Zero Punctuation: Turok

[ClassicThunder]

Then I argue that you are a chimp. All of the issues raised there have ruined certain FPS's for me, but when removed, or reversed (i.e. the gaming masterpeice that is Resistance : Fall of Man) the game itself is fantastic from head to foot. If the observed things are making FPS's less fun, then obviously Fps's are not getting better and better, but worse and worse.

Personal opinion only held by you and a few others. Have fun whining and reminiscing.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Personal opinion only held by you and a few others. Have fun whining and reminiscing.

Have fun blindly following the new messiah.

 

[sfried]

All I can say is "Well said, Yahtzee! It's about time somebody stood up for the good ol' days when PC fps weren't simply about running and gunning from point X to Y and that there was an astounding amount of divesity in them.", especially since the G4 people now watch your program,

Unfortunately, as long as Ubisoft continues to crank out Rainbow 6 Vegas sequels (since R6 officially went the way of the dodo ever since their move to the Unreal engine, and hence more pop-and-shoot gunbattles rather than real covert tactical planning and precision), and the more the industry supports this kind of uniformity because "it's more accessible" to the ironically "hardcore" crowd, I believe FPSs will continue to become stagnated and tarnished by the same people who thought that turning the original Halo from a tactical-team based pseudo-rts with squadbased mechanics to an utterly uninspired singleplayer campain focused on some heroics of an average superspacemarine, I think the videogame FPS industry as a whole is bound for shittyness.

Fortunately, as you say, there's always Valve and mods.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

I wish people in the industry at the moment would watch this episode in particular and be forced to pay attention, agreed with everything said with a wry smile on my face due to the style intrinsic to the author.

I would say my current pet peeve has to go to the grenades splash damage issue or the lack of as the case may be, it's farcical in any fps I played from recent memory, they are little more than an annoyance like roving midges in the height of summer.

I have to say I played HALO 1 on the PC when it came out and enjoyed it for what it was but I couldn't care less about #2 & #3 and the dumbing down of all types of game is slowly driving me insane.

I have heard people say that they aren't dumbing down games; my response would be yes they are, unless I'm gaining new intelligence and insight which I know is not physically possible at my current age and has not been for many years.

From what I have seen the author has no great affection for many RPG's but that's one of the areas that's getting affected the worst from my perspective, any developer that's producing them seems intent on trying to capture the fps market by castrating what should be rpg's and slapping on some fps game play elements.

So far in my personal option all these games managed to do was produce an experience with not enough fps to satisfy those customers they wanted to get the attention of and severely limit the rpg elements to alienate those customers too.

Argh, it's starting to grate again, I better stop now before I start ranting.

True i loved Halo 1 put 2 and 3 are just sad.

Call me ignorant, but why are we talking about Halo 3 in a Turok based thread? Whatever.

In any case, I just played Turok on my friend's 360. And all the issues Yahtzee talked about were there. And it really screamed "Generic!"

Because the evolution of Halo and its effect on FPSs is a issue to all FPSs and we are talking about FPSs as much as Turok, so please don't hate us for picking on Halo.

Indigo_Dingo
.....I don't see a "drunken on the rail shooter" out doing Unreal,pysco circus,undying,duke 3d or even Blood any time soon.....

 

[edinflames]

I would say, Yahtzee, if you want FPS with a sense of humor, then play the Postal Series, which features such hilarious bits as pissing on yourself to put yourself out when you catch fire.

Yes, Postal 2 while possibly the sickest game I have ever played (though the Devs argue it is only a sick as you make it - the meanest way to kill someone I discovered was to tazer them to the floor, and while they lie twitching and defecating themselves pour gasoline on said victim, throw on the match, piss on them to put the blaze out after their skin turns crispy, then behead the poor sod with a spade. Kicking the severed head out of the nearest window and into the streets is optional) made me laugh more than any other FPS I've ever played. The inclusion of Osama Bin Laden in the post-9/11 patch was a masterstroke.

 

[Firia]

Someone else said it, I will echo it. I like "Resistnaces'" take on Health Meters. It was segmented into four 25% portions. You would regen only up to the nearest 25th. 100%, 75%, 50%, etc etc. It was kinda like health meters, but it had regen effects. It wasn't the same as health meters, but more like the happy love child of Health Meters and Regeneration in FPS's today.

I'm not sad to see health meters go, and I'm not altogether upset at regenerating health in the modern FPS. I will be pleased if we even out on Fall of Mans' take on health meters.

(I still play alot of CS:S, where it's health meter-rific, and the only form of a health kit is in the form of a Respawn. )

 

[shadow1138]

The little brat actually shut her Sepiroth kissing mouth up!

Nice try, but there is no such thing as Girl Gamers.

That's the stupidest thing about it-she's not even a gamer she just saw the movies and games frome some ff freaks and decided they're the greatest things ever! Can you believe it ?

 

[Vortigar]

Indigo_Dingo:
Sheesh, did one of Resistance's designers steal your teddy?
I was just talking about the health meter!

Something no FPS has copied so far, which is odd, because they are on to something with that segmented regenerating health bar if you ask me. If you make a mistake in a level you do get penalized for it later, unlike the 100% regenerating bar, which allows you to just run amok and see how far it gets you before even having to consider employing any kind of tactics at all (as long as you keep half an eye on an exit strategy).

I think the 100% health regeneration by sucking your thumb in the corner thing was invented to make life easier for programmers. You don't have to distribute health packets across a level anymore, and fear you've placed too few or too many. You can just assume the protagonist has full health at all times and build your enemy encounters around that.

ps.
They could have a patent on that healthbar though, in which case it isn't that odd.

pps.
Thank you Firia.

 

[bfb8688]

He is dead on about Aliens. Even COD4 has Aliens references! In the first level, where you are on the ship, right before you breach the door one of your fellow soldiers says, "I like to keep this handy for close encounters." Gee...where have I heard that before? Also, later in that level as the ship is going under one of your teammates says, "We are LEAVING!" Another direct reference to Aliens. Of course, I love every second of it

 

[Joeshie]

Personal opinion only held by you and a few others. Have fun whining and reminiscing.

And yours isn't a personal opinion? Nice try there kid.

Some parts of FPS have improved and some parts have worsened. Good luck trying to find the diversity and uniqueness in FPS today that was present many years ago.

 

[MasterOfHisOwnDomain]

Hah, loved this one Yahztee. Like yourself I find Halo the definition of a bog-standard FPS nowadays..

 

[NSiky]

I agreed on most points except health metres. UIs need to be kept clear to keep a game feeling cinematic.

 

[Terramax]

I've seen City of Lost Children. Yep, that rocks. What is Ronny doing voicing this crap? Surely even he's making enough money to keep going?

 

[Nerdfury]

Fantastic, Yahtzee. If you even read the comments people leave you!

I remember the glory days of FPS's when they had a sense of humour about them. Blood was always my favourite! Althought the sequel sucked mighty wang.

 

[Same River New Water]

I understand that in a game you want to be the hero taking everyone out (something that COD4 often failed in during the SAS missions)

Wuh buh? Failed? I much preferred the SAS missions. I thought the whole point of the USMC missions was to show how the gung-ho US bulldozer approach resulted in a gigantic fustercluck which required the covert, surgical tactics of the SAS to salvage. But hey, that was just my reading of it.

One has to wonder though what the point of being a games reviewer is in Australia. I mean not only do you have the release date problems but a ridiculously strict censor board.

True, but thankfully they haven't banned anything particularly good yet, as far as I know. (We got GTA III eventually.) The lack of an R-rating for games (which is the reason "adult" games can't be released here) won't last: it was the result of a reactionary old Catholic bastard [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Harradine] having the balance of power in one of the houses of Parliament for years.

it really does suck he wont be able to play Brawl yet. If I have the money, I would send him a copy.

You'd better believe Australians (along with Europeans) were mighty pissed off [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_lockout] when the Wii and 360 were announced to be region-locked.

 

[Uszi]

I would say, Yahtzee, if you want FPS with a sense of humor, then play the Postal Series, which features such hilarious bits as pissing on yourself to put yourself out when you catch fire.

Yes, Postal 2 while possibly the sickest game I have ever played (though the Devs argue it is only a sick as you make it - the meanest way to kill someone I discovered was to tazer them to the floor, and while they lie twitching and defecating themselves pour gasoline on said victim, throw on the match, piss on them to put the blaze out after their skin turns crispy, then behead the poor sod with a spade. Kicking the severed head out of the nearest window and into the streets is optional) made me laugh more than any other FPS I've ever played. The inclusion of Osama Bin Laden in the post-9/11 patch was a masterstroke.

Well said, my kindred spirit.
I mentioned postal since we here in the states can expect Postal 3 relatively soon. Unfortunately Yahtzee has to wait until 2009. Poor Bugger. I'd like to see what he would have to say though, since I feel like the Postal series is in a totally different plane of gaming than Halo--as far as FPS goes.

 

[Uszi]

Oh, and on the subject of health bars:

I think that we should get a REAL shooter, where if you take a bullet to the hand you go down on all fours crying for your mum, while your attacker prepares a curb-stomp execution, and a shot anywhere to your chest, neck, head, or major arteries will instantly kill you.

Then we'll see just how important realism is to anyone!

 

[Zabadack]

Good to see some anti Halo comments, that game was more hyped than an ADD kid on Smarties

 

[Thedarkestofsouls]

I suppose if there was ever a time to join the forum, it's to comment on this.

Let me first state that Yahtzee is about the funniest thing since they invented the idiot playing with a ping pong paddle, and about as awesome as those mini sliced bagel bites. That being said, he is by no means perfect.

I went into this review hoping to see yahtzee's take on a game highly recommended by my brother. What I got was a complete waste of time. Yahtzee, you Hallow Crusader, why do you continue to bash a game you, to my knowledge, have never played. Halo: Combat Evolved was an excellent game, and had 4 of the 6 things you mentioned. It's true it defiantly FEELS like Aliens, but it feels like its more paying homage to it then ripping it. I respect your decision to hate Halo 3 (given the view of just that game with none of the back story, I can forgive any jabs) but play the game before you crush it. Halo: CE is on the X-Box live marketplace for download, and cheap. If I can go out and buy Psychonauts before judging it, the least you can do is allow the same courtesy.

Now, this is the part where I have to specify (to avoid my point being lost) that because I like Halo my argument is no less valid. As soon as this post hits the Forum, I can almost see people lining up with comments like "Fan-boy" and "pathetic" but honestly, it just makes you seem like children. Fanatically hating a game is just as bad as fanatically liking it. If you see the words Halo next or in the same sentence as "Good" "Fun" or "Depth" and your first thought is "Fan boy", you need to follow Yahtzee's advice on what to do with Assassin?s Creed when you're feed up with it (on a side note, I thought Assassin?s Creed was an excellent game, and hope such styles of games continue, just, you know, fixed). If you don't like Halo for any reason other than "It's Halo", then don't respond. If you do hate it for any other reason, don't respond anyway because this is not the "Lets talk about halo" thread.

So, I guess the point I'm getting at is, Yahtzee, review games. If you want to review a certain Genre's down points, release a special ZP on Saturdays, or title it "Genre: My Thoughts" or something. I am now even more unsure then I was going into your review of Turok. Though I suppose the Orange Box can always keep me company.

 

[Ozz04]

You know, from your videos it seems like you don?t really like anything about Australia, yet you still live there, doesn?t that seem a tad odd?