Quick Time Event

In video games, a Quick Time Event (QTE) is a method of context-sensitive gameplay in which the player performs actions on the control device shortly after the appearance of an on-screen prompt. It allows for limited control of the game character during cut scenes or cinematic sequences in the game. Performing the prompted action improperly or not at all results in the character's failure at their task and often in an immediate game over.

The term "Quick Time Event" is attributed to Yu Suzuki, director of the game Shenmue which used the QTE feature to a great degree. They allow for the game designer to create sequences of actions that cannot be expressed through the game's standard control scheme, or to constrain the player into taking only one specific action at a critical moment. While some uses of QTE have been considered as favorable additions to gameplay, the general use of QTE has been panned by journalists and players alike, as these events can break the flow of the game and force the player to repeat sections until they master the event.

Read more about Quick Time Event:  Mechanics, History, Use and Critical Reaction

Famous quotes containing the words quick, time and/or event:

    How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!
    Jane Austen (1775–1817)

    What is a novel? I say: an invented story. At the same time a story which, though invented has the power to ring true. True to what? True to life as the reader knows life to be or, it may be, feels life to be. And I mean the adult, the grown-up reader. Such a reader has outgrown fairy tales, and we do not want the fantastic and the impossible. So I say to you that a novel must stand up to the adult tests of reality.
    Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973)

    This event advertises me that there is such a fact as death,—the possibility of a man’s dying. It seems as if no man had ever died in America before; for in order to die you must first have lived.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)