I'm going through my backlog of games. Playing Enslaved right now, and i absolutely want to murder this woman 8 times over. All she does is bark orders, make snide remarks, and have mental breakdowns. She can't even pick up one of those guns i rip off to help a little? I don't know why i thought this game would be an exemption to the A.I companion horror rule.

[Super Angry Rant]

All i think about during the game is ways how Monkey could end this relationship, with trips death. My current #1 is since she said the head band is voice controlled, to rip out her tongue, tie her arms and sell her to someone for taking off this headband.

[End Rant]

Also this story is highly overrated, I'd say a syfy channel movie has a better story. The visuals are nice though, and that's about it. The combat is horribly broken, and buggy.

I'm mainly playing this cause people praised it with such high regard. I guess its one of those like it cause its niche situations. I'll finish it to finally be rid-of it, but I'm really disappointed.

Also reading the Giant Bomb review, i think we're playing two completely different games. All this game has is nice art design, and visuals nothing else merits a continuation of the series.

I hate to say this because I had such high hopes for Enslaved, but I agree with you. I think everything about that game, with the exception of the animations, is highly overrated. The only thing that got me interested was finding out exactly what happened to everyone who'd been abducted, although even that was largely ruined by the giant talking head because I couldn't tell whether they were being serious or trying to be funny.

As for the relationship between Trip and Monkey... I think Monkey is a masochist of some kind. I mean, he's gotta be right? Why else would he ever tell her to turn the headband back on?

@Kazona said:

I hate to say this because I had such high hopes for Enslaved, but I agree with you. I think everything about that game, with the exception of the animations, is highly overrated. The only thing that got me interested was finding out exactly what happened to everyone who'd been abducted, although even that was largely ruined by the giant talking head because I couldn't tell whether they were being serious or trying to be funny.

As for the relationship between Trip and Monkey... I think Monkey is a masochist of some kind. I mean, he's gotta be right? Why else would he ever tell her to turn the headband back on?

oh hai, you must be new to sci-fi.

@KingWilly said:

@Kazona said:

I hate to say this because I had such high hopes for Enslaved, but I agree with you. I think everything about that game, with the exception of the animations, is highly overrated. The only thing that got me interested was finding out exactly what happened to everyone who'd been abducted, although even that was largely ruined by the giant talking head because I couldn't tell whether they were being serious or trying to be funny.

As for the relationship between Trip and Monkey... I think Monkey is a masochist of some kind. I mean, he's gotta be right? Why else would he ever tell her to turn the headband back on?

oh hai, you must be new to syfy.

Fixed.

@Kazona said:

@KingWilly said:

@Kazona said:

I hate to say this because I had such high hopes for Enslaved, but I agree with you. I think everything about that game, with the exception of the animations, is highly overrated. The only thing that got me interested was finding out exactly what happened to everyone who'd been abducted, although even that was largely ruined by the giant talking head because I couldn't tell whether they were being serious or trying to be funny.

As for the relationship between Trip and Monkey... I think Monkey is a masochist of some kind. I mean, he's gotta be right? Why else would he ever tell her to turn the headband back on?

oh hai, you must be new to syfy.

Fixed.

Well played.

I don't want to open a new thread for this so I'll just necro this one: Since I've just finished the PC version of the game: Yes! Yesyesyes. Is Trip supposed to be a terrible character? Like, in the original chinese story was there some sort of demon? First off she leaves Monkey to die two times at the beginning of the game, alright, I already really care for her. Then, as you said, she continues to be completely useless throughout the game. And when Monkey cleary showes he cares for her during the village chapter (why is anyones guess, he just seems to accept anything, really) she doesn't even offer to take the slave-thing off even though she sees how much the images etc. torture him and drive him insane. (Also: "Turn it back on" WHAAT? You know you can just stay if you want to, right Monkey?) And in the end she is just like "Well, I'm just gonna kill this guy, whatever. Revenge". I have to say the "revelation" at the end is also just......what? WHAT? Is this supposed to be taken seriously? Really?

I had really high hopes for this game since Brad liked it so much but I think this is the first "Bredcommendation" (*cough*) I regrett. (Also I'm pretty sure the game thinks the player is an idiot and thus feels the need to highlight EVERYTHING. Even the obvious, glowing week points of bosses, it just slappes a huge "SHOOT THIS YOU MORON" sign over them)

@abendlaender: You seem to have encapsulated everything I remember hearing about the game during its initial release. I never played it, but I watched the ending on Youtube after the GB staff talked about it. And... dude... I really wonder who the fuck thinks these things are good ideas. Like, take Outlast. It's a great game, but the last half-hour just fucking obliterates any possible merit gained from the story up to that point. How does that stuff happen? Did they honestly never read about Deus Ex Machinas during school, or do they think they're the special exception to the terribleness that they pose? It baffles me.

@abendlaender I never felt that way. The game was certainly not perfect, but I thought the relationship between Trip and Monkey was pretty spot on. It begins as a forced partnership which slowly grows into an uneasy truce and finally genuine friendship.

Also I think the ending was great. IF you stop and start to think about it a little deeper then yah, like almost any plot it starts to fall apart, but at face value it was a really cool premise. Monkey puts the thing back on because he grows to care for Trip throughout the story and is willing to sacrifice something for her.

I'm not gonna try to convince you, cause different strokes for different folks, but the story and characters certainly aren't terrible. Maybe it's an acquired taste, as I found those two elements the best parts of the entire game since the gameplay itself is pretty rudimentary.

The whole "grows slowly into an uneasy truce" thing I don't get. There was maybe one scene, after the first meeting where Monkey showed dislike towards Trip (when she refused to move when he told her to) but after that he was pretty much okay with everything. There was no scene where Trip used the slave thing, never in the entire game (right after the first cut scenes) so I never felt like she changed much. And as I said, during the village chapter (which was chapter 6 out of 14) it is completly obvious that Monkey would help her anyway, yet she doesn't even think about asking him what he would do. Nope. Just....go along with it. I felt like they were trying to "justify" this by Trip saying something like "I wanted to talk to you, but there was never the right time" or something like that just before she turns the crown of during the final chapter.
And what excatly is Monkey sacrificing that requires him to wear the crown? He could walk away....but if he doesn't want to, why should he? Actually, it would have been a much more meaningfull act if he staid despite not having to. Instead he is just like "Nope, turn it back on because....reasons!" The only reason that scene exists, is because the game designers couldn't think of a better way to keep the interface on the screen.

The problem with the ending is, that I didn't stop and start to think about it, it fell apart immediately but whatever, I appreciate that they at least tried to do something different even. Endings are always easy to fuck up, so I wont hold that against them. I would actually agree that the story and the characters are the best parts of the game but....well thats just saying a lot about the game cause in my opinion neither of those parts were particularly good.

I'm not going to be like "You liked it? Well, that's cause your STUPID. Obviously it's terrible". If you liked it okay. I like a lot of stuff others don't. In my opinion it was a confused, week story with mostly unsympathetic characters but then again

You aren't far enough in the game for your current opinion of her to matter. That stuff changes drastically as the game goes on

I played it when it came out originally and found it good enough. But I didn't adore it like other people seem to. The only character I really liked was Monkey. Trip was too meek and Pigsy was obnoxious. I thought the game looked pretty good but it certainly wasn't the best looking game out the year it released and the gameplay is way, way too straightforward. I found it to be around a 3/5 experience overall. I could understand why someone might get way into it but I just didn't.

@abendlaender: it is totally a different strokes for different folks situation. The story and ending resonated with me on a positive level. I thought that, at the time, that was a pretty clever game plot. Then again I seem to differ in my taste for games quite often with most people. I thought FF13 wasn't bad or that Skyrim was a mindless bore with an atrocious main questline - so who knows!

I really liked the game, but that ending is probably in my top 10 of worst video game endings ever.

Me? I finished the game, I even mentioned it in the comment ;)

@humanity You know, I like a lot of stories that are probably objectively WAY worse than Enslaved (I really liked the story in Shadow Warrior, and that's a REALLY stupid, basic and predictable story). Different strokes is a perfect description, it's not like I can't see other people liking the story and the characters or something like that.

That ending. That was some pretty crazy shit. I'd probably have to go back and play it again to have anything intelligent to say about it.

That being said. Man. I can't believe they did that.

I had more problems with the way the game introduced to the world you were playing in then Trip, I found Trip's actions to be fairly believably imperfect for the most part. Yeah that meant she wasn't 100% likable, but being likable is not a prerequisite for being a well written character as people seem to think it is.

For as much as people complained about the ending, I thought it was far better than the open which was even more enigmatic and unexplained.