Plot Holes, Confusing Plots, and Terrible Plots

I'm not going to bother spoiler tagging anything. If you don't want spoilers, run away and go back to arguing over which Doctor was the least lame. The title of the thread should be fair warning enough.

Batman: Arkham City

The game itself was all right. Aside from an occasionally uncooperative camera during fights, and any "puzzle" element they tried to add being annoying as hell, the gameplay was fine. Once you got the hang of it, moving around Arkham City was a breeze and enjoyable. Running from one end of town to another as fast as you could as part of a Zsasz subplot was one of the best parts of the game, as far as actual gameplay value goes. Fighting was challenging and engaging, while at the same time simple enough to get the hang of.

But SOOOOOO much of the story made no sense and/or was completely unbelievable. The first scene sets the scenario of maybe six square blocks of Gotham being bought up and turned into a giant prison where they dump criminals end to fend for themselves. Sure, that seems like something that could never, EVER, EVER INFINITY happen in anything resembling reality, but this is DC Comic land, reality can take a lower priority to interesting.

Soon, Bruce Wayne shows up in front of the gate to give a speech protesting the whole Foxtrot, but before he can get two syllables out, a bunch of stormtroopers by the acronym of TYGER show up with smoke grenades and abduct Wayne and throw him into the prison. And no one seems to be particularly alarmed over a billionaire celebrity owner of a multinational corporation being thrown into a lawless hellhole of a prison for no goddamn reason. No one calls in the National Guard, the Gotham PD don't do anything useful (ever), there's no fucking reaction to this. Suspension of disbelief can only go so far.

Anyway, Bruce has Bat Gear airdropped into the area and Batman is off to do Batstuff all over the Batplace.

After a brief encounter with Two Face and Catwoman, the Joker gets Bat's attention by way of the sniper rifle. Bats, with some difficulty, tracks down Mista Jay. Joker gets the drop on Bats and hits him with CRAZYPURPLEKNOCKOUTGAS. When Bats wakes up, tied to a chair, Joker, who looks like absolute hell, explains that he's dying and Batman needs to find him a cure, and to encourage Bats, Joker infected him with the same disease. And sends Bats off in search of Mr. Freeze, who was working on a cure until he went silent.

You get to Freeze, after beating up Penguin. Freeze said he came up with a cure, but it didn't have proper phlebotium, so it degenerated too quickly to be used. Somehow, Ra's ah Ghul's blood can fix this. So you're off to track him down.

This is where plot holes and other nuisances begin to show up. As you're tracking down Ra's, Bats' health begins to noticeably deteriorate, with Oracle saying stuff like the vital signs on his suit went flat for a moment. Batman staggers to Ra's door, and Ra's is helpful enough to give Bats a sip of whatever keep Ra's more or less immortal. Ra's tells him the small amount is only enough to keep him alive a few minutes, and to live, he needs to kill Ra's and take over Ra's army of Hot Female Ninja. So Bat's is forced to choose between his pussy Thou Shalt Not Kill philosophy and his raging boner.

He manages to get Ra's blood without killing him. And he hauls ass back to Freeze. Freeze says Batman isn't getting the cure until he gets his wife back from Joker (sidenote: You'd think, after her being kidnapped as a bargaining chip 9001 times, he'd keep a closer eye on the bitch). After the most annoying boss fight in the game, Freeze and Batman realize Harleyquinn stole the cure. So Batman has to run back to Mista Jay.

I begin to wonder how much of the Immortality Syrup Bats drank, as he seems to be perfectly fine.

It takes a LONG ASS TIME to get back into Joker's base, and Joker wasn't so keen on letting Bats in this time. Yet Batman's health doesn't deteriorate at all. You find Joker, who's looking much better, presumably thanks to the cure. You fight Joker, and an army of mooks, and a couple of boss mooks, and then the place comes crashing down, trapping Bats under rubble. Before Joker kills Bats, Ra's daughter shows up an tells her she can give him her father's immortality, if he spares Batman. Joker takes the deal, and after Daughter indicates a tracking beacon on her shirt, they're off.

Then, other stuff happens, and Bats has to take a detour to stop the person who open Arkham City from killing everyone in it. This takes a LONG FUCKING TIME, and Batman still doesn't suffer any health problems.

After that's dealt with, Joker start's broadcasting on every screen, in a speech full of GLORIOUS puns and innuendo (have I mention that Mark Hamill is the best Joker every?), threatens to kill Ra's daughter on stage at some theater. You get there just in time to Daughter to escape, take her sword from Joker, and kill him, thus taking back the cure. Bats, though quite pissed at the "murder" of Joker, finally drinks the cure, even though, according to the actual plot, he should have been dead two hours ago.

At this moment, Bats recalls a handful of tiny details I left out, realizes something isn't right, and tries to warn Daughter just as she gets shot in the back. Joker, still looking sick as hell, starts to gloat from the balcony.

Joker, who was sick WELL before Batman, still hadn't drank the cure, THAT HE HAD IN HIS POSSESSION. No fucking reason for this, as there was PLENTY to cure him and still have enough left over to dangle in front of Bats. No fucking reason for him to still be alive either, as Batman was on death's door three hours ago. The healthy looking Joker that Daughter had killed begins to get up, revealing himself as Clayface all along. Batman sticks the cure in his belt and fights Clayface. Upon defeating Clayface, the floor has fallen through the bottom of the theater and you're in a dark basement. Batman is holding the cure in his right hand, and Joker is bragging about how we all know that even after all that he's done, Batman still would give him the cure.

Then, for no reason, Joker jumps out of the shadows, stabs Batman in his right shoulder, causing him to drop the cure, which spills all over the floor. Joker tries to lick it up, for some reason that doesn't work, then dies laughing.

So, a summary of the Plot Holes:
Bruce Wayne's internment in the prison, and really, the prison's existence
Batman surviving a LOT longer than the plot itself says he should.
Joker somehow surviving much longer than Batman, for no explained reason
Joker not drinking the cure when he had it, for no goddamn reason
Joker stabbing Bats in the arm that held the cure, for no goddamn reason.

Quote :

Joker somehow surviving much longer than Batman, for no explained reason

I think this gets explained in some technobabble at some point (possibly by Freeze). It's something along the lines of when Joker drank the Titan formula (which is what is making him sick in the first place) it mutated itself into a joker-specific bad-titan formula which he has a better immunity to, but other people like batman (and a couple hundred civilians... Don't forget, there's pints of Joker's bad blood all over Gotham, all evidently due to be released at exactly the same time, Joker's admin & logistics team are anything but inefficient.) get super-poisoned like woah by it.

Quote :

Joker not drinking the cure when he had it, for no goddamn reason

I'm pretty sure that Clayface-Joker even asks Batman where the cure is during the encounter after you're chasing Joker down wanting the cure.

Were the two of them just not talking?


I'm trying to figure out exactly how the Mad Hatter's subquest even happens. The set up is never explained as a hoax, nor is it referred to as something genuine that gets intercepted, or how Hatter has the ability to intercept it all.

WD40 wrote:

I'm pretty sure that Clayface-Joker even asks Batman where the cure is during the encounter after you're chasing Joker down wanting the cure.

So, uh, where did it go after Harleyquinn stole it during the Freeze fight? I didn't even entirely understand how Harley could have taken it, as Batman had JUST arrived back with the bit that made the cure viable, and then him and Freeze started trying to kill each other.

WD40 wrote:

I'm trying to figure out exactly how the Mad Hatter's subquest even happens. The set up is never explained as a hoax, nor is it referred to as something genuine that gets intercepted, or how Hatter has the ability to intercept it all.

Good point. If he found the cure (that Alfred shouldn't even have had at that point) before Bats, the container was pretty much tamper-proof. A convincing fake container would have been pretty hard to make inside of the prison.

Oh well, got me a 50 hit combo out of the resulting fight.

Why the fuck are there so many tubes in the Mushroom Kingdom?

Bongs.

Mikey Go WOOGA wrote:

WD40 wrote:

I'm trying to figure out exactly how the Mad Hatter's subquest even happens. The set up is never explained as a hoax, nor is it referred to as something genuine that gets intercepted, or how Hatter has the ability to intercept it all.

Good point. If he found the cure (that Alfred shouldn't even have had at that point) before Bats, the container was pretty much tamper-proof. A convincing fake container would have been pretty hard to make inside of the prison.

Oh well, got me a 50 hit combo out of the resulting fight.

Just got back from a second run-through... Apparently, thet bit where you see hatter in the background when Bats rescues Viki Vale... Right there, Hatter hypnotises Batman, gives him a subconsious command to go a rooftop (in the form of a phonecall from Alfred) where he opens a hallucinated canister, and falls asleep. Afterwards, Hatter carts bats off to his house.

... I'm not sure which is more unbeleivable.

Knorg wrote:

Why the fuck are there so many tubes in the Mushroom Kingdom?

They're clearly used as a transportation system.

KJM wrote:

Knorg wrote:

Why the fuck are there so many tubes in the Mushroom Kingdom?

They're clearly used as a transportation system.

I think the real question is: Why does Bowser keep filling his strongholds with them when he knows that his enemy is a fucking plumber!

The real question is why does Bowser use his sneak attack to always capture the Princess, instead of killing Mario when he least suspects it. Also, in Super Mario 64, why does he wait for Mario to get all of the power stars when he could have crushed him as he came through the door.

Also, why hasn't the Mushroom Kingdom taking some measures to counter the weekly Bowser attack? I mean, shouldn't they have SOME form of military to at least attempt to repel this shit? Why is their, first, last, and best line of defense a fat manlet plumber?

'Cause that's all they've ever needed?

I've seen some theories that Princess Peach enjoys being kidnapped by Bowser. Maybe Mario and Bowser enjoys their roles as well?

Poor Mushroom Kingdom, being caught up in their game.

Lurv wrote:

I've seen some theories that Princess Peach enjoys being kidnapped by Bowser. Maybe Mario and Bowser enjoys their roles as well?

Poor Mushroom Kingdom, being caught up in their game.

It's either this, or Bowser is not actually kidnapping Peach. Peach and Bowser are separated (who do you think the mother of Bowser's brats is?), but are attempting to work out some of the problems in their marriage. Mario is just some guy Peach went out with once, and is a dangerous psychotic who will not stop stalking Peach, no matter how many times Bowser has hidden her away for her own safety.

rae wrote:

Lurv wrote:

I've seen some theories that Princess Peach enjoys being kidnapped by Bowser. Maybe Mario and Bowser enjoys their roles as well?

Poor Mushroom Kingdom, being caught up in their game.

It's either this, or Bowser is not actually kidnapping Peach. Peach and Bowser are separated (who do you think the mother of Bowser's brats is?), but are attempting to work out some of the problems in their marriage. Mario is just some guy Peach went out with once, and is a dangerous psychotic who will not stop stalking Peach, no matter how many times Bowser has hidden her away for her own safety.

Or, ya know, it's the longest running joke in video game history, so much so that when somebody else kidnaps the princess of screen, the Mario brothers assume it was Bowser and Bowser himself gets rather annoyed somebody else is stealing his bit. (See Cackletta, The X-Nauts, Lord Bleck etc)

Skyrim has quite a lot. It's like it doesn't matter if you want to be every guild leader ever regardless of conflicting morals.

Also, killing a werewolf, wearing its hide and then joining the Companions is pretty awkward. They don't say a thing about it.

Somath Cegem wrote:

rae wrote:

Lurv wrote:

I've seen some theories that Princess Peach enjoys being kidnapped by Bowser. Maybe Mario and Bowser enjoys their roles as well?

Poor Mushroom Kingdom, being caught up in their game.

It's either this, or Bowser is not actually kidnapping Peach. Peach and Bowser are separated (who do you think the mother of Bowser's brats is?), but are attempting to work out some of the problems in their marriage. Mario is just some guy Peach went out with once, and is a dangerous psychotic who will not stop stalking Peach, no matter how many times Bowser has hidden her away for her own safety.

Or, ya know, it's the longest running joke in video game history, so much so that when somebody else kidnaps the princess of screen, the Mario brothers assume it was Bowser and Bowser himself gets rather annoyed somebody else is stealing his bit. (See Cackletta, The X-Nauts, Lord Bleck etc)

Also... cake. Peach always has Mario over for 'cake' before she gets kidnapped. Is this cake a lie, too? Is it a euphemism for sex?

I always figured it was just cake. Mario looks like he likes cake.

And how's a plumber dating the Princess and where is the King?

Mikey Go WOOGA wrote:

And how's a plumber dating the Princess and where is the King?

If a Princess is dating a Plumber, then you know exactly where the King is. Clogging up the septic tank.

Mikey Go WOOGA wrote:

The real question is why does Bowser use his sneak attack to always capture the Princess, instead of killing Mario when he least suspects it. Also, in Super Mario 64, why does he wait for Mario to get all of the power stars when he could have crushed him as he came through the door.

Also, why hasn't the Mushroom Kingdom taking some measures to counter the weekly Bowser attack? I mean, shouldn't they have SOME form of military to at least attempt to repel this shit? Why is their, first, last, and best line of defense a fat manlet plumber?

Actually, they DO have the Mushroom Retainers and...well, you can see how bloody useless THEY are.

Mikey Go WOOGA wrote:

The real question is why does Bowser use his sneak attack to always capture the Princess, instead of killing Mario when he least suspects it. Also, in Super Mario 64, why does he wait for Mario to get all of the power stars when he could have crushed him as he came through the door.

Because then we wouldn't have a video game.

3rd playthrough on New Game+ (I'm unemployed, all-right. I've got shit-all else to do)

Spoiler:

The ending sections of that game has some serious problems when it comes to informing players over what the hell is going on...

I was wondering what the hell she was doing tied up like that for the good ten minutes I spent goofing around with the tape on her mouth. I thought that there was a power vacuum in the face of Joker's demise and some rebellious goons managed to subdue her.

Yeah, THAT pile of bullshit was the most believable thing the godawful storytelling was leading me to believe at that point.

HAHA, TIME FOR DOUBLEPOST

Raine wrote:

Skyrim has quite a lot. It's like it doesn't matter if you want to be every guild leader ever regardless of conflicting morals.

Also, killing a werewolf, wearing its hide and then joining the Companions is pretty awkward. They don't say a thing about it.

Well, the Dark Brotherhood and Thieves' Guild wouldn't really care about conflicting morals as long as you do them well. And they're somewhat secret organizations, so the Companions and the College wouldn't know if you were the leader of the two.

DIFFERENT GAME: Jade Empire

99% of a really good game with a really good plot, but one little detail at the end is annoying. Short version: Right before the Final Boss, you make a decision to either free the source of the Boss's power or enslave it for yourself. This choice COMPLETELY buttfucked the Moral-O-Meter. You could have been the most mean spirited, puppy kicking, Closed Fisting jackass in the history of video games, but this ONE good act will through you from Total Dick to halfway up the GOOD side of the Karma Meter, and visa versa. Basically, it doesn't matter what you've done through the entire game, this ONE THING completely determines your Karma.

It's especially annoying if you're trying to be Closed Fist. Because the Closed Fist option is such an irredeemable dick move that Mikey felt bad after doing it.

I don't mind that you have the option, I mind that it defeats the purpose of having the Karma Meter for the first 99% of the game.

Mikey Go WOOGA wrote:

I don't mind that you have the option, I mind that it defeats the purpose of having the Karma Meter for the first 99% of the game.

InFamous does something like this too. But it seems to be carried off better.

It's been parodied a few times that InFamous' morality/karma system boils down to Cole having an internal monologue every time he confronts a dilemma that runs: "Be a decent guy" or "Fry him", but that was kinda the point. Cole is either supposed to be a decent, thoughtful guy, or a murder-happy sociopath. He's supposed to be polarised, and the game system supports that.

You are given a choice near the end of the game to use the Ray Sphere (The superhuman-making-bomb-plot-device) a second time. Doing so will quadruple your power level (which it actually does - Superevil Cole is ludicrously powerful - something that was retconned in InFamous 2) but will slaughter thousands. If you've gone Paragon the whole game, you can still go evil at this point - and it makes sense: The villain's baddie has just killed your girlfriend or forced Cole to make a choice that makes her leave him. Cole, regardless of his previous, has a reason to consider going to the Dark Side.

There is no "goodie" redeeming action, though. If you stick with Blue-Energy Cole Your power level remains the same, and you're stuck with the useless wind-up blaster "goodie" power, which, though powerful, is utterly impractical.

...

This has also reminded me how dumb the Karma system was in Fallout 3.

On a Psycho-Nutter playthrough I used the mesmetron on some random merchant. Robbed him of everything, including the clothes off his back, put an exploding-Slave-Collar on him, considered selling him to some slavers, and then let him run off, only to activate the bomb collar anyway, just to see what it looked like.

Then I earned Good Karma.

Turns out the merchant was a badie selling human flesh. Something I genuinely hadn't noticed, coz I just grabbed everything off him without looking.

Morality systems are dumb like that.

[Edit] I also sold the human flesh to the kids in Little Lamplight, and didn't earn Bad Karma for that. Selling Human flesh is only evil if other people do it, apparently.

^
I think, at least originally, if you poisoned the Wasteland using the purifier, it cancelled out. Turning the purifier on in the first place was as much Good Karma as poisoning it was Bad Karma.

Plus, that ending wasn't explained well enough, when President Eden told me the modification would kill people with mutations, I figured he meant the Super Mutants and Ghouls. And while the death of the goddamn Super Mutants would be nice, I just really wanted to finish Moira off.

I didn't except it to kill everyone with the slightest little mutation. At that point, you have to ask what qualifies as a mutation in the first place. DNA is obviously different from person to person. Does blond hair count as a mutation?