7 Ways Games Tricked You Into Thinking You’re Awesome | Part 2

Resident Evil 4 secretly making your knife ludicrously powerful, Portal 2 pretending you didn't shoot the wrong portal, and Red Dead Redemption 2 rewriting the laws of physics when you blast somebody off a ledge - get a look at these and more of the crafty hidden ways games boost your self-esteem, then subscribe for a list like this every Thursday, why not?
Previously on Outside Xbox:
6 Ways Games Tricked You Into Thinking You're Awesome
• 6 Ways Games Tricked Y...
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[@Zenlore6499]

It JUST hit me: when Wheatley is calling out “GRAB ME GRAB ME” as he flys into space, that’s a callback to when he asks you to catch him when he first detached himself! “CATCH ME CATCH ME”

[@NigelMelanisticSmith]

Same here! I wonder if I was just too hyped from the boss fight to notice the call back when I played, lol

[@madalice5134]

I only just realized this too. 🤣

[@jamesmeppler6375]

Kinda a lame reference

[@Zenlore6499]

@@Undcvrhlp I was literally a kid when I first played it, over the course of several days due to school. Haven’t played in years, this jogged my memory and linked the lines. I’m better at doing that now as an adult.

[@gamedifficulty_4230]

Another thing Portal 2 does - when you’re falling into a portal the game will nudge you ever so slightly in the right direction to make sure you definitely “sthwip” into the portal and don’t just long-fall-boot yourself into the ground next to it. Thanks, Portal 2

[@miniaturherkules3848]

Well...Miss Vance...that would be a considerably laarge nudge

[@Oshroth]

Portal 1 has that too. I think there is a setting for it in the options if you want to turn it off. The console command is sv_player_funnel_into_portals

[@magnusm4]

I'd just call that good game design. There's nothing as uncanny and frustrating as picky controls. You know in old games like Wolfenstein 3D when you tried entering a door, but kept sliding left and right instead. Imagine that in 3D. You're running past a guy but suddenly stop cause you hit his hitbox that is just one invisible pixel too big to see. That is frustrating and sticks in your head.

[@chaos.corner]

I heard about this on a different video about a year ago and turned it off to see what it was like. Then totally forgot I'd done that. Then went to play it again recently and was wondering why it was suddenly a lot harder than I remembered.

[@lnt305]

Still managed to miss so many of those though, haha

[@christophercollins3632]

In Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen, the battle music changes depending on how challenging the enemy is. One expert player lamented that selecting Hard Mode made it so the music never changes to the most dramatic song, and always plays the less threatening tunes. I guess the game thinks the big scary fights won’t scare you anymore. He plays on normal and nerfs his build, so he can hear all the music tracks

[@jaredcrabb]

Yeah, that game is awesome. Music still changes in BBI though.

[@SirStanleytheStumbler]

"To having people turn up at your birthday party" I feel personally attacked

[@ddjsoyenby]

same........and like making my health reach 0.

[@Ceece20]

Well you should feel personally attacked. So there!

[@SirStanleytheStumbler]

@@Ceece20 "how rude"

[@nyperold7530]

@@Sableagle No no no, somebody else is supposed to throw the party, two other guests are supposed to show up, and you're supposed to show up in whatever you slept in, because of course you can't change before leaving the house. Meanwhile, the animals have to throw their own parties, and have only two guests at a time. And that's only if, when, and for as long as you deign to be there.

[@philiphunn194]

@@nyperold7530 No, what's supposed to happen is you get invited to two parties on the same night, right next to each other, and then you have to flit back and forth between them with inevitably hilarious consequences. If watching 90s sitcoms has taught me anything, it's that that scenario is way more common than it should be...

[@Tickerbee]

Fun fact: "Alfred hires the criminals to amuse Bruce" is also one theory put forth by Neil Gaiman in the book "Whatever Happened To The Caped Crusader?"!

[@ethanrobyn2399]

Another instance of Portal 2 ignoring the wrong portal is when you are riding the funnel and Wheatly tries to smash you with a spiky steel plate,if you use the wrong portal the game will switch them around (If you're using a blue portal for the funnel and shoot a blue portal suddenly there is an orange portal for the funnel).They even tell you this if you're playing with the commentary thing on.

[@that_danishdude]

There's developer commentary available for while you're playing?

[@chocobofangirl]

@@that_danishdude yeah valve has that for that game and uh left for dead and half life, maybe others. Other devs do stuff like that sometimes too, you can get a commentary track for every cutscene from the penguin doods in disgaea one on DS and maybe other remakes. I bet dev commentary bonuses could be a whole list video

[@bilateralrope8643]

@@that_danishdude You have to start the game with an option other than the standard new game. I think Valve started doing it with HL2: Ep 1. They even have some of the Portal 2 co-op levels slightly redesigned so you can go through them solo with the commentary mode.

[@muhammaddafa2417]

Nu

[@pinewolfpresents]

"Leon is still a badass. However, you, the player..."

[@ddjsoyenby]

I GET IT I SUCK, YOU DON'T NEED TO RUB IT IN WHO ARE YOU MY DAD!

[@TheRedMage01]

Are like Mike trying to do stealth.

[@UnreasonableOpinions]

Adaptive difficulty can only be calibrated through consistent playtesting, and specifically bringing in fresh players so you don't dilute the results with them getting better. It's the most expensive per-hour version of playtesting. Capcom only spend the money here because RE is a huge flagship title for them. It's not helpful for many games because your winning-ness or losing-ness doesn't change the play experience, and for some games like XCOM or roguelikes the way winning makes you win more and losing makes you lose more is intentional, but it's great for survival horror since that depends on the player constantly feels like you just barely made it through each challenge.

[@JoshTigerheart]

Funny enough, modern Xcom does have it on everything but the highest difficulty. Lots of enemies on screen, have guys down, just took a crit, or whatever? The game will secretly adjust your chances to hit and be hit with the exact values depending on your difficulty selection. Lost your whole best team? Next mission or two are likely to have fewer or easier enemies so you can get on your feet. The game is also more likely to spawn missions you need, such as giving you a chance at a supply raid if you're low on resources. Highest difficulty will gladly kick you when you're down instead, however.

[@UnreasonableOpinions]

XCOM and XCOM 2 are great examples, because they originally planned to use relatively little of the adaptive difficulty and that only on lower settings, except the missed shot streak-breaker, but ended up adding more and more features during playtesting because player perception of RNG was wildly at odds with the actual RNG. Players have a bad habit of reading their to-hits of about 85% as 100%, and enemy to-hits of below 15% as 0%, and they have to cheat fairly heavily in the players favour for causal players to perceive the RNG as fair. Players at higher self-selected difficulties tended to be better at it because they understood the game was fundamentally about minimising risks, but even the devs who had coded the RNG preferred playing with a minimal streak-breaker on since it just feels better. Only on Legend is there zero streak-breaker.

[@nyperold7530]

Where I've seen #4 the most is in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. There's even a parody of westerns in Hidden Village. But, building on that is the slingshot. Normally, a Bokoblin will take several hits with a slingshot, so many hits that some players conclude, since there isn't a health bar, that the slingshot is doing no damage at all. But a Bokoblin who's standing on a ledge can be felled with a single shot.

[@SeviathTheHumanDrago]

It takes exactly 29 slingshot shots to kill bokoblins. I started my 6th run through the other day and counted for fun lol.

[@nyperold7530]

@@SeviathTheHumanDrago Huh. Maybe I was thinking of Moblins.

[@LAZERAK47V2]

A lot of FPS games have a built in mechanic where enemies will miss their first couple of shots so that the player has both an audio and visual queue to react to a new threat. And then you head into PvP and get caught off guard all the time until you learn game sense.

[@HeinerGunnar]

Yeah but they included that in the first vid they did about that topic

[@samtaholo]

@@HeinerGunnar Yes, and Mike mentions it eight seconds into this video. =)

[@lycanthrochick]

My reactions are so slow that sometimes I die even when this happens

[@kabob0077]

Halo 2 doesn't feel that way, at least on Legendary...

[@AmaranthOriginal]

Wildlands' partner AI was never caught and always hit targets when you were sneaking, which always made me feel like a tactical genius, as opposed to other games where the AI would...I don't know, get caught on the nearest branch and be detected immediately

[@lamebeast]

Guess they really are ghosts

[@CoolMrjames]

A few times I'd watch them walk straight past enemies who'd not notice them... The same thing happens in Greedfall, if an enemy notices your toes when you're sneaking, watch out! But any followers will trail behind you, sometimes nudging enemies out of the way roughly as they do, and the enemy never notices them at all...

[@tarekmoneimsaid]

I think a lot of games with a companion system do that, I believe Skyrim does it too. If you're sneaking, your companion could be crouching directly in front of the enemy commander's crotch and still not get detected.

[@Jonathon_Hennessey]

In Doom 2016 the imps fireballs are programmed to be more or less accurate depending on how fast the player is going.

[@sharonniblett8300]

That's really cool I didn't know that

[@gamepassghost]

This is the kind of info that lives in my brain forever. Thank you my friend!

[@michaelandreipalon359]

Hmm, does it still work in Doom Eternal?

[@Jonathon_Hennessey]

@@michaelandreipalon359 I'm not sure

[@karuiGaming]

Wait, how does that work? More accurate when you're slow or fast?

[@samwoodley1653]

Sometimes it's fun to think about enemies going easy on us as being like actors in a scary fun house at a carnival. They want to seem antagonistic and as a threat, but in reality they want to see you complete it and have fun doing so.

[@HeinerGunnar]

I'd compare it to a GM in a tabletop RPG. Yeah, he wants to challenge you, but ultimately wants to see you succeed

[@madalice5134]

You might like the VLDL channel then. They've got the best gaming skits and are just all around hilarious.

[@bentoth9555]

"The kick is amazing and you never need a seconf offensive move." That's your philosophy for Dying Light 2, isn't it Mike?

[@philiphunn194]

It was certainly my strategy for Dead Island before they patched out the ability to do it endlessly without losing stamina…

[@Eric-bq8nd]

Mike had settled into the Big Kick in Dying Light 2 before he even HAD IT. He speced into it from the get go.

[@nicktalksbond]

Finally found the background music 😁😁 “Ditch I Love You” by Jincheng Zhang

[@pablonarcoboy185]

Thanks for the sauce, soldier.

[@gamepassghost]

And now I’ve found you Nick Valentine. Excellent detective work, sad it had to end like this…

[@secretscarlet8249]

Background music for what?

[@samtaholo]

Sorry, but no. He's a scammer who's tried to claim that he wrote a lot of copyright-free music from the KZbin audio library. It's actually 'The Messenger' by Silent Partner.

[@secretscarlet8249]

@@samtaholo dude, thank you! I was baffled when I tried searching for the guy above, even though the name was already sending alarm bells. Still, thanks for telling us the legit name and artist!

[@kharnthebetrayer8251]

Okay, why dont more games include the Adaptive Difficulty thing from Resident Evil? That would be amazing cuz there's lots of games where Normal feels too easy, but Hard is a slog. So I'm stuck picking which one to deal with

[@PsyrenXY]

Because it takes playtesting to do correctly and the shareholders don't want playtesters on the payroll.

[@kharnthebetrayer8251]

@@PsyrenXY Yeah.. A lot of companies seem to be just straight skipping that part of the game-making process recently

[@flamer8415]

@@kharnthebetrayer8251 and it wouldn’t surprise me if one company does it then copyrights it. It’s kinda stupid how many things can easily be copyrighted and never used in any other games.

[@bustinarant]

Shadow of Mordor Nemesis system I miss you :(

[@darebrained]

@@bustinarant Warner Bros was the true nemesis all along.

[@00SLE7EN]

Most of these examples are pretty cool, I especially like everything they did in RE4. I think the scene in portal 2 though seems like it would have only been made better if Wheatley and Glados had mocked the player incessantly for their mistake before a gameover.

[@insertclevername4123]

As someone who finally tried Fortnite a couple of years ago and immediately said, "Wow, I can't believe I was able to hold my own against these kids," I'm deeply wounded by this revelation.

[@Tyrany42]

It feels like a pretty scummy tactic, the more I think about it. Lure people in with deceptive dopamine rushes. Yeah, it makes people feel good and want to play the game, but it's hard to see it as anything other than a lie.

[@insertclevername4123]

I can see the logic of having bots in the game, especially if you've got a mechanic that sorts players by skill level (I've been playing online games since back in the day of dial-up, so I know the frustration of trying to find a couple of people to play cards, much less 100 players in the same bracket to populate a game), and since I was way too cheap to pay for anything in the game, the only cost to me was hurt pride in realizing that I was killing bots instead of humiliating children.

[@ravenvanhonacker7560]

Yeah i felt that one to , now i am asking myself wich matches i've truely won 🤣😅

[@terotimonen8465]

lol

[@Nero_Eclipse]

Yeah, although it seems they removed that feature with the latest chapter. Unless the updated the difficulty on the bots, there is no explanation to why I'm constantly getting mowed down with a drum mag shotgun.

[@kingspilly4381]

A particularly goofy example of shooting an enemy off of a ledge is in the first F.E.A.R game. There is an enemy who will jump a few feet into the air when he dies to make sure that he'll go over the railing in front of him.

[@slverwolf27]

I mean, Resident Evil 4 gives you a hint about that earlier in the game. When Leon puts a knife to Ada's throat to subdue her, as he takes her gun from her, he says, "Bit of advice. Try using knives next time. Works better for close encounters."

[@nichmiller4251]

My first RE4 playthrough I knew about the first chainsaw guy and avoided that side of the village. Ended up knife slashing every villager from the top of the bell tower ladder. The chainsaw man never spawned because I was a coward with no bullets

[@kyuubinaruto17]

Both chainsaw guys are fully dependent on the player to activate them. You either have to go in the house with the shotgun, or go up to the path and get close. So they're totally optional. Speaking of the belltower it reminded me of a glitch I experienced, which I think only works on the Gamecube version. I got both action commands for both catching Ashley and going up the ladder, and the game got confused. So I caught Ashley, and wound up on the top of the tower. However, there was no collision. We were both floating up there, and while we could run around the little square area I couldn't use the ladder and was stuck up there until I reset.

[@nichmiller4251]

@@kyuubinaruto17 Oh that's insane!! I'm glad I missed that glitch. Woulda broke my brain. I didn't even know there was a shotgun until the bell tolled and I was alone in the village. Lol

[@MistahJay7]

Shoot the Bird that is by the dog you free. It always will have a frag grenade which I specifically use on chainsaw man that is waiting by one of the gates. I want that Ruby Lol

[@flaminG-Ghost]

Well, you don't have to enter the village... Just start shooting from where Leon watches them with binoculars and they will come in a single file down the path for easy knife kills all you have to do is dodge/shoot the occasional axe throws... That's an exploit to stop chainsaw man from spawning...

[@Zoso14892]

Some of these are brilliant, elevating the game to a cinematic masterpiece on occasion. Who cares about realism when you can watch bodies dramatically flop over a railing, or you can feel like a powerhouse even temporarily. It's nice to see examples of devs understanding their playerbase!

[@Charharr]

Name a more iconic duo than Mike and his love of dropkicking enemies 😂 Well, except Mike and his love of explosives, of course.

[@fabf77]

RE4 for me is very cool. Because the game subtly tells you several times, Krauser always appears playing in the cinematics with his knife. The fight against him shows you how using weapons in close combat is a bad idea. One day I came to this conclusion, I put it into practice and I was surprised by the great detail they had when putting these tracks so that the most observant receive it. A secret in plain sight.

[@Michael_Lindell]

1. That's a really knife detail!

[@sharonniblett8300]

Nice one

[@maxvel0city906]

Underappreciated comment.👍😂 Deserves way more likes.

[@TheLadyLiddell]

I actually really like the systems like RE4 and Arkham Origins where it scales the difficulty with the player skill. It's a good and subtle way to make games more inclusive and fun for everyone.

[@kamikaze4172]

I think Borderlands also has a feature that, when you enter fight for your life, the weakest enemy seems to hide or run out of range

[@LinkDawnbringer]

Wait... The Dark Messiah kick is in Deathloop? That just skyrocketed that game from "I should play that eventually" to "I have to play this SOON!"

[@Furionic696]

It doesnt present as many unique opportunities to use it, but thebgame is lit multiplayers fun and refreshing still heavily recommend playing because it has a fun sandbox same as Messiah atleast :)

[@charleslee8313]

All that's needed in that fourth example was a Wilhelm scream.

[@RyanIn3D]

The kick one reminds me of this part in the first Mirror's Edge, where you're running across some scaffolding, and there just happens to be an enemy stood right at the edge on a corner, with his back to you, practically begging for you to do a running jump kick and let him soar XD

[@torifort717]

The best part is that if I recall correctly, Mirror's Edge doesn't even count that as killing someone. So you can still be a pacifist Faith after you remind that poor guy he's in Sparta.

[@Feasco]

@@torifort717 the Batman defense: you don't kill them, gravity does see also: Spider-Man & Minority Report game adaptations

[@Beans244]

I remember GTA IV had much better ragdoll ledges than GTA V but sometimes it didn't always work out. They'd begin their tumble and then just fall on the ground or they'd smack their face off the railing. Good times.

[@FrenchCanadianGuy]

That was actually more realistic, like the whole game's physics.

[@claratalbot7613]

Thief immediately came to mind because as long as ur in the shadows the guards can't see. I've pick-pocketed one guard while his fellow guard was standing there talking to him

[@Ramsey276one]

O M G XD

[@BouncingTribbles]

I tell like I've learned more about game design from this series than i have from any of the reading I've done

[@mrsnatural2368]

I still love Wheatley, despite the whole "going mental and trying to kill me" thing

[@icequeensamwich9309]

My favorite example of ragdoll off ledge physics is the Mafia games. There's one section during Mafia 2 where people just keep running towards a second floor railing to shoot at you, who's across on the other side of the steps. Grab your rifle, duck down below the ledge on your side, and every time one goes running out of the room and up to the ledge, click boom. Another one goes tumbling down.

[@reidmorris5908]

Resident Evil 4's scaling difficulty system will then be used in Clover's next game, GOD HAND, in a more obvious way: there's actually a gauge that tells you if you're doing well, and an audience cheers when the difficulty raises due to you being a badass. And, of course, if you suck, the gauge drops and the audience boos you. Fun!

[@Taracinablue]

The game swapping out the correct color definitely makes sense. I had no idea! It was *such* a cool moment in-game.

[@gingersnaps6941]

Haven't played RE4, but I noticed in playing RE7 that the pendulum can heavily swing in the other direction aswell after landing several headshot kills some enemies suddenly taking only 50% of damage and then kicking your a$$.

[@HelpTheWretched]

A lesser thing in the Batman games is how the last enemy in a fight only takes 1 hit to knock out, as long as you combo into it.

[@RhyneSauce]

Reminds me of a mechanic in Dead Space, on the hardest difficulty the game purposefully makes encounters harder if you have ammo, and makes you feel like you're always just barely making it through each room as enemies only drop what you need to claw your way to the next.

[@s1n23]

Recently replayed RE4 and actually finished Professional mode. My god do enemies deal shit ton of damage you die in 3-4 hits. Adaptive difficulty saved my ass by dropping me healing items in the most of crucial times

[@stevenclark5173]

There's is no adaptive difficulty in Professional. It stays at the highest difficulty throughout.

[@markgiles6720]

Try it out in under 3 hours

[@247HOPALONG]

You have to admit that the confidence boost you get from going from "I suck at this" to "I just got my first victory royale!" is great!

[@mikoto7693]

The kicking over the ledge part reminded me of Jedi Academy. I’d go light side except for learning Force choke. Then, I was able to spend most of the game tossing enemies off ledges with it. Even the Sith enemies were easily dispatched because although they quickly resisted it was too late, they were already in motion and fell over the ledge due to momentum.

[@hugofontes5708]

"that's not the force I'm talking about, you flying fool"

[@otaku2567]

To think that one of the first outsidebox videos I watched has got a sequel shows how much time has passed watching this channel

[@Khroniclas]

I never noticed these damage boosts in BL2, damn you Gearbox, for tricking me into thinking that I am powerful!

[@meapickle]

Fighting striders in half life 2. When u fire a missle at them, they're programed to no shoot for a few seconds so u can guide the missle into them

[@normative]

Andy clearly a fan of Neil Gaiman's "Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?"

[@hollyhartwick3832]

I’ve never killed Krauser with the knife, but he does have one glaring weakness. His shield doesn’t cover his right foot. Shooting that will stagger him and force him to let his guard down.

[@Cuiasodo]

Fun fact: Alfred paying a bunch of actors to be henchman and take falls is the plot of a what-if style short in the comic one-shot "Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?" which is a fantastic Batman book written by Neil Gaiman.

[@Feasco]

ah shit, beat me to it

[@Thrillhou]

When I was a kid, I used to specifically exploit that ledge-ragdoll mechanic to conserve ammo. Especially in the early parts of the castle section, it was incredibly handy to clear a room with like ten well-aimed pistol shots, even if the setup to get all the monks to the ledges took a little extra time.

[@JamEZmusic86]

The kick in Dark Messiah got me so hooked on that game, it's truly a gem of a game. I wouldn' be shocked if the creators of Dying Light said they used Dark Messiah as inspiration.

[@TheOneWhoReportsForDuty]

I kinda wish Portal 2 had a second ending where you fired the wrong kind of portal, you get laughed at and then fire a blue portal where the orange one was. That would be kinda funny.

[@Cohult]

Ugh, using that clip from THAT shootout in RDR2... I got emotional.

[@Draenen]

I literally just finished rewatching Funhaus play through Dark Messiah and then you make a video with it in it....I should start watching Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy playthroughs next...

[@Nynzy]

Playing Dark Messiah of Might and Magic had so many jump scares my partner laughed and laughed just watching my reactions to each time something new came along~ X.X

[@HavocHounds1988]

I'm a bit disappointed that there was no bit in this video with Andy questioning what happened to the wall.

[@virgilscott2732]

Lol crazy respect for the inclusion of the Mad Dog McCree footage, my second favorite IR shooting game besides Time Crisis

[@TheRealMEEDABEE]

I got one more: In Skyrim, the combat and some of the worldbuilding isn't as amazing and complex as many would hope it would be, but that goes entirely out the window with the music - while technically not ameasurable thing that gives you a literal boost, the music used can really make you feel much more like the dragon slayer you play as. One example is the literal ballads that play for you depending on where you are in the main storyline, but a much better example comes with the music used in the dragon fights. One used is a triumphant rendition of the Skyrim theme itself, while another is titled "The One They Fear", said one not being the dragons, but rather the player, referring to the dragons' fear of the Dragonborn. Furthermore (and with slight spoilers Ig), in the final fight with Alduin in Sovngarde, the aptly-titled song "Sovngarde" plays, which is a variation on the official Skyrim theme - both songs, when translated, are the prophecies of the Dragonborn beating Alduin and saving Nirn. TL;DR, in the final bossfight, you literally get sung about the fact that you're due to basically kick the ass of a demigod and save the world. While it takes a bit of background reading elsewhere or finding the songbook in Skyrim, once known, it makes you feel all the more badass despite some of the more lackluster areas of the game.

[@Jacob_Roy]

Games don't have trick me to thinking that. I already am Awesome.

[@kristonparris4045]

It's true

[@CertifiedBoykisser2]

Doubt

[@sharonniblett8300]

Same

[@Ceece20]

I believe you inherently.

[@suicidalbanana5168]

@@Nesher_IL "I'm already am awesome"....you realise you're wrong thinking that's the proper grammar "I already awesome" is where your correction would've made sense to make it "I'm already awesome"

[@siobhanlawper1051]

You can't just drop a Mad Dog McCree clip in there without warning! I now feel intensely old. (Yes, I owned a CD:i. It was... a whole thing).

[@SaabTheFox]

So I played RE4 for my first time in VR (amazing experience) so that dynamic scaling feature is really interesting. I wonder if that was still implemented for that port.

[@ggEmolicious]

I’ve heard of kicking a man when he’s down, but kicking a man when he’s on fire…that’s a new one!

[@Ryu_D]

Thank you for the video.

[@BloodThirstyAvengers]

In GTA San Andreas, when you shoot and kill someone close to a ledge, they often do a small hop in the direction of that ledge to fall screaming to their death. This can be easily observed in the missions House Party or Black Project.

[@Resident_Legal]

Knife is Krauser's Kryptonite and that's very cool :)

[@luciogt]

Well "War is never fair. But, a game should be." - Brothers in Arms

[@KOU-ZAI]

I can readily assume that #4 was heavily inspired by a lot of the dramatic live-action Hollywood stunts that we often see in movies.

[@Firestar4041]

A wizard huh? Whats your favortie spell? "Big kick." . . . sorry wha- *Sparta'd off a ledge

[@leonardquirm]

4:47 I don't know if "and you don't want to go to heaven all embarrassed" is a reference to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy "I don't want to die! I've got a headache. I don't want to go to heaven with a headache, I'll be grumpy and won't enjoy it" but given the sequence is about Portal 2 and Space, I'm going to assume it is!

[@ECODKyleskymast]

In Left 4 Dead 2, the Director (The thing that dictates enemy and item spawns) is influenced by performance. If you're struggling through a campaign, it can spawn more health items. If you're dong too well, then it will spawn more Special Infected and can even change some map geometry.

[@lnt305]

In XCOM 2, the chance of a shot to connect is actually a bit higher than what it says in the lower difficulties so you can feel like a badass taking calculated risks. Ironically, there are numerous frustrated players swearing up and down the opposite is true

[@Feasco]

12:30 the concept of Alfred creating a villain for Bruce to fight was the subject of one Batman story Whatever Happened To The Caped Crusader where Alfred himself constructed the Joker persona

[@gamepassghost]

Mike blew my mind twice. In ONE video!

[@kacklina]

I adore Yakuza, but the series has mastered making you feel awsome in a very easy way. Im surprised is not in the list.

[@dmann2152]

12:28 is actually the premise for a segment in Neil Gaiman's wonderful "Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader"

[@ghost245353]

Regarding #1, Resident Evil 5 has adjusting difficulty too.

[@josephrigley8974]

Chucking yourself off something when you die is a classic stunt they used to have actors do it live everyday at the "American adventure" theme park when it was still open, the cowboy shows were great its a shame I never properly appreciated them as a kid.

[@pulsefel9210]

Lucky you. I only ever get put in fight for your life mode as I kill the last enemy, leaving nothing for me to kill so I survive

[@Jasonred79squeek]

House of the dead3. The damage in boss fights is scaled so that you will do very little damage until the last few moments you have to stun the boss.

[@l0stndamned]

The "The bad guys are actors hired by Alfred" theory was actually part of one of the comics.

[@batti591]

A non-canon one written by Neil Gaiman, but yes

[@Linkachus17]

for RE4 is no surprise to me since we in speedrun community only use knife to beat Krauser (round 2) as it take less time compared using gun (except exclusive 1 hit Magnum)

[@litmus7325]

I'd LOVE a video about "games where playing the one before didn't prepare you" mostly cause I just went from saints row 3 to 4 and FUCK its different

[@jimmysthoughts8571]

Also going from Jak and Daxter to Jak 2!

[@DarkMatterGER]

Going from Dark Souls to Bloodborne or Sekiro. I feel like my Dark Souls instincts where actually getting in the way of learning the game properly.

[@azuredragoon2054]

RE4 also did something with the aiming guns by making the laser sight visible on anything you can shoot. This would definitely improve your accuracy when you noticed this, making gameplay much easier. This isn't available on all weapons, but it does make landing headshots considerably more accessible. This feature also returned in RE5.

[@stevenclark5173]

Well you have to have some aim reference to make the game playable. It didn't matter as much in fixed camera old games.

[@azuredragoon2054]

@@stevenclark5173 It's certainly better than a rough cross hair. Plus, by highlighting anything you can shoot, it meant something suspicious could be checked by seeing if the laser sight registered on it.

[@shamNyin]

I like the way he says "even if you suck" during resident evil

[@justsomeclown7816]

Oh my god, I was tryna fight krouser for so long before i had to look up that the knife was the way to go.

[@EEUIO5678]

5:50 dammit. I never knew that. Makes sense lol I felt like such a badass

[@dxjxc91]

I've been playing Immortals Fenyx Rising lately. Great game, but I have have noticed a distinct lack of coyote time. It is very noticable in the timed platforming challenges.

[@itsdeonlol]

The Boderlands one was cool!

[@barletproductions]

3:11 ironically I did this with the VR port and original, and let me tell you it wasn't on purpose at first but it definitely made me feel badass going to to toe in VR knife fighting him. I believe that the VR port didn't have the bonus though I could be wrong

[@jaredcrabb]

If you mean resident evil 4 it would have, hes programmed to be wrak to the knife and strong against everything else.

[@melissapoling3768]

Speaking of kicking enemies, you ever drop kick enemies off of rooftops in dying light? Especially if you're sprinting at them like a runaway freight train, you can send them flying and watch as they ragdoll through the air and down to the ground 🙂

[@slcchina]

I see we’ve read Gaiman’s “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader.”

[@KingNothing1118]

My friends playing Fortnite in season 2: “Oh, we’re good now! We were messin ‘em up the other day!” Me, knowing we are all trash at the game but not bursting their bubble: “Yeah? 😃”

[@Chaotic42Kami]

Another way games help happens in RE5. The game will actually never give you ammo for a weapon you do not carry, so, an easy way to cheese it, is to remove from your inventory every weapon other than your favourite. The only exception, of course, are the RPGs, since they get treated as a single piece object, but you can get a lot of magnum ammo like this. And, if you're like me, never have to worry about getting pesky machine gun ammo. Now, I know what you're thinking "but I can get unlimited ammo if I upgrade my weapon to the max" and to that I say "yes...but what about Mercenaries mode?" This also happens there, so an easy way to get better ammo is to ditch the crappy pistol they saddle you with and just keep the shotgun/magnum/whatever you prefer.

[@Icam_here]

interesting that borderlands 2 did that, and it is a great way to make it feel like the new level is more powerful

[@michaelandreipalon359]

Yay! Dark Messiah of Might and Magic is here! Hope that's the PC port they're playing though.

[@SiilanPies]

I have put hundreds of hours into Borderlands 2 and had no idea it gives a damage buff after dinging.

[@Quasmokay]

I have to say that choosing the combat music as underscoring for the borderlands section thoroughly distracted me from what Mike was saying 😂

[@gerritvalkering1068]

One thing that I believe was admitted by the devs from the (modern) XCOM series is that a 65% chance to hit, is actually more like 70%, and the more shots in a row you miss, the bigger this 'probability correction' becomes. Why? Because humans are really bad at intuitively understanding probability. An 85% chance to hit feels like it should be almost impossible to miss, and no one thinks twice if they all connect. In fact, we get really upset when it misses, even though it's guaranteed to happen more than once over the course of a game. To prevent people from throwing down the game in disgust about that missed 95% shot, even though the last 19 times you took one you hit just fine, the game designers gave you a bit of a boost. It's pretty well-documented by now, and I'm pretty sure other games have used this mechanic.

[@daviddaugherty2816]

There's actually a name for that phenomenon: the XCOM fallacy, where something that has a 90% fails 1 in 10 times, but it doesn't feel like it should.

[@LifeWithMatthew]

Video games have never tricked me, I really am that awesome!

[@afterlife697]

I’m pretty sure resident evil 2 remake and possibly resident evil 3 remake allow you to defeat the boss no matter how much ammo you have There are times when I’ve gone into Bossfight’s and been like oh my gosh I only have three bullets left and then suddenly I shoot him one more time and the boss dies. Now I’m a pretty skilled gamer having beaten gears of war one on a hard difficulty beaten most of the halo franchise on legendary including reach and getting the mile high club achievement from call of duty modern warfare So I’m pretty sure I know a “give me” when I see it. Maybe you guys could include that in your next video about this subject. By the way Ellen you’re awesome I’m playing dark souls because of you and I’m absolutely loving it. Cheers