playing SSA1 #4 again I realized - have screw-ups off screen

We are heroes who save the world or people or cats or whatever. Something has to have gone wrong for us to be needed. Hollows was destroyed, a Hydra appeared in the sewers, etc. We should be used to things going wrong and us fixing it.

So I wondered why SSA1 felt so bad. I realized playing the 4th one (where you stand and watch Manticore and Liberty argue about who will protect Psyche) is that normally the disasters happen off screen. You hear about them and then fix them.

But in SSA1 you are forced to watch the disasters happen with no ability to prevent them. And not just once, but repeatedly - sometimes repeatedly in the same mission.

Had #4 started with being told that the dirge was causing a Longbow base to go wild, I wouldn't have blinked an eye. If I got to the end and Sister Psyche were insane, I wouldn't have blinked an eye.

The odd thing is that normally you are supposed to "show" not "tell" what happens. People prefer watching a movie to see the event rather than just have someone report what happened off screen. But a game is not the same as passive fiction. Watching a movie I feel no responsibility for a character making a bad decision. Playing a game I do feel responsibility if I am standing there watching them make it.

listos version: Missions need to be written understanding that we are participants and not observers in the events. If we are to be only observers that needs to be forced by having the events happen off screen or in a cut scene so that all responsibility is removed from us.