ashbolt
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ashbolt is
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Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
18 hrs ago
1 day ago
5 days ago
Pinged
ashbolt
commented on
ashbolt's
review of
Final Fantasy VII Remake
@dimsumboi420_ Yeah I agree with all that. I don't really think a lot of Remake is bullshit, like I said a lot of the expansions are good, but there really could have been a better way to just say it's a new narrative. With how much they extrapolate it basically is a different story, and had they just told players "It won't be the same here on" I think could have gone a lot better than trying to cram in the Whispers. Again, just making the story be different in the same way the Evangelion Rebuilds are could have gone fine (by just being different and telling us to deal with it). I think it would have been so much easier to just say "This is how we wanted the story to originally be" like they've been saying and left it at that while just modifying the story. Either way, same story or not, people would be upset about it. It could have been a totally newcomer friendly title had they been more open about it being a rewrite and not tried to piggyback off crucial details in VII. Granted, I can't even think of a good way to do that, the easiest way could have probably been to just call it Final Fantasy VII 2, as stupid as it is, but again that would have its own set of issues. This issue is totally pedantic and has no real bearing on the quality of the game, but I think you already get that given how many times we've probably talked about this lol.
I also agree that the rewrite will pay off, I never really said I was against it, just that the way they did it was a bit sloppy thus Remake has to suffer a bit from it. Honestly, I like they're rewriting it anyways, because it's a new story I get to experience rather than the same game again. More content is more content. Obviously, you'll hear about how I actually feel once I get through Integrade & Rebirth.
Also, the Remake double meaning is definitely just Nomura having his head up his ass. Like, yeah, that explains it, but it still isn't a good reason lol.
I also agree that the rewrite will pay off, I never really said I was against it, just that the way they did it was a bit sloppy thus Remake has to suffer a bit from it. Honestly, I like they're rewriting it anyways, because it's a new story I get to experience rather than the same game again. More content is more content. Obviously, you'll hear about how I actually feel once I get through Integrade & Rebirth.
Also, the Remake double meaning is definitely just Nomura having his head up his ass. Like, yeah, that explains it, but it still isn't a good reason lol.
6 days ago
ashbolt
reviewed
Gungrave G.O.R.E
I don't think I've ever been so astronomically bored with a game in my life. Gungrave G.O.R.E feels like someone looked at DMC2 and considered it the staple for all action titles ever.
The controls are clunky, the combat is boring, and the bosses are infuriating to fight against. The game looks bad, mimicking PS3 graphics quality, and Grave looks like if Daisuke Ishiwatari designed Shadow the Hedgehog while also looking identical to my 12th grade English teacher before his hair went white.
The only saving grace I can imagine for this game is that the writing is hilariously and almost intentionally bad. Corny beyond words, the entire premise is almost enough to make me want to keep playing this game.
There's a specific reason why nobody has tried to make an action game primarily about shooting guns. It just isn't fun. Make an actual shooter instead.
The controls are clunky, the combat is boring, and the bosses are infuriating to fight against. The game looks bad, mimicking PS3 graphics quality, and Grave looks like if Daisuke Ishiwatari designed Shadow the Hedgehog while also looking identical to my 12th grade English teacher before his hair went white.
The only saving grace I can imagine for this game is that the writing is hilariously and almost intentionally bad. Corny beyond words, the entire premise is almost enough to make me want to keep playing this game.
There's a specific reason why nobody has tried to make an action game primarily about shooting guns. It just isn't fun. Make an actual shooter instead.
6 days ago
6 days ago
ashbolt
reviewed
Final Fantasy VII Remake
This review contains spoilers
It's a bit preposterous to remake an entire game, and then ask the player to have played the original version of the game to understand the remake. A remake is supposed to be the definitive way for a new / modern audience to experience your title, no?
I'm a pretty big Final Fantasy fan, so I didn't really have any qualms with this. I played VII, liked it, jumped into Remake and got more than I could have asked for. VII itself is a pretty big title in gaming culture, however, so it makes sense that people would want to get acquainted with this title via its most recent release.
Only when I told my friend that to completely enjoy VIIR he had to play the original VII, to which he replied, "That's fucking stupid," did I realize that it is pretty fucking stupid.
While, I don't necessarily believe you can't do this conceptually, to advertise your game as a remake when it's really a rewrite is misleading. Granted, it's part of the marketing stunt / reveal that the story will end up being different, but this still could have been done without changing so much of the entry title.
On one hand, I can get behind a lot of the changes they made. Pushing Sephiroth into the narrative right off the bat works because he as a character already has an insane amount of cadence to it. Nearly everyone who likes games knows who Sephiroth is. We don't need to spend half the title building up his character because he's so engrained into the cultural mythos that his name holds its own weight.
On the other hand, introducing dementors during key narrative points doesn't work, because in order to recognize that the scenes are panning out differently you would have had to of played the original title. Maybe it would have worked if it was more subtle, or if the rewrite worked the same way as the Neon Genesis Evangelion rebuilds, creating subtle changes and then an entirely new story after everyone gets the gist, but instead it's just confusing to new players and jarring to old players. Even the climax rides off the idea that you have watched Advent Children, the biggest piece of shit movie only an avid Final Fantasy fan would consider watching let alone know about, and the ending requires you to have played Crisis Core to really understand its weight. (though Zack being dead is covered in the original, but that scene specifically is mirrored from Crisis Core. This is just semantics, it's not really an important distinction. Anyways,)
Now that we're post Integrade and Rebirth, these changes make sense given they clearly want to make a new story in the same world with the same characters (and conversely undo the shitshows that are Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus), but again, they could have done it so much better.
The point is, for a remake, FF7R is not exactly new player friendly.
That's my biggest gripe with this game. It's really just a marketing thing, but even some of the changes they made are just bad. If they really wanted to undo the future, or at least say the story will be different, they could have kept it at subtle changes like fighting Reno instead of running, or more Sephiroth appearances, rather than teasing us with this idea and stopping it with shadow people, then for us to kill said shadow people to "unbind" the narrative. At the very least, this title solves its biggest problem narratively.
The other narrative changes are simply extrapolations, giving Avalanche (as in Jessie, Biggs and Wedge) more character development instead of 5 lines of dialogue, new notable characters like Roach, and reusing other characters originally underutilized like Weiss (granted this is in Integrade, but I digress). It's all very good and breathes more life into a setting that was already pretty alive.
Outside of all of that, FF7R looks fantastic. From being the first game to have CGI cutscenes to now persevering clouds 3-polygon hair with realistic hair simulation, FF7 continues to be a testament to the current state of game tech. It's impressive how good this game looks and how well it runs.
The combat is an excellent mix of the modern FF realtime combat and the old turn based, being incredibly engaging despite being somewhat basic on the surface level. Attacks feel weighty, controlling and commanding characters is seamless, and overall the combat flows very well.
What plagues the gameplay is the dungeons. Most of them are increasingly boring, especially the last one. Given my playthrough took me over a year (because I forgot I had it in my Epic Games library rather than Steam), a lot of my final impressions ride on the final dungeon, which was tedious and annoying. A lot of the times I put this game down was due to playing through a dungeon that revolved around a really boring "move here pull lever" rhythm, but the combat and characters carry this game enough to make all that worth it.
Overall, Final Fantasy VII: Remake is pretty solid. It has pretty low lows, but the game overall is super engaging. So much so that I went out of my way to do every side quest, which is something I don't typically do. This titles biggest pitfall is that it claims to be a remake when it really isn't. This is a title made for fans of the series and only that. While you could get into the world of FFVII with Remake, you will be missing out on a lot.
It's one thing to remake a game and drop subtle nods to the original title for long time fans, but it's another to completely rewrite the story and tell people it's the same game. I doubt the Resident Evil remakes would be met to such acclaim if they did the same thing, no?
I'm a pretty big Final Fantasy fan, so I didn't really have any qualms with this. I played VII, liked it, jumped into Remake and got more than I could have asked for. VII itself is a pretty big title in gaming culture, however, so it makes sense that people would want to get acquainted with this title via its most recent release.
Only when I told my friend that to completely enjoy VIIR he had to play the original VII, to which he replied, "That's fucking stupid," did I realize that it is pretty fucking stupid.
While, I don't necessarily believe you can't do this conceptually, to advertise your game as a remake when it's really a rewrite is misleading. Granted, it's part of the marketing stunt / reveal that the story will end up being different, but this still could have been done without changing so much of the entry title.
On one hand, I can get behind a lot of the changes they made. Pushing Sephiroth into the narrative right off the bat works because he as a character already has an insane amount of cadence to it. Nearly everyone who likes games knows who Sephiroth is. We don't need to spend half the title building up his character because he's so engrained into the cultural mythos that his name holds its own weight.
On the other hand, introducing dementors during key narrative points doesn't work, because in order to recognize that the scenes are panning out differently you would have had to of played the original title. Maybe it would have worked if it was more subtle, or if the rewrite worked the same way as the Neon Genesis Evangelion rebuilds, creating subtle changes and then an entirely new story after everyone gets the gist, but instead it's just confusing to new players and jarring to old players. Even the climax rides off the idea that you have watched Advent Children, the biggest piece of shit movie only an avid Final Fantasy fan would consider watching let alone know about, and the ending requires you to have played Crisis Core to really understand its weight. (though Zack being dead is covered in the original, but that scene specifically is mirrored from Crisis Core. This is just semantics, it's not really an important distinction. Anyways,)
Now that we're post Integrade and Rebirth, these changes make sense given they clearly want to make a new story in the same world with the same characters (and conversely undo the shitshows that are Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus), but again, they could have done it so much better.
The point is, for a remake, FF7R is not exactly new player friendly.
That's my biggest gripe with this game. It's really just a marketing thing, but even some of the changes they made are just bad. If they really wanted to undo the future, or at least say the story will be different, they could have kept it at subtle changes like fighting Reno instead of running, or more Sephiroth appearances, rather than teasing us with this idea and stopping it with shadow people, then for us to kill said shadow people to "unbind" the narrative. At the very least, this title solves its biggest problem narratively.
The other narrative changes are simply extrapolations, giving Avalanche (as in Jessie, Biggs and Wedge) more character development instead of 5 lines of dialogue, new notable characters like Roach, and reusing other characters originally underutilized like Weiss (granted this is in Integrade, but I digress). It's all very good and breathes more life into a setting that was already pretty alive.
Outside of all of that, FF7R looks fantastic. From being the first game to have CGI cutscenes to now persevering clouds 3-polygon hair with realistic hair simulation, FF7 continues to be a testament to the current state of game tech. It's impressive how good this game looks and how well it runs.
The combat is an excellent mix of the modern FF realtime combat and the old turn based, being incredibly engaging despite being somewhat basic on the surface level. Attacks feel weighty, controlling and commanding characters is seamless, and overall the combat flows very well.
What plagues the gameplay is the dungeons. Most of them are increasingly boring, especially the last one. Given my playthrough took me over a year (because I forgot I had it in my Epic Games library rather than Steam), a lot of my final impressions ride on the final dungeon, which was tedious and annoying. A lot of the times I put this game down was due to playing through a dungeon that revolved around a really boring "move here pull lever" rhythm, but the combat and characters carry this game enough to make all that worth it.
Overall, Final Fantasy VII: Remake is pretty solid. It has pretty low lows, but the game overall is super engaging. So much so that I went out of my way to do every side quest, which is something I don't typically do. This titles biggest pitfall is that it claims to be a remake when it really isn't. This is a title made for fans of the series and only that. While you could get into the world of FFVII with Remake, you will be missing out on a lot.
It's one thing to remake a game and drop subtle nods to the original title for long time fans, but it's another to completely rewrite the story and tell people it's the same game. I doubt the Resident Evil remakes would be met to such acclaim if they did the same thing, no?
6 days ago
ashbolt
backloggd
Michigan: Report from Hell
7 days ago
ashbolt
backloggd
Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
7 days ago
ashbolt
reviewed
Bomb Rush Cyberfunk
If you play videogames with nothing but your eyes and ears you'll probably really like Bomb Rush Cyberfunk. If not, you'll probably find yourself amused for first half of the game.
There's this running joke with my industry friends about forcing a handful of artists to make a game and being given the best-looking walking sim you've ever seen. It's the most boring piece of shit ever, but damn, does it look good.
This is what BRC feels like. A really nice art demo. Sure, it has gameplay, and the writing is halfway decent, but it's all very shallow.
Before being a game BRC is first a tribute to Dreamcast era titles. It bleeds inspiration from Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure, and most evidently, Jet Set Radio. This adds to a lot of the charm of the game, be it the modern takes on JSR's style of music, the wacky character designs, and lack of facial animations. You feel the dev's love for this era, assuming you're at least somewhat acquainted.
Though, it feels like so much time was put into paying homage to Sega's last console that they forgot to make a game. The core gameplay is skating around town tagging walls and running trick combos. Very JSR. And while the graffiti system is pretty cool, allowing you to give motion inputs for each tag, the actual trick/combo system is incredibly shallow. 3 face buttons are tied to their own trick, and that trick only changes when you're jumping or time it with the boost button. There's some depth. But when it comes down to it, and you're facing off for score (and once you get told your multiplier goes up by leaning into rails), the meta is to grind around the map and mash every face button. Say I've been jaded from Skate 3, but it gets old fast, and there really isn't any kind of combo exploration.
Same goes for the different equipment. The skateboard operates the same as the inlines which operate the same as the BMX. The game feels no different on either and which you use is purely up to preference. You'd expect some areas to be accessible only by using one of the types or something, but there isn't. They're just there to give some illusion of variety. While I understand this is an indie game and only so much can be done, it shouldn't be much to expect some kind of ride-specific interaction. Though, they do toy with the idea of characters offering some form of special interaction, but never actually go through with it, only using it to tell you that you can swap between Writers.
The "combat" is equally shallow, offering even less variety, telling you to just mash one button 2-7 times. It's aggravatingly boring, making every time you gain heat an annoying occurrence. Despite that, the enemy variety is pretty good, and despite the lacking combat, the boss fights are pretty fun. The combat is serviceable in each boss setting, but in the open world it feels very out of place and just an afterthought. This is probably due to the fact the bosses require you trick and attack, while regular combat doesn't really allow you to use the trick system in tandem. Had BRC let you use tricks as attacks or let you seamlessly use both in standard combat, maybe it'd be more enjoyable. It doesn't, though, simply breaking the flow of the game.
The story itself is fine for a while. The setting, despite lack of background, is fun and the overall premise is interesting. Somewhere in the midpoint the game pulls out a series of twists that make the story far less interesting than its original premise, and the foreshadowing for the reveal is so heavy handed you kind of figure it out way before the game tells you. Lot of details are given that hold no real bearing on the story / are just forgotten about (like Felix's mask), and character motives get hard to fully understand. Without spoiling anything, had this game kept its initial premise and kept the roles each character was given as they were, I think the overall narrative would have been much more interesting. The twist exists to try and give the game something to say, and it feels so forced that it doesn't really achieve anything.
BRC is probably close enough to JSR that it achieves what it wants to, which is to be a JSR successor, so if that's really what you care about, you'll probably have a fine time. Otherwise, it's a very room temperature title hidden behind a really pristine coat of paint.
There's this running joke with my industry friends about forcing a handful of artists to make a game and being given the best-looking walking sim you've ever seen. It's the most boring piece of shit ever, but damn, does it look good.
This is what BRC feels like. A really nice art demo. Sure, it has gameplay, and the writing is halfway decent, but it's all very shallow.
Before being a game BRC is first a tribute to Dreamcast era titles. It bleeds inspiration from Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure, and most evidently, Jet Set Radio. This adds to a lot of the charm of the game, be it the modern takes on JSR's style of music, the wacky character designs, and lack of facial animations. You feel the dev's love for this era, assuming you're at least somewhat acquainted.
Though, it feels like so much time was put into paying homage to Sega's last console that they forgot to make a game. The core gameplay is skating around town tagging walls and running trick combos. Very JSR. And while the graffiti system is pretty cool, allowing you to give motion inputs for each tag, the actual trick/combo system is incredibly shallow. 3 face buttons are tied to their own trick, and that trick only changes when you're jumping or time it with the boost button. There's some depth. But when it comes down to it, and you're facing off for score (and once you get told your multiplier goes up by leaning into rails), the meta is to grind around the map and mash every face button. Say I've been jaded from Skate 3, but it gets old fast, and there really isn't any kind of combo exploration.
Same goes for the different equipment. The skateboard operates the same as the inlines which operate the same as the BMX. The game feels no different on either and which you use is purely up to preference. You'd expect some areas to be accessible only by using one of the types or something, but there isn't. They're just there to give some illusion of variety. While I understand this is an indie game and only so much can be done, it shouldn't be much to expect some kind of ride-specific interaction. Though, they do toy with the idea of characters offering some form of special interaction, but never actually go through with it, only using it to tell you that you can swap between Writers.
The "combat" is equally shallow, offering even less variety, telling you to just mash one button 2-7 times. It's aggravatingly boring, making every time you gain heat an annoying occurrence. Despite that, the enemy variety is pretty good, and despite the lacking combat, the boss fights are pretty fun. The combat is serviceable in each boss setting, but in the open world it feels very out of place and just an afterthought. This is probably due to the fact the bosses require you trick and attack, while regular combat doesn't really allow you to use the trick system in tandem. Had BRC let you use tricks as attacks or let you seamlessly use both in standard combat, maybe it'd be more enjoyable. It doesn't, though, simply breaking the flow of the game.
The story itself is fine for a while. The setting, despite lack of background, is fun and the overall premise is interesting. Somewhere in the midpoint the game pulls out a series of twists that make the story far less interesting than its original premise, and the foreshadowing for the reveal is so heavy handed you kind of figure it out way before the game tells you. Lot of details are given that hold no real bearing on the story / are just forgotten about (like Felix's mask), and character motives get hard to fully understand. Without spoiling anything, had this game kept its initial premise and kept the roles each character was given as they were, I think the overall narrative would have been much more interesting. The twist exists to try and give the game something to say, and it feels so forced that it doesn't really achieve anything.
BRC is probably close enough to JSR that it achieves what it wants to, which is to be a JSR successor, so if that's really what you care about, you'll probably have a fine time. Otherwise, it's a very room temperature title hidden behind a really pristine coat of paint.
7 days ago
ashbolt
finished
Bomb Rush Cyberfunk
If you play videogames with nothing but your eyes and ears you'll probably really like Bomb Rush Cyberfunk. If not, you'll probably find yourself amused for first half of the game.
There's this running joke with my industry friends about forcing a handful of artists to make a game and being given the best-looking walking sim you've ever seen. It's the most boring piece of shit ever, but damn, does it look good.
This is what BRC feels like. A really nice art demo. Sure, it has gameplay, and the writing is halfway decent, but it's all very shallow.
Before being a game BRC is first a tribute to Dreamcast era titles. It bleeds inspiration from Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure, and most evidently, Jet Set Radio. This adds to a lot of the charm of the game, be it the modern takes on JSR's style of music, the wacky character designs, and lack of facial animations. You feel the dev's love for this era, assuming you're at least somewhat acquainted.
Though, it feels like so much time was put into paying homage to Sega's last console that they forgot to make a game. The core gameplay is skating around town tagging walls and running trick combos. Very JSR. And while the graffiti system is pretty cool, allowing you to give motion inputs for each tag, the actual trick/combo system is incredibly shallow. 3 face buttons are tied to their own trick, and that trick only changes when you're jumping or time it with the boost button. There's some depth. But when it comes down to it, and you're facing off for score (and once you get told your multiplier goes up by leaning into rails), the meta is to grind around the map and mash every face button. Say I've been jaded from Skate 3, but it gets old fast, and there really isn't any kind of combo exploration.
Same goes for the different equipment. The skateboard operates the same as the inlines which operate the same as the BMX. The game feels no different on either and which you use is purely up to preference. You'd expect some areas to be accessible only by using one of the types or something, but there isn't. They're just there to give some illusion of variety. While I understand this is an indie game and only so much can be done, it shouldn't be much to expect some kind of ride-specific interaction. Though, they do toy with the idea of characters offering some form of special interaction, but never actually go through with it, only using it to tell you that you can swap between Writers.
The "combat" is equally shallow, offering even less variety, telling you to just mash one button 2-7 times. It's aggravatingly boring, making every time you gain heat an annoying occurrence. Despite that, the enemy variety is pretty good, and despite the lacking combat, the boss fights are pretty fun. The combat is serviceable in each boss setting, but in the open world it feels very out of place and just an afterthought. This is probably due to the fact the bosses require you trick and attack, while regular combat doesn't really allow you to use the trick system in tandem. Had BRC let you use tricks as attacks or let you seamlessly use both in standard combat, maybe it'd be more enjoyable. It doesn't, though, simply breaking the flow of the game.
The story itself is fine for a while. The setting, despite lack of background, is fun and the overall premise is interesting. Somewhere in the midpoint the game pulls out a series of twists that make the story far less interesting than its original premise, and the foreshadowing for the reveal is so heavy handed you kind of figure it out way before the game tells you. Lot of details are given that hold no real bearing on the story / are just forgotten about (like Felix's mask), and character motives get hard to fully understand. Without spoiling anything, had this game kept its initial premise and kept the roles each character was given as they were, I think the overall narrative would have been much more interesting. The twist exists to try and give the game something to say, and it feels so forced that it doesn't really achieve anything.
BRC is probably close enough to JSR that it achieves what it wants to, which is to be a JSR successor, so if that's really what you care about, you'll probably have a fine time. Otherwise, it's a very room temperature title hidden behind a really pristine coat of paint.
There's this running joke with my industry friends about forcing a handful of artists to make a game and being given the best-looking walking sim you've ever seen. It's the most boring piece of shit ever, but damn, does it look good.
This is what BRC feels like. A really nice art demo. Sure, it has gameplay, and the writing is halfway decent, but it's all very shallow.
Before being a game BRC is first a tribute to Dreamcast era titles. It bleeds inspiration from Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure, and most evidently, Jet Set Radio. This adds to a lot of the charm of the game, be it the modern takes on JSR's style of music, the wacky character designs, and lack of facial animations. You feel the dev's love for this era, assuming you're at least somewhat acquainted.
Though, it feels like so much time was put into paying homage to Sega's last console that they forgot to make a game. The core gameplay is skating around town tagging walls and running trick combos. Very JSR. And while the graffiti system is pretty cool, allowing you to give motion inputs for each tag, the actual trick/combo system is incredibly shallow. 3 face buttons are tied to their own trick, and that trick only changes when you're jumping or time it with the boost button. There's some depth. But when it comes down to it, and you're facing off for score (and once you get told your multiplier goes up by leaning into rails), the meta is to grind around the map and mash every face button. Say I've been jaded from Skate 3, but it gets old fast, and there really isn't any kind of combo exploration.
Same goes for the different equipment. The skateboard operates the same as the inlines which operate the same as the BMX. The game feels no different on either and which you use is purely up to preference. You'd expect some areas to be accessible only by using one of the types or something, but there isn't. They're just there to give some illusion of variety. While I understand this is an indie game and only so much can be done, it shouldn't be much to expect some kind of ride-specific interaction. Though, they do toy with the idea of characters offering some form of special interaction, but never actually go through with it, only using it to tell you that you can swap between Writers.
The "combat" is equally shallow, offering even less variety, telling you to just mash one button 2-7 times. It's aggravatingly boring, making every time you gain heat an annoying occurrence. Despite that, the enemy variety is pretty good, and despite the lacking combat, the boss fights are pretty fun. The combat is serviceable in each boss setting, but in the open world it feels very out of place and just an afterthought. This is probably due to the fact the bosses require you trick and attack, while regular combat doesn't really allow you to use the trick system in tandem. Had BRC let you use tricks as attacks or let you seamlessly use both in standard combat, maybe it'd be more enjoyable. It doesn't, though, simply breaking the flow of the game.
The story itself is fine for a while. The setting, despite lack of background, is fun and the overall premise is interesting. Somewhere in the midpoint the game pulls out a series of twists that make the story far less interesting than its original premise, and the foreshadowing for the reveal is so heavy handed you kind of figure it out way before the game tells you. Lot of details are given that hold no real bearing on the story / are just forgotten about (like Felix's mask), and character motives get hard to fully understand. Without spoiling anything, had this game kept its initial premise and kept the roles each character was given as they were, I think the overall narrative would have been much more interesting. The twist exists to try and give the game something to say, and it feels so forced that it doesn't really achieve anything.
BRC is probably close enough to JSR that it achieves what it wants to, which is to be a JSR successor, so if that's really what you care about, you'll probably have a fine time. Otherwise, it's a very room temperature title hidden behind a really pristine coat of paint.
10 days ago