I work at an EB Games in Canada and (for literally the first time in my time there) I played a game in advance of release. A Sony rep came around with the demo they're been showing to press for a while. This one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOHTJiRQB9o
I quite enjoyed it. Normally I'm not one to rag on people that work at gaming sites but I had watched an IGN guy play the demo and he seemed to really be having problems getting a bead on moving enemies. I was worried that the aiming and shooting feel/turning speed/arc might feel off. It's never been the strong suit of Sony published games I find and this is the first shooter from the studio. Turns out the IGN guy is straight garbage at shooters. That whole element felt great. I was able to pull off shots I wanted to without issue and I didn't feel like there was an over abundance of auto aim.
It looks fucking good. I was playing on a very small demo TV and maybe small blemishes will be visible on bigger sets but it looked amazing. Even things like eye and cloth movement looked great. 'nuff said.
You honestly can't tell when a cutscene ends. It just results in moments where you're thinking to yourself, "I feel like he would have done something by no- oh wait." which isn't exactly good for immersion in a sense. But it's still pretty impressive. It also lead to moments where you really do feel like your controller input is just triggering the next few steps of the animation (see the opening cave sequence of Tomb Raider and certain moments of Uncharted 3) which is a little disappointing when you become aware of it. It's like you're gently prodding a movie to continue playing instead of actually having agency with your input in the scene. It was in controlled moments so I don't think it will get too bad but it threw me off a little.
The controls overall were good. The cover is a little too sticky and there aren't as many contextual movement commands and in something like Gears. eg, in Gears you can push forward and X to move out of cover heading forward already in a run or you can push to the side and X to move quickly to the next piece of cover. Here only the latter exists so moving from cover forward, running, into cover is far more inputs than it needs to be and feels kinda clunky. It was an irritation that seems like a silly oversight but it was one I adapted to pretty handily over my 20 minutes or so with the game.
Overall I was pretty happy with it. I AM a person satisfied with a fun, single player game. Even one as simple a a cover shooter, proving I find the fiction interesting and the story at least half interesting. It really strikes me as a game like Gears of War, maybe a little more 'cinematic' in the hand-holdy sense. I'm not nuts about that but providing the overall narrative thrust is strong and the gameplay stays fun I kinda won't give a shit.
Respectfully,
my 2 cents,
also happy to answer questions.
Log in to comment