The Escapist : Zero Punctuation Game Reviews

pixelburp

"Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X." this week:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/689-Tom-Clancys-H-A-W-X

kaimera

HAWX

^^ post fail

Jilm

Good one this week.

humanji

The spoilers at the end were great.

Necronomicon

I was a little bored when he was talking highly about it, until he started ripping into Tom Clancy :pac:

pixelburp

This week, Siren Blood Curse:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/696-Siren-Blood-Curse

5uspect

Best ending in a long time!

noodler

Have this on the HDD but haven't gotten round to it yet. Is the review really spolerific?

Ciaran500

noodler wrote: »

Have this on the HDD but haven't gotten round to it yet. Is the review really spolerific?

Its fairly spoilerific.

SeantheMan

Must be where this seasons 24 got its idea ! or vice versa

Dyr

a classic

pixelburp

This week: The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/714-The-Chronicles-of-Riddick-Assault-on-Dark-Athena

Mr E

Valkyria Chronicles.

Safe to say, he didn't like it.
I know nothing about the game, but it sounds terrible from that review.

The general consensus is that its a very good game, so Yahtzee won't be on Sega's christmas card list this year.

Gummy Panda

its not working for me but i await Retro and Noodler into this thread.

/popcorn

BlitzKrieg

oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear.

Valkyria Chronicles is the only good game exclusive to the PS3, I am very much by his review but meh

edit: he didnt like the plot/characters urgo a big element of whats likable about the game goes out the window, sort of expected that.

wait til retro gets the news

Azza

Yeah Retro won't like this one bit at all....probably come on ranting about how he overlooked the mature story or something!

noodler

Gummy Panda wrote: »

its not working for me but i await Retro and Noodler into this thread.

/popcorn

Facepalm. Well thats why you shouldn't take the skinny little hick seriously.

Where do I begin? One, you can update guns many ways, tere are 3 types of every type of gun, therefore it can't be automatic because you have to decide which gun design you are going to upgrade. Hell, why not make all weapon buying in RPGs automatic whilst were at it?

Autosave huh? Wah-wah game was hard, I didn't have the foresight to save mid mission IN A TURN BASED GAME! and so died. Someone must be to blame and its not me so blame the game.

He complains about the enemy attacking when its your go but your own team are capable of sniping fire when its the CPU's turn. No mention of the gorgeous, and fairly unique, visuals and outstanding music either.

It is not portrayed as a good VS evil conflict-I want to say moreon this but I don't want to spoil anything for people who haven't finished it.

noodler

Awful review as is his style these days. Looking for cheap hits and won't get them by being nice. Its times like these I am pleased we have metacritic so people can get some kind of broader consensus so that the unfortunate ( Mr E) don't miss out on a truly outstanding game because of a impatient man with no taste who makes a living trying to shock.

Okay I am done, I'm tagging you in Retro.

pixelburp

But Yahtzee's not meant to be a games critic, I thought that was clear ages ago. He's a games equivalent of someone like Charlie Brooker; the "last angry man" who makes cranky broadsides whilst linking in some broader point about the medium he loves / hates. Ok, this weeks was poor, but I suspect that's more because he's stuck in the weekly routine of having to review a game.

L31mr0d

thing is ZP's a biased gamer. He likes FPS's, platformers and easy to play games with little to no learning curve. He's going to hate WRPG, JRPG, MMORPG, RTS... etc, its a given.

I'd be in the same boat as ZP tbh, I hate RPG's, I play video games for story as much as I go to have a kick around to listen to the goalie tell me about his weekend.

In saying that, I'll give VC a go, once my rental copy arrives, as I like turn based strategy, the demo didn't impress, but then I suppose playing 1 mission of X-Com wouldn't give you the sense of the overall game either

Retr0gamer

Yep not happy about this and it's very obvious he didn't play more than an hour of it. Firstly the game isn't a japanese RPG. It's actually a complete rehaul of the advance wars type games. But because it's got anime style graphics it's a JRPG to yahtzee.

I have to agree with most JRPGs having cliched storylines that are pretty much interchangeable but again valkyria chronicles isn't a about a group of people saving the world from destruction. It's a war story that parallels the events of world war 2 right down to the nasty stuff. And you really have no soul if you get to the halfway point of the game and aren't emotionally affected.

The evil western empire. Again it's obvious he didn't play the game enough because it's excellently portrayed that nobody is truly evil, apart from one particularly nasty enemy general. If he played enough of it he would have got to the bits

were in a wonderful scene alicia and welkin look after a wounded enemy soldier and would have learnt of the plot of the eastern empire to take over gallia as well

. And Welkin is drafted in as a militia squadron commander because he showed great leadership skills during the evacuation of his hometown and he was technically in the army since all able bodied men and women are drafted into the militia since they are trained in the armed forces during school. He makes it sound like it was a happy coincidence.

There's plenty of inaccuracies about the gameplay as well. I can't see how you could call the excellent streamlined interface cluttered, it really is very simple to use. You can only duck behind sandbags but other cover works less effectively and it's an obvious gameplay decision. Guns can be upgraded in 2 to 3 different paths and he would have found that out if he played past the halfway point. The whole enemy shooting you as you move is genius since it forces you to take cover while you move into position and your troops can do it too and adds a layer of strategy and visual flair since you can pin the enemy down and set up crossfire traps as can the enemy. And it's his own fault for not using the save function after every turn although I never used it and enjoyed the challenge.

However none of those are his biggest sin, this is:

Mr E wrote:

I know nothing about the game, but it sounds terrible from that review.

It's all well and good ripping the piss out of a good game for giggles. However this isn't Super Mario Galaxy. This is an overlooked gem that is selling far less than it deserves to. With a review like this yahtzee is going to put a lot of people off buying this game and they are going to miss out on probably the best PS3 title available at the moment and further dash the chances of a sequel arriving and even give the excellent Sega Overworks team an undeserved difficult time due to low sales.

Edit: Should I spoil my post my adding the M word?

pixelburp

Ack now I think people are over-rating his importance; the viewing public aren't that likely to not play a game because Yahtzee says so.

Besides, he hates RPGs of any form, so what? It's going to colour his opnions regardless of accuracy of review. I know people who hate hate hate RTS games but I don't get sniffy about it

johnny_ultimate

Next week: Yhatzee revisits the Darkness and gives the game his best rating ever (seven thumbs down).
Retr0 goes to Australia and murders him.



Edit: But interesting point about attacking smaller games - he does have quite a bit of influence (well, internet influence) and should he really rip apart games that are struggling for sales (given he is an independent developer himself?).

NeoKubrick

noodler wrote: »

Awful review as is his style these days. Looking for cheap hits and won't get them by being nice. Its times like these I am pleased we have metacritic so people can get some kind of broader consensus so that the unfortunate ( Mr E) don't miss out on a truly outstanding game because of a impatient man with no taste who makes a living trying to shock.

That's always been his style, though? You can't fault the production of his videos, but he's always gone for the sensational and rarely listens to the call of logic or reason, and if the punchline for the majority of jokes is an expletive, your writing wouldn't be approved of by Woody Allen. He appeals to the lowest common denominator: counter-culture.

Still, it's not his fault that gamers flock like 'tards to hear him preach these 'edgey' opinions for them to consume, and then fart out in discussions on forums, blogs etc: he certainly put counter-culture up for the sale, but he sure wasn't the fool who bought it.

gearoidof

mindless of all the yahtzee(!) hate, I still have a chuckle at his chest high wall joke every time ^.^

Azza

I wasn't emotionally affected by it all. But then again unlike some fools I have embraced Pyscho Power!

Its a great game bar 2 flaws which where missed in the review.

1. Its not Deus Ex
2. It lacked Pyscho Crushers

Otherwise it was very good!

Mr E

Can I just qualify my original comments by saying that I don't have a PS3?
(So even if he said it was the best game ever, I wouldn't be getting it anyway).

Jip

Lads, taking note of ZPs 'reviews' when deciding to buy a game is the equivalent of reading the Sun for the news. You just don't do it. It's entertainment, that's all. However I'm equally entertained by all the angry videogamers reaction above, the exact reaction I'm sure ZP sets out to provoke.

pixelburp

Indeed, the "Here's why yahtzee if wrong" point by point rebuttal is kind of amusing in itself

Otacon

While I would never use one of his 'reviews' as a basis for buying/not buying a game, for many, his opinion is considered in high regard.

He has complained many times about generic sequels, unoriginal premises and Japanese games in general. When he then slates a game that, if anything, displays none of these faults, and possibly stunts the game exposure and sales even further, I just can't understand why he did this.

It wasn't even for the humour as it wasn't funny.