Ben-DutkaBeyond: Two Souls saw quite the disparity in critical reception.
Some reviews were as low as 4 and 5, while others were 9+. Obviously, it's one of those love/hate things, so we wanted to see which side our community was on. As it turns out, the majority say that Quantic Dream has done it again.
Although we at PSXE were somewhat disappointed that Beyond didn't live up to our lofty expectations (honestly, I wanted another Heavy Rain ), we acknowledged that it had a superb story, fantastic acting, and some really intriguing characters. Not enough was done with either the plot or characters, as they both lacked a certain dimension, and action sequences that use QTE just don't work very well. But other than that, if you're a lover of great interactive drama experiences, it's a no-brainer: You gotta play it. Chances are, you'll love it, as many clearly do.
This week, we want to know what you think about the unfortunate Watch Dogs delay. The anticipated new IP from Ubisoft won't be here until next year, and it was supposed to be a major highlight of the fall lineup. How disappointed are you? …or do you care at all?
Related Game(s): Beyond: Two Souls
Beyond is still a strong storytelling experience but I think not having a larger cast of characters like Heavy Rain and Indigo Prophecy limits the ability to craft your own experience. Just two main characters that are always together narrows the way things can play out. But I am finding that different things happen or don't happen based on my decisions on the second play. I think if Cage had stuck with the interactive controls instead of trying to simplify them for non-gamers everyone would agree it's a high quality game. The dummy controls don't connect you to the world as well, and that's a problem for interactive drama.
Don't care about Watch Dogs. GTA as a member of Anonymous? Meh.
agreed completely
Almost finished with my second playthru of 'Beyond', and even I, having always been a defender of the game, was surprised by some of the choices available that I didn't even notice the first time around. Just fantastic.
I suppose the game could use more scenes with certain characters, but my overall enjoyment kind of overshadowed that. Still, I'm trying to be as objectively critical as possible and finding it difficult to be more than the tiniest bit disappointed.
As for 'Watch Dogs', I was really looking forward to that being my first PlayStation 4 title, but other than that, I don't mind waiting. As long as I get a great game, I'll be patient.
Had to cancel my ps4 pre order for financial reasons. being as 2 titles I pre-ordered were canceled (driveveclub/watchdogs) it kinda made my cancelation hurt a bit less lol.
As for beyond, I think I liked it more than heavy rain though at some points it just seemed to drag on…didnt get this feeing w heavy rain. at times it was intense for me (bullying/coma) as that was unfortunately a big part of my childhood. Oh and the ending…dang, really? throw that question at me? lol overall enjoyed the experience. It'd be an 8 maybe 9 for me
if by masterful you mean one of the biggest disappointments of the generation, then yea certainly masterful!
not only as a successor to beyond, completely ignoring that and treating it as its own experience, as if its QDs first game, its still personifies the problems and frustrations of this industry.
stories have to be so cliche and predictable you would swear they were straight ripped out of a 1970s hollywood film!
the big bad military discovers something new, so of course they have to take everyone down who has access to it because its too dangerous and us humans cannot control it, to then try to control it themselves.
its too dangerous for anyone else to experiment with, but not the americans.
sigh, why arent i surprised?
and of course they want to weaponize it, who cares about bringing people back to life, who cares about understanding whats on the other side, who cares about developing medical uses, we only care about turning it into a weapon.
getting a 70s hollywood vibe yet?
beyond SO DESPERATELY wants to be a movie oh so bad and it really ruins the experience!
hell its even filmed in the stupid pain in the a$$ aspect ratio, so half of the top and bottom of the screen gets cut off.
god that REALLY bugged me!
biggest disappointment with beyond is its set on such a intriguing interesting life mystery, what does happen on the other side?
where do we go once we die?
i really was expecting some big revelation reveal on this is QDs explanation, this is what we think happens.
but all i got was the big bad military found it and now want to rule the world with it.
how insightful!
cage really needs to stop flapping his mouth, writing checks his games will NEVER be able to cash!
stop with this hollywood obsession, and just do what he says he wants to do.
bring us experiences driven by storytelling, driven by emotion, driven by player consequences, and most importantly bring us something that will surprise and interest players.
not the big bad military finds a new technology and of course wants to use it to take over the world!
thats something a f*cking 5 year old would come up with, were in 2013 for f*cks sake i think we can come up with something more original and sophisticated than that!
speaking of the surprise and intrugue players, i was really surprised last night by batman arkham origins.
for once, and this is the first time its happened in years, i was actually sucked into something that was happening and really wanted to find out what happened.
the part where you enter the apartment and have to examine all the evidence and slowly piece together what happened, then once you have all the clues you go back to the apartment and how its brought together in that cut scene was just so brilliantly done!
its nice for once to actually be interested in whats happening in front of me, and say no im not going to bed i really want to see what happened.
i havent said that in years!
as for watch dogs how couldent you be disappointed?
this is the first time ive seen a game and said wow how creative, how original, why hasent this been done before!?
i cant believe how topical and of its time it is.
it was funny at the EB expo a few weeks ago in a Q&A the lead writer was asked what do you want the player to take away from this, and he simply said to realize that the things in the game are very real and could easily happen today.
and in some form they are, have.
games have been chasing reality since the dawn of time, its scary how close the setting and story of watch dogs really is.
so how could you not be disappointed when the first game thats actually original and unique since this generation started, how could you not be disappointed to hear its launch has been set back 5+ months, especially when that announcements made only a month before launch!
not to mention its a open world game, next gen systems dont have a open world launch game, nor do they have many this intriguing and unique.
AC been there done that, COD been there done that, WD, well, its a shame we have to wait 5+ more months for it.
especially when the wait is more than likely going to be for sales sake.
sigh.
god i hate this f*cking bullsh*t!!!!!!!!!
Have still yet to play beyond even though I've had it since it came out. Too sucked in to Kingdoms of Amalur and GTAV.
I can't really answer the poll this week. I need an option that says something like I'm glad it got delayed because I want it to be the best, most polished game it can be.
yea well it does sound like a love hate thing with this game. as for watch dogs it was gunna be a highlight of my next gen game collection on launch but it'll have to wait i'll have BF4 on PC this week and AC4 and Knack and Killzone:SF for the ps4 at launch but yeah i was really annoyed when i heard the news i'll live like you say i'll have plenty to play between the ps3 and ps4 over the summer so i'll get over it it's probably for the best aye.
happy gaming =)
I was really looking forward to Watchdogs but I cancelled when it got delayed and now I'm set on only buying it for the cheap.
I didn't even vote in the Beyond poll because there was no "don't care one way or the other" choice. I didn't get to to state the opinion that I had no opinion!
I liked Beyond,it's a great game but Heavy rain is[ for me]better : more choice's/ more caracters/more mystery
And Watchdogs: meh,not interested
Last edited by slow and smart on 10/29/2013 10:48:46 AM