Not again. It's way too early to be writing the same blog again. Hell, it was just last week; shouldn't there be more time between blogs so eerily similar?.....Allow me to explain. Remember how I criticized Gears 3 for having no sense of risk and a cast whose emotions range from "angry" to "ANGRY"? Replace the words "Gears 3" with "Dead Island: Riptide", and you have this review in a nutshell.
I'd say that the only difference is that Gears 3 integrates itself better into its own franchise better than this, but there are actually several differences between these games and that's a shitty difference. Anyway, it's been one second since the end of the first Dead Island game (which the game helpfully recaps as soon as you jump in) when all the characters are forced back onto the islands they spent 20-30 hours trying to escape. Now they have to do just that again, something I don't have too much of a problem with. Cheap narrative tools and potential pacing/focus issues aside, the plot goes in some mildly interesting directions regarding the protagonists' immunity to the virus and their constantly being fucking angry.
Actually, scratch that. I'm not so much a fan of that last one. Everybody's a raging asshole, and not in the fun "burning rectums set a zombie island aflame" manner (missed the chance to work "Riptide" into the game, there, Techland Random Letters), but more in a "I wish they'd all die in a sea of flames" manner. This much is evident from the very beginning of the game, with the narrator being overly casual about the zombie apocalypse and overly aggressive about every other little thing. Sadly, it doesn't get any better as time goes on; the plot-important NPCs all come to the conclusion that those immune to the virus should be locked away in special camps, and the protagonists (who happen to be immune) counter that argument by being really pissed off at everything all the time. And as I mentioned before, rather than trying to make the characters more likable, the writers simply turn their anger into a plot point, which is a lot like fixing a broken rib cage with a dab of ointment. It does nothing to make the characters more endearing, which is something a game like this desperately needs. If I don't give two shits about the characters I'm controlling, what's supposed to keep me playing the game?
This probably explains why I simply blasted through the story, something I clearly shouldn't have done. The story quests are repetitive (either "venture out and grab this thing for us" or the occasional "defend this area from zombie hordes"), the default options literally tell you where to go to complete quests (as in "here's the line you need to follow"), and about halfway through, the game simply rushes you through the damn things, like it's as fed up with them as I am. Instead, the main focus of Riptide is in exploring the vast world that is Banoi Island, which is an odd choice when you realize how the game never makes a strong enough case for why I should be doing this. In theory, there are tons of sidequests that should get the ball rolling on that exploration aspect, but putting the vast majority of them in the hub du jour defeats the purpose, doesn't it? Why should I bother actually setting foot outside the camp if I never really need to do so to initiate anything? The only non-hub quests that I can remember stumbling into were rescuing some helpless fool from the zombie hordes and....no, that's pretty much it. Not much in the way of variety, and given the last paragraph about how abrasive the characters are, I don't think the idea held much water in the first place. What other reasons are there to explore this zombified hellhole?
Material rewards? Like better weapons and stuff? That's only relevant after the fact, isn't it? Combat? OK, yea, I can see an argument for that. There's a wide variety of weapons and approaches to combat to fuck around with, and they're all different enough that you have good motivation to try each one out. For the record, I chose the cutlery because that's what was on my original Dead Island save and I'm unbelievably lazy. But if given the choice fresh, I still would've gone with the slicing weapons, but not because of the actual slicing. You can only really slice off arms, thus significantly weakening the tactical element that acts as the appeal behind choosing what to slice off in the first place. Not to worry, though; the act of actually slicing through those arms is still redeemable. There's something very rhythmic and appealing about the act of bashing a zombie in the shoulder and then jumping back before they have the opportunity to bite your face off, like a delicate dance. Pump up the Tchaikovsky, and not just because of the shitty rap music. And that's just with a single theoretical zombie. So what happens when it's a billion actual zombies instead of just the one that's almost never real?
Absolutely goddamn nothing. And so we come to the main problem plaguing Dead Island: Riptide: absolutely no sense of risk or consequence. Oh, sure, there are always a billion zombies hiding in the shadows, just waiting to kill you, and yea, you're going to die a lot, but that death doesn't mean shit. Again, the beginning of the game is a very good example. You're on a boat where the captain's gone zombie Ahab on you and is at severe risk of crashing the ship into the white....actually, I'm not quite sure why I made the Moby Dick joke. Anyway, the ships about to crash and you have to stop it from crashing. Or at least that's what the various characters tell you. In terms of gameplay, you have all the time in the world to clumsily bash the captain's skull in, because there are no circumstances under which that vessel will sink. Should you die, you only get a few bucks taken away and have to sit things out for five seconds.
And the entire game is like this, even though these punishments are completely meaningless in this game. Time-outs are obvious, since they don't impede your progress at all, but the money penalty is gonna need some more explanation. First off, the actual deductions are pitiful. At around $2000, I only got $19 of that taken away. I'd make a joke here if that wasn't so horribly depressing. But even if that number was higher, I still don't think it would mean anything. How is taking away money a punishment in a game where I don't need money for most of the experience. Most of my arsenal was made up of weapons I scavenged from the environment. While this is good for the atmosphere, notice how money never enters that equation. Sure, you can use that money to repair those weapons (not even with other people or supplies; just throw the money at a weapon until it remembers how to do damage), but again: the game's pretty much handing you most of your weapons, anyway. Being able to repair them is more a convenience than a necessity.
So with death meaning nothing, what value does the gameplay have? Without an option for failure, there's not much of a sense of accomplishment, either. And it's not like you can salvage much narrative value from this situation, either (although I'm not sure why anybody thought that would even be an option). You being an immortal super-god, the zombies cease being a threat and simply transform into six-foot tall houseflies you periodically swat. They're more an annoyance than something to be scared of. I have to imagine this is even worse when you have three other people helping you slash up zombies, as the game rather forcefully recommends. So with all this going against the games, on what grounds can I recommend it?......Aussie girls killing you with magical chainsaws?
Review Synopsis
- I have to imagine that the characters in this game would be just as hard to root for if the title was "Perfectly Normal Island".
- Wait, how do zombies in this universe exist when there's no possible way for anybody to die?
- I will admit, though, that the combat systems are good. It's just that they're surrounded by so much that isn't.
Have you ever wanted to see Sonic the Hedgehog die a diabetes death? No? Well, somebody did, because this ROM hack exists.
Just when I thought I got the demons out of this blog. I'm not even going out of my way to play these demon-centric games. I decide to play a game and then later find out that there's a very large focus on unholy monsters. But unlike the other times this has happened, I'm willing to take full responsibility in this situation. After all, I should have known what I was getting with the word "Castlevania" slapped on the title: a Dracula that must be killed with some comprehensive castle coverage. Unsurprisingly, that's exactly what Aria of Sorrow is.
Only add a dollop of fucking insanity. The year is 203......5, and Japanese youth Soma Cruz is spending his day watching the solar eclipse. Then, he's in Dracula's castle. It makes absolutely no sense, and the explanation makes even less: Dracula's castle is inside the solar eclipse itself. Not the sun, mind you, but the solar eclipse somehow. Completely ignoring the fact that putting a vampire anywhere near the sun is a monumentally stupid idea on its own, why couldn't Soma just be visiting Europe and then stumble upon Castlevania? No idea. I'm aware that this is a minor thing to get worked up over, but it's not like the game offers me much else to comment on. Story development only happens sparingly, so most of the time that I'm exploring, my one thought on the story always returns to "Seriously? A solar eclipse castle?". And the story isn't good enough or bad enough to overpower this sentiment; just vampire pimps trying to revive Dracula and Soma following them out of the room after every cutscene for reasons I never quite grasped. It gets the job done of getting me through the castle, sure, but not the job of making me forget th-
OK, I'm gonna stop it there. This is way too negative; it's time to move onto something I actually like about Aria of Sorrow. Like the soul gathering system, for instance. Killing a specific type of enemy enough times may prevent them from moving on to the afterlife simply because you want to throw katanas. Of course, the most obvious use is simply to provide variety to the combat that's at least somewhat in need of it. It's not bad, but it is limiting, like how Soma refuses to move while attacking and for a short second after, or how you can't aim your attacks up because up and attack activates your katana-throwing abilities. My point is that you're going to enjoy this more because you're fighting laser skeletons with your own Dr. Octopus laser beams than any of the mechanics that make this possible. I, however, am going to enjoy the soul gathering whatevers because of the sense of unity it brings to the package. As you'd expect from what I just said, I'd normally skip a lot of the combat. But not with souls on the line. These things directly impact my ability to navigate the castle, and killing everything's really the only way to get those cool souls. So to get to the better parts of the game, ruthlessly murder I must.
Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed that I replaced their eyes with eagles. Those who haven't incurred my strange wrath might have noticed me ranking the exploration as the best part of the game. If I want to waste an entire day just fucking about in the castle, going wherever I damn please, I can do that. If, however, I wish to make some progress toward killing Solar Eclipse Dracula or whatever, then it turns out I've already been doing that the entire time. Aria of Sorrow was guiding me to my objectives the entire time and I simply had no idea until I'd stumbled upon something important. The soul catching side of things only complements this sense of freedom the game gives me by adding a sense of motivation. I mean, what other reasons would there be other than the sheer fun of it? Upgrades? Other than the souls, the only things you'll find are occasional pieces of equipment and no, that's really it. Visual va-OK, that's something Aria of Sorrow has in droves. Spacious watery catacombs. Libraries with huge axes in the background for reasons unexplained. Those confusing floating gardens. What more could you want? Sure, you don't get a lot of time to experience all this cool shit, but it's still rather amazing how Konami packed so much into so small a space.
Review Synopsis
- I still can't get over "Dracula lives in the solar eclipse" plot point. Ugh.
- The soul catching system helps, though.
- As does the huge castle I get to explore.
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