Zero Punctuation: Monster Hunter Tri

[deckai]

How about this for a change:
WHY
DO
YOU
GUYS
EVEN
FREAKING
CARE?
I didn't think anybody took yahtzee seriously EVER, He has made a few good points, but as he's said before, IT'S NOT FUNNY IF HE THINKS A GAME IS GOOD. Now some people don't think he's funny at all, as they have a different sense of humor. But seriously, why does everyone complain like a bunch of 7 year old girls when yahtzee gives a game that they like a bad review?
And if he stopped playing 30 minutes in, who cares? maybe he just hated it. I played Fatal Inertia for 15 minutes before returning it to gamestop and getting a different game. Is that wrong? No, because I hated Fatal Inertia. Some people enjoy certian games more than others, like if I don't like Fatal Inertia, someone else might love it. Do I care? No. Should you care if yahtzee doesn't like Monster Hunter Tri? No, you shouldn't.

It's not the thing thats he gave a negative review... and believe it or not there are People that seriously belive what he says.

The Problem is, he never mentioned how long he played, in his review the whole game looks like a boring grind-fest.. and this is a think only people can see who played it further (hence the complains from the fans).

And the about your 15 min adventure, no it's not, you don't review it for the public, your are not paid for playing it. Yahtzee himself sayes he's a game critic, so he should at least give it a chance.

Not to mention that later, there are much more chances to make fun of the game (for example the exaggerating animations everytime the character uses a item while a dragon tries to bite your head off).

 

[asam92]

Am i one of 100 people who actually like this game, me and a friend of mine have delved combined 400 hours into the PSP Monster Hunter Freedom Unite. IT IS AWESOME!
Most people are just too blind to see that, if you look at most professional reviews on other sites they have given in at least an 8, if you bother to play past the first few quests then you will see that its not just gathering that you have to do, there is in fact large beasts like the one that attacked Yahtzee that you do vs, quite a few actually.
It is a slow paced start, but it gets oh so much better.
This game isnt about the storyline as much as it is about the accomplished feeling you get when you have slain a monster with your own skill instead of grinding up your level against weaker opponents then taking on the big one only to be 10 levels higher than it and slaughtering it with ease. Where is the fun in that?

Yahtzee, I usually agree with you on most games but this review just makes you look like you are paid to make games look as bad as possible, even though they arent isnt.
For F*** sake you even hated Uncharted 2 which won so many awards that it was shitting them out. BTW also awesome.

 

[Telekinesis]

How about this for a change:
WHY
DO
YOU
GUYS
EVEN
FREAKING
CARE?
I didn't think anybody took yahtzee seriously EVER, He has made a few good points, but as he's said before, IT'S NOT FUNNY IF HE THINKS A GAME IS GOOD. Now some people don't think he's funny at all, as they have a different sense of humor. But seriously, why does everyone complain like a bunch of 7 year old girls when yahtzee gives a game that they like a bad review?
And if he stopped playing 30 minutes in, who cares? maybe he just hated it. I played Fatal Inertia for 15 minutes before returning it to gamestop and getting a different game. Is that wrong? No, because I hated Fatal Inertia. Some people enjoy certian games more than others, like if I don't like Fatal Inertia, someone else might love it. Do I care? No. Should you care if yahtzee doesn't like Monster Hunter Tri? No, you shouldn't.

I only read like half of that post, so forgive me if I missed your point, but we've covered this a billion times:
We care because that review sucked. It wasn't fun. It wasn't relevant. It didn't tell me shit about the game. It wasn't funny. It was lazy. It was reused material/jokes/insults. It was just plain insulting. He was basically farting in our face and waiting to see if we'd inhale it.

 

[VanityGirl]

I smell a good extra punctuation article.
I can see is now "Yatzee talks about rabid fanboys".

What sucks is that Yatzee spent more time on FFXIII (5hours) than he did on Monster Hunter Tri. How do I know this? Because within the first hour and a half I was already fighting the large monsters in the game. If he didn't even mention the large monster aspect of the game, then he did a shit job. Hate to put it that way, but he's paid to spend at least a few hours with the game to get a feel of combat, story or whatever so he can make jokes about it.

I was hoping to hear jokes about how hard some the monsters were and what not. I was just very disappointed with this overall. There was some funny things, but it wasn't his funniest. :\


EDIT: The reason people are upset is not because he didn't LIKE the game, no it's becuase he DIDN'T give it more than an hour. Sorry, but he's paid to 'review' games, meaning he must actually play the game. Only playing an hour doesn't even make the 'review' funny. I normally find Yatzee hilarious, even when he bashes games I love, but this was so lazy that it wasn't even funny.

 

[Steampirate]

Not to derail the "AMG THIS GAME ROX" vs "STFU THIS GAME SUX" debate, but to instead ignore it and ask a question: Who is the neutral-plain-faced guy that shows up in lots of Yahtzee's videos? The guy who was the ball-eating squidfishmonster in this one. Who is he!?

 

[sfried]

I like Monster Hunter Tri. At least it doesn't treat you like an imbacile if you didn't get it the first time, as the game provides sufficient hints and context with regards to the items (dung bombs, for instance).

If you want absolute asspulling, play any of the Phatasy Star Online games. Now those...I'm pretty sure Yahtzee can spend a whole day picking about. At least Tri removes many of the annoying elements of those games.

A sh*t game on the wii - oh no, what a surprise....

Oh, a troll in the forums. How swell.

Yahtzee was spot on about those gathering quests, though. And that's one of the reasons why I love this game. They never tell you what to expect.

 

[Harmondale2]

Not to derail the "AMG THIS GAME ROX" vs "STFU THIS GAME SUX" debate, but to instead ignore it and ask a question: Who is the neutral-plain-faced guy that shows up in lots of Yahtzee's videos? The guy who was the ball-eating squidfishmonster in this one. Who is he!?

There you go mate, post 20 has the right answer, he talked about it in an interview

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.182077-The-ZP-face

 

[Siffit]

I bet Yahtzee is laughing his ass off right now

 

[Mindmaker]

No, I just can see a pattern in wii games. Sorry but bad tech is generally going to lead to bad games because with each generation what a gamer demands, and rightly so, increases.

Yeah, your reasoning makes perfect sense.
That's probably where the "PS3 has no games"-argument is coming from.

It's exactly the reason why I stopped playing modern PC games and stick to indie games and rougelikes.
All that new games have is shinier graphics, no innovation whatsoever.

PS3 and XBox360 failed to spark my interest, since they have chosen to go down the same path, while having more restrictions.

I don't want to say the Wii is the holy grail of gaming.
I probably wouldn't even have one if my brother didn't wish for it.
It's nevertheless a nice console, with a good amount of games which are enjoyable.

 

[thublihnk]

I like how people are steadily behind Yahtzee and watch every ZP until he turns on them and berates a game they love.
And then the pull out that classic line, "He's not even a real critic, he's just a comedian" or some such tripe.

Get OVER yourselves, seriously. Yahtzee is a critic, a damn fine one at that, and has a respectable view on games. Much more so than the IGN, Gamespot, Game Informer twats who review their game based on public opinion and launch hype more than anything else. Yahtzee dares to say the Emperor has no clothing, and for that he is valuable.

This is not to say that I simply agree with everything he has to say about games. I hated AC2, thought Arkham Asylum was meh, LOVED Mercs 2, and a few other things I've long forgotten by now. But you know what I do when I don't agree with Yahtzee? I consider his points, mull it over for a while, and usually walk away with a more informed, if largely unchanged view of the game.

Now, I realize he probably didn't play this one all the way through, or to where it really kicks in. So yes, this review contains a bias, but I think that's what a review should contain. It's a review, or retelling, of Yahtzee's experience with the game. The very nature of criticism is steeped in bias. If you want an un-biased review, look at boring Metacritic numbers. Indeed, it is not similar to your experience with the game, but I'd probably have a very similar experience. I am an impatient man. A game can have un-actioney bits at the beginning, but if it's got flat-out BORING bits at the beginning, I'll probably put it down.

Great review, A++ would buy again.

EDIT: I want to add a little postscript about Game Informer reviews, 'cause I really do respect the fuck out of those guys. They write good, well balanced and professional reviews, but there seems to be some cognitive dissonance going on between the actual written review and the number score they give. Often a game 'contains major flaws' and gets a 10, or provides a solid, entertaining and touching experience (again, according to the text) and gets something like an 8.5. What /is/ that.

 

[Thunderhorse31]

I like how people are steadily behind Yahtzee and watch every ZP until he turns on them and berates a game they love.
And then the pull out that classic line, "He's not even a real critic, he's just a comedian" or some such tripe.

Get OVER yourselves, seriously. Yahtzee is a critic, a damn fine one at that, and has a respectable view on games. Much more so than the IGN, Gamespot, Game Informer twats who review their game based on public opinion and launch hype more than anything else. Yahtzee dares to say the Emperor has no clothing, and for that he is valuable.

This is not to say that I simply agree with everything he has to say about games. I hated AC2, thought Arkham Asylum was meh, LOVED Mercs 2, and a few other things I've long forgotten by now. But you know what I do when I don't agree with Yahtzee? I consider his points, mull it over for a while, and usually walk away with a more informed, if largely unchanged view of the game.

I figured I would just quote this, seeing as how it's pretty much my opinion as well. Lots of times I agree with Yahtzee's criticisms, and even if he shits all over a game a like, for whatever reason (even if the criticism is "it's not immediately entertaining"), then I'm emotionally stable enough to handle it and move on.

So what if he played a game for only an hour? What kind of standards are we placing on him nowadays? "You need to beat a game before you can make humorous criticisms about it?"

 

[Caradinist]

I like how people are steadily behind Yahtzee and watch every ZP until he turns on them and berates a game they love.
And then the pull out that classic line, "He's not even a real critic, he's just a comedian" or some such tripe.

Get OVER yourselves, seriously. Yahtzee is a critic, a damn fine one at that, and has a respectable view on games. Much more so than the IGN, Gamespot, Game Informer twats who review their game based on public opinion and launch hype more than anything else. Yahtzee dares to say the Emperor has no clothing, and for that he is valuable.

This is not to say that I simply agree with everything he has to say about games. I hated AC2, thought Arkham Asylum was meh, LOVED Mercs 2, and a few other things I've long forgotten by now. But you know what I do when I don't agree with Yahtzee? I consider his points, mull it over for a while, and usually walk away with a more informed, if largely unchanged view of the game.

I figured I would just quote this, seeing as how it's pretty much my opinion as well. Lots of times I agree with Yahtzee's criticisms, and even if he shits all over a game a like, for whatever reason (even if the criticism is "it's not immediately entertaining"), then I'm emotionally stable enough to handle it and move on.

So what if he played a game for only an hour? What kind of standards are we placing on him nowadays? "You need to beat a game before you can make humorous criticisms about it?"

Maybe this game is one of those games where you need to play for more than an hour to get the full story?

Just putting that out there. You can probably play Pac-Man for an hour and tell me what the whole game is about, maybe this game isn't like that.

I wouldn't know though, i do not own a Wii and never played this. But it seems a lot of people are complaining over this.

 

[Thunderhorse31]

Maybe this game is one of those games where you need to play for more than an hour to get the full story?

Just putting that out there. You can probably play Pac-Man for an hour and tell me what the whole game is about, maybe this game isn't like that.

I wouldn't know though, i do not own a Wii and never played this. But it seems a lot of people are complaining over this.

Dude absolutely, I'm the last person to argue that you can judge a book by its cover - hell most of my favorite games of all time aren't "kickass" in the first half-hour of gameplay. That's got to be one (of many) reasons for Yahtzee's JRPG hate - I can't think of any that are totally full of must-play awesomeness before you invest even a little bit of time into the characters.

So sure, he should play the game longer to get a more thorough grasp for it, but then again, I'm not going to fault him for hating the 1-2 hours he did play it.

 

[thublihnk]

I like how people are steadily behind Yahtzee and watch every ZP until he turns on them and berates a game they love.
And then the pull out that classic line, "He's not even a real critic, he's just a comedian" or some such tripe.

Get OVER yourselves, seriously. Yahtzee is a critic, a damn fine one at that, and has a respectable view on games. Much more so than the IGN, Gamespot, Game Informer twats who review their game based on public opinion and launch hype more than anything else. Yahtzee dares to say the Emperor has no clothing, and for that he is valuable.

This is not to say that I simply agree with everything he has to say about games. I hated AC2, thought Arkham Asylum was meh, LOVED Mercs 2, and a few other things I've long forgotten by now. But you know what I do when I don't agree with Yahtzee? I consider his points, mull it over for a while, and usually walk away with a more informed, if largely unchanged view of the game.

I figured I would just quote this, seeing as how it's pretty much my opinion as well. Lots of times I agree with Yahtzee's criticisms, and even if he shits all over a game a like, for whatever reason (even if the criticism is "it's not immediately entertaining"), then I'm emotionally stable enough to handle it and move on.

So what if he played a game for only an hour? What kind of standards are we placing on him nowadays? "You need to beat a game before you can make humorous criticisms about it?"

Maybe this game is one of those games where you need to play for more than an hour to get the full story?

Just putting that out there. You can probably play Pac-Man for an hour and tell me what the whole game is about, maybe this game isn't like that.

I wouldn't know though, i do not own a Wii and never played this. But it seems a lot of people are complaining over this.

The 'full story' and 'some enjoyability' are two completely different concepts.

A good game might not be a THRILLING, ENGAGING, AWESOME ADVENTURE OF EXPLOSIONS AND TITS FOR ALL 59 HOURS OF GAMEPLAY, but it should definitely be GOOD for ALL HOURS of gameplay. (Imagine all my caps being said in a big, boomy voice and that all makes a little more sense)

I guess what I'm saying here is that while I don't need the thrilling opening of James Bond, I do need, say, an interesting main character introduced or some interesting (if not MIND BLOWINGLY AWESOME) gameplay. Just hook my interest. It's what writers, filmmakers and everyone else have had to do for AGES. If you don't hook your audience in the first few minutes, they might not be engaged for the rest of the story. Game developers are not, I repeat NOT, above this nor should they be.

 

[Anaklusmos]

I've actually just made an account, just so I can post in this epic thread.

First off I would like to point out, like so many other people have, that Yahtzee makes videos for our enjoyment and amusement.

Now that I have made that clear, what I am about to say will make more sense.

How do you people know that Yahtzee has played Monster Hunter for 2 hours, or whatever period of time. How do you know that he didn't complete the game, go "Oh shit, this game isn't great but, it isn't shit, so I can't say it's amazing, so I'll have to add it to the pile of games I don't like. I'm going to have to do this is in an interesting and funny way, so I'll talk about the first few hours of the game and nothing else, hopefully with the material I have it should make people laugh, and make the fan boys cry their eyes out. Job done."

 

[deckai]

The 'full story' and 'some enjoyability' are two completely different concepts.

A good game might not be a THRILLING, ENGAGING, AWESOME ADVENTURE OF EXPLOSIONS AND TITS FOR ALL 59 HOURS OF GAMEPLAY, but it should definitely be GOOD for ALL HOURS of gameplay. (Imagine all my caps being said in a big, boomy voice and that all makes a little more sense)

I guess what I'm saying here is that while I don't need the thrilling opening of James Bond, I do need, say, an interesting main character introduced or some interesting (if not MIND BLOWINGLY AWESOME) gameplay. Just hook my interest. It's what writers, filmmakers and everyone else have had to do for AGES. If you don't hook your audience in the first few minutes, they might not be engaged for the rest of the story. Game developers are not, I repeat NOT, above this nor should they be.

So you say, a tutorial is something that doesn't belong in a Videogame because it's not part of the story and/or isn't as exciting as the rest?

And by the way, MH3 doesn't really has a story, you are a hunter, called to hunt a specific Monster (the monster that Yahtzee saw in the water), but since you are a beginner you need to work you way up. But wait how can you knew that, Yahtzee didn't even bother to metion this...


And you mentioned before (or more agreed), Yahtzee is a critic, so he should at least try to play through the tutorial.

Even as a fan you can laught about his reviews, you see his points and laught about them because they are true. He doesn't invent them out of thin air... and his review so far wasn't wrong ...but it was incomplete -> therefore bad review

EditAnaklusmos ... really? I guess you havn't played it, right? If he had played so far he would have made a lot more jokes about it. And why reviewing the first hour of a nearly 100 hour game? Yahtzee's reviews usually are somewhat competent, he at least tries to show the whole game...

 

[thublihnk]

The 'full story' and 'some enjoyability' are two completely different concepts.

A good game might not be a THRILLING, ENGAGING, AWESOME ADVENTURE OF EXPLOSIONS AND TITS FOR ALL 59 HOURS OF GAMEPLAY, but it should definitely be GOOD for ALL HOURS of gameplay. (Imagine all my caps being said in a big, boomy voice and that all makes a little more sense)

I guess what I'm saying here is that while I don't need the thrilling opening of James Bond, I do need, say, an interesting main character introduced or some interesting (if not MIND BLOWINGLY AWESOME) gameplay. Just hook my interest. It's what writers, filmmakers and everyone else have had to do for AGES. If you don't hook your audience in the first few minutes, they might not be engaged for the rest of the story. Game developers are not, I repeat NOT, above this nor should they be.

So you say, a tutorial is something that doesn't belong in a Videogame because it's not part of the story and/or isn't as exciting as the rest?

And by the way, MH3 doesn't really has a story, you are a hunter, called to hunt a specific Monster (the monster that Yahtzee saw in the water), but since you are a beginner you need to work you way up. But wait how can you knew that, Yahtzee didn't even bother to metion this...


And you mentioned before (or more agreed), Yahtzee is a critic, so he should at least try to play through the tutorial.

Even as a fan you can laught about his reviews, you see his points and laught about them because they are true. He doesn't invent them out of thin air... and his review so far wasn't wrong ...but it was incomplete -> therefore bad review

EditAnaklusmos ... really? I guess you havn't played it, right? If he had played so far he would have made a lot more jokes about it. And why reviewing the first hour of a nearly 100 hour game? Yahtzee's reviews usually are somewhat competent, he at least tries to show the whole game...

It doesn't belong smack dab at the beginning! Engage me a little bit! Don't bore me to pieces before you've even launched into the meat of the material. BE CREATIVE. Throw something in at the very beginning that will make me want to play. Fallout 3 made it's tutorial interesting, the bond that was developed through the tutorial was the catalyst for the main character's motivation throughout the entire game.

Tutorials need to be in games, but they don't need to be boring as shit.

 

[KelsieKatt]

I've actually just made an account, just so I can post in this epic thread.

First off I would like to point out, like so many other people have, that Yahtzee makes videos for our enjoyment and amusement.

Now that I have made that clear, what I am about to say will make more sense.

How do you people know that Yahtzee has played Monster Hunter for 2 hours, or whatever period of time. How do you know that he didn't complete the game, go "Oh shit, this game isn't great but, it isn't shit, so I can't say it's amazing, so I'll have to add it to the pile of games I don't like. I'm going to have to do this is in an interesting and funny way, so I'll talk about the first few hours of the game and nothing else, hopefully with the material I have it should make people laugh, and make the fan boys cry their eyes out. Job done."

This has been explained a dozen times over.

It's extremely clear what he has and has not played of the game from what he described.

Even that very part with the sea monster is a specific segment in the tutorial. You do not see this sea serpent again until significantly later into the game, at which point you are blatantly sent on a QUEST to kill it. For that matter, the entire 'game' which he describes is nothing like what the actual game is like, all the stuff he mentions is part of the tutorial. The rest of the game consists primarily of getting bounty hunting quests to kill gigantic dragons and what not. These boss fights themselves also take a very long time from anywhere in the 20-40 minute. Closer to the latter if you're new. If Yahtzee had actually fought one of them, you'd know. It would be very obvious, not to mention he wouldn't make any of the ignorant statements about going around murdering creatures moms/children if he had, as that's only related to killing random little creatures scattered about the map which are mostly harmless. At best, he may have fought some small weakling enemies, like raptors or lizards, but that's about it.

In the end, he did not mention or review a single thing in relation to the actual meat of the gameplay and claimed it was something else entirely.

This is why people are annoyed. However, I guarantee he will still hate the game anyway after playing that ACTUAL gameplay, but that's exactly what people want to actually see, a REAL review. Whether it's good or bad, it doesn't matter. We want to hear him play the actual game before judging it, not the tutorial.

It would also be highly appreciated if he would actually blatantly mention right at the start of the review how much of the game he actually played, and also acknowledge the fact that the game is designed as a 4 player cooperative game, whether he plays it online or not. Acting as if these features do not exist is tantamount to lying and false advertisement.

There are plenty of other things he could make fun of within the actual gameplay, as it's far from perfect. However, he didn't even try.

 

[deckai]

It doesn't belong smack dab at the beginning! Engage me a little bit! Don't bore me to pieces before you've even launched into the meat of the material. BE CREATIVE. Throw something in at the very beginning that will make me want to play. Fallout 3 made it's tutorial interesting, the bond that was developed through the tutorial was the catalyst for the main character's motivation throughout the entire game.

Tutorials need to be in games, but they don't need to be boring as shit.

You mean like... showing one of the main monsters, and warning you that you are not strong enough for it? You could even try to attack him if you wanted.

But i agree, fallout 3 had a somewhat interesting tutorial but the games that do have interesting tutorials are extremly rare... and if i hadn't played the games that have boring tutorials, i would have missed a lot of good games. Boring tutorial =/= boring game...

And reviews are made to show you this.

I don't really understand why we still talk about this... you said yourself Yahtzee is a critic, and that his job is to inform the customer/gamer about the game (not the tutorial)... and this is something he failed to do...