Ok, three big things and one weird tangent.
Big Thing 1. I’m yet to find something in a video game that I get more pleasure from than moving quickly and precisely in 2D platformers, and my god does this game do traversal like a dream. Despite its somewhat overwhelming controls you never feel outside of the character, it's floaty when you expect and sharp when you want, always flowing beautifully between the many traversal options it presents throughout the game that consistently complements the previous ones.
It's obviously very similar to Blind Forest, and doesn't introduce anything as groundbreaking as the Bash, but honestly I could just do this forever and never get tired of it.
(also other games should totally just steal Bash, what are you waiting for)
Big Thing 2. So, I have this long standing silly debate with some folks I know about whether Ori is a metroidvania or not. The crux of my argument against it is that the game has no real interest in exploration, it is very linear, guided and progression always comes from story. But Moon Studios clearly loved Hollow Knight, and while I appreciate the added complexity to combat and the quirky characters with charming voices populating the world, it still isn't a game about exploring. And that becomes very clear when you look at how the map guy works. While in HK he is basically just selling you paper so you can draw your routes, making it so you can only see where you’ve already been through, here it's like he’s the one playing a metroidvania and just selling you the results of his work after he’s done.
I really do love these games as platformers, but they got nothing on really good metroidvanias, and trying to double down on that without really committing to it just seems like a waste.
Big Thing 3. It’s wild how they’re just straight up repeating the same tricks from the first game with the story here. Kinda feels like they can’t do anything other than ‘first five minutes of Up’ type of storytelling.
Weird Tangent. Is this the best Spider-Man game ever made!? I really think the only way we’ll ever come close to replicating the acrobatic, fast paced and precise mobility of that character in a video game is by limiting the movement to two axis. The 3D games always reduce the more extravagant traversal scenes to cheap QTEs because it would be impossible to control a character in situations like that, but we do it with Ori all the time! And he crawls on walls! And has this glowy rope thing he shots at stuff to get closer and he fights animal-like beings and… you get the idea.
Big Thing 1. I’m yet to find something in a video game that I get more pleasure from than moving quickly and precisely in 2D platformers, and my god does this game do traversal like a dream. Despite its somewhat overwhelming controls you never feel outside of the character, it's floaty when you expect and sharp when you want, always flowing beautifully between the many traversal options it presents throughout the game that consistently complements the previous ones.
It's obviously very similar to Blind Forest, and doesn't introduce anything as groundbreaking as the Bash, but honestly I could just do this forever and never get tired of it.
(also other games should totally just steal Bash, what are you waiting for)
Big Thing 2. So, I have this long standing silly debate with some folks I know about whether Ori is a metroidvania or not. The crux of my argument against it is that the game has no real interest in exploration, it is very linear, guided and progression always comes from story. But Moon Studios clearly loved Hollow Knight, and while I appreciate the added complexity to combat and the quirky characters with charming voices populating the world, it still isn't a game about exploring. And that becomes very clear when you look at how the map guy works. While in HK he is basically just selling you paper so you can draw your routes, making it so you can only see where you’ve already been through, here it's like he’s the one playing a metroidvania and just selling you the results of his work after he’s done.
I really do love these games as platformers, but they got nothing on really good metroidvanias, and trying to double down on that without really committing to it just seems like a waste.
Big Thing 3. It’s wild how they’re just straight up repeating the same tricks from the first game with the story here. Kinda feels like they can’t do anything other than ‘first five minutes of Up’ type of storytelling.
Weird Tangent. Is this the best Spider-Man game ever made!? I really think the only way we’ll ever come close to replicating the acrobatic, fast paced and precise mobility of that character in a video game is by limiting the movement to two axis. The 3D games always reduce the more extravagant traversal scenes to cheap QTEs because it would be impossible to control a character in situations like that, but we do it with Ori all the time! And he crawls on walls! And has this glowy rope thing he shots at stuff to get closer and he fights animal-like beings and… you get the idea.
2 Comments
Oh yeah, I think I've seen some footage of that before. It's impressive how committed it is to its physics simulation. Seems fun, and indeed very spider-man-like.
avibi
3 years ago