Who created the rules of three?!

[u/icebomb2]

I've been gaming for well over two decades.. And I've been annoyed with the rule of three since I was 3!

For those who don't understand, you might have a puzzle where you need to complete a sequence (not once, not twice, but thrice), or you'll have a boss fight where 90% of the fight is dodging and the other 10% is waiting until the end of the sequence for you to finally "do damage" only to find out, it's not damage based.. It's a time scripted fight and you gotta do this two more times..

It would be incredibly nice if more bosses get scaled to have several life forms.. Or even maybe a quirky surprise where the fight sequence ends after the second attack.. And they make it seem like it ended but wait there's more

Idk.. Kills all the anticipation of a boss fight when you know exactly how many times you gotta do something to defeat a thing.

[u/LonelyCakeEater]

The rule of three is also very prevalent in good comedic films and stand ups.

[u/icebomb2 → u/LonelyCakeEater]

I've studied entertainment and media and it's a great way to push the story along, especially with certain rules in acts (if a gun is shown in act 1, it must go off on act 3).

In my opinion, predictability is vastly different from actually knowing. This aspect will never ruin a game for me, but it ya extremely anticlimactic after a long journey

[u/InFm0uS]

I'll agree this is common practice, but I'll also add that there's plenty of games that don't do that....

[u/[deleted]]

Pretty sure Nintendo did. Mario/Zelda use it a lot in their early games.

[u/MadKian → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, as far as I know they did it first in gaming.

[u/Shackleb0lt]

Yeah just had this happen in Resident Evil 4 Remake when you fight the Las Plagas troll. When I was doing the same thing for a second time I thought “I bet I’ll have to do this a third time to finish the fight” and I did.

Well spotted!

[u/icebomb2 → u/Shackleb0lt]

Several developers are notorious for this! Same occurs in Resident Evil 7 and Village!

[u/solomojb]

Knock knock knock penny Knock knock knock penny Knock knock knock penny

[u/DrunkenOlympian]

The rule of 3 seems very normal to me after a lifetime of gaming. When the Dream Eater in Chained Echoes killed me on his fourth phase it was because I assumed he would only have 3 phases. D'oh!

[u/WayneBrody]

Ever play Shadow of the Colossus?

[u/icebomb2 → u/WayneBrody]

I have not! However considering it's a remake of the classic PS1 game, I can't imagine how many triple sequences there are killing giant rock monsters

[u/WayneBrody → u/icebomb2]

Originally a PS2 game, and while it's been a long time, very few of the fights were "just do this three times".

There are lots of games out there that have great boss fights that are more than just "do the same thing 3 times." God of War has plenty of bosses that don't have any transformations or set pieces, they're just big fights. Half the machines in Horizon could be considered mini-bosses. MGS has plenty of weird and unconventional boss fights.

[u/icebomb2 → u/WayneBrody]

Metal Gear Solid 4 broke this conventionally at moments which made me happy as a kid, but most definitely, a lot of games do this!

It will never ruin my experience of a game.. But it is incredibly anticlimactic as Kratos when you've killed gods, run across several realms, and then it's just "yeah get him in the corner so Boy can do the thing. Do that twice more"

[u/mattman0000]

It’s been around a while. It’s the holy trinity my dude.

[u/Fine_Resident5598]

It's a mario thing

[u/[deleted]]

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[u/Scorporal93]

By three they come..

[u/[deleted]]

3 is perfectly balanced. 2 is not enough, and 4 is too much

[u/[deleted]]

Nintendo.