On Glitches

So I frequently see people affiliate glitches with bad programming. That isn't exactly fair, nor does it really paint a good picture on how one would be able to find glitches.

Yes there are a lot of glitches that are the results of bad programming. However bad programming isn't exactly the only reason for their existence. There is a method of easily avoiding bad programming, but it would result in boring games.

If I made a game where all you did was walked right until a certain point at which you win the game, it would be really easy for me to find all the bugs before the game was released. However, that would be boring.

The reason there are glitches in games is due to ambition, creativity, and ingenuity. Because ambition, creativity, and ingenuity exist, developers create more and more complicated games with new mechanics, new physics, and new kinds of interactions. They may look for unique solutions to common problems.

The more complicated the game is or the more unique it is, the more potential for holes to be found in the code and thus glitches.

Look at a lot of the games that were considered revolutionary for their time in terms of game mechanics. Look at games with very unique mechanics, physics, or interactions. They tend to have a bunch of glitches, ESPECIALLY regarding their defining characteristics.

Lets go over a couple different games. I'll go through ones I know relatively well.

Metroid Prime was a first person shooter for the gamecube with an emphasis on exploration and item collection. To accomplish being able to use such a wide array of abilities without the need to go into a menu, they opted out of dual stick aiming. The c-stick was used for switching beams instead. The aiming system used was unique: You move and aim with the same stick, however you can't really do both at the same time. You hold r to stay in place and start to aim. You then lock onto targets with the l-button and are able to strafe around them.

There are a ton of glitches with these mechanics alone. Pressing l to lock on or pressing r to aim (or both) both have interesting effects on your speed. You can exploit this to jump further and faster than you're supposed to. By letting go of the l-button while doing what is effectively a dodge, your speed does not decrease as quickly and so you get sent flying at a high speed. A large part of these glitches is also due to the lack of a sideways speedcap.

Metroid Prime 2: Echoes is the direct sequel to the original metroid prime. A lot of the glitches found in metroid prime ended up being fixed in echoes. However, the game is very broken in it's own right. There are a number of unique scenarios in echoes that led to new glitches being found. Some of them were also able to be used in prime 1. For example the bomb space jump is a glitch that lets you jump in midair out of a bomb jump by taking advantage of an instant unmorph. Instant unmorphs are caused by the camera getting stuck behind an object when trying to unmorph. This is more common in echoes than in prime 1 so it was only natural that it was found in echoes first Others took advantage of unique mechanics to echoes, like the screw attack. The screw attack has a hitbox the size of the morph ball, but you get forced into standing when the screw attack is finished. This allows the player to go out of bounds by entering tiny holes in ways they weren't supposed to.

Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga is a game very near and dear to my heart. Despite being primarily an RPG, it features a significant amount of platforming, exploration, and puzzle solving. In the overworld you control both mario and luigi simultaneously unless separated under certain circumstances. When moving around, one brother leads and the other follows behind. You can switch who is in front with the start button. Each bro is able to perform various actions called action commands are shown in the upper right. The a button causes the action of the bro in the front to be performed, and the b button controls the one in the back. You can switch between actions on either bro by either using shoulder buttons or through performing context sensitive actions such as talking if somebody is front of you, reading a sign, and jumping on top of a barrel. Some actions commands are dependent on which bro is in the back like spin jump and high jump. The unique thing is that none of them are really independent of each other, each action command is basically in a list. There are methods of confusing the game as to what action command you should have and allowing you to switch to action commands that you aren't supposed to. This allows you to use certain action commands out of their intended context and break the game further, such as teleporting through walls through a glitched luigi hat, or by clipping through them with a barrel.

The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures is the second multiplayer zelda that was released. The first game, Four Swords could only be played multiplayer. FSA was primarily designed with all four players in mind, but took an interesting solution to allow for less than that to play the game. In single player game lets you control all four links, and lets you switch between them when needed. You are also able to call the other links to the one you are currently controlling and most interestingly of all, arrange your links in various formations and control them all at once. This can be used to hit a set of switches simultaneously, perform combat more efficiently, etc. These formations are also busted as hell. You can perform many glitches that take advantage of formations ranging from hovering over pits to effectively passing through walls.

I think I've talked about enough examples.

Glitches may not always be a sign of bad design, but of creative design. Of ambitious design. Of individuality. Of doing something different. It would be incredibly boring if every game was the same, so I forgive occasional failings of catching unintended behavior of code.

In my eyes, the fact that glitches exist is to be celebrated.

EDIT: A clarification: The fact that glitches aren't fixed is obviously due to time and budget. However, you always have to release at some point. The point of this is that it's no coincidence that glitches are found in certain areas versus others and why they are likely to pop up where they do.

EDIT2: read this whole reply chain I had with nmaster as well adds a bit more https://twitter.com/Nmaster64/status/671478385881817088

EDIT3: Would like to add another clarification,  I do think glitches are mistakes and are indicative that they didn't do something right, but I don't see the fact that mistakes are made as being inherently bad.