Deadly Premonition ?

irishash

I dont know if it has been mentioned on this tread before, but giantbomb picked this game as their last endurance run (where they play a game from start to finish, with amusing commentary).

Worth a look if you want to see what the game is about before you pick it up. Just go to the video page and pick the endurance run tab. There are 2 different runthroughs. As other people have said, it is a cheap(ish) buy, and a bit of a cult classic already.

pablomakaveli

Just started playing this yesterday. Obviously the combat is awful but the game does have a certain charm to it and York alone is enough reason to play it.

I'm at the lumbermill now though i haven't done a lot of roaming around yet so i might do a bit of that later.

tallaghtmick

i hate you all ive never wanted a game so bad lol

Shryke

I just looked this up and have a perverse inclination to buy it.

Grumpypants

pablomakaveli wrote: »

Just started playing this yesterday. Obviously the combat is awful but the game does have a certain charm to it and York alone is enough reason to play it.

I'm at the lumbermill now though i haven't done a lot of roaming around yet so i might do a bit of that later.

Once you get the sub machine gun the combat is a lot better.

pablomakaveli

Grumpypants wrote: »

Once you get the sub machine gun the combat is a lot better.

I'd actually just picked it up before i stopped playing last night but haven't used it yet. Sounds good so.

Retr0gamer

Wall crawlers later on are a pain in the hole. I'd advise looking up how to beat them.

johnny_ultimate

Just played the first hour of this. The Twin Peaks influence is on that fine line between homage and out right theft. The combat is a pain in the hole, the graphics and character animation PS2 quality (often sub that) and the voice acting iffy. Yet... there is something odd driving me forward. The strange atmosphere, the bizarre narrative, the hypnotic dream sequences. These are going to keep me engaged, just a shame there's so much damn shooting in between those bits!

Syferus

Got it before Christmas and threw a few hours into it over a few days last week. It's certainly queer, in the strictest sense of the word.

It's less Twin Peaks inspired and more wholesale rip-off, York even borrows talking to himself and having bizarre food fetishes from Agent Cooper. It feels like Hideo Kojima and Yu Suzuki jointly tring to make a horror game, but without much of either's deftness of touch or talent.

It's archaic to the point of exasperation; controls in every facet are poor and transitions and animations are as painfully slow and unskipable as in the early Resident Evil games.

In no way is it without charm and some of the scenes so far have been genuinely funny (and not in a Mystery Science Theater sort of way) and it's hard not to have a smidge of admiration for a developer that sets out to make a game so utterly over-ambitious when compared to their budget and ability to deliver on the concept they chose.

It's wonderfully broken and beguiling as a throw-back to older games but I do get the feeling it's somewhat of the sort of game you should play for a while to get the idea of and then just set it aside rather than simply ploughing through it in it's totality and perhaps hating it for all its failings, instead of remembering it for its quirkiness. Whether I'll heed my own advice is another matter entirely.

Retr0gamer

The story will keep you going. It gets crazier and compelling as you go along and it's hard not to get invested in some of the characters. Also the start button is your friend. You can use it to skip most incidental animations including the annoying rotating item screens when you pick up items.

Grayditch

The wall crawlers. Ugh. One after the other. They become so easy to bat when you learn the formula, but there was no need for the amount of the b******s.

pablomakaveli

I've been playing this for a while and im on chapter 14. I've been trying to do more of the side quests but when i was looking through the list i noticed some of the people who give side quests are characters who have died earlier in the game. Is there anyway to access these quests now or are they locked off for the rest of the game?

Retr0gamer

The only way to do it is from the load game screen you can select previous chapters and can then do the sidequests while replaying the chapter again. Only thing is you can't save until you've finished the chapter so you will have to play it in one sitting.

johnny_ultimate

I'm definitely getting drawn into this despite the plethora of issues I have with it. Things definitely improve with the sub-machine gun

(got the infinite one last night, so that's a relief)

although combat is still an irritant. I also hate the QTEs in this, some of which you are bound to fail first time.

But the cheapness in other aspects is endearing. The beyond crappy animation has given me plenty of laughs: a highlight was York's reaction when the shopkeeper started telling him about the spiritual map, or Thomas' shocked reactions to almost everything anyone says to him The storytelling could probably do with some editing, but there's plenty of strangeness, colourful characters and the likes to keep you involved. And yeah York is probably the best protagonist of a game in some time. But it's the whistling theme that keeps a particular grin on my face: such a brilliantly random composition.

I like it, Zach.

Retr0gamer

Just beat it there. My god is the ending good. Probably one of my favourite game endings ever.

pablomakaveli

I just finished it as well. The ending felt a bit drawn out with all the boss battles but i loved the ending. Can't believe the game was only rated 15 though. It was a bit gory at times.

Can't be bothered going back now and doing the rest of the side missions. Might leave those for another time.

dmcdante

Hi Guys did you finish it on hard or normal want to play it again on hard just want to know if its really hard or not a bit hard but the ending was great was not expecting much from the game when i got it but i sat down one day and could not stop playing it

Grayditch

I finished it on hard, as the explanations at the start lead me to believe I'd be missing out on stuff if I picked normal.

pablomakaveli

When i started playing i chose easy as the normal difficulty said it would put more focus on combat. Having heard the combat was the worst part of the game i chose easy so the combat wouldn't impact much on my enjoyment of the game.

If i ever replay it though i'd probably play ot on a harder difficulty.

johnny_ultimate

Finished it there, a good ending if slightly soured by the strange inclusion of

fairly standard bosses

in the last hurdle - anything in this game that requires precision aiming is a no-no IMO :pac: But other than that, I'm sort of sad to leave Greenvale and the cast of characters. The petrol station guy and his constipated walk. Michael and his rhyming, or 'so says Mr. Stewart'. Keith 'epileptic fit' Ingram.

Surprised at the way they graphically dispatched Emily, didn't think they'd go through with it!

But most of all it's a shame to leave

Francis 'York / Zach' Morgan, who makes a good claim to most charismatic protagonist in gaming for some time.

I shall constantly be checking to see if there's any F.K. in the coffee for years hence.

Now if you excuse me, I have some whistling to do Zach.

koneko

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The only way to do it is from the load game screen you can select previous chapters and can then do the sidequests while replaying the chapter again. Only thing is you can't save until you've finished the chapter so you will have to play it in one sitting.

There are issues with replaying chapters if you have a key in your possession that is needed to advance, so I'd be careful with this. I ran into one key-glitch too
Going to replay this on Hard soon as well, can't get the game out of my head.

Damn, it really is a wonderful game.
Isn't that right, Zach?

o1s1n

I'm a bit late to the party on this one, but picked it up there Friday before last and finished it today.

What a game. The main story was so compelling that I pretty much skipped every side quest just to see what would unfold next. Sometimes it felt so badly made and then BAM, there would be an absolutely incredible scene that made the hard slog through all those annoying QTEs and fights worth it.

I now have that empty feeling after finishing a great game where you really miss the characters/world...haven't experienced that in a very long time!

jaykhunter

After hearing such divisive reviews on this i decided to drop 17 bucks on it and give it a go. Got about 2 hours into it and wow, the controls are just so broken.

I hear ya gotta push thru the opening bits because as bad as the game is technically, the awful script is just the gaming equivalent of "the room"!

Is this true? If so, how long into the game do i have to trudge through to get to the awful goodness?

Retr0gamer

jaykhunter wrote: »

I hear ya gotta push thru the opening bits because as bad as the game is technically, the awful script is just the gaming equivalent of "the room"!

Is this true? If so, how long into the game do i have to trudge through to get to the awful goodness?

The 'awful' script isn't actually awful at all, it's one of the best written games in a long time. It's pushing though the gameplay which is a bit crap to uncover the next part of the story which makes it worth it. Also the pay off at the end is well worth it. It's funny and weird but intriguing and it does all come together in the end.

The opening shooting section is a pretty bad way to open the game. It's only about 40 minutes long but once you get out of that section you can start to enjoy the story.

jaykhunter

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The 'awful' script isn't actually awful at all, it's one of the best written games in a long time

Oh c'mon, there's a difference between a well-written prose and a piece of shít that's so bad it's highly entertaining!

I'll push on with it next week and hopefully reach the zenith you have

Retr0gamer

It's meant to be funny and zany though. It comes across as goofy but it's totally intentional. It's far from the tain wreck that The Room is. I think the dialogue is really well written and the acting ranges from acceptable to outstanding for some characters. Play it a bit more and you'll see there's method behind themadness

calex71

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The 'awful' script isn't actually awful at all, it's one of the best written games in a long time. It's pushing though the gameplay which is a bit crap to uncover the next part of the story which makes it worth it.

Quoting that makes it sound like L.A Noire

Wooden Jesus

jaykhunter wrote: »

Oh c'mon, there's a difference between a well-written prose and a piece of shít that's so bad it's highly entertaining!

I'll push on with it next week and hopefully reach the zenith you have

Id say if you dont enjoy it from the start you wont get into it at all.
After the town hall meeting where you meet most of the characters is where it gets good though.
The bit really will be make or break for most people.

Grayditch

This game isn't for everyone, the same way a lot of movies are not. It doesn't have mass, mass appeal. If you don't like the quirky humour or the story, all you're left with, essentially is a boring game with shoddy controls, so I can see where some people are coming from. I am not of that opinion, I wish there were more games like this.

5uspect

I think I'll try to pick this up this weekend, or after I finish L.A. Noire. I'm a huge Twin Peaks fan and I quite enjoyed Alan Wake with all it's faults.