We chat about videogames and videogame accessories.

There is a concept in certain fields of an “affordance”. The basic idea is that the way to use some things is inherently obvious based on your past experience. Console gamers know how to use a controller, and certain button layouts are simply conventional by now. This can be slightly mysterious to brand new gamers, but modern controllers make it pretty clear what you’re supposed to grab onto and messing with the inputs a bit should give you a rough idea of what they’re supposed to do (teaching a complete newbie how to get a disc into the console without damaging it or anything, on the other hand... well, that’s a tougher design problem).

Yet for some reason a lot of games have gotten deep into the idea that players don’t understand how to use a controller, even when we are hours and hours into a game. Frankly, it does not take a lot of processing time for a computer to see when a player might have trouble with a certain concept and thus need a nudge in the right direction, but we rarely see that sort of thing in practice, because it does take conscientious design. If a game flashes a hint that I need to go past a ledge before hitting jump after I’ve made the jump too early ten times, that’s cool. If it tells me that before I see the jump, though, I’ve been robbed. It’s taking me out of the game for no reason.