Games to look forward to!

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
Nintendo is remaking Zelda: Link's Awakening for Switch. Due out later this year:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/_U-_XfDGgDw

I was excited when I was hoping the animated opening was reflective of the style they were going for in game rather than Mii Plaza. =)

Aazealh said:
It pales next to Link's Awakening, but the sequel to Hollow Knight looks neat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFAknD_9U7c

Well, looks like quite a bit more of the same, and I'm not a big fan of promoting a supporting character to main protagonist in a sequel. I needed at least a HINT of something expanding on the fate of The Knight. :guts:
 

I know that I know :)

My post our worse
Griffith said:
I was excited when I was hoping the animated opening was reflective of the style they were going for in-game rather than Mii Plaza. =)

Oh yeah, Mii Plaza that was a thing :puck:

by the way, be careful what you wish for because I would personally be horrified if the game reflected an animated look considering Zelda's previous attempts at an animated looking game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN8-Pdz-ns8
:magni:

so ill stick with the Mii Plaza look for now :shrug:
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
I like the look of Link's Awakening. This Mii Plaza joke has me remembering when Wind Waker came out and people thought it was too cartoony/for kids. This looks like a whole world made out of miniatures. I think that's a pretty cool idea, for everything to look very solid and hand-crafted.

zelda-awakening1.gif


Check out how the lighting shows off the texture on each tile.
 

I know that I know :)

My post our worse
Walter said:
I like the look of Link's Awakening. This Mii Plaza joke has me remembering when Wind Waker came out and people thought it was too cartoony/for kids. This looks like a whole world made out of miniatures. I think that's a pretty cool idea, for everything to look very solid and hand-crafted.

I'll give it a shot just like how I gave wind waker a shot. And jokes aside I do find the whole almost plastic toy-like design of the game interesting and definitely innovative. But hey I'm fine with anything as long as it's not this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNpLXo55yfw
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
I like the look of Link's Awakening. This Mii Plaza joke has me remembering when Wind Waker came out and people thought it was too cartoony/for kids.

Or when Minish Cap came out! :carcus: Anyway, the ultimate quality of the game and that style notwithstanding; it was! They turned off half the fanbase. :ganishka: There's lots of reasons OoT and Twilight Princess after it sold a gazillion copies, but part of it is the appeal of the art design, which was also fantastic if not as unique and iconic. I thought they did a fine job threading the needle with Skyward Sword and perfected it with BoTW. Hell, do something more with cel-shading, that's what was great about WW anyway. Make Link and his environment and enemies appear exactly as they did in the Link's Awakening instruction manual! How cool would that be (I've basically been waiting years for this =)?

Walter said:
This looks like a whole world made out of miniatures. I think that's a pretty cool idea, for everything to look very solid and hand-crafted.

Check out how the lighting shows off the texture on each tile.

That's cool, it can be done well of course, but however they dress up some of the graphical details I'm just not a fan of the overall design, and my cynical ass also can't help but interpret it as a cheap gimmick, basically. Like, this indicates to me it clearly isn't their best effort, and while that's fine for a remake, I would have preferred a different direction with the opportunity to do something with it you might not in a main game, especially since it theoretically won't be too big as a ported portable (sure doesn't look like they're going the RE2 route, anyway).

Username has been taken said:
And jokes aside I do find the whole almost plastic toy-like design of the game interesting and definitely innovative.

What about Yoshi's Story and LittleBigPlanet to name a couple? Also, explicitly mentioning the toy aspect I can't help but think, "GET THE TOY LINK AMIIBO TOY TO GO WITH YOUR CARTOON LINK AMIIBO TOY AND MORE SERIOUS CARTOON LINK AMIIBO TOY!" I'm clearly wrong about this being bad for business as far as the fanbase is concerned now. We all made our choices long ago. I'm mostly peeved that now I have to buy a Switch for a game that I think looks cheap. =)
 

I know that I know :)

My post our worse
Griffith said:
What about Yoshi's Story and LittleBigPlanet to name a couple?
Well, you got me there :ganishka: well let me rephrase that it's innovative for a Zelda game as we hadn't really had a Zelda game look like this as of now. wow, this response is a bit late isn't.

More news on Cyberpunk 2077 apparently they say they are going to to be present at e3 2019 to be expected, but what I'm wondering is are we going to get a release date.
here's a vid on it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqQ6vO3jtW4
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
New trailer for Cyberpunk 2077 just came out. Release date is slated for April 16, 2020. MIGHT have story spoilers for anyone concerned about that sort of thing.

Nah, you should just include the follow up with the man himself:

I'd much rather be playing as Keanu Reeves' character, though. Just do it and put him on the box.
 
Eh, if we were to play as Keanu Reaves, I'd prefer he be a rockerboy who has a vision to make the world a better place through the awe-inspiring message in his music: "Be excellent to one another!"

EDIT: Heh, looks like I'm not too far off the mark; he's playing Johnny Silverhand.
 
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Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew

Looks like we won't have to wait forever for the FF7 remake after all, but is it going to recapture that magic from adolescence now that the game itself is old enough to join SOLDIER and buy a drink? I think I empathize more now with the oppressed homeowners crowded into Midgar than the heroes. Get lost eco-terrorists, you're blowing up my hood and somehow lowering my already depressed property values even further! President Shinra, as the evil businessman and de facto head of the World, has aged well as a plot point, but I hope Rufus doesn't going forward. =)
 
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I am stoked as hell for Cyberpunk. But it's so hard for me to commit to those massive games. I'll probably do it anyways though sigh.

But as for Final Fantasy VII, I was genuinely impressed with what I seen. I watched the announcement live and I felt like a giddy little girl at what I seen. I wasn't expecting much honestly, but I feel like it seriously exceeded my expectations.

What I am wary of, is what they plan to do episodically. The fact they don't know how many 'games' it's going to be and such. It makes me feel like the finale of the series is going to be on PS9 and I'll be playing it in hospice if I'm lucky enough.

Either way, I've been wanting this since the PS2 was a thing and here we are. So excited!
 
I am stoked as hell for Cyberpunk. But it's so hard for me to commit to those massive games. I'll probably do it anyways though sigh.

But as for Final Fantasy VII, I was genuinely impressed with what I seen. I watched the announcement live and I felt like a giddy little girl at what I seen. I wasn't expecting much honestly, but I feel like it seriously exceeded my expectations.

What I am wary of, is what they plan to do episodically. The fact they don't know how many 'games' it's going to be and such. It makes me feel like the finale of the series is going to be on PS9 and I'll be playing it in hospice if I'm lucky enough.

Either way, I've been wanting this since the PS2 was a thing and here we are. So excited!
That's pretty much why my hype for it died down down quickly. At best, it honestly doesn't sound like Square-Enix has a proper roadmap for this project yet, and at worst, they're planning to effectively turn FF7 into a series that they can squeeze to the very last drop. And as cool as the game looked, particularly the fight against the Scorpion Sentinel, I fear this is going to be another flashy but ultimately shallow and tedious combat system, which has been the case for all these systems that have tried to combine real-time action with turn-based mechanics (and the case for every Final Fantasy game released in the past decade).
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
That's pretty much why my hype for it died down down quickly. At best, it honestly doesn't sound like Square-Enix has a proper roadmap for this project yet, and at worst, they're planning to effectively turn FF7 into a series that they can squeeze to the very last drop.

*buckle up for a rant*

Yeah, it screams of surrender or stalling disguised as a feature, "Its SO BIG we couldn't fit it in ONE game! ...or come close to finishing it." Like they're gonna turn FF7 into Game of Thrones or something, including probably not finishing the last books or petering out the final episodes after biting off more than they can chew. It honestly reminds me of some insanely over-ambitious fan project you know is DOA when you hear it, "We're going to recreate the entire Fallout series with photorealistic graphics... using Mario Maker and a DAT recorder!" Anyway, this still looks like an out of control mess they're now trying to spin into some multi-part series; that, or they're so concerned they can't meet expectations of quality (they know as well as us everything branded "FF7" since FF7 has sucked) so they're quadrupling down on quantity to overcompensate. Again, the best case would have been RE2 where Capcom seemed to finally draw the line, finished what worked, polished it up and put a bow on it for release. This is more like Square is trying to turn into the swerve or something and it sounds insane. What's it even going to cost, for them and consumers? Is each part going to be a full game? What if sales drop halfway through? Part of me kind of hopes they throw so much into this vortex it ruins them. :zodd:

Yeah, I'll buy it though. =)
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
So I didn't pay any attention to Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order because I assumed it was just another watered-down EA ripoff of the Jedi Knight games, like the new Battlefronts, but then I come to find it's made by a more respectable developer and looks like a cross between Dark Souls and Tomb Raider (Uncharted), which are like my favorite and low-key favorite game series of the last decade.


So, could this be something like Star Souls, or is it just going to be a different sort of cookie-cutter AAA experience; repetitive button-mashing combat, skill trees, upgrades, etc etc; call it Star of War or Jedi's Creed, amirite. I certainly hope for and would be interested in the former, but the latter is more typically what you see out there.

Anyway, I'm officially monitoring it now, but it's still solidly behind Death Stranding on the coming soon looking-forward-to scale, which, while it might not be any good, probably won't be typical.

Looking forward to:
1. Elden Ring
2. Death Stranding
3. Doom Eternal

Keeping an eye on:
4. Jedi Fallen Order
5. Hollow Knight: Silksong
6. Cyberpunk 2077
7. Nioh 2
8. System Shock
9. The Last of Us Part II (if I play Part I =)

???:
FF7 Remake
 
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Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Yeah, it's been rumored for a while (and speculated) that Valve could/would announce a new HL game that would be VR-only. And all along, I told myself I wouldn't be won over by this shit. But you know, that was a helluva trailer. Ever since, I've been doing budget projections for the next 6 months to ensure I can afford at least an Oculus Quest + Link once it lands in March. :daiba:

People on the fence about VR have needed a meaty incentive to take the plunge for a while, and this appears to be it.

It's funny for me, because each major HL iteration has involved a major technology hurdle in some way for me. For HL1 in 1998, my PC could barely run it, but I played through the whole thing anyway, even though through some sections it was 1-5 fps. For HL2 in 2004, I was in college at an apartment without internet, so I lugged my PC to a friend's house for the launch of the game on Steam (required online purchase). And now, for HL: Alyx in 2020, I'll be spending ~$500 to get a rig to play it.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Why don't they just make Half-Life 3? :troll:

I'll play devil's prosecutor: I'm skeptical of franchise "VR only" releases, precisely because it's not billed as Half-Life 3 but a literal in-between game; so, are they really all in, or is this a lower stakes experiment, lower investment and possibly a "lesser" game, etc (the $500 gaiden is worse than the $40 demo =)? If this was HL3 and it was VR exclusive, or more realistically simultaneously released ala RE7 but with more emphasis on the VR ("the VR version is the REAL version we ported to non-VR for financial reasons"), that'd obviously be a huge deal. But, I'm not a big Half-Life fan, so only you can give me that perspective; it obviously sounds like you've been won over despite your initial resistance to the idea, so it must addressing something you've been looking for.

Also, and I don't know if he harbors similar feelings, he would certainly know better, but when Aaz is lukewarm on a VR announcement I'm really dubious. =)
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Why don't they just make Half-Life 3? :troll:

I feel like this is Half-Life 3, for all intents and purposes. Gabe Newell has said time after time that they wanted each iteration of HL to be a leap forward, and VR is a leap forward. Even without the magic 3 in the title, any gameplay / tech ideas Valve has been dreaming up over the past 10 years since HL2:ep2 is probably going to make it into this game. The only thing missing is of course the continuation of that story, which is indeed a black eye as far as I'm concerned. There's also the distant possibility this won't just be a prequel, but will also extend into the future beyond HL2. But at that point, they probably would just call it HL3 for marketing purposes.

precisely because it's not billed as Half-Life 3 but a literal in-between game; so, are they really all in, or is this a lower stakes experiment, lower investment and possibly a "lesser" game, etc (the $500 gaiden is worse than the $40 demo =)?

VNN indicated this would be a ~15h campaign, (and they called this announcement a month back). Anyway, as I've said before, I've been waiting for a great excuse to jump into VR. I've had a Quest in my cart off and on again since it was announced. This is just the push I needed to finally bite the bullet. So I don't think of it as $400 just for HL.

when Aaz is lukewarm on a VR announcement I'm really dubious. =)

Nah -- if Aaz didn't care or was against it, he'd never have raised it for discussion :void:
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
It's funny for me, because each major HL iteration has involved a major technology hurdle in some way for me. For HL1 in 1998, my PC could barely run it, but I played through the whole thing anyway, even though through some sections it was 1-5 fps.

Hahaha same. Maybe not as bad as 1-5 fps but man did my PC struggle with HL1. For HL2 I actually resisted Steam for a long time so I think I only ended up playing it when the Orange Box came out, and by that time I could get decent performance out of it.

I'll play devil's prosecutor: I'm skeptical of franchise "VR only" releases, precisely because it's not billed as Half-Life 3 but a literal in-between game; so, are they really all in, or is this a lower stakes experiment, lower investment and possibly a "lesser" game, etc (the $500 gaiden is worse than the $40 demo =)? If this was HL3 and it was VR exclusive, or more realistically simultaneously released ala RE7 but with more emphasis on the VR ("the VR version is the REAL version we ported to non-VR for financial reasons"), that'd obviously be a huge deal.

There's a couple different things at play. The first is that a good VR game can't just be a port that works both on flat screens and in VR (as a VR game, RE7 isn't very good). That's because the beauty of it is in the interactions. You have to physically grab a magazine and insert it in your gun, you can quickly open a door, throw a grenade in and then close it again, you hold onto a ledge with one hand while shooting at enemies with the other, etc. While the immersive view is obviously a great part of the experience, the real deal is the hand-tracked controls. It's a bit hard to describe, honestly, but if you check what we saw in the HL:A trailer, those interactions are impossible to replicate with keyboard and mouse; it would have to all be automated, and then what would be the point?

To give another example, I'm currently playing a game called Stormland (by Insomniac Games) on the Rift. To look at my map, I just raise my left hand and check it like a watch. I wanna expand it? I press a little tab with my right index. Need to check objectives? Turn my wrist around, there they are. I've got holsters all over my body where I can stash or grab weapons and grenades quickly. You grab grenades, then activate them, then throw them, all manually. To steady a rifle, you grab it with two hands. To switch special attacks, you have to rip out your left arm (you play as a robot) and place it on the work bench. You can climb all over the terrain, again manually. And then you can glide from the higher points by stretching out your arms in front of you, like Superman.

These are random examples, but they're what makes VR special in an FPS. No more pressing R to reload, E to interact, F for flashlight, G for grenade, C for crouch. The upcoming Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond (from Respawn) is also like that. It's a WW2 shooter, but you've got to line up the M1 Garand to one of your eyes and close the other to nail some nazis from afar. You have to pump the shotgun between each shot, you physically duck or lean in, etc. Now about Half-Life: Alyx specifically, the thing is that it started as a VR experiment before developing into a full game. They're not outright saying it, but until now no one there had the balls to even attempt HL3 anymore. And even if they did, it would have gottten shot down because of internal politics or something. Like Walter said, VR is enough of a step forward technologically that it allows them to do something special. And they've said HL:A is as big of a game as HL2 and meant to be a full entry in the series, and possibly something that will lead to HL3. As Gabe Newell put it: "VR has energized us".

Also, and I don't know if he harbors similar feelings, he would certainly know better, but when Aaz is lukewarm on a VR announcement I'm really dubious. =)

Oh I'm just acting blasé for no reason, I'm actually excited for it. :guts:

Well, there is a reason I guess: I know few people care for VR, and I don't think any single game will change that. However I do believe we've reached a point where the tech is pretty damn good and the games are as well. And it's only going to get better. It won't ever replace traditional video games, but as far as I'm concerned it's a great new frontier for them.
 
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