Games That Feel Too Long/Short?

[Moonface]

For the past week I've been playing Days Gone, and it's the first game in a while that felt like it was dragging on at points and made me wish it was trimmed down a little. I know it's a thing for open world games to give fetch quests and stuff to pad things out a bit, but this game made that stuff feel like very obvious padding and made me wish I could get back to advancing the actual story.

As for a game that feels too short, Ratchet & Clank: Quest for Booty felt that way to me back when I originally played it. When every other R&C game before it had been an 8+ hour affair, a 2 hour entry that was part of the mainline games felt very underwhelming in comparison. It sucked more because it wasn't a bad game, so one moment I'm really enjoying the game and suddenly it's over.

[Kyng]

To be honest, when a game feels too long, it's usually my own fault: I like to explore the entire game world, thus spending way longer on the game than I need to . Skyrim falls into this category: I still haven't finished the main quest (or even come close to doing so), because I keep getting distracted by the side quests .

As for games that are too short: Portal is my go-to example. However, that's understandable: Valve probably just didn't know what they had at that point, and they were just testing the concept to see if they could flesh it out later.

[Moonface]

As for games that are too short: Portal is my go-to example. However, that's understandable: Valve probably just didn't know what they had at that point, and they were just testing the concept to see if they could flesh it out later.

I think any first entry for a game series is fine to be shorter since generally you're trying out a concept and don't necessarily want to pour a lot of time and resources into something that's testing the waters. Luigi's Mansion is a game that comes to mind that I think fits into this idea too.

A game I finished yesterday that feels a little short is Jak 3. The length isn't bad, but it feels short in that a lot of story context is just never covered. A character who swears he will not return to Haven City is just inexplicably present for a single mission in said city, and then disappears again back to where he actually lives. Jak collects light and dark eco crystals, but I didn't encounter any dialogue that suggests they are used for the planet defense system. Speaking of said system, one mission has Jak disabling the shield on the enemy ship that's going to attack the planet so that the defense system can target it, but you don't get told that is why you're doing the mission (you get told nothing, you just do it out of the blue). So the game doesn't feel short in the sense of there isn't enough on offer, but rather that it doesn't seem to cover everything it's supposed to cover.

[Moonface]

Two more games that I think are a little too long; Alien: Isolation, and TLOU2. Both games have points where you think it's going to be over, and it isn't. That can be a good thing but for both of these games I don't get excited about there being more, I just get annoyed by it and want it to be over. A:I shouldn't be longer than 8 hours, and TLOU2 feels long because of the way it's structured (although there are parts I think could be cut that wouldn't impact the game at all).

[Maniakkid25]

I actually have a game that feels too short that you might be surprised I'm mentioning, given I savagely tore it a new one: Digimon World Data Squad. No, seriously, the game feels too short! See, one of the reasons it feels too short is that Daemon is meant to be a plot-critical character, and only shows up for about 5 scenes. This is in spite of the fact that two subplots revolve around him: Marcus' payback for getting beat up, and another character's disappearance. Maybe if they spent more time giving a damn, his plot thread would have gotten the development it needed to matter! Or, maybe they might have gotten more milage out of him menacing the party. I don't know; it's not like I write a better story for the game during my rant.

[Moonface]

@Maniakkid25: Do you think they could've covered the character appropriately in the time the game runs for or does the game need more time to cover it? Just curious if the problem is lack of focus or actually a lack of time.

[Maniakkid25]

Both, to be honest. The game zips from plot zone to plot zone fairly quickly, and we don't really spend much time developing the plot threads that are made. It's more "Hey, this is a thing that happened, MOVING ON!" This only compounds the fact that they waste time on pointless characters that mean nothing to the plot, making the whole thing a mess.