@jeff@janman Watching the gf play the game pacing does improve. Post-Frieza the game's side stuff really takes off (getting the Driver's License isn't as solid as the episode, but Yamcha being constantly shat on even in his quests is great). Collecting the Dragon Balls extends through all the regions (the rewards are a little lackluster, but you can bring non-canon enemies back to life on Earth like the Ginyu Force) so I get why they blocked it off in the beginning. Enemy difficulty still a little on the easy side beyond the Ginyu Force/Frieza.
EDIT: Yeah the hearing same barks from the start, the weird cutout fights/moments and constant shots facing away from the camera make this feel like a *real* budget title made for people who never touched the other games/interacted with the franchise since they watched it on toonami. The increased challenged from the random encounters which force you to use their systems really don't make up for everything else being mediocre.
@impatientandy: The wait last night was up to an hour and half per game unless you were a whitelisted streamer. Absolute insanity for a major company.
As someone who's thrown ~150 hours into Autochess and about 25 into Underlords already I really want to dig TFT because it offers a chance for new strats/metagame exploitation, but they really failed a lot of fundamental things from the perspective as someone wholly unfamiliar with League and its characters (and I'm one of the strategy/Magic Arena/Hearthstone players who only knew some of the DOTA characters from the og mod and the 2 week failure that was Artifact). I'm sure the vast League audience will be fine, but unless wide ranging UI changes are made quickly to really differentiate characters/items I see the rest of us bouncing off (the carousel is a cool comeback mechanic but even after spending a ton of time watching Scarra, Toast, and Dog play on another monitor since closed beta I still can't tell who's who or what they do).
Not even a big Nintendo fan, but at this point I want someone to shake someone over there to convince them to make their own Pokemon spin on the genre to mix things up because unfortunately neither offshoot is living up to the update schedule, ingenuity, and foresight the OG mod team's shown (though Valve's rapid patch releases are kind of mindboggling).
God seriously, go buy Hitman 2 and thank ZMF later...also @dgtlty don't go around leveling serious ass accusations of being a white supremacist without proof or doing a basic-ass Google/Twitter search of who you're trying to John Proctor my guy.
@s5n8k3: What does WB being a distributing publisher for the game (just like Witcher 3 in NA) have to do with anything? And have you actually seen more than a minute of 2016/2018's gameplay, if the mass variety in challenges, dialogue, and kill methods somehow rate as a "lack of gameplay/freedom of interaction" in your book, what exactly do think the games should add? Don't even know why I'm wasting time replying to someone who's obviously played very little of the game/probably still upset MGSV lost GOTY/thinks Hitman TM is Absolution, but just wanted to say thanks for the laugh mate.
Glad to see Heat Signature finally getting a little recognition...for me it surpasses the kind of rhythmic chaos that Hotline Miami dished out because the interplay between skin-of-your-teeth escapes and light sci-fi flavor means you're effectively writing your own little Cowboy Bebop action scenes.
Why a major studio still hasn't made a Space Bounty Hunting game is beside me, but this gives me real hope that it's possible to really pull one off.
@sto_ln: I mean it's their creative vision, so I don't think fans should dictate what inspirations they pull from.
But yeah it feels off to me because the quotes from the other games were remarkable because they exposed you to a variety of great literature, culture, and people you otherwise wouldn't know about and made you want to dig into their original source. Not saying their aren't great blogs out there, but typically that level of writing doesn't inspire that same urge. Here's hoping there's just very little of it in the game
@grimmer: I disagree with Dan on a lot of things but he is 100% not misrepresenting this game. It's an absolute mess on pretty much every front and is an absolute chore to play through (having him attempt to roll the dice to get one of items to cross the bridge to the other section of the map will require running through the remarkably unfun, broken plate spinning meter management, and would make for boring footage with no payoff). Feel free to check Steam reviews or peruse Twitch VODs (I rarely use it, but went on to see if people actually liked this thing, and I was surprised how few streamers do considering the genre and sales estimations). Guys on the Beastcast also share Dan's thoughts on the thing.
Furthermore, for everyone complaining about how rushed this is go back and look at other "Unfinished" QLs and you'll find that they're pretty light on content, because honestly it's unfair to both reviewer and developer to drag them out (sure it'll show how little depth this thing has, but it is in Early Access). I'm sure if this ever gets finished it'll be looked at.
EDIT: Saw your comment on the Joy. If he takes them in the beginning the game ends (in the Steam EA version credits roll). He does mention you need Joy to get through that checkpoint on the bridge, but you'll have to find it (because the game isn't finished and the procedural generation seems broken this can be next to impossible to find on the starter island).
While I do agree with the general sentiment that a more directed narrative experience like the opening would be cool, I don't think what's here is as bad as Dan (and a lot of other people) are making it out to be. This looks like it still has potential to be a solid survival game with some interesting narrative elements.
If I had a dollar everyone said a survival game had "potential" I'd have enough cash to half develop one of my own. People have actually had a chance to play and watch previews of this thing, and it really is as bad as Dan is making it out to be. Other than theme and some flavor text it's lacking in almost every area (combat is Skyim-lite, survival aspects are poorly balanced and tedious, the crafting/quests are phenomenally dull, the procedural generation is a broken crapshoot, and the overall gameplay loop is unsatisfying because it does none of the above well).
It's pretty obvious it was selected for Microsoft's E3 conference solely because the trailer had a distinctive style, not on the potential of the gameplay (this is the Dead Island of survival games). I hate to say this, but I've never been more happy to refund a game.
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