The black line represents a branching path you can take in a game.
There are points in a game that are impossible to return to after leaving the area or like killing a certain boss enemy. (Red X in the image)
When there are cool/special items only accessible in those areas (yellow star), if you leave and can’t come back, you might miss the item and be unable to get it ever without restarting and playing the game all over again just to get the chance to pick it up this time around.
Things get much worse when there are multiple items or even boss fights like this in the same game, where doing things ouf of order can lock you out of full questlines (like in Elden Ring where reaching Altus Plateau before getting as far as possible through everyone’s questlines will make half of them unable to be completed for no reason whatsoever)
And then you have the witch quest line that needs you to go to the Plateau before doing some other progress (I no longer remember what is what well enough)
Which is fun for a player aimed at multiple ng+ runs in a row, but a disaster for a player who would have loved to play through some story and may never even know it was there (yes, the girl with eyes of Shabriri, I am looking at you)
I don’t get it
Yeah that’s what happens when you go past the point of return first
The black line represents a branching path you can take in a game.
There are points in a game that are impossible to return to after leaving the area or like killing a certain boss enemy. (Red X in the image)
When there are cool/special items only accessible in those areas (yellow star), if you leave and can’t come back, you might miss the item and be unable to get it ever without restarting and playing the game all over again just to get the chance to pick it up this time around.
Things get much worse when there are multiple items or even boss fights like this in the same game, where doing things ouf of order can lock you out of full questlines (like in Elden Ring where reaching Altus Plateau before getting as far as possible through everyone’s questlines will make half of them unable to be completed for no reason whatsoever)
And then you have the witch quest line that needs you to go to the Plateau before doing some other progress (I no longer remember what is what well enough)
Which is fun for a player aimed at multiple ng+ runs in a row, but a disaster for a player who would have loved to play through some story and may never even know it was there (yes, the girl with eyes of Shabriri, I am looking at you)