Tutorials in the beginning of the game

[EternalShadow]

As long as you tell the player that esc is the menu (or whatever keybind you have) and that the player gets those items, you should be covered. Everything else is often the lack of a player's will to experiment, unfortunately. If all else fails, tell them to look around and experiment!

 

[Dragnfly]

Sorry to be so wordy when the point of my post is "don't be too wordy".

I'm all for Learn by Doing and learning when something becomes relevant. Don't tell them the crafting system in the intro if you won't be unlocking the system for 10 hours (though smartly hinting to it's existence is a nice little appetite teaser). Actually, learning when something becomes relevant can become very fun for people who discover the option before they're supposed to. It rewards experimenting. I'm fine with holding people's hand, to a point, and that point fluctuates with the task. I wouldn't expect to have to explain what ATTACK, MAGIC, ITEM, DEFEND or RUN does but if there's, say, a "tsungle" command then I'd like to know what that does, which can likely be told in a single sentence or it should be clear what it does when I use it. I'm not the type to expect people to figure out how to fix a nuclear reactor but if you said "open this panel on the side of the reactor" and I saw screws on the panel, I'd be asking for a screwdriver. Same deal with games. Everything in life has a sort of pass level for expected deduction and comprehension skills and basic gameplay should be very low. When a game tells me "use the arrow keys to move" I feel like the creator is insulting me. IF the arrow keys don't move me, and the mouse doesn't do anything I'm going to try other keys.

With RM games I think some sort of control identifiers are often useful though. People should move with the arrow keys naturally, or I suppose WASD if they're new to RM (although when WASD doesn't move their character they should naturally try the arrows). They'll likely try CTRL, ALT, Space or Enter to Accept and Esc to cancel (for the record, I'm all about Z and X). Running is something no friend I've given an RM game to yet has known unless the game or I told them. They tend to assume you can't run (until necessary, which might be never) once they find out the Move, Accept and Cancel controls. I'd wager the person playing your game isn't playing a game for the first time but it very well might be their first RM game, so let them know if they can run.

My advice on good tutorials-
 

-The best tutorials don't feel like tutorials. Youtuber Sequelitis might have an annoying style but he really did a good job of explaining this in his Megaman/X video. Basically, you have the gameplay pose uses for your systems in a controlled, low-or-no risk environment before throwing you to the wolves, without stopping the actual game for it. The bit mentioned earlier with the chest and door is even a good example. The player accomplishes something and feels good for it, so they're more inclined to move on.
-If you must do a full-on tutorial, consider your setting. If your hero is a seasoned veteran solider, don't have his buddy say "Hey, do you remember how to fight?". I forget what game it was but it asked that and if you said "No, tell me." then the buddy said "Damn. Then you're probably going to die." and it moved on to the fight (in basic RM combat system). LOL nice little jab. Now, if there was a non-basic system he could ask "Do you know about McGuffin Orbs?"

-Make it part of the story. If your tutorial requires text explanations, spread them out based on necessity and have the characters discuss them in a fitting manner. If the game is light-hearted or starts light-hearted, a funny tutorial is good here. The best part about that is that you can make it a learn-by-doing with quirky dialogue.

-NEVER make them mandatory. ALWAYS allow tutorial skipping. But it might be worth it to offer some rewards in the tutorial like some small pocket money or something the player won't feel too bad about missing out on, but if they do the tutorial then there's a little thank you for them.

Game designers are at a turning point right now. The majority of players are lazy. Tragically so, even. So while the big companies are pretty much forced to cater to the dumb and lazy folk or face reduced sales, us smaller guys have a chance to hopefully re-spark in some people the resourcefulness gamers used to have which should be common sense for humans. Especially since even the most popular RM games are still very niche and require at least some knowledge to get into. Us old timers weren't geniuses. We just knew that pressing buttons does things, so let's see what they do, and we knew that the HP number that decreases when the enemy hits us isn't telling us our printer ink is running out, but that we're taking damage. What happens when it hits zero? Maybe a little golden elephant pops out of your optical drive and gives you a coupon for more of that glue mom sniffed while pregnant for you but smart money says your character dies. So ask yourself "Should this control/function/etc be common sense if I'm playing an RM game (but not a videogame in general) for the first time?" and if the answer is "Yes" then don't even mention it. If people see an Item called "Healing Potion" and die because they didn't know how to heal when there's an Items option right on the battle menu then you just need to shake your head and give them a ball to play with instead.

 

[EternalShadow]

I too, have seen people die when they have skills and items they can use (they'd played games before and kept asking what the other battle options did), and I saw someone in real life stare blankly at the screen (they'd never played a computer game before) rather than try a bunch of buttons, or even the "common sense buttons" - a basic level of competency should be expected with games, but first-timers might like a small manual that comes with a/the game. Otherwise, Google is their friend. 

Tooltips are also useful. Like, when you hover over something and it says briefly what it does.

 

[CzarSquid]

I think the best way of doing it is to keep it short and simple. In the game I made, Friend, I just gave all the controls in the intro where the player is free to stay in that room and get an understanding of the controls or the player can leave if they already know the basics. That way the people who know how to play get literally 6 seconds of tutorial. The rest can stay and learn.

When introducing new gameplay elements you need to be careful because there is a fine line between telling the player what they should do and overloading the player with too much information. You can be surprised how many people will skip information just because they feel like they are reading too much (the owl from Zelda: Ocarina of Time) or because they already know what to do. Spoon feed the player the information. There is no need to go over every single aspect of the game in one long winded speech. Break information into tiny chunks. Show each idea one at a time. Let the player try it out rather then telling them. Use visual examples on how to do certain elements! Sometimes you may even have to repeat information to the player to perform the task.

If I wanted to teach players about equipment. First I need to determine if the player has an idea to do so. An easy way would be to give the player an item to equip and ask them to equip the item. This is important because if the player knows how to equip then don't insult their knowledge by making them sit through a 2 minute tutorial on something they already know. If the player has no idea then all the player needs to do is talk to the NPC again for help. Then break down the steps of equipping through visual aids (show the player menus and how to change equipment). After that, let the player try again to equip the item to see if they understand the concept.

tl;dr: Assume everyone playing your game is either a pro or absolute beginner to gaming. Break down your tutorials in tiny chunks (less than 30 seconds each). The best way to make sure a player understands a concept is to ask them to prove it. If the player can't prove it is when then you explain the gameplay element.

 

[Caustic]

Personally, I don't mind which way it goes as long as the tutorials are skippable when I want them to be.

If I have to sit through a 5 minute text crawl telling me how to frickin' WALK, that's too much. On the other hand, handing me something that has no relation to what I did before and expecting me to figure it out - "Oh, by the way, you can't save here either. Ta-ta!" - will drive me insane. Somewhere in-between - not necessarily hand-holding but giving out important info that will save my butt from being set on fire one too many times - is a good balance.

As well, tutorials that give rewards are always appreciated :3 Good MMO's have this down pat; you do the early quests - even if they are boring - and you get free stuff that'll last you for a good few more levels. Or maybe some of it is worth selling to get some starter cash, if you can't/don't want to use them. The single-player equivalent is sort of like the Mayor's house in Chrono Trigger; sure they chatter, but you can get quite a few nice items out of it, so it feels rewarding each time you play through it.

Some people don't know much about games (*cough*My Parents*COUGH*), so they may need some coddling to start. But it shouldn't last the entire game either -- something the modern GTA's have, for some reason, forgotten about. If you're just now telling me how to auto-aim THREE HOURS IN, something has gone terribly wrong

 

[JAD94]

First off I just want to say I absolutely love your profile gif lmao!

Second you made some real good points. Some things are good to learn right away and not half way through the game. I tried to make the tutorial interactive so it feels like gameplay and not a school lecture lol. God knows I hate reading paragraphs and paragraphs of texts.