This is the new games thread

[nathansmart]

I'm not going to say that I don't skip the cutscenes in the RPGs that I play (and end up never finishing) but I say that when they are done well and they are engaging, there's no reason why they can't enhance the gameplay. Metal Gear Solid had that one 90 minute cutscene (or whatever) and I remember thinking I was going to hate it so I just kept looking for it. Eventually, about 30 minutes in I finally realized that the cutscene I was watching was the long one. But, it didn't even hit me because it was an interesting scene.

I guess I'm just trying to say that, yes, cutscenes can make a game boring, but good ones, make it awesome. And Uncharted 2 has awesome ones. And awesome gameplay. And iSos sucks at it.

btw, one of the reasons why I think the X button to climb up mechanic is awesome is because when you're running around with an analog stick anything can happen that you didn't mean to (especially when the camera angles move so much). The X button helps you to choose your climb as opposed to it happening on accident because the camera changed while you were holding left and now you need to hold up (or whatever).

[Berliner]

I've never understood the plots behind Metal Gear Solid or Final Fantasy games. All I remember about the plot of Final Fantasy 7 is some stuff is called Mako and its bad or something.

[Alex Mac]

I think on the cutscene scale, MGS is the major outlier in terms of raw length and amount. Kojima seems to think more like a movie director than game designer as time goes on and as he gets more absorbed into whatever messages he wants to express. But I am not sure it make his games lose vailidity. MGS2, to my understanding, is actually used by some college professors to explain meme theory. Whether or not the cutscenes draw away from the gameplay itself is another issue. However, at least the Metal Gear series makes up for that major flaw in its interesting story (which makes the cutscenes a bit more forgivable in my book) and creative gameplay (particularly when it coms to boss battles).

As for the discussion of linearity versus open world, we've had two amazing example in 2009 with Uncharted 2 and Assassin's Creed 2. Uncharted 2 is my game of 2009 and it was linear as hell but I found it launched the experience forward at the same pace of the summer blockbusters that it pays homage to. Assassin's Creed 2, on the other hand, is a very open world. I would complain that all my exploring broke the pacing of the story for me except that all the exploring never got old. It was one of the reasons the game was so great. The same was true for inFamous or even the Saboteur. The latter in particular is more interesting as a sandbox than as a storytelling experience. I think the bottom line comes to implementation. If a game is trying too hard to to give you complete freedom, you might feel lost. If it tries to hard to make you do something, you might feel like an unwilling participent. If either approach is done right, however...

[nathansmart]

It's pretty insane the amount of stuff they come up with for the MGS series. You can download a database of sorts on the PS3 and they have a timeline reaching back to pre-revolutionary war times.

[ericluxury]

I would agree with Todd Levin about Fallout 3 and I loved Oblivion. It felt like they made a mod of Oblivion, but instead of getting to do fun stuff like join and rule a Theives Guild, I have to do stuff thats way more boring. I got the feeling they did this so that you can more closely follow the story (which you could basically abandon in Oblivion), but I am so far not impressed enough by the story to miss out on many of the things that I like about medieval RPG games, especially when the action isn't done that well.

I find that its really hard to find any rules as why a game works. There are lots of great linear games and there are plenty of great sandbox games (and of course bad versions of both). Same with cutscenes. There are examples of cutscenes that are get you into the story or the feeling of the game and then games like Half Life 2 or Bioshock where the story is better told because of its lack of cutscenes. The main thing I don't like about linear games is I like to think that in playing the game I am making this character better, which is why RPGs with levels are so appealing.

[isoS]

I'm not going to say that I don't skip the cutscenes in the RPGs that I play (and end up never finishing) but I say that when they are done well and they are engaging, there's no reason why they can't enhance the gameplay. Metal Gear Solid had that one 90 minute cutscene (or whatever) and I remember thinking I was going to hate it so I just kept looking for it. Eventually, about 30 minutes in I finally realized that the cutscene I was watching was the long one. But, it didn't even hit me because it was an interesting scene.

I guess I'm just trying to say that, yes, cutscenes can make a game boring, but good ones, make it awesome. And Uncharted 2 has awesome ones. And awesome gameplay. And iSos sucks at it.

yeah, well you suck at capitalizing the correct letter in a screen-name!

btw, one of the reasons why I think the X button to climb up mechanic is awesome is because when you're running around with an analog stick anything can happen that you didn't mean to (especially when the camera angles move so much). The X button helps you to choose your climb as opposed to it happening on accident because the camera changed while you were holding left and now you need to hold up (or whatever).

and that's why camera angle changes suck -- I've hated them since the first Resident Evil (a popular game that I didn't like bc the controls stunk).

I acknowledge that part of the problem is that I jumped right into Uncharted from Batman, and my brain couldn't accept that the controls were different. But Batman doesn't require a button push to climb over a rail, and it was never a problem.

If I were a game designer, I'd probably be trying to do the same thing Uncharted tried to do (and does better than any game i've seen): make a playable movie. And maybe that's why I'm critical of it: I want it to be flawless, and for my taste, it's not quite there yet with controls and intrusive cut scenes. I would love to see them make an Uncharted with no cut scenes -- it would force them to creatively tell the story in game syntax, instead of falling back on film conventions. Cut scenes are a cop-out.

(Keep in mind I've read literally thousands of movie scripts, so maybe I just have less patience for movie-style storytelling in games -- especially since it's usually badly written. I can't be charmed by the evokation of a cliche like "I'm getting too old for this shit" -- as Uncharted presents -- because I've just seen it too many times.) I play games to get away from movie stories and movie structure, so that probably explains my particular aversion.

[nathansmart]

I think Uncharted does do a good job of it though. Sure, there are a bunch of cutscenes but there are also a ton of moments in the game where you're walking around and conversations are being had. I really liked all the talking that happened while you were exploring. That really made me feel like I wasn't playing a game anymore.

[TomHicks]

I realized after reading through the subsequent postings, the reason I liked Fallout 3 vs Half Life 2 was that doing the quests meant I would get new wearable stuff and upgrade my character's stats. I love that part of the game. And I really liked the giant grid in Mass Effect where you could spend points across so many factors. That might be the one thing I miss, but last night I fought my way through the first floor of that under-construction building looking for the Assassin, and the gameplay is so fluid and fun -- I don't remember the gunfights being this great in Mass Effect, and I really loved that game.

I am a Vanguard, and I have been using Jack and Miranda almost exclusively now. There is a point where the enemies bottle neck coming around a corner and through a doorway, and it was Warp and Overload with Miranda, and then Pull and Shockwave with Jack and I. I think I fired two shots against that group.

I also really enjoy grinding in the Final Fantasy games, but in the last one, XII, I forgot what the story was about by the end except in the most general terms. Um, those guys are brothers ... princes, I think, from an invading country. That guy is a disgraced former soldier. Oh, shit! And there's an identical-twin reveal, isn't there?

[jesterobobman]

I liked FF12 in a in a different way to the other games, though I did that that you were just overseeing the battle, especially as you got strong and had gambits set up, which kind of took you out of it a bit, rather than feeling like you were a character. Also, the fact that there is the guild missions and those fights that feel like real accomplishments(Yiazmat etc), and the upgrade system fitted my style.

That said, the Star Ocean version of fighting where you really actively control 1 character is much more fun. If Square could combine that with the more free upgrading of final fantasy(and have a good story) that'd be perfect for me.

[JPSpaulding]

BioShock 2- so far just like BioShock 1 which means it's awesome!!!

back to Rapture

[Jon Eering]

Any folks still playing Diablo 2?

It appears blizzard is patching it after such a long time, really fixing it up.

[James Smann]

BioShock 2 is fucking awesome! JSpaulding: I'm with you, it feels exactly like BioShock 1, but the graphics improvements and the gameplay improvements (being able to use both a fired weapon and a plasmid at the same time) make it awesome. I was so afraid that the rumors of moving away from story would be true, but I fucking LOVE this story so far.

At first I was a little off-put by only having the Big Daddy arsenal, but then I fell in love with the rivet gun, and now I have a whole new respect for them in the first BioShock. Cannot wait to get home and play some more!

[ProfessorShutYoMouth]

I rented Bioshock 2 yesterday and played a few minutes of the multiplayer. I could only find a game in the free-for-all mode off the bat, and I really didn't care for it. I think I am just getting sick of deathmatch-type games in general, so maybe some of those other gametypes are more fun.

Plus, I got my ass kicked hard and always died within seconds of spawning so maybe that's another reason I didn't like it.

I'm looking forward to playing the story mode, though.

[James Smann]

Yeah, multi-player for me in BioShock seems unnecessary really. What made the first game so great was the single player story mode, so adding MP just seemed like 2k's efforts to bring in the Call of Duty crowd...which is fine...but I probably will never play that mode unless I find myself jonesing for every single achievement in the game.

[MrDys]

Online-only achievements are almost as much horseshit as achievements that require you to buy DLC.

[bridgetosolace]

Wait, people actually care about their gamer score?

I mean, I'm a giant nerd, but that's one "Whose got the bigger dick?" contest that I can stay out of.

[James Smann]

There are some games I just really like getting all the achievements for (like Arkham Assylum) because they make what you have to do to get them awesomely fun and challenging. I'm not like that with every game, but some are just fun to try to completely max out on. To put some perspective on it: there are only two games I've done this on since owning my 360.

I don't post my gamerscore on my facebook page or anything...it's just fun.

[isoS]

Late-adopter question of the day: if I didn't play Bioshock, should I go back and do that (I remember everyone here being gaga over it) or should I just play Bioshock 2? Oh, and quick follow-up: IT'S NOT LINEAR, IS IT?!?!?!!

[James Smann]

Ha ha ha. I will not testify to the linear nature of BioShock. For me, I'd play the first one first so you can kind of get used to the idea of plasmids and stuff first. They don't do a WHOLE lot of explaining so far in BioShock 2 as to what that is; sort of assuming you know already. But I'd not say it was 100% essential for you to play them in order...just from the story point of view though, 2 is a true sequel so more perspective on who is who will be gained by playing 1 first.

[TimBuktu]

So I was obsessed with ME2, then had to go on a vacation with my family...

Anyways, I finally tried the Battlefield BC2 demo... Holy fucking farts it's awesome. It looks amazing, and it's super fun to play.

I can't wait for the full version, I'm sure I'll spend an eternity playing it.