Titanfall Arcade Screws Up Asteroids

[Andy Chalk]

Titanfall Arcade Screws Up Asteroids

The Titanfall Arcade is now open and I can only hope that the people who made it were kept far, far away from Titanfall itself.

I don't know how "8-bit is better with a Titan," exactly, but I can tell you one thing that isn't: the old Atari classic Asteroids. It's not an inherently bad idea and given how simple it is - Asteroids, but with a vector graphics Titan instead of a triangular spaceship - you might think it would be pretty hard to screw up. You'd be wrong.

It looked solid enough when I first started playing and the Titan's super-powered weaponry made short work of the many asteroids swarming around. But it seemed a little too easy, even for an arcade oldster like me, so when the "Titan Wins" message popped up after 30 seconds or so of play, I gave it another spin with a little less focus. And I won again. And again. And again.

I eventually came to realize that the Titan is invulnerable, and that I could start the game, ignore it for the requisite amount of time and still "win," albeit with a less-than-spectacular score - you don't get points for destroying asteroids by letting them smash into you. It is, in other words, an effectively worthless implementation of the game; after all, if you can't lose, why play?

It may seem like a disproportionate amount of complaining about a free Flash promo-game, but Titanfall is going to be a big, big release for EA, and given that it's following the SimCity and Battlefield 4 multiplayer train wrecks, it needs to be airtight from top to bottom. Yet this is how EA sees fit to promote it? Respawn puts together a game that just might have what it takes to unseat Call of Duty as king of the online shooters, and EA can't even hire someone who knows Flash programming well enough to whip up the equivalent of a high school project? The mind boggles.

Missile Command and Centipede are "coming soon" and will hopefully be better - I was a big Centipede fan back in the day - but given their relative increase in gameplay complexity I'll be happy enough if they don't crash my browser when I launch them. I certainly hope that Titanfall arrives in better shape than this.

Source: Titanfall Arcade [http://titanfallarcade.com/]



Permalink

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

if you can't lose, why play?

You mean you don't play to satisfy your insatiable urge to have the biggest number?

Clearly you're not a true gamer.

 

[Pyrian]

I'm pretty sure the Titan being overpowered and invulnerable is the entire point of making these games.

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

Well in the grand scheme of things I'm just glad that EA marketing didn't involve trying to kill moms or something.

 

[fix-the-spade]

So, another of EA's clueless disposable advertising campaigns?

I'd love to know who it is they keep hiring to make these.

So I can shoot them.

In all seriousness, EA's advertising has been so horrible in the last decade that 'let's take iconic games and use the nonsensical inclusion of Titans to draw attention to Titans,' is possibly the best one they've had in years.

 

[Makabriel]

Sooo, I guess someone has missed the point of "8-Bit is better with a Titan" comment at the bottom?

Yes, the point is that you can destroy or survive anything with a Titan. That's... the joke.. gah

 

[Vivi22]

if you can't lose, why play?

You mean you don't play to satisfy your insatiable urge to have the biggest number?

Clearly you're not a true gamer.

But getting the biggest number is more interesting when dying is there to cut your attempt short.

 

[Racecarlock]

As a man who uses a lot of cheat codes, I'd say feeling like an indestructible immortal god who can crush whole civilizations beneath his might boot is pretty cool.

Although you should still have to enable cheat codes.

 

[josemlopes]

I am still waiting for the review of Duty Calls, that game was so easy that really showed how the market is more focused on quick bursts of making the player feel awesome without any kind of real danger.

 

[marurder]

The lightning beam continues to play in a 3 second loop even after the time is up.
stopallsounds!!!

 

[Andy Chalk]

Sooo, I guess someone has missed the point of "8-Bit is better with a Titan" comment at the bottom?

Yes, the point is that you can destroy or survive anything with a Titan. That's... the joke.. gah

If that's the joke, it's beyond lame, especially since someone else just "explained" in response to my own earlier joke that players get out of Titans and go on foot because they're actually quite destructible in combat. More to the point, it's not even the indestructibility that's really the issue - it's that you can just stand there for 30 seconds (or however long, I didn't bother to actually time it) and do absolutely nothing, and still "win." Whether it's supposed to be a joke or it's just a simple half-assed job of Flash programming is pretty much irrelevant, because it's an absolute failure either way.

 

[Geisterkarle]

I don't know why so many dislike this idea! I think it's cool! Something new and other, than all the other promotions!

@EA: Could we have a Titanfall Text Adventure?

 

[TheIceQueen]

I played this game while studying from my textbook.

And when I say that I played this game, I basically just moved my mouse in circles while I looked down at my textbook and read. Didn't even pay attention to the game, if you can even call it that. I still won and I only did slightly less than the attempt at which I was at least somewhat focused on the 'game.'

So, overall, I'd say it is indeed pretty dumb.

 

[Excludos]

Sooo, I guess someone has missed the point of "8-Bit is better with a Titan" comment at the bottom?

Yes, the point is that you can destroy or survive anything with a Titan. That's... the joke.. gah

If that's the joke, it's beyond lame, especially since someone else just "explained" in response to my own earlier joke that players get out of Titans and go on foot because they're actually quite destructible in combat. More to the point, it's not even the indestructibility that's really the issue - it's that you can just stand there for 30 seconds (or however long, I didn't bother to actually time it) and do absolutely nothing, and still "win." Whether it's supposed to be a joke or it's just a simple half-assed job of Flash programming is pretty much irrelevant, because it's an absolute failure either way.

It's a fake propaganda for the use of titans concealed as a game. This went completely over your head, even thought the clues are everywhere. Expect the other 2 games to be exactly the same.

My thinking is that if this was fallout instead of Titanfall, you'd get it right away.

What ticks me off is that even after being explained this, instead of going "aaah", you stubbornly lash out on it for not being obvious enough when its pretty fucking obvious to everyone else.