The Up Button Episode

[fishbang]

Your Friday Episode of IGC is now ready for download (http://ingamechat.net/audio/IGC20081031.mp3).

By the time of this posting, most anyone with the inclination to do so will have played the Mirror’s Edge demo on at least one of the consoles where it can be found. It’s probably safe to say that opinions will be divided - in some cases greatly. From the first viewing of the first teaser, Mirror’s Edge has been captivating and consternating, and it hasn’t stopped being either now that we’re collectively hands-on.

For my own part, I thought the demo was exhilarating, and I find myself rooting even more for the leaf-turning coalition within the Electronic Arts power base. But I’m also prepared for the inevitable community schism, something that’s sure to develop around a game whose qualities are so thoroughly subjective. Something that may well develop within our own studio.

[danielOut]

After playing the 360 demo, let me add that I was very impressed. I really enjoyed it.

However, the obviously-made-in-flash cutscene looks just like a fucking esurance commercial. WTF, dice? That's some sloppy shit.

[Psykoboy2]

I'm on the side of Daniel with this. I mean, I'm not as enraptured as fishbang is with this, but it's much better than what I sat down with at PAX. That tutorial really helps things, especially in the area of combat.

Regardless of anything, the demo is doing what it's supposed to be doing with me - it makes me want more. I mean, I'll go back and run that course again and again, but man...I want more places to run around in.

[Rilav]

just played the demo(360) after which I really wanted the full version

I think that the cutscene is done to contrast the realism of the gameworld.

[Psykoboy2]

Yeah, I don't think it's sloppy at all. I think it's a style. And it works on me, anyway. I didn't make the esurance connection until just now reading Daniel's comment.

[danielOut]

The animations are shitty. The stills from the cutscene are pretty, and I really like the super-clean style. However, the animation is CLEARLY tweening, and is just a sign on laziness.

[Rilav]

I didn't really notice any tweening.. might be because of my TV or whatever.

[Ravenlock]

Am jealous of those who can check out Mirror's Edge, that's a game I'm really interested in. Downloading the Tomb Raider PC demo on Steam right now, will post some thoughts from the PC version in a bit. :)

[fishbang]

Downloading the Tomb Raider PC demo on Steam right now, will post some thoughts from the PC version in a bit. :)


Oh yeah, thanks for that reminder. I need to dload that today and check it out.

[kyrieee]

I hear the reason they didn't do 'real' cutscenes is because doing first person ones is really expensive and a lot of people just want to skip them anyway, so they preferred to put those resources into other parts of the game.

When you guys were talking about Tomb Raider, did you mean Legend? Because you kept saying The Last Revelation, which was a PS1 game, but what you said made no sense if you meant Legend because it didn't have a single large set-piece puzzle. Instead it had a ton of (really bad) combat. Anniversary though, the TR1 remake, was really good

I though the demo was pretty good. I think they understand that the game should be about challenging puzzles and platforming, not combat. Also, they allow you to turn off all the hints and ugly crosshairs which is great (in Legend there were voiceovers literally telling you what to do). There are some animation glitches though, it's probably Edios' fault because they put them on a tight schedule, which is too bad (1½ year for a game isn't much)

[fishbang]

When you guys were talking about Tomb Raider, did you mean Legend? Because you kept saying The Last Revelation, which was a PS1 game, but what you said made no sense if you meant Legend because it didn't have a single large set-piece puzzle. Instead it had a ton of (really bad) combat. Anniversary though, the TR1 remake, was really good



I did that, sorry. That was me. I do it all the time, in fact, and I don't know why. It's the Ls or something. Of course, I get my wires crossed on a lot of other things like that as well. Good head for pictures and a bad head for names. But anyway, thanks for the correction and yes, TLR was inferior as hell and Legend was fantastic.

[kyrieee]

Btw, there is no release date for the PC version of Mirror's Edge so... yeah:mad:

I don't want to be rude and start an argument, but TR: Legend had copious amounts of combat which is what I thought you didn't want :confused:. I know it got good reviews but I'm playing it right now and I'm a bit frustrated with the combat part of it. I liked Anniversary much more. Also, it's worth playing through the new demo more than once. There are quite a few secret areas. One of the two in the tiger area is pretty hard to figure out how to get to

[Ravenlock]

My PC impressions may have to wait until tomorrow (for the TR:U demo), my sister-in-law's volleyball game ran a little long and my wife and I have a Halloween / guy's-30th-birthday party to go to in about an hour.

That said, I did really enjoy both Legend and Anniversary, the parts that I played. (Gametap FTW.) It's kind of funny - the Tomb Raider series has always kind of struck me the same way, no matter which entry it is. I love the puzzles, I'm fine with the traps, and while I don't particularly like the firefights, I hate the animal sequences. Getting rushed by 5 wolves or 2 bears or whatever the hell it is this time and having to leap around hitting "fire" for 3 minutes while you dodge flying teeth is just the most annoying damned thing ever, and I'd much rather do a duck-and-cover firefight than more of that anyday. Which I know is a little odd maybe since the animal combat is really where the series started, and the (at first truly awful) firefights came in later and didn't really improve until Legend.

It's just one of those things, though. I like environmental puzzles enough to put up with the wolf, bear, bat, spider and every other goddamn-thing ambushes, but they piss me off every single time. I can't describe how happy I was when Prince of Persia: Sands of Time came out and was basically a Tomb Raider game without that crap. ;)

[Mr. Murphy]

I just played it and fell in love. But I knew I would from the moment I first heard about this game - the gameplay is right up my alley. Moving fast and being acrobatic is one of my favorite things about gaming.

My brother calls it "the REAL Prince of Persia". Kindof a weird statement, but I know what he means.

[kyrieee]

I feel stupid for posting too much but there's a tranquilizer gun now that sedates the tigers in one shot! (they get back up though)

The spiders and birds die from one shot so it's no problem.

[Ravenlock]

The spiders and birds die from one shot so it's no problem.

Goddammit, there's spiders in the demo? Usually I can assume I won't have to deal with spiders until the full game.

I fucking hate spiders. In real life and in games, but usually especially in games, since they tend to be much larger and more aggressive there than they are, say, in my basement.

[danielOut]

Goddammit, there's spiders in the demo? Usually I can assume I won't have to deal with spiders until the full game.

I fucking hate spiders. In real life and in games, but usually especially in games, since they tend to be much larger and more aggressive there than they are, say, in my basement.

I would have agreed with you until today, when I was wandering around in some culverts and had to deal with a mass of real spides. Nope, I hate them just as much in real life.
Maybe more, actually. In games if they kill me I can load from save.

[Ravenlock]

I would have agreed with you until today, when I was wandering around in some culverts and had to deal with a mass of real spides. Nope, I hate them just as much in real life.
Maybe more, actually. In games if they kill me I can load from save.

Step 1: Don't wander around in culverts.

Step 2: If you ignore step 1, carry this (http://www.hotshotbrand.com/ProductCategories/IndoorInsecticides/SpiderKiller/) with you. If one must kill a spider, at range is definitely the preferred method.

[kyrieee]

Funny, I just had a discussion about how disgusting spiders are
The ones in the demo aren't too bad though, they're almost regular sized. They do jump in your face like facehuggers however

The ones in here are more scary
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/41906.html

[Rilav]

american spiders = nothing compared to the scary ass spiders here in Australia

Red backs,, icky (http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/australian/theridiidae/Theridiidae.html)

I remember one time I woke up and nearly fainted cause there was a massive spider outside my bedroom window.

[Raen]

I remember one time I woke up and nearly fainted cause there was a massive spider outside my bedroom window.

That's what you get for living somewhere where pretty much everything is designed to kill you.

[Ravenlock]

Funny, I just had a discussion about how disgusting spiders are
The ones in the demo aren't too bad though, they're almost regular sized. They do jump in your face like facehuggers however

The ones in here are more scary
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/41906.html

Oh great, so there's basically an entire "giant mutated spider lair" level.

Well, fuck. Now I'll need to find somebody to email me a savegame that lets me skip that, if I ever do buy this. :rolleyes:

[danielOut]

That's what you get for living somewhere where pretty much everything is designed to kill you.

He's playing life on the "Hard" difficulty.

[Ravenlock]

First 20 minutes impression of PC demo of TR Underworld:

Feels like Legend and Anniversary, is prettier, runs very VERY smooth. None of which are bad things.

Agree with James that the water at the opening is gorgeous, and the volume of the wave swells feels right as well as being very pretty. Nice trick. Also, Scott? Yeah, those aren't dolphins, man. Those are definitely sharks. Dolphins do much less of the trying to eat you.

Controls are about the same as they were in Legend/Anniversary, which is fine because they worked well there. Wall climbing seems to have just a hint of Assassin's Creed in it, which is not a bad thing. In general, my first impression is good. Will play more later.

In unrelated news, the reason I haven't played more than 20 minutes of this is that Spider-Man: Web of Shadows for the Wii showed up from Gamefly yesterday, and damn, that is fun. The fight controls are occasionally a little wonky (flicking the nunchuk left and right switches suits, which feels cool, but targeting a new enemy requries flicking the nunchuk down, which was a boneheaded design decision - you end up switching suits midfight without meaning to all the time), but the swinging / web-ziplining feels great, and wallrunning is the best it's ever been... which, when put together, means traversing the city is a joy, and that's as it should be. It's central to that character that swinging around the city is something he really likes doing - his powers are FUN - and a Spidey game should communicate that. This one does, maybe even better than SM2 did.

And the fighting is really enjoyable as well. I've been doing the optional "beat 50 enemies", "beat 75 enemies", "beat 100 enemies" quests just because I want to beat up more guys. The feel of Spidey zipping in and out of a fight with speed and accuracy has, IMO, never been captured better.

I'm not sure it's up to the standards of Spider-Man 2 in all respects (the plot seems mostly filler, and the voice acting is atrocious, and, inexcusably, you can't turn on subtitles to avoid listening to it), but I think it's pretty easy to call it the best Spidey game since SM2.

EDIT: Actually I guess it's not totally unrelated, since we've been talking about Spiders for a page and a half. Hm.

[Ravenlock]

Just finished listening to the podcast for this one - where the hell is the PC Mirror's Edge demo? You've gone and put this right back at the top of my anticipation list.

Not that I'll be done with Fallout 3 by then, but still.

[kyrieee]

Just a random thing
This episode (http://www.ingamechat.net/?p=230) doesn't show up in the October archive (or any other archive). I guess it should

this one too http://www.ingamechat.net/?p=236
oh well

[bapenguin]

Since you guys switched to the regular name titles for the episode, I'm totally lost. It's be great if you could at least append the data of the recording on the end of it.

I'm about 9 episodes behind.

[Kojak]

Well you told me at the end of the podcast that anyone listening should jump onto the forums so here I am in all my wonderful glory.

Just finished listening to the podcast for this one - where the hell is the PC Mirror's Edge demo?

I guess we dont get demo's anymore? When I heard that there was a demo on both of the consoles I scoured the internet to find one but could not even discover a single trace, not even an announcement that there was one coming. So I wouldn't get your hopes up, obviously people with PC's have enough money as it is to be able to try something without buying it, or its assumed that we are just going to pirate it anyway.

[Rilav]

from what I have read the PC version of Mirrors edge doesn't come out till sometime in 2009(at least according to eb games website)

I'm thinking it will be like Assassins Creed/Mass Effect, release the console versions first then 3-4 months later release the PC.

[Iron Past]

I wanted to make a request, could you credit what the intro/outro music is? I just ask because some of it is pretty cool and I just want to know. Also, this last podcast didn't file under "podcasts" like the last few episodes for some reason.

Edit: Almost forgot, in Fallout 3 I got the Fry Cook position after my G.O.A.T. :p It had points in Explosives, Small Arms and I think medicine, but I don't know if it's random.

[danielOut]

Nearly all the music so far has been Bill Brown's stuff (composer for the Tom Clancey games), Final Fantasy 7/Tactics, or stuff from the Ace Combat series.

I'll try and provide those footnotes in the future

[Spigot]

"Iteration!"

Thanks for the shout-out guys. My kid thought it was funny that the radio was talking to him :)

I've played the PS3 demo of Mirror's Edge and quite liked it. I'm still going to wait until the new year to buy it but it has completely dispelled my worries that there would be something wrong with it.

As for Fallout 3, damn... That game has sucked me in in ways that Oblivion never did. I took a sick day today and spent the whole afternoon playing it. Stupid minefield...

I got the "Pipboy Programmer" job from my GOAT exam. I think it was high in Science, Speech and Small Guns.

[Psykoboy2]

"Iteration!"

Thanks for the shout-out guys. My kid thought it was funny that the radio was talking to him :)

Was wondering when you'd get around to hearing this episode. Glad he enjoyed it. Hope he picked up on some of the other words we say.

[Spigot]

Was wondering when you'd get around to hearing this episode. Glad he enjoyed it. Hope he picked up on some of the other words we say.I should send you guys a video of my kid singing along to the Get It Together song from LittleBigPlanet. My daughter goes nuts when she hears that and the Castle Crashers music.