Game News ELEX II gets a combat trailer, now available for preorder

[Tyranicon]

It's honestly a bad trailer in the sense that I have learned very little about the combat. Otherwise, it's okay I guess, the visuals and the emotional impact is fine, I don't see much wrong with it. It even made me a little bit excited.

Otherwise, I can't wrap my head around this whole "eurojank" thing. Is this an "edgy" thing some Americans like to say about games made in Europe to feel superior or something? I don't think ELEX was buggy or unstable, on the contrary, I found it quite performant and never have experienced a single crash. Maybe a few quest sequencing bugs here and there, but those were very rare and only resulted in some weird dialogs, really. I found the production values quite high as well, the world looked amazing and the visuals were just beautiful.

So yeah, I just don't get it... I don't play AAA games much, so I have no idea how they look like and play these days. The closest I guess was the Rise of the Tomb Raider that I played a few years back, I guess that's "non-janky" to you? Personally, I found ELEX better in every regard. Okay, maybe the animations were a little bit smoother in Tomb Raider, but who cares really if the game is otherwise generally boring (it was).

So, honest request, give me some non-janky examples, now I'm really curious what your frame of reference is.

Eurojank on the codex isn't always a derogatory term. Many people quite like it, as less time spent on animations is more time spent on the meat of the game, which they enjoy.

As for which games are non-janky when compared to Elex... well, basically most AAA games and some polished AA games like Senua's Sacrifice.

A quick glance at this trailer will tell you that movement animation has a bad match with terrain, leading to your feet floating above the ground and seemingly sliding all over the place. Melee weapon animations are relatively basic, they don't show much gunplay (hmmm), player and enemies don't have facial expressions during combat, ragdolls seem dated, etc.

But that's fine because it's what people expect from PB. If the rest of the game is fun, it'll be a good "eurojank" rpg.

 

[Lord of Riva]

That said the bar isn't exactly high right now if you are looking for a first/third person open-world RPG, since what is their competition?

You should really try Chronicles of Myrtana: Archolos if you can't answer that question.

But... you can play both games?

Archolos is pretty solid and I enjoyed it but I am also already done. (Thanks for based poles btw. )

I am looking foward to Elex 2, the trailer is still completely pointless and shit. Chances are that the game will be pretty good and since when are RPGs a genre where you are drowned in titles?
There is sadly always enough room to squeeze some shit in between decent games.

 

[Rincewind]

A quick glance at this trailer will tell you that movement animation has a bad match with terrain, leading to your feet floating above the ground and seemingly sliding all over the place. Melee weapon animations are relatively basic, they don't show much gunplay (hmmm), player and enemies don't have facial expressions during combat, ragdolls seem dated, etc.

Okay, I'm apparently very insensitive to that kind of stuff, given that I mostly play older games anyway. Haven't noticed any of that! But yeah, I don't care either, those are very unimportant details for me.

It's a style vs substance thing basically, I get it now.

 

[HoboForEternity]

the main con of combat in elex are the homing projectile mainly and hitbox. but once you've gotten hold of it, it's actually pretty intuitive and much better than assassin's creed combat aka "magnet" combat in AAA action RPGs nowadays. you know where you just press a button and the character automatically orient themselves to the nearest enemies, not allowing you to "miss" if you're within some distance of enemies. basically press button and fancy animation plays.


i do admit their hitboxes are such a mess that it hurt this type of combat input and somehow this combat trailer looks worse then streamer's gameplay especially how the camera move when jax tried to dodge roll that alien thing (that's probably because they try to show "cinematic" angle using the in game engine, because elex 1 doesn't look like that. (all PB games have really generous zoom in/out level and the previews and trailers so far have the camera zoomed so near the character it looks worse than it is.



in term of damage response for the enemy AI, piranha bytes are always better than say 100% of bethesda games, but they have very awkward sound design that makes the illusion somewhat broken.

basically what i hope from elex 2's combat is : better hitboxes, better enemy projectile design (aka set trajectory instead of homing and you have to basically use the invulnerability dodge roll to dodge instead of running.

for melee in specific, i actually like elex 1's combo meter and it;s a shame they took it out. it doesn't hurt too to have some unique weapons with different animation or more combo options. ironically gothic had better hitboxes (at least by my experience in archolos. the weapon's reach are accurate to its presentation in pixel, so i really don't get how in ELEX a sword can register a hit, like there is an invisible shaft coming out of the sword tip that magically extend its range.


as for animation, eeeh it's PB. they look good enough for me.

 

[Darth Roxor]

projectiles in elex are not homing, they just trace the direction of your movement when released

l2p

 

[Ryzer]

But that's fine because it's what people expect from PB.

No, people expect a finished product.

the main con of combat in elex are the homing projectile mainly and hitbox. but once you've gotten hold of it, it's actually pretty intuitive and much better than assassin's creed combat aka "magnet" combat in AAA action RPGs nowadays.

What are you smoking? Assassin's Creed combat is somewhat enjoyable and isn't fundamentally broken and glitchy. Elex combat is the lowest of the low. Nobody enjoys Elex combat.

in term of damage response for the enemy AI, piranha bytes are always better than say 100% of bethesda games, but they have very awkward sound design that makes the illusion somewhat broken.

You are completely deluded, Elex AI is fucking garbage. Companions AI stand still like a tard and doesn't react when the player get molested by enemies. Even the Companions AI in Beth games react when the player get attacked and you can give him tasks.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Nobody enjoys Elex combat.

i do

what now asshole

 

[Falksi]

"How appropriate, you fight like a cow"

Never gets old

I'm convinced that the quickest way to break the retardation which sites like Twitter and RPG Watch have poisoned our society with is to make the first 3 Monkey Island games mandatory plays for kids under 15.

 

[Zarniwoop]

"How appropriate, you fight like a cow"

Never gets old

I'm convinced that the quickest way to break the retardation which sites like Twitter and RPG Watch have poisoned our society with is to make the first 3 Monkey Island games mandatory plays for kids under 15.

If only it were that simple.

Humanity is so fucked at this point, all you would get is a bunch of purple-haired teenagers inventing pronouns like Chuckself

 

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

Assassin's Creed combat is somewhat enjoyable and isn't fundamentally broken and glitchy. Elex combat is the lowest of the low.

So an Ass Creed super fan doesn't enjoy ELEX.

Why am I not surprised.

 

[Hellraiser]

Assassin's Creed combat is somewhat enjoyable and isn't fundamentally broken and glitchy. Elex combat is the lowest of the low.

So an Ass Creed super fan doesn't enjoy ELEX.

Why am I not surprised.

He needs an AWESOME BUTTON to do AWESOME THINGS and watch AWESOME animations like in them marvel movies, that's the real essence of a finished product apparently. He has needs you see, special needs.

 

[Zarniwoop]

I don't know, flying around on a jetpack and shootan things is pretty awesome.

 

[Rincewind]

the main con of combat in elex are the homing projectile mainly and hitbox. but once you've gotten hold of it, it's actually pretty intuitive and much better than assassin's creed combat aka "magnet" combat in AAA action RPGs nowadays. you know where you just press a button and the character automatically orient themselves to the nearest enemies, not allowing you to "miss" if you're within some distance of enemies. basically press button and fancy animation plays.


i do admit their hitboxes are such a mess that it hurt this type of combat input and somehow this combat trailer looks worse then streamer's gameplay especially how the camera move when jax tried to dodge roll that alien thing (that's probably because they try to show "cinematic" angle using the in game engine, because elex 1 doesn't look like that. (all PB games have really generous zoom in/out level and the previews and trailers so far have the camera zoomed so near the character it looks worse than it is.



in term of damage response for the enemy AI, piranha bytes are always better than say 100% of bethesda games, but they have very awkward sound design that makes the illusion somewhat broken.

basically what i hope from elex 2's combat is : better hitboxes, better enemy projectile design (aka set trajectory instead of homing and you have to basically use the invulnerability dodge roll to dodge instead of running.

for melee in specific, i actually like elex 1's combo meter and it;s a shame they took it out. it doesn't hurt too to have some unique weapons with different animation or more combo options. ironically gothic had better hitboxes (at least by my experience in archolos. the weapon's reach are accurate to its presentation in pixel, so i really don't get how in ELEX a sword can register a hit, like there is an invisible shaft coming out of the sword tip that magically extend its range.


as for animation, eeeh it's PB. they look good enough for me.

Well, that's all very interesting, but once I turned off all the auto aiming, auto locking and whatever else auto option there was for the combat, I found it very enjoyable and had zero issues. That "auto-lock on the nearest enemy and press button to win" in AAA games that you described sounds like utter crap.

Bad sound design in PB games? Honestly, I found both the sound and the music very good in all PB games that I played. Especially the music of Kai Rosenkranz, virtually all his tracks are masterpieces, very recognisable style and just oozes atmosphere. 9 times out of 10 I could spot his music before reading the credits. Haven't noticed anything wrong with ELEX either in the sound department.

 

[Ryzer]

Keep describing a game that doesn't exist, that there is nothing wrong with it, so that you don't remember what it really is.
A fundamentally broken game that if you put effort into it and get pass the obvious flaws offers a good story, enjoyable quests and very good world. But most people don't have the patience and the tolerance I have with it.

 

[HoboForEternity]

, I found both the sound and the music very good in all PB games that I played. Especially the music of Kai Rosenkranz, virtually all his tracks are masterpieces, very recognisable style and just oozes atmosphere. 9 times out of 10 I could spot his music before reading the credits.

weapon VFX in elex were pretty bad. i forgot about risen but gothic (or archolos if archolos doesnt use custom sound effect) is better. music are fine, but PB post Kai is just kinda mediocre (apparently bjorn isnt that much of a composer)

 

[Darth Roxor]

personally i thought the ELEX music was pretty good, the ambient pieces are p. atmospheric and i liked the mild industrial bits in the combat themes





(tavar theme is p good too but for some stupid reason i cant find it on jewtub)

 

[Rincewind]

Agreed, Bjorn is an entirely different league than Kai. He's mostly fine when it's just about stiching a few notes together for atmospherics, but it's clear he hasn't got much instinct for melody and harmony. Still, I think he managed to produce quite atmospheric and fitting background tracks for ELEX, even if they're not super memorable. My favourites are the Goliet tracks, and some of the more futuristic ones are quite good too.

 

[Ryzer]

They are totally forgettable. Compared to Risen 1 soundtrack it's awful.

 

[Konjad]

personally i thought

Well, you also played through entire Arcania series and just pretended "haha, it's because it's so bad guys and I need to write a review haha"

 

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

They are totally forgettable. Compared to Risen 1 soundtrack it's awful.

Not as good as Assassin's Creed soundtracks, am I right?

 

[Joyvankek]

DID YOU KNOW:
The reason poles love Gothic so much is actually the result of a secret german brainwashing operation?
The german government paid to have gaming magazines distributed to poland when poles couldn't afford video games, and included copies of Gothic(and Might and Magic, but that's for a later discussion) with them.
The poles spent their entire youth playing nothing but those two games creating an entire country dependent upon PB and ensuring the german economy stays propped up no matter what.

Except back then, you had well developed black market. Some games had an "unofficial" translation, at it's peak you even had russian doing dubbing in polish.
So you didn't hit the mark with this one. You need to dig deeper if you want to know the real reason behind such a great reception of Gothic 1/2, Might and Magic and CS1.6.

Otherwise, I can't wrap my head around this whole "eurojank" thing. Is this an "edgy" thing some Americans like to say about games made in Europe to feel superior or something?

Not sure with "eurojank" but slavjank was just that initially, but later on we embraced the meme and now it means game with good atmosphere and enjoyable to paly, but glitchy and usually with bad animations.
So good ideas, and low budget.

You should really try Chronicles of Myrtana: Archolos if you can't answer that question.

I am planning on doing just that. Also for anyone else interested in this mod conversion, it's also available on GOG.

 

[thesheeep]

I'm moist already.

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

Release is not far away and I can't wait to play it.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

Unlike the first one, this will be a because I got the tech to handle it

 

[MasPingon]

It looks bad, you can tell they copy paste this trailer:



But it looks like chinese version from 90's.

 

[HoboForEternity]

It looks bad, you can tell they copy paste this trailer:



But it looks like chinese version from 90's.

And elex still has better combat that twitcher 3