So I was looking through my quite frankly ridiculous list of steam games for something to play, when I suddendly notice I have apparantly bought the entire GTA collection at some point but never installed it. Now I have very fond memories of the GTA series, I still remember at the gentle age of 12 I got GTA Vice City, and it blew my mind completely. The violence was a core part of it I won't lie, but I also enjoyed the tone of the game, and the humour it had. I probably played Vice City for well over 2-400 hours or something crazy I think I eventually got 100% completion which was no easy task (stupid hidden packages.)
However everything changed in 2004 when the next installment in the GTA series was about to be released, I remember I could hardly sleep the day before launch day cause I was convinced it was going to be awesome. I was not dissappointed, me and my friend spent an entire weekend playing this 24/7 like maniacs sleeping maybe 2 hours at most just playing constantly, and it kept blowing our mind. I still remember when we figured out CJ could swim, we both just kind of flipped out for a moment. Then we found the motherfucking Jetpack, the jet, the fact that the game was about an entire state. Everything about that game just blew us away.
So fast forward till today or last week to be precise, and I downloaded it (7gbs? holy shit.) And it took me about 15 hours to get through the game since I played it for a ridiculous amount of time back in 2004-05. And I was suprised how well it has aged, I mean yeah the graphics look like shit, but it does the job and it conveys the story and action still. The humour is still there, the soul of the game is still there. And I am suprised how Rockstar managed to make the world seem so alive. Also how over the top the writing is in a good way (which is a pretty hard balancing act) while keeping the characters likeable and not completely absurd. (Something Saints Row fails completely at.) The only thing I could really criticize is the shooting which, compared to modern games is about as sophisticated as 2 empty cans connected with a string. But to be fair its peers in the genre has not evolved much past this.
So after playing through this I think that San Andreas is the pinnacle, the crowning achievement in the open world genre, everything else is just a piece of shit compared to it. And I have played it all, Saints row 1 and 2 is just not sophisticated enough, GTA San Andreas was goofy and all but it had style damnit. It did not have a character spray shit on buildings, and it always seemed to atleast have some foot in reality. GTA 4 was very tough for me, it was like a old friend coming back from a year long trip but on said trip had found out he was gay and had brought with him an annoying gay asian man.
GTA 4 was a emo game, like in a bad way. I got nothing against emotional stories, but if you got a brooding bitch who just sits there and bitches about his dark and terrible past it gets old after about 1 hour especially when he goes out and murders 50000 people and slaughter their children and rapes their corpses afterwards. So we got a emo hypocrite bitch as a main character, basically a Jrpg hero or something as our protagonist. and his sidekick is without a doubt the most annoying entity in ever, I could not be this annoying if I tried. I am of course talking about your fucking cousin, yes the fat bastard who bitches about everything. After 5 hours of his "humor" I found myself yelling at the TV. Also he calls you when you least needs it and asks you if you want to go out bowling? why would I ever want to do that. And the other characters in the game are okay, I would lie if I didn't say Brucie was fucking awesome, and I really liked Playboy X for some reason. And I fucking hated Dwayne.
However the characters and story aside which both are pretty mediocre to just plain bad, the City and the enviroment feels dead. It feels like GTA3 with a new graphics engine, there is no personality in this city, yes it looks nice, but there is nothing here. There is nothing to do in this City it might aswell not be here. So GTA 4 is not an open world game cause they don't utilize it at all, they spent all this time making this sweet looking city but then go ahead and ignore it, it just blows my fucking mind.
In my opinion whoever came up with this name and thought it was a good idea should be shot, then set on fire, then thrown off a building and then curbstomped by 1000 angry Nazi sympathizers.
If you look at Deadly premonition from an objective view you will quickly dismiss it as absolute garbage, the visuals are N64 era quality. The soundtrack is out of its fucking mind, the controls are copied from a 90s resident evil game. But still people enjoy this game, why is it?
Yes you can quickly dismiss this as "haha its so bad it's good" but I don't think that's it. A lot of games have been hilariously bad in the past but has not gotten the weird recognition that Deadly Premonition has gotten.
No I think people look at Deadly Premonition as a breath of fresh air, a game that is not about realism, not about sky high budgets and ridiculous production values. I mean look at movies, I would say the best movies are from independent creators with a small budget. And Deadly Premonition also throwback to a simpler time when games were not all about super serious space marines killing aliens. A time when blue hedgehogs with red sneakers that ran ridiculously fast made sense, a time when you could release a game about a Swedish chef riding a bull shooting crocodiles out his blond mustache.
Yes this is a throwback to a time when games were made by like 10 people at most, and you had to get creative and not throw money at stupid celebrity voice actors, and hire a legion of animators and 3d artist to render the character walking across the road. And its obvious that Deadly Premonition doesn't care about any of that stuff, (to be fair they couldn't word on the street is that they made this game with a 10 dollar budget.)
And I for one hope that more games like this will be made in the future, to try and combat the "hollywoodization" (coining that phrase) that is going on in the video game industry at the moment, and maybe we can avoid having our games become soul less entertainment packages devoid of any personality, except the regular hollywood personality mainstays, like the brown haired quick witted hero, and the tough lady. Because that is safe, marketable and will sell the most. Which don't get me wrong I can understand I am not some fat Internet critic which has this special snowflake syndrome expecting everything to be catered to just me and me specifically no matter how unique my tastes may be. But sometimes if you want to make something special you have to be completely original, nobody remembers the guy who went with the stream, history only remembers the guy who went against it.
And the people who said, "wow this is alot like zelda" did not lie. But I am not going to be the most redundant person on earth and go over this well trodden ground for the billionth time. Who am I kidding? That is exactly what I am going to do.
Lets say I was a movie director. And I figured I would make a movie about a young boxer called the irish stallion, and his road to beating the champion which is some black guy or something. Would you call this movie an homage to the movie "Rocky"? or would you call it a shameless rip off?
This is exactly what Darksiders is, I am all for taking ideas from other games and other entertainment products. I cant find a single entertainment product that is 100% original after all. Which is fine, if you find a formula that works you dont turn a 180 and try something completely different, no you continue down that road and keep perfecting whatever it is you are creating. However heres the thing, this is where Darksiders seizes to be a "homage" or being "inspired". It does not move forward at all.
I ask you this, what part of Darksiders moved the formula the Zelda series has used 20 years perfecting forward? Cause I sure as hell cant find one, I mean yeah you can like the setting better, but that is just a matter of taste it does not improve the product. And at every god damn turn in that games development when the developers came to a crossroads to make it exactly like Zelda or improve on it, they chose to copy. They show NO intention or will to make this game more than Zelda.
I mean the Combat is paperthin, I went through the entire game using one button (guess which). And I just smashed it like a madman and it worked fine for me. The Graphics are wonky as hell, the story is well, not its strong point. War is basically Link put through an "emofication" (Trademarking that btw.) I mean how much can WAR bitch and moan and brood like a bitch? I wanted to punch war in the face at the halfway point of that game.
Anyway, Darksiders is by no means a bad game, I dont think anyone will say that, what I am saying is it just feels soulless. It feels like someone sat in a meeting and said, those zelda games are pretty popular, lets make a complete copy without even attempting to put any effort into innovation, it will probably sell. And it did, which great I guess. I just hope the next Darksiders will bring more than just a complete copy of Zelda once again.
And also, I watched Jeff on Gametrailers and I am sorry but that infuriated me, I know the man is entitled to his own opinion which is fine. BUT he basically said "THE BALL IS IN NINTENDOS COURT NOW SINCE DARKSIDERS OUTDID ZELDA!" which, how can a copy of something be better than the original? I am sorry Jeff, I agree with alot of things but its impossible. Well I guess it has points which explains it.
Anyway I know this sounds like a crazy fanboys rant, but the last nintendo console I owned was a Nintendo 64, but to be fair the Zelda series will always be close to my heart no matter what, which is why Darksiders bothers me so much.
Anyway that was basically my 2 cents.
P.S I know my grammar is not exactly the greatest (D in English and I am Norwegian so I dont speak English as a first Language, however hopefully you can understand my crazy ramblings.)
Finally Giant Bomb is live!!!! Been following this site for quite some time, as for what I will be doing for my blog I am not certain yet I guess I'll figure something out! :)
Log in to comment