Ever beat a game w/o using a major gameplay mechanic?

[Gunstar Green]

My first time playing a Wing Commander game I went through most of the game not knowing about autopilot, slowly crawling my way towards every nav point.

I usually ignore item crafting systems in every game that includes them.

[Frag Mortuus]

I will either not use something or I will over use it.

In Batman Arkham Asylum I pretty much played the entire game through Detective Mode and in pretty much all Metal Gear games I just stare at the map the entire time.

However, in games like Oblivion and Skyrim I never use magic.....ever. I have never crafted a potion, weapon, improved a weapon, or anything else like that.

I will hoard ammo in all games. I will use the weakest weapon every on even the hardest enemy until I have no choice because I have used all of my pistol ammo.

I pretty much find an attack I like and use it through the entire game.

[BoneSnapDeez]

However, in games like Oblivion and Skyrim I never use magic.....ever. I have never crafted a potion, weapon, improved a weapon, or anything else like that.

This is the magic (no pun intended) of WRPGs. So many choices and options. You're free to do what you like and ignore what you like.

I think I once read that you can finish Planescape: Torment while only fighting like 5 battles.

[dsheinem]

I beat Sonic 1 without jumping

[Blu]

I remember a few:

1. Final Fantasy VII - Not knowing the ins and outs of Final Fantasy VII's spells, and getting beat on bosses by not breaking their shells/guards. I also ran into the challenge of not knowing how to best use Materia and Limit Breaks.
2. Diablo II - playing through the game with a build that I thought was going to be awesome, only to find out I was getting pulverized later in the game. This was before any of the patches that let you respec your character -- you had to start over entirely. It was actually pretty fun to suck and made the game more challenging and rewarding.
3. Final Fantasy VIII - playing through the first time (I was like 12 at the time), the junction system was really tough and I relied on the GF system. When I replayed it twice, junctioning magic makes the game so much easier and less time consuming, once you have all the magic you need.

[dunpeal2064]

Final Fantasy VIII's biggest downfall imo. The system is great, but so complicated that the difficulty could in no way be crafted around assuming the player understands the system fully. In my first playthrough, the challenge was actually decent. With any understanding of the game, though, you can pretty much break everything.

Square must have really liked VI to go and make an even more broken game.

[ZeroAX]

Square must have really liked VI to go and make an even more broken game.

Am I the only person in the world who couldn't break FF VI?

[BoneSnapDeez]

Square must have really liked VI to go and make an even more broken game.

Am I the only person in the world who couldn't break FF VI?

Well even FFVI's stat/level progression system is arguably "broken." I can't think of another RPG where you can turn your characters into walking death machines so quickly and easily.

Now that I'm thinking of retro RPGs...
- I never use the double/triple techs in Chrono Trigger. I never found them to be advantageous in any way when I can just cast regular singular techs with my individual characters. Maybe the combos are slightly more powerful, but the game is so easy anyway I doubt it would make much of a difference.
- When I played Secret of Mana as a kid I never knew or cared about how to level magic spells. For most of the game it didn't make much difference - until I got to the final boss that is. He always took about 30+ minutes to take down because I was doing so little damage.

[Ziggy]

In Castlevania III for the NES, I didn't know for the longest time that Grant, Alucard, and Sypha are playable characters. I've never owned the manual for the game. I don't think I actually beat it though, before finding out I mean.

[Anapan]

Nightmare Creatures 2- I played through the entire game until the last boss without knowing about combos. I was 25-30 minutes into the last battle before looking online and finding out I'd only been doing weak attacks to everything and I hadn't even hurt him .