Morality from Mass Effect: I honestly find it interesting that BioWare back in the day made a Morality System that makes your choices matter, you can write Shepard whatever you want, and form what happens in the Galaxy, Paragon Shepard is what I feel is who Shepard is, while Renegade Shepard shows that the Ends justify the Means, but there are some Renegade options that are punishable, like Sabotaging the Genophage Cure when Wrex is alive, letting the Council Die on a Renegade Playthrough, and presenting evidence against Tali’s father in her Loyalty Mission, leading to minimal war assets in Mass Effect 3 and heavy casualties in the Destroy Ending, “But your choices don’t matter in Mass Effect 3.” well I feel like in the Destroy Ending they do, because if you have the free Extended Cut DLC then you’ll see what happens to organics after Synthetics are killed and possibly rebuilt. And there are Paragon Options that show that you are a Mary Sue, and going all Paragon would have consequences, it would make it harder to make broker peace between the Quarians and the Geth, if you rewrite the Heretic Geth, you’d start a war between the Krogans, Turians, and Salarians, if Wreav is the Leader of Clan Urdnot if Wrex was killed on Virmire, and encouraging Kasumi to keep the Greybox in the Stolen Memory DLC will keep Kasumi in the Past, leading to a Victory at a cost.

My vote for best gimmick goes to The World Ends With You's original DS release. Controlling two characters on the two different screens, one with buttons and the other with touch control, was super unique, albeit tricky to get the hang of. No game has ever done anything quite like it. I also have to give an honorable mention to the Break and Boost system in Octopath Traveler and its sequel. When fighting bosses, there is a ton of strategy involved in when it is best to Break your foe so you can whale on them for massive damage with Boosted attacks.

All that talk of gravity and nothing about Pucci?

Going back to the start of the video, I would put up the Future Visions from Xenoblade Chronicles as an honourable mention. While it may not be the focal point of the gameplay, it's an ability that has significance in the game's story, exploration and combat.

Starforce is slept on

metal gear rising reveangence. bravely default. and shadow of mordor were so good.

22:29 WARIO TIME!!!

*Pulls out megaphone* THE STYLE SYSTEM IN DMC IS ONE OF THE GREATEST GIMMICKS IN GAMING HISTORY AND I WILL STAND BY THAT FOR ETERNITY! THANK YOU!

Plesioths from Monster Hunter. Being a water type is a bad enoigh omen, but nothing can prepare you for that frickin hitbox disrespecting ass check called the Hyperspace Tackle! It transcends the game and slaps you in real life, apparently. It's even a screen nuke in their turn based spinoffs. Thanks a lot, jackasses.

22:28

Exists a similar gimmick of Bravely Default in Soma Union called Attack/Support then is more interesting like in support can use mp to healing or using buffs or something like that. And in some battles,the enemies can switch all of your party the attack or support mode then force you to adapt and even punish you to use the same strategy all the time (seriously,the devs knows how to make a perfect rpg into the battles).

Nice Kingdom Hearts reference, Quarter Guy!

22:30 wtf Party Crashers jumpscare!

Lan Hikari invented the Brotherband system?!? Holy crap!

Using King of Skill's Wario Time meme is hilarious

Bonus fact for Star Force 3: One neat implementation of the Brother System is Rogue Armor. It gives +50 power to ANY sword/slash cards (effectively doubling SwordFighter cards), but lock you out of any Brothers. So you become a glass cannon.

Does Tag Power from Advance Wars Dual Strike count? I know it's 2 CO powers in one turn but at least you get to change COs without going into your opponent’s turn.

Everybody’s got a gimmick now!

If you plan on making the worst gimmick list, look up Sommer sega.

Sometimes, it's good to stand out.

My honorable mention is... honestly, _the entire combat system_ of Library of Ruina (and Limbus Company to an extent, but I'd rather stick to Library of Ruina for all those people who hate gacha games (and also Limbus Company _is_ different to an extent)). So in a standard "turn-based" RPG, you or your party takes a turn, then the enemy or the enemy's party does. That's the most basic thing about turn-based RPGs, isn't it? Library of Ruina takes that... and tosses it out the window. Here, during each turn, both your party and the enemy party act at _the same time,_ with the gameplay focusing on clashing your attacks against those of an enemy for big rewards. Sure, you _can_ hammer into the enemy with unopposed attacks if they let you, but winning clashes raises your team's Emotion Level (or the individual character's Sanity in Limbus Company), letting them get big buffs from the abnormalities of whatever floor's crew you're playing as at the moment. This changes... basically _everything_ about the game's mechanics. Speed isn't a measure of who gets their turn first - instead, higher-rolling speed dice (yeah, this game works on a dice roll system, Limbus Company changes it to coin flips) are able to overturn the lower-rolling speed dice of an enemy to force an enemy attack to clash with what _you_ want it to clash with. Big numbers on attacks don't _just_ mean higher damage, having higher dice rolls on an attack makes it easier for the attack to win a clash. Sometimes, either you or your enemy can even dish out various kinds of "mass attacks" (basically giant super moves) that, depending on the type, require you to add up the attack rolls of your or your enemy's _entire team_ to not get nuked down. I know I'm not exactly giving this system the justice it deserves, but I thought it deserved at least a _rough_ mention. Project Moon is awesome.

what about metal gear solid peacewalker where you and friends (i think friends) can take on velociprey, rathalos, and tigrex, and the unique gearrex

A favorite of mine is the Ouroboros from Xenoblade 3. After a specific point early in the game, specific pairs of your party members can do a legally different Fusion Dance to take on a significantly powerful form that gives you a different set of Arts and renders you immune to damage while it's active and acts as a turbo-charged version of the classes you start out with. Furthermore, each pair has two different forms depending on who's taking the reins, for example, Noah's form is a powerful swordfighter with the ability to _surf on his twin swords_ while Mio's form is an agile rollerskating catgirl. Add all that onto the fact that this isn't like Shulk's visions from 1 or the, as the fans call it, Coffee & Milk power from 2; the Ouroboros power is readily available for use throughout most of the game. No need to charge up a meter of any kind or wait for something specific to happen. Sounds overpowered, doesn't it? Well, it can be if you know what you're doing, but it does have weaknesses. Barring certain fights, you cannot remain fused indefinitely, as the form has a heat meter that you need to keep track of. If it overheats, the fusion will automatically cancel and will be unusable until after a full cooldown, which can potentially screw you if it happens at a bad time. And while the form's invincibility may be a handy way to save your ass if you're on critical health, getting hit will make the heat meter fill quicker.

While I haven’t played Gravity Rush, you’ve given me a chance to lament the abandonment of the Vita. Though mine is full of games available elsewhere, it became my preferred way of playing a lot of these games, especially Final Fantasy X being the main game bringing me back. Plus I first got into Metal Gear with the Vita (though its HD collection only has MGS 2 and 3), and while not the best option in those cases, I would say they’re ideal for taking those great games on the go. The big problem with support being dropped so soon, though, is that it makes replacement models and parts horrendously difficult to find. My Vita is currently the older model with a proprietary charge port, with a cord I don’t fully trust due to multiple points of failure, and my proprietary Vita memory card has just started to show the first signs of failure. With such a short and halfhearted window of support and no third party alternatives afaik, fixing or replacing hardware issues like I’m worried about is far more of a nightmare than it would be for much older systems, and likely to be impossible before long. The only upside is that the games I have on there can be procured again elsewhere for the most part, but having my best option be to leave my own Vita to die doesn’t sit well with me.

Dragon Quest V For like. a good 75% of the game you have at maximum, 2 human party members. So what makes up the rest? Monsters, not just ones you like, throw out. No they level with you and gain new abilities as they do. Everything from Golems to Ghosts to Slimes. Also later in the game you have a choice of marrying a rich noble's daughter and getting a white mage or your childhood friend Bianca and getting essentially a black mage...or if you're playing the DS remake you can also marry his 2nd daughter who's a physical attacker. Even in the game's final act where you can make a party of 4 out of potentially 6 human characters, it can still benefit you to save some of those party slots for monster recruits.

I remember that the Gamecube had bongos, and those weren't compatibles with Wii games... Donkey Kong Barrel Blast was originally designed for the bongos on Gamecube, but was released on Wii... without bongo supports... As for Hi-Fi Rush, Microsoft deemed Tango Games "too expensive". That studio was making AA games with AAA budgets. Given that their last game didn't sell millions, they had to cut their resources down.

Personal Honorable Mention : The Entire Game - Library of Ruina Aside from the abnormality pages, everything combat related in the game involves the roll of a die. EVERYTHING COMBAT RELATED.

14:25 Nemesis System was incredible, the fact that it's being gate-kept behind a patent is such a waste....

Just a quick word about the Nemesis system and Shadow Of Mordor. You were able to recruit captains in that game as well, not just it's sequel. Some people forget about that because it was in the latter half of the game while Shadow Of War brings the mechanic back earlier in the story. Great part of the video on the mechanic, but that bit of misunderstanding stood out to me.

I don't blame anyone for not knowing about it, but before Hi-Fi Rush, there was No Straight Roads. It was an admittedly rough attempt to make a 3D Hack and Slash Rhythm game. Unlike in HFR, only enemies actually moved to the beat. The only time YOU need to worry about it is when you need to dodge, or more importantly, parry their attacks. I liked it well enough, but it was rough around the edges, and again, I don't blame anyone for not knowing it exists

Actually, Hi-Fi Rush wasn't the first game to combine rhythm with action. No Straight Roads was the first game to do it; an underrated game that hardly anyone talks about.

Some of my favorite gimmicks that didn’t make the cut are: -The Klonoa series: grabbing/throwing enemies, particularly throwing enemies down as a makeshift double jump. I love that you can construct some combination of navigation, combat, and puzzle solving into a single action. -The Pikmin series: the timer system and the way it forces you to figure out what things you can actually allow yourself to do day-by-day to maintain efficiency. Not only do you always just go for whatever the next part you see is one-by-one, but you also have to consider which specific ones to go for next and in what order. -Panzer Dragoon Saga: the battle system, segmented arena movement not only giving you the ability to try and position yourself to avoid damage or take advantage of enemy weaknesses, but allowing enemies to do the same. Ramping up the intensity is the way battles function as an in-between of real-time action and being turn-based as a result of the charge system, a system that allows you to chain what would otherwise be separate attacks over multiple dedicated turns in just a single turn. I notice all of my favorite gimmicks have an underlying theme of efficiency to some degree.

QG talking about Ape Escape in the year of our lord 2024. What is this timeline. Also, Yu-Gi-Oh!Sevens/Go Rush reference in the #1 spot. Neat.

No shout out for Arkham? If I'm not mistaken, Asylum might be the first game to take a rhythm game and make it the main combat mechanic. Hi-Fi rush probably couldn't exist without it.

New QG video day is always a good day <3

great List Quarter Guy lots of games im famular with and have played now for my off the list choice for a video game gimmick it would have to be the Dive System in the Ar Tonelico Series as this was used in 3 games as far as i know lets use a machine to "dive" into our female party members called Revyatail and go inside their Cosmospher or as its called a Soul space to play are Visual novel to help them with trauma , get to know them better ( great for character growth ) some funny moments ( seriously doing a Cosmospher blind first time and i dare you not to laugh ) and ofcourse to get stronger by unlocking more powerful song magic and umm.... stat changing outfits BUT this gimick also encuraged extra playthoughs as you can only dive so much into a Revytail's Cosmospher if you do it to much with one female party member the other will shut off acess to theirs this usualy happens around levels 5/8 oh and this also determins what ending you will get and these games are LONG special mention to Ar Tonelico 2 for its battle system insted of a typical Turn based ( ar tonelico 1 ) a Tales of series knock off ( ar Tonelico 3 ) the second one turned the combat into a rythem game of attack and Defend and you will HAVE to perfect the time specialy if you want to live in the late game as missing the timing could be fatal

I want to say Detective Mode from the Arkham games since it allows you to plan out your attack or locate clues that would otherwise be missed but I'm not sure if it would count as a gimmick.

So glad to see Gravity Rush get some love. GR2 is among my top 10 fav games of all time

Oh, about Mordor/War. WB had the balls to patent the system, and, just like that one CEO from that friggin' Smiling Friends show, it is their intellectual property(patent, in this case) to sit on and do nothing with.

Quick thing about Bravely Default. Its mechanic was touched on in its spiritual predecessor Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light. You had Action Points(AP) instead of MP, and each character, as long as they're in normal condition(which I assume means they've no status condition, bear with me as I'm going by a wiki cause my memory wasn't reliable for this one), and you can opt to get an EXTRA AP by using the Boost command, as certain attacks and spells use more than 1 AP. In fact, the artstyle of the game is akin to Bravely Default, which links the two even more.

Nice nod to both twilight zone and are you afraid of the dark

I predict Hi-Fi Rush at number 1 Edit: I hope someone picks up that phone

Another of my least favorite boss ideas is a boss fight that is invincible for large periods of time. It can work in the context of someone like Dimentio to emphasize how they've attained godlike status temporarily. But what I'm talking about are those BS bosses that employ cheap tactics to make the battle longer and more aggrivating. Like, say, a frog living in an ocean of lava. The gameplay of Kirby can be often pretty well paced, particularly in their boss fights. So isn't it cool how Pyribbit from Triple Deluxe can just completely break the pacing by being completely untouchable in the background? There are bosses that you need to dodge before gaining the opportunity to safely damage them, but I'm not thrilled to spend minutes at a time waiting for such opportunity. At least there's no time limit... Unlike his Super Fighters version!

A good gimmick not only has to work and control well, but it must also be portable on other systems. No one likes it when good games are stuck on one system forever. Gimmicks that damage your screen is also bad.

Nintendo did have depth on characters on some enemies on spin-offs on Mario and Pokémon. Paper Mario and Pokémon Mystery Dungeon.

Somehow Astro Bot was the first game that allowed me to experience what Ape Escape is all about. That game is the best platformer I've played in years!

0:37 14:33 What game is that? It looks like fun

One of my most favorite gimmicks is the Beast Gauge from the Bloody Roar series basically your cast of heroes, heroines, anti-heroes, anti-heroines, and villains are Zoanthropes humans who through their own genes, or scientific experiments or in the case of 3's main villain Xion a ancient malevolent spirit of darkness at war with the spirit of the Earth since the beginning of history, or in Nagi from 4's case being a special type of Zoanthrope that partially turns into a copy of Xion's alternate form when tries to kill her anyway these individuals can turn into a were-animal form and this gauge is what determines when you can turn into your were-animal form and it starts out at 0 but is filled to a good amount when you land the first hit and fills a little bit if you are the recipient of the first hit and as the fight progresses the Beast Gauge will fill as you get hit and dish them out and when it reaches a certain level you can press the Beast button and transform into your were-animal form increasing your strength, speed, defense and gaining the ability to regenerate lost health up to a certain limit, as well as the Beast Button becoming a 4th attack, and getting a new were-animal form themed grapple though if you get hit while transformed the Beast Gauge will go down and the hit that sends it down to 0 will send you back into human form meaning there's a risk and reward system do you hold off on transforming till you reach the max level that way when you transform you can stay in your were-animal form longer possibly allowing you to make a comeback via the stat boosts and regaining the health you lost while you were in human form or do you transform as soon as possible to get the stat boosts and begin health regen immediately and run the risk of getting knocked out of the were-animal form a whole lot sooner. And what you can do with the Beast Gauge was expanded on in each game this has led to both good and bad results as in Bloody Roar 2(BR2: Bringers of the New Age in Japan, and Europe) super moves called Beast Drives were introduced and these would use up the entire Beast Gauge transform you back into human form after the super move was preformed and you regain almost all of your health even when blocked being another risk-reward mechanic added do you preform a Beast Drive as soon as possible for immediate health recovery and the chance of big damage in a effort to the end the battle as soon as possible or do you wait it out and use a Beast Drive in order to recover lost health and a chance to do big damage as a comeback mechanic that can turn the tide of a fight, 3 introduced the Hyperbeast a power up state where you transform into your were-animal form with a even stronger boost to your stats, faster and greater health regen, and the ability to preform unlimited Beast Drives however this form is on a time-limit and once it runs out you go back into Human Form and can't transform into your were-animal form for the rest of the fight another risk-reward mechanic do you use Hyperbeast in order to get better stat boosts, better health regen, and the ability to preform unlimited supers but run the risk of losing the ability to transform back into the were-animal form the rest of the fight once the time limit on the power-up runs out or do you hold off on it and activate it when you think the opponent's health is low enough to where you can win with a few well-placed attacks or a few back-to-back Beast Drives. Then there's Bloody Roar 4 which made the stupid decision to make the Beast Guage a 2nd Health Bar and this was a dumb call as once your health runs out you can turn into your were-animal form and continue to fight as it with no health regen to save you oh sure you can transform sooner but the health regen is now slow as heck meaning you run the risk of getting knocked out of your were-animal form for possibly the rest of the fight and the Beast Drive is made useless due to the whole using up the entire Beast Gauge but with a miniscule health regen so what can you do to regain your Beast Gauge in order to turn back into your were-animal oh nothing much only sacrificing your Health Bar to refill the Beast Gauge with refilling it to full leaving you at only 1% health seriously who on the BR4 team made the call to ruin this gimmick and the various mechanics that improved the usage of it and ruin the risk-reward factor that actually led to tactical decisions during a fight by turning the Beast Gauge into a 2nd Health Bar.

Honorable Mentions: *Mega Evolutions - Pokemon Series -Ever since gen 6 introduced Mega Evolutions and brought them back for gen 7, they've been absent from gens 8 and 9. I'm just so happy they're bringing them back for Pokemon Legends Z-A. *Rhythm - Metal: Hellsinger -Similar to Hi-Fi Rush, Metal: Hellsinger utilizes rhythm. Shooting on the beat will increase the damage of your attacks. Except in a FPS.

22:44 Only a matter of time before this becomes Oscar's new legacy on the internet. 🤣🤣🤣