Comic Strips

This is the exact same instinct that drives us to run away from the obvious path first. "Clearly that's where the final boss is. Let me just check what's down this way first..."

"...oh no wait, there's a point-of-no-return ledge here. Ok, so maybe that other way was actually where the secret was. I'll go back..."

"...hmm, there's another ledge on this side too. Let me just put in a save point and...ok, yeah, this one is the final boss. Let me reload and check the other path..."

"...ugh, it restarted me way back here? And respawned all the enemies when I reloaded? That's frustrating..."

"...THEY BOTH. LED. TO THE SAME. EXACT. PLACE."

That's why I find idea that in Ready Player One no gamer tried running a car backward offensive.

Developer: here's a fun little thing people will be excited to find!

Player: I will never trust anyone again

Every single waterfall I find I must check behind it, forever.

Donkey Kong Country…

Credit to Tim Buckley for briefly becoming one of the most widely mocked people on the internet and spawning a meme that lives on to this day but just rolling with it and continuing with his dream of making webcomics.

I always try to figure out which direction the game wants me to go so I can try going the opposite way first.

The most damning game for me was Dragon Ball Z: Super Saiya Densetsu on SNES.

It was an rpg. A good like 10 hours into the game you're wondering around on Planet Namek and the only way to progress in the story is to find Dende. Well you get pretty much no info or hints about where he is. Well all the houses and huts all have decorative pots in them, kind of like the kind you could smash in Zelda games. In DBZ, at no point was anything in any of these pots, and you couldn't break them, or even get acknowledgement that pressing a button near one of these pots even "checks" the pot. All the pots seem to just be decor you can't interact with.

Of course, that's where Dende was. The only thing in any pot in the entire game was a kid that you were required to find in order to continue progressing, found half way into the game after you've decided already that the game won't let you interact or check pots, and then making you check all the rest of the pots for the rest of the game because "they hid one thing in a pot, surely there could be another".

Donkey Kong Country did this to me forever

And then the movie adaptation of Ready Player One acted like placing something before the starting line is some kind of super-sneaky hiding method.

For me it's waterfalls - have to check behind every single one for a hidden cave.

This has proven to be problematic in real life, like when I visited Niagara...

Tons of games did this in the 2d side scrolling period.

Also in this list: checking under stairs and behind waterfalls

In Sega Genesis/Mega Drive Aladdin in several levels in the beginning you have go forward a bit and then return back to the start to find the secret. Needles to say, it also messed me up for life.

As a Wolfenstein 3D player that checks every square centimeter of every wall for secret passages, I feel this pain.

Old school Armored core gamer here. This is me.

B^U

TIL CAD is still going and it looks different.

Doom 2

Note: Your character is highly unlikely to "Whump" into the left side obstacle. They are more likely to do the Michael Jackson standing walking in place motion while you try probing the left side for openings and weaknesses.

Oh crap. I do it too. It's useful in Rayman Origins and Legends. (Maybe once)

Lego Star Wars instilled this as well as leaps of faith

Ha! In Kirby they put stars or collectibles or plot items in obscure places in just about every game!