This is the second time I've abandoned this; I tried it on the PS4 years ago and lasted only a few hours. I was encouraged to give it another go, however, after reading how it was a good Steam Deck game. It isn't, though: the sense of scale is hamstrung on the smaller screen, and the bits where the camera zooms right out make it difficult to see what's going on even on a big monitor or TV, let alone on the Steam Deck. This time around I got ten hours in, but I've realised now that I should have trusted my instincts the first time and have decided to pack it in for good. I put it down about a month ago to play something else - always a bad sign - and having come back to it in the last couple of days, I'm not inspired to keep playing.
Beyond a few briefly interesting set pieces, my biggest problem with it is simply that it's boring, with nothing that truly stands out. The world is drab and grey; the combat is mushy and repetitive; the level design, especially in the more confined spaces, is horrible - so easy to get lost in - and exacerbated tenfold by the wilfully awful map. Its various systems and mechanics feel fiddly and unintuitive, too. The chip system, for example, seems novel to begin with, but once you get over the fact that you can turn off various elements of the HUD, you're left with something that makes upgrading your character's abilities and equipment a chore, to the point where I was put off from doing it after a while. The controls are also less than ideal, like having the unreliable lock-on mapped to LT, then shoot to RB (which you'll constantly have held down because you don't ever not want to be shooting) and then dodge mapped to RT - it's all a bit clumsy. Thankfully, you're only ever really mashing X and Y to smash through hordes of the similar-looking robot enemies as quickly as possible; if the game had lived up to its Platinum credentials and had had you pulling off combos and other more interesting things, then I imagine it would have been quite an uncomfortable game to play.
Gameplay aside, many of the game's fans also seem to be very fond of the story, but either it hasn't really got going yet, ten hours in, or it's just lost on me. Regardless, having so many bitty sidequests cropping up all over the place (represented by annoying red blips on the useless minimap) often dulls a lot of the plot's momentum. It seems a bit off to have NPCs who will ask you to collect some stamps for them, for instance, while you're en route to destroy a huge aquatic robot monster who's emerged from the ocean and is about to destroy the last vestiges of humanity once and for all. Knowing that you have to play the game several times through to get the most from its narrative is also a massive turn off for me, one that even the occasional glimpse of 2B's bottom can't remedy, alas.
I quite liked the music (BECOME AS GODS), but this seems to me, overall, as if it would be much better as a tighter, more linear experience rather than an arbitrary open-world game. Running back and forth across the same old crumbling skyscrapers, busting up the same old mobs, pausing only to pick up glowing piles of scrap metal, or severed cables, or pieces of natural rubber, does nothing for it.
Sorry to all its advocates, but 2B is not to be for me.
Beyond a few briefly interesting set pieces, my biggest problem with it is simply that it's boring, with nothing that truly stands out. The world is drab and grey; the combat is mushy and repetitive; the level design, especially in the more confined spaces, is horrible - so easy to get lost in - and exacerbated tenfold by the wilfully awful map. Its various systems and mechanics feel fiddly and unintuitive, too. The chip system, for example, seems novel to begin with, but once you get over the fact that you can turn off various elements of the HUD, you're left with something that makes upgrading your character's abilities and equipment a chore, to the point where I was put off from doing it after a while. The controls are also less than ideal, like having the unreliable lock-on mapped to LT, then shoot to RB (which you'll constantly have held down because you don't ever not want to be shooting) and then dodge mapped to RT - it's all a bit clumsy. Thankfully, you're only ever really mashing X and Y to smash through hordes of the similar-looking robot enemies as quickly as possible; if the game had lived up to its Platinum credentials and had had you pulling off combos and other more interesting things, then I imagine it would have been quite an uncomfortable game to play.
Gameplay aside, many of the game's fans also seem to be very fond of the story, but either it hasn't really got going yet, ten hours in, or it's just lost on me. Regardless, having so many bitty sidequests cropping up all over the place (represented by annoying red blips on the useless minimap) often dulls a lot of the plot's momentum. It seems a bit off to have NPCs who will ask you to collect some stamps for them, for instance, while you're en route to destroy a huge aquatic robot monster who's emerged from the ocean and is about to destroy the last vestiges of humanity once and for all. Knowing that you have to play the game several times through to get the most from its narrative is also a massive turn off for me, one that even the occasional glimpse of 2B's bottom can't remedy, alas.
I quite liked the music (BECOME AS GODS), but this seems to me, overall, as if it would be much better as a tighter, more linear experience rather than an arbitrary open-world game. Running back and forth across the same old crumbling skyscrapers, busting up the same old mobs, pausing only to pick up glowing piles of scrap metal, or severed cables, or pieces of natural rubber, does nothing for it.
Sorry to all its advocates, but 2B is not to be for me.