Watch_Dogs is quite simply AMAZING!!!

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Watch Dogs just blows away Rockstar's games like GTA and RDR, it's not even a contest.

Aiden controls so much better than John Marston or Niko, who feel so mechanical in comparison. Even Rockstar's pure shooter, Max Payne 3, controls horribly mechanical. Aiden moves so much more fluidly from cover swapping to seamless vaulting. The only issue with Aiden is that you can't shoulder swap. The driving controls are just fine; if you are having problems, you need to learn how to drive.

The main thing that separates Watch Dogs from most sandbox games is the missions are open-ended. I don't see the point in playing a sandbox/open-world game with linear missions. You have so many options to go about completing the mission to hacking to stealth to standard shooting and you can mix and match among them freely. The AI in Rockstar's games just doesn't allow for anything along those lines. I played the first 3rd of RDR and just quit because every mission played out exactly the same with extremely subpar cover shooting; I walk past imaginary line where all enemies know my location and I have to kill them in a extremely whack-a-mole manner, not fun at all. It was on par with Winback, one of the very first cover shooters.

Chicago in Watch Dogs is more real than any other game. Every NPC is unique, you can hack people's phones to see text messages and overhear phone calls. You see a chick throwing her boyfriend's stuff out the apartment. This is the type of world GTA3 gave us a glimpse of, but Rockstar hasn't evolved past that, they just make the game better looking.

Watch Dogs will be looked upon as a truly special game in the advances it has made to its genre.

EDIT:


This is why Watch Dogs just kills GTA and RDR. The character control of Aiden is just so much smoother when compared to Rockstar's games along with the animations themselves; the cover system is so much better allowing for cover swap melees and shooting. The enemy AI is better, which allows for mix and matching between gunplay, stealth, and hacking. There's so many options you have at your disposal in Watch Dogs to go about engaging each and every enemy. If you play it like a bland cover shooter like the IGN playthrough [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHlYuhdyeDg] of the same mission, that's your own fault.

 

[tippy2k2]

I went from being cautiously optimistic about this game with all the bad press Ubisoft kept giving themselves to normal optimism now that reviews and whatnot are coming down. Most of them don't rate it quite as highly as you are but overall the game is getting great reviews from what I've seen.

I will likely purchase this game....eventually. It's been quite the time since I've paid full price for any game and this one does not quite do enough for me to make me break that habit (not the games fault; I just don't really care for open world games). Games drop in price too quickly for me to pay full price for something unless absolutely necessary.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

I went from being cautiously optimistic about this game with all the bad press Ubisoft kept giving themselves to normal optimism now that reviews and whatnot are coming down. Most of them don't rate it quite as highly as you are but overall the game is getting great reviews from what I've seen.

I will likely purchase this game....eventually. It's been quite the time since I've paid full price for any game and this one does not quite do enough for me to make me break that habit (not the games fault; I just don't really care for open world games). Games drop in price too quickly for me to pay full price for something unless absolutely necessary.

I HATE most open world games because the missions are linear instead of open-ended, which defeats the purpose of an open world game. Linear games do linear missions way better than open world games. I bought RDR for $7.50 and feel ripped off, I just couldn't take the boring and subpar cover shooting anymore. I actually bought a PS4 for Watch Dogs, and I'm loving every minute of the game. If you're going to buy the game for a console, you can buy it now, play it for a month or so and sell it for probably $40 on eBay. That's what I do most of the time, which is why I don't mind buying a game on day 1.

 

[Zhukov]

It really, really isn't.

It's an open-world, third person shooter. With lots of driving. Whoop-de-doo. Have fun commuting to your next mission.

The hacking amounts to a 'Use' button that can be used from a distance. "Wow... I can press X to make that thing explode! Much better than every other game where I just shoot the thing to make it explode!"

The story is fucking awful. You are Aiden Pearce, a thirty something brown-haired white guy at large! Someone killed your family member (a nephew this time, how refreshing!) and now you're out for revenge! The dialogue makes my mute button finger twitch.

It looks pretty meh too. But I guess that's to be expected. It takes time for developers to start really taking advantage of next gen hardware. Still, it'd be nice if they took the time to make some decent faces. Aiden's sister and nephew in particular look like fucking shop dummies that came to life. Kinda ruins it when the game is shoving them in your face, screaming, "You care about these people! You really do! You want to be a manly man and protect them from the terrible world of bad people!"

It's "morally grey", which in this case means that Aiden just acts like an arsehole to almost everybody he meets. He feels like a 90s anti-hero, and comes across as having some kind of social impairment. To be fair, I think they might actually be going for that. Still leaves me with a unlikeable twit for a protagonist who can't get past "Hello, how ya goin'?" without threatening somebody.

About the only nice things I can say about it that the city does feel more alive than most of what you see in most open world games and there's an absolute ton of content on offer.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

It really, really isn't.

It's an open-world, third person shooter. With lots of driving. Whoop-de-doo. Have fun commuting to your next mission.

The hacking amounts to a 'Use' button that can be used from a distance. "Wow... I can press X to make that thing explode! Much better than every other game where I just shoot the thing to make it explode!"

The story is fucking awful. You are Aiden Pearce, a thirty something brown-haired white guy at large! Someone killed your family member (a nephew this time, how refreshing!) and now you're out for revenge! The dialogue makes my mute button finger twitch.

It looks pretty meh too. But I guess that's to be expected. It takes time for developers to start really taking advantage of next gen hardware. Still, it'd be nice if they took the time to make some decent faces. Aiden's sister and nephew in particular look like fucking shop dummies that came to life. Kinda ruins it when the game is shoving them in your face, screaming, "You care about these people! You really do! You want to be a manly man and protect them from the terrible world of bad people!"

It's "morally grey", which in this case means that Aiden just acts like an arsehole to almost everybody he meets. He feels like a 90s anti-hero, and comes across as having some kind of social impairment. To be fair, I think they might actually be going for that. Still leaves me with a unlikeable twit for a protagonist who can't get past "Hello, how ya goin'?" without threatening somebody.

About the only nice things I can say about it that the city does feel more alive than most of what you see in most open world games and there's an absolute ton of content on offer.

It really really is amazing. I get bored within the first hour of any Rockstar game. I'm talking how much better the world is and how much better missions are structured, not that it has 3rd-person shooting or a cliche main character. Vanquish and RDR both have 3rd-person shooting, one of them is great.

Did you want hacking to be a mini-game every single fucking time? Because that's just so much fun! in Deus Ex HR, Mass Effect 2, Bioshock, etc. And hacking isn't really hacking when you do most things; you hack in to get access, then you have access and you can just "use" whatever like a authorized user of said system could.

 

[josemlopes]

Played a bit and found it really mediocre, and saying that it blows away GTA V or RDR almost makes me want to puke.

The city is small, the controls are mediocre, the action is lackluster, the driving is abysmal (and that carmaggedon minigame is only challenging because of it), and most of the things that actually work are basicly what was already in the other Ubisoft games like Assassins Creed or Far Cry (suprised they didnt let the guys that did Far Cry's 3 driving help as it was very fun, or hell, from Driver San Francisco). The driving is basicly at the same level of the driving in GTAIV, shit.

The only saving grace is the profiler gimmick that does make wondering around entertaining even though GTA V makes the city feel more alive and varied with a bit more subtlety (in GTA V you can see the owner of a rich house arrive in his rich car, park it in front of his garage and smoke a cigarette in the doorway instead of just adding a random fact about a citizen and calling it a day, the phone chats are a litte better but its weird seeing a guy paired with a girl talking on the phone with another guy how someone elses tits are amazing)

Also the GTA Online missions are as open ended as they can be, they just give you an objective and the means of getting it are up to you, you can go with a tank, a helicopter, snipe them from REALLY FUCKING far away, get an armored truck full of guys, jump from a plane, attack through the rooftops, use a boat to aproach or snipe if near the coast, etc...

In Watch Dogs the police sees through walls, NPCs listen to calls even if their phones are down, the characters never change their clothes even if its a flashback cutscene in the rain (the sister sure is immune to catching a cold), the main character is as edgy as it can get.

And the gunplay while being the best part of it is mediocre as it can be, I was expecting more as Far Cry 3 and Splinter Cell Convition/Blacklist had some fun gunplay. To say that its a lot more fluid then Max Payne 3 really raises the bullshit metter.

I really dont get how someone can make a thread about a game and simply ignore any kind of negativity in it and praise every part of it as a feature, even I recently made a thread about Wolfenstein that while I called it the best game I played this year so far I never went out of my way to call other games shit and present Wolfenstein as the one true game. I liked it a lot and that was it, just my opinion.

In the end all I see here is "Watch Dogs did nothing wrong, Rockstar is shit"

 

[Zhukov]

It really really is amazing. I get bored within the first hour of any Rockstar game. I'm talking how much better the world is and how much better missions are structured, not that it has 3rd-person shooting or a cliche main character. Vanquish and RDR both have 3rd-person shooting, one of them is great.

Did you want hacking to be a mini-game every single fucking time? Because that's just so much fun! in Deus Ex HR, Mass Effect 2, Bioshock, etc. And hacking isn't really hacking when you do most things; you hack in to get access, then you have access and you can just "use" whatever like a authorized user of said system could.

Oh, I'm not sticking up for Rockstar. I don't really like them either. I enjoyed RDR, but still got tired of it before the game was over.

As for the hacking, no, I don't necessarily want it to be a mini-game. (Which is funny, since there is an annoying hacking mini-game in Watch Dogs.) But 'Press X to Hack' is still decidedly unimpressive. It's just a remote 'Use' button. Also, it often feels stupidly unnecessary. Oh look, I can press X to hack to raise some cover. Revolutionary! I can press X to hack to make that guys pants explode for an effortless insta-kill! Next gen has truly arrived, guys!

I quickly stopped bothering to hack at all. Just third person peek-a-boo'd my way through the missions. Which wouldn't be the worst thing ever, since I actually enjoy third person shooting games, but this one is pretty sparse. As an action game, it doesn't really have anything going for it. Oh, except for... dun dun dun... a slow motion mechanic! WOW!

 

[Elfgore]

It's pretty "meh" for me. I'm enjoying the shooting and hacking, but the driving is downright awful. Makes having the open world a chore. The story so far is eh too. The most enjoyment I've had out of it is turning Aiden into batman and adding commentary. It's not bad, but it isn't really good enough for me to justify owning a ps4 for the "true" watch dogs experience.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The game looks good but is saying that other games are awful by comparison really the kind of praise you want to give it?

 

[Total LOLige]

I don't really like "sandbox"/open-world all that much, give me super linearity and corridors any day of the week. I'm not really sure how I feel about it yet. It certainly hasn't been mind blowing but all of the game mechanics work pretty well. I wouldn't say that it's better than RDR though and it's like a million years away from being able to touch Sleeping Dogs in terms of awesomeness.

Spoiler: Damien is an absolute spitting image of Mark Lanegan

Damien

Mark Lanegan

 

[DudeistBelieve]

I'm enjoying it quite a bit, but the stealth elements remind me a helluva lot of the Batman games. Except instead of swooping around on gargoyles you're using cameras.

I also like what they've done with the police, this idea of Car-Stealth, how they scan the area first or give a brief warning when someone's calling the cops.

So far though I've sunk more time into robbing people's bank accounts for money than anything else.

It really, really isn't.

It's an open-world, third person shooter. With lots of driving. Whoop-de-doo. Have fun commuting to your next mission.

Actually I've been walking and robbing people. Occasionally I kill the people that search for information that offends me (like RAPE or Scientology)

The hacking amounts to a 'Use' button that can be used from a distance. "Wow... I can press X to make that thing explode! Much better than every other game where I just shoot the thing to make it explode!"

and in Batman you use a batarang by tapping the trigger button. Oh did you want a minigame? Do you realize how annoying that would be for every damn thing? You're in the middle of a car chase or infiltrating, but hold on you gotta play Pipe Dream over and over!

I mean it be nice if at some point I come across an MS-DOS screen like in Enter The Matrix and actually get to hack something, but for gameplay it would annoy me to have to do something every time I wanted to hack a camera.

 

[Zhukov]

It really, really isn't.

It's an open-world, third person shooter. With lots of driving. Whoop-de-doo. Have fun commuting to your next mission.

Actually I've been walking and robbing people.

Ah yes, robbing people. Look at person and Press X to Rob. Simply AMAZING. Next gen has truly arrived.

Spoiler alert: you're wasting your time. You don't really need the money for anything. The game throws cash at you like mad and there's not much to spend it on.

The hacking amounts to a 'Use' button that can be used from a distance. "Wow... I can press X to make that thing explode! Much better than every other game where I just shoot the thing to make it explode!"

and in Batman you use a batarang by tapping the trigger button. Oh did you want a minigame? Do you realize how annoying that would be for every damn thing? You're in the middle of a car chase or infiltrating, but hold on you gotta play Pipe Dream over and over!

I mean it be nice if at some point I come across an MS-DOS screen like in Enter The Matrix and actually get to hack something, but for gameplay it would annoy me to have to do something every time I wanted to hack a camera.

Not sure I get the Batman comparison.

Like I said above, I don't really want a minigame (spoiler alert: Watch Dogs has it's own annoying hacking minigame. You'll run into it soon enough if you haven't already.)

But I am incapable of being impressed by a remote 'Use' button. Especially when there's very little need to use it, given that pretty much every problem can be solved quicker and easier by shooting it in the head.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Played a bit and found it really mediocre, and saying that it blows away GTA V or RDR almost makes me want to puke.

The city is small, the controls are mediocre, the action is lackluster, the driving is abysmal (and that carmaggedon minigame is only challenging because of it), and most of the things that actually work are basicly what was already in the other Ubisoft games like Assassins Creed or Far Cry (suprised they didnt let the guys that did Far Cry's 3 driving help as it was very fun, or hell, from Driver San Francisco). The driving is basicly at the same level of the driving in GTAIV, shit.

The only saving grace is the profiler gimmick that does make wondering around entertaining even though GTA V makes the city feel more alive and varied with a bit more subtlety (in GTA V you can see the owner of a rich house arrive in his rich car, park it in front of his garage and smoke a cigarette in the doorway instead of just adding a random fact about a citizen and calling it a day, the phone chats are a litte better but its weird seeing a guy paired with a girl talking on the phone with another guy how someone elses tits are amazing)

Also the GTA Online missions are as open ended as they can be, they just give you an objective and the means of getting it are up to you, you can go with a tank, a helicopter, snipe them from REALLY FUCKING far away, get an armored truck full of guys, jump from a plane, attack through the rooftops, use a boat to aproach or snipe if near the coast, etc...

In Watch Dogs the police sees through walls, NPCs listen to calls even if their phones are down, the characters never change their clothes even if its a flashback cutscene in the rain (the sister sure is immune to catching a cold), the main character is as edgy as it can get.

And the gunplay while being the best part of it is mediocre as it can be, I was expecting more as Far Cry 3 and Splinter Cell Convition/Blacklist had some fun gunplay. To say that its a lot more fluid then Max Payne 3 really raises the bullshit metter.

I really dont get how someone can make a thread about a game and simply ignore any kind of negativity in it and praise every part of it as a feature, even I recently made a thread about Wolfenstein that while I called it the best game I played this year so far I never went out of my way to call other games shit and present Wolfenstein as the one true game. I liked it a lot and that was it, just my opinion.

In the end all I see here is "Watch Dogs did nothing wrong, Rockstar is shit"

Every single mission in RDR plays out like lame whack-a-mole. I stopped playing because I just couldn't take it anymore, the shooting was boring me to death and there was literally no challenge to the game. Doing a cover swap melee in Watch Dogs is way more fun than RDR whack-a-mole.

I have no problem driving, you just need to learn to drive properly.

I listed of an example of watching a chick throw her boyfriends stuff out the apartment in Watch Dogs, you act like you just see texts or hear phones calls of that type of stuff.

The enemy AI in Rockstar games don't allow for much open-ended-ness, once you cross that imaginary line all enemies know your position. In Watch Dogs, you just have to break line of sight.

The gunplay in Rockstar's games, even MP3, is just abysmal. I can cover swap shoot in Watch Dogs, not GTA, RDR, or MP3. Splinter Cell Blacklist had mediocre gunplay, I platinumed the game because it's a great stealth game, not because it's a great shooter.

Spoiler: Why MP3 sucks

1) You have to take your thumb off the left stick to shoulder swap. That's a big no-no because I have to stop moving to swap shoulders. L3 is a perfect shoulder swap button.

2) The crouch button literally only works when it wants to. I'm mashing it and Max will crouch after the 5th or so button press.

3) There's no way to quick switch weapons. You have bring up the radial dial to do any kind of weapon switching. Such a freaking simple solution is being able to just tap the button to quick switch weapons while holding it brings up the radial dial, something even MGS1 did.

4) Every time Max dive rolls or in last stand mode in bullet time he freaking gets up for no reason. Dive roll behind say a counter (chest high cover), Max will stand up, get shot, and then take cover instead of just being able to go straight to cover.

5) Max while sluggish (which is fine) feels a bit floaty (not fine).

6) With TPSs having cover swap nowadays, it just feels a bit archaic not being able to cover swap.

I know what I'm talking about with controls for TPSs, I'm one of the best online TPS players. I played MGO for 4 years against the very best players; FYI, you needed really good aim because only headshots killed (no 3-4 shots to the chest would kill). I'm in the top ranked clan on Ghost Recon Future Soldier and have probably like 100 clan matches on my Youtube if you require proof.

---

As for the hacking, no, I don't necessarily want it to be a mini-game. (Which is funny, since there is an annoying hacking mini-game in Watch Dogs.) But 'Press X to Hack' is still decidedly unimpressive. It's just a remote 'Use' button. Also, it often feels stupidly unnecessary. Oh look, I can press X to hack to raise some cover. Revolutionary! I can press X to hack to make that guys pants explode for an effortless insta-kill! Next gen has truly arrived, guys!

I quickly stopped bothering to hack at all. Just third person peek-a-boo'd my way through the missions. Which wouldn't be the worst thing ever, since I actually enjoy third person shooting games, but this one is pretty sparse. As an action game, it doesn't really have anything going for it. Oh, except for... dun dun dun... a slow motion mechanic! WOW!

What do you want hacking to be? It seems to me it can either be A) a button press or B) a mini-game. It's your all fault for playing Watch Dogs like a standard cover shooter, you're missing all the fun. It similar to playing Vanquish as a standard cover shooter. Mix and match between hacking, stealth, and shooting to make your own great moments.

You forgot cover swapping; cover swap melee & cover swap stop and shoot. A lot of TPSs have a slow motion mechanic, I don't get your point. It's not one single game system that makes Watch Dogs special, it's how all the system work with each other, which you pretty much didn't bother with as you just played it like Winback.

 

[Zhukov]

As for the hacking, no, I don't necessarily want it to be a mini-game. (Which is funny, since there is an annoying hacking mini-game in Watch Dogs.) But 'Press X to Hack' is still decidedly unimpressive. It's just a remote 'Use' button. Also, it often feels stupidly unnecessary. Oh look, I can press X to hack to raise some cover. Revolutionary! I can press X to hack to make that guys pants explode for an effortless insta-kill! Next gen has truly arrived, guys!

I quickly stopped bothering to hack at all. Just third person peek-a-boo'd my way through the missions. Which wouldn't be the worst thing ever, since I actually enjoy third person shooting games, but this one is pretty sparse. As an action game, it doesn't really have anything going for it. Oh, except for... dun dun dun... a slow motion mechanic! WOW!

What do you want hacking to be? It seems to me it can either be A) a button press or B) a mini-game. It's your all fault for playing Watch Dogs like a standard cover shooter, you're missing all the fun. It similar to playing Vanquish as a standard cover shooter. Mix and match between hacking, stealth, and shooting to make your own great moments.

You forgot cover swapping; cover swap melee & cover swap stop and shoot. A lot of TPSs have a slow motion mechanic, I don't get your point. It's not one single game system that makes Watch Dogs special, it's how all the system work with each other, which you pretty much didn't bother with as you just played it like Winback.

It's not about Minigame VS Press X. I want hacking to be neccesary, useful and fun. Bonus points if it's original.

As it is, what exactly does hacking do in this game?
- Making shit explode. Not neccesary or particularly useful since shooting them in the head works better. Arguably fun if you've never seen an explosion in a video game before. Definitely not new or original.
- Distractions. Shooting them in the head works better.
- Traffic lights and "blockers". Actually neccesary, useful and fun. Congratulations Watch Dogs! Sadly they fuck it up by hijacking my camera to go, "Ohhhh, look at this, LOOOOK AT THIS!" while I drive into a wall because I can't see where I'm going.
- Stealing money. Ha. Ha. Ha.
- Tagging enemies. Oh fuck off Watch Dogs. I'm going to shoot them in the head in a few seconds anyway.
- Opening doors. My God. The awesome. It burns!
- Backouts. AKA easy mode button because apparently Aiden can see in the dark and nobody else can.
- etc etc

As for cover swap etc etc, why would I bother with those things?

I have a magic device known as a "Gun" that I can point at at my problem and make it disappear in half a second. I also have a magic thing known as "Focus" (aka slo-mo or bullet time) that makes the problem stand still for a few seconds. Combine the two for easy mode.

So why would I fuck around pressing X to use this or that?

If all your awesome mechanical systems are rendered obsolete by the 'Shoot Him in the Head' system then your systems are not working with each other. That's a sign of a game with shitty balance.

 

[Zaydin]

I've been enjoying Watch_Dogs, myself. It runs fairly smoothly on my PC, despite not meeting all the recommended requirements, Chicago in is probably one of the most 'alive' sandboxes I've seen in a game so far, and the missions have some flexibility in them, generally having a choice of either going in guns blazing, or sneaking around, knocking out guards one by one, and hacking objects for distractions.

It's not flawless, though; I find it a little irritating that I can't shoot while driving, which is something I've been able to do in just about any sandbox game I've played in the last five years (With Just Cause 2 being the only other exception), and the vehicle physics feels off to me.

 

[Vigormortis]

While I can't really agree that Watch Dogs is "simply amazing", given the levels of mediocrity on display for large portions of the game, the abysmal job done in porting to PC, and the bevy of broken promises[footnote]Not even going to go into the bullshit "chart-based purchase guide" bullshit.[/footnote], I will say this:

I completely and wholeheartedly agree that it's better than any of Rockstar's latest endeavors.

 

[LobsterFeng]

It looks pretty good, but I can tell the story missions will be frustrating and tedious and basically ruin the experience for me like all Ubisoft games. I'm sure it's really fun to just dick around the map though.

Also the spider tank looks pretty cool. But that just makes me sad that the game is about spider tank.

 

[Denamic]

It's not amazing, but it's by no means bad. The side missions gets pretty boring after you've done the 20th identical mission, as well as having somewhat tedious travel times for some of them. Cool mechanics and solid gunplay. Vehicles don't feel all that solid but it's not bad. Well worth buying at any rate.

Fuck uplay though. Uplay is trash.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

It's not about Minigame VS Press X. I want hacking to be neccesary, useful and fun. Bonus points if it's original.

As it is, what exactly does hacking do in this game?
- Making shit explode. Not neccesary or particularly useful since shooting them in the head works better. Arguably fun if you've never seen an explosion in a video game before. Definitely not new or original.
- Distractions. Shooting them in the head works better.
- Traffic lights and "blockers". Actually neccesary, useful and fun. Congratulations Watch Dogs! Sadly they fuck it up by hijacking my camera to go, "Ohhhh, look at this, LOOOOK AT THIS!" while I drive into a wall because I can't see where I'm going.
- Stealing money. Ha. Ha. Ha.
- Tagging enemies. Oh fuck off Watch Dogs. I'm going to shoot them in the head in a few seconds anyway.
- Opening doors. My God. The awesome. It burns!
- Backouts. AKA easy mode button because apparently Aiden can see in the dark and nobody else can.
- etc etc

As for cover swap etc etc, why would I bother with those things?

I have a magic device known as a "Gun" that I can point at at my problem and make it disappear in half a second. I also have a magic thing known as "Focus" (aka slo-mo or bullet time) that makes the problem stand still for a few seconds. Combine the two for easy mode.

So why would I fuck around pressing X to use this or that?

If all your awesome mechanical systems are rendered obsolete by the 'Shoot Him in the Head' system then your systems are not working with each other. That's a sign of a game with shitty balance.

Why force people to hack? It's there if you want to, it's your choice, force it upon yourself. It's bad game design to force things on players, especially in an open-ended game.

I guess you just proved stealth games suck because you can just shoot every enemy in the head, it's faster and more efficient so it's better!!!

And cover swapping is awesome, something every TPS should have, here's what you can do: