This is an experiment. I don't want engagement to go down. I like how many people have been writing big, beautiful, critical impressions about various games. I like other people reading them and then having a discussion with you about them. And, in that respect, I see the value of having these discussions centralized in an established thread that people are constantly posting in.
But if this thread can thrive on its own user engagement-wise, then it might be better for this and Recently Beaten Games to function as their own independent threads.
I'll be posting my own impressions here for a while to see what happens. It's not like we can't go back to the old thread if things don't work out.
EDIT: Just to be clear. This isn't JUST for posting reviews. Like in the old thread, we can and should discuss our feelings on games other people have reviewed.
Also, to be clear, a "review" can be whatever you want it to be, so long as there's a bit of substance to it. If you can summarize your feelings in a paragraph or less, it's probably better left to the Recently Beaten Games thread.
DOUBLE EDIT:
Reviews currently hosted in this thread as of 02/14/23:
Shin Megami Tensei
Platform: GBA
Reviewer: Ralizah
Post #2,054 Read Review
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Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne HD Remaster
Platform: Switch
Reviewer: Ralizah
Post #2,153 Read Review
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Shin Megami Tensei V
Platform: Switch
Reviewer: Ralizah
Post #2,203 and #2,236 Read Impressions and Read Review
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Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga and Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 2
Platform: PS2
Reviewer: Ralizah
Post #1,114 and #1,346 Read Impressions and Read Review
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The Simpsons Game
Platform: PS3
Reviewer: RogerRoger
Post #5 Read Review
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Sly 2: Band of Thieves
Platform: PS Vita
Reviewer: crimsontadpoles
Post #841 Read Review
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Sonic 3D Blast (a.k.a. Sonic 3D: Flickies' Island)
Platform: Genesis (a.k.a. MegaDrive)
Reviewer: RogerRoger
Post #1,043 Read Review
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Sonic Adventure DX
Platform: PC
Reviewer: Buizel
Post #1,743 Read Review
Great Jade Cocoon 2 Review. The Pokémon-esque Divine Beasts sound like an interesting feature.
Shame that the music is so poor. It made me think how important music actually is to me in an RPG, especially older ones where it helps to convey moods and emotions that the visuals are unable to.
Nice. If I can come up with a good long form review, I don't mind using this thread, and I'm down with discussion if I'm familiar enough with the game someone else talks about.
"We don't get to choose how we start in this life. Real 'greatness' is what you do with the hand you're dealt." -Victor Sullivan "Building the future and keeping the past alive are one and the same thing." -Solid Snake
Apologies for breaking in this new topic with such a mediocre game, but...
***
The Simpsons Game
PlayStation3 / November 2007
Can a parody of shameless, lazy cash-in games still be a shameless, lazy cash-in game in and of itself, without undermining its own point? Or does it just reinforce the joke?
That's essentially the question at the heart of The Simpsons Game, a straightforward platformer that won't keep you busy beyond six hours and leans heavily on its send-up of games and gaming culture in order to cut corners. There are plenty of neat moments and laugh-out-loud gags peppered throughout but, when you stop to think about it, you're essentially playing a poor imitation of its betters, a hollow shell doing trade on your adoration of a global mega-franchise.
Giving you control of each Simpson family member (minus Grandpa, of course) presents an opportunity for varied approaches to gameplay, but it's less smart and more S-M-R-T when you get beyond the initial novelty of it all. Bart can glide, grapple and shoot his slingshot as Bartman. Homer can transform into various blob-shaped states (gummi, helium, etc.) to roll around like a wrecking ball. Marge uses a megaphone to nag NPCs into action, a'la Pikmin, and can send Maggie into various vents, whilst Lisa can summon the giant "Hand of Buddha" to move objects around. It all sounds quite diverse but in reality, it just leads to somewhat repetitive busywork as you switch around, trying to hold back waves of respawning enemies as you figure out simplistic puzzle objectives.
Invariably, you'll be interrupted by a Comic Book Guy pop-up stating that what you're doing is "real original" as he ticks the gaming cliché you're currently undertaking off a long list. It's here where questioning the classic Simpsons parody tone kicks in; it's funny that the game recognises crates, lava pits, re-used enemy models and springboards as hackneyed tropes, but you're then given eighteen shallow levels of them to play through. Oh sure, blasting through to the credits won't take you very long at all, but it's still a heck of a lot longer than your average twenty-minute episode, where the gags don't have the time to wear thin.
To try and combat this potential fatigue, The Simpsons Game uses every trick in its repertoire, with recycled jokes and characters from the television show papering over the gaps between its new gaming content. This is, just as it sounds, a mixed bag. A surprise appearance from Kelsey Grammer's Sideshow Bob falls as flat as the rake he predictably steps on, but then a cameo from Will Wright (creator of SimCity and The Sims) hits a solid note, feeling like one of the franchise's better celebrity guest spots. As everything rushes towards a muddled conclusion, the parody levels reach breaking point and there's an odd disconnect from the final cutscene, but there's plenty in here for gamers to chuckle at. If you took all the new animated content created for the game and merged it together into an extended "let's make fun of videogames this week" episode of the show, it'd probably work better.
But as it stands, you're forced to wrestle with an obtusely unresponsive camera (which the game jokes about, and it isn't funny) to see it all through and, despite the short run-time, I'm not sure it's really worthwhile. Some levels work better than others; there's a three-part Medal of Homer mission which is pretty neat, especially considering it uses the actual Medal of Honor soundtrack, and a trip to Japan packs in a lot of the better references, but longer play sessions unfortunately began to test my patience. I thought I'd have it all finished within a couple days, but it took me over a week, playing in far shorter bursts than I expected to... and this is coming from somebody who has a high tolerance for the Simpson family. That tolerance varies a lot from person to person nowadays, and the franchise knows it, as betrayed by the option to decrease the amount of one-liners spouted during gameplay.
So perhaps the self-deprecating humour softens the blow, but the general lack of effort is still a direct hit to any potential long-term enjoyment. The Simpsons Game is exactly what it tries to shine a light on, crossing the limit of what is permissible in parody around halfway through its runtime.
And in the YouTube age, I can't recommend tracking down a copy over merely watching a Let's Play.
@RogerRoger Nice review, I read all the way to the end. I still want to play the game one day though! I think I only had the Wii when it came out and it wasn't top of my list when I eventually got a ps3.
@ralphdibny Thank you! Should you ever track down a copy, it'd be interesting to see whether you agree. I think hardcore Simpsons fans would definitely have see a better picture than I've painted above, but I was trying to separate out my nostalgic fanboyism from a more critical analysis.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@RogerRoger Nice write up. It's been a long time since I played the PS2 version, but remember being a bit disappointed with it. Released long after the excellent Simpsons Hit & Run, The Simpsons Game felt mediocre by comparison. I still enjoyed it, but both the gameplay and the humour was hit and miss in it.
@crimsontadpoles Thanks, and yes, The Simpsons: Hit & Run is a genuinely great game, so it's a shame to see this as somewhat of a backwards step. I played the PS2 version back in the day as well, and it's telling how much of it I'd completely forgotten about, whereas I can still hum the music from all of the Hit & Run hubs. If we could still rent games from Blockbuster Video, I could recommend it a whole lot easier.
The recent rumours of a Hit & Run remaster have me drooling like Homer over a doughnut box. If they could do that, and do it well, I'd be there day one.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
I think what this topic needed was a nice short and sweet review to get it started @RogerRoger!
I bought my son this for PS2... And... uhh... Least it's not The Simpson's Skateboarding?
Thanks @mookysam! The battle system in two is pretty unique in the switching sides and having to protect the protagonist from harm
The first has a more traditional fight system like pokemon except in that Levant can actually attack as well if you switch to him. Though it's kinda pointless...
@RogerRoger great review Rog. The Simpsons have been out staying their welcome for years, Homer the drunk dad, Marge the stay at home clever wife, the stupid and naughty boy, the matilda like daughter, the belligerent grandad. It's all very 1990s.
PS3 Megathread 2019: The Last of Us
Multiplat 2018: Horizon Zero Dawn
Nintendo 2017: Super Mario Bros 3
Playstation 2016: Uncharted 2
Multiplat 2015: Final Fantasy 7
@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy Thank you and yes, there are far worse Simpsons games out there!
@themcnoisy Cheers, buddy. I think you're right; it was around the time of this game, around 2007 and 2008, that I fell off the Simpsons bandwagon. There was this and the movie, which was better than I'd expected, but I don't think I've watched a single new episode since. I tried once and it was so bad, I switched it off after five minutes.
Ah well... at least I still have my DVDs of its golden age!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
Crash Bandicoot Via the Crash N.Sane Trilogy for PS4
I played this title over the course of 4 days. I achieved 80% completion with ten gems (Obtaining the Red coloured one among nine clear gems) and beat the final boss obtaining one of two endings (Though I've collected all the gems in my original play through two years ago)
I didn't replay any levels and finished the game with a cool 91 lives.
Whoa! You poor lucky sods are gonna see two more of these in the future!
A Little Background
The initial concept for Crash came about in August 1994 as Jason Rubin and Andy Gavin of Naughty Dog began their move from Boston to Los Angeles to meet with Mark Cerny of Universal Interactive Studios.
Naughty Dog had signed up to do three more games for Universal Interactive and were on their way to pitch Way of The Warrior.
During the road trip Rubin and Gavin visited a number of arcades and noticed that racing, fighting and shooting games had all started to transition to full 3D ... the pair turned to their favourite genre, the character based platformer.
The Sonic's a*s game was born (A joke between them as you'd be staring at Crash's butt the entire time).
Of course it ended up being called Crash Bandicoot instead (Though Willie The Wombat was a placeholder name... And other names included Dash, Bash and Smash)
The wikipedia entry for this title was actually quite interesting to read and I'm sure there's been an article or two about it before... this bit in particular raised some eyebrows
In a continuing attempt by Universal Interactive to take credit for Crash Bandicoot , Naughty Dog was told that it was not "allowed" to go to the first Electronic Entertainment Expo. In addition, there were leaked copies of the temporary box cover and press materials for the Electronic Entertainment Expo, upon which the Naughty Dog logo was not found on the box art, in violation of the contract between Naughty Dog and Universal Interactive, was omitted. In response, Jason Rubin drafted and printed 1,000 copies of a document entitled "Naughty Dog, creator and developer of Crash Bandicoot" to hand out in front of the Crash Bandicoot display at the Electronic Entertainment Expo. Beforehand, Rubin passed out the flyers "for review" to Universal Interactive, angering its president.
As for the 2017 Remake that's essentially more of a remaster (or a "Remaster-Make" as I dub it ) Vicarious Visions (whom had worked on a few GBA Crash titles previously) was set to work on recreating the original trilogy.
Vicarious having almost none of the original source codes for the series and only some polygonal meshes from Naughty Dog and Sony they essentially had to go by eye, using the original releases to recreate the level design in what I'd say was a labour of love as it's faithfully recreated. (Jump physics aside if you have a problem with them)
Easiest. Level. Ever.
Story & Characters
The story of Crash Bandicoot is ridiculously simple.
Dr. Neo Cortex, an evil big headed scientist with a secret island base in the Australian archipelago, is attempting to create an army of super soldiers using animals and an Evolvo-Ray with assistance from Dr. Nitrus Brio.
The latest subject, Crash, a bandicoot inexplicably already wearing fingerless gloves, shorts and trainers, is placed into the Evolvo-Ray and submitted to the "Cortex Vortex" to enhance his intelligence.
Deemed a failure Cortex plans to dispose of Crash, only for our hero to cause havoc and escape... by falling out a window of Cortex's lab and washes up on N.Sanity Beach the next day.
Thus begins his adventure to run, jump and spin his way through three islands and 26 levels to defeat Cortex and his minions and save his girlfriend Tawna before she is also subjected to the Evolvo ray.
Hey what were you expecting?
Other characters (Aka. the bosses) include;
Papu Papu, a tribesman. There REALLY isn't anything else to say about him besides him being the first boss of the game and is particularly easy to beat.
Ripper Roo, a blue furred kangaroo in a straitjacket as the Cortex Vortex has made him mentally deranged. The second boss overall.
Koala Kong, a buff as hell Koala whom loves his fabulous muscles a bit too much being a huge showboat. The third boss of the game.
Pinstripe Potoroo (Pinstripelli Potorotti actaully). Presumably the only success story of Cortex's initial batch of experiments as he's the C.E.O of Cortex Power. He loves firing that tommy gun of his in the fourth boss battle.
Oh and Crash is helped on the way by Aku-Aku. A witch doctor like mask that'll protect him from the various wildlife and obstacles over the course of the game.
Because this is part of the trilogy you can also play as Crash's sister Coco once you've beaten Papu using the time travel shenanigans of the third game.
It makes sense I guess?
Ahh who cares about continuity she's adorable!
Gameplay & Design
The fact that Crash is based on the Sonic and Mario games of yesteryear (just with 3D modling) is quite clear with the focus on relatively tight hallways in the level design.
Hell it almost feels like an experimental 2.5D before the term was truly coined and refined as Crash Bandicoot doesn't really use the full 360° movement to it's advantage. Especially so this title where you travel one plane/direction only to switch another.
Not that I find it much of a problem. The enemies, obstacles and crate crashing all add to a satisfying platformer that's got a decent amount of challenge to it in my opinion.
I'll admit I never actually completed the original version of this back in the day. The archaic saving system of having to get a gem (Which you could only get if you didn't die) or complete a bonus round to be allowed to save (Or get a password if you never had a memory card) were annoying to say the least and I'm sure the original wasn't so generous as this doling out extra lives.
Thankfully there's a much more welcoming autosave function alongside being able to manually save at the level hub. Plus extra lives are plentiful, I in fact reached 99 by the start of the third island.
Also despite being 16 or so when I played the original I wasn't entirely used to gaming back then compared to now even if my reflexes have dulled a bit.
The levels are only 5-10 minutes or so in length so they aren't too long at all if you want a quick gaming session (Though if you're having trouble it'll obviously take longer) and I bet the title would be particularly good to have on Switch on a commute.
The only bad thing I can say about the gameplay is the bosses are fairly easy and nearly all employ the "dodge attacks til weakspot is shown" tactic (Ripper Roo's revolves around timing TNT explosions) and aside from the two hog levels and indianna Jones'ing away from a boulder it's pure platforming.
I also didn't have a problem with the jump physics at all. And the run towards the screen boulder levels have never bothered me either but I'm just weird.
The backdrops and scenery for the game are gorgeous. It was hailed back in the day for it's graphics with some neat trickery regarding how they did it and I think you'd be hard pressed to say that the "Remaster-Make" looks bad either!
As mentioned earlier the level hub is unique in this title and that compared to the so-so hub rooms of Crash 2 and 3 you can see the three islands in question (You can use circle and square to rotate the camera) with each level having some graphic to indicate what you'll encounter that's just a nice little detail to me.
The warp rooms never were as neat as this map
Though I do feel two levels are seemingly are out of order.
The first level of the third island "Heavy Machinery" has you start inside the Cortex Power building... only for the second level of the third Island "Cortex Power" to start with you entering the Cortex Power building and even has a slight visual cue at the start of the level highlighting you're outside. It's a really small quibble but I noticed it.
Plus whilst the addition of time trials are nice... The levels are much longer in this compared to the levels in the second and third games and don't quite fit the mould and encourage you to try one more time. I never bothered with them as a result.
Sound
James Mancell did the soundtrack to the original 1996 release (The remaster is a bit unclear on who actually did the remake's... I'm assuming Mancell?) is quite unique with the heavy xylophone usuage in the jungle and river tracks in particular but there's a very unique sound throughout the whole score like the use of animal noises in the jungle tracks and the chanting in the "wall fortress" levels.
Unfortunately you can't choose to switch between the original soundtrack or the updated one like in the Spyro trilogy or Crash Team Racing.
Some tracks are much better in the original.
Like 》Generator room for example《 (The link is to the original gameplay as the atompshere of the level as a whole really works for it)
》The updated track isn't bad at all《 I quite like it. It's just not as effective. (Plus the visuals in the level are nowhere near as spooky either)
However there are some tracks that shine a whole bunch more in the remaster-make
Of course this is definitely more a personal preference thing, so the milliage may vary to you.
The sound effects are pretty decent too. Like I said in my last review I find it hard to see on how you'd mess those up really and everything sounds like it should.
Special mention to Lex Lang whom has been hamming up the goofy side of Cortex ever since he got the part in Twinsanity.
Whilst he doesn't reach the heights of Clancy Brown in my opinion (Whom didn't voice Cortex til the second game when they originally released) Lex puts in a rather good performance!
Nothing to do with the sound really. I just wanted to put this screenshot in!
Round up & Final Score
All in all Crash's first outing is good. It's not perfect but the title is very well made and whilst the gameplay is simplistic, I'd say it still holds up quite nicely... espcecially as part of a trio for £30 or less.
Crash Bandicoot 1 get's a high 7
Pro's
Crash has never looked better
Varied and unique soundtrack
Meh's?
Aside from the two hog riding levels there is next to no gameplay variety that the later titles have. Whether you consider that good or bad is up to you. I personally quite enjoyed it.
Potential problems may arise with the jump physics
Con's
Whilst the bosses are all visually nicely designed, the battles themselves are quite simple. Plus Papu-Papu feels a bit out of place compared to the others.
Interesting connection to 2.5D platfomers, even if I don't think the style works here.
I feel Crash 2 and Crash 3 make better use of the 3D axis. Being able to walk two steps to the left or right or perhaps jumping diagonally for a single crate isn't exactly great usage. Even the hog levels barely use it to it's advantage.
Yup. You can do the same in Crash 2. You just switch back to Crash for bosses and the "Great Hall" level in this one as that leads to the alternate ending when you have all the gems
I have no problem with them at all Ralizah. In fact I love those levels... I don't understand what people find hard/have trouble with them 😂
Because you can't see where you're going or what to avoid until you're right at it. The camera is pointed the wrong way. It'd be like a kart racer where you're staring at the front of the kart the entire time.
WHAT IS IT?: Developer QuanticDream's latest cinematic adventure game (and the only one I've actually played). Set in the relatively near future (2038), the game follows the intertwining stories of three androids in the city of Detroit (Connor, a police android designed to investigate 'deviant' androids who are rebelling against their programming and attaining a sense of selfhood; Kara, a housekeeping android who, through a series of events, finds herself protecting an abused little girl named Alice; and Markus, a domestic care android who eventually finds himself the de facto leader of a revolutionary android rights movement).
Platform: PS4
Level of completion: I attempted to go for the platinum, which requires completing the game, and many individual chapters, numerous times. As it stands, I've gained all but three or so of the trophies and have completed the game's story two or three times, at least. I'll probably go back to it eventually and clean up the remaining trophies with another playthrough or two, but I'm kind of burned out right now.
GAMEPLAY
I mentioned that this was a cinematic adventure game, which naturally means that the level of interactivity here is somewhat limited. Like many other story-heavy games on PS4, you're almost always being directed through a scripted sequence that combines user input with narrative in such a way that the entire game feels like a playable cutscene of sorts. There are locations with some level of exploration and player agency to them (and there are actually collectibles to find in the form of magazines, some of which change depending on choices you make that impact the direction of the story), but, ultimately, you're always being funneled down a narrative route of sorts. Your character can often walk around and examine some objects in their environment. They also frequently engage in Quick Time Event-heavy action sequences or, more rarely, conflicts where the player must quickly choose how to respond to a situation from a list of prompts.
More than any game I've played in recent memory, Detroit: Become Human seems to satisfy that classic TellTale games mantra about your choices mattering. Each chapter features a complex internal flowchart of cause-and-effect that tracks how the player's actions cause events to turn out by the end. More importantly, though, is the way in which events ripple across the narrative of the entire game and inform events that come later on. There seem to be two kinds of consequential choices in this game: decisive ones which immediately impact the narrative (such as choices that lead, fairly quickly, to a character living or dying, for example, which directly impacts how events later in the game will turn out), and ones that effect how other people perceive certain characters or factions. These latter types of choices have little impact on their own but, cumulatively, they lead to narrative-shaking changes. It's similar to, if more complex than, the 'law vs chaos' scale that is employed by several SMT games.
STORY/CHARACTERS
Another strength of the game is the wide variety of characters you'll meet across the various chapters, from mentally unstable vagrant androids to people living in isolation who have quietly either become heroes or complete monsters. The core relationships in this game are between Connor and his cynical police lieutenant partner Hank Anderson, a complex character who struggles with discriminatory feelings toward androids while also finding himself becoming increasingly empathetic toward the "deviant" androids he comes across; Kara and Alice, who quickly find themselves developing an interesting mother/daughter dynamic; and Markus and a variety of other people in the rebel group he stumbles across: the core players in this group swing from hopeful pacifists who want to learn to co-exist with humans to hardened militants who think the only way forward is to respond with violence, and the ending of Markus' story, along with multiple big story events, will change drastically depending on which of these approaches he tends to adopt throughout the game.
So, to reiterate, while I won't go into more depth in the story, expect to investigate mysteries when playing as Connor, struggling to survive and protect Alice when playing as Kara, and deciding how to incite a revolutionary political movement as Markus.
ART/CHARACTER DESIGNS/MUSIC
Not a lot to say in these areas. Detroit: Become Human does a good job of cultivating a hyper-realistic art-style that (mostly) avoids the uncanny valley (except where it intends to: this IS a game about androids, after all) using a combination of high-poly models, effective lighting (some of the rainy environments in this game are especially gorgeous), and clearly motion captured faces. It's obviously not quite 1:1 with real life, but, for the aging PS4, it's a really impressive effort.
The music is... pretty good. It doesn't stand out for the most part. It's not something I'd listen to on its own, but it does a good job of heightening the emotions of whatever is happening in a given scene. I particularly like the panicked sound of this track:
Other observations:
Some games get off to a slow start. This one doesn't, and essentially puts all its cards on the table at the beginning with a high-stakes hostage negotiation that does a really good job of introducing the player to the core gameplay systems. Very cool.
Scenes in this game, while incredibly streamlined and directed, are dense with a ton of detail, including interactive objects that reveal lore and worldbuilding in the background, be it through readable news tablets that flesh out current (circa 2038) political events, polling data that reveals interesting things about the public's feelings on androids more broadly, the ways in which androids are changing different entertainment fields and areas of scholarly expertise, etc., signs on the wall or in stores, news interviews on the TV, etc. It does a fantastic job of building the illusion that you're taking a peek at what a future America might look like, as opposed to just playing through a science-fiction story about androids.
I feel like Kara's storyline was worked into the game because the developers started with the character and felt like they needed to integrate her. Her storyline doesn't really mesh well with the Markus/Connor storylines, however, so every time one of her chapters pops up you know the game is going to start spinning its wheels narratively for a little while. This would have been more understandable if the storyline had interesting themes/ideas that enriched the broader social focus of the other storylines, but I never really felt like they added much to the game on their own terms. You had the REAL game with the other two characters, and then you had this little side story about Kara and a little girl that just kept popping back up.
For all of the complex issues that feed into the setting and would make for fascinating subject matter to explore across the scope of the narrative, I feel like the writers really drop the ball here. The game is entirely uninterested in the possible cognitive, moral, and experiential differences between human life and android life or the extended implications of sentient A.I. becoming a thing, and instead uses human control over androids as a somewhat tepid metaphor for racism and bigotry more universally. I mean... IT WORKS, but it feels like the game's writers took the safer, but less interesting route when it came to constructing this narrative. In-game scenarios are also frequently VERY morally black and white (Markus' storyline is a bit of an exception to this, thankfully, and there are a few points where you'll be asked to make life-or-death decisions in his route). If Detroit succeeds as an interconnected, choice-driven adventure story, then it mostly fails as thought-provoking literature.
Similarly, its depiction of political oppression and activism is fundamentally very lazy. Why do all 'awakened' androids seem to automatically join your side (people advocating against their own rights isn't exactly a recent historical phenomenon)? How is this massive civil rights movement kickstarted so rapidly? All it takes is a couple of non-violent demonstrations for the government to go full Third Reich on androids, and, similarly, a kiss or a song are enough to largely defuse government violence. The game's heart is in the right place, but it streamlines actual social conflict to the point where story beats feel vaguely cartoonish.
This game desperately needs a function to fast-forward though many of the looooooong talky sections that you have to sit through over and over if you're going for all the trophies. This game certainly doesn't respect the player's time and, in many respects, feels like it was designed with only one complete playthrough in mind, despite the wealth of choices available to the player. Japanese visual novels deal with this by allowing the player to quickly skip through previously read dialogue, and this game would benefit dramatically from something similar.
At several points in the game, it will ask the player to shake their controller around to simulate an in-game action. Can't say I'm a fan of this. Waggle controls weren't particularly engaging in various Nintendo Wii games a decade ago, and they make even less sense here.
CONCLUSION
Despite some narrative missteps, inconsistent pacing, surface-level treatment of complex social and technological issues, and missing QoL features for trophy hunters/completionists, the game stands tall as one of the best adventure games I've played in recent memory. The complex web of decision-making that happens across the various chapters can lead to radically different outcomes by the end, making this one of the few adventure games I've played where the player's decisions ACTUALLY do matter to the outcome of the story. The dire narrative stakes, thematic presentation, and gorgeous, ultra-realistic visual style make this feel like an interactive movie in the best way possible. I was fully invested in the fates of these characters from beginning to end, and frankly never expected I'd end up enjoying it so much.
@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy My favourite and most frustrating level of crash is the bridge one where the panels fall out from underneath you. I also find the sound effects to be weirdly repetitive to the extent that they become trippy. The rhythm of that level and the trippiness of the spin, crate and dying sound effects resulted in one of my favourite game experiences for years!
When I saw it initially earlier I thought you'd already reviewed this already but I think that was just an extensive discussion with RogerRoger and Th3Solution in the Become Human thread!
It's nice that even if you found a number of faults with the title, you still ended up thoroughly enjoying it!
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