A sister recommended Red Dead Redemption 2 to her brother, but regretted this decision after he decided to skip all the cutscenes

Playing through a favorite game together sounds like the perfect bonding activity. In practice, it can turn into quiet torture if the person sitting next to you treats story-driven titles like an obstacle course to be sprinted through.

One Red Dead Redemption 2 fan ran into exactly that problem after sitting her older brother down with the game.

He skipped every cutscene, drove past random encounters, ignored Arthur diary and blew off side missions entirely. By chapter four, he still hadn't learned the characters names, and the low honor Arthur playthrough she'd hoped to watch unfold turned into cold comfort given how fast he was blowing through everything.

Complaints about pacing weren't limited to Rockstar western. Cyberpunk 2077 has the same issue, only worse. Characters promise to call back "in a few days," then ring twenty seconds later with a brand new story mission, pressuring players into rushing the main quest and breaking the narrative flow in the process.

Someone even built an entire spreadsheet laying out a recommended mission order with breaks between them, just so the story wouldn't feel like a race against the clock.

Games about dying protagonists came in for criticism too. Cyberpunk 2077 puts you on a countdown to save V, yet keeps tempting you to pop the orange pill for another Johnny hangout session, only to tell you at the finish line that your condition has gone too far.

Fallout 4 has a similar disconnect – you're supposed to be urgently hunting for your missing son, but the game nudges you toward building settlements instead. One commenter summed up the design conflict pretty well:

A surprise pikachu moment if there ever was one, and it's all because of the game's inherent schizophrenia between 'you're dying let's go let's go' and 'go for a random sidequest to help your neighbour with his pet tortoise'.

The slow start of the western remains its own hurdle for a lot of players. The snowy chapter one prologue turns off even longtime fans, and some keep a separate save right before the train robbery just to skip straight to the action.

One person with a thousand hours logged admitted they've never opened the journal once, despite loving the game. Playstyle is a personal thing, and people who prefer to soak in every detail just don't mesh well with those who mash "skip" on every line of dialogue.