That Limited Edition looks sexy.
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That Limited Edition looks sexy.
this game looks pretty hot. both graphics and few of the gameplay features.
It does if you only own the PS3.Quote:
Originally Posted by bbobb
Now THAT doesn't make sense.Quote:
Originally Posted by Glass Joe
:lol: Fair enough.Quote:
Originally Posted by ChaoofNee
me thinks the delay is some because of them wanting to take extra time to clean it, and more because MGS4 is raping all PS3 game sales this month.
I picked up the 360 version of Alone in the Dark at gamestop today. I only had the chance to play it for about an hour, but I really like it so far...despite how TERRIBLE it is in quite a few areas. Really, I would only give it about a 7/10 so far but I like it for what it is.
This is definitely a game that everyone should rent before purchasing though, because every aspect of the game is very flawed. The graphics offer some very nice lighting and elemental effects, but some of the character models and environments are very "blah." The controls are also very befuddling. This is quite possibly the most poorly implemented and polarizing control scheme I've seen in a game since Gunvalkyrie on the Xbox. Its not that the controls are necessarily BAD, they are just overly complicated. The first problem is that the developers couldn't decide whether to make the game first person or third person, so you constantly have to switch between third and first person views and each button performs a different action depending on the view that you're in. So, I'm always finding myself getting crossed up trying to figure out which button executes the action I want to perform.
More examples of the overly complicated controls include:
- In order to simply make the character run, you must hold the L button AND press A. This means, if you want to run and jump, you must hold L AND A and then hit the X button to jump. This just isn't very comfortable on a 360 controller, and it feels sloppy. Why couldn't the developers make one of the 10+ buttons the run button?
- Melee combat is also odd. Instead of allowing you to easily swing a melee item with the quick press of a face button, the developers decided to go the Death By Degrees/Grabbed By the Ghoulies "flick the analogue stick" route with the melee combat. Usually, this control scheme is very unresponsive and inaccurate in every game that uses it, but they somehow found a way to make it suck even more. Instead of just swinging the stick in one direction to swing a melee item, you must swing the stick left AND then swing it back to the right to perform ONE MOTION. So, of course, melee combat becomes very frustrating and it seems unresponsive overall.
Negatives aside though, I have to admit that the developer did everything in their power to really impress the player. "Alone in the Dark" is a very cinematic experience with some truly thrilling gameplay moments thrown at the player one after another. There are also some very nice environmental puzzles that make the player take advantage of the games' physics, much like Half Life. Best of all though, is that the player can seemingly choose any way to tackle the game's obstacles. You can seemingly combine the majority of the items to create new items and there are several ways too to get around some of the enivronmental puzzles and the game's battles.
So far, it really surprises me that they took the time to make every other element of "Alone in the Dark" so impressive and then they dropped the ball with the control scheme. This major oversight is what will really hold "Alone in the Dark" back from being a game that will be embraced by the mainstream. Therefore, I would only recommend this to people who are big fans of the series, or serious game players who can look passed really glaring flaws. I honestly think a casual game player would give up on this game after the first 30 minutes or so. So, I'm going to predict that this will be a game you will see used at Gamestop very quickly and this will be in the $20 bargain bin within a month or two.
EDIT - Wow, I just saw the IGN review and they absolutely trashed this with a 3.5/10. I'll have to read through their review because most of the reviews I've read (including the IGN UK review) have been in the 7 range so far.
I wonder if the PC version will allow some of these control issues to be tweaked to where they aren't a problem.
Guess I'll find out when my copy gets here (hoping tomorrow).
nice writeup "magnifiedplaid"
Played this for a couple more hours tonight and I have a few more observations.
- First, apparently I was wrong about having to squeeze the L Trigger and press A to run. You only need to press the A button to run. I couldn't get the character to do that at the beginning though...so maybe I had to wait for the game's tutorial to introduce the run button. Either way though, having A to Run and X to jump is a minor annoyance.
- Control issues still pop up throughout the game though. For example, the ingame tutorial says to press A to turn on the flash light, and press A again to turn it off. Sometimes I'll be pressing A several times and the flashlight will not turn off...other times I barely press it and it turns off quickly. This is an issue since the flashlight uses up batteries. I notice that if I'm holding another item, like a gun or crow bar, while I carry the flashlight it is practically impossible to turn off the flashlight. So, I literally have to go into the inventory and put either the gun away or manually unequip the flashlight.......stupid shit like this really takes you out of the experience. Another minor quirk regarding the flashlight is that it seems to turn itself off if you jump or fall off a platform....which is a bad thing because you need light to fend off some of the "instant kill" enemies :(
- Suprisingly enough, the actual controls in the driving sequences are not as bad as the professional reviews indicate. If you played Test Drive Unlimited, you should be at home with the somewhat average vehicle control here. Instead the main problem, in the initial driving segement I played, is that it just feels glitchy and cheap. There are items constantly flying at the screen and the terrain is constantly changing in front of you (much like Excite Truck), but every time I barely scraped the edge of a wall my car would fly a hundred feet in the air...and it would result in an instantdeath. I had to retry the first driving segment about 15 times because of this. Frustrating to say the least.
- The game also seems to have an odd disconnect between chapters. It feels as if a different team worked on each chapter. By the time I got to chapter 3 they all of a sudden shoe horned in a map, psuedo health bar system, radar, PDA screen, and all this other random junk that should have been in the first two chapters. I kept wondering where the hell that stuff came from all of a sudden. Just very odd.
- Yet, the most frustrating aspect of this game is that there are some truly BRILLIANT moments buried under all the crap. During the first 5 or so hours that I've played, there have been some truly "holy shit" moments and some great gameplay innovations that I haven't seen in too many other games in this genre. Thus, I have a really bipolar reaction to this game. One minute the game seems awesome...and the next it really sucks...then it gets awesome again. Its easy to see why the review scores vary so wildly.
Basically, I think the 1up review put it best when they said "Alone in the Dark" feels "experimental." Its like no gameplay idea or concept was ever turned down in a development meeting. Every idea imaginable is thrown into the game. A few of the ideas work, and a lot of them don't. I seriously wonder what kind of random horse shit this game is going to throw at me next. I'm trying very hard to like this game, but its definitely fighting me every step of the way.