Rage 2 from Just Cause devs

[Adon]

Ended up grabbing this when it was on sale a while back.

I'm about 17 hours in and surprisingly still having a good amount of fun. Usually, I tend to stay away from open world games because they tend to get tiresome and repetitive towards the end (on top of the usual fluff that comes along with it), but I enjoyed Rage 1 well enough; same with Mad Max. So far I've found the gunplay and abilities to be just varied enough to keep me going, and this is probably one of the few occasions where I prefer the size of the map, its scale and how condensed everything is. A bit of a shame because that means the vehicle combat suffers and that was easily the best part of Mad Max, and this seems to be a notch lower than that in terms of combat, weapons, and number of objectives. Much like the original Rage, the vehicle stuff seems to be more supplementary to the FPS portion.

Maybe it has to do with my schedule, but what sets this apart over other open world games is how quickly you can clear out bandit dens and the like; while normally this might be a detriment, I actually kind of like that about this game. Because of how condensed everything is, clearing out those dens while making my way to main quest objectives is rather easy since it never feels like I have to go out of my way to for them in the same manner that so many open world games do.

Unlike Rage 1 and Mad Max, Rage 2 has more varied environments, but I do prefer the original art design and style of Rage 1. I do not think 2 is bad in this regard as I believe their intention was to present a more rugged, less stylized post-apocalyptic world and this is evident by their decision to not have any kind of cel-shading. Whether or not that's a bad thing ultimately narrows down personal preference. I also don't think the colors are any more "washed out" than the original Rage which prominently featured a lot of desaturated or muted colors outside of a few exceptions; but Rage 2 does end up using a lot of pastel and soft colors which gives it more of an impressionism look in some ways.

 

[Silly Germans]

I thought the combat was super good and it baffles me others don't agree. However yes, I agree everything else in the game is incredibly dull and boring. The "Worth a Buy" guy on Youtube echoes my thoughts pretty well.

I do agree, the combat was excellent. Gund handling, movement and impact were all above average. What it lacked was good encounter and map design. The open world design did certainly not improve the game. I think it could have been even a great game, had it been designed as a tight single player experience with hand crafted combat situations, the mechanics and the engine are all good.

 

[DalekFlay]

I do agree, the combat was excellent. Gund handling, movement and impact were all above average. What it lacked was good encounter and map design. The open world design did certainly not improve the game. I think it could have been even a great game, had it been designed as a tight single player experience with hand crafted combat situations, the mechanics and the engine are all good.

It's funny too because the original Rage wasn't really an open world game, it had linear levels connected by an overworld map. Rage 2 has moments like that here and there, the space station place or whatever for example, but overall it embraces a generic open world design that makes the game worse. Don't tell publishers that though, they're convinced open world is a green light to success right now. I guess you can't blame them when you look at the biggest singleplayer sellers, but it's a flooded market.

 

[Silly Germans]

I wasn't surprised by that, since the game was developed by Avalanche Studios who did Just Cause. But I thought that they would deliver a somewhat decent open world with mediocre/weak shooter game play. I find it really strange that it turned out exactly reversed.

 

[Ash]

Played this. Actually not bad. Combat is pretty good though some of the guns are questionable, as well as resource distribution. the majority of the time you're gonna be shooting people with the assault rifle and shotgun. Good thing they're fun weapons. Started on Nightmare difficulty and the game (or combat rather) was moderately challenging, only starting to become a bit too easy at the end once I had everything upgraded. Nothing else about the game aside from the combat is really any good, entertaining, interesting nor challenging. Thankfully the devs seem to understand this because it is 80% of what you do. The world design once again follows the dumb conventions of the modern AAA industry's standardized open world. Whatever the case, it's categorized as "good for what it is" and filed in the "one of the few acceptable modern AAA games" drawer. It's alright.

 

[Ash]

the vehicle stuff seems to be more supplementary to the FPS portion.

The biggest problem in that regard is the icarus (flying machine).

1. You unlock it rather early.
2. it costs 10 bucks. WTF?

It should be a late game unlock and cost 250 bucks to call in (highest of any vehicle). that way getting around by car remains relevant for most of the game and you'll appreciate the driving aspects more: convoys, roaming traders, people fighting in the road, road blocks, ramps placed everywhere, as well as general exploration not being "fly to the nearest point of interest".

Dumb modern game designers. At the same time though the world design is a bit mediocre. They probably made the icarus so accessible because they know it's shit. Of course ideally the world would be a lot better and the icarus wouldn't be so accessible.

Anyhow, if I had to describle this game in one sentence it'd be "Borderlands but actually good, but not that good".

 

[BLOBERT]

It was a derisive way of referring to cover shooters, where you wait for guys to pop out of cover. Eventually, it degenerated into a generic term for "shitty gameplay", yes. But the meaning lives on with the derp trolls:



It's just that "you stand and pop the moles" sounded like such a broad description that it could include any game that's not about hipfiring while moving.

BRO LOLLOLOL IT WAS ALWAYS ABOUT NEWSHIT GAMES LOLLOLOL

 

[kreight]

Free on EGS right now.