Preview Boiling Point impressions at RPGDot

[Saint_Proverbius]

Tags: Boiling Point: Road to Hell

There's a <A href="http://www.rpgdot.com/index.php?hsaction=10053&ID=1126">first impressions</a> article over at <A href="http://www.rpgdot.com/">RPGDot</a> about <A href="http://www.uk.atari.com/index.php?pg=game_detail&productID=172">Boiling Point</a>. I don't know anything about this game, don't pretend to know anything, so I'll just go with:
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<blockquote>As good as this all sounds, Boiling Point has plenty of rough edges. Clipping issues abound but it's the NPC path finding that stands out the most. While it generally works, you'll occasionally find vehicles have suddenly turned off the road and into a building - I watched two trucks that had both turned into a building alcove perform a strange dance as they drove backwards and forwards, stuck between the building and hitting each other when they tried to back out. Civilians that so much as touch your parked car will die an instant screaming death if the engine is running and sometimes they'll get stuck between the car and a nearby object such as a lamppost, leaving no option but to kill them as you pull out, damaging your civilian ranking.</blockquote>
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Maybe they should change <i>Civilian Rating</i> to <i>Assisted Darwinism Rating</i>. Then it becomes a feature.
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Thanks, <b>Dhruin</b>!
<br>

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

I watched two trucks that had both turned into a building alcove perform a strange dance as they drove backwards and forwards, stuck between the building and hitting each other when they tried to back out.

That's not a problem, it's actually a cunning Austin Powers reference.

 

[space captain]

its a pretty fun game if you are into open-ended FPS type games... the RPG stuff is not exactly lite, but its not really that prominent either

the way the quests and the factions all work together is the really impressive thing...

make sure you choose "hard" difficulty to get all the AI goodness

 

[Shagnak]

I've been looking forward to this game after I dloaded a bunch of gameplay movies a month or two ago.
It's a pity that it has (apparently) been released in such a state. Might wait and see what sort of support it gets.

 

[space captain]

they are working on a patch but there are some issues i doubt will ever get fixed

its still 100x more fun than Dung Lords right now - but yeh, its got some problems

 

[Shagnak]

Oh well. If it magically appears at my local EB it might be worth a crack then.

I heard there was a US patch released, but now its suddenly unavailable. What's up with that?

 

[MarFish]

Oh well. If it magically appears at my local EB it might be worth a crack then.

I heard there was a US patch released, but now its suddenly unavailable. What's up with that?

Just downloaded and installed the patch from gamershell, so I think nothing is up with that.

The game is nice and very impressive, but certainly lacks the polish of an AAA title. Some design decisions are plain stupid (You get timed missions and can't pass time unless you have a car, you have to sleep every so often, etc). Amusing to see your local CIA guy kill 20 civilians on the sidewalk because he tries to pathfind around you standing on the road.

Dialog choices ranges from decent to stupid ("Are there any spies in this town?").

So far I like what I see, as long as you expect a daring but very unpolished game (it's Atari, what do you expect), you're not going to be disappointed

 

[Fez]

There wasn't much fanfare for this release then. Shame it wasn't finished properly. Wasn't there someone who used to pimp it here sometimes?

 

[Shagnak]

Just downloaded and installed the patch from gamershell, so I think nothing is up with that.

Err...no. I mean that it is not available from the "official source" (the publishers or developers website).
http://www.atari.com/us/support/newfaq/ ... =DOWNLOADS
As in, their download page says "currently unavailable", but it was before.
Of course gamershell (and others) will have it, they got hold of it when it was initially available.
But the developer and publisher have withdrawn it since for some reason.
Even the appropriate folder on the ftp is empty. I wonder if there were patch issues? - shades of Far Cry maybe?

Edit: anyway, sounds like an interesting game. Maybe they bit of more than they could chew, but that's better than going the boring and predictable route and STILL failing (a la DL).

 

[Fez]

I'll wait and see how it turns out after it is patched. I'd rather not play another Dung Lords.

 

[MarFish]

Bugs so far (with patch) in 5 hours of gametime

- 2x CTD
- Enemies falling in the ground after being hit by a granade, can't loot them
- AI car driving over a dozen civilians trying to maneuver over my car parked in the middle of the road
- VO volume can't be controlled, VO sometimes vanish in background noise
- VO sometimes vanishes completely (maybe the lines in question don't have VO, not sure)
- Civilians die when touching your car if the engine is on, regardless of your velocity. Parked killer cars, you get the picture

Annoyances
- No minimap, just a compass
- Can't pass time, sleeping doesn't work all the time if your character has slept enough, he refuses, forcing you to loiter around until a timed event happens
- The XP / character development page is completely noninteractive, you can't spend points or anything. Think Morrowind action driven skill development without the option to spend any points.
- The head wobble when moving, especially when prone makes you sick
- Some extremely ugly textures, ugh!
- Fake day/night cycle for NPCs. Buildings are locked, but if you manage to get into them through a window, the NPCs are there just as per day and you can talk to them just fine. Or just talk to them through the window....
- Enemy choppers try to follow you into a tunnel. Granted, you see this happen in movies and it's cool, but it's still an exploit of dumb AI :p
- Ugly character models
- No damage model for cars, just a HP stat, no visual damage.
- Odd attachment to the word "gringo".
- Some dumbass thought you need to confirm ANY item you loot. Because it's so bad to accidently loot an item (that you can just put back or drop), they have you click a fucking confirmation box for every piece you loot.
- Some badly designed dialog.
Q: "Do you want to buy this for 1000 pesos?".
A1: Yes
A2: That sounds like a good deal! I'll take it!
Where is the fucking A3:... 1000, are you mad? no way?????

Nice things
- Exploration and free roaming gameplay at it's best. Well done journal system.
- Good sense of goals at any time. Mission tracking and map (not minimap) are very powerful and the game doesn't feel as empty as Morrowind (yet?)
- Addiction to "medpacks". Very innovative system for limiting the use of healing resources.
- No level loads, completely seamless world. Excellent.
- Car trunks can be used to store stuff (not just extra tires)
- Beautiful scenery (if you don't look to close at some of the textures)
- Nice ambient events (i.e. driving along a road in the dark you'll see soldiers and rebels fighting, with tracers flying over the road, very cool. Scripted police roadblocks are nice too.
- Some neat scripted missions. Take pictures of the mayor meeting a crimelord, plant drugs for the police so they can get rid of someone
- Fun stealth gameplay - steal laptop from mafia camp ... went in with a knife, silently took the guards out, took it, made dash for the car ... and got shot by sniper.
- Combat AI is passable. Not the best out there, but quite nice on max difficulty unless they get stuck, which happens from time to time.
- Piranhas
- Working faction system, quite impressive with short term and long term effects.
- Randomized mission parts. First time I started I could get info on the daughter for 2000 pesos, next time I started guy wanted 3000 pesos which meant I had to do some missions first to get the cash for him.
- Believable south american country. Having been to south america a couple of times now, it's definitly "authentic" - from the military roadblocks to the tire and gas stations on the road.

All in all the positive outweighs the negative, but if you have huge expectations regarding polish, pass on it. Kind of like a troika game, very grand vision, quite well executed but hampered by bugs. It doesn't feel unfinished however, more sloppy polished.

It apparently had multiplayer at some time during development because they forgot to remove the keyboard binding option for team chat, etc from the controler config... Fuck you Atari, that would have been fun.

 

[theverybigslayer]

- AI car driving over a dozen civilians trying to maneuver over my car parked in the middle of the road
- Civilians die when touching your car if the engine is on, regardless of your velocity. Parked killer cars, you get the picture

These are not bugs. Fun! :D

 

[MarFish]

- AI car driving over a dozen civilians trying to maneuver over my car parked in the middle of the road
- Civilians die when touching your car if the engine is on, regardless of your velocity. Parked killer cars, you get the picture

These are not bugs. Fun! :D

If your car killing people wouldn't degenerate your faction rating with the civilian faction, I wouldn't care, but nothing better than coming out of a house after doing business to be mowed down by a mob of armed civilians.... Of course the latter itself could be realistic in some countries, but I doubt they would it because your car happend to become a mass murderer while you were away.

 

[Dhruin]

There is a mini-map. Check the screens in my article.

 

[Vidder]

Bugs so far (with patch) in 5 hours of gametime

- No minimap, just a compass

(press tab, or M)

- Can't pass time, sleeping doesn't work all the time if your character has slept enough, he refuses, forcing you to loiter around until a timed event happens

(try pressing J, does not work in dangerous areas)

- No damage model for cars, just a HP stat, no visual damage.

(after a wild ride through the jungle my car looks like a mashed tin.)

- Some dumbass thought you need to confirm ANY item you loot. Because it's so bad to accidently loot an item (that you can just put back or drop), they have you click a fucking confirmation box for every piece you loot.

(just keep adding more stuff to your inventory, ignore the confirm button. when you´r done, confirme ONCE!)

you are just not very good at "playing" games, right?
haha, all those above things you stated are definately wrong!

 

[MarFish]

Bugs so far (with patch) in 5 hours of gametime

- No minimap, just a compass

(press tab, or M)

- Can't pass time, sleeping doesn't work all the time if your character has slept enough, he refuses, forcing you to loiter around until a timed event happens

(try pressing J, does not work in dangerous areas)

- No damage model for cars, just a HP stat, no visual damage.

(after a wild ride through the jungle my car looks like a mashed tin.)

- Some dumbass thought you need to confirm ANY item you loot. Because it's so bad to accidently loot an item (that you can just put back or drop), they have you click a fucking confirmation box for every piece you loot.

(just keep adding more stuff to your inventory, ignore the confirm button. when you´r done, confirme ONCE!)

you are just not very good at "playing" games, right?
haha, all those above things you stated are definately wrong!

You can't sleep if your character is fully slept out, he will say that he's too zippy too sleep. Thus you can't forward time, regardless whether or not you have a car. You are forced to do other stuff to come back in time. That's just plain bad design, even morrowind had the loiter function. J only works in army bases, hospitals, cars and motels.

Unload an assault rifle in your cars window and notice the absense of any visual impact. Run your car into a wall and notice that nothing changes, no broken window, no twisted hood, nothing. The few dirty texture changes to your car is not a damage model, they are a texture change - no impact on how the car drives unless a tire blows which is a seperate system determined by tear and wear, not damage. Mafia, GTA, Flashpoint, pretty much any game that featured cars and more or less open ended gameplay had much better visual representation of damage.

The fact that you can ignore the confirm button doesn't make it less stupid. Why confirm an action that has absolutely no consequences and can be undone at any time. Bad design.

All wrong my ass.

you are just not very good at "playing" games, right

Maybe you are not very bright.

 

[space captain]

1. Cars DO have damage modeling. Glass doesnt break, but the front end gets mangled and twisted. Its not much, but its there. seems to happen when car is less than 50%

2. there is a minimap

3. you can loot a corpse WITHOUT going to their inventory screen, just walk up to them, point your crosshair at them - and everything they own is listed from F1 - F12 for "quick looting"

 

[Shagnak]

Good sounding review at jolt:
http://www.jolt.co.uk/index.php?articleid=4017

They point out that its very buggy ("uncountable" bugs), but still recommend it:

Boiling Point is an amazing piece of work, but is like a piece of art that will never be finished. We wouldn’t hesitate in recommending it, despite its flaws, as it is the very definition of freeform adventuring.

Score - 8.3 despite some obvious shittiness.

Certainly sounds worth investigating...

 

[space captain]

see my posts above

 

[Fresh]

Good sounding review at jolt:
http://www.jolt.co.uk/index.php?articleid=4017

They point out that its very buggy ("uncountable" bugs), but still recommend it:

Boiling Point is an amazing piece of work, but is like a piece of art that will never be finished. We wouldn’t hesitate in recommending it, despite its flaws, as it is the very definition of freeform adventuring.

Score - 8.3 despite some obvious shittiness.

Certainly sounds worth investigating...

After reading Eurogamers review I was pretty much sold - this game seems fantastic. I think Im gonna wait for a patch or two before I play it though.

 

[Fresh]

http://www.uk.atari.com/third_party/for ... 98b&t=9905

Originally Posted by Skulls
AMD 3200
1Gig Crucial Ram
Audigy Sound
Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb graphics
Graphics Settings:-custom Gfx, evrything FULL except for the LOD settings which i put about halfway
custom Effects, EVERYTHING MAX except lighting which i had to put on Vertex or the game was choppy.
1024x768 32Bit
Results:-
GRAPHICS: 8.5
The game looks BEAUTIFUL with the graphics set as above. No jerkiness whatsoever, No ragdoll effects (which is dissappointing). Sometimes the blood pools appear on a table, or up a lampost . Weather effects are absolutely stunning. Day and night cycles very realistic (attacking a settlement at midnight is a sight to be seen). Weapon models look good (not quite CS quality but very good all the same). The jungle looks great, very dense vegetation. Tracer effects from the enemies weapons is real good (if you have the Static Geo set to 1000m you can see a firefight happening from a massive distance with Binoculars). The scenery (Bridges, Mountains etc.) Is STUNNING (VERY Far Cry).

SOUND: 7.0
The sound was quite buggy when it came to the speech, some of the time there would be no speech at all, just captions (but this is easily rectified in a patch). Weapon sounds were very realistic (the AK47 actually sounds like an AK47) Wildlife sounds and Vehicle sounds were accurate and not annoying. Just needs patching is all.

GAMEPLAY: 8.5 (will review IF the Multiplayer Patch arrives)
You can choose to do the main mission (which requires money to get the required info as to where to start hunting for your daughter) or you can do Sub-missions for the various Factions in the gameworld(which earn you the money required for the main quest),The missions are very diverse (Assassination, Theft, Surveilance, Escort, Infiltration etc.). Plenty of Factions to affiliate with (Each with their own missions and agendas) Generally if you side with the CIA, Government or Civvies then you normally end up going against the Mafia, Geurrillas and Bandits. A HUGE World, now i mean HUUUUGE. I took a car 7KM out into the jungle, got jumped by Bandits (I was working for the CIA) who blew up my car (yes they abumsh you as you drive past) nearly got killed but escaped into the jungle, THEN had to walk about 3.5KM (which took me like 15 mins or so) before a car came by, CarJacked it (Shoot the driver in the head as he drives by) and drove the remaining 4KM back to the CIA base (that took me about another 6-10mins) BTW i got lost and ended up behind some AMAZING looking mountains and had to walk like 2KM round them last night, but i didnt mind cos i ran into some Mafia in a car , and they WEREN'T kidding when they said it was Seamless with NO Loading, I didnt see ONE loading screen after i srated the game proper. AI isn't too bad (some people have criticized it) then enemy do forward/side rolls to avoid your gunfire, sometimes they shoot aimlessley but i was playing on EASY so it is probably more accurate on NORMAL or HARD. The Voice Acting is a bit rubbish i must confess and i mean what was the deal with the **** song during installation OMG!. Annoy one Faction/Group and they will remember it so be warned, choose your allies carefully. Eac time you kill an enemy a row of boxes appears on the left of the screen showing how your act has effected your relations with the various Factions. The POSSIBILITY of MultiPlayer has got me drooling, IF they can utilise the hole are in MP games then this will BLOW the current MP titles to smithereens. If i had to make comparisons, i would probably say, Deus EX+Far Cry+Operation Flashpoint (For its expansive area).

REPLAYABILITY: 9
Due to the fact that once you choose your allies it makes it virtually impossible to do jobs for the alter Factions plus the fact that the world is so huge, it will take you a LONG time to finish the game and wont see even half of the missions.

OVERALL:8.5 (With the possibility of a higher mark after a bugfix/multiplayer patch)