Really Late Game Reviews: Risen
May 16, 2011 – 3:50 am
Finished Risen the other day, so figured I’d do one of these and maybe save people some potential disappointment.
Game took about 36 hours to finish doing pretty much everything possible in a single playthrough. Considering this was another relatively cheap Steam sale purchase, not a bad deal at that length.
The graphics often seem to be drooled over, but I’m not sure why exactly. The scenery is quite nice. Overall no complaints about the landscapes and backdrops and such (although people have actually made mods to make improvements: http://kamrades.com/en/index.php?m=games), but the people all look really odd. It’s like, the models are really simple and kind of clumsy, big round heads, club feet and such, but then they are covered with these really detailed and trying to be realistic/gritty skins, which creates this weird effect where you have this round-headed hero who kind of looks like the guy on the box art if he doubled his weight and possibly had a birth defect.
Nice scenery in Risen, contrasted by ugly, ugly people
Hi! Look at my huge head!
Hello modelling from the 1990's
The game has great music, although it was wildly inappropriate at times as a lot of the “wandering the countryside” music sounded a whole lot like “OMG SOMETHING BITING YOUR FACE OFF” music at certain points, which ended up with me suddenly jumping at a drum beat and swinging around wildly looking for whatever horror was trying to eat me when there was nothing around for miles. This was made all the worse because some of the enemies really blended in with the scenery well, and you didn’t realize they were there until you stepped on them and they repaid you by gnawing on your spleen.
At around 2m35s in this video you get an idea of the type of sudden change in theme of the music. This is just the general wandering around tralala music.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmlxb0o4hI8#t=2m35s[/youtube]
The music for some specific areas is even worse in terms of the whole messing up the tone thing:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AozHZDEuRhw[/youtube]
Dialogue and script are actually okay overall. The combat is difficult as rumored, until you realize that magic and the crossbow are king and cannot be blocked unlike 99% of your melee attacks and weapons. The physics seem to weird out sometimes where corpses would fly across the map when I shot them with the crossbow or go sliding around so I had to chase a corpse to loot it. Physics also affected the jumping and climbing which was clunky. The game also seemed to be struggling with how realistic it wanted to be with annoying “realistic” stuff like some of the things below or being able to take a bath, and then silly unrealistic stuff like taking a bath fully clothed in your armor and with your sword still on. Also some weird camera angles, where you have cutscenes with someone talking who is not on screen.
A talking chair! Speaking character, nowhere to be seen...
There is also an annoying tendency, which I can only assume is intended to stretch out the playtime or just a horrendous oversight, for the NPCs to be using various crafting and other things at the exact moment you want to use them. Crafting a sword has 4 steps, use the forge, use the anvil, use the water trough, use the sharpening wheel, but the npc blacksmiths will be using whichever of those items when you need it, and you will have to wait. Then when you finally get to use it, and finish, they will be using the next item you want, because for some reason the NPCs take a LOT longer to do the same stuff as you. And for some stupid reason, you can interrupt them, but they don’t stop using it until they are done. There is no option to just talk to them and say “hey, get out of my way, I’m the PC here!”.
So overall the game was a fairly mediocre RPG with some annoying bits to start, then it started to get tiring at the end. I only managed to finish it because I was pretty sure there wasn’t that much left to the game when I started to get bored of it, but they could probably easily chop 10 hours out of it and do no real harm. After awhile, a lot of the stuff started to feel like it was intentionally put in just to make the game drag out and have a longer playthrough time.
On top of that the endgame, final boss fight and ending were all terrible, making what would have been an okay, if not fantastic, gaming experience, into something that left me feeling cheated and regretful.
(More spoilerrific specific complaints below!!!!!)
Display spoilers
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2PaduvpYPA[/youtube]
ALERT! Urgent incoming messages from the corporate alliance!
Really Late Game Review: Darkest of Days
March 8, 2011 – 4:49 am
Okay, so I just finished this game. It’s a game that caught my attention a long time ago but I never got around to getting it for various reasons (price in particular).
But sometime last year I noticed the game had a demo on Steam, so I downloaded it and tried it and although it wasn’t the most polished gaming experience ever, it was fun and had a really interesting concept.
So I decided I’d buy it, but it was $40 on steam which is just too much for me for anything other than a game I just must absolutely have now, of which there are maybe 4 or so a year. Part of the reason these reviews are “late” game reviews, in addition to just plain old lack of time to play the games, let alone write about them, is because I wait for most games to go on sale or hit the bargain bin to buy them.
So knowing Steam as I do, I decided to wait for the game to go on sale. So I waited. Annnddddd waited… And waited. But the damn thing never went on sale.
Then, finally, last year during the holiday sale, it dropped to like 13$ so I grabbed it.
Just finished it and for the most part it is what I was expecting. Not a super polished fps, some clunky bits like invisible walls, mediocre or even slightly below average graphics (for its time even) and some kind of silly plot holes (which I’ll go into below to avoid spoilers yet), but overall not bad… Up until the “ending” that is anyway.
You may be wondering why I have quotes around the word ending there. That would be because it didn’t really have one. It just sort stopped and started rolling the credits part way through. It was honestly so abrupt I thought there must have been some sort of an error that made the credits roll early. But no, just a really horrendous cliffhanger.
I mean the game itself took me about 7 hours start to finish, which isn’t too bad I guess. Well, not for 13$ anyway, if I had actually paid $40, I would have been pissed. But it made the game feel even shorter than it was and just left me feeling really ripped off and disappointed. I mean, one of the main reasons I bought the game in the first place was because I really liked the concept and thought there was potential for a good story, but it ends so suddenly and literally nothing is resolved. None of the main story or plot points is resolved at all. It actually leaves off at the point where you think you might finally start getting some answers. And, the game did poorly so odds are there won’t be a sequel.
So that is my single biggest complaint about the game. So fair warning to those considering it. The game is fun, but my god horrible cliffhanger, so in clear big flashy print, IF YOU WANT A COMPLETE STORY AND/OR HATE CLIFFHANGERS, SKIP THIS GAME.
The gameplay itself and the concept are still fun (running through the civil war with a full automatic assault rifle is probably one of the most fun things I’ve done in a game), but damn the ending left me bitter. I’m so tired of everything I like, Sci-fi in particular (but that’s another rant) ending abruptly with no resolution.
Anyway, on to the nitpicking:
(SPOILERS BELOW!!!!! Mostly mild, but I’ll hide them behind this spoilers tag just in case.)
Display spoilers
Quick and Dirty
The Good
- Interesting concept and story
- Super fun running through historical battles with modern weapons
- Decent dialogue
- Interesting settings you don’t often see in FPS (Civil War, WWI, etc.)
- Instant action mode which lets you replay any level with any weapons you want
The Bad
- Clunky. Not a very refined shooter
- Weird plotholes and unreasonable restrictions
- Short. 6-7 hours at most for the average FPS gamer to complete the storyline missions
- Horrible, horrible cliffhanger that will likely never be resolved because of the game’s poor sales performance
Some Images:
Fair and balanced gameplay
I'm sure the timeline will be fine
ALERT! Incoming Transmission!
P3P – Strike Three, You’re Out!
September 11, 2010 – 6:03 pm
I am throughly under the impression that Atlas has brilliant marketing. Mostly because the alternative would mean that I was incredibly stupid. It took me less than a week to break down and buy the new(old) release of Persona 3 on the PSP. Once the feelings of bitter recrimination and self loathing had subsided, I booted the game up to check it out.
The first thing I noticed was the snazzy new opening, which seems now to be a given in every new rerelease of the game. I was pleased that they included the original opening as well. After actually starting the game, I was faced with a dilemma however. I had a choice between choosing a male and a female main character. The game was kind enough to assure me that picking the female option didn’t mean anything. Feeling reassured of my masculinity, I selected the female character. I had already played through the game as a male character and the goal was to see what was different after all. Upon making my selection, it immediately switched to an interface of hot pink. It also doesn’t help that the the female main character was especially feminine. Normally this wouldn’t be a huge issue, but the protagonists in Persona are supposed to be blank slates that you impress yourself on. So despite the games warnings, it made me feel incredibly gay.
As I played the game, I found myself with a vastly different perspective than I had originally envisioned. Rather than laying my personality over the main character like I did in previous versions, I instead became protective of my female main character. I was a lot more concerned with what friends Violet (my protagonist’s name) was making and in particular who she decided to date. As options became available, I thought about whether or not they were good enough for Violet. It was a sharp departure from my perspective in previous games, which was to date as many available ladies as possible (all for the social links I swear). I was mostly OK when she decided to date Akihiko, since he seems to be a fairly upstanding boy, but was concerned when she was becoming friends with Junpei (I didn’t want my character dating some deadbeat kid).
From a technical standpoint, I was fairly impressed with how well the port was done. To save space, they removed most of the cutscenes and used a series of still shots. In the actual game, the world is rendered as images with sprites rather than 3D models, with the exception of Tartarus (the main dungeon). This helps preserve the feel of the original game while keeping the visuals looking nice. It also gives off a stronger visual novel vibe than the previous versions of the game. This also apparently allowed them to save enough space to add extra vocal lines and new music, rather than remove them, which was a pleasant surprise.
The story also changed a lot more than I was anticipating. Aside from redoing all the references from him to her, they also added whole new dialogue paths and have redone many of the reactions and responses of characters to be more suitable to a female lead. For example, when Junpei’s complains about your character taking the lead, it takes on less of a resentment feel and moves more towards a display of insecurity, hidden behind a veil of light sexism. The mass amount of changes didn’t affect the core of the story, but gave a new, fresh perspective on the game that made playing it a 3rd time enjoyable, rather than tedious.
With the port comes a host of game play improvements as well. The battle system has been revamped to be more in line with the games successor, Persona 4. This includes the ability to control all party members and the guard command. One new limitation that was added is that the protagonist can no longer use any weapon, being restricted to swords swords (males), or certain pole arms (female). As well, the knockdown mechanic has been changed to be less punishing to both your party and the monsters. Some other changes include the removal of the fusion spells which were replaced with fusion cards. I found this to be both mixed advantage/disadvantage. On the one hand, you no longer need to carry persona simply to be able to use the fusion spells, but on the other hand, you are now much more limited in how often you can use them.
Overall, I found the game to be a solid release. Between the new mode and other tweaks, as well as the ability to be able to play an excellent RPG on the move, the game provides enough new content and features to justify purchasing it, especially if you’re a fan of the series.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB4WyHe-HRM[/youtube]
Really Late Game Review: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadows of Chernobyl
August 31, 2010 – 4:12 am
So I bought and played Stalker… err sorry, I mean S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (read that to yourself as “S period T period A period L period K period E period R period” every time it shows up in this post and you might get a small taste of something similar to the annoyance I felt playing the game.) Shadows of Chernobyl during the Steam holidays sale, or rather I should say I bought it during the sale back in December and got around to playing recently.
Short version of this post: Blarg, I want my $2 back.
This game got so much favorable press and fanfare and rave reviews, comparing it to Fallout 3, that I was expecting something I could really get into, but I just don’t get what anyone sees in this game.
So many things just irritated the hell out of me from the onset, some of my major qualms with the game (in no particular order):
1. It looks like ass.
I know it’s a 3 year old game, but it looks like ass for a 3 year old game. Gray colored people fighting other gray colored people and gray colored monsters in a gray world with gray rain. Sure, sure, it came out in 2007, but so did Half Life 2: Episode 2 and the first Mass Effect. I mean, look at a comparison between the two games:
Sure, we’re talking a much smaller company vs. a huge multi-million dollar gaming powerhouse company, but still, even in it’s heyday, I can’t say S.T.A.L.K.E.R. was much to brag about in the way of graphics.
But graphics aren’t everything you say? I agree, many games make up for lackluster or dated graphics with other elements. Which leads me to more complaints.
2. Horrible A.I. & buggy as hell.
You start of the game with like a slingshot and soon run into enemies with fully automatic weapons and body armor. Stealth and smart use of terrain etc. are supposed to be the key here, but whereas with a nice spec a modern (not 2007) PC at full settings I still have trouble picking out Mr. Gray Blob 1 from background of gray blobby trees, gray blobby railroad tracks and gray blobby building, they instantly know exactly where I am at all times and and are just predisposed to disliking me for some reason.
Stealth is a lie in this game. The A.I. always knows where you are, even when they cannot possibly see or hear you and are half a mile away.
Except when it is just completely clueless and can’t tell where anything is like in situations where you can go in by an alternate route and the A.I. will literally stand still and let you shoot them in the back head repeatedly and the dumber than dirt allies.
Add to this the self completing/failing missions (I failed missions I never even picked up!) and a host of other technical problems, and it just doesn’t make the game very much fun to play.
Examples: (Videos found on youtube, not mine nor is the terrible music in most of them my choice)
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snlq1A00lC4[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOBNmBIjt1s[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwFfx71x-JU[/youtube]
3. OMG THE HEAD BOB!”#!”$!%!”
Seriously, wtf. This is not “realistic” and anyone who claims it is should immediately visit a doctor, because the world is not supposed to flop around like this when you walk:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJmgpLvjQ44[/youtube]
4. Story
Apparently there is one. I know, I was surprised too. I played the game for a total of 7 hours, and still mostly had no clue what the hell was going in. It starts off boring and doesn’t tell you anything. The game makes you work at trying to piece together the story. I don’t mean in an in-game/in-world sort of way. I mean if you, the player do not read tons of text and make a serious effort to try and figure out what the hell is going on and what the point of you doing anything is, then the story is vague at best.
It never really seems to grab you and involve you in the story, its more aimless wandering and doing a bunch of more or less random quests because you just don’t have anything better to do.
Add to this that most of the spoken dialog and in-world text is in Russian, which while making for a “realistic” experience as the game is based in Russia, does not make for a very involved experience for me, because I DON’T SPEAK OR READ RUSSIAN GODDAMNIT.
Now, I’m a translator in my real world job. And I can completely sympathize with the fact that 99% of all things are better in their original language, but that doesn’t help when I don’t speak that language, and I’m not about to try and pick up another language so that I can gain a better understanding of a game that I am angry I paid $2 for.
All of that together just makes for a disjointed, vague, difficult to find and comprehend story, and an overall terrible gaming experience. I put 7 hours into the game because so many people told me how wonderful and great and awesome it was, like a better version of Fallout 3. Well, they wrong. All of them. I enjoyed Fallout 3 about 1,000,000 times more and I rage quit in the middle of that game because of a bunch of bugs that made it impossible for me to progress in half the missions.
The only fun or enjoyment I had at all in stalker was when I finally managed to get a gun with a scope and made my way up to the highest point in one of the towns and went water tower on all the anti-social, boring, buggy A.I. brown and gray pricks who lived there before uninstalling the game and falling into a restless sleep dreaming of the $2 and 7 hours I would never see again.
Really Late Game Reviews: Mass Effect 2
August 26, 2010 – 5:32 am
Continuing a long standing tradition of mine of playing games well after they are released, I’ve actually managed to play this one in the year it was released, but considering I started it nearly 6 months after release despite preording the deluxe edition, still a late game review.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCpK2XnIaeI[/youtube]
Summary: Good game, had a lot of fun. Didn’t notice how stupid some of it was till afterward.
I really like the Mass Effect series. Sure the games leave something to be desire in a lot of areas, and there is a lot of talking etc. but overall I love the characters, the acting, the universe and how engrossing and involving the games are.
I loved Mass Effect 1, played it through twice. Ended being surprised by how much I liked some of the characters (2 playthroughs and I still ended up with Tali and Wrex in my party most of the time through both).
Mass Effect 2 carried on the tradition with the return of a few of your old teammates in various ways (Yay Tali, Wrex, not so much Garrus) and the introduction of some great new characters.
I had a ton of fun playing all the recruiting missions and loyalty missions and doing all the side stuff.
Graphics were nice, acting was superb, dialog was great and the combat was a lot more fun and a lot more challenging than the first game.
Also some of the renegade options were hilarious, although the renegade paragon system itself was not my favorite aspect of the game, more on that below.
Overall I’d recommend the game.
I do have a few qualms with it though (as always in no particular order).
1. Armor and inventory (or lack thereof).
I don’t think anyone enjoyed exactly how the inventory system in ME1 worked, but I’d have much rather they improved the inventory system rather than remove it completely. I might be the oddball here, but I really enjoyed all the different armors and stuff from the first game. I ended up keeping less than the best armors for a bunch of the characters (Wrex) just because I thought they looked so much cooler.
For Shepherd it was alright, because you could customize everything and what not, but there wasn’t shit you could do with squadmates until you had their loyalty and that just ended up with usually 1 stupid pallete swap of their current outfit. The fact that they release DLC that costs money to change appearances really kind of pissed me off.
I also hate the fact that you can’t remove your helmet, or change your armor during the game without going to your special armor wearing contraption on the ship. Wearing the helmet constantly during cutscenes and such got annoying so despite wanting bonuses the helmets provided and having 8 billion different types of headwear from deluxe edition content, DLC, promotions etc. I just ended up forgoing any head protection at all so I could enjoy the cutscenes without sounding like Darth Vader.
Also not fond of the weapon assortment. Am I the only one who barely used the heavy weapons? I used grenades in the first one constantly. Heavy weapons I rarely bothered with. I don’t like the progression of weapons either. No selection, no catering to specific playstyles, just individual, specific weapon upgrades as the story progresses, making it so no matter how often you playthrough you always have more or less the same loadouts at the same points in the game.
2. I miss the long elevators.
Yeah, I know people are shaking their heads at that, but I enjoyed the long elevators rides and their spontaneous conversations and stuff from the first game. Also interactions between companions were painfully few and far between, despite the fact that some of those characters should have been interacting A LOT and some truly great missed opportunities for fun dialogue and story (Tali and Legion, crocodile dundeeZaeed and Grunt, etc.).
I disliked the fact that you barely talked to or interacted with your squadmates except for on the ship, and on the ship you had to run all over hell and back and elevators etc. to get to them. The whole “I am done talking for now, come back later” crap got old real quick too. I’d have booted Garrus’ moody emo taurian ass out of the nearest airlock if it was really my ship.
3. Renegade, Paragon, I’m the guy with the gun.
You get bonuses for being either realllllllly good, or realllllly bad. In fact, one could easily argue that doing one or the other is required to finish the game in the best way possible because otherwise you can end up unable to resolve some situations in a satisfying manner.
There really needs to be a more middle of the road option. Some of the people I wanted to slap around (TAKE THAT REPORTER!) and some people I felt bad for or whatever, but the game kind of railroaded me into being one or the other.
4. Weird bugs.
I got the weird clipping bugs, often requiring a reload of an earlier saved game, way too often for my liking. I would walk into a desk or something and the game would propel me onto the desk and up through the ceiling or some other stupid thing. Got annoying after awhile.
Or else armor and weapons clipping into itself/other pieces during cutscenes and such (this was a huge issue for Dragon Age with it’s ginormous armor)
Some examples:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34bD6prBwj0[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZa-Iq4AMFI[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U6sX9hdYow[/youtube]
5. Main storyline (SPOILERS BELOW!!!!! )
Display spoilers
Conclusion:
So overall, great game, lots of fun, enjoyable, but not without its negative aspects and wtf moments, and in all honesty, I can see how people wouldn’t like it. I enjoy it because story is vital to me in a game. It’s often where I get most of my enjoyment from in single player games. Immersion. An engrossing story and world can be the single most definitive factor for me in deciding whether a game is good or bad, so I didn’t mind the hours and hours of cutscenes and talking and dialog options and such, but I can see how some people would not enjoy it as much.
To each his or her own, I enjoyed it, and I’d recommend it. Good acting, good writing (except for a few story points mentioned above) and dialog, amazing cast, fun combat, awesome world setting with a lot of potential.
