Good game manuals have gone to hell.

[Excalibur Bane]

Well, I must say I'm very discouraged by this whole small package non-sense that publishers and retails have agreed with. I just don't care for a jewel case sized game package, not for computer games and especially sims of any kind.

The manuals are the worst. We get a CD, usually the mandatory cd key or serial number and an extremely useless Quick Start guide or something of the sort.

Gone are the days where we get good, quality printed manuals. We get lousy PDFs the majority of the time. I don't even have a printer right now, so I'm stuck browsing them outside of the game. Pretty annoying when you have to swap back and forth (if you even can!) between the game and Adobe to follow a tutorial that requires you have the manual.

I still have my coveted SWOTL manual and game box. That's the way it SHOULD be! A nice, bound manual with all kinds of juicy historical information that helps deliver a kind of background and premise for the game. Even better, it had copy protection that was as good as the stuff today: The codewheel!

I found that little thing entertaining. Just poking around with the various combinations. Course I was considering younger then, maybe I was more easily entertained. I'll have to go dig it out and see. :hmm:

Anyway, I know the whole cost and space savings but I really don't think it's going to help in the end. I'd rather pay more for a game with a good manual, then less for a game with no manual or a crappy one.

[Camaero]

I agree with you completely. Every sim game I have bought lately, while it may be a great game, the manuals are all completely useless! Either all the information is obsolete or some very important information is left out.

I like big thick and well written manuals that I can spend hours on the crapper reading!

[Herman]

Bravo. My favorite manual came with Harpoon II - a nice meaty publication that not only told about the game, but about general tactics.

[gdogghenrikson]

I like big thick and well written manuals that I can spend hours on the crapper reading!

:rotfl:
I agree

[TLAM Strike]

I got to go the other way on this one. I don’t mind not having a printed manual, the only major printed manual game I purchased was Star Fleet Command and although I found it a good resource once I learned everything (which only took about a week) I never really used it except to occasionally read the ship descriptions when I get bored. The stories in the back of the printed SHII manual made for some good reading when I got nothing better to do and the reference stuff is helpful at times but I wouldn’t have minded it on pdf. Other than key commands I rarely use the manual after reading it once or twice the few exceptions have been the SC/DW manual (pdf) for some of the mission editor stuff, the MiG Alley manual (again pdf) for info on the gangues and flight operations and the SH1: Commanders Edition (another pdf) for some of the reference. A big box and manual is nice but in the end it just ends up as shelf decoration in my room. Maybe I just have a good memory and don't need a self contained reference.

[jumpy]

Perhaps not as weighty as some flight-sim tomes- TFX tactical fighter experiment (typhoon?) back on my old 386 (or was it 486?) had a great book with all of the info you could possibly want including weapon specs tactics and loads more. Simulation games of any sort really should come with an extensive printed manual imo.

I wish SH3 would have had a better manual with it. The mission editor information was really lacking..........but thanks to Subsim the whole problem was made a lot easier.

[Onkel Neal]

I thought only bad manuals went to hell...

[Wim Libaers]

Some parts can be in pdf, like background information that you're not likely to read more than once. But there are other things that definitely should be available as printed information. Reference tables and checklists (launching depth for weapons, safe arming delays, cavitation charts, sonar frequencies,...), but even that isn't available (or it is changed in patches). Many flightsims even come without a keyboard reference!

Also, if a game has lengthy walkthroughs for training missions, but only in pdf, and the game itself tends to crash when using alt-tab, that's bad (Falcon 4). Yes, you can print the pdf, but it's not cheap.

Of course, this depends on the game. For Doom 3, the tiny manual was appropriate, nothing more was needed. But a sim needs a bit more.

[Godalmighty83]

you dont even get a manual at all with some games now. (iam looking at you half life 2)

[OneShot]

Fondly I remember the days of Jane's Simulations with thick bound manuals, not only covering the systems, but basics of Helicopter Flight (for Longbow) for example. I think that printed manuals should come along with simulations at least, and of course if a game is complex enough to need a reference while playing it should have at least that reference printed out already.

Funny things, even tho the DVD Jewel case is now standard, when you look around a lot of new games come in two versions now. The standard one in the jewel case and the Directors Cut, Collectors Edition or whatnot in a mostly large box with printed manuals and goodies.

[FesterShinetop]

Depends on the game I think, but for sims I prefer a nice big manual with lots of (useless?) stuff in it! LOL
I loved the Microprose manuals... AND the huge boxes those games came in :|\

[Etienne]

I love the Chuck Yeager's Air Combat manual. I refered to it (Plane info, flight envelope info) long after I'd played the game.

MS Flight Simulator 2000 was a huge deception for me. No manual at all. I got fed up after a week of pdf'ing back and forth, then deleted it.

It's not as bad when it's a budget game reedition. But for a full price affaire? **** that, I want the book.

[Skybird]

Microprose.
Jane's.
Falcon 4.0
Dangerous Waters.
767 Pilot in Command (which was pdf)

Sometimes I got almost as much excitement from reading these manuals as I got from the sims themselves

I hate pdf manuals.