I liked the asshole potential as the ghost character, just fucking with peoples day, being all ethereal and "CAN'T TOUCH THIS" on everyone around me.
Zero Punctuation: Beyond: Two Souls
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
I know this very late, and this probably won't be read, but I feel a need to comment on Quantum Dream and Beyond: Two Souls anyway. Maybe I was just the heated argument spearheaded by rhodo, I don't know but here it goes.
The problem with defending Quantum Dream games as interactive novels is that it wasn't in anyway marketed that way. These games are suppose to be video games, and a good video game should be able to use the two main assets of that medium. This means a game is not just a visual medium, like a movie, but also interactive one (something unique only to video games). When the interaction by the player has little to no impact on making the story meaningful then the video game is a failure in my book. I mean it doesn't even need be complex, it can be simplistic as all hell. Look at the Stanley Parable were game play is minimal but meaningful to the story. Beyond: Two Souls' problem isn't the fact that it's mostly QTE, but the fact that a lot of these QTE are just "road bumps"...and Yahtzee even mentions this. Where the button presses don't mean anything expect "Press A" to continue. The story actually pauses until the player presses that button. It's not exciting because there is only one option for the player and it hinders the story because it hurts the pacing. It works with visual novels, where these is usually text that the audience needs time to read, but if the action is happening in real time, like in Quantum Dream's games, then its not helpful at all.
And another thing, the flaw in David Cage's ideology is that movies =/= video games. Video games, since it's impossible to be completely realistic without using live footage, it is an animated medium. Cage's push towards realism is not very practical and frankly its narrow minded. I know a lot of people enjoy realism in their games, but I feel that only pushing toward that style can be destructive. Not only will video game budgets continue to bloat, but we won't explore other esthetic forms of visual expression that is available for video games if we continue along that trend. Some people including critics, like Jim Sterling, don't like people like David Cage because his idea of producing realistic games like movies are counter intuitive to a medium that can do so much more than movies can. So yeah, emotions= good writing not graphical power. David Cage's fans shouldn't worry though, it seems that Sony will continue to fund his games if only because it is a superficial way of showing off the processing power of their system by pushing more "realistic faces".
But people already know this crap I guess.
Personally, I liked Heavy Rain but I didn't like the demo of Beyond: Two Souls because it felt so restrictive. My grandfather didn't like the game because it controlled terribly...which it does. I don't hate David Cage, but I can see why people might. I think it's an okay writer, but I'd really rather see him as a filmmaker personally.
The problem with defending Quantum Dream games as interactive novels is that it wasn't in anyway marketed that way. These games are suppose to be video games, and a good video game should be able to use the two main assets of that medium. This means a game is not just a visual medium, like a movie, but also interactive one (something unique only to video games). When the interaction by the player has little to no impact on making the story meaningful then the video game is a failure in my book. I mean it doesn't even need be complex, it can be simplistic as all hell. Look at the Stanley Parable were game play is minimal but meaningful to the story. Beyond: Two Souls' problem isn't the fact that it's mostly QTE, but the fact that a lot of these QTE are just "road bumps"...and Yahtzee even mentions this. Where the button presses don't mean anything expect "Press A" to continue. The story actually pauses until the player presses that button. It's not exciting because there is only one option for the player and it hinders the story because it hurts the pacing. It works with visual novels, where these is usually text that the audience needs time to read, but if the action is happening in real time, like in Quantum Dream's games, then its not helpful at all.
And another thing, the flaw in David Cage's ideology is that movies =/= video games. Video games, since it's impossible to be completely realistic without using live footage, it is an animated medium. Cage's push towards realism is not very practical and frankly its narrow minded. I know a lot of people enjoy realism in their games, but I feel that only pushing toward that style can be destructive. Not only will video game budgets continue to bloat, but we won't explore other esthetic forms of visual expression that is available for video games if we continue along that trend. Some people including critics, like Jim Sterling, don't like people like David Cage because his idea of producing realistic games like movies are counter intuitive to a medium that can do so much more than movies can. So yeah, emotions= good writing not graphical power. David Cage's fans shouldn't worry though, it seems that Sony will continue to fund his games if only because it is a superficial way of showing off the processing power of their system by pushing more "realistic faces".
But people already know this crap I guess.
Personally, I liked Heavy Rain but I didn't like the demo of Beyond: Two Souls because it felt so restrictive. My grandfather didn't like the game because it controlled terribly...which it does. I don't hate David Cage, but I can see why people might. I think it's an okay writer, but I'd really rather see him as a filmmaker personally.
Telltale wasn't in the picture back thenWoodsey said:
OT: I'm watching a LP of this garbage (Cryoatic's [https://www.youtube.com/user/ChaoticMonki] if you're interested) and he just finished the Native American bit.
The "game" has nowhere to go but up from here. Then again, it is made by Quantic Dream so it'll probably reach new levels of awful in the next part. This "game" is unbelievably bad.
Kind of like the British man who wrote the initial review that inspired this very thread filled with similar bile coming from a primarily European audience. Talk about ironic.ProfMcStevie said:
"American" is just easier to throw around as an accusation because it's the one Western nationality that's been made into a pejorative term.