Thursday, December 09, 2004
It's been a while
Though we'll be a lot more timely on such things after having attended E3 2005, I've finally gotten to play a couple demos of games I've been looking forward to coming out in the next 3-4 months. Namely Conker: Live and Reloaded, Resident Evil 4, and The Punisher.
Conker is probably the best-looking console game of the generation, and considering this generation isn't looking like it's going to last much longer, it might end up as the graphical crown jewel. I'm speaking in terms of sheer technical wizardry of course, the art direction and design is a lot more subjective. There's just so much crazy blood-on-lens-splatter, particle effects, er...fur-shaders (*bites knuckle*), focus changes and dynamic lighting that you can't help but be engulfed completely by the visuals. The audio is up there too, with piercing Teddy Bear screams and thundering gunfire around every corner. It's shockingly immersive considering it doesn't look real, per se, at all, and the sight of scalpel-throwing psycho doctor Tediz ends up being as frightening as it sounds. Anyhow, the game looks amazing, just take my word for it. As for the gameplay, it did make me significantly less excited to lay hands on the finished product. It was an experience, for sure, but it still controls like an N64 game (slow and sloppy). In the glorious time of games like Ratchet and Clank that provide you with such perfect basic movement and shooting controls (not to mention a ton of other maneuvers you can pull off if you desire), Conker just feels imprecise and frustrating. Jumping through a couple of lasers was a massive chore, and taking down the bad guys just felt chaotic and impulsive. That, and it's just too....simple, as much as I hate to say it. Simplicity can be elegant, but here it's just kind of boring fighting every fight the same way. The visuals and audio will probably be enough reason to venture through the single-player when it comes out, but I really hope the control scheme gets tweaked heavily for the multiplayer, lest it blow goats.
Resident Evil 4 is really fucking good and really fucking scary. I was a bit worried about it for some reason (probably because it's on the GC, which I worry about a lot these days), but it looks great and plays well. Though a good amount of the tension still comes from wrestling with the controls in intense situations (such as having an axe hurled at you from a running villager/quasi-zombie), it's the first RE game I've actually had fun fighting in since...ever. The aiming isn't so hot on the GC's twitchy analog stick, but it works ten times better than any incarnation before it. Shooting weapons out of evil's hands is sweet, as is close-quarters brain disassembling. There's not really too much to say about the game if you've watched any trailers for it; yes, it really does look that good, yes, the quasi-zombies do yell to each other in some creepy devil-tongue (some call it "Spanish"), and yes, there is still goofy herb-mixing and inventory management (hit 'y' to bring up my items while 'start' brings up a useless map? not exactly intuitive...). It's a very enjoyable mixture of fun and terror, and I'm really looking forward to playing through the entire game (accompanied by my fellow pussy Tom, of course).
Finally, The Punisher is pure fun. The comic was always badass, and the movie was only bad-bad, not awful-bad, but the main reason I was so looking forward to it is that it's Volition's first game since Red Faction 2, a personal favorite of mine (it's where PA and I disagree the most). The game looks and controls like most any other third-person action game (such as, say, Max Payne), but the interrogation parts and general close-quarters options really add a lot. Instead of killing a bad guy right away, you can grab him and either A) use him as a human shield, B) 'quick kill' him by putting your gun to the back of his head and executing him (different animations for every gun, always with a satisfying pop), C) interrogate him by punching him in the stomach/balls or smashing his head on the ground, or D) drag him to a specific torture point (such as a piranha habitat in the zoo) and get information the easy (and usually bloody) way. The A.I. is as simple as it comes (hit, shoot, repeat) and the presentation is far from outstanding, but when I can blow the legs off of a dead body I'll at least be renting your game, thank you).
Odd how all three of those games are intensely violent, eh? Seems like more of a coincidence than anything for me to muse about, but the blood and guts actually add a lot to each game. I'm just glad that the industry's maturity has kind of leveled off a bit, and that violence is being used more wisely in games and not so excessively. But what do I know.
Conker is probably the best-looking console game of the generation, and considering this generation isn't looking like it's going to last much longer, it might end up as the graphical crown jewel. I'm speaking in terms of sheer technical wizardry of course, the art direction and design is a lot more subjective. There's just so much crazy blood-on-lens-splatter, particle effects, er...fur-shaders (*bites knuckle*), focus changes and dynamic lighting that you can't help but be engulfed completely by the visuals. The audio is up there too, with piercing Teddy Bear screams and thundering gunfire around every corner. It's shockingly immersive considering it doesn't look real, per se, at all, and the sight of scalpel-throwing psycho doctor Tediz ends up being as frightening as it sounds. Anyhow, the game looks amazing, just take my word for it. As for the gameplay, it did make me significantly less excited to lay hands on the finished product. It was an experience, for sure, but it still controls like an N64 game (slow and sloppy). In the glorious time of games like Ratchet and Clank that provide you with such perfect basic movement and shooting controls (not to mention a ton of other maneuvers you can pull off if you desire), Conker just feels imprecise and frustrating. Jumping through a couple of lasers was a massive chore, and taking down the bad guys just felt chaotic and impulsive. That, and it's just too....simple, as much as I hate to say it. Simplicity can be elegant, but here it's just kind of boring fighting every fight the same way. The visuals and audio will probably be enough reason to venture through the single-player when it comes out, but I really hope the control scheme gets tweaked heavily for the multiplayer, lest it blow goats.
Resident Evil 4 is really fucking good and really fucking scary. I was a bit worried about it for some reason (probably because it's on the GC, which I worry about a lot these days), but it looks great and plays well. Though a good amount of the tension still comes from wrestling with the controls in intense situations (such as having an axe hurled at you from a running villager/quasi-zombie), it's the first RE game I've actually had fun fighting in since...ever. The aiming isn't so hot on the GC's twitchy analog stick, but it works ten times better than any incarnation before it. Shooting weapons out of evil's hands is sweet, as is close-quarters brain disassembling. There's not really too much to say about the game if you've watched any trailers for it; yes, it really does look that good, yes, the quasi-zombies do yell to each other in some creepy devil-tongue (some call it "Spanish"), and yes, there is still goofy herb-mixing and inventory management (hit 'y' to bring up my items while 'start' brings up a useless map? not exactly intuitive...). It's a very enjoyable mixture of fun and terror, and I'm really looking forward to playing through the entire game (accompanied by my fellow pussy Tom, of course).
Finally, The Punisher is pure fun. The comic was always badass, and the movie was only bad-bad, not awful-bad, but the main reason I was so looking forward to it is that it's Volition's first game since Red Faction 2, a personal favorite of mine (it's where PA and I disagree the most). The game looks and controls like most any other third-person action game (such as, say, Max Payne), but the interrogation parts and general close-quarters options really add a lot. Instead of killing a bad guy right away, you can grab him and either A) use him as a human shield, B) 'quick kill' him by putting your gun to the back of his head and executing him (different animations for every gun, always with a satisfying pop), C) interrogate him by punching him in the stomach/balls or smashing his head on the ground, or D) drag him to a specific torture point (such as a piranha habitat in the zoo) and get information the easy (and usually bloody) way. The A.I. is as simple as it comes (hit, shoot, repeat) and the presentation is far from outstanding, but when I can blow the legs off of a dead body I'll at least be renting your game, thank you).
Odd how all three of those games are intensely violent, eh? Seems like more of a coincidence than anything for me to muse about, but the blood and guts actually add a lot to each game. I'm just glad that the industry's maturity has kind of leveled off a bit, and that violence is being used more wisely in games and not so excessively. But what do I know.
// posted by Nick @ 1:04 AM 
Subscribe to Posts [Atom]