General gaming discussion

johnny_ultimate

Just throwing it out there: Arkham City and Arkham Knight are well made but incredibly dull games that took what was special about Asylum and tragically undermined it by adhering to an industry-standard open world structure. Also have the worst, most over-indulgent reliance on collectibles in almost any game ever made.

*whistles and pours gasoline on floor as I walk out of the thread, haphazardly hurling a match over my shoulder in the process*

kunst nugget

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Just throwing it out there: Arkham City and Arkham Knight are well made but incredibly dull games that took what was special about Asylum and tragically undermined it by adhering to an industry-standard open world structure. Also have the worst, most over-indulgent collectibles in almost any game ever made.

*whistles and pours gasoline on floor as I walk out of the thread, haphazardly hurling a match over my shoulder in the process*

They were a chore to play. Ironically, Origins was much closer in spirit to Asylum and a better game as a result but it was so broken when it was released that it's all but forgotten about now. I bought it about a year after it came out and when everything was fixed on it and it was great.

gizmo

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Just throwing it out there: Arkham City and Arkham Knight are well made but incredibly dull games that took what was special about Asylum and tragically undermined it by adhering to an industry-standard open world structure. Also have the worst, most over-indulgent reliance on collectibles in almost any game ever made.

*whistles and pours gasoline on floor as I walk out of the thread, haphazardly hurling a match over my shoulder in the process*

From the perspective of someone who just finished Assassins Creed: Unity, I respectfully disagree...



EDIT: Oh, the Unity map above is missing at least 25 more icons for the Companion Missions.

I also collected everything in Arkham City and regret nothing...

Zero-Cool

Asylum is definitely the best of the series. Origins gets blasted online but i really enjoyed it. City and Knight were great but yeah, the Riddler trophies took the absolute piss. The car was overused in Knight also with too many puzzles needing it.

I dunno if I'd be too bothered with a Justice League game but purely because i have no interest in JL.

Zero-Cool

gizmo wrote: »

I also collected everything in Arkham City and regret nothing...

I got the platinum in Asylum, City and Knight and then again in Return to Arkham for Asylum. Origins had a trophy for getting the highest rank in their multiplayer mode so feck that.

J. Marston

Thought about it before and Joker actually killing Bruce Wayne's Batman could be a great starting point for a reboot. Have Robin or Batgirl (or both, two playable characters) take the mantle looking for vengeance. One might want Joker dead, one might want him imprisoned. Ultimately you'll have a choice to make. Call it Arkham: A Death in the Family.

Or if you want to keep Kevin Conroy, go with a Batman Beyond setting and Terry McGinnis taking over.

Varik

Zero-Cool wrote: »

I got the platinum in Asylum, City and Knight and then again in Return to Arkham for Asylum. Origins had a trophy for getting the highest rank in their multiplayer mode so feck that.

I've to load up my PS3 to finish it but have all but the origin trophies bar the last set of challenge rooms. PS3 Firmware corrupted so can fix it just to swap another HDD to reinstall and then put the old one back but not been bothers. Online was great when it worked but you'd get kicked for no reason and games would end as most of the players got kicked.

Still have to go back for most of Knights.

J. Marston wrote: »

Or if you want to keep Kevin Conroy, go with a Batman Beyond setting and Terry McGinnis taking over.

All the CW superhero stuff went downhill, but still smile when some of the characters from the future says schway

Penn

gizmo wrote: »

From the perspective of someone who just finished Assassins Creed: Unity, I respectfully disagree...


EDIT: Oh, the Unity map above is missing at least 25 more icons for the Companion Missions.

I also collected everything in Arkham City and regret nothing...

The sight that killed my interest in the Assassin's Creed Franchise for several years. Got a few hours into Unity, saw that, and just couldn't bring myself to go through it again.

However, I also collected everything in Arkham City and I too regret nothing. Arkham Asylum is the better game overall, no doubt about it. It has a much better balance. But I loved Arkham City. The map and interiors were just the right size, the collectibles were well spread out and a decent proportion of the Riddler Trophies were well designed in terms of puzzles, and gliding around the city always felt awesome. Origins and Knight went too big with it then.

Asylum was the better game, but I always had more fun with City.

sweetie

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Oh, it's the Odallus dev. They nailed that game, very excited for this then!

Anyone tried this on the Switch, not many reviews online and its about €5 from the US store and i'm going on holidays today so could be a perfect pool game?

pixelburp

Arkham Asylum is legitimately one of THE great video games, period; tightly paced, a great story & characters, and polished to a mirror shine; arguably the only blip was the very last boss, which I don't think anybody thought worked. City was the obvious, natural progression for the series, given that first game did dabble with "open world", albeit more Metroidvania than GTA. The sequel did work in fits & starts - the Mr. Freeze boss battle remains one of the great boss battles in gaming IMO - but like any open world game, the pacing just went out the window. There was something viscerally fun just flying from rooftop to rooftop though, and when elements clicked, City was just as good as that original game.

Kiith

I actually preferred City to Asylum. Not sure what it was, but Asylum just didn't draw me in as much, and i remember hating having to use the detective mode constantly. Not sure how constant it actually was, but it seemed like a lot.

Retr0gamer

pixelburp wrote: »

Arkham Asylum is legitimately one of THE great video games, period; tightly paced, a great story & characters, and polished to a mirror shine; arguably the only blip was the very last boss, which I don't think anybody thought worked. City was the obvious, natural progression for the series, given that first game did dabble with "open world", albeit more Metroidvania than GTA. The sequel did work in fits & starts - the Mr. Freeze boss battle remains one of the great boss battles in gaming IMO - but like any open world game, the pacing just went out the window. There was something viscerally fun just flying from rooftop to rooftop though, and when elements clicked, City was just as good as that original game.

It's good but I wouldn't class it as one of the greats. The stealth is great but the actual hand to hand combat is rubbish and the boss fights are all terrible. Mr. Freeze boss battle in city wasn't anything special considering we live in a world where Gunstar Heroes, Metal Gear, Contra, Radiant Silvergun and hundreds more I can list with actual good boss battles.

It's a good game well worth playing, but feel it gets its flaws overlooked as it was the first good super hero game since Spiderman on the PS1.

pixelburp

Well, that's told me.

Asylum good, City grand, Knight crap

Retr0gamer

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

Asylum good, City grand, Knight crap

Works for me.

Penn

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

Asylum good, City grand, Knight crap

You forgot Ori...gi...Loading...Loading...Loading...Loading...ns worst.

Shiminay

Knight, aside from not working at all on PC at launch, decided that they were going to feature the Batmobile and it was without question the worst feature in the game. They were clearly out of ideas and I suspect pressure from Warner to try and wring every last penny out of the franchise saw the half-arsed job they did with Origins become even more half-arsed (remember they admitted that it was too expensive to fix for PC and that they abandoned it meaning anyone could get a refund, but only if bought directly from Valve) with Knight. I lament the fact that no one played the frankly exceptional multiplayer that Origins had - the premise was so good. 3v3 of Joker and Bane goons battling it out with Batman and Robin skulking in the rafters taking out both groups. Easily one of the best "uneven" multiplayer games I've played.

I'm looking at picking up either Divinity 2 or Pillars of Eternity 1 in the Steam sale. I know Divinity is supposed to be fairly lighthearted and that's turning me off a bit tbh.
Would I be better off with PoE so? I don't mind a bit of lightheartedness but I'm in the mood for something more serious in tone at the moment.

Retr0gamer

Go for pillars so.

Or check out Underrail which is a criminally underrated RPG.

Doctor Nick

I really enjoyed all Arkham games. Didn't mind the Batmobile in Knight and I'm not usually a fan of driving games. In fact, I enjoyed Knight so much I bought the extra DLC missions and did all Riddler side stuff for the true ending. I'd love to see another Arkham game. Might be the game that finally makes me stop playing Souls/Bloodborne/Sekiro.

Kiith

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

I'm looking at picking up either Divinity 2 or Pillars of Eternity 1 in the Steam sale. I know Divinity is supposed to be fairly lighthearted and that's turning me off a bit tbh.
Would I be better off with PoE so? I don't mind a bit of lightheartedness but I'm in the mood for something more serious in tone at the moment.

For me, Divinity 2 is a far far better game. POE1 was really tough to get through, with my multiple attempts only getting maybe 5-6 hours in. POE2 was an improvement, that i mean to go back to.

Divinity 2 caught me immediately, and kept me hooked for 98 hours. It's better in pretty much every way. Story isn't that light either...especially not some of it.

Doctor Nick

Cake of Tremendous Power wrote: »

I'm looking at picking up either Divinity 2 or Pillars of Eternity 1 in the Steam sale. I know Divinity is supposed to be fairly lighthearted and that's turning me off a bit tbh.
Would I be better off with PoE so? I don't mind a bit of lightheartedness but I'm in the mood for something more serious in tone at the moment.

Are these both turn based combat?

Kiith

Doctor Nick wrote: »

Are these both turn based combat?

Divinity 2 is turn based, but POE1/2 are real time with pause. POE2 added turn based in a later patch.

Anyone who may be turned off by either, i was a die hard real time with pause fan until Divinity 2 showed me turn based can be done really well. I'd almost say i prefer it now, though i'm still not 100% sure about that :pac:

Doctor Nick

Kiith wrote: »

Divinity 2 is turn based, but POE1/2 are real time with pause. POE2 added turn based in a later patch.

Anyone who may be turned off by either, i was a die hard real time with pause fan until Divinity 2 showed me turn based can be done really well. I'd almost say i prefer it now, though i'm still not 100% sure about that :pac:

Haven't played too many turn based games and really struggled with the few I have. Felt they took me out of the action. Suppose I just didn't understand how to play them. I'd heard good things about Divinity 1 and 2 and have been tempted to try them but always worried they might be turn based. I might try pick up a highly rated turn based game like Persona (or even Divinity) to see if I can get into them. I hear great things about them so I must be missing something

Retr0gamer

Turn based is always better than real time. Just a lot of popular turn based games do it badly.

Find me a real time game with better combat than xcom of FF Tactics and I'll change my mind

Retr0gamer

Sega totally ripping off the legendary Actraiser... which I'm ok for. I heard yuzo koshiro is even doing the music like he did for Actraiser

https://youtu.be/199txOkVIqQ

Potential-Monke

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Find me a real time game with better combat than xcom of FF Tactics and I'll change my mind

Subjective, but God of War, or, well, anything not turn based.

Retr0gamer

Potential-Monke wrote: »

Subjective, but God of War, or, well, anything not turn based.

God of War? You could have mentioned a game with a better battle system like a Platinum game. God of War is fine but didn't get the hype for it. It's a big improvement on the old games for sure but don't think it lives up stuff like Bayonetta and Revengeance. Switching attacks due to arbitrary enemy weaknesses always annoyed me, the same thing killed DMC for me. The best Platinum games (because they've made a few clunkers as well) allow you to be way more freeform in attacks.

Anyway I meant in RPGs terms. So try again :P The only battle system in real time that has come close to matching the strategy and tactics of a turn based RPG have been the Xenoblade and Last Story games. Infinity engine type games can be done well. But they still don't come close to the likes of the best SMT games, Grandia or the aforementioned games.

Zero-Cool

HA Greg Miller got banned from E3 2020

https://twitter.com/GameOverGreggy/status/1144278969736318977?s=19

Potential-Monke

Retr0gamer wrote: »

God of War? You could have mentioned a game with a better battle system like a Platinum game. God of War is fine but didn't get the hype for it. It's a big improvement on the old games for sure but don't think it lives up stuff like Bayonetta and Revengeance. Switching attacks due to arbitrary enemy weaknesses always annoyed me, the same thing killed DMC for me. The best Platinum games (because they've made a few clunkers as well) allow you to be way more freeform in attacks.

Suppose it depends on what you are looking for in combat, and me thinks you and me have very different ideas of what's better and what's not! Checking out the Platinum games list, I can see they made Vanquish which was lauded by a lot of people but I found it utterly crap. Similar to Revengeance, didn't enjoy that either, and you also mentioned Bayonetta (so DMC is included) and I wasn't a fan of any of them.

Maybe I have a very strict line between fun and frustrating, as I found what people think are the poorer combat games, like the original God of War, are better for me. And as simplistic as the first 2 Darksiders combat systems were, I much preferred them to the aforementioned games.Maybe I just like casual combat, because the likes of Dark Souls and Vanquish are not my cuppa. Meh.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Anyway I meant in RPGs terms. So try again :P The only battle system in real time that has come close to matching the strategy and tactics of a turn based RPG have been the Xenoblade and Last Story games. Infinity engine type games can be done well. But they still don't come close to the likes of the best SMT games, Grandia or the aforementioned games.

And again, I think this is where we differ. You obviously like strategic combat, and I prefer all out balls to the wall get in your face button mashing (but mashed in a particular order, not just mash everything). The recent God of War refined that system imo, and I've been told on Give me God of War it's fairly challenging. Definitely my GOTY last year, and most likely the best game on PS4 right now imo. Also, I think RPG has taken on a broader term these days too, apparently RPG is for tabletop and RPVG/CRPG is for video games. But I digress, I would consider God of War an RPG right now, because it has elements of it. Not as much as others, but still has elements. I also consider Horizon: Zero Dawn an RPG, but I suppose more the sub-category of ARPG.