You know those times when you get stuck on a level? Running around for hours, backtracking through the map, searching every crook and cranny, going through your inventory five times over, wondering what other possible weak spot the boss could have, slowly enjoying your game less because it definitely isn’t you being stupid, this game is stupid, what the hell man?! *Huff puff, scratching your head and let out a huge sigh*
Eventually when all ideas have been exhausted it’s time to swallow your pride and log on to GameFaqs.com, or perhaps if you’ve got one of those BradyGames guide walkthrough beauties.

Now this is where the dangerous bit kicks in. The moment you’ve resorted to a guide there’s this lingering temptation to just follow it straight afterwards, meaning that you now don’t bother figuring it out on your own. You just simply read along and do as it says (yes I know that’s its purpose) but this then spoils the game content when you know what to expect, changing the way you perceive the game. When this happens I pull out the term, ‘lazy gamer’.
Games tend to have built in guides, tutorials and hints (making me less bothered to read a manual) and I’ve started to realise that it’s turning me into a lazy gamer. Recently I’ve been playing Batman Arkham Asylum and admittedly I’ve been capering around seeing the world of Arkham Asylum only in detective mode. Detective mode highlights objects you can interact with and clues you in on what you have to do next. It’s a mode that you can switch on and off but it takes away seeing the true colours and graphics built around you (which is a stunning experience) if you’re using it. Unfortunately my lazy gamer would say, ‘I’ve had to use this visual mode for pretty much most of the time so why not be in it all the time for convenience?’

When I was stuck on Obscure (PS2), I turned on the lazy gamer tactics. There are six playable characters with their unique abilities and the game often required finding and using items to progress. One of the characters, named Josh, had the ability to spot things in the room so after being stuck for a small time period; it wasn’t long after that I’d start abusing the powers of Josh. Running into every single room on the map location and just pressing the circle button waiting for two responses along the lines of, ‘There’s something in this room’ or ‘There’s nothing left for us here’. My horror game was no longer filled with silence and suspense, they were replaced by a character constantly rinsing and repeating these two sentences to the finish.
A different sense of laziness, while playing any of the Pheonix Wright series on the DS my thinking cap totally turned off after at least 10 minutes of being stuck. In short the game needed me to investigate various locations and speak to people to reveal clues and evidence for upcoming court cases. Now what you get is a still landscape background which you poke about with your stylus in particular areas to find things. However after you’ve taken twenty logical guesses where only half may have produced positive results, you’ll resort to a quick barrage of tapping with the stylus like a pneumatic drill all over the touch screen starting from left to right, top to bottom.
So the order is that if at first I don’t succeed, try, try, again. After a good portion of time while trying and I’m still trying, I’ll try by spoiling and abusing the game mechanics. Then if I’m still stuck I’ll log onto an online walkthrough and follow that to the end. Usually I get more satisfaction completing something by myself but nowadays I’ve become equally satisfied to just finish the game using a guide. I’m sure we’ve all been a lazy gamer at some stage.
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