Enslaved As It Should Have Been

[minarri]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass. ...

There's a difference between having a strong body and looking like someone nicked the muscles from five anatomic models and had them implanted. Honestly I find it pretty repulsive.

OT: I'd definitely check out a game like the one Yahtzee dreamed up. Journey to the West is really an interesting story and it could make for a fun game.

 

[MailOrderClone]

Thanks alot Yahtzee you malignant humanoid something-or-other, you've made me want to read Journey to the West.

You made me want to read a book.

A book that's not American.

You monster.

 

[mr_rubino]

We already had a faithful...ish adaptation of Journey to the West on PS1 (Although things went off the rails in the last chapter or so, and someone added Xiaolongnu and a dryad named Lady Kikka to the "main character" pool), and it was called Saiyuki: Journey West.

EDIT: Actually, the company who made it apparently mixed in characters and concepts from an unrelated myth that they made a video game adaptation of. But since the actual plot is still Journey to the West, it's still a more faithful storyline.

 

[Cobalt Lion]

The Monkey in Enslaved doesn't seem to have much of a character at all. His backstory and motivation are absent without leave and he's pretty much just a big wooden club tied to the plot with string.

Please sir. That's "a big wooden club tied to the plot with string and a time bomb on his head."

I agree with the assess emnt that "Journey to the West" would have made a interesting game, but I think that what occours much of the time in the game-development line, (and if someone has personal experiance in game storyline development and can counter this argument, please feel free to correct me.) is that developers get loosly inspired by something and try to use it as a springboard to come up with something that is new and innovative. Sometimes it works, and sometimees it dosen't. I can respect the attempt at trying not to be a cookie cutter game, but this seems to be one of the cases where it just didn't work.

 

[supermike6]

Yahtzee, your problem is your completely judging the story of the game on what you think it should be. They don't have to be extremely faithful to the story, they're just being honest by saying it inspired them instead of just copying it. Your adaptation had just as much to do with the source material as theirs did. Are you saying that because your basing your story off another one, you can't have any creative licence? Because you sure gave yourself some. Enslaved's story is actually really good, even if it doesn't stringently follow this story you love so much despite having never read. I think your reviews are usually awesome, but man, you really came at this game's story the wrong way.

 

[Rickyvantof]

It would be like Ratchet & Clank, but slightly different.

 

[Spelonker]

It makes me wonder why creators do this. Adapt works when they don't intend to follow the source, I mean. In that case, why not just create their own IP?

*cough*DmC*cough*

And to be honest about it, if anyone were ever going to make a video game out of Journey to the West (or most other legends), they should just stick as closely to them as possible while downplaying the boring parts. Otherwise, they shouldn't try to pass it off as the original (example, God of War is not called "The Adventures of Hercules"). Legends are already fantastical enough, you don't need to change the setting to capture the player's imagination. It'd be like taking Star Wars and setting it in medieval times. It's just unnecessary. It's so hard to fuck up adapting a good legend as it is. I mean, why the fuck isn't there a game about Thor and Ragnarok out there already? Who the hell wouldn't want to play as THE GOD OF THUNDER as he traverses the land to fight all sort of nasty creatures? If you turn Thor into something generic like a space marine and the Midgar Serpent into a robot, you've lost most of the originality of the legend. We've seen this kind of setting in so many games before, but how many games is there set in Viking folklore? Undoubtedly less than there is games set in futuristic worlds.


I know I'd play an Into the West game if it were a good adaption of the original. But not if someone wiped their shitty ideas over it because they thought they were being "creative".

 

[Swifteye]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

 

[Spookimitsu]

Yahtzee's game idea was....dull. Perhaps it wasn't explained well enough, but it really didn't grab me.

I like the sound of Enslaved: Odyssey to the West more.

Have you played it? The whole slaver routine doesnt sound related to the source material. Yahtzee's actually sounds like it has much more depth.

Perhaps you should play it and then say if you like it or not. I liked "the sound of it" as well, unfortunately that lasts only until you put the disc in.

 

[Ampersand]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

 

[Swifteye]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

That is not what I meant at all. I was just saying that Yatzhee isn't interested in dramatic body structures.

 

[Ampersand]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

That is not what I meant at all. I was just saying that Yatzhee isn't interested in dramatic body structures.

Fair enough.
I just don't see what makes it such a big deal. Bottom line, dramatic character models are alot more fun to design. I mean I seriously doubt we'd have as many iconic characters as we do in gaming if everyone designed their characters like Alan Wake.

 

[Swifteye]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

That is not what I meant at all. I was just saying that Yatzhee isn't interested in dramatic body structures.

Fair enough.
I just don't see what makes it such a big deal. Bottom line, dramatic character models are alot more fun to design. I mean I seriously doubt we'd have as many iconic characters as we do in gaming if everyone designed their characters like Alan Wake.

I agree to that. That's why I make stories with anthros instead of humans. I feel I have more options in design.

 

[Ampersand]

Woops, that got away from me.

 

[Ampersand]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

That is not what I meant at all. I was just saying that Yatzhee isn't interested in dramatic body structures.

Fair enough.
I just don't see what makes it such a big deal. Bottom line, dramatic character models are alot more fun to design. I mean I seriously doubt we'd have as many iconic characters as we do in gaming if everyone designed their characters like Alan Wake.

I agree to that. That's why I make stories with anthros instead of humans. I feel I have more options in design.

What's an anthros?

 

[mr_rubino]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

That is not what I meant at all. I was just saying that Yatzhee isn't interested in dramatic body structures.

Fair enough.
I just don't see what makes it such a big deal. Bottom line, dramatic character models are alot more fun to design. I mean I seriously doubt we'd have as many iconic characters as we do in gaming if everyone designed their characters like Alan Wake.

I agree to that. That's why I make stories with anthros instead of humans. I feel I have more options in design.

What's an anthros?

Furries?

 

[Ampersand]

I have a question.
Why do you seem to have a problem with men who are strong looking strong? Seriously you bring it up in almost every review.
You can't have climbing trees, lifting heavy things and fighting giant robots as regular parts of your life style without gaining some serious muscle mass.

This seems especially ironic to me seen as how you so openly object to wimpy looking teen aged boys swinging giant buster swords in JRPGs.

Maybe he wants a balance. A normal basic body structure human being. Someone agile but strong but not like body buidler the characters he comments as being too built have so much muscle it would probably hinder agility. and for wimpy teens weilding giant swords it just comes off as improbable and annoying.

The human body isn't like an rpg character creation screen, you don't have to choose between being strong and being fast.
When it comes to climbing and/or combat, you need to train in strength to get faster and vise versa. If you only do one you'll wind up crippling yourself.

That is not what I meant at all. I was just saying that Yatzhee isn't interested in dramatic body structures.

Fair enough.
I just don't see what makes it such a big deal. Bottom line, dramatic character models are alot more fun to design. I mean I seriously doubt we'd have as many iconic characters as we do in gaming if everyone designed their characters like Alan Wake.

I agree to that. That's why I make stories with anthros instead of humans. I feel I have more options in design.

What's an anthros?

Furries?

Oh right.
When i'm designing a new character I usually just scratch at the page with a pencil until it starts to look like something I like.....It's not very elegant but I usually get some interesting results. = )

 

[Swifteye]

Furries?

As it is commonly known. But really it stands for Anthropomorphic which is just making something that isn't human whether it be a an animal, A car, or a milkshake. And giving it human characteristics

What's an anthros?

Short for Anthropomorphic which is just making something that isn't human whether it be a an animal, A car, or a milkshake. And giving it human characteristics.

I use it all the time for my writings. When I used to daydream fanfict about human characters I ran into a brick wall. It felt like there was a real limit to how you could create a human that would showing transformation or a clear difference in power and abilities without the use of something like technology or gaining the powers of gods and or animals. At some point I just cut it loose and started writing about animal people than humans. For the most part.

 

[Fearzone]

It's like the first thing to get rationed in times of crisis is the bottom four inches of all the world's baby doll T-shirts.

Makes sense to me!

 

[Dragonpit]

Interesting concept. Totally workable, but what's the main obstacle, I ask you? Several problems are mentioned, but none stand out. Well, at least you didn't go so far as to include romance. Nothing wrong with it, but we don't always need to see two characters eye each other like their own personal microwaved watermelon.

Also, Yahtzee's personal site has been flagged by my computer recently as a potential hazard for malware. The computer makes it clear that Yahtzee himself doesn't endorse it, but that pretty much leaves me with the problem that I want to see his site and yet it has been flagged and blocked.