Just one of the best polished mainstream title.
I agree in general but I would like a few of these games. Thankfully, Hellblade 2, Gears 6 and Perfect Dark should fill this void.
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Oh, for sure. I think they certainly have their place, I think I just kind of got where I am because when I turn on my PS it is generally to play their exclusives, and I think I just got burnt out on that sort of design.
The other part of it that Ive never really been able to articulate well enough is that they all feel nearly identical visually. The best way I can describe what I am trying to say is rendering wise. Obviously Alloy would be out of place in spiderman, but the way the character looks and the general look of the game (not the art/theme) are very similar.
I understand and I agree. These are my favorite type of games but 22 hours into Ragnarok, it’s pretty obvious of what the games are. They have a template/formula and nearly all of their first party titles tend to do all the same things for the most part but with a different location, different stories and characters.
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Excessive handholding and automatic platforming (press forward + A to awesome) are the two things that I dislike most in gaming, both of those are the reasons that I couldn’t stand Tomb Raider 2013 for example…what a miserable and infuriating experience this was especially since it was also a TR game which made it even worse. I can stomach a lot of things in today’s AAA template/design desicions but handholding and automatic platforming…there’s nothing as immersive breaking as those two for me.
That’s the question…why do that? it seems like the game wasn’t from the ground up designed that way because as you say why bother including puzzles in the first place, I guess focus testing most likely is the reason for those odd and obnoxious choices.
And the funny thing is that they could’ve easily fix that by making this “hints” system either an option or making it available only on the easy difficulty…why would anyone want this level of handholding and backseating when they choose to play on the harder difficulties presumably seeking challenge? it’s crazy to me that they didn’t give a fuck and let it this way in all difficulty modes. I guess that’s when a piece of media stops having any artistic vision & integrity (yeah AAA can have those too IMO) and starts being a mass market product.
It’s one thing to see games in the last 10-15 years being dumbed down in some ways (that many of us are considering as “QoL improvements” nowadays) but this is some next level BS.
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I agree completely. At least give gamers an on/off option. “Hints” is either default or minimal. I have it set to minimal and it’s still too much.
I’m loving GOWR for the most part but the hand holding, ease and direction the game gives you is ridiculous. At times, it does take you out of the game.
Close to movies as possible
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The combat in gow 2018 while good could have been better but its limited with over the shoulder view. Kind of makes it clunky even though i enjoy it
Sony want people to see the stories hence why super accessible.
And here’s another one:
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I haven’t played GOWR but from watching all the gameplay on twitch I had similar thoughts. I think Sony gets away with this because they are one of the few companies putting out games of this production value along with Rockstar and a couple others. So many fancy animations and pretty environments constantly make the players go wow! that look cool, thereby overshadowing any other problems there may be.
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I haven’t played GOWR yet, but yeah those devs should copy what the Tomb Raider series did with the different difficulty settings for combat, puzzles, exploration, etc. For example, increasing the exploration difficulty allows you to play without runes, yellow paint or bird shit being on every climbable surface.
I get why Sony is “improving” the handholding in their games. They want to be welcoming to more casual audiences that don’t play many games. Their staple of 3rd person cinematic games are already probably more appealing to those less familiar with gaming than a lot of other types of games. For example, my parents don’t game at all really (they played a tiny bit on the Dreamcast). I could never imagine them playing Xbox’s typical exclusives (racing, shooter, RPG), but maybe they would really enjoy a Naughty Dog game on the lowest difficulty. They would treat it like a movie. Honestly, I think that this could be a successful formula (cinematic games with settings that make the game basically play itself + their television/movie push for exposure) for Sony to expand their audience.
They just need to do a better job with giving more difficulty options so that everyone’s happy. GOWR should get a patch to fix this problem imo.
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This is the thrust of it. I want as many people to enjoy games as possible and wish all games had robust accessibility features! Just have granular options to dial stuff down. A patch would be great, I agree.
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Haha. Best cultist burn in a while. 
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I know you’re just joking around, but I don’t consider that to be a burn personally. Imo, Nintendo has made more GOAT-level games than Sony and Xbox combined despite their primary audience being families and younger children. Minecraft is another example of a mass-appeal juggernaut among kids and casuals, but it’s still 100% GOAT material.
I think Sony’s games are more appealing to folks who only watch TV/movies than most other games because of Sony’s focus on cinematics and storytelling (two things that very rarely matter to me personally).
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Game Maker Toolkit just put out a pretty good video about this:
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Thanks for linking that. Pretty good. Although now I’m convinced too many playtesters are impatient morons.
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