Titanfall: reviews discussion thread

@chaser324: I agree. 'Online Only' works for specific games, like competitive shooters, and I really think certain games could benefit from cutting the fat off of their bloated products.

I just think it doesn't work as a concept to implement across a whole console (original Xbox One pitch) or with games that clearly should support single player modes (Simcity). Titanfall makes sense to only be online.

Also, like you said, Respawn would need to create a completely different ai for a bot match. You could run circles around the other team if they were using the current Titanfall AI. They're dumb as hell.

@chaser324 said:

@monkeyking1969 said:

I have to agree. It not that they had to put in a single player campaign, but not even an offline mode with bots? Not even a practice mode that you could play offline? Sorry that stinks of 'always on' to check-up on gamers, not for any game play reason but just to put you under their thumb.

I don't buy into this concept that every game has to have offline content, and if it doesn't it's just keeping gamers online as some form of DRM to inconvenience them. Why can't a game just be an online multiplayer FPS? There's certainly no lack of a proven audience for it. Would you make the same claim against an MMORPG?

Also, why bother developing the complex AI required to make a meaningful human substitute just for a very small subset of people that might on a few very rare occasions actually use it?

Yeah, I'll never understand why a game must feature offline content the same way that a game must feature online content. Titanfall needs a single-player as much as Dead Space 2 needed multi-player aka not at all.

Judge what they are making for what it is and not what it is supposed to be.

@lumley: Well, this is pretty much what I expected. As much as I dislike FPS games now, I have to admit that the game looks pretty good.

This is one time where I will be waiting for a few Aussie reviews. I really need to see what the servers will be like.

Related info: here's the current preload/unlock schedule for Titanfall.

It looks like I'll be going to sleep early so that I can wake up at 3 AM to start downloading the game. Kinda sucks that not only is there no pre-load on Xbox One, but it also doesn't become available to start downloading until three hours after the PC version unlocks. I can understand the logic of staggering it out a bit, but it's still a bit of a bummer.

Yeah I think the sites holding their reviews for a while are doing it right. As games change the way they're played and run, the way they're reviewed needs to change as well.

Was really hoping, at least, one of the two (Dark Souls or TitanFall) would be available at midnight eastern. Instead both at 3 a.m. So tired of that shit.

soooooooo, what are the odds Polygon might change their review score for server problames......again? Jeff pointed that out on his early "previews".

I still feel it's good to be critical about this game.

No its total shit on a tablet too. the text is way too big

Polygon has demonstrated that they won't hesitate to change a review score multiple times, but I'm sure they'll wait at least 1-2 days post-launch before changing anything.

However, maybe it's just wishful thinking, but I feel like this should be a fairly stable launch (or at least probably won't be a total disaster). That beta was about as wide open as it gets, and I never experienced any issues with it.

@chaser324: Not to derail the thread, but have to say I agree with you regarding Polygon's design (might as well throw The Verge into that as well). That kind of "responsive" design seems to be popular everywhere now and I generally don't think it adds anything, and just makes articles more difficult to read. It seems like every site who writes long articles are moving in this direction, and I'm not a fan.

I think taking the shitty single player campaigns out of MP FPS games is something that really needed to happen. I just think this makes people who primarily play single player games rethink how much value they would get out of one of these types of games. For someone who lives and breathes FPS MP games it's completely worth the asking price, but for people like me who get burnt out after 10 - 20 hours of doing the same thing over and over, it's a hard sell. With the old COD games I used to enjoy the dumb action movie I got with my MP shooter, so I got that and 10 hours of multiplayer and felt content. BF4 really made me realise I'm over MP shooters and even if Titanfall is a fantastic one and I do have friends to play with, I can't see myself picking it up.

I just wish there were more interesting FPS games like Far Cry 3, Bioshock and Borderlands being made. Here's to hoping Destiny is good 'crosses fingers'.

@chaser324:

Ironically, the lack of a "pre-release hype train" will probably help improve the chance for a smooth and stable release. Failing or avoiding to tell everyone about TitanFall everywhere and all of the time in every medium available might actually save it.

@slashdance said:

$60 though...

If I like a multiplayer game then I'm going to play it for a really long time and put in at least 50 hours, so that's easily worth $60 for me. I know I'll like this game since I was in the beta.

Not bad, I'm not all that interested but may give the 360 version a shot (if it's solid).

@deathstriker said:

@slashdance said:

$60 though...

If I like a multiplayer game then I'm going to play it for a really long time and put in at least 50 hours, so that's easily worth $60 for me. I know I'll like this game since I was in the beta.

I'm mostly just quoting this because I love this Larry David gif.

The jury is still out for me, a couple reviews, including Jeff, mention that the whole package feels a little thin and that was something I was worrying about. I really like multiplayer shooters but I already have quite a few...

$60?

I have no interest in playing the game, but the main thing that worries me is that EA cancelled the game's release entirely in South Africa because of network performance issues. And while the rest of the world is not South Africa, it does make me wonder what EA's idea of "good enough" is to release in any particular territory.

Polygon's review changes are a bit silly, considering how it'd be best to hold it all off like Jeff is doing and then come up with a review score later down the line because "hey, we haven't seen this work in the wild yet." But that doesn't matter because metacritic just scoops up the first review and the whole entire changing of score never did matter in the first place.

Microsoft has better history with server issues, the beta ran well for over 2 million users. I was surprise to hear Jeff say there were problems before launch.... and I'm still skeptical about ALL OF THIS, I'd rather have a real critical view of this game then just hyperbole that fits perfectly as a blurb on a launch trailer.

hey, I'm not excited that in order me to change my character gun I need to log into the server to do that.

I am not asking to be a reductive dick or anything, but would it be accurate to describe this game as yo call of duty but with robits?

Wouldn't surprise me if that was a convenient excuse and the real reason is "its not worth maintaining servers there for the amount of copy's we will sell" Internet in the united states by and large is considered really shitty so I cant imagine that's the real reason for canceling it in south africa. Though thats all speculation I know dick all about maintaining networks

While that's not necessarily an incorrect description, I'd say it is a bit too reductive. Yes, the Call of Duty pedigree is very evident, but there are other elements (maneuverability, pacing, burn cards, etc.) which I find to be at least as impactful as the titans if not more so.

I wouldn't say you're a reductive dick but you do sound like a moron saying "yo call of duty but with robits".

@agnosticjesus: Fair enough lol

Yo jesus! I also don't want to be a reductive dick (you be the judge of that) but is Donkey Kong Country just Mario Brah but with mankeys?

They already have bots in it...So, they have bots, they have modes of play the rely on bots, but SOMEHOW you think people shouldn't play without being online and without five other people? Really? Really, really? I don't buy that line of thinking at all, nothing suffers form having andf offline bot mode to practice...nothing.

@monkeyking1969: The fact that there are already AI controlled elements is kinda irrelevant. The role and capabilities of the player-controlled pilots is so different from that of the grunts that I think there would be very little in the way of overlap in those AI routines. You couldn't just throw in eleven more pilots operating on grunt AI to fill up an empty match. For a relatively small team, it's a very non-trivial amount of additional work to produce AI capable of being even a poor substitute for a human controlled player.

I also never said that I thought an offline mode would be of any real detriment to the online. I was more just making the case that it was by no means a requirement for a game marketed as an online multiplayer game, and that it would so rarely be played that it likely wasn't worth the additional work.

@spraynardtatum said:

@deathstriker said:

@slashdance said:

$60 though...

If I like a multiplayer game then I'm going to play it for a really long time and put in at least 50 hours, so that's easily worth $60 for me. I know I'll like this game since I was in the beta.

I'm mostly just quoting this because I love this Larry David gif.

The jury is still out for me, a couple reviews, including Jeff, mention that the whole package feels a little thin and that was something I was worrying about. I really like multiplayer shooters but I already have quite a few...

$60?

I don't see what the big problem is, COD and Battlefield are pretty much multiplayer only too and no one seems to have a problem spending $60 on them. I'd rather BF4 had been MP only if that meant more maps, vehicles, and it worked from day one.

lol

It's probably gonna be hard just not picking up a copy of Titanfall tomorrow when I get Dark Souls II. Plus I do have a friend who will really be into it. Damn it!

Playing on PC and I think this game looks like garbage (for a game that is coming out in 2014). The character models in the cut scenes are absolutely horrible.
The game play is fun though, but for a AAA title, lack of a single player campaign, sub-par visuals, and a relatively shallow multiplayer experience definitely leave me wanting. I doubt this will be a go to game for more than a month, which is a disappointing.