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Quick Time Events
Although the arcade game Dragon's Lair is made up of Quick Time Events (or QTEs), Sega officially coined the term with its Dreamcast adventure, Shenmue. Little did the company know that the rest of the video game industry was going to copy and abuse its idea. A QTE forces you to make a split second decision to save a video game character and/or trigger an action. One of the more famous ones from Shenmue forces you to quickly press a button to avoid getting hit with a soccer ball. In this case, failing doesn't ruin the story, but you can die in other games, such as the upcoming Bourne Conspiracy. On one hand, QTEs keep us on edge and adrenaline levels high. On the other, developers have overused this feature to the point that we groan whenever a button pops up on screen. Unless there's a way to innovate, the QTE needs to go.
Reader Comments (61)
cant you get off the GTA 4 thing not stnading the test of "time".