Instruction Manuals

I still like instruction manuals, if only for the "feelie" novelty of the better ones. Zeus, for example, explained the game's mechanics and commands entirely through a written narrative not unlike an actual Greek mythological tale in feel. GTA and Manhunt remained astonishingly in character on every page. Of course, everybody knows that We <3 Katamari's manual is just plain awesome.

I still get nostalgic for the old manual-based copy protection of the past. Not the "page 6, line 21, second word" kind, but the ones that really made sense in the context of the game. Sierra had a lot of those. StarTropics even had the whole dipping the paper in water thing, although it doesn't exactly involve the manual itself. I simply feel like games lost a certain degree of immersiveness when manuals became an afterthought.

How ya doing, buddy?