Poll: Dishonored

[Jimmy Sylvers]

What do you guys think of it?

I have only played a small amount so far (Damn Uni work!) but I can say a bit about it:

The Good
-Great game play for both stealth and combat. The way you are detected/avoid detection is quite good and the combat is fast-paced and visceral.

-The world is interesting and well developed.

The Bad
-Much like Dark Messiah the acting and story isn't fantastic. There is no real explanation to the character, you just turn up and they assume that Corvo is all set to be an assassin.

-The graphics are nothing to write home about, from a distance the textures are OK but having just come from playing Arkham City, they aren't very impressive. (That said, there seems to be a fair few unique faces, so that is pretty cool).

-I have been getting a lot of 'invisible walls'.

 

[daveman247]

well, its not out yet here so i cannot say. Will be getting it on the fri though so i CAN say then

 

[dumbseizure]

I have loved the game so far, but it isn't without its weaknesses.

Positives:

-Combat. The fighting feels fluid and responsive, the fighting actually feels like a fight, not like im just swinging a stick around. I love how the game assigns whatever you choose to the left hand, leaving the right hand with your blade so your not switching between pistol and blade.

-Abilities. The abilities are very satisfying to use. Things like the windblast feel powerful to use, but also feel like the mana use is justified.

-Movement. The movement in the game, jumping around buildings, blinking between areas or even blinking between assassinations of guards makes you feel like a king among mere mortals.

-Story. I like some aspects of the story, I found myself getting emotionally involved with certain aspects, like the daughter. Reading the books and listening to characters speak, I found myself genuinely wanting to know more about them.

-Lack of boss fights. I felt that they made the right decision with not including over the top, balls to the wall boss fights. A boss fight where someone can take 50000000 hits to the face with a crossbow would not have fitted with the vibe of the game. I mean, the feeling I have gotten so far is that Corvo is powerful as hell, ending peoples lives in an instant. Adding a huge boss fight would not have fitted in too well with that overall feeling.

Negatives:

-Story. I know story is in the positives and negatives but hear me out. I felt like you weren't eased into the story, more thrown into it head first, and then you have to work shit out from there. The starting of it made me a bit dissappointed as I wanted to know the background of Corvo more than anything. Some aspects of the plot I could also see coming from the other side of mars, and sometimes I just wanted to run in the other direction, with me screaming at my computer saying "WHAT DID YOU GO IN THERE FOR YOU IDIOT!" when the game left me little to no other choice.

-Some stealth aspects. I did find some things with the stealth that made me confused, like a guard walking past me 6 times before noticing where I was, or hiding in the shadows on a rooftop only for a guard to spot me somehow through sheer luck or magic.

-Characters. Some characters I found memorable and loving, but I also found that other characters were just plain confusing. Their motivations and the actions that they took did not seem to have much meaning behind it. In saying that I am probably somewhere round halfway through the story so maybe their motivations get revealed later, so this point may end up dissappearing.



Overall though I am loving this game. As someone who loved Mirrors Edge and Assassins Creed, I feel right at home playing this game. The abilites feel powerful, the fighting is responsive and the movement is the cup of earl gray that I was looking for.

 

[Jimmy Sylvers]

Yeah, I am finding the game play great, I really liked the combat in Dark Messiah too and I am also a fan of AC and Mirrors Edge. I quite like the game so far, it just feels a little unrefined in some aspects.

 

[Spectrum_Prez]

I've only played five hours of it so far, so these should be considered first impressions:

1.) Core gameplay is very good. Everything I've encountered so far is smooth and well-balanced. Abilities seem to be thought out and offer different channels for development. Stealth is great, combat seems solid (haven't done much fighting yet though).

2.) Art design is absolutely top-notch. Great Fin de Siecle feel.

3.) Story is lacklustre. It's very heavy-handed and a bit rushed. "Now you're doing A. Now you're meeting B. Now you're doing C." The character-building moments, such as the hide and seek with Princess Emily, seem tacked-on. By far my biggest gripe was the decision to throw ambiguity about the plot out the window in that first six-months-later scene where the two big-bads pretty much confess to masterminding the conspiracy. Without that scene, the devs could have played at the "were they in on it?", "are they unwittingly falsely accusing?", "are they just trying to maintain order amidst chaos?" moral ambiguities. Ambiguity about the morality of assassination would have pretty seamlessly linked up with the High-Low chaos meter system that will supposedly decide which story-ending you get.

4.) Garrett doesn't do any trademark voiceovers. Damn. But in general, the characters, including the protagonist, have been pretty weak so far. The audience with the Empress was not what I expected. She certainly did not come across as someone worth dying for, and she didn't seem very imposing or awe-inducing at all.

All above opinions subject to change as I free up time to actually play this thing.

 

[ohnoitsabear]

I'm in the second mission so far, and I find the game fucking amazing.

I seriously spend a half hour exploring around the bar area. The fact that I not only can do this, but I enjoy doing it speaks a lot for the level design in the game.

The combat is also satisfying and visceral. Not enough to carry the game by itself, but it doesn't have to, because other aspects are so awesome.

Play this game. Right now.

 

[Erttheking]

It's about as good as I expected. In other words pretty damn good.

 

[Zhukov]

Actually a lot better than I expected. That is to say, it's fucking excellent.

Level design is great. Setting is one of the best I've ever seen. Seriously, this is how you do a "dark" setting, not that Witcher 2 three-implied-rapes-per-minute crap.

Game looks gorgeous. Love the visual style.

PC port is very solid with none of the usual porting issues, at least so far.

Only real complaint I have is that there aren't enough non-lethal mechanics. If you're a sneaky, pacifist wuss like me you're basically stuck with just choking people out or using sleep darts. Meanwhile, your more bloodthirsty counterparts get to backstab people, blast them, snipe them, set them on fire, fus-ro-dah them off rooftops, feed them to swarms of plague rats, engage in swordfights and so on.

Oh, and lastly, I absolutely love the whispering heart. I've spent way too long following people around just to learn random tidbits of info about them.

 

[Waffle_Man]

Dishonored is good and you should get it.

If you don't, you lose the right to complain about the state of the gaming industry.

 

[Rednog]

Still waiting for the European release, so I'll chip in when I actually get my hands on it.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

Going into town tomorrow to pick it up.

I wish it was Friday.