Skip Dialogue in Games and Save Time
Want to know how to skip dialogue in games? We’ve all been there. After years of gaming, we’ve all had enough of long, drawn-out cutscenes and tiresome conversations. Some of us may even skip entire games if we’ve heard the dialogue enough times.
For those of you that play games for the story, sitting through hours of dialogue can be a necessary evil. But for those of us who prefer the gameplay, we need to find a way to skip dialogue in games. Our preference for playing the game rather than listening to someone talk is completely understandable, so we want to know: how do we skip dialogue in games?
How to Skip Dialogue
We’re going to assume that you have played a game with excessive dialogue before, so we’re going to skip to the best ways to skip dialogue.
The first time we ever skipped dialogue in a game, we were playing Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. We’d just finished the main quest, and the game was trying to drag us into some side quests. We were more interested in exploring than listening to the same NPC explain their problems, so we discovered we could skip dialogue. And it worked – we skipped all of the dialogue and started exploring. But as we did, we missed important details about the characters and the world.
Eventually, we learned that if we listened to the dialogue once, we could save it so we didn’t have to listen to it again. So we started a new character and listened to all of the dialogue. We didn’t skip it this time, but we discovered that playing without subtitles was more immersive. We could focus on what was being said and who was saying it.
It’s been nearly 20 years since The Elder Scrolls IV, and yet there are still games with excessive dialogue that we wish we could skip. We’ve even written guides on how to skip cutscenes in the Zelda games and Final Fantasy XVI. So whether you’re an RPG veteran or just a casual player, here are some ways to skip dialogue in games.
Skip Dialogue in Zelda
When the Zelda games offer an option to skip dialogue, it’s usually because they have long and unnecessary dialogue scenes that you’d rather not sit through. The dialogue itself is usually well-written, but the scenes are so long because the game wants to show off the impressive graphics.
If Zelda could learn from Gears of War, there would be a system where you hold a button to view events. Sure, it’s not as good as skipping the dialogue entirely, but at least you can get through the game without sitting through pointless cutscenes.
Skip Dialogue in Final Fantasy XVI
Final Fantasy XVI has a lot of side quest dialogue that can feel exhausting. There are generic NPCs who need help with stupid tasks that aren’t worth your time. We’ve also played the game three times, and each playthrough was more tedious than the last.
One user mentions their experience with a tedious sequence in a game, involving multiple fast travels and conversations. They mention that they can usually skip the dialogue in games, but this was a sequence that they found so boring that they didn’t want to risk skipping anything.
Another user shares their experience with a tedious sequence in a game, involving a lot of grinding, fast travelling, and conversations. They mention that, despite skipping a lot of dialogue in games, they still couldn’t skip this part of the game because it was so boring.
Skip Dialogue in Final Fantasy XV
Some users defend what they consider to be the best dialogue in the Final Fantasy XVI trilogy. They discuss the quality of the dialogue in the game, comparing it to The Witcher 3. One user defends Witcher 3, saying it was done better and kept them engaged. Another user shares their experience of becoming impatient with games as they play more. They mention the exception of the Mass Effect trilogy, which they can replay every year.
Skip Dialogue in Yakuza
Some users mention skipping dialogue in games like Yakuza. They mention that Yakuza games have long cutscenes and conversations before allowing exploration. They also mention skipping dialogue in games like Yakuza to focus on gameplay. One user uninstalled Yakuza at first but later reinstalled it and suffered through the dialogue.
Skip Dialogue in Games
The first user expresses a preference for playing the game rather than listening to dialogue. They discuss how excessive dialogue in Final Fantasy XVI and how it has improved their reading speed. They criticize the lack of effort put into side quests in Final Fantasy XVI.
What is your approach to skipping dialogue? Do you skip dialogue in games or do you find it necessary?
