Anjon

I used to think there was no time travel involved either, except the Lucetes explicitly say that there is near the end of the game. While Booker was one of a million possibilities, they say that old Elizabeth is simply the future version of Elizabeth when Booker doesn't come back in time to save her from Comstock's brainwashing. "Why do you ask 'what' when the question is 'when'?" and such. It's unknown which Booker she sent for (either the one from her own time/world or another), but the Elizabeth she wanted that Booker to save is her in the past. Also time travel is the only scenario in which killing Booker would nullify Elizabeth's existence. If it was simply alternate realities, then Booker drowning wouldn't have phased out any Elizabeth, because that would have just been one possibility, not a direct link through time.

I was going to make a huge salty thread on glaring plotholes, but then I thought "Actually, there's no way the devs didn't think about these. They're probably hard at work making DLC to fill those in." So instead I'd like to make a huge sweet thread on things we'd like to see addressed in a DLC supplement or something. With a $20 season pass, surely we're getting something besides gear and weapon skins, right? This turns my glaring plothole-induced rage into lighthearted hope for the future! So, here're some things I hope they address somewhere down the line. I'd love to hear some other ideas!

I love how you ignored the entire rest of this article to focus solely on the Anita video posted innocuously amongst a batch of equally engaging content, armed with your witty retort towards an argument no one started. Your Anita Sarkeesian senses are surely tingling this day.

1. Devil May Cry 3 showed me that combat in a game could be more than just mashing buttons or shooting at dudes. I know that technically DMC1 could have done the same thing, but the fact that it was decidedly easier meant that at no point were you ever expected to master or even become decent at any of the game;s systems. There was a degree of scrub-friendliness that allowed you to progress if you brute-forced it hard enough. DMC3 wasn't at all like that. It demanded more of the player than any other action game available at the time. This has given it the reputation of being a "hard game", but it really isn't. It just expects you to know how to play it and punishes you for slacking off. It respects the player and asks that the player respects it in return. Every action game I've played since now gets compared to DMC3 in terms of combat design. Since then, its spot has been taken by Bayonetta, but you never forget your first....
 
2. Street Fighter III: Third Strike inspired me to get down into the nitty gritty about game design in general, because simply learning to play it decently meant you had to know how the programming worked. I learned about frames and how to count them, I learned about button priority, animation priority, hitboxes, hurt boxes, and generally how to get the best out of a game on both a technical and casual level. Third Strike is also just a beautiful example of 2D animation in a video game. It remains one of the prettiest fighting games to this day.  3S in combination with DMC3 eventually helped me development my own theories of game design which I'll hopefully put into practice one day.
 
3. Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil is probably the first game I've ever become emotionally invested in on both a gameplay and story level. The themes were surprisingly mature and actually got me to wonder about some pretty complicated societal issues. While I've never actually cried during the ending of  a game, this is probably the closest I've ever gotten to doing so, granted I was pretty young at the time. Gameplay wise, the game is essentially a puzzle platformer with some light combat. The puzzles are designed in such ways many of the tougher ones require some kind of "sacrifice" to solve. Sometimes you'll have a difficult time progressing to a portion of the level, then reach a puzzle that seems to want you to throw all that progress away in order to solve it. Then there're my favorites that feel like you're breaking the game to solve them, but the solution is almost certainly intended by the developer. Not many puzzle games nowadays would attempt something like that.
 
4. Skullgirls is kind of weird, but definitely belongs on this kind of list for me. It completely changed the way I see fighting games and the future of game development. Lead programmer Mike Z has gone above and beyond in order to bring this game to the public and is generally an easily approachable guy. He answers questions almost without hesitation, even when he probably shouldn't, and I've learned invaluable information about game development leading up to and following Skullgirls' release. The game is still a very player-driven experience with a perfect blend of fan influence and creativity. There are features in it that players have asked to be included in fighting games for over 10 years, and now big budget developers are shamelessly copying them, which is great. Anything that changes the fighting game industry for the better is welcome. Capcom even directly credits Skullgirls for some of its new features in current fighting games, and fans are constantly telling other developers to "make it like Skullgirls".
 
5. The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise got me into gaming as more than just a toy to sometimes play with friends. The Sega Genesis was the first game console I've personally owned, and Sonic the Hedgehog was one of the first games I've personally owned and beaten. Sonic was my gateway into gaming. He easily became my favorite video character, and I became so obsessed with the series that I would literally buy any Sonic game that came out, even if I had to purchase a new console to do so, which is exactly why I bought the Sega Dreamcast (no regrets). This series made platformers my favorite genre, which holds true today despite them being virtually an endangered species at this point. Sonic 3 & Knuckles is still probably my favorite game of all time, and Sonic Adventure is still kind of close it. Unfortunately the franchise dropped off the map after Sonic Adventure, the developer Sonic Team was disbanded, and not a single Sonic game has been made since.

Maaan. I got a call from Anna or Nina Williams I can't remember which when trekked tag 2 came out. It was really embarrassing too.

Back in the day, Nintendo had a habit of contacting people who pre-ordered certain games via phone and hitting them with a special "Thank you" message for being interested in the game. The only one I remember personally was for Super Mario Sunshine, which got me a phone call saying "Itsa me! Mario! Thank you for-a playing my game!" or something along those lines. Does anyone still do that anymore? It was a pretty cool, personal touch that I've (shamefully) forgotten over the years, but it just randomly came back to me. These could still be happening, but I don't know...

@Anjon said:

@Taku128 said:

@Anjon said:

Events shift in 999 when they really shouldn't. For example, there's a character who can die if you choose a certain course of action, but that action has nothing to do with them nor how they die. It's just an arbitrary change much like Heavy Rain's arbitrary changes.

I got every ending in 999 and have no idea what you're talking about. Your path opens up situations for certain things to happen that wouldn't in other storylines, but there's never an instance where something happens in one playthrough that should've happened in the others but didn't, at least not that I can remember.

I distinctly remember a situation where a certain character that originally died had escaped death for seemingly no reason when I got different endings. It's been a while since I've played it, but that stuck out to me as being a real "What are you trying to pull, game!?" moment. Though I haven't played VLR, so maybe they explain it in some crazy pseudo-science-y way later on in the timeline. Maybe Mantorok had something to do with it. Apologies for incredibly obscure references.

Could you spoiler tag what you're talking about? The only situation I could think of would be

*MAJOR 999 SPOILERS INSIDE TAG*

SPOILER WARNING: Click here to reveal hidden content.

When Snake is "killed" by being pushed through the Number 3 Door, but in the true ending you find out it was actually Nagisa Nijisaki, one of the Cradle Pharmaceutical executives, who got pushed through the door. Santa dressed him as Snake to trick Ace into killing him since his prosopagnosia would prevent him from realizing it wasn't Snake. This is consistent across all "timelines".

@Anjon said:

Events shift in 999 when they really shouldn't. For example, there's a character who can die if you choose a certain course of action, but that action has nothing to do with them nor how they die. It's just an arbitrary change much like Heavy Rain's arbitrary changes.

I got every ending in 999 and have no idea what you're talking about. Your path opens up situations for certain things to happen that wouldn't in other storylines, but there's never an instance where something happens in one playthrough that should've happened in the others but didn't, at least not that I can remember.