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Maztorre
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
Location: Ireland
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 Posted: Sun Nov 02, 2008 12:17 pm |
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| another god wrote: |
| Sonic done right? |
Yep. The actual mechanics of movement and the simulation of character momentum feel right. What I'm hoping for is that the level design can match the range of movement of the character. My only major doubts about the level design come from a worry that they'll start jerking off about the story and keep stopping the character instead of just Making Good Levels.
Anyway, the video reel at the end of the demo generally gives me hope that they know what they're doing, especially regarding the use of colour for theming the stages. |
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Maztorre
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
Location: Ireland
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| Posted: Mon Nov 17, 2008 8:09 pm |
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| Quote: |
As I was playing, I mentioned to my wife, "can you imagine what this game would be like if they gave you a limited number of lives?"
"Yeah, you would have given up a long time ago," was her response, and I think that's an indicator that there's something keeping the game from being all it could be. |
Breaking news: Home videogame plays better without arbitrary life counter.
It's an indicator that the developers know what they're doing, especially given how the game will save a checkpoint after every few obstacles you clear. After I beat the game once none of the stages have been difficult to clear, instead I've just been speedrunning all the singleplayer stages looking for the hidden routes, and replaying the game on hard. The main issues with the singleplayer stages are the spikes in difficulty that further playtesting could have ironed out for first-time players, and a handful of occasions indoors where they could have telegraphed where to go a bit better (though I quite like the panic that sets in while looking for an exit during Flight). Once you start digging into the time trial mode, especially racing the ghost replays, the genius of the level design starts to shine through.
Calling this game deeply flawed at any similar level to Assassin's Creed is wrongheaded; judging by the time trial mode and subsequent playthroughs of the singleplayer stages, the developers have followed through on their vision almost exactly. The game is somewhat uncompromising until you get a grip on each stage, but the whole point of having a relatively short story mode and lots of short time trial stages is to encourage players to quickly memorise what to do and then start exploiting the stages for shortcuts.
Some niggles:
Too many SWAT cops too soon, and too many cops in general. There are plenty of times where they use the police presence really well (run away from alleys with bullets and flashing lights coming out of them), but the combat engine just doesn't allow for taking out 3 or more enemies to be particularly fun. The riot police/SWAT are so much work to kill in unarmed combat that if you fuck up a disarm you may as well reload the checkpoint. Would have liked the last big police fight to have a bit more weight to it, but by that point I had killed so many by defaulting to guns it just felt a bit anticlimactic. Making a hole and escaping should have been more viable all-round throughout the last few stages, and doing a runthrough where you don't get shot at all should have been feasible.
There are a lot of moments shown in the animated cutscenes that would have been a lot more powerful in first-person, in the game engine. Thought they were on to something good in Flight when you get into the offices, but they fail to capitalise on that in later scenes. Should have been kind of elementary to maintain the first-person perspective after spending so much effort on the physicality of the avatar.
Guys I haven't heard anyone say how gorgeous the shade of green used in this game is. It's sexy as hell.
Last edited by Maztorre on Mon Nov 17, 2008 8:30 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Maztorre
Joined: 04 Dec 2006
Location: Ireland
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| Posted: Mon Nov 17, 2008 8:48 pm |
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| bloody heartland wrote: |
Maz how Sonicy is this
I think games like this and modern!sonic should abandon combat altogether in lieu of enviromental hazards |
It's pretty crazily like Sonic 1 in many places.
I think ME's combat mechanics are fine, they're just stretched to breaking point on 3 or 4 occasions. Whenever you have the momentum/time to deal with an enemy effectively it's exhilarating, especially since the commands are all common sense-based and intuitive in the same way as Mario 64s. Whenever it becomes stressful to handle a group of enemies you start to wonder if there's even any fast way to beat them. This pretty closely relates to some of my peeves with Sonic 2 (enemies designed to very harshly fuck you over) compared to Sonic 1 (enemies that almost always have a method to beat/avoid them that will maintain your momentum). Abandoning the combat isn't really an answer considering there are plenty of times where the combat is thrilling and adds tension, and more importantly, plays really well. Not to mention that it handles melee combat brilliantly in first-person, which is a nice achivement. |
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