Watchdogs - wasted potential?

[Blackpapa]

I saw some watchdogs footage recently.

I was hoping for a game like Blood Money meets Uplink in a free-roam GTA-esque world. You know, dress up as a Comcast technician to tap your target's local network, steal an ID badge, ambush the admin and beat the passwords out of him, setup your own botnet by manually infecting machines.. stay low because the establishment has a score to settle with you.. All the while evading your opposition because you're way outgunned.

Nope. Run BALCKOUT_LOL.APK - Adan Pierce probably got it from a website with a green-black color scheme, courier font and lots of spinning skull and radiation warning gifs. Run people over, cause mayhem, hacking is just a theme of your superpower, not mechanically relevant.

This game has all the hallmarks of "It would've been a classic if only it wasn't bastardized". And since Ubisoft hates modders, nobody ain't gonna fix it.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

from the reviews, it sounds like we're getting another Assassin's Creed situation: a game with a LOAD of potential, put unfortunately the finished product is more of a glorified tech demo that's meant to showcase "next-gen" capabilities. Seems like there going to need another entry to iron out a lot of kinks and hit their stride.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well it does seem like they could pull something grand out of the concept, but as their first attempt they at least got the basics down and got to about a first timers GTA game.

But if they ever really pull it together and like OP said make it a cross of complex hacking to prep the scene and then use those resources to execute things by plan that shit would be off the chain, then I would swallow my pride and buy another Ubi game.

 

[Blackpapa]

from the reviews, it sounds like we're getting another Assassin's Creed situation: a game with a LOAD of potential, put unfortunately the finished product is more of a glorified tech demo that's meant to showcase "next-gen" capabilities. Seems like there going to need another entry to iron out a lot of kinks and hit their stride.

If you're going to showcase next-gen tech, you probably want a tight engine to show off. This is not a lean, tight engine and neither are the visuals good enough to justify the hardware requirements.

What I mean is that they've picked up a cool concept but instead of building a game around it, they used it as a wallpaper over a competent but otherwise unremarkable GTA competitor.

Watchdogs tried to differentiate itself as being the more "darker" and "deeper" game. Yet it looks like they've did little with the subject matter - DXHR had more mechanics centered about hacking this game about a vigilante hacker.

There's place for superpower games - infamous, because LOL bioengineering. Here, I was hoping for a more serious and realistic approach instead of LOL MAGIC HAX

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

The problem with Ubisoft is that they keep applying the same gameplay mechanics to every game they make. That's not good game design. That's lazy game design. Of course it's going to feel like a lot of wasted potential when instead of thinking of something original, they take things that they already made in one of their previous games and paste it into a title that is supposed to be completely different.

 

[SonicWaffle]

The problem with Ubisoft is that they keep applying the same gameplay mechanics to every game they make. That's not good game design. That's lazy game design. Of course it's going to feel like a lot of wasted potential when instead of thinking of something original, they take things that they already made in one of their previous games and paste it into a title that is supposed to be completely different.

While I agree to an extent - Watch_Dogs certainly feels like an amalgam of previous titles - to give Ubi credit they do at least switch it up and add new things. While they do carry over a lot of things like control styles and gameplay elements, they also introduce new things each time. I'm a fan of the AC series, and I think Black Flag is by far the best because it takes an almost totally new (it featured in ACIII but who cared?) direction with the sailing.

I guess the attitude is that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you have a style that you know will sell copies, why risk those sales by experimenting with something wholly new when you can just modify what was already successful? Not exactly an adventurous or risky attitude, but given the exorbitant costs of making a AAA game nowadays I can't really blame them for not going all the way out on a limb. At least they're edging further out onto the limb with each game.

 

[endtherapture]

I saw some watchdogs footage recently.

I was hoping for a game like Blood Money meets Uplink in a free-roam GTA-esque world. You know, dress up as a Comcast technician to tap your target's local network, steal an ID badge, ambush the admin and beat the passwords out of him, setup your own botnet by manually infecting machines.. stay low because the establishment has a score to settle with you.. All the while evading your opposition because you're way outgunned.

Nope. Run BALCKOUT_LOL.APK - Adan Pierce probably got it from a website with a green-black color scheme, courier font and lots of spinning skull and radiation warning gifs. Run people over, cause mayhem, hacking is just a theme of your superpower, not mechanically relevant.

This game has all the hallmarks of "It would've been a classic if only it wasn't bastardized". And since Ubisoft hates modders, nobody ain't gonna fix it.

When I first saw the concept I was hoping it'd be somewhat like an open-world Deus Ex Human Revolution - rehack security systems to help you in your stealth missions and stuff. But hearing it compared to Assassin's Creed makes me sad.

 

[DaWaffledude]

Honestly, I'm confused by how disappointed people seem to be with the hacking mechanics. They showed how it worked from the first bit of gameplay footage. Why is this suddenly a surprise?

 

[carnex]

I have to second Waffle. From the first trailer it was shown that hacking will not require any further interaction after pressing one button. And since they went for an action game it's really the only choice, anything else would interrupt action.

Now, would it be better if it was more methodical? Maybe, but it would most likely reduce the audience for game too.

 

[Sarcasm.]

Knowing Ubisoft we'll see a trailer for the sequel before the year is up. I wish the story for the game was more bad ass, I thought it was going the route of "We need overthrow this oppressive and intrusive government that erased privacy and harasses their powers"-blablabla, and then it instead went on the a combination of Splinter Cell story lines with very few original ideas.

 

[SonicWaffle]

Watch dogs started out as a driver game, or at least a racing game. Its engine shows that it still had some heritage to a cancelled racing game.

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/12/27/watch-dogs-engine-originally-built-for-a-racing-game/

Watch Dogs is a frankenstein's monster. It has more stolen parts than a chop shop. There was no way they'd be able to do what you just said with this mish mashed system.

It was doomed from the start. It wasn't built originally as a hacker game, it was a bare bones racing game.

Seriously?

SERIOUSLY?!

The driving in Watch_Dogs is utterly abysmal. The fucking Mako was a better ride than almost anything I've run across in the game so far. All I can say is that if this engine was originally built for a racing game, someone out there really shouldn't be allowed to make games anymore.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

If you're going to showcase next-gen tech, you probably want a tight engine to show off. This is not a lean, tight engine and neither are the visuals good enough to justify the hardware requirements.

What I mean is that they've picked up a cool concept but instead of building a game around it, they used it as a wallpaper over a competent but otherwise unremarkable GTA competitor.

Watchdogs tried to differentiate itself as being the more "darker" and "deeper" game. Yet it looks like they've did little with the subject matter - DXHR had more mechanics centered about hacking this game about a vigilante hacker.

There's place for superpower games - infamous, because LOL bioengineering. Here, I was hoping for a more serious and realistic approach instead of LOL MAGIC HAX

Welcome to the first year of new hardware; nothing in the first year is going to light the world on fire because of people having to get used to the kinks of the new systems. Ubisoft TRIED to use this to justify the new stuff and it seems like they failed for the time being. They didn't base it around hacking because that would take a LOT more time and effort than just bumping up the quality of the textures.

 

[pilouuuu]

Well, AssCreed 1 was incredibly boring and FarCry 1 and 2 were deeply flawed, so maybe Watch Dogs 2 will be much better. Ubisoft gets better with sequels.

Watch Dogs is a flawed good idea.

 

[Roofstone]

Personally I've been having a great time with it, it is awesome non-stop fun no matter what I do. Be it story, crime fighting or simply having a walk down the street.

If they make another one and it is even better it'll be darn awesome!

 

[Easton Dark]

Well, AssCreed 1 was incredibly boring and FarCry 1 and 2 were deeply flawed, so maybe Watch Dogs 2 will be much better. Ubisoft gets better with sequels.

Well they didn't make Farcry 1, and Assassin's Creed 3 is considered the worst of them all.

They can hit or miss.

 

[DEAD34345]

It's exactly as I expected from Ubisoft. It works perfectly fine as a game, it's fairly pretty, it's even vaguely fun, but it does absolutely nothing new or interesting. If I wasn't the kind of person who plays a lot of games I'd think it was incredible, as it stands however all I can think is "Been there, done that", and I'm already bored of it. Luckily I got it for my brother, and he seems to enjoy it at least.

I can't even look forward to a sequel, really. This is Ubisoft, so they're only going to release the same game another dozen times. Bleh.

 

[vIRL Nightmare]

I think we're going to get another saint's row with this. Slow if not sub par start that turns into something impressive and fun. The only major problem is the driving mechanics on anything not a motorcycle. Other wise it is a littering of really good ideas that weren't quite executed correctly.