you are acutely aware of just how much time everyone has left to live and so you can use spare anima in the form of meteor dust you find to increase the lifespans of yourself or of say this blacksmith he will be grateful and it'll get you a discount on weapons but he will also remind you that his sister's days are numbered as well and that you should share some with her and so you feel this pull between wanting to keep characters alive for their usefulness and wanting to keep others alive simply because you're weirdly attached to them it it adds an eerie dissonance to know that you may not be able to save everyone and that in fact you may be forced for the greater good to spin spear meteor dust on one character who is more useful to you even if you aren't emotionally invested in them effectively sacrificing another that you truly care for in one 2012 study researchers studied the effect of stress on moral decision making they gave subjects a hypothetical decision to make in both stressed and unstressed conditions the decision was essentially would you sacrifice one person to save the lives of several others in the event the decision maker was stressed and the decision was presented from a personal perspective where the decision maker is required to take direct action to sacrifice a person the participant was much less likely to do so in this case being anxious made participants more receptive to their feelings than to logic uncited presents these exact types of decisions to you under the umbrella of a merciless time limit there is a tangible sense of desperation and urgency that leaks into every little thing you do every mistake every time you're lost every nap to rest your battle proven pup every missed chest of meteor dust doesn't just burn your time it burns someone else's as well and since you are the only one person responsible uncited use of time creates a sense of unease and a genuine sorrow that in my experience other countdowns haven't even come close to it should go without saying that if you haven't played you really ought to give it a go it's amazing what being constantly reminded of these seconds passing this can do the clock ticks at the exact same speed when we're waiting for class to end when we're stuck in traffic when we're laughing hysterically with our friends and when we desperately just want to fall asleep the way we perceive time is largely dependent on how much we are perceiving it it only speeds up and slows down subject to what you are willing it to do and I think that's why timers and games will be around for a long time they may or may not actually add any real difficulty but by simply being there and making you fiercely aware of the hands of the clock turning it changes things for many of us it clouds our judgment for others it may spice things up and sometimes it can be used to make something pretty damn remarkable time waits for no one but if you can keep your cool focus on what you can control embrace the panic and move with purpose you just might find yourself waiting for it [Music] hey there gang thanks so much for tuning in to another episode of Psych of play appropriately I was in a bit of a time crunch writing and producing this video since I took a week off after the anime episode to travel I was really relating to the subject matter in this one let me tell you thanks a ton for the reception on the anime episode it means the world to me that you guys still enjoy what I was making even if it wasn't gaming related so seriously genuinely thank you and a special thanks to my patreon supporters who continually blew my mind with their generous contribution to the show a resounding shout out to this most featured patrons Henry Kenyon Felipe Belmar IUS 19 box Fox Blazer strategy Emma p and jerowen thanks again like the video share the video subscribe let me know your least and most favorite timers and games down below and as always please have yourself a damn good one thank you [Music]

Channel: Daryl Talks Games

Views: 345,977

Keywords: Daryl Talks Games, Psych of Play, Game Design, Psychology of Games, Psychology of Gaming, Psychology, timers, countdowns, countdown psych of play, timer psych of play, majoras mask, unsighted, wario land, wario land psych of play, unsighted psych of play, majoras mask psych of play, majoras mask moon, majoras mask psychology, psychology of majoras mask

Id: lxwgQbtuD6U

Length: 21min 50sec (1310 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 17 2022