How do you feel about spoilers for video games?

[twilitfalchion]

With the abundance of game trailers, leaks, and gameplay shown online, spoilers have been more and more difficult to avoid. Although I guess the relatively easy solution to avoid getting spoiled for something it to simply avoid watching anything about it.

Personally, I feel that even watching gameplay and trailers is a spoiler in itself, as the experience is just a little bit less new or fresh than if I had seen whatever it was for myself for the first time. This is why I was so glad that very little of BotW was spoiled for me. I'd say that almost the entirety of my experience in BotW was completely new to me, and I'm very glad it was.

But how do you all feel about spoilers? What is a spoiler for you? Is it seeing any part of a game, or the story, or just the gameplay? And do you avoid spoilers or don't worry about avoiding them at all?

 

[Spirit]

I usually try to stick to just trailers unless I'm really on the fence, then I'll watch some gameplay videos.

Spoilers are really hard to avoid though, Nintendo trailers especially tend to show so much.

I remember last I was on Twitter before BotW came out, I was just checking my newsfeed and Nintendo posted an image of Dinraal.

I didn't know dragons were in BotW, I didn't want to know, I wasn't actively looking for spoilers or even info in BotW because I was trying to avoid things at the time, but there it was, just casually in my newsfeed.

Was not impressed.

 

[Fraxinus]

It really depends on the game and how invested I am in it. Like Spirit said, if I'm on the fence for something, I'm more likely to look more into it and probably have some minor stuff spoiled by my own will because that's part of the decision-making process in seeing if a game is worth the money/time.

Most games I'm okay getting a little bit of information shared, like what is seen in trailers and then maybe some updates about some of the characters, locations, etc. The more interested I am in a game, the more I may follow some of that news up until release. I expect to stay caught up on all the Rune Factory 5 news whenever that starts coming, as I have in the past with past installments since I've had a presence online. But this can also go the other way. It's super dependent on the game and what sort of experience I get from the game. For instance, I have stayed caught up with Team Cherry's blog posts about Silksong, but I have made a point to avoid gameplay outside of the trailer--such as that seen from the Nintendo Treehouse at E3 last year. For a metroidvania, I think showing the starting area and its layout is a spoiler and would ruin the exploration aspect of it when I dive into it myself.

For the most part, plot points outside of the exposition are where the spoiler territory starts. The identities of bosses are spoilers to me as well, especially if they're story bosses. The exception is if their identity is known from the exposition. Locations are spoilers if they're not revealed by the developers. They choose what areas to show you carefully. Spoilers are kinda hard to avoid though, especially with social media being the way it is. People are inconsiderate and there's a handful of youtube channels that are notorious for putting late game spoilers in their thumbnails. So if you watch any bit of coverage on a game, you risk youtube suggestion spoiler-y material to you.

I was lucky to be pretty in the dark about BotW, apart from a couple people in the shoutbox here mentioning the name of the boss of Vah Ruta--but even then, what I pictured to go with that name was definitely not what I got so it was less of a spoiler than it seemed at the time.

 

[Dizzi]

Like if youre researching if you wanna buy the game then in ok witg them but if im not really researching cuz u know ima get it then youre dead to mw...

 

[the8thark]

As long as they are clearly labelled and not bait and switch then I'm fine with them.
The issue is many many websites do the bait and switch to get more hits/page views.

 

[Paranoid King]

Games are interesting. With books and movies, the story and characters are the whole point. I don't want to be spoiled with those, because I lose out on the impact of the reveal.

But with a game, stories can take a sideline to gameplay. If the gameplay is more important than the story, I don't care about spoilers because they don't impact my experience. For example,

Spoiler: 25-year old Metroid spoiler

Samus is a girl.

That's neat, but I don't care if I'm spoiled by that, because I spend the whole game fighting space pirates, not dwelling on Samus's backstory.

However, if you told me that

Spoiler: 25-year old Chrono Trigger spoiler

The main character dies halfway through.

I'd be upset, because that game dwells mostly on the characters and story.

Back to the original example, I wouldn't mind BotW spoilers, because I focused on the combat and adventure portions of the game. I'd still buy the game even if I already knew everything about the game. But I can see why someone would be on the other side of that fence, because BotW heavily features exploration and discovery.

 

[mαrkαsscoρ]

yeah I try to minimize trailer watching as much as I can, but it's weird in what developers think is ok to show off that the fans think is spoilery

for instance, for xenoblade representation in smash bros, they spoiled a VERY key revelation that many fans, including myself, are like "why in the hell would they do that??"; I also remember when I was playing persona 4 w/ my friend, I got a game over and went to the title screen, after a bit, an in game trailer started to play and he told me to skip to avoid spoilers, and I'm like dude, they literally put this trailer in the game, how much could they possible spoil? *a pretty interesting spoiler happens on screen*
also the literal cover art for phantasy star III is a spoiler in of itself

but on the whole, if I know what happens in the first couple hours in a game, I don't mind it much since it's something that literally happens in the beginning [unless it's critical to the rest of the game], but anything afterwards is what I consider a spoiler

 

[GoronGainz]

Avoid them as much as possible, if it's a game I know I'm gonna get I won't watch any trailers, any gameplay. I want that fresh feeling.

Same with movies & TV shows, though avoiding stuff about them is hard with social media. Never seen an episode of Game of Thrones but I can tell you a list of characters who die in it.

If i'm on the fence about something I'll usually defer to recommendations from people as oppose to gameplay & trailers.

Enjoy that element of mystery & discovery but almost every trailer now seems to be "Here's the plot, here's the plot twists, here's the cool game mechanics that would've been a nice surprise, here's the final boss, buy the game"

 

[Sheikah_Witch]

I like watching some things as a 'taste' of what's to come. I consider it part of the experience, in a way. I watched all of the E3 2016 footage of BotW, and it was a great feeling to salivate over it and then, finally, get a hold of the real game and walking down the hills of the Great Plateau for myself, after watching a year of footage.

But there's E3 footage, and then there's flat out significant story spoilers, which of course can ruin a lot.

 

[MapelSerup]

I’ll watch trailers and any updates, especially for a game I’m very interested in. Otherwise, though, I avoid them like the plague. Anything I would have enjoyed finding out myself I try to avoid, but I’m not the best at it.
I went into BOTW almost completely blind, luckily. I only saw one trailer and didn’t even know it or the Switch existed until a few months before release.

 

[~Kilza~]

I prefer not having the game spoiled for me, so that way everything is fresh and new to me and I can have a more enjoyable experience without knowing things like "oh X character is going to die" or "oh this is the part where Y happens".