Quick Look: Child of Light

Was looking forward to this but I think I'll pass. Combat looks bland and too simplistic, skill trees are apparently lame and offer very little in the way of character customization. World seems too barren/empty despite it looking beautiful. Wasn't a fan of the writing at all from what I've seen, I'm not into rhyming for the sake of rhyming,, especially when it doesn't seem very well written. Bit disappointing, o well, I hope it does well anyway because I want to see more big studios doing unique games like this.

@kenpachiramasama said:

Haha, yeah, that was a little frustrating. Even though he DID fly right by the mage character earlier, still, when the enemies clearly keep saying "countered PHYSICAL attack" and raising their defense, I would've started using Aurora's magic attacks way sooner than literally the final attack in that whole battle.

This games combat and writing isn't doing much for me. I can still appreciate the games art though.

Yeah, I as almost screaming this at my screen :D

That's not the issue.

The couplets have no rhythm. He's utilising a form of writing just for the sake of it and without understanding why it can work so well. It's a shame because there's nothing wrong with the idea, it's just that the execution has been completely botched.

Also, this is a guy who praised the fact that he wasn't given an editior while working on this. No decent writer in their right mind would thank a lack of an editor unless there's no space to fit them alongside their own ego.

Also worth noting that this guy also wrote Far Cry 3 and, well, assuming that he has an ego isn't a stretch.

Anyway, this is not good poetry. The writer doesn't have a good sense of form if he is a native English speaker.

Man, the battle music's incredible.

@believer258 said:

Watching this promo video for the game is also a great way to muster some dislike for the writer. Even the way he speaks sounds really awkward (as in how he stresses and/or stretches out certain syllables).

The game looks pretty interesting to me despite how far up himself that guy is. He *did* attempt something relatively unique, but I feel like he doesn't realize that there's a huge difference between doing something and doing something well.

That's just so damn Brad. Just ignore those constant red messages and keep repeating the stuff which doesn't work well, while at the same time wondering out loud why it isn't working. He's fine at video games, but man it would be less frustrating if he learned to step back for a second and consider things.

From my work field I know a lot of people like this though, who will ignore every blatant error/warning message and then don't understand why something doesn't work. It's fascinating and frustrating, I just don't understand how one would help them.

You guys are pretty cool guys.

@san_salvador: Dont forget all those licensed Schwarzenegger movie games :)

The rhyming isn't great, and it feels like it's forced most of the time. I'm not a big fan. Also don't care much for the girl's 3D look in the 2D world. Never liked that. Aside from that it's alright. I think it's a pretty middle-of-the-road game.

I agree with Brad's sentiments, the poetic dialogue idea is sound but the implementation is lacking. Entertaining watching Brad play, as always. Thanks chaps!

What, even the console versions force you to put up with Uplay? Uggghhh.

I was interested in this, but I guess I'll be giving it a miss now. What a shame.

Would absolutely love to see this on the Vita. Seems like a great after work/low key/wind down RPG.

I beat this yesterday, but I'll watch this. The rhyming in the game wasn't always bad, just forced at times. It's something I could have done without, which could have made the characters more relatable and likable. As for difficulty, I too played it on normal, and felt as I went through it, it would be a good game for RPG beginners, or people that just don't like RPG battle systems. I didn't even die once.

It is. I bought it on my PS3, but downloaded and played it on my PS4. So, you should be fine.

jesus christ @brad

So this is the much hyped Child Of Light, eh? Gotta say, I'm not impressed by this one. Pretty for sure, but not looking to fun to me.

Does make me want a new Grandia though...

I like how they talk about the skill tree snaking and curving around visually while still being completely linear in actuality, then call it more simplistic than FFX's sphere grid when that's literally exactly what the sphere grid did too. So funny how many people continue to fall for that, what a brilliant move by Square.

I'm with you, but the Sphere Grid did offer the possibility to branching off early with those gate nodes and teleport spheres. It made no sense to do so, and you were far better off going down a character's entire line then heading into another character's grid, but it was possible.

That said, a better comparison might be the License Grid from 12, where at least there was no clear path to the skill progression.

As a fellow English major, I had no real problem with the verse. Maybe I had a more well-rounded education in poetry, I dunno. The entire game in the same meter would have made for much worse rhymes, trying to shoehorn everything into it. Looks neat and seems to play good, but do I spring for this or Transistor first?

wow I had seen the name of the game pass around, but had no idea it was a turn based rpg, might try it out after all.