This is an option within a menu that allows the user to load the next location where the game would create an auto-save. The objective here is to allow a user to skip essentially any section of the product. This is a secure method to allows anyone to avoid game sections they are not comfortable with, even so this is not the cleanest solution for any given problem it is a straightforward approach to resolving a large number of potential issues in one go.
Feature Description
At a suitable location in the menu (Usually directly in an accessibility menu section) will be a button that reads “Skip to next game section” pressing this button will create a save state from the current game state and load the player to the next expected auto-save location. While this is usually no issue for linear games it can become more complicated for other game structures and the team would need to become more creative when establishing this feature. Mission/Episode based games might allow players to skip entire missions or episodes or better sub-sections of them. Open-world games might disable this button in general but allow it to be used to skip to the end of a combat or puzzle.
Since games frequently feature events that affect future gameplay each forward location that can be loaded in with this feature will need an example game state to use (My personal recommendation is to allow the completion of each section in the expected good method and handing the player all necessary things from the skipped gameplay section, don’t hand the player all the optional pickups like equipment/abilities that are not required to play the game. It’s just confusing if the player gets all of them at once).
Instead of using the normal checkpoints, it might be beneficial to create some specifically for this feature. This might sound like a lot of extra work but it also creates a lot of suitable starting locations for playtesting and press previews to make up for the time invested.
If the product in question features smaller interaction events like quick-time-events/puzzles/combats/etc. it might be a good call to create a specific skip option for one or multiple of these elements that simply allows the player to complete the event successfully.
