AndreyTsvetkov
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A profound waste of time
A profound waste of time
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This review contains spoilers
In from one ear out the other. It’s got plenty of spit and shine and looks the part for its mere 25 million dollar budget, but at the end of the day it just rings hollow. Adding this to the pile of games that proudly sell themselves as ,,narrative experiences’’, but fail to engage me in any way. Why? I just don’t believe that the de facto template for story games the AAA behemoth has imposed on us still has any moving power to it. I like wide stealth sections where I have to hide in bushes and throw stuff to distract guards as much as the next guy, but we can not deny that these ideas have long been running on fumes.
Convention isn’t that bad; plenty of games that don’t reinvent the wheel are good or even great. All would be fine if I either found the story or the pure gameplay interesting, but I see both as precisely the opposite. All aspects of Requiem's design work in service of the story so much so that to hate on the story is to hate the rest of the game. Tightly knit together, they are almost inseparable and I’d wager that is what makes me the outlier in the praise for these games. I don’t get what makes the story here so special. Comparatively, maybe; contrasted with the average game, this sequel might stick out, but if you view it on its own terms it fails.
Nothing moves me here and I don’t get what should.The closest I can get to is a metaphoric tale about learning to let go of a loved one that is your world and accepting that you can’t save them, no matter how hard you want to. Happiness slips from under them from the very start and the respite we find our heroes at the beginning lasts all but too briefly. Little Hugo is robbed of the right to be a child again and again. His sister Amicia fights for the chance to change that. I find that to be an amiable framework for the plot to spring from, but it doesn't really blossom into anything and it just devolves into a series of unfortunate events. It confuses hardship as a substitute for serious drama. Everyone whimpers and cries all the time (or is at the edge of bawling), they are beaten and mistreated, they are out of breath from running for their lives and they often swim in shit, guts and blood. Its devices of narrating are more exhausting than anything else and when Sorobo tries to shock me with the horror of the plague with a disgusting visual and a sharp sting from the string section of the orchestra I snicker at the banality.
It doesn't help that the characters in these games don’t feel human to me. Everything that comes out of their mouths is fake; an alien interpretation of human speech that comes eerily close to something real. Their faces are soulless heaps of pixels and I’m hard pressed to remember anything interesting they say or do.
On top of that, Plague Tale 2 has decided to double down on the moronic side of the story about the Macula, magical blood properties, ancient tombs, secret cults, rat kings and more that it inherited from the original. Only this time it manifests a lore about the Carrier and the Protector that is as unnecessary as it is stupid. I won’t get any more into that, but it completely loses me when it starts rambling about that shit. When we get to the end, the rat nuclear bombs destruction of Marseille proves too much for me; its grandiosity suffocates the last remaining intimacy the story had.
And as a game? I would say serviceable and occasionally fun. It often feels sluggish and a tad unresponsive to me and I get that our protagonists are more feeble and defensive and the gameplay should reflect that but Requiem walks the thin line of it just being unfun to play. It has so many tools at our disposal, but they rarely seem developed to their maximum potential and they end up being samey in the end. Despite that, it’s still fun to manipulate the rats to your advantage when you get the chance.
It is also way too long and that might be because there’s something really artificial about the pacing. I am not saying the games this copies from are not like this, but they hide it much much better. Plague Tale varies between walking and talking (usually a space reserved for environmental puzzles), combat encounters with people that require stealth/action and confrontations with rats that have you thinking with light in order to survive. It needs to be strict about this order of the gameplay loop for variety. There occurs a problem though, when any of these core pillars present itself just for the sake of it. Unwarranted materialisation of rat swarms is the most frequent offence. Everytime they burst out of the ground I winced in annoyance. That's a strange reaction to have about the best and most unique feature in your game. The most egregious example is a chapter that has you making your way through the little fuckers just for your ship to get across a river chain. Clear padding for time.
It feels ingenuine to compare this to a big league player like Naughty dog, but this wants to be Uncharted and/or Last of us so bad that it invites the comparison itself; if you’ve played both you’ll know what I’m talking about.
There's a small detail that delighted me. When Victor strikes for Amicias life, she dodges him and starts running to the nearest exit. She is all alone at that moment, but exclaims ‘’Hugo, run!’’ nonetheless, as if he were there. What a clever little way to show how deep rooted Amicias protectiveness over her brother is. What usually constitutes a gameplay audio que that informs you to press the R2 trigger, is now being reversed into character building. I also love when I can see mosaics in video games, so I liked the chapter that has you infiltrating a ceremony. Lovely stuff.
There might be some moments of beauty here, but they are lost on me. This isn’t a bad game, just a painfully uninteresting one and I venture to predict that posterity will remember these as the games with the rat tech and not much else. I disliked the first game doe, so don't take me seriously, lol.
Convention isn’t that bad; plenty of games that don’t reinvent the wheel are good or even great. All would be fine if I either found the story or the pure gameplay interesting, but I see both as precisely the opposite. All aspects of Requiem's design work in service of the story so much so that to hate on the story is to hate the rest of the game. Tightly knit together, they are almost inseparable and I’d wager that is what makes me the outlier in the praise for these games. I don’t get what makes the story here so special. Comparatively, maybe; contrasted with the average game, this sequel might stick out, but if you view it on its own terms it fails.
Nothing moves me here and I don’t get what should.The closest I can get to is a metaphoric tale about learning to let go of a loved one that is your world and accepting that you can’t save them, no matter how hard you want to. Happiness slips from under them from the very start and the respite we find our heroes at the beginning lasts all but too briefly. Little Hugo is robbed of the right to be a child again and again. His sister Amicia fights for the chance to change that. I find that to be an amiable framework for the plot to spring from, but it doesn't really blossom into anything and it just devolves into a series of unfortunate events. It confuses hardship as a substitute for serious drama. Everyone whimpers and cries all the time (or is at the edge of bawling), they are beaten and mistreated, they are out of breath from running for their lives and they often swim in shit, guts and blood. Its devices of narrating are more exhausting than anything else and when Sorobo tries to shock me with the horror of the plague with a disgusting visual and a sharp sting from the string section of the orchestra I snicker at the banality.
It doesn't help that the characters in these games don’t feel human to me. Everything that comes out of their mouths is fake; an alien interpretation of human speech that comes eerily close to something real. Their faces are soulless heaps of pixels and I’m hard pressed to remember anything interesting they say or do.
On top of that, Plague Tale 2 has decided to double down on the moronic side of the story about the Macula, magical blood properties, ancient tombs, secret cults, rat kings and more that it inherited from the original. Only this time it manifests a lore about the Carrier and the Protector that is as unnecessary as it is stupid. I won’t get any more into that, but it completely loses me when it starts rambling about that shit. When we get to the end, the rat nuclear bombs destruction of Marseille proves too much for me; its grandiosity suffocates the last remaining intimacy the story had.
And as a game? I would say serviceable and occasionally fun. It often feels sluggish and a tad unresponsive to me and I get that our protagonists are more feeble and defensive and the gameplay should reflect that but Requiem walks the thin line of it just being unfun to play. It has so many tools at our disposal, but they rarely seem developed to their maximum potential and they end up being samey in the end. Despite that, it’s still fun to manipulate the rats to your advantage when you get the chance.
It is also way too long and that might be because there’s something really artificial about the pacing. I am not saying the games this copies from are not like this, but they hide it much much better. Plague Tale varies between walking and talking (usually a space reserved for environmental puzzles), combat encounters with people that require stealth/action and confrontations with rats that have you thinking with light in order to survive. It needs to be strict about this order of the gameplay loop for variety. There occurs a problem though, when any of these core pillars present itself just for the sake of it. Unwarranted materialisation of rat swarms is the most frequent offence. Everytime they burst out of the ground I winced in annoyance. That's a strange reaction to have about the best and most unique feature in your game. The most egregious example is a chapter that has you making your way through the little fuckers just for your ship to get across a river chain. Clear padding for time.
It feels ingenuine to compare this to a big league player like Naughty dog, but this wants to be Uncharted and/or Last of us so bad that it invites the comparison itself; if you’ve played both you’ll know what I’m talking about.
There's a small detail that delighted me. When Victor strikes for Amicias life, she dodges him and starts running to the nearest exit. She is all alone at that moment, but exclaims ‘’Hugo, run!’’ nonetheless, as if he were there. What a clever little way to show how deep rooted Amicias protectiveness over her brother is. What usually constitutes a gameplay audio que that informs you to press the R2 trigger, is now being reversed into character building. I also love when I can see mosaics in video games, so I liked the chapter that has you infiltrating a ceremony. Lovely stuff.
There might be some moments of beauty here, but they are lost on me. This isn’t a bad game, just a painfully uninteresting one and I venture to predict that posterity will remember these as the games with the rat tech and not much else. I disliked the first game doe, so don't take me seriously, lol.
Harry wakes up in a wrecked car and the passenger seat is empty. Heather is missing. He crawls out of the ruins of the vehicle and stumbles onto the street, swallowed by a thick fog. The ghost town you find yourself in is smothered out of any visible signs of life. Snow is falling gently. Only your footsteps echo in company as you prod along the lonely streets. A mirage of your daughter vanishes behind the corner and you shout at her desperately to wait. You sprint into the alleway to catch her, but when you turn around the corner, you only find the massacred remains of flesh and blood in place of your missing girl. The spine of an animal is the only thing you can make out in the mush of guts that resembles anything. That is when everything starts to tighten, when you feel short of breath. A siren wails in the distance, it’s prolonged cry piercing the air with unresolvable panic. You run ahead, but you can’t be sure if you are running to something or away from it. The tight fixed camera angle of the alleyway gets narrower and you're beginning to squeeze yourself into the nightmare; the camera can’t even hold its footing. It trembles out of fear, swaying frantically, distancing as far away from Harry as it can, looking for an escape. It gets darker and darker, until Harry is forced to put a match out to not lose himself. In the darkness the world is shaking with banging and screaming, the camera is spinning all around. A trail of blood leads to an appalling crucified corpse, rotting with meat tangled in rusty barbed wire all round blocking the way. The light has almost faded and you can’t escape the maze. In the insanity of banging metals and scraping pipes you get attacked by something you can’t describe. Small creatures gnaw at your feet and stab you with their knives and you can’t do anything. You don’t know what's happening yet, utterly helpless you just wait for the nightmare to end. Right then Harry wakes up, gasping for air. His eyes are wide open, but the nightmare hasn’t ended. Silent Hill awaits you.
That is how you open your game. Hooked right away I was surprised the more I progressed through it. How, despite its ancient two decade plus age, a end of the millennium video game piece of technology could preserve its tone and stand its aesthetic ground. More than that, I even started seeing it as timeless. There is potential in retro texture work and low poly models that wasn't apparent to me before as it is now; horror might take advantage of more than any other genre. The jagged corners of the pre anti-aliasing days and the muddled texture work give clear enough information, but they also suggest. I can see that rusty door and its brown unappealing colouring, yet I can only imagine what horrors that gave it its tint. Objects just seem that much stranger, as if the way you see them is the closest someone could make them out from memory. This isn’t something unique to Silent Hill, but I hope we see these technical limitations of the past as an aesthetic choice in the future more and more.
The proportions are also way off, which adds to this unsettling feeling. Everything is a bit too big, a bit too wide. The streets are so much wider than they should be that there exists a space between opposite pavements, where you can walk, but not see either side of the street. Just fog and nothingness. It all accumulates in this surreal dreamy quality that is rarely matched to this day. What helps greatly too, is the effectiveness of the cinematography, if we might call it that. Fixed camera angles just shouldn’t have left mainstream gaming. They paint a picture and create tension in a way modern interactive right analog stick cameras can’t. It hits different when you press the handle of an old creaky door and enter a room where you don't see what is in front of you, but rather, see the character looking at the space beyond with the wall behind his back. The camera doesn’t let you see much and it induces anxiety, as you hear something coming closer way over the edges of the screen.
I don’t know what black magic and ritual sacrifice Team Silent performed to make this sound the way it does, but they made the official soundtrack to all your darkest nightmares. Absolutely legendary work.
What this ultimately is about as a narrative is of little importance. In a classical sense the story isn’t any good. It barely has a plot for things to keep moving and it completely loses me every time it ventures into ramblings of esoteric bullshit, occult crackpot gibberish and alien rubbish. The established atmosphere is so effective that explanations of things damage the psychological undertone that is present throughout the game. When it relies on writing it’s abhorrent. The Twin Peaks influence here is apparent, but the Lynchian approach to dialogue just doesn’t work out. It’s stilted and uninteresting and I couldn’t wait for it to be over. It’s not all bad though, because by the end, there is a death scene so peculiar and strangely sad that I remembered it for days after. There seems to be so much beneath the uppermost layer of this game. I'm sure that is why it has the following it does. I can’t wait to try the sequel.
That is how you open your game. Hooked right away I was surprised the more I progressed through it. How, despite its ancient two decade plus age, a end of the millennium video game piece of technology could preserve its tone and stand its aesthetic ground. More than that, I even started seeing it as timeless. There is potential in retro texture work and low poly models that wasn't apparent to me before as it is now; horror might take advantage of more than any other genre. The jagged corners of the pre anti-aliasing days and the muddled texture work give clear enough information, but they also suggest. I can see that rusty door and its brown unappealing colouring, yet I can only imagine what horrors that gave it its tint. Objects just seem that much stranger, as if the way you see them is the closest someone could make them out from memory. This isn’t something unique to Silent Hill, but I hope we see these technical limitations of the past as an aesthetic choice in the future more and more.
The proportions are also way off, which adds to this unsettling feeling. Everything is a bit too big, a bit too wide. The streets are so much wider than they should be that there exists a space between opposite pavements, where you can walk, but not see either side of the street. Just fog and nothingness. It all accumulates in this surreal dreamy quality that is rarely matched to this day. What helps greatly too, is the effectiveness of the cinematography, if we might call it that. Fixed camera angles just shouldn’t have left mainstream gaming. They paint a picture and create tension in a way modern interactive right analog stick cameras can’t. It hits different when you press the handle of an old creaky door and enter a room where you don't see what is in front of you, but rather, see the character looking at the space beyond with the wall behind his back. The camera doesn’t let you see much and it induces anxiety, as you hear something coming closer way over the edges of the screen.
I don’t know what black magic and ritual sacrifice Team Silent performed to make this sound the way it does, but they made the official soundtrack to all your darkest nightmares. Absolutely legendary work.
What this ultimately is about as a narrative is of little importance. In a classical sense the story isn’t any good. It barely has a plot for things to keep moving and it completely loses me every time it ventures into ramblings of esoteric bullshit, occult crackpot gibberish and alien rubbish. The established atmosphere is so effective that explanations of things damage the psychological undertone that is present throughout the game. When it relies on writing it’s abhorrent. The Twin Peaks influence here is apparent, but the Lynchian approach to dialogue just doesn’t work out. It’s stilted and uninteresting and I couldn’t wait for it to be over. It’s not all bad though, because by the end, there is a death scene so peculiar and strangely sad that I remembered it for days after. There seems to be so much beneath the uppermost layer of this game. I'm sure that is why it has the following it does. I can’t wait to try the sequel.
We should repair rather than remove. This goes not only for an old broken camera or record player, but the relationship we have with the people we care about. This is what ‘’Assemble with care’’ is all about and it expresses that with 13 levels of you assembling stuff interspersed with slides of a story about a falling father/daughter relationship and two feuding sisters. Great as a concept, not so much as execution. The clickety clacks of objects while they are disassembled and put together is what is best here. Sliding my fingers through the touchpad to unscrew the screws never got old and was satisfying, which I guess is what the devs were going for. And it is, don't get me wrong, but for a game titled like this I expected a lot more. What should’ve been most important here is process: the process of taking things apart and finding out what they are really made of, what their texture of history is, how they were and how they are now. I might be describing a wholly different game, but the set up of the premise just asks for more. It is just too simple for my taste. Every action is relegated to unscrewing, removing basic pieces, connecting wires and glueing stuff once in a while. There is barely any character in the objects themselves .It is fine and quite chill though if I don’t have my occasional wrestle with the controls. I understand that the gameplay loop must have repeating elements in it for progression to occur, but what we have here barely kept my interest. It also didn’t help that what little writing this had was at a disney channel level of competence. At the end of the day we mustn't forget that this is an indie phone game, and for that I can cut it some slack.
p.s
Maria has to have one of the most fake jobs I've ever seen in a game. Repair woman, really ? She earns a living by gluing shit together that any 2 year old could and travels europe with it. Nah
p.s
Maria has to have one of the most fake jobs I've ever seen in a game. Repair woman, really ? She earns a living by gluing shit together that any 2 year old could and travels europe with it. Nah