Review The Last Game You Beat

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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Mr357 » Wed Nov 18, 2015 5:15 pm

Thief wrote: I prefer a recommend or don't recommend "scoring" method. The numbers are arbitrary anyway.


Right. A lot of people give games 9's or 10's just for being functional and enjoyable, but to me a 10 means perfection and is unobtainable.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Axm » Wed Nov 18, 2015 6:37 pm

Monkei wrote:It doesn't really matter what you think of the metascore system - you can still scroll past that score and have a look at the whole of all reviews taken into account, which will still undermine the point that you're rightfully and luckily pretty alone with your odd 2/5 rating for Tales from the Borderlands.

Ya thats my opinion. Get over it.
I said to you last time around I can see the appeal there for some people, but its just not for me. Comparing what people say or what arbitrary number is assigned on metacritic will never effect my opinion of it.
As a Shenmue fan of all things you should have some tougher skin about it.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Monkei » Thu Nov 19, 2015 3:58 am

The discussion about the scoring system is totally legit, but I think we need these numbers to make reviews more practical. The scores serve as a great first orientation, before diving deeper into what a game is all about.
Recommend/don't recommend is fine, too, but it might feel too vague for a lot of people.

And despite what some of you might think about the numbers (I myself am kind of torn about that), would you say you strongly disagree with the metascores for the last couple of games you beat (if you can be arsed to look them up)? Because I most of the time feel like "yeah, that's about it, seems fair".
Of course there are cases where I can't understand metascore at all, like with Man of Steel. But then again movies are a whole other thing.

Let's pick the 84/100 Halo 5 currently holds, Axm. Would you say that's way off? Inaccurate? Unfair? You praised the multiplayer but called the story campaign hot garbage. For you it might still be a 5/5, because you play it mainly, if not only, for the multiplayer. But if you had to give the game as a whole a score (and obviously you do rate games with scores, despite disliking metacritic), an honest, "objective" score that's meant to help others to decide whether it's for them or not?

Mr357 wrote:
Thief wrote: I prefer a recommend or don't recommend "scoring" method. The numbers are arbitrary anyway.


Right. A lot of people give games 9's or 10's just for being functional and enjoyable, but to me a 10 means perfection and is unobtainable.


Right, that's a huge problem there. If you say a 10 is perfect and it doesn't get any better and it can't be obtained, and thus never give it to a game, then that makes the 9 the new 10, and you have the same problem again - the whole scoring system is fucked if you see it that way. And seeing it that way is totally legit.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Axm » Thu Nov 19, 2015 4:49 am

Never said I had a problem with using numbered scoring, thats indeed why I use it too.

Just have a problem with people trying to make a defense of a biased opinion by using metacritic of all things, which has a jacked up logic in making a universal score out of un-universal scores to prove to themselves someone elses opinion is less valid.

And again regardless of taking others review scores into account, my opinion is my own and 76 reviews positive vs. 92 or whatever number you want to use is and always will be arbitrary until you poll everyone on the planet who's played the game and then using the same scoring method to calculate a real average.

Its just nonsense. Take my game opinions with the grain of salt that it already is.
I only write these reviews for myself anyways cause its fun to analyse what ive just experienced out loud. If someone generally agrees with my opinion on games here then thats just a cool side effect.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Monkei » Thu Nov 19, 2015 10:56 am

Just have a problem with people trying to make a defense of a biased opinion by using metacritic of all things, which has a jacked up logic in making a universal score out of un-universal scores


Monkei wrote:It doesn't really matter what you think of the metascore system - you can still scroll past that score and have a look at the whole of all reviews taken into account, which will still undermine the point that you're rightfully and luckily pretty alone with your odd 2/5 rating for Tales from the Borderlands.


And my opinion is biased because of my avatar? How so? I put that there because the game is great. I don't think the game is great because it matches my avatar. I'm not sure if you fully understand what 'biased' means.

About opinions being less valid: There's a difference between saying "it's not after my taste" and "it's bad, it's a 2/5, it's Telltale's weakest, worse than GoT and BttF". You acted as a critic, so I think that metacritic.com link actually kind of proved your opinion as a critic to be not valid at all, yeah.

PS.: I'm not saying your opinion is wrong because it's different. It's just the fact that your reasoning for the game being weak is, well, weak, to say the least. Unlike the reasoning of most critics who gave very positive scores.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Mark James G » Thu Nov 19, 2015 4:17 pm

The last game that I beat was Turok 2: Seeds of Evil. Easily one of the best FPS's out there.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Axm » Thu Nov 19, 2015 6:55 pm

Monkei wrote:
Just have a problem with people trying to make a defense of a biased opinion by using metacritic of all things, which has a jacked up logic in making a universal score out of un-universal scores


Monkei wrote:It doesn't really matter what you think of the metascore system - you can still scroll past that score and have a look at the whole of all reviews taken into account, which will still undermine the point that you're rightfully and luckily pretty alone with your odd 2/5 rating for Tales from the Borderlands.


And my opinion is biased because of my avatar? How so? I put that there because the game is great. I don't think the game is great because it matches my avatar. I'm not sure if you fully understand what 'biased' means.

Everyone has certain biases. I'm biased for a number of game series out there. If this was Teltales Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic id be on a defensive rampage without having even played it.

You like Borderlands alot based on your avatar and your defense of the game against my opinion which im sorry to say I think is less biased. I actually like the main Borderlands games alot, the art style is cool, gameplay, world, comedy and all that I think is great. I just didnt like what Telltale/Gearbox did with Tales. My fanboy goggles came off with that one.
You dont agree. I get it. Get over it and keep on having your own opinion and ill have mine.
This is getting abit asinine and repetative, so make your next inevitable post about whatever and ill move on.

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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Monkei » Fri Nov 20, 2015 2:16 am

Yeah, no, I get it, too. It was time to move on at least one post ago, so let's just do that now.

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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Henry Spencer » Sat Nov 21, 2015 7:20 am

Project Zero V/Fatal Frame V (Wii U)


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Well, to start with I'd say it's the weakest entry in the series thus far. Why? Well, the mechanics at first, feel really tight but as the game progresses, you tend to find that these new controls, new mechanics are rather broken. It's never been harder to get a Fatal Frame/Zero shot than in this game. The reason being that you have to be patient, so patient that sometimes enemies just...never attack you and you're left waiting for like two to three minutes and get bored waiting and take a shot then the ghost lunges for you. It becomes this tiresome process of "should I wait or not" approach to the gameplay. I preferred it when ghosts just has a predictable attack pattern that made it more obvious when to attack (as in they float/walk/run towards you and as they are right in front of you, attack and you retaliate) but nope they just had to change it to something weaker.

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The story on the other hand is really up and down in terms of quality (they also got a bit carried away with the amount of cutscenes in this game, I preferred the presentation approach of earlier games where they told the story through the gameplay and in the investigation/adventure sections). You get three characters to play as and certain recognisable characters/concepts make a return. You actually learn a lot about one mysterious character who has been in every single game in the series in this game, which was interesting, so was the strife of the ghosts in general, especially the ones who commit suicide or are killed by the two serial killers. Those stories are just freaky. It's just a shame it doesn't translate to the game itself and it is easily the least "scary" entry in the series, but the atmosphere is still as strong as ever. In fact, in some ways it is the most disturbing entry such as the way in which people die and the story being all about suicide, which for personal reasons is not cool with me. But I think Shibata does a good job there, since it made me a bit sad whilst playing it. What he falters on in this game is the actual main storyline, which is very weak compared to previous entries, especially the third game. It all feels...very run of the mill, been there done that. The main shrine maidens story at first seemed interesting but you then realise her actual backstory is really...lame and nowhere near as interesting or memorable as the other "big bads" of the previous entries like Sai and Kusabi from 2 and especially Reika (The Tattooed Lady) and Head of the Kuze (The Floating Hands Woman) from 3. The "big bad" of 5 does have a great design though, but that's the most interesting part of her, her actual battle is also really good.

As far as the ghosts designs, some of them are very much "meh" but there are some good designs, but again, for some reason they throw the same ones at you time and again instead of the more creepy and memorable ones (like the Tall Lady; long limbs and an incredible creepy smile who watches you from a distance, the Falling Woman; who jumps off the cliff and pushes other people off cliffs/high places with the creepy messed up face and the Crushed Man; that awful scream). It was toned down in terms of ghost design, there's no real "hellspawn" ghosts in this one with half of their body missing trying to drag you into hell like in earlier titles. Which is weird to me since it is also easily the most violent/disturbing game from a Nintendo console that I have ever played. There's incest, a guy getting stuff into a tiny box, women getting drowned alive with their limbs going into weird directions, a serial killer gouging women's eyes out, suicide notes, kids justifying suicide and taking part just because their friends are doing it... all sorts of disturbing stuff. I honestly felt a bit depressed playing this game, maybe my negative reaction is because of this, I don't know. It got to a point where I had to play the game in short bursts since it got so grim.

As far as mission design/level design goes they honestly did a great job with around half of them (especially Missions 4, 5, 6, 8, 13 and the final mission) and the other half are just recycled ad infinitum and the fan in me realises they do this in other games, backtracking is a part of it, but here they literally, mission after mission (playing as different characters each time) make you go the exact same route and fight the exact same ghosts over and over. Plus the game takes so long to get into its stride; in 3 they just drop you straight into it and angry ghosts are relentless in their chase of you, here they're just wandering very slowly towards you, like they just don't care.

The whole 1990s VHS aesthetic to show you the ghost's stories is great and so is the camcorder/found footage aesthetic, they did a really good job of capturing that, since those are the most disturbing and quite frankly the only interesting moments of the game's story.

Overall, I enjoyed the game sure, but it's definitely my least favourite in the series. In the next one they really need to change things up more like they did with 3 (and by the looks of it, 4, which was set in modern day more and in different kind of locations like hospitals) since this was very much a "been there, done that" experience with clunky controls and repetitive missions and ghost encounters that just was not scary/creepy enough. At least the writing outside of the main storyline (as in the ghost's back stories) and the atmosphere were both as strong as ever plus the extra content is really good too (stealth gameplay with a certain Dead or Alive character). If you're after a classic survival horror game and happen to own a Wii U, then it's very much worth playing. Even as the weakest game in the series, it is still a good game, even if it disappointed me. And yes, both Yuri and Hisoka are both hot, even I'll admit as such.

I'll be buying Fatal Frame IV next for Christmas, supposedly all you need to make it work with the English fan translation is an SD card with the patch on it, a copy of the game and one app for the Wii and hey presto, away you go. Easy peasy.

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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Kenny » Sun Nov 22, 2015 4:39 am

Arkham Knight (PS4).

I liked it, it was cool. The new gameplay additions made the game more challenging, like making you not as reliant on using the Bat Radar as in previous games and having med guys come in and revive baddies you knocked out. The Batmobile parts can be a pain in the ass sometimes especially in one particular boss battle but it was fine for the most part.

Probably the craziest story out of the three main games but I prefer the one in AC the best. It was more straight forward and always gained momentum, never losing its luster. I think I only had problem with ONE part but it was so superficial, it might as well not even be mentioned. AA had the best setup and idea though, as great as it was to explore Gotham I really prefer the idea of Batman getting trapped in the Asylum while having to deal with all the famous escaped convicts he helped put in there.

As repetitive as AC was, I think that was the best one in terms of gameplay. AK had more variations and variety, but I felt like it broke up the fun too much. Especially the puzzle parts. AC made me an addict because the stealth and combat sections were just too much fun.

Anyway, it was well-worth playing and owning. Don't think i'll get to the extra sections anytime soon but I do wanna try the Batgirl missions.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Eisuke7 » Sun Nov 29, 2015 12:17 am

Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception 6/10
Why so low? See my review video below!

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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Axm » Sun Nov 29, 2015 12:42 am

Eisuke7 wrote:Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception 6/10
Why so low? See my review video below!

phpBB [video]

I liked your review because you were honest about it not being your genre. And although I don't agree with all your opinions, most are valid. I love the Uncharted series but it definitely has its faults.

Was this the first entry into the series for you? That would explain some of your detatchment from the characters and story. Alot of dialogue from the previous games support emotions in 3. But yes, its still a light hearted Hollywood action flick type of story so on the surface its still about one liners and excuses to create problems.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Eisuke7 » Sun Nov 29, 2015 1:00 am

Thanks a lot for your reply! It's really good to have someone actually reacting to it!
But no, I am not new in the series. I have played 1 and 2, but not the PS Vita game.
Every time I play Uncharted I can't stand the lighthearted Hollywood crap, yet somehow I keep coming back :)
I guess it must be the graphics!

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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Kenny » Sun Dec 06, 2015 12:30 am

MGS5: Phantom Pain.

Finally. Through all my bitching and moaning, I finally finished it.

If Metal Gear Rising never existed, this would easily be the worst one in the series in terms of story. There's no real conflict I can make out and the main problems are absolutely fucking stupid even by Kojima standards. A parasite that causes you to die...if you speak a very specific language. That is so stupid, I can't even begin with that. FOXDIE made more sense in a pseudoscientific standpoint, which I thought was brilliant, and this felt like a pathetic retread on that. Except there was no dramatic angle to it.

Skull Face is an AWFUL antagonist. Not only does he have a shitty design and name, he has shitty motives. There's nothing substantial going on with that guy. The whole ending was all dramatic but I felt absolutely NOTHING. NOTHING at all.

And that's because NOTHING happened.

The only other bad guy, the Flaming-Torch-But-Not-Really guy, is really such a throwaway character. I found out he's really Volgin after looking it up. Big whoop. Mantis might as well have NOT been in this at all. And baby Liquid Snake, I mean Eli, came in way too late so there's no development for him in the main story. Quiet was even pretty worthless.

Everything was just really Kaz talking about some bullshit here and there. Ocelot occasionally chimed in, but he did nothing at all really except torture Huey Emmerich. A character that's just a sad replacement of Hal Emmerich to begin with. Considering you know how he ends up in MGS2, they should've just made up a brand new character that had nothing to do with Emmerich at all. Because all those so-called tense moments were extinguished when I realized nothing was gonna happen to him.

And that ending about the languages? What? The nuclear statistics at the end of the other ones made sense since Metal Gear is essentially an anti-nuclear proliferation story, a pretty serious issue. The languages thing seemed more like a "fun fact" kind of tack-on.

Honestly, it seems like the more expansive the gameplay got...the worse the story became. Much worse. Maybe Konami really did Kojima a favor by firing him from his own series instead of making him slave away another Metal Gear. They progressively felt more and more like phone-ins. Like he really stopped giving a shit.


As far as the game itself, it's repetitive but pretty fun after awhile. But sneaking still really sucks. What makes it hard for me is the fact that bad guys can see you from seemingly MILES away pretty easily. The sneaking aspect of MG was always a joke, so I guess this was a way to really make it a true sneaking game. Plus the dialogue always overlapped with Kaz, the dropoff lady talking, the soliders, and basically everyone else under the sun having a million conversations at once. That was pretty awful sound design.

And I get that the whole thing was revolved around building Outer Heaven, but I found it really annoying to be prompted for missions on building the base when all I wanted to do was play the fucking story.

Which was a pile of shit in the end. Oh well.



EDIT:

After typing all this, the credit finished rolling and it turns out it's just Chapter 1 I just finished. WTF. What's the point of the credits? Jesus christ, and the next two missions are just a gigantic pain in my ass. THE FUN JUST DOESN'T STOP.
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Re: Review The Last Game You Beat

Postby Axm » Mon Dec 07, 2015 3:23 am

Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor

Graphics

Not one of the best or worst looking games around..just kinda bland looking. You have 2 open world lands to explore. One is a grey and lifeless pile of rocks and the other is basically the same place with a masking of green over everything to make it appear like it has more life, but it's really just the same shitty world. In the end id rather run around the green place.
The orks faces however are pretty impressive and nasty when up close, so theirs that, but otherwise its just such a boring and throw away environment.

Gameplay

Basically this is Assassins Creed meets Batman. You have terrain and structures to climb around on with all the same kind of issues as Assassins Creed and you have combat similar to Batman when fighting multiple enemies working on timing combo's and kill streaks.
If you like AC and Batman, this game will feel at home for you and you will like it. For me, the combat in those games have always just been decent at best imo, so in the end I got bored with it.

However, the game has a system in which powerful ranked orcs you kill get replaced by new ones. If you die to a high ranked enemy, said killer becomes more powerful and gains in status.
The system is cool and I enjoyed it for the first 10 hours or so. After that I was over it and just wanted to pick up collectables and do side missions in peace without it getting in my way.

Also lots of padding with same-ish side quests and collectable gathering.

Sound/Music

Standard Lord of the Rings affair. Its good, but I'm not a big Lotr fan so no tents were pitched whilst playing.
Did run into some sound bugs though like drop out and repeating.

Story

Ranger guy's family is killed. He's out for revenge. He gets possessed by a Elf that helps him do bullet time and see enemies from far away. They struggle in working together while talking mad lore in your ear non-stop.
I am indifferent to it all. I bet Lotr fans will eat this shit up. I really don't care. The $20 I spent on this game was to hack some guys up, not to listen about how the ring was forged by a emo elf.
Also the ending was kinda abrupt and kinda "thats it...?" feeling.


In the end it's not a bad game, it was decent fun, but just play a AC or Batman instead of this recycled 1 trick pony.
I got the Platinum trophy so I will never feel the need to touch it again. (TWSS)

2/5
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