zisssou
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Post by zisssou on Oct 28, 2024 16:24:04 GMT
I purely loved AW2 because of Twin Peaks references. I liked Control, but the storytelling was abysmal.
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wunty
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Post by wunty on Oct 31, 2024 9:54:20 GMT
The Alan sections... I'm trying to love them. There's so much that's fucking awesome. But second time through and I really don't get on with the shadows. At all. Not knowing which is going to attack me and which isn't just isn't actually "fun". It's laborious. Slowly approach and shine flashlight on it long enough so it either dissipates or comes at me. Every. Single. Time. The one time I don't, is the time I get clobbered. It's just a shame that we couldn't just have more of the normal combat encounters. It's not like Saga has loads of them. Big chunks of her chapters are walking simulator.
Argh it's such a frustrating game. I fucking love so much of it, yet grind my teeth at the rest.
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askew
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 10:02:36 GMT
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Post by askew on Oct 31, 2024 10:02:36 GMT
Yes, the game tricked me into wasting too many flashlight charges on them, particularly towards the end.
While I enjoyed it, I wish the game hadn’t let me swap between characters. I’d reached a particular story beat with Saga, only to then have to spend a chunk of time catching up Alan’s side of the story. I’m actually struggling to remind myself what happened after that 😂
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wunty
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Post by wunty on Oct 31, 2024 10:06:32 GMT
There's also far too many collectables and things. I spend more time looking for lunchboxes, figuring out nursery rhyme puzzles, following yellow arrows to lock-boxes, looking for spiral words of power etc than I actually do fighting anything.
See if Remedy pull this shit for Control 2 as well, and actually forget to put gameplay in. I'll be bloody raging. I can tolerate it in this, but my limit will have been reached if they do it again.
Again though, I love it. God, I'm so conflicted. See. There was none of this with Silent Hill 2. Bloober just fucking aced that.
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Dgzter
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Post by Dgzter on Oct 31, 2024 10:19:29 GMT
Yeah, I've only reached the part where I can now switch between the characters. I do love the atmosphere, settings, and there's a lot of really cool and interesting ideas here, but I have to echo the criticisms about the combat -- which so far are pretty much identical to how I felt about combat in the first one.
It's still just not "fun", so far. Still feels to me like they've misjudged the timings on how long it takes the flashlight to burst through and render the mobs vulnerable, and the dodge still absolutely sucks.
Loving the Twin Peaks vibe, mind. And Saga's sections so far have been really cool. That'll probably carry me through the game. And it looks gorgeous too!
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richardiox
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 10:29:29 GMT
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Post by richardiox on Oct 31, 2024 10:29:29 GMT
This talk about the combat is why I haven't yet played AW2. I'm hoping the accessibility patch they released this week? means when I do buy it I can just make the frustrating combat piss easy and then enjoy it for the atmosphere and story.
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 10:36:16 GMT
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Post by Jambowayoh on Oct 31, 2024 10:36:16 GMT
I made the mistake of playing too much of Saga's campaign then having to spend a long stretch of just Alan which just killed me.
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MolarAm🔵
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Oct 31, 2024 10:38:26 GMT
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Oct 31, 2024 10:38:26 GMT
Definitely true and I think if Control 2 comes along and goes for a similar vibe then that well would run dry very quickly. Plus, looking at just game play, Control felt like a great combination of the Quantum Break powers with the fluidity of Max Payne's combat. I don't think you can accuse Remedy of not knowing how to make an action game after Control (and their first game was Max Payne, so you can't go far with that argument). They wanted something different with AW2 and they stuck with that, for better and worse. The action in Control was good, but the encounter design was not imo. The vast majority of sequences consisted of men with guns spawning in, you throwing things at them/shooting with your gun, and repeating until they stop spawning. There's really not that much enemy variety either. They had such an interesting setting too! But even the supposed highlight of the Ashtray Maze was just a shiny corridor with the same combat and shitty nu metal playing over the soundtrack, and by that time I was getting a little sick of that combat loop. If I'm going to get on with the sequel, I think I'd like maybe 20% less combat, and a lot more of the weird non-Euclidean space stuff. More Motel sequences. That stuff was great! |
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 10:44:37 GMT
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Post by Mark1412 on Oct 31, 2024 10:44:37 GMT
This talk about the combat is why I haven't yet played AW2. I'm hoping the accessibility patch they released this week? means when I do buy it I can just make the frustrating combat piss easy and then enjoy it for the atmosphere and story. Stick it on story mode and it's very easy. Didn't die once in my playthrough. I actually liked Saga's combat, too. It's the previously mentioned shadows that are shit. |
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 10:48:11 GMT
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Post by baihu1983 on Oct 31, 2024 10:48:11 GMT
You don't even need story mode. Just put it on God mode and kill everything in 1 shot and you can't die. Only way I've forced myself through it as nothing really clicked with me.
The constant change the scene stuff with wake got old quickly.
Mind place stuff feels pointless.
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zisssou
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Post by zisssou on Oct 31, 2024 10:52:13 GMT
I put one shot kills on Control because it was boring me. Had a blast after that. Quite literally.
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 10:58:00 GMT
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Post by baihu1983 on Oct 31, 2024 10:58:00 GMT
Same. Disliked the gaming world design.
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wunty
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Post by wunty on Oct 31, 2024 11:00:10 GMT
You don't even need story mode. Just put it on God mode and kill everything in 1 shot and you can't die. Only way I've forced myself through it as nothing really clicked with me. The constant change the scene stuff with wake got old quickly. Mind place stuff feels pointless. I might actually do that. The trouble is that I do actually want the tension from difficult encounters... So I don't know.
Yeah I don't like the mind place stuff either if I'm honest. It's needless and faffy.
It's quite funny as looking at my first playthrough time for this and - again - comparing to Silent Hill 2. They were both around 22-23 hours. Yet I know that a good few hours of AW2's playtime was fucking about on a bloody pinboard, looking for lunchboxes, slowly walking up to shadows and getting clobbered, fucking about changing scenes etc.
Sounds like I'm being overly critical and I should hate it. I think I'm being overly critical because I don't hate it, and (grudgingly) have to applaud Remedy for thinking so completely outside the box, doubling down on all their cinematic cross-over and music inspired stuff and indulging themselves here. Again though, no more indulging yourselves to this extent please guys. You've got it out your system now. Please.
Talking of music, some of the post-chapter songs are cracking.
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Alan Wake
Oct 31, 2024 11:04:12 GMT
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Post by baihu1983 on Oct 31, 2024 11:04:12 GMT
Yeah really like some of the music.
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