PixlBit

I wasn't interested in this game at all till I saw your review Vic. I had the same thoughts about it as you did before you played it, "Decent Gears clone, mindless fun." Now I know that it earns quite a bit more than that simple judgment I had. I'm definitely going to download the demo today, try it out, and see what it feels like for myself. I think the Hollow Children are a nice concept and I like that the narrative involves whether they should be treated as humans or not. The little things you mentioned are what interest me the most. Simple rpg features, speech tree, etc.

Since it's focus is on action and it's a shooter, the weapons are critical. What are the weapons like Vic, what did you think of them? I don't remember you mentioning them much.

I agree Jules, I think much of it is generational. Back when RE came out on PSX I was mostly playing my N64 I think and I was honestly in a whole different world and state of mind. My cousin had a PSX and brought over games like RE1 and Alien Trilogy and thought they were pretty cool back then but I didn't beat either of them. Alien Trilogy has nothing to do with our conversation, but I wanted to give a shout out to it because I played it as a kid lol. When I played RE briefly back in those days I can't remember hating the controls. I was truly frieghtened by the giant spiders walking around and the zombie dogs. I never got into the series the way other people did back then or wanted to keep playing though. Now after all these years when I got the remake and tried to get through I'm having a really hard time. I eventually got a PSX of my own but I never played RE. I really loved Syphon Filter, Medieval, and lots of other stuff. It's really difficult to try and distinguish the PSX and PS2 days for me. My old PS2 was my favorite console I ever owned and I loved the collection of games I had, but it's hard to draw the line between those experiences and the PSX.

The RE I have is not unplayable, it's just not fun for me. I have these games and I'm never giving them away, so eventually I'm going to bookmark an online guide and use it to help me in some ways because I don't want to be beat by the games. The parts I have explored and the stuff I've seen has been really cool, the fixed camera angles just aren't for me. I wouldn't say I'm navigating with ease, but I also wouldn't say I'm playing something broken I guess.

When it comes to MGS I've never had the same feeling of triumph. I've been an anomaly. I've been stuck in the same parts of the game ever since I was a kid, to the point of it being comical. I played it on PSX back in the day and it made a little more sense back then. This Twin Snakes remake is ridiculous and it has a FPS mode that is about as useless as can be. The guns don't put people down, the aim is terrible, and the original never had me aiming and shooting at people. The FPS features really threw me a curveball and I can't imagine why they thought it would be a great idea. The guns aren't powerful, the aim sucks, and there's no advantage to be gained from aiming and shooting at people. In fact I always find myself at a disadvantage when I choose to pull my gun out. I've been sneaking around the game as much as possible.

I have the Gamecube remake of Resident Evil as well as MGS Twin Snakes. I really wanted both of them, but once I got them and put a couple hours into each, I just couldn't keep going. I've taken really long breaks from both of those and I'm not exicted to go back and keep plugging at them at the moment. I missed the boat on these games and on this gameplay. RE4 was the first game in the series I played, and once I went there I can't go back. The RE remake looks really nice, the music is awesome, and I honestly want to keep exploring the mansion and running from zombies, but it's truly not fun. It's not fun at all, it sucks a bag of dicks. I don't feel like I'm surviving or in horror either, I just feel like I'm in an interesting environment but stuck dealing with crap controls and crap gameplay and we are in an age where we don't have to deal with that regularly anymore.

MGS Twin Snakes isn't mechanically terrible like RE is, but Twin Snakes is just really hard for me to make sense of. I'm a huge stealth guy, but this game doesn't do it for me. I'm literally stuck wandering around this compound and I can't figure out what to do, it makes no sense. There's no objective, no narrative I can make sense of, no visual clues. When I ring up my buddies on the radio Snake has, they don't tell me anything meaningful. I've snuck through the same ducts a dozen times, scoured every hallway and room for items, looked for doors, snuck around undetected, used my fancy box to hide in, and I'm just stuck in this friggin hangar with nothing to do. I'm very patient but even I have limits so after an hour or two I just get fed up, let people notice me, they shoot me to death, and I rage quit. I use to have MGS on PSX back in the day and I was stuck in this same fucking spot back then when I was a kid! I'm quite proficient with the stealth mechanics and I've really been trying to make progress, I just think Twin Snakes sucks at being a game.

If I even want to attempt to make it through RE and MGS Twin Snakes I'm going to need some online guides to hold my hand, becuase I can't do this crap on my own it's just no fun. I don't feel challenged at all, I just feel frustrated and handicapped by ridiculous controls and gameplay design. There's nothing I've had to do in RE or in Twin Snakes that required any skill. Well when I got in a fight with Revolver Ocelot I just jogged around a square room and shot at him till he died.The game has some really sophisticated mechanics and it uses the controller and environment to the max, but it never lets you learn any of these things or exploit them, it just expects you to know everything and puts you in a "meh" sandbox. Anytime I want to put the game in I have to go online or pick up the manual to try and figure out what all the buttons do and what things Snake can do. So far I just feel like it's overly elegant, and the levels/encounters are poorly laid out, they don't give you opportunity to capitalize on the mechanics or even learn them. Which is terrible because the mechanics are what I'm most interested in. The story isn't something I think I'm going to get into right now, it's just nonsense. I'm interested in this but I'm certainly not nostalgic for it, and it's certainly not the benchmark for stealth gameplay in any way.

The only reason I even bought Twin Snakes was because I was sad that I was missing out on MGS4 Guns of The Patriots. Back when 4 came out I wanted to play it so bad, I still do, but since I don't have a PS3 I wanted to get some kind of MGS game to let me do something in that universe. I really wish I had a PS3 and Guns of the Patriots.

I'm looking forward to the review! I missed out on the demo sadly. I also really want to know what the game offers in the way of single player or offline modes. I know that the games are designed with an online focus, but I've heard there's some offline stuff as well. I'm more interested in offline play.

The name Sine Mora transports me back to the good old days of Morrorwind and the way everything is named in the game. Balmora, Tel Branora, Tel Mora, I could go on lol.

I really want this game when it comes out. There are some aspects I think I will get tired of quickly. For example the picture theyve been painting is that the island is just simply inhabited by psychos and d-bags. I hope I don't end up getting the same feeling I did during GTA4 where i just got tired of all the d-bag characters and quit caring about the story. Dr. Earnhardt seems fairly interesting, I just don't like the crazy guy with the mohawk that says fuck all the time and likes to kill people. I'm still really interested in the game though because even if the characters aren't very interesting I'll just love to play the mechanics and combat. It's crazy you can pick up psychadelic flora, consume it, and have it affect the level design and experience. I thought this would just be a straight up shooter, but things like the mushroom trips could present really abstract gameplay sequences.

I don't know anything about the books or the show, but this game looks interesting. I clicked on this and checked it out simply because it says combat mechanics guide for the game and I like hearing designers explain their systems. I like how the different classes have stances that will affect their strategy. A landed knight carries a sword and shield so he is a warrior but has a focus on defensive stance and will be able to fight longer battles. In contrast the magnar carries two weapons, has a frenzy stance, and his strategy will be to overwhelm his enemy with pure offense. This seems like as generic and standard as an rpg can get, but it does seem like it would be really fun. Plenty of stats. Critical chance %, energy recovered per second, damage deflect %? Sounds like a fun time to me.

Anytime Patrick. Zelda fans have to stick together! Just kidding lol. No but seriously, we do.

I agree with you in so many ways, it's just that when I start going onto these kinds of thought processes that deal with gaming, culture, war, etc, I have to flesh the entire thing out. Real life isn't as simple as black and white, good and evil, corrupt and pure, or right and wrong. I don't want people to say stupid things like "Exhibit A is evil!" and I don't want opposition to just say "You're stupid, nothings wrong!". I don't necessarily want to take sides, I just want to explore and organize all the opinions I have and be completely transparent. I play the games and love them, and I see them in a different light than most people seem to. I expect a different experience out of them, and that's what I get. I can understand your view though, explain why it makes sense to me, and defend it like I'd defend my own. I did the same thing with Jesse a while ago when he did his "Games Aren't Art and I'm Okay With That" feature. I disagree with him, and explained why, but I also found ways to defend his point of view and get his back because there wasn't any right and wrong between us, just differences.

This sounds and looks really cool Travis. Based on what I'm hearing I think I'd want to give this a shot. Do you know if it has a demo on XBL?

I gave Armored Core 4 a shot and played the XBL demo a few years back and I didn't like it. The mechs didn't have enough weight and punch to them. It just felt like I was some fairy prancing and gliding around the levels and everything was way too quick. It never felt mechanical, heavy, powerful, or badass. I've always wanted a mech game that's slower, has more weight and crunch to the mechs, more powerful weapons, and doesn't rely on speed. Hopefully it could have some stealth in addition to the tactics. I've always wanted a good mech game. I use to play a bunch of different MechWarrior games back in the day and I even had some cool mech game on PC when I was little, don't remember the name, but it was cool.

Thank you Nick, I think it's a much needed improvement and I appreciate it a lot. I've used the search field a few times before and it wasn't very positive at all. The results were poor and the search inquiry had to be incredibly specific to even hope of bringing up the result you were looking for. You basically had to know what you were looking for, how to spell it, and not screw anything up.

Since I read this I've been doing various searches and trying to put it through its paces, and it's come out with flying colors so far Nick. I'm trying to throw it curveballs and search in vauge inquiries like "ff primer" and it will bring up exactly what I want to see "Final Fantasy 13-2 Primer". I could search for "harvest" and it'll bring up Kathrine's Tour De 64 Body Harvest 64 feature from 2010, which is what I had in mind. Based on results, I have no reason to believe it can't handle whatever I throw at it. Like any system it'll have flaws and somebody will find it someday, but I think it's amazing from what I've seen.