[Intrepid Homoludens]

Dreamfall. Nice but flawed.

[Spiwak]

Ico - 8.7

[SoccerDude28]

Half Life 2: Episode 1

9/10

True masterpiece. My only complaint (if you can call it that), is that it left me wanting so much more.

[wilco]

Originally Posted by Spiwak

Ico - 8.7

That's too low...

Also, another 9/10 for Half-Life 2 Episode 1.

A great demonstration of high-quality episodic gaming. Short, cheap but intense and leaving people wanting more. If there was a pre-order option for Episode2 at the end everybody would click it.

I was tempted to buy Sin: Episode 1, but the reviews were a little mixed...

[Spiwak]

Originally Posted by wilco

That's too low...

You're probably right. I downgraded it because I thought it was too short and lacking in replayability. But I change my mind--you can't look at a Ueda game in the same way you do other games. I'll give it a 9.1, because it's so atmospheric and artistic (compared to other video games at least).

[insane_cobra]

Originally Posted by wilco

If there was a pre-order option for Episode2 at the end everybody would click it.

There isn't? There definitely should've been. Okay, it's Valve and Half-Life 2 so many people will probably do it anyway, but it's a missed opportunity and an amateurish move on their behalf.

[RLacey]

Amateurish? I'm perfectly happy not to be subjected to marketing adverts at the end of my game...

[insane_cobra]

That's fine, I don't like ads myself, but from developer's point of view, it's a silly move. They didn't have to put in anything flashy and alienating, just a simple "If you liked this game and the trailer you just saw, click here to preorder Episode 2." link.

To quote Greg Costikyan (the top of the page post):

Originally Posted by Greg Costikyan

I have, as you might expected, looked at demos for many, many downloadable games recently. It's amazing and somewhat surprising how they vary in terms of reminding people that they can buy the full application. In general, I think a lot of developers are failing to remind downloaders enough, and therefore having fewer conversions (to paying customers) than they otherwise would.

Obviously, you don't want to annoy players by badgering them constantly--but there are a number of non-intrusive things you can and should do.

1. The first thing a player should see when he starts the demo is a screen that provides an opportunity to buy the full game, with a link directly to a purchase url. It should be easy to blow this off and start playing, of course. With most demos that unlock into full games, the unlock solution does this automatically--but when developers provide separate demos (meaning purchase is a separate download and install), they often don't do this. It can be as unobtrusive as an item on the main menu--nobody's going to whine if there's one more item on that menu.

2. The last thing a player should see when he quits out of a demo is a full screen describing all the cool features he gets in the full game--and again, with a live link to the purchase URL.

What's surprising is how many games don't do this--or do, but don't have a live link, just an URL in graphics on the page. Make it easy, please. *snip*

Obviously, he's talking about demo versions, but the second point is also applicable to episodic gaming, at least when you're a company like Valve and you know another episode will get made.

[wilco]

Episode 2 will only be available in 6 months, and in Steam I think the pre-orders only begin when you can actually pre-load the game.
But when it is released, they will probably patch the first one to include that option at end.
I wonder if episode 2 will begin with "previously on Half-Life 2..."

[Spiwak]

I actually hope they just add Episode 2 onto Episode 1, so that by the end all of the episodes are together. I dunno if it'd be possible, but I think that'd be nice and convenient, anyways.


I'm not sure if it's really be a drawback but you'd have to have Episode 1 to buy Episode 2, though.

[Junkface]

Shadow of the Colossus. Somewhere between wow and ...wah?

[Spiwak]

I thought Shadow of the Colossus was great. I even decided to replay the fights in Time Attack to see what new digs the character can get. It's fun but the level of frustration the game had in regular mode is amplified when you're working under a time limit.

What specifically is making you go "...wah?"?

[RLacey]

Dreamfall - 7/10
The uncharitable person in me is still wondering what happened to the actual gameplay (and is still smarting over Chapter 5). The story was quite good, though.

[Veracious]

Agatha Christie - And There Were None: 6/10

Aspects in which the game was lacking:

-Immersion, because of the bad combination of graphics, animation and scripting.

Spoiler:

people appearing and dissappearing, the need to always find out their ever changing whereabouts and to chat with them about every topic

-Some bad puzzles. A lot of items in the inventory and a lot of locations could make it exceedingly troublesome to advance the game if you get stuck.
-A bit buggy. I experienced 1 crash and 1 apparent bug where a person in the game was both alive and dead at the same time (in different places). That made me believe that I was stuck because no one seemed to respond to anything I was trying to do and I had to resort to www.uhs-hints.com
-Movement between screens. For example the living room is a mess to navigate through. This also translates to poor realization of the layout of the house or makes it pretty difficult.

The good stuff:

-The story. A good implementation of the classic.
-The overall mood. Created by the gloomy weather, fitting music and ok-ish voice acting.

[Kolzig]

Another World 10/10

Half-Life 2: Episode 1 8/10

[Junkface]

Originally Posted by Spiwak

I thought Shadow of the Colossus was great. I even decided to replay the fights in Time Attack to see what new digs the character can get. It's fun but the level of frustration the game had in regular mode is amplified when you're working under a time limit.

What specifically is making you go "...wah?"?

I was still waiting for it to sink in. I'm also confused as to how things I found extremely irritating, off-putting and to draw me out of the game (such as the linearity, repetitive and frustrating battles with some of the colossi and lengthy opening and ending cutscenes) still seemed to work relatively well in the context of the game overall... if that makes sense. I think the prevailing emotion now is definitely wow though.

Originally Posted by Rlacey

Dreamfall - 7/10
The uncharitable person in me is still wondering what happened to the actual gameplay (and is still smarting over Chapter 5). The story was quite good, though.

Isn't Chapter 5 the part heaviest on genuine gameplay though? I'm smarting over the last couple of chapters because of their lack of gameplay.

[RLacey]

Originally Posted by Junkface

I was still waiting for it to sink in. I'm also confused as to how things I found extremely irritating, off-putting and to draw me out of the game (such as the linearity, repetitive and frustrating battles with some of the colossi and lengthy opening and ending cutscenes) still seemed to work relatively well in the context of the game overall... if that makes sense. I think the prevailing emotion now is definitely wow though.


Isn't Chapter 5 the part heaviest on genuine gameplay though? I'm smarting over the last couple of chapters because of their lack of gameplay.

Yes. Well, Chapter 5 has the only real puzzle in it, but the managed to annoy me even then by combining it with the sneaking section .

[LimpingFish]

SiN Episodes: Emergence. Good, not great.6/10

[Spiwak]

Fable: The Lost Chapters

9/10. Loved it. My only complaints were that it's relatively short (I beat it in ~20 hours, doing practically everything there is to do eg silver keys and demon doors) and that the game world is fairly small and als othat it consists of a billion tiny maps.

That said, I still absolutely the play-experience. The story wasn't revolutionary by any means, but it was intriguiging and engrossing nonetheless. Despite the shortness of the game it still felt pretty epic, due in part to the awesome fact that the character's aging (I was 65 by the time I beat it and I was looking pretty haggard). It felt like I was playing Beowulf, in a way....even the transition from Fable to the TLC felt like Beowulf's reign of peace or whatever after slewing Grendel's mother till the dragon comes and all that when he's an old man and he takes up arms once again. While aging was cool, I think it lacked the depth it could have had, such as your age affecting your stats or ability or NPC reactions, and also that other characters did not age at all in the game (well, I suppose you must forgive Jack of Blades). But the other cool stuff added, like the NPC-reactions and romance/marrying, were all implemented perfectly, in my opinion, and were a lot of fun.

The art direction was beautiful and befitting the off-kilter, quirky atmosphere of the game (really refreshing given it's otherwise cliched fantasy-setting). When I play a fantasy RPG I like seeing hugeness--weapons, armor, villains, breasts--and Fable delivered on all fronts. The locales were nice and varied (Chapel of Skorm, Grey House, Headman's Hill and Necropolis were all sweet), but a lot of the silver quests were kind of repetitive, what with half being escort quests.

By the end of the game I had more experience than I knew what to do with, but that was certainly alright as I like to be able mow down mountains by the end of any RPG. Speaking of which, the combat was a whole lot of fun and a great implementation of non-strict RPGing. I especially loved how archery was implemented. I don't think you could ever hope to have a character based solely on archery or Will, not as effectively as you could a brute force fighter, but for my particular character the balance between the three basic combat mechanics was nearly perfect if not a little bit in melee's favor.

Anyways, I'm gushing now. So I beat the game and I loved it. Not a perfect implementation of some of the brilliant and cool ideas behind it, but I think wholeheartedly that they'll greatly improve all of this in Fable 2 and I'm now greatly anticipating the sequel. I've heard the sequel supposedly has guns,as it takes place 500 years or so after the first game....wild.

[Cold-Factor]

Sudeki: 7.5/10