Whoa... I just go to a meeting for a few hours and look what happens... Not even the Batman review caused something like this. I'd like to say a few things:
1)It seems some readers still do not get that I'm reviewing ONLY the story, not the game itself. Personally I think MW2 is a great game. But that's besides the point. You would think writing this on top of the page in huge bold letter would clear things up. I guess I am too naive then...
Another point which comes up a lot is that the game is a whole, the story is not important and should never be reviewed. Personally I think the story is important. I think every game tells a story. That's why I am mainly making research on and writing stuff about interactive storytelling. That's what I do for a living. Following the sandwich metaphor... sure the sandwich is a whole. But you can see me as a pickle expert. I know a lot of things about pickles and for those who care about pickles I review the quality of the pickle in detail. If you want the review of the whole sandwich, I believe there should be a huge button up there somewhere which says REVIEWS. There are a lot of really good game critics running this site. I'm sure they'd do better than me.
2) @Red12b: Bioshock 2 eh. I was really disappointed by Bioshock in general so I did not feel the need to get the next one at once. I was thinking like, "okay I'll get it when I have time..." I may get around to that later. What are your opinions? Should I review it?
3)@Michael: Owl of Minerva sums up what I meant in the review. Of course there are reasons for all the things happening in the game. But do you really think Russia would invade the US because of a terrorist attack on an airport? I mean... Isn't that too fast? Sure the defense grid is down but is that america's only defense really? What happened to good old eyeballs? WW II didn't have a hi tech def grid... My point is that hiding such a massive assault would be incredibly hard, and doubly so in a peaceful world. How did that happen.
Sure Ramirez serves as a conduit for showing you how it would look if the US was actually invaded. But mechanically it contributes nothing to the story. Maybe if Ramirez died in the end my opinion on this would be different. But I still think the whole arc was a waste of time.
4)Here's what I also get a lot: "This is a video game. What did you expect? For a video game the story is quite good. If you want a story go play MGS4. "
This is a video game which is telling a story. So it's a vessel for a story. If you don't aim to tell a good story why would you bother with a story at all? I agree very few video games have good stories. But is comparing video game stories to other video game stories a good method to make things better? I don't think so.
And for the record: I think I should review Metal Gear Solid 4 at one point. Although that would make people hate me even more. Seriously... If I had to construct a gallery of all things that should not be done while telling a story, most of that gallery will feature parts of different Metal Gear Solid games. So yeah... if you want a good story in a video game I recommend NOT to go and play MGS4
Finally... Thanks for all he kind words of those people who read me. I'll try keeping up with a normal schedule and not review stuff every six months. Hopefully the Uncharted 2 review will come much sooner.
dreamkin's forum posts
SPOILER WARNING: The following text may contain spoilers for the people who have not finished the game in question yet. Reviewing the story sometimes makes such things inevitable.
Idea:
Back in the era of cold war, World War III was a very popular idea. I still remember all the statistics claiming that the two super powers had enough nuclear weapons to destroy the entire world several times over. Even the most sensible person was afraid, thinking that the fate of the entire planet depended on a simple red button and the finger which would accidentally press it. So we also had theories about a third world war fought with conventional weapons.
While the cold war is long gone, it is still a potent idea. It could be said that the first Modern Warfare game was suffering from a distinct lack of a world war. Instead of open warfare it focused more on secret operations and rightly so. For the second game in the series the guys at Infinity Ward see it fit to start an all out war between Russia and the US. Although I find it an old and tired idea in this age the whole thing is tied to terrorism to make it relevant today. The fact that a huge war may start because of a simple misunderstanding and a conspiracy and there could be people who would profit from this is a strong idea. Yet we already had several games exploring this and "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" adds nothing significant.
Rating: 1 out of 2
Setting:
The setting of the original Modern Warfare game was balanced on the edge of a knife. It was realistic just enough to be fun. We knew that the events taking place in the story were quite improbable but they still remained mostly in the realm of the plausible. Infinity ward resigns to the idea of "bigger and louder" for the sequel and turns the story from a Tom Clancy novel to a Michael Bay movie.
Physics defying stunts were also part of the previous chapter in this story, but what drives this contemporary near future setting over the edge is how key characters in it behave irrationally giving shape to it. Everything in this world is on overdrive, every picture is painted with huge gestures. Partly responsible for this is the abysmal characters and the nearly non-existent plot structure but when everything happens in such an overstated fashion events lose their impact. Things like this make sense in a setting like Warhammer 40000, but Modern Warfare wasn't a story which needed this. At this level of illogic it does not serve the story anymore.
Rating: 0 out of 2
Characters
As it is with the first part of the story and indeed with all games in the "Call of Duty" series, "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" juggles several protagonists or rather several points of view and playable characters complicating the story by the folly of using first person point of view and mute people.
There is a confusion about who the protagonist in this story is. In the first game Soap emerged as the de facto hero by the process of elimination. In"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" the main protagonist seems to be Roach based solely on his screen-time and his direct relationship with Soap. Although it can also be argued that Soap is the overall protagonist of the whole series since when all is said and done he still has the last word. The other character we spend most time with is James Ramirez, a featureless, uninteresting rank and file soldier whose story arc despite being epic ends up as entirely pointless. Things are blurry...
The reason for the blurriness is the cardboard cut nature of all the characters. All these people are essentially nobodies; disembodied hands holding guns. The military nature of the story seems to take care of all the problems of motivation but it actually fails to do so especially considering most of the main characters go rogue at one point in the story of "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2". The first game could be seen as a prelude to a more complex story but by the time we come to Modern Warfare 2, the audience wants to know more about the protagonist. Who is Soap? Why did he join SAS? What drives him? What motivates him to do all these incredible feats of courage and heroism? What's his issue? Does he have a family? A kid? A wife? If no, why not? This is a guy who manages to cheat death several times, still managing to kill the antagonist. And yet except for him being probably Scottish we do not know anything about him. The question is, why should the audience care? The same holds true for all the characters on the protagonist side. Only Price shows tiny clues of having a genuine personality but those sparks are so tiny they are nearly invisible.
The antagonists do not fare better. In a good story the motivations of the antagonist is always thought provoking. "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" takes the motivation of "General Hummel" in "The Rock" and gets it entirely wrong. Sheperd, the main protagonist revealed by a plot twist is little more than a madman. Hummel never intended to launch the missiles. He just wanted the government to pay for and recognize the deeds of all the forgotten soldiers. For similar reasons what Sheperd does is starting World War III. This is so absurd and over the top, that it can only be attributed to his mental instability. And "yes it does not make much sense but he's insane" is not really good storytelling.
As for Makarov, I can't decide if shooting an airport full of his own people or starting World War III instantly because of a terrorist act is more insane... which brings us to our next point of interest...
Characters: 0 out of 2
Plot Structure:
...or the lack of it.
"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" is essentially a bunch of grandiose action set pieces held together by a very thin string of plot. You often get the feeling that they first designed the scenes and wrote the plot between the scenes to make sense of the progression. Which was probably the case here... It feels like a McG movie which takes itself seriously. And no one likes such a thing...
In the previous title the greatest strength of the story was that the developers felt comfortable cutting to the point of view of several different characters. This eliminated the idle walking sections of traditional shooters and kept the pacing up. We see the same structure here. The problem then is the sheer size of the events. In "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" events are so big that they require a reasonable period of build up. However the game doesn't have time for that. It's a shooter and it wants to do what it was designed for. As a result, instead of a proper story building up the major events in a logical fashion we get a few words quickly explaining what is happening and why, and then saying go go go go and dumping you into the action.
Often things progress too quickly and with too few reasons. It's more of a spectacle than a proper story. As a result, the audience quickly stops caring about the story completely. The lack of interesting characters doesn't help.
How come the terrorists in the original story now rule Russia? When and how exactly did that happen? Is an overseas occupation of the US the best way to conduct warfare? Where is the preliminary air assault? Exactly how is this occupation a surprise to the US government? What in the world are the CIA and the NSA doing?
A few terrorists shoot people in an airport... (again never mind the problem about them getting into that airport with large automatic weapons they could not have possibly concealed) One dead guy happens to be a CIA agent. So Russia declares war... Does this really make any sense? Why would CIA do something like that? Why would Russia risk war? And if the Russian government is simply insane, why do they need the airport thing in the first place? They could have simply said "You know what we should do? We should invade the US!!"
There are two main loosely connected story arcs. Roach and Soap's storyline seem to be the main one. Ramirez is the victim of an entirely pointless plot development. He has absolutely no effect on what happens. Soap doesn't fare much better. In the end you will find yourself saying... "Huh.. and?" But you won't get any answers.
Ironically the airport scene criticized by many people as being there only for the sake of causing controversy turns out to be the best piece of interactive storytelling in this whole mess. You may not shoot anyone as a good guy but in the end you will get shot yourself. That would be a very dramatic and ironic moment in which you will feel helpless and betrayed. Then again you may choose to shoot every innocent in sight too. In the end you will get shot anyway, and the war would have started because of an asshole who's dead anyway, so what's the point? You could start shooting people and then have mercy and stop... etc. It's a small but powerful character moment modifying the story in a small way. Sadly it doesn't have any impact on the general storyline. Which needs any impact desperately.
Rating: 0 out of 2
Crafstmanship:
"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" is competently written but you won't find anything memorable other than the excellent soundtrack by Lorn Balfe and Hans Zimmer. There is a theme you could hum to yourself but frankly Zimmer had written better stuff in the past.
Jesse Stern seems like he wants to write better stuff but probably the plot which urgently wants to get from one action scene to the other gets in the way. Still there is no subtext, no interesting moments or quote worthy one liners. The writing just works in a way that you won't hate it. By comparison Gears of War had an empty storyline and flat characters too but the writing made you want to care about those characters. "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" lacks that kind of authorship. But then again it never sinks to the depths of Japanese action adventures either. At least that's a relief.
Rating: 1 out of 2
OVERALL: 2 out of 10
(0-3= BAD, 4-6= AVERAGE, 7-10= GOOD)
Already Reviewed: "Infamous", "Batman: Arkham Asylum", "Wet", "Planescape: Torment"
NEXT REVIEW: "Uncharted 2: Among Thieves"
Your opinion on gameplay will depend on your opinion on the gameplay of earlier Bioware titles like Baldur's Gate. Torment plays much like them. So if you played and like Baldur's Gate, chances are you'll play and like Torment too. It even removes some stupid stuff like waypoints and adds running.
That being said... Compared to Baldur's Gate series there are fewer quests and fewer items to collect. There is a LOT of text to read. And even though the close up camera helps with the story it doesn't help with ranged combat. Not that you'll find any ranged weapons in this game... (except Nordom's weapon), which adds another problem.
I'd say the gameplay is dated and had problems even at the date it was released.
If Steam would release this as a $ 5-10 budget title I'd buy it though.
http://www.bootstrike.com/Torment/Online/torment_vista.html
Here is a helpful article about possible issues. If you own the game legally you can also download several mods made by fans to make the game run on modern operating systems.. Hope you can run it.
SPOILER WARNING: The following text may contain spoilers for the people who have not finished the game in question yet. Reviewing the story sometimes makes such things inevitable.
Idea:
The hero is not trying to save the world, the city, the princess or any such thing. He is not trying to kill the evil overlord. He is not even trying to save himself. In fact it's the opposite. When you get right down to it, our hero, who really isn't a hero at all, is trying to die. Dying, being a rare feat he's unable to accomplish. And this is the potent general idea behind " Planescape: Torment". Everything is upside down. From the first moment to the last, the main goal here is challenging and destroying expectations. A hero who's trying to die. A city which is everywhere yet nowhere. A brothel of intellectual pleasures. And a whole lot of abstract ideas given physical form. It's the physical manifestation of one man's inner struggle and while such a topic is a bit outside the general tastes of the usual video game audience, " Planescape: Torment" uses this basic idea and carefully turns it into an RPG without ever losing sight of the goal. Even without the Planescape license, it's still a great idea, powerful enough to stand on its own in any medium.
Rating: 2 out of 2
Setting:
During the second half of the 90's, Dungeons & Dragons, the original RPG, was losing steam. Thanks partly to White Wolf Inc. the market was flooded with the so called "mature RPGs" designed for tweens rather than teens. These games down played the role of action and focused on character interactions. Consequently, TSR, the company behind Dungeons & Dragons, tried to release their own "mature RPG for tweens" in form of Planescape. It was supposed to be a D&D campaign setting for the "grown-ups". Saying that they overshot their goal would be the understatement of that decade.
The problem was the over-maturity. By taking the silly and simple concepts of D&D and treating them as meaningful metaphors of a cosmology which actually is trying to say something and/or forces the player to ask fundamental questions such as "what is the meaning of life, what exists and what doesn't" they have basically required that the players should be part time philosophers. As a role playing setting it is barely functional. As a setting for fantasy fiction it's one of the best.
" Planescape: Torment", uses this setting as settings are intended to be used. Writer Chris Avellone obviously has something to say and instead of using a setting as simply a cool backdrop, he leverages the full potential of Planescape to tell his story more impressively.
The story mostly take place in Sigil. A surreal city which is in the middle of an infinite multiverse. You immediately ask yourself: "How can something be in the middle of infinity?" You're right to ask this questions and many more. " Planescape: Torment", carefully replicates the alien visual style of Sigil as it is mostly envisioned by Tony Di Terlizzi. And as a setting Sigil is a fantasy fiction writer's wet dream. It's a piece of solid ground between possibilities, a place where you can get physically attacked by a concept, a gateway and an inn between solid and the abstract. This is a land where if you can convince someone into believing that he does not exist, he actually ceases to exist.
In " Planescape: Torment" particularly, you will feel that the setting itself is a character, judging the protagonist's actions. This is more justified in this story than any other, especially considering the fact that the city is ruled by an omnipresent being called Lady of Pain a name more than fit for someone who rules a place which serves as purgatory for our protagonist.
Rating: 2 out of 2
Characters:
Research shows that more than 90% of stories on any medium today are in fact of the dramatic type. (or shakespearean stories. depending on the terminology you prefer) It is no secret that such a story is built on characters and the conflicts between those. Therefore any story arguably is as good as its characters. Exactly this is probably the area " Planescape: Torment" excels in.
That being said, it has to be mentioned that there is a distinct lack of a real antagonist. Of course this is closely connected to the fact that the protagonist, Nameless One, is actually the antagonist of himself. He is practically fighting against his own crimes and sins. By uncovering the secret to his own identity, he also uncovers the physical and emotional destruction he caused in the past, shattering not only lives but also entire civilizations in his selfish pursuit of power. It is a cycle which he cannot break. Regardless of how many times he dies, he's resurrected for an unknown reason, each time with a different personality, yet each time he wreaks even more havoc. The player can play him as an evil man or a golden hearted angel, but that is largely irrelevant. What's done is done, and now it's the consequences coming back to haunt him even beyond death.
Arguably even more interesting than the main character are the supporting cast of the story. You have a guy who comes from a land made of abstract chaos given by the structured thoughts of its inhabitants. He's an outcast... Why? Because he questions. And his questioning literally breaks the walls of the city, threatening the very existence of his people. There is a succubus who has fallen from the grace of Hell because she has forsaken the pleasures of flesh for more intellectual pursuits. There is a mage who is obsessed with fire so much that he turns into fire, a warrior whose dedication to a cause is so strong that he doesn't realize he's already dead, a cheerful skull who is very friendly but then turns out to be the very personification of betrayal, a half demon, half human girl with an actual tail for men to chase and a walking TV set from a dimension made entirely of order... yet he's a rebel. Each of these characters not only has intriguing connections to Nameless One but they are also each so interesting that it would have been possible to base an entire game on just one of them.
Even those characters who are actually not your party members are interesting. Besides major characters like Mebbeth the old woman and Trias the Deva you'll meet a guy who's a letter in the divine alphabet, an ultimate warrior who gets bullied by thieves, a girl with a mechanical heart who's searching for the key to her own heart, an street who's giving birth to an alley and many many more...
In short it's all brilliant from start to finish.
Rating: 2 out of 2
Plot Structure:
" Planescape: Torment" starts with a classic video game mystery. We have the amnesiac protagonist who's not really sure of what's going on. Amnesia is very popular in video games for a similar reason the "Mute Protagonist" is. It gives you a blank slate the player can fill. " Planescape: Torment" does something else entirely. Instead of trying to identify the player with the protagonist it actually uses amnesia as a plot device. It is elemental in the general structure and also provides the first motivation for our hero: Figuring out what the hell is going on.
The reason this is not a hero quest becomes apparent when we discover who Nameless One is. This is not a hero quest, this was a hero quest, a quest which ended as a tragedy. The villain has won, the hero has lost, " Planescape: Torment" is the aftermath.
It is safe to say that " Planescape: Torment" is probably the only video game which lets you play as a villain in a way which is not ridiculous or comical. Sure there is stuff like "Overlord", "Dungeon Keeper" or "Evil Genius" but these are all over the top in terms of story. " Planescape: Torment" on the other hand is quite serious about what really happens to a godlike villain in a fantasy setting.
That's not to say " Planescape: Torment" is devoid of any humour. But even its humour is subtle, clever and quite different than the usually slapstick style of other similar productions. There is a distinct lack of swords for instance and at one point you can enter a classic D&D dungeon complete with a boss in the middle. By itself this may not sound funny but that's the way " Planescape: Torment" critics the genre by presenting a classic dungeon as a stupid experiment conducted by creatures bound by nothing but laws and rules.
The real triumph of " Planescape: Torment" though, is the fact that it uses the video game mechanics as a storytelling device. Nameless One cannot die. That means each time you "fail" instead of getting a "game over" screen or loading a save file or starting over and accepting these things as necessary evils of the medium " Planescape: Torment" turns it all into an organic component of the story. You don't fail, you just start over. Every time you fail you just start with another tragic cycle. It doesn't matter if you're playing the game for the first or tenth time. You may not know anything about the story but don't worry. Nameless One forgets everything too. It's all part of the vicious cycle he is stuck in.
Much like most video game stories " Planescape: Torment" eventually confronts the audience with more than a few plot twists too. These twists too are expertly executed, in that they are all foreshadowed and plausible, which is no simple feat considering that the story takes place in a setting which makes practically everything possible.
From the first motivation of finding Nameless One's lost journals the last confrontation with what is essentially himself, this story about discovering one's nature and then finding out what can change that nature is up there with the best fantasy fiction and quite possibly without equal in its own medium.
Rating: 2 out of 2
Craftsmanship:
" Planescape: Torment" uses a modified version of the famous Infinity Engine which powered games like Baldur's Gate 2 and Icewind Dale. The interface obviously wasn't designed for storytelling purposes. Still Chris Avellone and his team does their best with it. Visually it's a feast as far as the technology allows. Tony Di Terlizzi's vision for Planescape is captured perfectly. Each and every location is crafted with care. The fact that the engine is not up to the standards of the story means you'll have to read a lot of text. Normally that's not a positive in a mostly visual medium. But the text that's present is written with so much care that it's impossible to badmouth " Planescape: Torment" for that deficiency.
Simply put the craftsmanship here is top notch. It's almost as if every single texture and every single word is placed in its position with care. Combined with the amazing soundtrack which somehow does manage to have a theme for every single character and still manages to be weird but consistent in this extremely out of this world setting, " Planescape: Torment" is turned into an experience you won't easily be able to forget.
Rating: 2 out of 2
OVERALL: 10 out of 10
(0-3= BAD, 4-6= AVERAGE, 7-10= GOOD)
Already Reviewed: "Infamous", "Batman: Arkham Asylum", "Wet"
NEXT WEEK: "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2"
WARNING: This review is only concerned with the story of a game. Even though the story is an important part of a game, by no means is it the defining component. A game with a horrible story may very well be one of the best games ever produced. It's just that my reviews are not about that.
SPOILER WARNING: The following text may contain spoilers for the people who have not finished the game in question yet. Reviewing the story sometimes makes such things inevitable.
Idea:
"Wet" is all about mixing crazy Hong Kong movie action with 70's exploitation cinema. While this presents the developers a lot of opportunities for storytelling and stylistic purposes, there isn't really anything terribly original here. The writers obviously did not delve deep into the films of the era they are trying so hard to mimic. So in theory the idea is good. If only it was in better hands...
Rating: 1 out of 2
Setting:
An otherwise pretty contemporary setting gets partly interesting for being free of the usual constraints of the laws of physics. This is your usual video game universe where people never suffer any injuries if they consciously jump from great heights, slow motion saves you from bullets and chainsaws are actually better melee weapons than swords.
There is no constant location here. True to form, this is a location hopping adventure. Rubi literally travels around the world. You will visit, Texas, Hong Kong and London. The problem is that none of these places have a distinctive look to themselves. The world in "Wet" usually consists of hallways and warehouses. The setting is neither interesting nor pretty to look at and it doesn't help the story at all.
Rating: 0 out of 2
Characters:
Like my review of characters in "Batman: Arkham Asylum", this is a tough one too. In theory things are great. "Wet" has a lot of interesting, larger than life characters like "Batman: Arkham Asylum" does. And they all have a pretty detailed background written for them. Especially on the visual side of things, it's clear that a lot of care went into creating these characters. Rubi's outfit is carefully constructed to be both utilitarian and sexy at the same time, but the sexiness is subtly male instead of pure female. For all intents and purposes we can say Rubi is a man in the body of a woman. Many of the character designs are so interesting that my research partner Dr. Gülin Terek Ünal, was especially interested in them and took her time to examine every single aspect of their clothing and accessories. Pelham, Tarantula, Ze Kollektor and even Dr. Afro are all interesting characters living in a 70s comic book version of our modern world.
The problem though is that there are simply an awful lot of them compared to the relatively short run-time of the story itself. So many of them have literally a few seconds of screen time. Some of them, like The Torturer, die right after they are introduced. It's a funny detail that the life of some mobs in this game last more than quite a lot of supposedly major characters.
Side characters in a story are there to challenge the protagonist in different ways to invoke different character traits in her, so that we can get to know her and she can evolve. But the number of characters in this story make it very hard for any side character to be involved in the proceedings in a meaningful way. Consequently Rubi's interactions with them are very limited. Combine that with horribly uninteresting dialog and at the end of the day you will realize that the wonderful visual style of the characters is gone down the drain and you don't care about any of the characters at all.
Sure, Pelham is evil, but you don't hate him enough because you don't exactly get his motivation for doing that thing he did. Was it a threat directed towards William Ackers, was it payback or was he trying to frame Rubi? Why should I be surprised or impressed upon witnessing Zhi's betrayal when he isn't even established as a likable character I know or care about. Why should I be sad when the terribly generic Ming dies? You could have replaced him with a simple computer screen giving info. (minus the accent).
In fact the characters are so forgettable that I am struggling to remember their names even though the names are printed on screen with giant letters.
Rating: 0 out of 2
Plot Structure:
This is a fairly generic revenge story with no interesting plot development at all. Rubi is a "fixer" who does not really need any reason but money to do whatever she does. She is double crossed and fooled. She then gets angry and kills everyone on her path. And that's pretty much about it. In spirit of fairness though, this isn't any less than what was expected from the movies "Wet"s trying to mimic. Plot, here, is just an excuse for steering the characters to the next action set piece, and a very weak one at that.
On the plus side you have some nice plot twists thrown into the mix. The main mystery here is the reason why Ackers wants to save his son and then kills him. The fact that Ackers isn't Ackers makes some sense. But it also proves how dumb Rubi actually is for not checking out who she's working for exactly.
In general the plot follows a pattern. Rubi does some job. Things go wrong. Rubi needs info. Rubi finds info. Rubi does the next job. Redo from start. Insert combat between these sentences and you have the plot structure of "Wet". It never pauses to develop character relations or conflicts. It has no tolerance for scenes in which you can breathe. Consequently this action roller-coaster turns into an action free fall. Action saturation makes you care less for the plot.
Some obvious opportunities for developing the plot are missed. There is obvious potential for a love affair between Trevor and Rubi for instance. Imagine the impact Trevor's death would have if he and Rubi were romantically involved a few years ago. Imagine Rubi's anger. Imagine how the final relationship between William Ackers and Rubi would be. And this is only one of the many missed opportunities here.
The plot here is simply not personal enough for us to care. It almost feels like there were previous episodes of Rubi's adventures and we have missed them. This would have been okay in this genre but "Wet" doesn't feel like a good Rubi story.
Rating: 1 out of 2
Craftsmanship:
Again in theory "Wet"s central idea is a great opportunity for the developers run wild with their craftsmanship. In practice it feels rushed and centered too much around the meta aspect of things. They went you to feel like you're in a movie theatre. There is a grainy filter, visible flickering of the projector, commercial breaks and a great licensed sound track. The occasional red filter is done well too.
The problem with these ideas is that they are not always utilized correctly. Commercial breaks are not between acts and come off as random. Transitions are awkward. Red filtered scenes feel interesting for the first few times but afterwards you get tired of them. There are no other filters and even though it sounds like a nice idea to use the filter in a car chase scene, "Wet" uses it in the wrong car chase scene. You get to see a red haze in a spectacular scene which makes you want to see it in all its explosive glory.
"Wet", also fails in writing department. This kind of story requires a lot of impressive one liners, punchlines and long dramatic speeches following the action. "Wet" fails in all of these areas and fails to use other attributes of the movies it's trying to mimic. The dialog is simply forgettable.
Rating: 0 out of 2
OVERALL: 2 out of 10
(0-3= BAD, 4-6= AVERAGE, 7-10= GOOD)
Already Reviewed: "Infamous", "Batman: Arkham Asylum"
NEXT WEEK: Retro Review "Planescape: Torment"
It seems like we're talking on entirely different levels, using different axioms and relying on different things we consider as facts. It is very hard to communicate in such cases.
Just because many video games have bad stories doesn't mean the story doesn't matter.
For reference you can make research into the history of movies. The first real blockbuster movie was about a running horse. It was just... running. And that was it. Hardly a great story isn't it? Yet look what movies can do today.
Stories are stories. The medium is the language. Be it a song, a movie, a novel, a ritual or kindergarden play... They are all stories told in different mediums, different languages if you will. There is no reason why a Batman Animated Cartoon can't be as good as William Shakespeare's Tempest.
We simply have different views of life.
Everyone is entitled to that.
I think this is the final thing I'll say about this topic.
" Yeah, you're review was good. The story doesn't need to be great for a game to be good. There doesn't even need to be a story beyond Joker is a bad guy and so are the majority of people in AA, take em down. But I do believe the characters should have at least got a 1. They acted exactly how I wanted them to act. But I guess that would be my review and not yours. Nice work. "The score for the characters was 1 for a long while. So my review was about to be your review. :P It's just that I felt at some points Batman was behaving out of character. Still if I review it again today I might give it 1. I don't know.
Thanks for your nice words.
This is turning into a one on one discussion. Maybe we should continue this in Private Message form if you wish. Anyway. To answer your obvious and/or implied questions:
1)I don't even start writing story reviews before I finish the game. For games with multiple endings (like Infamous) I finish them multiple times to get all the endings. So don't worry. You can ask questions freely. There won't be any spoilers.
2)Yes I have hunted down almost all the tape recordings and listened to all I have hunted down. Most of the tapes didn't tell me anything I didn't already know though. (I've been reading Batman a lot when I was young, these days I barely have time anymore) I know who Harley Quinn is. I know who Joker is. And I never said anything about missing back stories.
Even if we ignore the fact that the tapes are optional extras and as such not organic components of the story itself, the tapes themselves tell you very little about what these characters are doing in THIS story.
As for the motivations... There is a difference between means and ends. Yes, Joker is trying to get the Titan formula. But when you get right down to it... why really? Why was the doctor really working for Joker? Why does Joker even need super soldiers like bane?
As you can see I never questioned why Poison Ivy was there. It's the Arkham Asylum. All sorts of freaks are there.
Of course there is a plot here. How else could I have reviewed it? It's just that it's not a good one. Much better stories have been written and some of those were Batman stories too.
and finally
3)At the end of the day this is just my opinion. You may find the story wonderful. To which I can only say: Good for you. I wish I could enjoy this story as much as you apparently did. My loss, really... :)
Except for the fact that I am not reviewing the game." I know however, you shouldn't take away points because you made the story such an important part of your review process. Giving batman arkham asylum only 6/10 is irresponsible and not a good system of reviewing a game. "
The story isn't "such an important part" of my review process. My review process is ALL about the story. I am not giving Arkham Asylum a 6/10. I am giving its story a 6/10 just like a gave Infamous' story a 4/10 last week.
Of course this is not a good system of reviewing the game. This is actually a horrible system of reviewing the game. Or rather it would be. If I was actually reviewing the game. Which I am not...
I hope this time it's clear. :)
Still thanks for pointing out the need to revise the warning text to make them more clear.
Log in to comment