Topic: User Impressions/Reviews Thread

@RogerRoger My grand plans for replaying the series have stalled after the first game. So next up is UC2. You’ll probably recall that I was pleasantly surprised how much my UC1 replay maintained my fond memories of it, so if history holds then I’ll enjoy UC2 even more. However, having spent a couple weeks up to my chin in TLoU2, I don’t know if I want to try another ND game for a while. I figure I’ll get to UC2 late May maybe, and UC3 perhaps in June, UC4/LL in July… although I’ve got the proverbial backlog millstone around my neck which might pull me who-knows-where. There’s the wild card of the new PS Plus in June, and I’m terrified of how that might affect my backlog — effectively exploding it wide open if I choose to upgrade. 😅

@LN78 I actually haven't bothered posting them over on NL since I started this thread on here, for whatever reason.

With that said, I've been whining about Banjo-Kazooie non-stop on NL as I've been playing, so the same criticisms are on there, dispersed over dozens of posts, and I've had some productive discussions about it with other people.

@RogerRoger You're right, of course. I've played it, talked about it with others, can articulate my disappointments, have tried approaching it from a few different angles, and that's enough for an educated opinion on a thing.

At the end of the day, though, as a piece of entertainment, it's either engaging or its not. Even if I did consider some mitigating factors (it's old, it tried new things, etc.), that wouldn't change that I didn't enjoy playing it, and that truth has to be reflected in the way I talk about the game.

@RogerRoger Nice write-up! Apple Arcade, huh? I thought the screenshots looked like something from a mobile game when I first skimmed your post. But a lot of surprisingly solid games are previous Apple Arcade exclusives, and, tedious progression structure and lack of content aside, this sounds like it was probably one of them. Given the spy theme of the game, I can understand why you were probably attracted to it.

Sorry to hear the story didn't make much of an impression, either. Honestly, from the sound of it, this game would have benefitted tremendously from going full arcade with it. Ditch the story, bump up the amount of content, and keep it a pure gameplay experience, as that sounds like the sole redeeming factor of this title.

This looks like the sort of thing that'll be $3 in PSN/eshop sales within a year or so. Probably a better grab closer to that price, then!

btw, congrats on that LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga platinum trophy. How long did you end up having to play the game to snag it?

Welcome to the club!

@RogerRoger …And true to form you had the wind take you to a road less traveled with Agent Intercept. 😄
I enjoyed reading your take on this, particularly since it is a mobile-turn-console game and I think we are starting to see these come over more and more; I can’t believe how well Among Us did on console. I’ve always been skeptical of this particular cross-platform porting, and it’s good to know my fears are both substantiated and misplaced at the same time. 😅

I suppose the best thing is just to know what you’re getting into with a game that started out mobile, and temper expectations accordingly. Heck, I’ll admit that Fruit Ninja is one of my guilty pleasures and that I’ve actually paid good money to play the big screen version at the arcades before.

Anyways, a nice balanced review of a game which I would guess hasn’t been played by the vast majority of console gamers.

@RogerRoger The review and the discussion is definitely worthwhile. As you say, the crossover between console and mobile is happening at an increasing pace.

I haven’t really participated in mobile gaming in a couple years. And I should clarify, I guess, and say “phone gaming” because I certainly dabble with my Vita occasionally and still flirt with the idea of the Switch. But I’ve been increasingly dissatisfied with phone gaming, just due to lack of having the full array of joystick and button controls from a pad.

Looking at the Apple Arcade store, there are oodles of games in there, many of which look familiar from consoles. I was just thinking the other day as to whether I’d enjoy playing some old console classics on my phone, especially those I’ve never played like the old Final Fantasy’s, Chrono Trigger, etc. The price barrier will probably get in the way though, as it just feels like I’d rather spend the $15 on something playable on the big screen. I’ve also read that the phone ports of those games are often poorly implemented.

There’s no question that the mobile phone market is enormous, and there’s money to be made. With billions of phones out there, it’s no wonder that Zynga Games is worth over $12 billion, much more than what MS paid for ZeniMax or what Sony paid for Bungie and Insomniac.

Anyways, it’s a separate discussion all together, but I think it’s good to see that these ports can be done with a certain level of quality.

Horizon Forbidden West

-Is this my new favorite PS5 game? Yes
-Do I think Forbidden West is better than Zero Dawn? Yes, in basically every way other than traversal
-What score would you give it? 9/10, which would be the highest score I've given any PS5 game so far if I did reviews. I would have given Zero Dawn an 8/10
-What did you think of the final portion of the game starting with Gemini? I think they nearly nailed everything with the story starting at that Quest....

As for everything that followed, I'd say most of it was good. The scene of Aloy flying in and bombing Regalla's machines was pretty epic. My only really uncertainty is I'm not sure how I feel about the next game being up against a creation that was pulled out of thin air in Nemesis, but I have confidence in Guerrilla to do it well since they've done really good with Horizon's story so far.

My only real problem gameplay wise was traversal. Climbing up and then magically being blocked from climbing up further only because Guerrilla said no was continuously annoying. Basically, certain things in the game you had to do the way they want you to and their way only, with traversal being a part of that. Besides the already mentioned developer blocking, the "Guerrilla Rules" also applied when you would be struggling to find where to go exactly in say the Relic Ruins. You'd see an opening or something that you could easily get through, but because they didn't program you to be able to, you just jump into an invisible wall. Missing a jump because they want you to hit Circle to jump backwards when you could easily just turn the camera and jump normal yourself was also annoying. Basically, my biggest gripe with the game could have been summed up quicker by just calling it "Guerrilla Rules" from the start, but oh well. It's an open world game, and yes there was plenty of freedom, but I'm not sure if they did that try to limit glitches or not.

They improved the game in several key areas, with the facial animations being a huge improvement over Zero Dawn. They also deserve a lot of credit for going out of their way to make every character look and sound different. The amount of voice actors in the credits was astounding. I just hope they make substantial strides with traversal for the 3rd game. Then we could finally have a true 95/100 on Metacritic caliber game to potentially close out the story.

@KilloWertz I appreciate your summarizing thoughts on Forbidden West and congrats for finally finishing it. In fact I would suspect (and I’m only guessing since I haven’t played it yet) that most players didn’t even find the amount of inaccessible places in the open world that you reference, since I imagine you were very thorough in your long playthrough since launch.

Good to know it surpasses HZD for you in nearly every way and so l’ll most definitely enjoy it one day.

@KilloWertz Heh, I don't dare click on those spoiler tags.

The first game was one of my favorites on PS4, so if this is actually a decent improvement on that, it should still be one of the best games of the generation. Although it's disappointing to hear the traversal still disappoints, considering they made a point of highlighting improvements early on in the promotional period. When I saw the glider and grappling hook, I immediately thought they'd put significant work into improving Aloy's ability to tear through the world, but I suppose that didn't end up being the case.

I remember there being a lot of negativity regarding the facial animations when HZD was first revealed, but it seems like that mostly didn't end up being an issue when the full game came out. Although I guess it's good to hear they've improved on that.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

@Th3solution The amount of times I would climb up and then have to find another way up that actually went to the top was likely more than certain spots that literally are inaccessible. Still, like you said, I was pretty thorough, but I also probably got lost a bit more often doing certain things (like the already mentioned Relic Ruins) than the average person too.

You'll enjoy it one day when Aloy is old and gray.

@Ralizah Yeah, my spoiler tags are doozies, both in length and story. Good call not clicking on them.

I'd probably put Zero Dawn only behind Spider-Man for Sony exclusives in the last generation, so that would put it at least hovering around my Top 5.

As for the traversal, it's possible that some people who play it will be able to shrug some annoyances more than me. I'll freely admit I get frustrated with things like that easier than some people do, but I still hope they make more strides for Horizon 3: Return of the J... I mean Horizon 3: Return of the Savior. The Glider actually does help, as if you're high enough, you can glide a good 200 yards or more. So does the grappling hook at times when you are climbing, but that obviously doesn't solve being cut off while climbing at times. While I stand by what I said, it's still possible you'll be more ok with it than me.

If I remember correctly, I think it was the eyes making it really obvious it's a video game more than anything in the first game. There's still a rare occurrence here and there where she'll be looking down and to the right during a conversation for no reason really, but they've patched it I believe to the point where it doesn't happen much. Between that and the fact that even basically all side characters are different, they deserve plenty or praise for their efforts. That had to take a lot of work having dozens of people come in to record dialogue, and you're welcome.

@KilloWertz Good write up and I find myself agreeing with a lot of your points. It's one of the best games I've played this year, if not the best and definitely goes one better than ZD in many aspects. With regards to the traversal I don't think I had as big of an issue with the climbing as others and quite enjoyed it compared to the really restrictive climbing in the first instalment, however I can see that there is still room for improvement.

The glider was a great addition though and I found myself using it at every opportunity, well every opportunity that my wife reminded me it was a thing as I just kept forgetting I had the ability. That was also the case with other aspects of the game as well e.g. the food and a lot of the melee abilities. They seemed like unnecessary distractions to me and I was just happy with the core gameplay but I can see how they could be useful.

Despite those issues it's an outstanding game!

@RogerRoger 😂 Brilliant!

@RogerRoger Hope you are putting this in your portfolio for when you go for that Push Square reviewers position 😀

@RogerRoger Wow, I really am struggling with how to respond to such a wonderfully entertaining peek into your inner monologue, but suffice it to say that I have immediately added The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe straight to the top of my wishlist! I’d have hit the purchase button except I’ve overspent this month already. Cheers for the recommendation… I think? 😄

@RogerRoger lol good work. Did it take a while getting the tone right?

And did they really make dialogue and references platform-specific? Like, there's maybe subtle changes between the PS and Switch versions?

I'm happy this weird little PC classic finally came to consoles.

@mookysam Cheers, mooky. 😁
And Kudos for having a marathon review reading session. No small task there! 😄

Wondering if we’ll get to read one of your reviews soon, btw.

@RogerRoger Well, you dun good. It sounds like you had fun with it, too.

With that said, knowing not to push a joke too hard is also crucial.

@mookysam The unfortunate thing about ranting about games I dislike is that I feel the need to experience them as fully as possible first.

re TWEWY:

What motivated me to play the original was actually that I scored an amazing deal on the sequel last year ($15 for a brand new copy of Neo: TWEWY). I'd heard people say (regarding the first game) that the Switch version's combat was worse, but having experienced the original, I can't imagine how that's possibly true. It's an interesting game, but the actual design of it is a mess. Pretty much the definitive example of style over substance, as far as I'm concerned.

And yeah, good call on playing it muted. I typically only do that with games where I'm grinding areas or content I've already experienced before, so it's preferable to listen to podcasts or whatever.

re Banjo:

Considering I knew what to expect from some of the other games this developer has made (including the one with the poop monster and the sunflower lady that looks like she was ripped straight out of Eiken), this game's very 90s style of humor didn't really bother me. Literally everything else about it did, however.

The xbox version is the one to play, I think. The big improvement it apparently makes is that it doesn't force you to re-collect music notes if you leave a level and come back.

You've become rather disenchanted with a number of these N64 classics in recent years, haven't you? It hurts to admit, but sometimes the past is best re-experienced through the rosy lens of youthful memory.

All I'm learning from my time with this library is that I was probably right not to delve too deeply into it back in the day! Some PS1 games have fared poorly when being revisited (Crash Bandicoot: Warped was shockingly bad compared to how I remembered it), but a lot of the games I've gone back to in recent years have held the majority of their appeal intact over time. Not true with these N64 platformers.

@RogerRoger He liked my review. He really liked my review.... sniffles.... lol

Thanks and same here. I also look forward to figuring out what The Stanley Parable is at some point after your absolutely genius review.

loved reading that @RogerRoger
Thanks

You might wanna rephrase that abbreviation for mookysam there! 😬 😂