Arkham City,Skyrim, or Saints Row 3?

[fragmaster09]

okay, so i pretty much have the funds spare right now to buy ONE of these games(around £40)For Xbox 360, but i am sure i would enjoy all 3 equally, so, those who have played the games, could you tell me the pros and cons in an unbiased way, to help me decide which to buy,

~Thanks

(NOTE: Unbiased is the 'key word' here, i understand Skyrim's great, but it's not the reincarnation of Jesus or anything, it's equal to the others)

(NOTE2: chances are, i'll buy Skyrim OR Saints Row 3,(but i like having options y'know?), they both have longer gameplay/cost ratios, and both are (seemingly) very non-linear, which Arkham City seems to not do so well with)

 

[NinjaDuckie]

See, the way I see it, it's all down to how much time you have and are willing to spend on these games, and how much dedication/enjoyment ratio you want to have.

Saints Row 3 is probably the lowest dedication to highest enjoyment, in a sort of GTA fashion where you never bother with the story and piss about hitting old women with baseball bats and ramping motorbikes off buildings etc. That said, the story is presumably pretty decent or it wouldn't have spawned a third game.

Arkham City is the next level up. A more or less equal amount of dedication to enjoyment. If you want to spend your days having Batman punch dudes in the face to some badass music, swoop from the sky to the frightened cries of "It's Batman!" and "He's HERE!" before you kick dudes unconscious and beat the shit out of the entire Batman villain troupe, this is the way to go about it. Especially fun if you turn the main music off and play the 60s Batman theme over the top instead. It's also got a good balance of stealth and combat, and the Catwoman sections are pretty decent too.

Skyrim is probably the most demanding of the games. I already know people who are putting more hours into this game than doing their university coursework. Don't get me wrong, it's a great sequel in the collection of brilliant games that are the Elder Scrolls series, but you need to know how much time you're willing to spend playing it, because it's not something that you can just pick up occasionally and play; as an RPG it demands that you go through it all at once. That's the way I see it, at any rate. 'Unbiased' is a hard way to review things like this, because everyone has conflicting tastes in gameplay.

Personally, I'd take Arkham City. I'm incidentally playing it right now, doing all the sidequests for a second time on Normal difficulty this time around. Also, Big Head Mode is hilarious.

 

[fragmaster09]

Thanks, NinjaDuckie,

seeing as to what you said, i have played Bethesda's Fallout FPS Duo(F3 & F:NV, not the first 2), and immensely enjoyed them, i also have a decent amount of spare time, at least until next year, when my end-of-school exams start, for which i will not go to school(full day's worth some days), and days devoted entirely to revision(no or very little playing time).

However, i immensely enjoy story, but hate being locked into said story, which, in a way, is the reason i probabaly won't but Batman: AC, and judging from my past experiences of GTA(SAn ANdreas and Vice City), i tended to forget about the story right about the time the missions got more side-quest'y and the 'story' missions became vague, however, i have heard that Saints Row is getting progressively more Absurd, which i tend to enjoy for 2 months straight or so, then re-visit it every now and then, and let my little Sister's friend play(as is the case with Just Cause 2).

I can, however, see the merit to Skyrim, a game with good mechanics and playability, from (what i think of as) the BEST storyline-writers in the gaming industry, as such, Skyrim would be very enjoyable, were it not for the one thing i can come up with against it: the setting, you see, i HATE 'Middle Earth' style Fantasy, and that's probably due to the lack of ranged weapons other than Bows, which i have never got along with in any game.

so both games have ONE major Flaw each, intense fun for a couple of months, to be revisited occasionally(usually due to overdoing it, and it becoming 'boring' as a result of over-exploration), or less INTENSE fun (fun nonetheless) for a much longer peroid, but putting up with annoying middle-earth names(usually of places) and a single, rather annoying feature(that is not going to be changed, The Elder Scrolls is entirly built around Middle-earth style fantasy, so at least it's pretty much made that feature worked in as well as it's ever going to be)...

i'll have to ponder this...


(NOTE: is the UI of Skyrim REALLY as bad as they say? or is it just PC-Elitists complaining that they have to share a game made to be compatible with machines people use because they can't afford a high-end laptop to play these kind of games on?)

Addendum: it seems Skyrim has around 5 different possible playthroughs for each Race,
multiply that by the 20 or so races...
a maximum 100 unique playthroughs of a 30-hour game, meaning around 3000 hours of Gameplay at most(although i guarantee i won't even manage 1000 hours),

However, Saints Row 3...
each playthrough would last around 50 hours(due to messing around), with 2 or 3 playthroughs altogether... 150 hours max, if i was extremely dedicated and wanted to spend a long time on it...

(NOTE: these calculations are all MAXIMUM possible playtime, if i played it for all of my spare time, until the game had literally NOTHING to give me anymore)

 

[CRRPGMykael]

Skyrim is pretty good.
Also, I'm gonna get to play Arkham City soon, but if it's anything like the prequel, then it's totally worth buying.
Saints Row 3 is...meh. Mediocre. Like all of the other ones.

 

[Simeon Ivanov]

I'd say SKYRIM. It's a great experience overall.
But if you want some childish immature humor - Saints Row the Third.

 

[Therumancer]

okay, so i pretty much have the funds spare right now to buy ONE of these games(around £40)For Xbox 360, but i am sure i would enjoy all 3 equally, so, those who have played the games, could you tell me the pros and cons in an unbiased way, to help me decide which to buy,

~Thanks

(NOTE: Unbiased is the 'key word' here, i understand Skyrim's great, but it's not the reincarnation of Jesus or anything, it's equal to the others)

(NOTE2: chances are, i'll buy Skyrim OR Saints Row 3,(but i like having options y'know?), they both have longer gameplay/cost ratios, and both are (seemingly) very non-linear, which Arkham City seems to not do so well with)

I have all 3 games (lucky me) although they are for differant platforms. Skyrim on PC, SR3 on 360 (hardly touched it), and Arkham City for the PS-3.

You are likely to get the most gameplay out of Skyrim. That is the one that pulled me away from Arkham City and Dark Souls and has been keeping me from doing much with SR3. *HOWEVER* Skyrim allegedly has some serious problems on both consoles even though Bethesda is working on repairing them... you don't know when that is going to happen.

If you don't want to risk Skyrim, I'd honestly recommend Saint's Row 3. Length wise I'd say it's rating similarly to Arkham City, and honestly while Arkham City is a wonderful game it has it's definate flaws. A lot of Arkham City's playability comes from your desire to hunt down those Riddler trophies and master things like the training missions and so on in order to unlock rooms for the challenge modes, artwork, and other things. The side activities that pad out Saint's Row seem to be more varied, than pretty much heading around from puzzle to puzzle and trying to figure out how to solve it with your gadgets.

Given the option, eventually get all 3 (hey Christmas is coming, you might get some as presents, or some money in your stocking), but if your getting one now I'd say Skyrim or Saint's Row as your likely to get the most enjoyment out of them. Skyrim is apparently playable, but has issues on consoles as I said. (heck on the PC I have issues with the game just suddenly crashing/snapping off once in a while... very annoying).

 

[NinjaDuckie]

I'm currently working my way through Oblivion on the PC. I ended up buying Skyrim on Steam, but my laptop just can't handle it, even on the lowest graphics settings and with the 'fix' that someone else provided on the Bethesda modding website.

Sorry, I didn't read your second NOTE before posting. Yes, granted, as a Batman game you are supposed to be locked into a linear story, and the sandbox function that allows you to toddle around the city looking for bright green question marks instead of rescuing people because you're "HURRDURR BATMAN LOL" is more a gimmick than a true sandbox, and the combat and stealth sections are non-transferable (meaning you have to use stealth in the stealth sections etc and can't choose your own path through them), but really, I think it's worth it for the sheer terror you can inflict on the criminal scum.

You mentioned Just Cause 2, that's a true sandbox at its best. You don't have to be limited to a small area and you're pretty much entitled to go wherever, do whatever, blow shit up for no reason. Likewise, though, there's still the linearity of the missions themselves.

The format of Skyrim and the previous games in the 'Scrolls (lol, Mojang) series allows the player to be completely free to take on environments as they see fit, unrestrained by which path they want to take to it, and the results can be different depending on dialogue choice and skill usage. Some people take it to the other extreme, roleplaying an entire life in the game, going out to hunt deer to put food on the table for their virtual wife and kids.

Don't get me wrong, I do like the freedom to be a Mystic Marksman (custom class, magic and stealth focus) and to not be forced to play the game a certain way, but some games do require that approach in order to make the narrative more believable and immersive.

 

[Sethzard]

I would say skyrim as it has easily the longest play time.

 

[nyysjan]

If you like Bethesdas sandbox style rpg's, best time for money ratio will be Skyrim, haven't played it however so can't really comment.
Batman: Arkham City is pretty good and entertaining, but i was dissapointed about the rather shallow handling of the enemies (too short a game to give justice to so many batman villains in one game).
Saints Row: The Third is difficult to quantify, gameplay is good, world is open, but the main story is short and badly written, and your enjoyment may depend on how much of a fan you are of SR2, bigger fan = less enjoyment.

 

[Smertnik]

It really depends on what you like the most. Can't comment on Skyrim or Arkham City yet but SR3 turned out pretty good - the graphics are pretty, the gameplay is good, the game itself is optimised very well. If you enjoyed SR2 you'll love it more than likely.

 

[Sir Strange Of The House Lycan]

Skyrim is fantastic from what I played (I'm getting it tomorrow) but I've completed Saints Row three near 100% and it is just...Magnificence. It's so balls out insane that every mission that isn't activity introduction will just break your holy- ridatashit-o-meter.