In this episode of Interactive Friction, we hit the best part of game… after we go through Citra’s bullshit.
It truly is a shame that we had to go through this really shitty dream sequence before we have to experience some of the best this game offers in terms of storytelling. It is a boss battle that lasts about twice as long as it needs to. On top of that, it is easy to figure out and not particular fun to fight.
Then, it’s followed by one of the most uncomfortable “sex” scenes I can remember. Citra really creeps me out in this scene, and I’m not sure if that’s intentional or just me being prudish or something else.
But after that, we finally get to the best part. Vaas, the best part of this game, goes out in a blaze of glory. The little hallucinations they give you right before Vaas’s final scene are a really, really nice touch of subtly in story telling. Even before that, the whole scene has Vaas just pointing out the absurdity of one lone, rich, white boy taking on a literal army of pirates and their commander. In this one mission, we have a lot of small things coming together.
Not only does it represent the end of the best character in the game, but also the true transition of Jason Dilweed from a rich, white, douchebag to a rich, white, monstrous douchebag. His friends no longer matter, only the bloodlust. Again, there is potential. Must could have been done with these ideas, but that’s the story of Far Cry 3. Far Cry 3 is a host of things that “had potential” and “could have done”s. In the end, what is an Ubisoft game, but a miserable little pile of unused potentials.
Sam could not make it to this week’s recording because his job had left him physically exhausted that weekend. As a result, this is a bit of a shorter cast than usual.
Also, we had no viewer questions this week. If you have a question, comment, or anything else you want to be read on the air, please e-mail us at thetexturepop@gmail.com. We’ll be happy to read what you send, within reason.
0:01:20 Gaming News Persona 5 Teaser Trailer I really wish Sam was here for the Persona 5 conversation. Chris and Garrett are great conversationalist, but they don’t care as much about Persona 5 as Sam and I do, so it would’ve easier to have a conversation with him around. One thing I want to note is that there was a Final Fantasy XV trailer that also came out this same week. In comparison, the Persona 5 trailer looks so much better. It’s not surprising, but it is indicative of the obvious transition to from Square-Enix to ATLUS as King of JRPGS.
Nintendo’s new revenue-sharing program I do want to make a correction of a mistake I made in this video. Nintendo takes 30%. The video maker takes the remaining 70% of YouTube revenue. That’s still really pointlessly mean, but less so than I made it out to be in this segment. Still, the fact that they want any piece of that pie is a really bad precedent to establish. It speaks to the bad part of Nintendo’s decidedly older paradigm when it comes to video games. They make good consoles and good games, but there’s no excuse for this ignorance of the online space. There’s still one thing we didn’t mention is that Nintendo will only allow content from a pre-approved list of games. If you want to do a video on Smash Bros, Nintendo does not care about you. It’s shocking how backwards this line of thinking is, and I hope it bites them in the ass.
0:22:30 Garrett lists everything he did in rapid-fire (and I can’t keep up) Yeah.
0:26:30 Garrett discusses game ideas he has from his Game Design class. “Iron Aurora” copyright 2015 to Garrett Glazewski.
0:34:30 I have been playing Final Fantasy VI You’re probably getting sick of hearing me say this, but I have an article on the game in the works, so I want to keep my discussion of it hear to an absolute minimum. I have a large queue, I know, but please bear with me. Still, we had a great discussion of the game here. I had a blast playing and I easily see why so many people love it. I do love how Chris gets to be the “modern Final Fantasy sucks” guy, since he’s the oldest.
0:57:25 Chris plays Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel (because of DLC). It’s Borderbutts. If you like Borderbutts, you probably already own it.
1:07:10 Chris played more Hyrule Warriors (because of DLC) And I’ve got nothing to add, unfortunately.
1:11:00 Chris played Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z Y’know, I’ve never been a fan of the Ninja Gaiden franchise. Having said that, I’m impressed at how bad Chris’s descriptions and examples make this game sound. I really can’t envision myself having much fun with it.
1:28:00 Wrapping Up Interactive Friction is here. My inFamous: First Light article is here.
Addendum: After the podcast was released, Sam had a chance to write his own opinions out, since he missed the recording. You can find that article here.
Now that all the filler is out of the way, Sam and I are free to finish the best part of the game, before moving on to the worst part of the game.
We have a pretty lengthy discussion on PMCs in video games. Without delving too much into politics, I think it would be difficult, but not impossible to tell a story involving a PMC without that organization being secretly evil. There is a very good reason why PMCs are generally frowned upon in polite company. I’d be interested in seeing developers try that, but one cannot deny that there’s a huge risk in doing so.
Another topic we talk about is game endings. One of the things that I have noticed, particularly in the last generation of gaming, is that a lot of games tended to end a lot later than probably should have. I truly think that ending the game at the point before Jason even gets the chance to confront Hoyt would have been a lot better. Not only is that last half (or third) of the game a massive drag, but Jason dying as a result of his falling into madness is an extremely appropriate end to his character arc. As we mentioned in the episode, Bioshock suffered a similar problem after the grand reveal.
We said that this part is the high-point of the story. We’re actually a little wrong. It’s not this episode that serves as the strongest part of the plot, but the next episode. It actually makes use of some more subtle writing and use of metaphor to convey the overall point of the story. But we’ll get to that next time.
One of the things I was told pretty regularly before I finished inFamous: Second Son was that getting the First Light expansion was worth it. Since it was a standalone DLC akin to that of Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, this was something that people told me to play without even touching the main game. Because it was free on PlayStation Plus, I took the opportunity to play it after finishing Second Son. First Light, especially when compared to Second Son, is quite interesting to look at. This is because it is in a very unique position with regards to the franchise, which I will detail this week. Hopefully, First Light shows Sucker Punch a new direction they can take the franchise, to help alleviate some of the more common criticisms from both myself and other critics.
Released in August of 2014, First Light tells the story of Abigail “Fetch” Walker, the conduit Delsin takes his Neon powers from in Second Son. It shows how, after coming to Seattle, she finds herself embroiled in gang politics, narcotics dealing, and the DUP. Not only is her capture and transfer to DUP custody explained, but also her descent into anger and rage, resulting in the Fetch seen in Second Son.
The very first thing I noticed while playing First Light is that it is the very first game in the inFamous franchise that did not make use of the Good/Evil karma system seen in every other inFamous title to date. In fact, no morality system exists in this game. This does wonders for the story. Since Fetch has to become the character from Second Son, she cannot take a different path. Secure in the knowledge that the plot only has one possible outcome, the writers are free to delve deeper into the character and why she is making the choices she makes. Fetch is totally free to express her inner thoughts, take stances of her own, and define herself as a character.
Previous inFamous protagonists did not get that same freedom. Because the player could choose between being completely Good or completely Evil, the writers had to take both possibilities into account when writing dialog. The protagonist’s dialog had to make sense for both a saint and a devil, with the exception of scenes that take place immediately after a karmic choice. In a sense, they served more as ciphers for the player than actual characters. Because of this, they could not take strong moral stances on anything, because the possibility existed that they would not take the path which they were advocating. Since Fetch can take moral stands, and form opinions of others, it makes her that much more strongly characterized as a result.
The other positive about removing the karma system is that is eliminates this need to allow players to choose between two overly extreme story choices. As I have talkedaboutin the past, inFamous’s karma system often makes the player make decisions between normal person or cartoon villain. Second Son had the opposite problem where choices felt far too similar on both sides in some instances. When these get removed, the writing becomes stronger just by virtue of not taking the player out of the experience with these inherently meaningless choices.
Another way in which First Light differentiates itself from Second Son is in the way powers develop. In Second Son, there were four different power sets that all played the same, but had different properties, because Delsin could use multiple powers. Fetch only has Neon powers, much like Cole in the original games only had electricity. Instead of having one template in which multiple powers are used, Fetch has one skillset which gets augmented gradually, over the course of the expansion. As a result, the sense of progression is a bit more pronounced.
What is more important to our conversation is how these powers can be upgraded over the course of the game. In both games, players need to gather some form of collectible. Delsin had to collect Blast Shards in Second Son and Fetch was required to gather Neon “Lumens” in First Light. For certain upgrades, Delsin also had to acquire a specific karma-level, either Good or Evil, to earn the right to purchase them. For example, only an Evil Delsin can upgrade his grenades to have a larger explosive range, while only good characters can heal themselves by subduing enemies without killing them. On the other hand, Fetch only needs to unlock the base power to purchase upgrades for it. Some can only be gained after beating the game, but without karma blocking off development, Fetch develops much more organically.
Overall, the removal of the karma system afforded First Light a number of opportunities not granted to other inFamous games. I know, deep down, that this is because it is only a $15 DLC, much like the Festival of Blood on the PS3. However, it still reveals that the franchise has been held back for a long time by what initially seemed like a necessity. At the time of the first inFamous, moral-choice systems were all the rage. Now, in an era full of choice-based games like those from Telltale, they seem very weak. Perhaps it is time to consider a change of pace for the series, now that we know it can work without such mechanics.
In this episode, we finally complete the pointless filler missions, and get back to Jason being a complete tool.
It sure is convenient that good ol’ Bambi decided to betray us in this section. Otherwise, we would not have been able to give it to Citra to actually progress the story in some way. Actually, that might have been an interesting opportunity. After getting Bambi’s dagger for him, another mission or two to either take it from him or convince him to hand it over to us.
Alternatively, we could left the island and not given a shit because we essentially completely our main objective of getting all of our friends back and get off the island. Riley (to our knowledge) is dead, so we have every living party member with us. By all rights, we should be gone.
However, Jason does not want to leave. He suddenly decided that he wants revenge. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that. Unfortunately, there’s no real lead in to his decision. A scene or two of him talking with Liza, or hell even Citra, about taking revenge and/or killing Vaas/Hoyt, As it stands, it takes less than 5 minutes for him to go from “My brother is dead.” to “Let’s kill some folks.” If that was just what put him over the edge, and he was already contemplating it, that would be one fine. It’s just, they could have done some form of foreshadowing.
Back to the topic of Buck, it really doesn’t make sense for him, to betray us. What exactly does he hope to gain? It’s not like he was particularly happy to keep Keith, and he knew we were pretty good at wasting pirates. It just seems like an unnecessary risk, and any future business transactions he undertakes of this nature will be compromised, because the other party has no reason to trust him.
There’s only so much stupid that a plot can hold before I start to wonder whether or not the editors are as high as our friend Oliver seems to be. I’m just not sure how it came to this.
And the whole group is back together again. Further, Garrett’s friend Tyler stopped by to join us for most of the cast.
We tried to do something new by having all of us record our audio on Audacity. However, it fell through. We’re going to try it again next week in an effort to improve the listener experience, so don’t lose hope.
0:01:30 Viewer Questions Adonisus’s podcast is here, for those who are curious.
“Do you think that an AO game has any commercial viability?” Honestly, there is a small, but potential market for an AO game. As much as I dislike Hatred, as an example, I believe that it can do well. Retailers will not waste their time with AO games, for two reasons. First, there is not a big enough market. Secondly, they tend to present a family-friendly environment, which those games tend to detract from. That said, I imagine with all the publicity, sales from the designers website will, while no where near as good as a dedicated retail store, will likely be enough to make a profit. In that sense, it could be commercially viable in those terms. So, while it is not a big market, it does exist.
“What do you guys think of the news that Marvel intends to reboot their universe after the Secret Wars event?” I am glad Chris is here to answer this question, because he knows so much more about comics than I do. In general though, I am of the attitude that I am okay with whatever changes a developer wants to do, so long as the character can still be recognized as the character. We can only determine how good and bad changes are after they’ve been implemented.
0:17:13 Gaming News The Elder Scrolls Online goes Buy-To-Play I think this will attract more people to the game, since the barrier of entry is lessened. However, I feel that the next logical step is truly Free-To-Play, and this won’t produce enough revenue to not go in this direction. The game is still fundamentally flawed, and the initial bad taste it left in the mouth of many players is still there. They could do well, but it needs to reclaim a lot of its lost good will.
In a broader sense, I am not convinced that subscription is the way to go for specific games anymore. For $15 a month, I could get either a Netflix or a GameFly account. Those are just significantly more robust forms of entertainment.
AOL is shutting down Joystiq The way it was handled is pretty fucked up, if you ask me. I hope the staff bounces back from that. Gaming journalism has accelerated in these past years. It used to take years for a publication to shut down, but now shut downs happen all the time.
0:34:00 Tyler played Dragon Age: Inquisition (because his save file was lost) I feel bad, because I would be pissed off if all of my saves and data just vanished like that. Defeated by a power surge. We then go into a somewhat random conversation about save features in remakes. Then we discuss Dragon Age 2 and Origins, because of course we do.
0:46:55 Tyler played a bit of Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2. He beat his old record in zombies. I can’t really say if that’s good or bad, because I’m terrible at those kinds of games.
0:48:10 Garrett installed a 2TB HDD in his computer. It’s a lot of memory. Even better, he has Windows 7 now, instead of Windows 8.
0:50:04 We talk about the Nationwide Super Bowl commercial. In hindsight (since I watched it after the podcast), I can see why people reacted as strongly as they did. However, that’s the entire point of the commercial. I actually thought it was really good.
0:51:50 Garrett played League of Legends With a new season, the rankings reset, so Garrett needs to get good again.
0:52:55 Garrett talks about his game design class with Tyler. The more I hear about GameMaker, the less I would ever want to use. I mostly just want to do the coding myself, so that I have more control over the final product. Coding isn’t as hard a people make it out to be. It mostly just takes practice, like any other discipline.
0:59:50 Garrett tried out to be a voice-actor in an animated video for the Zoophobia web-comic. ’nuff said.
1:02:30 Sam tried the new and improved Warframe Apparently it is a lot different than it was before.
1:05:00 Sam tricked convinced a co-worker to get Saya No Uta It’s again hard to comment on this without spoiling it, so we can’t get into a big conversation.
1:07:00 Sam bought and played a bit of Dying Light I initially was not terribly interested in getting Dying Light at first. Having seen a lot of it, I kinda want to get a copy of it now. It looks really interesting, and I’m a completely sucker for parkour-esque exploration in video games.
1:13:45 Sam played Forza Horizon 2. Yeah. Racing games…. It is really hard to talk about them. Also, talking about the show in the middle of recording.
1:19:25 Sam played Life is Strange: Episode 1 I do want to play this game, I really do. However, after playing all of those Telltale games, I am burnt out on the episodic model. I just want to wait for all the episodes to come out before I invest. If Dontnod releases episodes 2 through 5 in a timely manner, I might change my mind. Until then, I am keeping my wallet guarded. It’s also hard to talk about it because, like any episodic game, we cannot determine its quality until after every episode has been released.
That said, what I have heard about Life is Strange is promising. It is also really interesting to note how rare it is for games to take place in the modern world, without any sort of catastrophe or twist. It’s just our world.
1:29:55 I finished Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls I don’t have much more to add here in the shownotes. In the coming weeks, I will release an article on my experiences with the game.
But it’s worth talking about the challenges of moving an inherently PC game to a console. It’s easier said than done.
1:38:25 I played and beat the first Bayonetta I suck at this genre, but I loved playing the game. It’s nice to play something that doesn’t take itself too seriously. On top of that, it’s very visually appealing.
1:42:45 I just finished Dead Space 2. Like with Diablo 3, my article for it is coming. But the conversation we had on it was a good one.
In general though, it is a significantly, noticeably better game than Dead Space 3, to the point where I actively wonder what the hell happened between the two games.
1:52:40 I went with some friends to see The Imitation Game. As a Computer Science major, this was a very interesting movie because it was basically a biopic of the guy who invented my entire discipline. On top of that, it’s a very good dramatic movie. This is one of the most unknown, yet interesting people in recent human history. I had a great time and would easily recommend a lot of fun watching it.
1:56:26 Chris did not play Assassin’s Creed 3, and instead played Assassin’s Creed: Liberation HD. Aveline is such a good character, and the game is so much better paced. It really should have been the one Ubisoft focused more on. Definitely get it over Assassin’s Creed 3, as it’s much better in almost every way, especially with the stuff they added to the original Vita version.
There are ideas in Liberation, like Aveline’s multiple disguises, that deserve to be revisited in other games in the franchise. There’s a lot that mechanic could be used for. I’m also not kidding when I say that Aveline is the most interesting protagonist in the Assassin’s Creed franchise. Her background is interesting and I wish she was used more frequently.
I also find it amusing that Chris is having a bit of a “Season of Assassin’s Creed” in a way that I had my “Season of ATLUS” a few months back. It’s good that he’s taking a hiatus for now.
2:15:45 Wrapping Up My inFamous: Second Son article is here. Sam’s Life is Strange article is here. Sam’s videos are here and here. Interactive Friction is still a thing. A new episode went up. Adonisus’s podcast is, once again, here.
You’re probably wondering, “Why did Google lead me here!?” Those of you not wondering that are probably asking “Why is this so damn late!?”
Well, we forgot to record last week. Sam and I thought we had a backlog of episodes to go through. As it turns out, we did not. So, we got together on Monday (which is when this should have been posted), to record a new batch of episodes before we got too far down the hole.
I’m also not entirely sure what happened to my audio during this recording session.
Anyway, this episode has more filler missions.
Do you know how every Let’s Play series will inevitably have that one episode where nothing substantial happens, and as a result the commentary feels a lot like repeated what was previously said.
This was that episode.
What I want to talk about instead is the way that writing about games fundamentally alters the way people like Sam and I play them, since it came up in our discussion. Before I started doing stuff like this, I would just go through games and think “Oh, I liked that.” or “Oh, that was bad.” What changes when you start making this kind of content is that you instead beginning to think less about what emotions you feel as you play (which are easy to discern). Instead, the focus shifts to why the game elicits those reactions from you. That, to me, is what distinguishes a critic from a more, and I hate to use this word, “casual” consumer of video games.
Anyone can do it, it’s just a matter of actively trying to shift one’s mode of thinking. There’s nothing inherently special about people who criticize media beyond their willingness to just go out and do it, especially in this day and age.
The inFamous franchise has always been a popular one for owners of the PlayStation 3. Developed by Sucker Punch, the creators of the Sly Cooper franchise, inFamous used many common superhero tropes to create its own universe and world. Both of the games on the PS3 followed protagonist Cole McGrath, also known as “The Electric Man” and “The Demon of Empire City,” and his desire to grow and develop his powers in preparation to face “The Beast”. Those who played those games know that his story, in either of the second entry’s two possible endings, comes to a very definitive end. Of course, that did not stop the creation of a new entry in the franchise for Sony’s relatively new PS4. This sequel, inFamous: Second Son, is the subject for this week’s article.
InFamous: Second Son is an interesting game, because it is one of the exclusive games that came out extremely early in the new console generation. As a result, it occupies this unfortunate space between superhero-sandbox game and PS4 tech demo. It also presented a large change in direction for the series in terms of tone. Though the game still feels very distinctly like an inFamous game, it seems like many of the best elements of that franchise were diluted somewhat. This all combines to create a game that, while satisfactory, does not quite live up to its predecessors.
But before we get into that, it is important to discuss the story of the inFamous franchise as a whole. In the world of inFamous, certain people are born with abilities that may or may not awaken. Referred to as “conduits”, these people, if their latent talents manifest, have fast healing, enhanced physical prowess, and the power to channel a particular material. This material can be anything in particular, even man-made. At the end of inFamous, the protagonist, in the canonical Good Ending, sacrifices his life and the lives of all conduits in order to save all normal people from a terrible, and highly lethal, plague.
Second Son takes place after this event. As it turns out, not all conduits were killed, only most of them. After these random people began to manifest all sorts of strange and powerful new abilities, governments began to fear them. Later on, the United States government began to take steps to fight against these “bio-terrorists.” As a result, the Department of Unified Protection (DUP) is formed. Headed by a concrete-wielding conduit named Brooke Augustine, and armed with technology to detect and combat conduits, the DUP have absolute authority to imprison or eliminate anyone who possesses the conduit-gene.
This is a remarkable change in tone from previous inFamous games. The PS3 titles were very comic book-inspired. It was mostly about people with superpowers going up against other people with superpowers. Second Son, on the other hand, is extremely heavy-handed with its political commentary. Allegories to the modern-war War on Terror are overt, obvious, and all over the place. Furthermore, these concepts are linked together by imagery of the police state, like an Edward Snowden-inspired social commentary. While I am not against politics in video game, in fact I often encourage it, the game seems almost afraid that the player will not understand the message they are attempting to make. I strongly feel that it would have better for Sucker Punch to be more subtle with the way they introduce and comment on these issues. Social commentary is far more likely to make a lasting impact when it does not sound, to the audience, preach-y.
Of course, being an inFamous game, the karma system makes a return. As the game progresses, players are given good and/or evil karma based on how they play, what they do, and what decisions they make in the story. Starting at neutral, Delsin Rowe will shift, over time, towards either a Good or an Evil alignment as karma is accumulated. Though the plot will follow the same rough path regardless of these choices, events will be altered to reflect karmic alignment. Further, certain upgrades to the player’s powers will be either unlocked or blocked off depending on which side of the spectrum Delsin stands on. This is nothing new, and behaves much like it did back in the old inFamous games.
For a couple of years, I have been a major critic of this karma system. Back then, these choices were always between childishly-binary extremes. For example, in the original inFamous, one of the moral choices is to decide whether to inform someone that their wife died so that they will let allow the protagonist to advance, or to just kill them to get them out of the way. In the immortal words of Yahtzee Croshaw in his Bioshock review, back when these systems were more commonplace, “You can choose to be either Mother Teresa or a baby-eater, with no apparent middle ground.”
Some of the choices present in inFamous: Second Son still have this degree of cartoonish morality. On the other hand, many of the decisions that affect moral standing do not really seem to be all that different from each other. In a few scenes, Delsin comes into contact with other people that have powers. When his brother, who is a police officer, attempts to bring them into custody for crimes they have committed, the protagonist is given a choice. He can free the conduit, setting them on the path to redemption for good karma. Alternatively, he can free the conduit, allowing them to run-free on society and show the world how strong they are for evil karma. In either case, the player makes the exact same action. However, the only difference is in the logical reason behind the action.
Fortunately, the game plays well. Like the PS3 inFamous games, it is mostly an open-world sandbox where the player is free to use their powers as they see fit. The city contains many side quests, which players can undertake in order to wrest the city of Seattle, Washington, where the game takes places, from the DUP, much like the territory side-quests from old games in the franchise. However, there does not seem to be as much as there was in those entries. In fact, the game feels a lot shorter. It can be beaten, 100%, in a single weekend. Some franchise fans might be put off by that. However, with my busy schedule, and the various side projects that I have going on, I appreciated the fact that the game was a bit more succinct.
Unlike Cole McGrath, Delsin Rowe is not an electrical-conduit. In fact, he channels a very unique material. He channels others conduit powers, with the ability to absorb and use as many abilities as he can find. The first power he acquires is Smoke, followed by Neon, Video, and lastly Concrete. Each power controls similarly, with different properties and upgrade paths keeping them apart. That seems like a missed opportunity, given that they could have made each power feel unique, and not just a small twist of familiar mechanics. The player can change these powers by absorbing the appropriate element, like smoke for smoke powers. I found myself more heavily relying on Neon, as that power allows one to run up walls and dash infinitely. Furthermore, neon signs are plentiful in the environment. Others may find more use from other powers, but I am willing to bet that most chose similarly, especially since Concrete does not become available until the game’s final boss fight.
As I said in the introduction, Second Son feels much like a tech demo. Specifically, the game makes used of the PS4 controller’s motion controls and touch pad in a way that strongly resembles the forced SIXAXIS integration seen in early PS3 games. Two large examples come to find. First and foremost is Delsin’s desire to tag walls with his spraypaint art. In a couple of optional missions, Delsin can find a suitable wall and make the choice to paint it with happy, blue art for good karma or angry, red art for evil karma. In either case, the player will have to tilt the control and move it around to paint the picture, using motion controls. I would personally rather just use the analog stick as this just felt cumbersome. I even experienced hand cramps from holding the controller sideways a few times.
The other example comes from the liberal use of the touch pad. Some of these uses are good. For example, context-sensitive actions are all mapped to pressing the touch-pad down as a button. This is simple, intuitive, and easy to understand. The more damning use fortunately only occurs one in the game. In order to pass through a DUP checkpoint, players will, early on in the game, need to use the touch pad to move their thumb into position so that a machine can take a blood sample and test Delsin for the conduit-gene. (Spoilers: He gets detected.) Again, it feels forced and does not really work as well as the designer intended. It took me a few minutes to figure out how the mechanic worked, and it only occurs exactly one time. Aside from that one time, players will never need to use it to get through any content, mandatory or otherwise. In these respects, it feels like a tech demo, despite being an otherwise solid game.
As a fan of the inFamous franchise, I cannot help but be disappointed by Second Son. Though developed by the same people, and in some respects improving upon the controls of the PS3 games, many parts of this game feel forced. The story heavy-handedly attaches social commentary to a setting that makes it seem weird and out-of-place. Portions of the gameplay are very gimmicky, strongly resembling that of a tech demo, and not a real interactive experience. Lastly, the game seems unsure of itself when reusing the moral choice system of its predecessors. Fortunately, it does enough right to justify playing it at a discounted price. It is not a bad game, it just does not live up to what I come to expect from Sucker Punch. It is a good game to get for someone who already has a PS4, but not worth getting a new console for.
In this episode, we dive headlong into a vat of terrible, terrible filler. Naturally, this makes us spend almost an entire episode talking about Final Fantasy.
I want to stress that there is nothing inherently wrong with these missions in terms of gameplay. They are actually very fun to playthrough. Everyone wants to be Indiana Jones, after all.
The problem is that they just do not fit into the story. So far, Jason has been established as being someone who is willing to kill or cripple anyone who gets in the way of his friends. Every time he acts out of line in this section, Buck (and I had to Google that name) calls up his cronies and asks them to torture our friend Keith. So, Jason would probably have shot Buck stupid and forced him to lead him to Keith. It’s hard to argue that Jason wouldn’t, since murderous rage is the entirety of his character arc.
It’s also difficult to justify how Buck didn’t get the dagger by now. He works for Hoyt, the soon to-be-revealed main bad guy. It should be simple to get his men, which he apparently has if he can call them up to torture Keith, to get this dagger for him. Barring that, Hoyt has an army of disposable pirates that are fully-capable of doing the job. Really, it just shows incompetence on Buck’s part.
Which is why this segment of the game feels so poorly justified. Not only does Jason not have a compelling enough reason to take this quest in lieu of more direct options, but Buck also doesn’t have a compelling reason to outsource this quest to Jason. Also, remember that we needed this dagger to get Citra to help us find our friends, which we will have once we finish this quest.
It’s a huge mess, probably better left cut out of the campaign.
This is the part where the game artificially pads itself out by adding missions to the main story that do nothing to advance the plot.
There really is no other reason to have Oliver’s rescue by a sniper section aside from the designers making it so. Honestly, what I suspect happened is that the designers had already created this segment, and the writers had to find some way to tie it into the rest of the plot. Sometimes, that style produces gems like Uncharted 2. More often than not, it creates segments like this.
It doesn’t help that the Sniper Rifle you get in this section is one of the worst weapons in the game. Even the basic sniper rifle is more accurate that the one you receive in this mission. I’m not sure why they did that either.
As for the topic of Jason Dilweed’s friends, it’s so sad that they have a lot of personality in their backstory, but that never comes up in the main plot. It’s such a wasted opportunity. The writers could have used those details to give us some attachment to them. Then, when Jason begins his descent into madness, they could contrast with Jason’s new personality, to further highlight how far down Jason stoops. That would’ve been so interesting, but they didn’t do that. That’s the problem with this game. The writers missed so many great opportunities.
