Ash
Arcane
- Joined
- Oct 16, 2015
- Messages
- 7,133
I am saddened that you found that abomination good. This means your point of reference for what games are able to achieve is rather low. The game is borderline braindead and unengaging, frequently. Take the following examples:
Level 11 (or whatever) - Space Station: The entirety of this level is using the one single gun you're allowed, shooting the same one enemy type over and over, and your weapon is infinite ammo (infinite charges from wall-mounted charging stations). The level design while pretty, is entirely a straight line. Nothing changes from this description. You just shoot the same dudes in hallways with the same infinite ammo gun. No unique events, no unique combat setups, no traps or cool ambushes, no other form of gameplay. No other anything except probably some shitty woke dialogue. This is utter dogshit videogaming. Have you not played a real singleplayer FPS before? Probably not, as those were mostly only made in the 90s.
Level 14 (or whatever) - Sewer infiltration: Sewer levels, despite their reputation, are almost always good in practice. You wont get visual stimulation, but devs always make them testing to navigate, usually offer some kind of puzzle, often a notable atmosphere, good combat setups, among other things. I am a fan, for what they are. This is the worst I have ever seen. You do nothing but follow a linear tunnel network with no gameplay in sight and listen to shitty dialogue for about 15 minutes. I would pick VTMB's unfinished janky sewer stretch to Hollywood over this any day.
Level 4 - Nazi Concentration Camp, Auszwitch if I recall because the devs are edgy woke degens: A """Stealth""" mission that is comprised of nothing but jumping through scripted hoops, and not like those old adventure or stealth games that demanded you be observant, investigate, and figure out the solution. A toddler could do it.
Occasionally, approximately 4 times maybe, the game shows it has some potential with a half-decent combat arena, such as when you finally leave the aforementioned sewers, but that's all, and it most certainly doesn't save the game from utter mediocrity and braindead status.
This is the first AAA game, back when those were allowed to be good, and one of the most significant games of the 90s. You've failed yourself. You wont get a deep intellectual story nor a super hardcore gameplay experience, however, you will get one of the most awe-inspiring and most ambitious games ever made nonetheless. The gameplay while not hardcore in difficulty is complex, engaging and multi-layered enough if you give it time to shine as it continually deepens, the story while it wont leave you philosophizing what can change the nature of man and strings together quite poorly when you try to add it all up, will take you on a incredible moving adventure to save the world filled with action, comedy. tragedy, cool events, exotic locales and so forth, the visuals are an absolute spectacle (just don't fixate on the shitty character models), and the four hour long soundtrack by the venerable Nobou Uematsu stands as one example of why he is the best video game composer ever to grace the medium, at absolutely no contest. Throw on top a bunch of charm by the bucket load. It's not a perfect game, the combat could be more challenging and a few parts may drag (especially early on), a few mini-games it may be better time spent watching paint dry, the writing wont win respect among intellectuals, but to at least not have given a fair shot to a 90s Final Fantasy is to not truly know gaming. Its budget was 10x larger than any other 90s game (except other 90s Final Fantasy games) and it shows, with absolutely wild stuff such as an entire mostly optional interactive theme park built within it (which still has relevance to the core gameplay via rewards).
There is also a mod that turns the game into a more hardcore experience and fulfills its combat potential named 'FF7 Hardtype', which I strongly recommend to anyone that has played the game before.
Good man. You know your stuff. One of the steepest examples of decline in the industry, and that's saying a lot when it's almost all decline in the past two decades. 13 is the point of rock bottom and no return.
I agree with all of your list except Fallout: New Vegas. One of few worthy high profile games post-decline, while flawed.
Well, and Doom Eternal is fairly decent for modern shit, though is certainly not Doom. It belongs in the same shitty sub-genre as Serious Sam/Painkiller/Hard Reset et al, and with that considered is the best of that subgenre. Not that that is hard to accomplish.
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