Attract Movies and Modes

[KaiserMk7]

Enticing cinematics and automated gameplay demonstrations that start to play if you idle on the title screen for a period. Should developers still spend the time and effort to make these? Why or why not? Do you have any examples of the practice that you're especially fond of, that you think are especially well-made or well-implemented, or that you think are done very poorly?

 

[Clippy]

It's an arcade thing, isn't it? At least that's where I've seen attract movies the most. That's where they make the most sense. Gotta show off some gameplay to make you want to spend them coins. I go 50/50 on whether or not those demo reels should still be a thing. On one hand there's not much of a point to have them since you already bought the game and you don't need to be convinced any further to fork over your money. On the other hand they still have the coolness factor and they're way better than a soulless black screen that says 'press any button'. Now that I think about it trailers have been filling the role of attract demos but it's not quite the same now is it.

 

[KaiserMk7]

It's an arcade thing, isn't it? At least that's where I've seen attract movies the most. That's where they make the most sense. Gotta show off some gameplay to make you want to spend them coins. I go 50/50 on whether or not those demo reels should still be a thing. On one hand there's not much of a point to have them since you already bought the game and you don't need to be convinced any further to fork over your money. On the other hand they still have the coolness factor and they're way better than a soulless black screen that says 'press any button'. Now that I think about it trailers have been filling the role of attract demos but it's not quite the same now is it.

Now I'm tempted to put a full release attract video in a demo and have it play at the end in addition to from the title screen.

 

[Frickinfrik]

Attract Demos are especially interesting when they show footage of an earlier build of a game. Like, i think the one in Mario Sunshine was footage of an earlier near-final build. I also think the one in Twilight Princess showed a near-final build in it’s attract demo (which was a recreation of the E3 2005 trailer), as it showed Link having the Hylian Shield in parts in the game where he hasn’t obtained it yet and Wolf Link in a cutscene that Human Link is in.

 

[Kremiso]

jap are master in attract mode things
anyone remember Tech Romancer Dreamcast, wait a bit in the main menu and this video start up
...pumped up everytime here :)

 

[qw90700]

Enticing cinematics and automated gameplay demonstrations that start to play if you idle on the title screen for a period. Should developers still spend the time and effort to make these? Why or why not? Do you have any examples of the practice that you're especially fond of, that you think are especially well-made or well-implemented, or that you think are done very poorly?

I 1000% hate that the intro of video games spoils what will happen in the game. Instead what it should be about is introducing features of the game to literally attract you. Gameplay videos that doesn't spoil but make you get to know the game more will be huge plus.

Instead they rather put "nonsense" music clip style videos that doesn't mean anything and can be even false "advertise" how the actual game is. There are many games the intro cringe made me actually lose interest in the game. Sometimes I played games for hours but I thought the game is so boring and stopped playing the game and then learned about a feature that unlock a few hours more of gameplay that actually make the game worth to play for. Long story short advertizing IMO should be in a way customer actually get an idea why they would wanna buy and use that product. But instead they just tend to make some random famous person use the product without saying anything about the product itself as it doesn't give information. And recently $ony made some random Korean singer not many people know in a PS5 ad and she just acting like she knows what is PS5 and fake using it. It doesn't say anything about PS5 or is there any video game worth to play on it. Well it shows a glimps of video games but it's more like flash games lots of people played on internet like 2 decades ago lol.

I never cared about "empty trivial" cutscenes Blizzard does for example. Something happens but it doesn't worth to watch. IDK why in video games the intro videos tend to be useless videos that something happens but it doesn't mean anything. Generic scene people stand and look, people attack each other, they just around and all... so nonsense.

And then it depends on what the game is about too. If it's like a Silent Hill game then show what kind of horror style the game has to get to know the reality of the game. No one can get what is different in Silent Hill games without showing what makes Silent Hill the "Silent Hill" and not some generic horror game series.

For example Metal Gear Solid 3's intro is a generic stuff in false way. It shows the game as if it's ordinary military action game because it shows Snakes attack anything that moves. Because of it I remember video game magazines in my country wrote "the game is too boring, not an action game at all as it seems like. You either have to stay in bushes for hours or try to attack everyone but they kill you. Camera angles are so bad you won't see where enemy attack you unless you bother with activating FPS camera but then you cannot move your character. What a trash game it is my score 60/100" lolol.

 

[Cantarella]

They're cool. I like when they show little gameplay tips that you might not intuit on your own.

I also like Chrono Cross's. It shows a lot of stuff that is impossible in the game, which is kind of funny, but more importantly, it has this song.

Other than one of the many non-canon endings, this is the only time this song plays.

 

[Vardalis]

It's an arcade thing, isn't it? At least that's where I've seen attract movies the most.

Yeah, I'd say I probably know it more from arcades, but I feel like it was a thing in the PS1/PS2 generation sometimes as well, which was mostly due to in store advertising I'd imagine.

The attract modes I probably remember the most are from lightgun arcade games. CarnEvil sprang to mind immediately because the part at 57 seconds gave me nightmares as a kid:

I also feel like this one is burned into my brain because it always came out ahead over the general arcade noise of the time (starting at about 50 seconds) and was absolutely everywhere: