I was reading Peter Pears’ recent review of Across the Stars, which includes this:
There’s an optional part of this game, which you can skip altogether – but if you do, you’ll miss out on what makes this game rich and fun.
Personally, when I played the game in question, I did (unintentionally!) skip the “rich and fun” part of the game, without ever knowing it was there. And in the present comp, I’ve already run across several games that made it possible to skip important events; to miss facts about the protagonists that fundamentally shape their stories; to stumble on an easy but monotonous puzzle solution when there exists a subtler and more interesting one; or to find out information in an order that completely destroys the best-path unfolding of the plot.
So here’s the hint: any time your game has a better path and a worse path — where worse means not “the player is losing” but “the player accidentally, and probably without realizing it, has wound up on a path that makes the game less fun or less effective” — it’s time to edit the design.
That might seem to go against the whole principle of significant choice and multilinear design in games. We are seeing a lot more games lately that have multiple endings or significant variations in the way the story plays out. Which is cool. Some of those (including some in this comp) handle that variability with aplomb. Still, that approach only works so long as the player is guaranteed an equally strong experience regardless of how he exercises his freedom.
This is why, in turn, sometimes it’s worth stepping back and asking yourself, well, what is the cool thing about my game? What is key to the story? to the narrative pacing? to the interaction? And how can I make sure that those things are preserved, regardless of the choices the player makes?
Emily Short's Interactive Storytelling 
This happened to me in at least one game in this competition. I read about the neat feature in other reviews and feel dumb for missing it, but at the same time, think, “Why did the author make that part so incidental?”
But what about the ‘hidden treasures’? If all the games are perfectly balanced on all their possible ways, it doesnt matter too much which one you choose. That is bored. Is not great when you find in the forums that a hidden funny part exists?
I feel the variants in the story should be ‘significant’, but a bit of random and hidden surprises it is really welcomed.
Easter eggs are fine, but I do think there’s a problem when it’s possible to completely skip the part of the game that makes it fun.
I understand that this is probably not is happening here, but I do see the possibility that this sort of technique could be applied intentionally and artistically, to point out something about human nature.
Let’s say we miss a major conversation between the protagonist and a character, a conversation which alters the protagonist’s perception of herself, because the other character was originally represented as scary, or utterly boring. The larger point is that if we fear or avoid contact with others, we’re likely to limit ourselves and our experience of the world. The players of this game would be split into two groups: those that found the world limited (because they had avoided interaction with that character) and others who, having experienced that major conversation, found the world engaging.
That said, I agree some writers need to find a better middle ground between putting the player on rails and providing choices varying wildly in their content and quality.
The players of this game would be split into two groups: those that found the world limited (because they had avoided interaction with that character) and others who, having experienced that major conversation, found the world engaging.
But then you have the problem that those who avoided the interaction would never know what the point of the game was really supposed to be (unless they talked to other players afterward, of course). I think in that case you want to make it clear that there is more you could have gotten out of the game had you approached it differently. (“Little Blue Men” and “Varicella” both have ways to end the game early, in what seems like perhaps a win condition, but they both let the player know that there was indeed more to see.)
It seems to me that there’s a place for “worse paths”, as long as you take care to make sure that the player knows going in that they’re embarking on a worse path.
Well, I can tell you the reason we allowed a third of the game to be skipped. It was a competition game. I knew that it would take 5 to 6 hours to finish, and I wanted to shortcut that if the player found the work around. It’s not the best in game design, but I was trying to consider that it was being entered into a two-hour comp. And after playing several games in this year competition, there is a point that you get to where you just want to see the end.
But Peter and myself both felt that it was a bad idea to release the walkthrough, and we think that we should’ve made people use the InvisiClues.
Maybe I should pull it out for the second release.