Zero Punctuation: Tomb Raider
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
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I want to know how this whole argument about Spec Ops came up in the first place. It seems like a really bizaare tangent.
EDIT: Oh yeah, the game was still on my play list. So thanks to all of you for spoiling that part. Jerks.
EDIT: Oh yeah, the game was still on my play list. So thanks to all of you for spoiling that part. Jerks.
Did you see Toy Story 3, yet? I just want to know so I don't spoil that Woody was imagining Buzz the whole time.Mahoshonen said:
Oh, wait...
According to them, "you could have just stopped playing the game". Which is technically true. But nobody stops following a story they got invested in just because they can see it will end up going horrible places, so the devs are little more then pretentious wankers.Machine Man 1992 said:
Anyhoo.
Almost forgot how good Yahtzee's skill with words was. There's probably a reason I've yet to miss a ZP episode.
His point, sir, is this blatant misandry is something we shouldn't rightly stand for or allow to happen without bringing it up with the developers. If the roles were reversed and it was a male and all he did was kill endless waves of females, the game would have been protested left and right. Was it intended to be hateful? I doubt it. This is kinda like how Resident Evil 5 wasn't intentionally racist against African people. It just needs to be pointed out to the developers that they need to keep this stuff in mind. Maybe sprinkle in a few female baddies in here and there.Woodsey said:
A quick-time event that prevents you from getting raped? All quick-time events are just a little rape of a free-steaming game.
Natla died twice. Horrifically.Kennetic said:
Sophia Lee got fried hilariously.
Also, Lara Croft puts a bullet between her mother's eyes. She either died there, or a few decades before, depending on how you look at it.
Also, we watch a bunch of the Peru expedition get killed off.
There aren't tons of examples, but saying "NOT ONE" is just inaccurate.
EDIT: Oops, you meant just the new game, didn't you? DAMN these freaking naming conventions.
Holy shit, I thought I was the only one who realized there wasn't an actual character arc for the character. She is innocent and naive, then badass the next moment. Also, the gameplay is completely removed from the character development. At no point does what is going on in the game reflect the cut scenes and how Lara is supposed to be changing (arcing). From moment one she goes from being reasonably good at killing everything that moves to being an extremely efficient killer. It's still a good game, but all the posturing about a story about a woman who is afraid to even talk back to her reflection at the beginning, to an arc that is supposed to make her a defiant, strong, adventurous... adventurer just takes away from the overall experience for me. Also, the fact that they are concentrating exclusively on MP expansion and ignoring the SP is a big turn off when everything is said and done.
Right and wrong. I think games are meant to be about me, but aren't always. That's what sets them apart from fiction and film, but not all take advantage of that. Tomb Raider had me telling Lara what to do, but at no time did it feel like I was in her situation, or that I was in any way involved besides in a totally mindless, almost insulting way. It was like reading a book and when the character decides to do something, getting a prompt to tap the page 8 times to proceed. I think that's what made it a poor game more than anything.ArmorKingBaneGief said:
elilupe said:
Interesting justification , and imo the biggest mistake made in that game which would of been good if i could empathize at least with walker but as hes a total fucking idiot that makes blatantly bad decisions i spend half the time screaming at him for being a twat and the other walking forwards getting him shot because his death is more entertaining than carrying on.
But that old rant aside i still dont get why its different than tomb raider, whats to stop the same argument being used on tomb raider and say lara decides not us?
OT fun episode again , and whoa steady on that was approaching something akin to a review
Haven't played the game to be able to form my own opinion of it yet; but the jarring shift everyone talks about doesn't necessarily mean "there isn't an arc" so much as the arc is broken because the writers and game designers appeared to be working toward two different visions for the game.Baresark said:
Was the game supposed to be this movie-esque character focused thing, where the game design messed it up? or was a layout for the game type already in place when they decided to bring in some writers to try and do an intricate way to rationalize all the stuff in a way where a new version of the character can get away with it?
Did popular backlash against perceptions of linearity (you need a degree of linearity and restriction for structured, well-paced, planned story-telling; giving the player more freedom is incompatible and increases the need for more abstract narrative ideas) and perceived downgrading of the character's "power" lead to hasty back-pedalling that compromised the overall product?
From a story perspective, would we have ended up with something quite a bit better if the game design had played in line with the writer direction and they were able to just do their thing with proper pacing for a transition within the character arc?
Writing for a video game can be a lot more difficult than it seems, because the instances where the story takes and maintains shape before the game design rather than vice versa, is comparatively a lot more rare.
Don't be an ass. The thread topic has nothing to do with Spec Ops save for a single clip of the box in Yahtzee's review. If this was a thread specifically about Spec Ops you may have a point. But it's not, so what you just wrote is what is known in the vernacular as a shitpost.ArmorKingBaneGief said:
You're just jealous 'cause I'm holding a royal flush.Mahoshonen said:
On topic, I notice that bows are starting to become popular in shooters. Farcry 3, Crysis 3, this latest Tomb Raider...there a reason for that, or is it just a massive coinkidink?
Well, to be fair about it, it's not like she was the same character leaving the game as entering the game, so there technically was an arc. The issue is that it's not an "arc" to speak of, as in it isn't a gentle sloping curve with a series of events that show the gradual change of the character to the new character. It's more like a switch gets flipped. One moment she is a frail little creature, the next she is a killing machine. And that is completely disconnected from the gameplay. She will be frail and unsure of herself in a cut scene and need the support characters to assure her she is quite capable of doing it, then 10 seconds later she is shot gunning her way through barriers and sniping enemies with a bow. She will however, at one particular moment in the game, decide that she is a new character, and I'll spare you the spoiler as to when that happens.Khanht Cope said:
I also agree that some degree of linearity is necessary. I also did not feel that the game was overly linear. The areas aren't huge by any stretch, but you can go back to old locations to find treasure and what not from any base camp. I thought the game was honestly very good, the gameplay was solid. The story was one of the main focuses of the game according the developer, but I don't buy it. It wasn't bad, but it was honestly just kind of derivative and cliched. Lara wasn't this compelling character they sold her to be. Also, the arc was non existent, as I explained above.