Dishonored Review

[Deacon Cole]

Am I the only one who got a Bioshock vibe?

 

[OldDirtyCrusty]

Thanks for the review. This game sounds like a win and i really like the mission based freedom. Now i have to get my hands on the english dubbed version since there`s no way i`m laying my hands on the german version.

Bethesda is a anoying publisher when you want to play your games in the original language. If someone from the Netherlands get`s it and could confirm it has the english dub it would be great.

 

[AJax_21]

I dont want to be a negative nancy but the fact that the game does a lot of the aiming for you is a bit of a turn off for me.
I'm just going to go out and say it, I dont think this game is actually anywhere near 5 stars, not even three at best. I think it's going to go through L.A Noire syndrome, Massive hype, everyone thinks it's amazing, then, the realisation that it is actually terrible.
but that's just me. I hope i'm wrong.

Care to explain why? And the auto-aim can be turned off, at least in the PC version.

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

Was on the fence on this one but the reviews so far have been really positive. To steam!

I'm not sure if this is out in the UK today, but I will definitely look out for it when I'm in town today. My expectations for this game grew with almost every new trailer, and I'm glad to see that I probably won't be disappointed.

It's out Friday here in the UK

 

[Erttheking]

Objecti

Question!

Is the protagonist overpowered in terms of balance? If so, can this be adequately mitigated by difficulty settings?

It's just that I've been getting that impression from all the preview gameplay footage. Abilities like possession and blink just look kinda game-breaking to me. So I would greatly appreciate some insight from your good self, y'know, having played the game and all.

Thanks.

You only get so many runes at a time, so you can only be so powerful. Same with weapon upgrades. The game adds more guards, etc, if you get a high chaos rating, which you will if you just kill everyone or leave lots of bodies lying around. Add to all of that the different difficulties, and you should be just fine.

The game adds more guards if you leave a lot of bodies...that is FREAKING AWESOME!

 

[Erttheking]

Didn't read the full review (What? It said it had spoilers) but...damn, five out of five?...when was the last time a game that a review that good on this website...ok, now I am REALLY looking forward to tuesday.

Are you kidding? It seems like The Escapist is unable to give anything but praises to every AAA-game that is released these days. Maybe not five stars all the time, they're not that bought out, but it's hard to find a four star review of any much hyped game.

Even this, which looks and sounds a lot like a new case of the Bioshocks. Everyone raving about the story and the choices, only for the game to turn out to be a poorly written variation on better, more nuanced books that most gamers haven't read and the choices ending up to nothing but an A or B type of ending.

Hope I'm wrong though. It would be fantastic to be able to find a great game after such a long year of bad releases. But five star reviews certainly aren't an indicator of any kind of quality anymore.

Unless if, say, Edge gives it five stars.

The Escapist has been "bought out"...yeah...I don't buy it. If they're "bought out" then how come Resident Evil 6 only got three out of five? Same with Skyrim Hearthfire.

 

[Krantos]

"Bethesda game"... Throws money at the screen.

After Morrowind, Bethesda has become my favorite developer. The Elder Scrolls and Fallout 3 were near perfect, but their other titles have been lacking. If Dishonored is at least half as good as reviews claim it to be, yey!

No. Stop.

Bethesda is only PUBLISHING this. Developers are Arkane Studios.

Bethesda really needs a name change. There are two separate companies named Bethesda, both owned by parent company Zenimax.

Bethesda Game Studio is the developer behind all the Elder Scrolls titles and Fallout 3.

Bethesda Softworks is the publisher who as published the Elder Scrolls, but has also published such "gems" as Wet, Rogue Warrior, and Brink.

By all means Dishonored still looks great, but don't go into it thinking it's developed by the Elder Scrolls team.

 

[Susan Arendt]

I dont want to be a negative nancy but the fact that the game does a lot of the aiming for you is a bit of a turn off for me.
I'm just going to go out and say it, I dont think this game is actually anywhere near 5 stars, not even three at best. I think it's going to go through L.A Noire syndrome, Massive hype, everyone thinks it's amazing, then, the realisation that it is actually terrible.
but that's just me. I hope i'm wrong.

You can turn off the auto aiming. Also, have you played the game? I'm just curious what you're basing your evaluation on.

Just watched the Machinima review...

He said 10 hour campaign (i know you can replay it differently)..
also very inconsistent questionable AI...NPC's spotting you through walls, seeing dead bodies through walls. Every NPC being simultaneously alerted when one spots you...

It's clearly going to be a good game but if these problems are true (and a patch doesn't fix them)...the whole stealth area of the game is messed up and everyone is going to have to downgrade their reviews when a possible exaggerated over the top metacritic backlash begins. Hopefully these problems are very very limited.

This is still the best and most respectable gamesite in my opinion....but they said Mass effect 3 was near to perfect....

10 hours? Bollocks. Unless you're skipping all of the cutscenes and just racing to your target as fast as you can. In other words, not actually enjoying the game.

I never had any NPCs spot me through walls. Through windows, yes, but that makes sense. Also, when you're spotted, they call out to their fellows and/or sound an alarm, which is what draws the others to you.

I only experienced one technical glitch when I played, which was a river fish swimming in mid air during the final mission. Which I thought was kind of amusing, really, though it did ruin a bit of the drama of the moment.

 

[synobal]

Objecti

Question!

Is the protagonist overpowered in terms of balance? If so, can this be adequately mitigated by difficulty settings?

It's just that I've been getting that impression from all the preview gameplay footage. Abilities like possession and blink just look kinda game-breaking to me. So I would greatly appreciate some insight from your good self, y'know, having played the game and all.

Thanks.

Pretty much my questions here as well. Game looks great but I worry it is too easy.

 

[Mortamus]

Didn't read the full review (What? It said it had spoilers) but...damn, five out of five?...when was the last time a game that a review that good on this website...ok, now I am REALLY looking forward to tuesday.

Are you kidding? It seems like The Escapist is unable to give anything but praises to every AAA-game that is released these days. Maybe not five stars all the time, they're not that bought out, but it's hard to find a four star review of any much hyped game.

Even this, which looks and sounds a lot like a new case of the Bioshocks. Everyone raving about the story and the choices, only for the game to turn out to be a poorly written variation on better, more nuanced books that most gamers haven't read and the choices ending up to nothing but an A or B type of ending.

Hope I'm wrong though. It would be fantastic to be able to find a great game after such a long year of bad releases. But five star reviews certainly aren't an indicator of any kind of quality anymore.

Unless if, say, Edge gives it five stars.

Bioshock was a game though that we could interact with, not a book. Also, this is an opinion, not a fact.

If they enjoyed the game, they're going to give it a good rating.

Don't worry if none of the bad stuff was really touched on here, as we'll likely get to see Yahtzee rip into the juicy good bits next week.

 

[ResonanceGames]

Even this, which looks and sounds a lot like a new case of the Bioshocks. Everyone raving about the story and the choices, only for the game to turn out to be a poorly written variation on better, more nuanced books that most gamers haven't read and the choices ending up to nothing but an A or B type of ending.

Bioshock wasn't a variation on any book, it was a variation on System Shock 2 -- though it did heavily reference Ayn Rand. To call her writing "better" would be nutters, so I hope that's not what you were implying.

Dishonored is heavily gameplay centric game, not a story driven one. Also, choices aren't something that necessarily build up to a many different endings. A lot of the best choice-heavy games have one ending but leave minute-to-minute gameplay up to the player. That's what Dishonored is attempting to do (though apparently there are also several different endings as well as a bonus).

 

[l3o2828]

Looking forward to get this.

 

[Shadowstar38]

(though apparently there are also several different endings as well as a bonus).

Other reviews have said there is a good ending and a bad ending depending on how many people you killed. So, yeah.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

"Bethesda game"

Next!

The post right below it...

"Bethesda game"... Throws money at the screen.

After Morrowind, Bethesda has become my favorite developer. The Elder Scrolls and Fallout 3 were near perfect, but their other titles have been lacking. If Dishonored is at least half as good as reviews claim it to be, yey!

You do realise that Bethesda Softworks are the Publishers of Dishonored? Arkane Studios are the Devs.

 

[Kopikatsu]

I... dunno. I think everything about the game sounds great, but when I see actual gameplay it just looks bad. Just overly stiff and very dated. The animations look unnatural, especially when the AI has to interact with the environment (like that NPC walking down the stairs near the end of the video review), and weapon/item usage (especially running around with your hand(s) in front of your "face" just feels like something that belongs in a game from 5+ years ago, not something we should still be seeing today. It may sound like I'm bagging on the game from a purely aesthetic point of view but I think thats something of a testament to how well designed the rest of the game seems to be. Everything else about the game is working overtime to pull me in, but when I see the game I can't help but feel pushed away.

I know just how you feel. But with the HUD, I think it's just...this game shouldn't have been first person. Heavy focus on first person stealth or first person platforming is a deal breaker, and this game has both together. IMO it would have been a lot better off as a third person game. Although Blink might be a bit more awkward to use in third person.

That's not the game's fault. That's a personal preference against first-person stealth games/platformers. Strider had some reasonable critiques, though of course I don't quite see eye-to-eye with what he says, but your argument is merely bias. So, being first-person, a stealth game, and a platformer, the game's not for you.

EDIT: Er, sorry about the double post. I'm pretty tired.

No offense, but have you played a game with a heavy focus on first person platforming or first person stealth? Because it's not bias, that camera scheme just isn't any good at either of those things.

Even if you work really hard to make it work like what was done in Mirror's Edge, it's still pretty awful. ('Course, the opinion part of this is my thinking that Mirror's Edge and Thief were bad games)

 

[PunkRex]

ME AND MY SCURRYING MINIONS WILL RECLAIM THE CITY!!!

Seriously... ima go Pied Piper on so many bastards.

 

[dakkster]

No offense, but have you played a game with a heavy focus on first person platforming or first person stealth? Because it's not bias, that camera scheme just isn't any good at either of those things.

Even if you work really hard to make it work like what was done in Mirror's Edge, it's still pretty awful. ('Course, the opinion part of this is my thinking that Mirror's Edge and Thief were bad games)

I was just about to say something along the lines of "Thief says hello" but then I read that last part and then it hit me that I hardly ever come across anyone who says that Thief was a bad game. I think both the Thief games and Mirror's Edge are brilliant at what they set out to do, but perhaps that's because I have a different set of expectations for them...

Either way, Dishonored has looked awesomeballs from day one and all the reviews that are coming in is just confirmation of that.

 

[Ghonzor]

You do realise that Bethesda Softworks are the Publishers of Dishonored? Arkane Studios are the Devs.

At least someone remembers. I'd hate to see Bethesda get credit for this game when Arkane actually developed it.

 

[Sangreal Gothcraft]

Ugh...the wait is killing me, Just a few more hours till i can play with with Mouse and Keyboard..

 

[DrunkenMonkey]

I love how some people are still saying it's not worth 60 and they are waiting for the price drop. Then they wonder where all the new IPs go when they don't support the developer at the months of the release. The irony.... this is how games like RE6 thrive and games like dishonored fail at launch. I just don't get it... ;(

Also to all people giving the animations flak, look at it this way, if they poured money into it like say what id did with Rage, this game wouldn't do so well. I'll take content, creativity, and birth of ideas, over things like life like animations any day of the week, month, year, interdimension, etc.