Ben-DutkaAnother busy week and we're only getting started! The holiday season is just about here.
FFXV, MGSV gameplay take center-stage at TGS
Square Enix and Konami showed off plenty of new gameplay for Final Fantasy XV and Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain at this year's Tokyo Game Show.
As for the latter, that footage featuring Quiet was pretty slick. The environments are obviously much larger and more open than ever before, and I like the idea of calling in a partner to assist (provided I don't ever have to babysit). Quiet seems like an awfully competent aide and the gameplay looks diverse and intense. I know I can't hope for a pure stealth game in every sense of the word; mainstream blockbusters have to be more accessible these days, and accessibility means action. That's just fine, so long as I can succeed being as stealthy as I desire.
Diamond Dog seems like a worthy companion as well. Let's just hope they utilize him correctly… As for FFXV, there was a very pretty trailer along with more gameplay footage released later (yes, I saw it). I fail to see how it's a role-playing game but whatever. I'm sure it'll be deeper than your standard hack 'n slash action game but if I have to execute button combos, I'm out. That is not a Final Fantasy adventure nor is it an RPG. Period.
P.S. If the game comes out great, so be it. It just has the wrong name.
Survival/horror fans, your lovin' the news lately, I'm sure
So first, we got that terrifying trailer showcasing the enemies we'll face in Shinji Mikami's The Evil Within . Then there was that Silent Hills concept teaser that was nightmarish from front to back.
I think it's interesting that two hugely anticipated survival/horror games have stolen so many headlines over the past few months. This was a genre that was on life support for the majority of the previous generation, and to see it spring back to life with such horrifying vivacity is encouraging. It means there's always hope for a genre (or sub-genre) that's down but not necessarily out. I also think that, despite the similarity in tone and style, Silent Hills and The Evil Within will be distinctly different experiences. I mean, at this point who needs Resident Evil ? Seriously?
Personal gaming update
I've played enough of Destiny to be satisfied. It's a good game but hardly worthy of the ridiculous hype, and I'll leave it at that. I keep pressing through Diablo III: Ultimate Evil Edition , but it's a little weird…I just finished Act II and I'm already at Lv. 35. Isn't that halfway to the level cap? And there are five Acts, right? This means I'll have a maxed-out character before I even finish one play-through, and there are, what, eight more difficulty levels? I don't get it. So, if you wanted to keep going with this character in harder difficulties, you just have to rely on better equipment, but no more powering up from a level perspective…?
Anyway, I had some fun with Run Like Hell but it's obviously an adapted mobile game. See, those are entertaining for about a half-hour and that's it. I do have Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor sitting here waiting to be reviewed, though, so expect that analysis early this week.
Yes I am Ben. Man, PT's interview with Sir Del toro was very honest, and showed how he and Kojima are so dedicated to what they do. If none of you have seen that interview I say check it out. I don't think I'm allowed to link on here but its on Konami's channel. one of them anyways.
F Final Fantasy, its now officially dead to me. Nope nope nope nope. Nope.
This week was all about Naruto Revolution, which people seem to be angry about the story. Its not Storm 4, its the inbetween. letting the anime finish or something. What's cool is that its one of the only anime games ever to break almost 3m copies sold. Thats really cool. Its a ton of fun, and they completely revamped the gameplay. It is no longer a button masher with visuals, you have to learn everything about your character now. From the recovery after an attack, to how quick they are at countering. Matsumoto is a funny guy too. Bandai's youtube channel has him talking about Naruto storm and he's hilarious.
Metro continues to be played almost endlessly by me it seems. One would thinks almost an entire month would wear out a game for me but nope. I also played some Chaos Theory, NFS Most wanted, and Hoard.
Hoard is fun in that you just fly around looting things and are basically the evil dragon for once. Its a great unwinding game. I did play some Destiny this week but my limited time only allows for like 2-4 hour sessions of gaming a day. I miss being younger sometimes, but I do have equally fun doing what I do as well. Win/win I guess.
Turns out mother nature is a liar, cause its freaking hot again. I need to move back to Washington and enjoy the nice, cool air and spats of rain every other day.
I meant anime game series's. Storm 3 basically hit 3 million copies sold. Just wanted to clarify.
As for the Diablo 3 situation. Yes you will mostly be relying on better gear to get you through the higher difficulty levels. But once you max level your character, you will begin to earn paragon levels which is where you choose specific stats to increase permanently. I have one character that's around paragon level 170 or so. So you'll still be leveling up just won't be learning any new skills.
Ah, thanks, that explains the Paragon thing, too, which has been confusing me. 🙂
MGS5 looks great. I'll get it for sure. I like my stealth games. I do look forward to the next Splinter Cell. The last few levels in Blacklist were awesome and the story really mounted the tension. The game seemed both accessible and hardcore. It was great.
PGU: I'm hooked on Destiny. I love the Winter's Run strike mission on Venus. It's probably my fav. THe boss is fun to fight. I like how he emerges from a locked up vault and Dinklage is like "you sure this was a good idea?" Then from the smoke emerges this sci-fi version of Sauron who taunts and laughs like Shao Kahn. The level is fun to fight within too. Plus the visuals of the whole mission are just beautiful. Some epic scenes. The game really nailed the balance of technical know-how and expert art direction. The nice thing is in knowing the game is more or less the same on Xbox One, visually. So knowing that things only get better from here is a promising one as far PS exclusives go and more mature multiplats. We are still on the first gen of next-gen software after all.
I played that mission 3 times tonight because the strike Playlist likes it as much as you do. If I have to play it one more time I'm probably shelving the game. 😉
I gave AC4 a spin finally. Can't believe I waited this long. It has crazy nostalgia for me because of the shanties. It's very maritime. lol… As a Nova Scotia native, I grew up hearing -MOST- of those songs. No lie! 3 in particular my grandfather used to sing all the time when he was alive.
So yeah… that part alone gives me a very warm feeling. lol Plus it's been fun.
similarly I feel a lot of nostalgia while harpooning Great Whites and Humpbacks from my man boat out in the ocean.
=p
I loved every bit of AC4. Something I couldn't say for the rest of the franchise.
You shouldn't hunt whales, even digital ones.
You and humpbacks. Where's LV?
Last edited by Underdog15 on 9/21/2014 4:39:47 PM
I was busy installing a hot tub this weekend. Be jealous!
You and your hottubs and boat-casinos. Jealous of both!
Last edited by Underdog15 on 9/21/2014 9:05:22 PM
@Temjinn
I live in Ontario now, but I did actually spend the first 21 years of my life living on the Canadian maritime east coast. Spent every summer swimming in the Atlantic and sailing. I grew up listening to a lot of live and recorded folk music. My grandparents grew up and lived out their lives there, too, and some of the shanties in the game truly are songs they used to sing. I already knew a few of the ones in AC4 off by heart, actually.
Last edited by Underdog15 on 9/23/2014 10:11:38 AM
cool. i grew up listening to 80's pop rock =p
lol what a little cutie
Last edited by Underdog15 on 9/24/2014 7:44:28 AM
Well,Silent hill will be released in 2016?I pre ordered The evil within,but i want more than 1 survival horror game if possible.
i'm glad for Res.evil remake remastered[pfff] in 2015, imo for now one of the best survival horrorgame's and finally on ps[yes it's old,but it's welcome],maybe res.evil rev.2 will be a better one then 4 and 5.I also want silent hill,but that's 2016.Oh and until dawn[maybe also 2015] looks also great,finally some great [survival] horror games
Last edited by slow and smart on 9/21/2014 1:43:40 AM
i meant 5 and 6[not 4 and 5]
Last edited by slow and smart on 9/21/2014 2:01:08 AM
They definitely made it so you could hit lvl 70 a lot quicker in Diablo 3 UEE. It's kind of nice once you're able to take on Torment modes (my girlfriend and I almost hit lvl 70 in Paragon levels). It takes a little getting used to, but I like the pacing far better than the first version of Diablo 3.
I'm still cruising through Destiny – just hit lvl 27. I have a hard time telling whether I keep playing thanks to my OCD need to complete things, some need to prove that it's worthwhile to avoid buyer's remorse, or if I actually like it. Hopefully, I'll hit level 28 next week, and make the last few raid item pushes for level 30. Then? Pretty much depends on how much more free content they decide to include.
I'm not much into horror games like Silent Hill. I played FEAR and of course the RE games but there's something about them that are not quite fun for me.
PGU: I'm still playing Destiny. At this point I'm level 22 and I think the whole thing after 20 is a sham. I'm only still playing at this point to get gear that will aid me in the raid and to keep up with future dlc.
I was hoping for great things after level 20 considering that's what everyone was clamoring about, and when I'd ask what to expect I never got an answer. Now I know why, you get the chance to play the same missions you have played, already at a higher level. Which further proves the game is un-inspiring. Yet here I am continuing to play it despite my frustration. I'm having fun with friends but the redundancy is starting to wear on me.
Enjoying the hell out of Swery65's Dark Dreams Don't Die. A breath of fresh air after being busy in Destiny's uninteresting world. I stand by the claim that this game is a deception. It's a social game that limits interaction, a loot game that barely drops loot, a purported "Star Wars/ LotR" magnitude story that forgot to include the likeable heroes and villians or an inkling of personality in any of the dialogue, or aworld that offers you an opportunity for Destiny but refuses to let you leave a single mark on it even in the form of the slightest destructible environment. Anyway, I'm done with it for a pretty long while. Mordor, Isolation, Hyrule, Bayo 2, Evil, Sunset, Horizon 2, Ori, Unity, Advanced, and Inquisition are dropping in fast. I cant waste my time on this overhyped turd.
Last edited by n/a on 9/21/2014 8:40:23 AM
I'd agree it's all a big deception. Especially the size which we were lead to believe was huge. I can't get over the fact that even though each mission you run through the same places you had in previous missions to get just a little further. If this game is so big, why do they have to do that?
well i'll be looking forward to the shadow of modor review cos i'm keen for that game
as for everything else FFXV maybe maybe not i'm not sure if i'll ever get behind FF unless my friends do and they want me to, as for MGSV i might be more interested in that tbh. idk if the evil in is my cup of tea or silent hill but i thin its one things i'd have to do those games with friends
as for destiny as i've said a few times this week itss there on my list just not sure when i'll get around to it and i'm also yet to play diablo and i told my friend i would on PC or playstation at some point so i can give it a go so thats there too.
as for games that can only keep ur attention for 30mins thats not really my cup of tea i like to game for longer periods of time than that.
happy gaming
MGSV looks like The Witcher with guns.
I'm glad horror is making a comeback, it makes sense with the state of humanity right now and the fact that genres have to die out and come back on a kind of circadian rhythm. I hope we see the return of some more goodies like the JRPG.
I beat Murdered: Soul Suspect. Loved that game; the environments, the story, the characters, the collections.
I'm playing Destiny when my heart can take it, and finding that I'm either a bit of a bigger badass than I thought at FPS or the game is made for beginners. (not counting the crucible of course). Which is good news cuz these old hands are slow and a-tremblin.
Yes my Captain America binge has brought me to play Cap's Super Soldier on PS3. Yes it's fun.
Fairy Fencer F is so much fun I wish I had more time for it. And I just bought Modnation Racers and Motorstorm Apocalypse on that flash sale!
No time.
The Witcher with guns…
I… see it now.
Man you are on a roll! More people need to see how The Witcher is the king of European/Western RPGs, so great.
I'm always on some kinda roll man!
The Witcher 2 is my favourite western RPG hands down. Definitely in my top 10 games of all time, I'm hoping 3 delivers what the devs are claiming, if it does then open world games wont have an excuse for delivering a sub par story anymore 😀
I really liked the gameplay trailer for FFXV. Yes, it was fast and action-based, but it definitely reminded me more of a slightly sped-up Demon's Souls than a proper action game, like DMC, or GoW. I don't see why you're saying that it's not an RPG. If I'm not mistaken Amalur had combo attacks, and it was an RPG. FFXV is bound to have levelling, gradual unlocking of attacks and abilities, customisation of character in terms of armour and weaponry… That's what makes it an RPG, right? And I've seen it said on here plenty of times that every FF has a different battle system. And, if I'm not mistaken, FFXII had a real-time battle system, so it's not as though the elements of FFXV are unseen in the series before. Of course, I'm playing Devil's advocate here, as I've not played many of the FF games, and I'm making some assumptions about the gameplay of FFXV, but I don't see why it shouldn't be called Final Fantasy just because it's different from what's come before.
Personal Update:
I've not been around much, as you all have undoubtedly noticed. I've been busy with life, and uni, and stuff, but I wanted to let you folks know that I'm still alive.
My gaming hours count this year has been utterly woeful, but I've just started playing FFX HD this week. I'm not loving it, but maybe that's just because it's not what I'm really in the mood to play. It just feels that little bit too sluggish in both battles and exploration. And I wish that S-E had made the environments seamless and made the camera more user friendly for the upgrade. It gets kind of annoying to take five steps and then face yet another loading screen… Small complaints though; it's a solid game that I'm looking forward to getting into more, as I've only played about three hours so far.
Anyway, peace all!
Sometimes you can't beat real life. Then when real life beats you, it's back to games 🙂
I agree, FF15 shouldn't be beat on because of its combat system. They are allowed to change the combat if they want, and in my opinion it was never the turn based combat that made me feel like it was a final fantasy game.
It was all the other stuff, the explorations, the towns, side quests, leveling up, equipement, hidden bosses etc.
I like how the combat looks, it honestly just looks like a refined Kingdom Hearts, which is fine by me.
xenris: No. If I have to execute combos to produce a desired effect, and if everything is based on my dexterity and reaction time and not my strategy and micromanagement, then it's not an RPG. It's an action game or at best, an action/RPG.
I'm not saying FFXV won't have other RPG elements. I'm saying the core gameplay won't feel anything like an RPG as it might put the emphasis on everything action-oriented, which in turn downplays the role-playing aspects. Every last second of the footage I've seen thus far screams action game, not RPG. It looks nothing like trailers we see for Dragon Age, The Witcher, etc., and it's not just because it's Japanese.
Give it a flashier, slightly faster-paced mechanic and it doesn't look that much different than Metal Gear Rising. That's not an RPG.
@ Ben, have you not played The Witcher 2 yet? It is agreed upon by most gamers to be one of the best RPGs last gen, and its combat is very much not turn based, not like Dragon age 1 or 2 but more like a slow methodical action game. Not quite as slow as Demons souls but not quite as fast as a full blown action game like DMC. You still have to micromanage it just happens at a more speedy pace.
Further more what would you classify the Tales games as? They have very fast combat, that is very action and combo based. What about Star Ocean 3 and 4? Those are easily considered JRPGs but they have pretty twitchy combat systems. The main difference is that they have separate screens for battles.
I think it comes down to what qualifies as an RPG, because what defines an RPG is hard to really say now a days. Skyrims definitely and RPG, but it plays and looks very actiony, same with The Witcher 2, both are very much RPGs and yes you could put Action in front of them but they are still recognized by almost everyone as RPGs.
wait-da-minute
Xenris weren't you saying Mass Effect 2 shouldn't have been considered an RPG, but instead a shooter during GotY awards a few back back while Ben was defending that it should be classified as an RPG, like the majority of the net considered it.
fast forward to today and it seems you're both in reverse rolls 😉
EDIT: my thought is this. An action game can exist without RPG elements while an RPG can exist without action elements. Therefore, the purest expression of an RPG is one that doesn't have any action. And the purest expression of an action game is one that doesn't have any RPG elements. Contra rules!
I'd say in this day and age there's almost nothing pure and everything is mixed. Where some games reward stats over actions and other games reward action over stats. In my mind a game like Final Fantasy XIII simply doesn't allow you to get very far on actions alone. Stats are integral. Therefore it's more RPG than action, thus an RPG-Action game (RPG comes before action =p )
Last edited by Temjin001 on 9/22/2014 1:45:38 PM
take DMC for example. That game may have RPG-like elements in stat building but they're not requisite to finish the game. There's plenty of hardcores out there who can finish games like GoW, DMC, and NG wihtout ever upgrading their character. That's impossible in a game billed as an action-rpg, which I'm sure FF15 is like.
(yes, Temjin. we get it)
Last edited by Temjin001 on 9/22/2014 1:52:23 PM
I was talking about Mass Effect 2 because some sites were giving it RPG awards and other sites were classifying it as an action game, it didn't have a defined category. It was just a confusing time, and I believed a step back in terms of RPG mechanics compared to ME1, and definitely had more of an RPG lite system like CoDs multiplayer.
Mass effect 2 was a game that you could beat without using the very shallow skill tree 😛 people did it a lot 😛
See Dark souls is considered an RPG but lots of hardcore nuts do level 1 playthroughs….so I get your thoughts on the subject but there are lots of weird exceptions to the rule. Also back in the PS2 days there were level 1 challenges for Final Fantasy 10 well it was a no sphere grid challenge.
So while I don't always agree with the internets opinion on genres in the case of the Witcher 2 and Skyrim I would say they fall into what I consider an RPG, and thats a game with classes or systems similar to the original DnD rule set. Games that rely on dice roles and less hard numbers. Action rpgs still have leveling, you can buy items, but there are usually a lot of dice rolls being thrown behind the scenes, and dmg values are random. Also leveling up and character building is way less linear than say GoW, which you have some choice but its usually less extensive then something like an RPG.
Im glad you brought up ME2 because Ben gave it an RPG award, or was it ME3, either way, if he considers that game an RPG, with its stripped down loot system, leveling system etc, then how can he not call FF15 an RPG 😛
Also NIER is hugely action based combat, so what does he consider that game?
Despite all of that I usually judge a game an RPG after I play it, some games just have the RPG feel even if they have action based combat and other games that are supposed to be RPGs come off feeling like action games.
don't the guys who beat Demon's Souls real quick exploit bugs in the game in order to do it? like forcing themselves through walls through glitches?
can they beat the game on level one by progressing through the game the way it was designed to be? as in fighting through each level and monster and boss as it were intended. That sort of thing can be done in GoW. Their skill and dexterity is so refined they don't need any enhancements.
Last edited by Temjin001 on 9/23/2014 1:23:37 AM
Yeah, that's crazy. I always need to boost level. Need the wiggle room for error. lol
Yeah temjin, straight up level 1 through the whole game its crazy.
The new final Fantasy game seems like it's a sandbox game to me. I'm probably wrong. Hell, I hope that I am! What's the difference? I won't pick it up anyway…
PS – no GT7 news makes me sad. Yet another show without even a hint from PD. Getting worried that this is going to turn into another GT5 situation.
Last edited by DemonNeno on 9/21/2014 8:01:26 PM