Every Game Needs Waypoints
Fun fact: If you aim at something and press the Waypoint button (G by default), it creates a small icon that everyone can see on their HUDs. This is very useful for marking objects like rare caches, Argon Crystals and Ayatan sculptures. But you can also use it to mark the way for other players, and you can use it to highlight dangerous enemies. It’s a small, useful feature that can help avoid confusion or point to rare loot, and is genuinely useful for newbies.
My question here is, why don’t most games have this?
Well, to be fair, a lot of games have a waypoint or pinging system. But a lot more games should allow players to ping items and locations, especially on larger levels and maps. For example, the other day, I played a Strike in Destiny 2 for the first time, and ended up lagging really far behind because I couldn’t find the cave entrance. But there was nothing I could really do about it, because the rest of my fireteam couldn’t just point out where to go.
That being said, Destiny 2’s waypoint system is fucking awful in general, and can get as lost as I can.
As another example, when I played Dead Rising 4, the three of us got very lost. The markers that were supposed to show where the objective was made no sense at all. And it would have been nice to ping useful weapons, since their placement is completely random. Another game we played recently was Golf With Your Friends. This game DID have markers but they didn’t last long enough to properly convey information. Golf With Your Friends does have a free-camera mode, but some of the holes are so damn convoluted that you still don’t know what to do.
Of course, plenty of games just don’t need it. But we all knew that anyway. On anything with a large map and multiplayer though, the ability to ping things is a godsend. Especially if there is loot to be picked up.
Warframe’s Waypoint system isn’t even that good.
Funnily enough, Warframe’s ability to ping things isn’t amazing. It actually has a lot of flaws, especially when marking where you’re going.
A more useful implantation of pings is actually in League of Legends. In LoL, the ping system works with both automatic and player-chosen pings. In fact, LoL’s ping system points out tons of useful things, from missing enemies to how much cooldown time an ability has before it can be used. If anything, the ping system is almost too useful, and you can mark and point out all sorts of things.
Unfortunately though, LoL’s ping system is heavily held back by the fact that players spam pings when they’re angry and/or losing. It’s definitely possible to abuse pings, especially the question mark ping, as a way of taunting or angering other players. Heck, in the handful of times I’ve played League of Legends, I’ve had people spam pissed off pings at others plenty of times.
Risk of Rain 2 has a great waypoint system
One of the better ping systems I’ve seen is Risk of Rain 2. The levels in RoR2 are quite large and have a lot of hidden and out-of-the-way chests and items. The pings aren’t as in-depth as League of Legends’ system, but it is still quite robust. However, it does give you all the information you might need. More importantly though, the waypoints and pings linger for a decent amount of time. This is crucial because RoR2’s levels are pretty large and take a lot of time to traverse.
Okay, sure, at the end of the day, using Voice Chat will always be better than pings. But not everyone is willing to talk to complete strangers. On top of that, using a microphone can easily lead to trolling, harassment and more. A ping system won’t be as accurate, but in many games, it could at the very least nudge people in the right direction.