*Note I copied this post from another forum that I wrote it for. Also I have not played the predator yet*
Having just played it, and the experience being contrary to the mantra spouted in the threads here, I am at a loss why a lot of people are having a bad experience with this...
Here are some ideas:
-People are too used to the valve-style floating camera: in this game, especially when you are a marine, the movements are slow and clunky (keyed movements mind you, not mousing). You walk slow, you jump hardly, and it feels a lot less steady cam vs what you are used to. How is this a bad thing? Why do all games must posses a steady cam? I my self find this movement style welcome for a game like this... it increases the tension a lot on the part of the Marine because there is no doubt the Alien will move fast and more fluidly than you, and provides a higher level of immersion as it present arguably a more realistic movement system. My only critisizm was that I couldn't crouch, the pulse rifle had a small lag between firings which was odd, and that the default walk speed is a little slow. The gunplay is quite fun and exciting.
-People are lazy when it comes to new games. To be honest playing the Alien was similar to slipping in to an old restitched glove: I played AVP2 a LOT as the Alien, and therefore all I had to do was learn the new keys and ablilities. I rembered that, as the Alien, I have little health, move fast, can walk on walls, and darkness is key and while playing I found wall walking, hiding in the shadows, patience, and wall jumping to be essential to have fun and play well. A lot of players may not be used to the large learning curve, which is sad as a lot of fun can be had playing the Alien... spotting an unsuspecting marine walking about, I wall jump to the dark shadow laden celieng and wait until he walks by, at which point I start to follow making sure to stop if he turns around (motion Tracker). When he feels safe, I drop to the floor, and impale him with my tale. Sadly another marine sees and starts shooting, so to avoid dying I just walljump my way out of there, looking for my next.
-People are frustrated by scary games. I jumped quite a bit playing the Marine as I had people coming out from nowhere ripping my proverbial guts out. Instead of getting frustrated, I recalled how the extreme tension of wondering what that sound was or what that shape is that I felt before in AVP2 is right here, and that I should savor such a rare feeling from a video game. Why is darkness such a bad thing? After Doom 3 was released, every game needs to have a super bright level selection else it is deemed sub par? Darkness is well used here, it builds the tension to a large degree and you even get to use *gasp* a motion tracker and flash light to help even the odds. After learning the ropes a bit I had no problem topping out the score board as a marine.
-People expect all games to look like airbrushed Crysis photos running at DX10. I ran the game maxed out, and had a very enjoyable and immersive graphical experience. Maybe it is playing source all these years that has made be a little less vain about graphics, but there is nothing to complain about here. The DX9 rendered effects, lighting, and graphics are at or above par for a DX9 renderer in this day in age not to mention all the little effects that go with everything. Are there people who seriously think that Bioshock looks better than this game in regards to graphical abilities? Also, look at my system... kinda old isn't it? Not everyone has an I7 and a 5870 with a 480 on preorder, it's nice to have a relatively nice looking game that runs silk smooth on something that for the most part came from 2005 (though I will admit this game runs a lot better on my current video card than it would have on my old X1950xtx).
-People have forgotten the nature of demos, which is not supprising since I cannot remember the last time a tripple A title had a demo... To put simply, demos are DEMONSTRATIONS. They are not a full product so it is foolish to complain of missing features or even the occasional bug. I did not experience any bugs but I hear some people have. I guess they forgot the days of the BattleField games being plauged by them in the early releases... do you people not remember how much updating went in to 1942? Why do they get a pass for patching and balancing when newer games don't?
-People love to complain. What can I say, this is self explanitory. Especially when they over hype them selves on pre release material (I had a safe level of hype as I have only read a few articles and watched 2 trailers, in addition to not following games much now a days) and procede to pick apart everything that is negative with something instead of considering the positives as well. It wouldn't supprise me if some people play games looking for flaws because after all the pre-release material shown flaws are the only things left undiscovered. Take note, I am not saying this game is flawless, far from it, but I do think the positives outweigh the minior negatives.
I have held back from buying games for a long time because just about every game released lately is rather poor on the quality scale, I might make an exception to this one. If the user feedback is positive (after filtering out the disagreeable comments in the nature of the current ones floating around)and reviews are good, then I will buy this.
Having just played it, and the experience being contrary to the mantra spouted in the threads here, I am at a loss why a lot of people are having a bad experience with this...
Here are some ideas:
-People are too used to the valve-style floating camera: in this game, especially when you are a marine, the movements are slow and clunky (keyed movements mind you, not mousing). You walk slow, you jump hardly, and it feels a lot less steady cam vs what you are used to. How is this a bad thing? Why do all games must posses a steady cam? I my self find this movement style welcome for a game like this... it increases the tension a lot on the part of the Marine because there is no doubt the Alien will move fast and more fluidly than you, and provides a higher level of immersion as it present arguably a more realistic movement system. My only critisizm was that I couldn't crouch, the pulse rifle had a small lag between firings which was odd, and that the default walk speed is a little slow. The gunplay is quite fun and exciting.
-People are lazy when it comes to new games. To be honest playing the Alien was similar to slipping in to an old restitched glove: I played AVP2 a LOT as the Alien, and therefore all I had to do was learn the new keys and ablilities. I rembered that, as the Alien, I have little health, move fast, can walk on walls, and darkness is key and while playing I found wall walking, hiding in the shadows, patience, and wall jumping to be essential to have fun and play well. A lot of players may not be used to the large learning curve, which is sad as a lot of fun can be had playing the Alien... spotting an unsuspecting marine walking about, I wall jump to the dark shadow laden celieng and wait until he walks by, at which point I start to follow making sure to stop if he turns around (motion Tracker). When he feels safe, I drop to the floor, and impale him with my tale. Sadly another marine sees and starts shooting, so to avoid dying I just walljump my way out of there, looking for my next.
-People are frustrated by scary games. I jumped quite a bit playing the Marine as I had people coming out from nowhere ripping my proverbial guts out. Instead of getting frustrated, I recalled how the extreme tension of wondering what that sound was or what that shape is that I felt before in AVP2 is right here, and that I should savor such a rare feeling from a video game. Why is darkness such a bad thing? After Doom 3 was released, every game needs to have a super bright level selection else it is deemed sub par? Darkness is well used here, it builds the tension to a large degree and you even get to use *gasp* a motion tracker and flash light to help even the odds. After learning the ropes a bit I had no problem topping out the score board as a marine.
-People expect all games to look like airbrushed Crysis photos running at DX10. I ran the game maxed out, and had a very enjoyable and immersive graphical experience. Maybe it is playing source all these years that has made be a little less vain about graphics, but there is nothing to complain about here. The DX9 rendered effects, lighting, and graphics are at or above par for a DX9 renderer in this day in age not to mention all the little effects that go with everything. Are there people who seriously think that Bioshock looks better than this game in regards to graphical abilities? Also, look at my system... kinda old isn't it? Not everyone has an I7 and a 5870 with a 480 on preorder, it's nice to have a relatively nice looking game that runs silk smooth on something that for the most part came from 2005 (though I will admit this game runs a lot better on my current video card than it would have on my old X1950xtx).
-People have forgotten the nature of demos, which is not supprising since I cannot remember the last time a tripple A title had a demo... To put simply, demos are DEMONSTRATIONS. They are not a full product so it is foolish to complain of missing features or even the occasional bug. I did not experience any bugs but I hear some people have. I guess they forgot the days of the BattleField games being plauged by them in the early releases... do you people not remember how much updating went in to 1942? Why do they get a pass for patching and balancing when newer games don't?
-People love to complain. What can I say, this is self explanitory. Especially when they over hype them selves on pre release material (I had a safe level of hype as I have only read a few articles and watched 2 trailers, in addition to not following games much now a days) and procede to pick apart everything that is negative with something instead of considering the positives as well. It wouldn't supprise me if some people play games looking for flaws because after all the pre-release material shown flaws are the only things left undiscovered. Take note, I am not saying this game is flawless, far from it, but I do think the positives outweigh the minior negatives.
I have held back from buying games for a long time because just about every game released lately is rather poor on the quality scale, I might make an exception to this one. If the user feedback is positive (after filtering out the disagreeable comments in the nature of the current ones floating around)and reviews are good, then I will buy this.
