Pragmata - Call Her Moonchild
- Thread starter PsychedelicDiamond
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- Apr 1, 2009
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And I finished it today.
Overall it is a very competent TPS, probably moreso than I'm able to realistically give it credit for, having only finished it on normal difficulty without diving much into the post game.
While it lacks a bit in enemy variety, the core mechanics of the combat are surprisingly strong enough to carry the game. Which mostly comes down to its mod system, that lets you equip up to 6, depending on how often you've upgraded, perks that affect the combat and gives you a rather impressive number of ways to specialize your build. Now, this isn't something you'll likely ever particularly need during a normal mode playthrough, make no mistake, but it's really interesting it's there. I came into Pragmata expecting a story first game but I got something that was rather mechanically sophisticated, in a 7th gen action game sort of way. Particularly the boss fights stood out as being very well designed, even if it was rather easy to upgrade your way out if any challenge. Nevertheless, they all made for very impressive setpieces. Pragmata does definitely share a lot of DNA, both artistically and mechanically, with Vanquish, if not quite with the same priorities.
This is never clearer than with its VR Training missions, that I ignored for a pretty big part of the game, but turned out to have some of the most mechanically interesting challenges in it. While I don't exactly think that Pragmata's controls lend themselves all that well to the platforming and movement exercises these make you do, they stress the actual mechanics and your aptitude more than the regular story does, most of the time. And they are definitely something the developers want you to engage in, considering they hid quite a lot of upgrade material and unlockables behind them. Then again, if you do upgrade too much, you will very likely be overpowered for the finale, which I definitely felt when I got there.
Meanwhile the story was nothing much to write home about. Pragmata was announced with a rather evocative trailer, that brought some of the early teasers for Death Stranding to mind, but Pragmata isn't really taking any big swings. It's not the heady, weird science-fiction I was hoping it would be, it's much rather something that could have been a B-tier Neil Blomkamp movie. And, you know, I really don't want to be too harsh, for one, because I know I'm biased. For reasons that should be self explanatory, my receptivity for stories that expect me to humanize machines has drastically diminished over the last couple of years. Although, yes, I know, it probably makes more sense to think of Diana and her sister as something more like clones. But the other thing is, it all plays out fairly predictably, in a very 00's Japanese action sci-fi way. Which, don't get be wrong, will surely be part of the appeal for many of its fans. I'm sure this says more about me than about the game, but aspects of its plot and the way it played out brought to mind Sonic Adventure 2, of all things, for me.
Now, again, I don't want to be too down on it, because the character writing is quite good. For a game that really only has two characters actively present in it, both of these characters are pretty well characterized and well acted. They are very archetypal, of course. Hugh is the goofy dad, Diana is the precious, precocious daughter. Their personalities are established in the very beginning and they basically stay where they are up to the end, with all the big emotional moments you'd expect from this kind of story. But these emotional moments work because Hugh and Diana embody the character types they represent very well, you do grow attached to them and you do empathize with their relationship. So while Pragmata couldn't exactly be confused for some existentialist science-fiction masterpiece except, perhaps, by the same people who confuse Nier Automata for one, it's a very effective little action drama that knows how to hit the right notes.
I doubt Pragmata will likely make it into my Top 5 of the year by the end of it, although I could see why, for many, it would. It's a very confident, start for a new IP that avoids any feeling of feature- or scope creep, wraps up in a lean 15 hours and delivers a simple, but satisfying, action experience with a simple, but satisfying, story. It is, no doubt, quintessential Capcom, one foot on the side of modern, cinematic action, one foot firmly planted at the arcade. And I don't blame anyone for treating it as a breath of fresh air, because compared to a Naughty Dog or Remedy style cinematic TPS with 40 hours of playtime and 10 hours of cutscenes, it is refreshingly modest and to the point. Now, it's not exactly the sort of thing I go crazy for but neither could I say anything bad about it. It's a good game that knows exactly what it wants to be.
Overall it is a very competent TPS, probably moreso than I'm able to realistically give it credit for, having only finished it on normal difficulty without diving much into the post game.
While it lacks a bit in enemy variety, the core mechanics of the combat are surprisingly strong enough to carry the game. Which mostly comes down to its mod system, that lets you equip up to 6, depending on how often you've upgraded, perks that affect the combat and gives you a rather impressive number of ways to specialize your build. Now, this isn't something you'll likely ever particularly need during a normal mode playthrough, make no mistake, but it's really interesting it's there. I came into Pragmata expecting a story first game but I got something that was rather mechanically sophisticated, in a 7th gen action game sort of way. Particularly the boss fights stood out as being very well designed, even if it was rather easy to upgrade your way out if any challenge. Nevertheless, they all made for very impressive setpieces. Pragmata does definitely share a lot of DNA, both artistically and mechanically, with Vanquish, if not quite with the same priorities.
This is never clearer than with its VR Training missions, that I ignored for a pretty big part of the game, but turned out to have some of the most mechanically interesting challenges in it. While I don't exactly think that Pragmata's controls lend themselves all that well to the platforming and movement exercises these make you do, they stress the actual mechanics and your aptitude more than the regular story does, most of the time. And they are definitely something the developers want you to engage in, considering they hid quite a lot of upgrade material and unlockables behind them. Then again, if you do upgrade too much, you will very likely be overpowered for the finale, which I definitely felt when I got there.
Meanwhile the story was nothing much to write home about. Pragmata was announced with a rather evocative trailer, that brought some of the early teasers for Death Stranding to mind, but Pragmata isn't really taking any big swings. It's not the heady, weird science-fiction I was hoping it would be, it's much rather something that could have been a B-tier Neil Blomkamp movie. And, you know, I really don't want to be too harsh, for one, because I know I'm biased. For reasons that should be self explanatory, my receptivity for stories that expect me to humanize machines has drastically diminished over the last couple of years. Although, yes, I know, it probably makes more sense to think of Diana and her sister as something more like clones. But the other thing is, it all plays out fairly predictably, in a very 00's Japanese action sci-fi way. Which, don't get be wrong, will surely be part of the appeal for many of its fans. I'm sure this says more about me than about the game, but aspects of its plot and the way it played out brought to mind Sonic Adventure 2, of all things, for me.
Now, again, I don't want to be too down on it, because the character writing is quite good. For a game that really only has two characters actively present in it, both of these characters are pretty well characterized and well acted. They are very archetypal, of course. Hugh is the goofy dad, Diana is the precious, precocious daughter. Their personalities are established in the very beginning and they basically stay where they are up to the end, with all the big emotional moments you'd expect from this kind of story. But these emotional moments work because Hugh and Diana embody the character types they represent very well, you do grow attached to them and you do empathize with their relationship. So while Pragmata couldn't exactly be confused for some existentialist science-fiction masterpiece except, perhaps, by the same people who confuse Nier Automata for one, it's a very effective little action drama that knows how to hit the right notes.
I doubt Pragmata will likely make it into my Top 5 of the year by the end of it, although I could see why, for many, it would. It's a very confident, start for a new IP that avoids any feeling of feature- or scope creep, wraps up in a lean 15 hours and delivers a simple, but satisfying, action experience with a simple, but satisfying, story. It is, no doubt, quintessential Capcom, one foot on the side of modern, cinematic action, one foot firmly planted at the arcade. And I don't blame anyone for treating it as a breath of fresh air, because compared to a Naughty Dog or Remedy style cinematic TPS with 40 hours of playtime and 10 hours of cutscenes, it is refreshingly modest and to the point. Now, it's not exactly the sort of thing I go crazy for but neither could I say anything bad about it. It's a good game that knows exactly what it wants to be.
- Apr 1, 2009
- 16,478
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- Whatever, just wash your hands.
I got the secret ending and it annoyed me and I think hurt the game overall. I wanted more of a happy ending, I don't really mind the bittersweet ending, but after going through the trouble of the unknown signal and just getting a single voice over line of dialog that really just says Hugh is alive, not even a rescue ship. Its just annoying.
Just started playing. I am only 101 minutes in, and all I can say about Diana is:
No, seriously, she has won me over with that adorable drawing. Plus, as much as she is built to have all the high-tech knowledge, yet everything is still new to her, and everytime her eye shines whenever she sees something new, I have a big dad smile on my face.
I definitely want to be a dad someday lol.
As for the gameplay, at first I thought it was gonna be Ashley-level of escort mission through the entire game. But as it turns out, I NEED her to actually do shit. She is also constantly on my back, and I don't need to worry about being separated.
I probably will need to get used to it, but the hacking minigames are sometimes too stressful for me, especially when I'm facing multiple opponents.
I am also glad each area doesn't seem to be insanely big, and is a glorified corridor. Great, it only makes "check-back later" notes easier to remember, and I do not need to check every nook and cranny for potential screts,
No, seriously, she has won me over with that adorable drawing. Plus, as much as she is built to have all the high-tech knowledge, yet everything is still new to her, and everytime her eye shines whenever she sees something new, I have a big dad smile on my face.
I definitely want to be a dad someday lol.
As for the gameplay, at first I thought it was gonna be Ashley-level of escort mission through the entire game. But as it turns out, I NEED her to actually do shit. She is also constantly on my back, and I don't need to worry about being separated.
I probably will need to get used to it, but the hacking minigames are sometimes too stressful for me, especially when I'm facing multiple opponents.
I am also glad each area doesn't seem to be insanely big, and is a glorified corridor. Great, it only makes "check-back later" notes easier to remember, and I do not need to check every nook and cranny for potential screts,
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I caved and bought the game over the weekend to take breaks between Diablo 4 playing (which I will review after this post), and man it's not anything like what I expected in the gameplay front.
I was expecting more of a run and gun shooter type experience with hacking elements both during and out of combat, and while the hacking is there the shooting is a far slower affair than I expected. I imagine that fast shooting would be ridiculous to expect both high energy shooting and also expecting the player to hack everything at the same time, so the gameplay makes a lot more sense than I thought it would originally. It's definitely a game that plays a lot better than it looks, because I was wholly uninterested looking back at those original trailers and shit, I even remember thinking the game was a single player Warframe looking game.
Well it's none of that and actually it reminds me a lot more of Dead Space than anything else. Especially in terms of the set up to the story.
Then there is Diana and holy fuck she's amazing. I can see why it's triggering everyone's testicles and ovaries on the internet. She's clearly the embodiment of everything great about having kids with very few of the drawbacks, (like feeding, making messing, shitting themselves, temper tantrums, etc). It works though I wish there was a little more of a reluctance on Hugh's part because the intro of the game suggests he's not interested and doesn't even like kids, yet he instantly accepts Diana with zero pushback to her presence. Maybe it is because he knows she's not a real kid, or i dunno. But he plays into the father role right away which makes the bond weaken a little because it's not really earned or built up in anyway.
Regardless the interactions and the collectibles are exceptionally heartwarming and cute, and while the story is predictable and not really very unique, the small personal moments make up for it.
That being said, for all the cuteness I am not sure that the game itself is actually good from a gameplay standpoint. I mean it works sure, but I'm not sold on the multitasking experience expected of me between shooting and hacking. I find myself getting hit because I'm looking at the hack window rather than the enemy and yes that is a skill issue on my part, it's also a fundamental problem for anyone who doesn't have 8 eyeballs to look at everything at once at all times. For small group encounters it's fine most enemies feel slow enough under the expectation that the player is playing with their rubix cube first, it starts to become a problem when dealing with 5+ robots at once. There also doesn't seem to be an option to overpower enemies without hacking them first either, with full powerups on my gun it still hits for chip damage until robots are hacked and I feel like that is a missed opportunity to showcase player power. I don't see why basic walkers and the weak flying bastards can't eventually be dealt with using no hacking, which allows you to clear the fodder in group fights before focusing on the bigger must-hack enemies.
Everything has to be hacked, doors, robots, moving platforms, all hacking all the time and while it's okay in the first few areas, eventually it feels redundant and I don't want to tap a couple buttons to open every damn door. You know?
I was expecting more of a run and gun shooter type experience with hacking elements both during and out of combat, and while the hacking is there the shooting is a far slower affair than I expected. I imagine that fast shooting would be ridiculous to expect both high energy shooting and also expecting the player to hack everything at the same time, so the gameplay makes a lot more sense than I thought it would originally. It's definitely a game that plays a lot better than it looks, because I was wholly uninterested looking back at those original trailers and shit, I even remember thinking the game was a single player Warframe looking game.
Well it's none of that and actually it reminds me a lot more of Dead Space than anything else. Especially in terms of the set up to the story.
Then there is Diana and holy fuck she's amazing. I can see why it's triggering everyone's testicles and ovaries on the internet. She's clearly the embodiment of everything great about having kids with very few of the drawbacks, (like feeding, making messing, shitting themselves, temper tantrums, etc). It works though I wish there was a little more of a reluctance on Hugh's part because the intro of the game suggests he's not interested and doesn't even like kids, yet he instantly accepts Diana with zero pushback to her presence. Maybe it is because he knows she's not a real kid, or i dunno. But he plays into the father role right away which makes the bond weaken a little because it's not really earned or built up in anyway.
Regardless the interactions and the collectibles are exceptionally heartwarming and cute, and while the story is predictable and not really very unique, the small personal moments make up for it.
That being said, for all the cuteness I am not sure that the game itself is actually good from a gameplay standpoint. I mean it works sure, but I'm not sold on the multitasking experience expected of me between shooting and hacking. I find myself getting hit because I'm looking at the hack window rather than the enemy and yes that is a skill issue on my part, it's also a fundamental problem for anyone who doesn't have 8 eyeballs to look at everything at once at all times. For small group encounters it's fine most enemies feel slow enough under the expectation that the player is playing with their rubix cube first, it starts to become a problem when dealing with 5+ robots at once. There also doesn't seem to be an option to overpower enemies without hacking them first either, with full powerups on my gun it still hits for chip damage until robots are hacked and I feel like that is a missed opportunity to showcase player power. I don't see why basic walkers and the weak flying bastards can't eventually be dealt with using no hacking, which allows you to clear the fodder in group fights before focusing on the bigger must-hack enemies.
Everything has to be hacked, doors, robots, moving platforms, all hacking all the time and while it's okay in the first few areas, eventually it feels redundant and I don't want to tap a couple buttons to open every damn door. You know?
I think I'm about 1/3 of the way through, maybe less (a look at a walkthrough reveals 6 areas, and I beat the second boss).
Lovin' it so far. Just a good action game with a bit of a unique hook in the core gameplay loop, which is like the best thing I can ask for from games right now.
I'm running on my mid-level PC and it plays like a dream.
All the non-gameplay stuff- the characters, the area designs, it's all very nice, nothing amazing, but a tasty enough icing on an excellent cake.
My biggest concern was how I would handle dodging all the attacks while doing hacking and shooting and it got better once I realized how slow the enemy attacks actually are. The only one that gets me a lot is the little thing that zips at you real fast. There have been a couple of spots where the rooms are small and there's a lot of enemies and I find myself having to spam dodge and not finding a moment to do my hacking. The yellow squares that do extra stuff to them is key here.
My overall assessment of this game will now depend on the last area or boss or two, when many such games jack up the difficulty or feed you endless swarms of enemies to tire you out before the end. If it doesn't go crazy with that crap, it'll be a top game for me.
Lovin' it so far. Just a good action game with a bit of a unique hook in the core gameplay loop, which is like the best thing I can ask for from games right now.
I'm running on my mid-level PC and it plays like a dream.
All the non-gameplay stuff- the characters, the area designs, it's all very nice, nothing amazing, but a tasty enough icing on an excellent cake.
My biggest concern was how I would handle dodging all the attacks while doing hacking and shooting and it got better once I realized how slow the enemy attacks actually are. The only one that gets me a lot is the little thing that zips at you real fast. There have been a couple of spots where the rooms are small and there's a lot of enemies and I find myself having to spam dodge and not finding a moment to do my hacking. The yellow squares that do extra stuff to them is key here.
My overall assessment of this game will now depend on the last area or boss or two, when many such games jack up the difficulty or feed you endless swarms of enemies to tire you out before the end. If it doesn't go crazy with that crap, it'll be a top game for me.
- Apr 1, 2009
- 16,478
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- Gender
- Whatever, just wash your hands.
The game gives you lots of tools to make it easier and none of the enemies are very fast and aggressive, at least for long. Its really well designed to give you time for the hack, plus, you can actually partially hack, stop then resume. With upgraded weapons you can deal with weaker enemies, but it will still take more shots then a hack would. Like, there was a hover gun drone pretty far away that I couldn't hack, so I used the charge shot to take it out, but it still took like 3 fully charged shots to do it.
- Apr 1, 2009
- 16,478
- 5,075
- 118
- Gender
- Whatever, just wash your hands.
Third boss/area down. Woo!
So how worth it is it to get every collectible? I explore as I can and try to get what I can but I can see I've missed a few things, like upgrade items, mods, and toys for Diana. I've basically been spreading my resources across everything, upgrading whatever I can whenever I get back to the base. The maps are not helpful so I don't think it will be fun to back track and try to find everything, and I certainly don't care about achievements since getting them all would require a replay on harder level and I don't do that.
So how worth it is it to get every collectible? I explore as I can and try to get what I can but I can see I've missed a few things, like upgrade items, mods, and toys for Diana. I've basically been spreading my resources across everything, upgrading whatever I can whenever I get back to the base. The maps are not helpful so I don't think it will be fun to back track and try to find everything, and I certainly don't care about achievements since getting them all would require a replay on harder level and I don't do that.
Capcom executive explains how Pragmata’s design was influenced by Western tastes, hints at bigger future for the IP
The recently released Pragmata has been a pretty big success for Capcom. While not capturing the same numbers as Resident Evil Requiem, the company has a
nintendowire.com
I was remembering this comment of yours while playing yesterday because I know what you mean and it's the kind of thing I would normally agree with.
But with this game, I actually do like this aspect of it. It gets into that hard to define thing about games where individually something would be weird or silly but together it works. I hack some enemies, I hack a door, I upgrade my hacking abilities, and I hack and hack. Since the hacking itself is simple and fluid it all makes for this total rhythm that puts me in a zone. I dig it.
Scrolled past your two posts and nearly did a spit take.
I beat the game this weekend. My thoughts around the hacking still hold up and I was really sick of it by the end. The gun variety yields a lot of utility but isn't very interesting, and even the hacking upgrades and little tools you can get within the hack itself just do more to divide your focus while at the same time throwing harder enemies that require focus from you. The split attention really bothers me.
It's not super hard to get through but some of the fights near the end got really frustrating.
The game is carried by the story and bond Hugh and Diana develop and you push forward to get her all the REM collectibles and do things with her. I found the game at it's best when just exploring and doing none of the combat at all.
The secret ending is just stupid bait and I am incredibly disappointed by it.
Overall I think it's a cool new IP and it tries to be unique so I'll take that where I can get it. It's fun enough and short enough that the annoying things are not deal breaking things.
It's not super hard to get through but some of the fights near the end got really frustrating.
The game is carried by the story and bond Hugh and Diana develop and you push forward to get her all the REM collectibles and do things with her. I found the game at it's best when just exploring and doing none of the combat at all.
The secret ending is just stupid bait and I am incredibly disappointed by it.
Overall I think it's a cool new IP and it tries to be unique so I'll take that where I can get it. It's fun enough and short enough that the annoying things are not deal breaking things.