Category: Platformer

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Game Ramblings #14 – Mirror’s Edge Catalyst

More Info from EA

  • Platform: PS4
  • Also Available on: Xbox One, Windows (Origin)
  • Genre: Action/Platformer

So, it finally happened; we got a new Mirror’s Edge.  Like the original, the core of this game is all about the first-person parkour-inspired platforming, and this prequel/origin story/retcon doesn’t change much about that.  What this one does do is throw away the linear progression in favor of an open world taking place entirely on the rooftops of Glass, which was also the city setting of the original.  So then the question is, did that change work? Did this game improve on some of the shortcomings of the original?

Going to get this out of the way fast.  Yes, the running that covers the core of the game is still fantastic.  Getting into a good flow running across the rooftops is still better in this game than in any other parkour-style game that I’ve played.  The open world nature of the game makes this even better, as learning routes between common hubs pushes you to get faster and faster travelling around the city, making that traversal fun enough to often skip using the fast travel that was available.  Some people have already complained that some of the traversal skills are locked behind an XP wall, but I never hit a point where I felt limited in what I could do, and the new skills that were unlocked pretty seamlessly integrated into how I was playing, as I was learning to use them one at a time and could experiment over extended play running around the city.

That said, the open world nature of the game did suffer from something akin to Assassin’s Creed syndrome.  There are some good side events scattered around.  The time trials of the original came back in the form of Dash events, and are still as good as ever as you continue to improve on your runs to 3 stars.  However, most of the side content is little more than fluff consisting of collecting orbs or doing more normal running segments that you would already be doing to get around the city.  While these do give XP for people grinding out upgrades, I got to the end of the game without needing the XP only incidentally doing these things while getting around between story missions.  For the completionist, this game has a lot, but for the people going straight through the story, these are skippable.

Unfortunately, the combat was still not that great here.  While it’s definitely a game about staying OUT of combat, there’s enough forced combat missions that the poor quality of the combat can be annoying at times.  They did get rid of the poor gun combat from the original, which is a plus, but even the hand to hand combat was not that great.  It basically consists of weak punches that I stopped using about 1/3 through the game, and strong attacks that can be effectively head on or from a side.  While there are some nice possibilities in the side attacks, particularly in causing enemies to stumble into and interrupt each other, the actual pace of the combat is generally slow and clunky.  Given how good the running is, it’s not a huge deal that combat is poor, but giving more possibilities of entirely avoiding the handful of forced combat areas would certainly have gone a good way in improving this situation.

So overall this game was pretty similar in outcome to the original.  The running portion of the game is still fantastic, the combat was still pretty poor, but the game overall is still highly enjoyable and worth playing.  While the open world change to the game flow has some hits and misses, the parts of the game that were still fun about the original are still maintained.  Just don’t expect the story to make any sense when connected to the original.

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Game Ramblings #10 – Ratchet and Clank (2016)

More Info from Insomniac

  • Genre: Action/Platformer
  • Platform: PS4

As it turns out, the game based on the movie based on the game is still as good as it was on the PS2.  As it also turns out, you can retcon an origin story without actually retconning an origin story.  Basically, Insomniac has pulled a rabbit out of a hat.

So, yes, this is technically a game I’ve played before.  Saying I’m a Ratchet and Clank fan would be a bit of an understatement.  I’ve effectively played through all the games, including Secret Agent Clank, Size Matters, and the slightly unusual side games on the PS3.  I came into this one not really sure what to think.  On the one hand, it brings the origin story into a more modern time, with the things that Insomniac has learned in the past 15 years.  On the other, I came in knowing that they were going to be retconning a significant amount of the origin story of what is now a 10+ game combined story.  I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a bit suspicious of the thing as a whole.

So, let’s get this out of the way.  If you’ve never played a Ratchet game before, this is a damn good starting point.  If you have played a Ratchet game before, this is a damn good restarting point.  In some ways, this game really is an all star combination of the best of the past titles.  The weapons and upgrade system tied to it are heavily influenced by the later titles in the series, with standard blasters like the Combuster to the absurd like the Sheepinator to the explosively fun like the RYNO.  The levels themselves are also show a bit of a mix.  There are some that are reimaginings of original game levels, and some created new for this game.  Overall, it hits a lot of the highlights from the original, while swapping in some newer, better designs for some of the repetitive elements that would no longer work as well.  And holy shit it was so nice immediately turning on the strafe controls right at the start.

So now, about that story.  I’m going to avoid spoilers here, but they explain away the retcon of the origin in a way that absolutely makes sense for this series.  From the opening cutscene, long time players of the series will be in on the gag, and appreciate the in-jokes that pop up to explain the differences between the original and remakes, while new players don’t even have to care that the original existed.  The end of the game also leaves an opening to explain how we arrive at one of the later titles in the series.  The trademark Ratchet humor exists throughout the game, and from what they’ve shown of pre-rendered cutscenes in the game, should also translate very well to the movie theater.  Is it kind of weird to see the changes? Sure.  Is it very Ratchet and Clank? Yes.

I guess I don’t really have much negative to say here though, which is slightly rare.  There’s a handful of weapons I didn’t really use, but that’s mostly because the ones I did use were never really running out of ammo.  There were a handful of areas where there was probably a bit too much collecting, but nothing that got in the way.  The difficulty on normal was too easy, and moving up too hard provided a nice challenge, but had sort of strange power spikes depending on my upgrade path, but again didn’t provide any negative blocker.  Overall this just continued the Ratchet and Clank mainline series history of being at worst a really damn good game.

So, I dunno, go out and buy it I guess! 😀

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Game Ramblings #9 – Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China

More Info from Ubisoft

  • Genre: Stealth Action
  • Platform: PS4
  • Also Available On: Xbox One, PC (Uplay)

This is going to seem like a fairly negative review, but for me it’s with good reason.  Assassin’s Creed Chronicles has a lot of the makings of a great 2D stealth action game, and even more so, has a lot of the great makings of a game that fans of Metroidvania style games would enjoy.  Environmental traversal feels great, stealth kills feel great, combat feels great.  In particular, the combat allows for really smooth transitions between defensive and offensive maneuvers to allow for rapid kills that nearly feel rhythmic in their execution.  Visually, the game also is fantastic, with each of the Chronicles trilogy having their own unique visual style.  That said, I never got that far into the pack, and for me it was the feeling that the game was getting in my way that caused me to stop playing.

One of the core parts of the China episode is that the player gets scored based on their actions within segments of the level, then at the end of the level they can gain upgrades, whether that be health bars, ammo pack upgrades, etc.  However, the way the scoring was done actively forced me into a specific play style to maximize the score I was getting, and killed my reasons for pushing forward.

The maximum score for segments of the levels can be achieved in one way; never being seen, never killing anyone, and never setting off any traps around the level.  What this meant for me is that I could never use the fantastic combat system that they had implemented, I could never even stealth kill enemies even if they never saw me, and any progress through levels became a slow series of waiting in a hiding spot until the perfect opportunity arrived to move forward without being caught.

While I am all for having a full stealth option, at the end of the day the things that have always been the most fun for me in the Assassin’s series are being able to do stupid things like jumping off a roof to assassinate unsuspecting enemies, then sending throwing knives into the people responding.  The China Chronicles episode actively worked against doing anything resembling that style of gameplay.  For players that enjoy full on combat, it’s even worse as combat is by far the lowest scoring option of the three.

At the end of the day, the China Chronicles game is a game that is frustratingly close to being great.  Given the chance, equal scoring for the three paths would have at minimum allowed me to play as I want, and probably have resulted in me playing through all three of the trilogy, rather than stopping at the first.  For me, the Assassin’s games have always represented a series that largely allows you to play as you want, as long as you get to the end goal.  Sure you may miss some optional bonuses, but the core of the objective was always achievable.  In this case, China has gone so far down the route of sticking to the full-stealth option that I just couldn’t bring myself to want to keep playing, and that’s kind of an unfortunate end result.