Amnesia

[Ish]

If I read about or play one more game where the lead character has lost there memory I swear I'm gonna blow.

What is it with developers and this vastly overused cliche? It seems like every other game with a story relies on this particular narrative 'device.

Some imagination people. Please! Because on current evidence if story driven games are the way forward then god help us all.

Right. Sorry. Just needed to get that off my chest.

[Tokyo Trash Baby]

Give us some examples, I cant think of many. Is it an RPG thing cause I dont play them.

[Alf-Life]

I can only think of Headhunter. And p'rhaps Halo

[Ish]

Planescape Torment (though I forgive this one as its a great great game).

XIII

The new Free Radical game (Silent Sight isn't it?)

They tend to be instantly forgettable for me due to this (pun not intended, though kinda ironic). But I'm pretty certain if you read a magazine or something like GameSpot there are loads of the buggers.

Perhaps its me with amnesia. Perhaps I keep forgetting I've already read about the game... but have lingering thoughts on amnesia. Nah. I don't think I'm going mad. I can't be. Surely.

[Garibaldi Biscuit]

Is is an overused cliche, usually a cheap way of generating suspense and intrigue without any of the hard work, but some titles do still use it as a plot-point yet still come off marvellously well.

Planescape: Torment for instance, when the game begins your character is found in a morgue with no memory ( much like Shadowrun ), but from that point on it evolves into a masterful RPG, one which some, including myself, consider the best ever example of the genre.

So yes, it does bother me, but only really gets under my skin when the revelations which are revealed as to who this character is and why they lost their memory fall flat; if you start your game with a cliche then you'd better have something amazing round the corner to make up for it, be that an amazingly well-developed gaming world, immersive past of the main character, or, better yet, both.

[Tokyo Trash Baby]

What was that game on PSone with that huge "free john cord" campain? That whole game was based on Amnesia.

[goldbricker]

I suppose it's a good way for a player to learn to interact with a new game's environment. The character in the game has to relearn the skills that he has forgotten and it gives the player the chance to pick up the controls during the early levels.

[Alf-Life]

Yeah, wouldn't Half-Life's intro be that much better had it been Freeman's first day at work, thus mirroring the player's awe?

[SharkAttack]

Flashback (the Total Recall inspired action platformer) was another wasn't it? I loved that game.

[Flabio]

Theres been a few recent games that use it to good effect, but mentioning them by name might be considered spoily to those that havn't played them yet. Makes actually talking about this quite hard

[PeteJ]

Bioforge was another, but I loved that game and have awaited a sequel for many a year

Breakdown is yet another, but that handled things quite well. Shame about the game, but the story was decent.

[ryodi]

What was that game on PSone with that huge "free john cord" campain? That whole game was based on Amnesia.

That was In Cold Blood by Revolution Software. I've picked it up cheap but still haven't got round to playing it properly.

[Sketcz]

I quite liked shadowruns amnesia storyline.
I thought it worked very well, pulled me in, and along every step it just got more and more gripping.

Headhunter also worked very well.

I vote they stay, Ive only played 2 games with them, and thought them to be excellent.