The Last Of Us Review

A couple of things before we start. First of all I was a victim of the dreaded "auto save" glitch which destroyed my experience about 8 hours in so I wasn't able to finish the game. So in depth talk about the storyline will be kept to a minimum because I didn't see the end of it and I'm currently too blinded with rage to care.

Secondly, The Last of Us is good. Let's get that out of the way to put this review in context, what it isn't though is a shining example of videogame storytelling or game design. It's alright, it does what it does and for the most part does it well, and the absolute landslide of other reviews proclaiming it to be "near perfect" and "one of the best games ever made" are nothing short of ridiculous and hyperbolic.

As you could probably guess from the fact that it's a piece of entertainment that was released in the 21st century The Last of Us is all about zombies. It's kind of difficult to tell whether it's blatantly ripping a lot of things off or if zombie fiction has blurred into one huge singularity and it's just impossible to tell one from another these days. There's not really any surprises here, humanity has been severely ballsed up by a virus, the military is keeping the survivors quarantined but they're kind of being dicks about it and there's a outsider cult who don't appreciate the "being dicks" part and therefore pledge to outdick the military in the name of their own survival.

You play as Joel Notsureiftheyevermentionhislastname, a jaded outlaw who is a bit miffed at the world in general after his daughter got infected with a severe case of dead right at the start of the outbreak. Circumstances are sure that he ends up escorting a girl named Ellie through the ruins of civilisation and long story short she might be the only hope of finding a cure. The writing is fine, the setting is well established, the characters motivations are decently explained and the dialogue is up to usual Naughty Dog standards in the sense that it's inoffensively generic. The Last of Us could indeed be a movie, not a very good movie mind, but hey if it would get 2 and a half stars at the Box Office then apparently we should all put it on a pedestal as a marvel of video game storytelling.

There's a lot of issues with the mix of storytelling and gameplay that take away the effectiveness of both, which ultimately is my main problem with The Last of Us. The first two hours play like the most boring bits of Uncharted and The Walking Dead strung together as the game forces you to slowly pace through it's world and demand that you appreciate the quality of the environments the development game spent far too much time making. It really gets frustrating after a while, there's many times where you enter a brand new arena and want to run off into it to explore but the game pulls you back on a choke lead because it's time for TALKY TALKY STORY TIMES and your control is severely limited or you just bounce off a NPCs big fat arse.

While Joel isn't quite the psychopath Nathan Drake is, who murders people at mass for no reason other than they're trying to destroy and steal ancient ruins before he can, there's still a lot of unnecessary violence in the game. Joel is supposed to come off as someone who fights to survive and has no issue with getting mean sometimes, but about halfway through the game it does feel like the game is throwing encounters with large groups of random dudes for no reason other than the player is understandably getting bored. There's quite a few human encounters where you're made to clear out large groups of guys for no real reason, I guess it's trying to establish a cruel and dog eat dog world but in the survival context of the game wouldn't it make more sense to -avoid- encounters altogether?

Let me ask you this dear reader, how familiar does this scenario sound? You fall into a new room in a game, there's nothing in the room but some form of crate that you can push against a wall to leave the room. There's an awful lot of that sort of thing in The Last of Us, and this review officially makes the statement that this does not count as gameplay. It's not a puzzle, it's not challenging and it's only there to pad out play time. It's hard to argue that this is good design in any way when I'm introduced to a brand new beautiful looking environment, but I'm programmed to ignore everything around me but the big dirty stick on the ground because I know that's there for a "puzzle" and nothing else is important.

Several hours into my playthrough of Last of Us I was really disappointed. There's nothing inherently special about the game, like the vast majority of linear triple A titles for the most part it's a really pretty looking corridor sightseeing tour which moves at the writers pace not the players or the game designers. But then the game dragged me to a big huge arena with lots of enemies and allowed me to approach the situation from any angle I chose. These are the only bits of The Last of Us that truly live up to the hype, there's no regenerating health so you don't want to take damage which makes every hit matter so running in guns blazing is almost never an option. These bits are just fun, they're tense and they actually engage...not that they're perfect either.

Melee combat is far too effective, there was one situation where I punched about six guys to death all in a row who all had guns so felt a bit silly afterwards. Enemy AI is absolutely pathetic, that might seem harsh but for a title of this magnitude in 2013 the fact that stealth and action encounters still have not evolved from "What was that noise!?" in Metal Gear Solid 1 in 1998 is ridiculous. Enemies can pretty much see you and forget about your existence within seconds, a lot of human characters had a bad habit of running directly into gunfire and are just general idiots. It's also frustrating that the game has a strong inventory and level up mechanic which rewards exploration to find supplies, but every time you clear out a huge arena and go exploring for goodies the game starts yelling at you to move to the next checkpoint because you're starting to hurt the scriptwriters feelings by WANTING TO PLAY A GAME.

You've probably noticed there's been a big gaping hole in this reviews commentary so far...why haven't I talked about the soundtrack yet? Well, on the one hand...OH WAIT ZOMBIES. Design wise they're quite impressive, the fresher looking ones withhold more human elements in their movements and their grunts and you get the feeling that there's still some human sanity in there struggling against the infection but they're far too gone. There's also the "clickers", the super creepy guys who are blind due to the infection giving them a nice fleshy burka and instead rely on hearing alone.

These guys are great for stealth sections as they instakill you if not approached properly and add to the tension in zombie based encounters. What they suck at though is other parts of the game, they are by far the most frustrating thing about The Last of Us. Using a pipe to clear out a bunch of regular zombie dudes only to have it break and then get murdered instantly by a clicker because you now can't do anything happens way more than you'd think and it's really bloody annoying. Especially since these guys don't instakill your AI partners, so eventually it occurs to you that the best strategy is to lead the clickers into your AI partners and then shoot them down while they're distracted which is kind of stupid if you think about it.

This is getting a bit long now so I'll wrap up. As said, The Last of Us is good....but what it's not is special. In basic design it's not really that different to other games on the market, and there's not many examples of writing and gameplay mixing in a way where the story grips you like the frankly superior Walking Dead game. It's good at what it does, but even then it has some bizarre technical issues, padded out sections and balance and gameplay design issues. This review is not here to destroy The Last Of Us for anyone, but basically a reminder to everyone to not gush over things so easily.

Even if you don't care about a lot of what this review has covered, is The Last of Us really the game you want to hold up on a pedestal as "perfect design" for all other games to copy? A game that scarifies gameplay for story and vice versa rather than find a happy marriage, and a game that for half its running time gives the player as little control as possible? Naughty Dog are the absolute best at this kind of game, but these aren't the best kind of games, so try to control yourself next time game journalists...yea?

E3 Rundown (about the stuff I care about)

Well E3 has come round again and this years showing was pretty much objectively more impressive than last years due to stuff actually happening.

Everyone has their own highlights that mean something to them whether it's positive or negative, and here's my rundown of what -I- care about, and therefore you should too. Obviously.

CONSOLES

After the Xbox Ones near comically awful announcement a few weeks ago the pressure was on Microsoft to show some actual games and remind people that it's ring binder of a console does actually play those. In fairness, they showed a lot even if it was mostly pre-rendered/live action trailers and got padded out with a few 360 games and non exclusives as well, but there was games there and that was a focus. Not that I'm even remotely interesting in buying one still though, paying £430 for the console equivalent of a moody cat that will only let you stroke it when it feels like it and only comes back to your house if you leave food out for it every day is not in my post graduate short term plans.

The PS4 showing for the most part was a little dull, I'm interesting in whatever Quantic Dreams and Media Molecule are working on but neither were formally announced so there's nothing exciting about that yet. None of the other games are getting me pumped, the new Killzone looks awful and other than the Abe's Oddysee HD remake which barely even counts there's nothing I would immediately buy based on the showing. The PS4 is also cheaper, more powerful and allows game sharing so it's already got a lot of ground over the Xbox. One big gap in the showing though was the lack of Vita titles, of which there are still barely any, they announced a few but if they want people to run out and pay £100 more for a Vita rather than a 3DS then they failed to build excitement.

The Wii U...really disappointing, none of the announcements were surprising and the half heartedness of the Mario 3D world and Mario Kart games is a big letdown. People were wondering were Mario was going to go next after Galaxy, and apparently the answer is nowhere because 3D World looks like a "best of" of the entire franchise so far than a brand new game....and some of the worst bits as well. Mario Kart 8 reminds me of a PS1 game I loved as a kid called Rollcage with it's "upside down" racing gimmick, but Rollcage limited this to high speed racing and tunnels whereas Mario Kart 8s plan is just to flip the entire track upside down to make control and direction more confusing. I'm not a Mario Kart guy anyway....but it looks kind of ass...

DEAD RISING 3

This gets my official "Best of E3 award", because it's showing was six minutes of mostly unedited gameplay footage which shows off the engine and gameplay. Dead Rising 2 is one of my favourite games of the current generation, it was an original take on sandbox gameplay which combined lots of zombie based dicking around with great exploration elements in finding weapon combos as well as offering a structured challenge which kept you on your toes throughout, as well as an actually good level up system which constantly encouraged you to enjoy the experience as much as possible for progress.

The new game seems to take everything I loved about Dead Rising 2, take away the whiny daughter character and the loading, increase the amount of zombies on screen at once and -claims- to have 100s of weapon combinations which you can make out of anything you find which makes the fun of the game even more organic and free flowing. My only concern is the setting is a bit too grim and dark, because the other really great thing about Dead Rising 2 was the fact it was really bloody stupid, and seeing these dumb characters in a dumb setting play out a dumb story entirely straight only added to the fun, the silliness looks to still be present in the violence and hopefully hasn't been toned down in the rest of the game too.

MIRRORS EDGE 2

WHY. Okay, some people liked Mirrors Edge 1 and it was an uncharacteristically experimental game by EA and in some ways I'm happy it exists. But on the other hand, making a sequel to it is bloody stupid. Even if you were able to oversee the big gaping flaws in the first game to see what it was going for, you have to agree that first person freerunning brings gameplay issues that other genres and perspectives overcame decades ago. The primal issue being not able to see your feet making gameplay extremely trial and error due to miss judged jumps and screwing up the most basic elements of movement possible. I'm glad the first game got released and EA tried, but in my opinion it's a dead end in game design and another example of style over substance so I don't really support a sequel. SORRY GUYS.

SUPER SMASH BROS 4

MEGA MAN IS IN IT OHAMAGHWAERD.

Plus it's made by Namco this time and might actually be a fighting game and not the pile of ass that Brawl was. I'm not the biggest Smashophile in the world but I'm looking forward to this.

YOSHI'S NEW ISLAND 

Well what can I say about this game other than it looks about as inspired as that title is. Is this all Nintendo have got now? To release a similar looking sequel to something else and stick a New, World, Land or console abbreviation in the name and call it a day?

A little public service announcement on this game, it looks like ass. I love Yoshis Island, quite possibly in my top ten games of all time but this looks putrid. The hand drawn cartoonish graphics have been replaced with hideous 3D sprites, with ropey animations at best complimented by mouldy looking colours, and the once smooth control is being replaced by...well...being on the 3DS which will mean a lot of swearing at the D-pad and cutting into the palm of your hand if you play it too long. My advice is avoid, and it's painful to say that.

And I guess that's it...

Overall, the games I'm excited for (which are few and far between right now) were pretty much all announced before E3 other than Dead Rising 3, and this years showing was basically a preview to a generation I don't feel invested in. Gaming, and especially AAA development gaming is becoming bloated and unsustainable and the last thing it needs is another petty console war to push things over the edge even more. I have no backing for any of the horses in the console race (although I wouldn't mind the Xbox One getting made into glue) but if you are a fanboy then I suggest you back your console of choice with all the energy and braindead bias support you can muster because you might not get another opportunity to do so.

Straight Edge does not mean "Dick Head"

This following is a letter I posted to the wall of one of the bigger Facebook "straight edge" pages. It is basically a detailing of my frustration with the community as a whole, and why I'm often embarrassed to be associated with it.

"A little introduction to this post, I recently turned 21, I’ve never smoked, I’ve never done any recreational drugs and I might have been drunk a couple of times as a kid due to special “Christmas Wine” privileges, but I’ve never chosen to drink. I just finished a three year Journalism course at University and didn’t touch a drop of alcohol in my time there. I will also point out that what I’m about to talk about doesn’t apply to everyone on this page, and from what I’ve seen that includes the admin(s), but it certainly appeals to way too fucking many of you.

My general point is; the attitude of a large amount of people on this page absolutely sucks.

I get it, non-drinkers are a distinct minority of modern western society (as low as 10%, and some polls claim it’s even lower than that) so if you are a non-drinker it can be an incredibly isolating feeling and I feel like that all the time. Not understanding or conforming to something that to most people is a basic part of a regular social life can make you feel different or weird in a negative way. And it is perfectly natural then for the sake of your own ego to come to the conclusion that this isn’t happening because you are different, but rather because everyone else is just stupid. I used to feel this way, but I grew out of it when I was about 15 due to not being a complete tard.

Unfortunately, a lot of “straight-edgers” don’t seem to grow out of this attitude and the sin of elitism flows through the veins of this community like hepatitis D….for douchebag. To someone visiting this page for the first time they could be forgiven for thinking “straight edge” isn’t a life choice but a fucking cult. I have seen people claim that others can’t be TRUE STRAIGHT EDGE because they don’t have tattoos, or listen to certain music, or have dared to *gasp* TRY weed at some point in their life.

It is flat out disturbing to see people on this page refer to each other as “brother” and talking about “breaking your commitment to straight edge”. I don’t consider any other human being who makes the life decision to not drink my “brother” in the same sense that I don’t consider people who run the shower before getting in my “brother”. I mean good for them, you don’t get cold water shrivelling up your nuts when you do it that way, but it’s not exactly something I bond with people on though.

As for “breaking your commitment”, my main question is “commitment to who?” The straight edge community? Surely that’s not what people mean as that would be flat out admitting that “straight edge” is a creepy cult for weirdos. All I can assume is that people mean the commitment you make to yourself. But why is this a taboo and awful thing to do? I’ve met me and I’m a complete dick, if anything it makes more sense to screw over that guy before he gets me first.  People can make whatever life choices they want, they can also make the decision to alter those choices when they wish to, isn’t the primal message to “do what you want”? Is it really hypocritical for someone who claims to be straight edge to want to TRY a bit of the other world? I wouldn’t do that because I just don’t have the interest, but I have no moral objection to it and I don’t understand why anyone else would either. No-one on this page should feel bad for not following the stupid arbitrary rules that some members try to establish, your life, your rules etc. etc.

The reason I’m bothering to write this and the reason why I’m disappointed in this community is because I feel like this page isn’t doing its job. As mentioned above, straight edgers and especially non-drinkers are a distinct minority in society and that does cause isolating feelings. The straight edge community should act as support for those people and a reminder that there are other people who are the same, and you can be happy despite in some ways being different to the majority. It should also help people “come of the teetotal closet” if you will and show them that it’s okay not to drink if they really don’t want to. And I fear that when people come to pages like this and see the elitist insecure dickweeds saying who can or can’t be in their special little club because of what’s on their skin, what they listen to or how much substance has been in them and how straight edge HAS to be a “life commitment”, these people will feel even more isolated or even weirder for their life choices.

I’ve just said goodbye to a lot of friends the past few weeks, I still have one really hard goodbye left to go and my dog could be dying, this is an important time for me to not feel socially incapable and entirely alone, and this page and other pages like it COULD be a helpful crutch, but for the most part they’re not.

So in conclusion, for those who are doing it, knock it off with the culty stuff about “commitments” and “creeds” and LIVING FOR THE XXXs BROTHER or whatever the fuck goes on here. You are not helping anyone and your obvious insecurity about your own life choice and personality blossoms beautifully for everyone to see and get a little depressed by. I hope the people who this post applies to stop being an embarrassment to the rest of us."

Silent Hill: Downpour (PS3) Review

Silent, Downpour, not, good, tries, fails, heugh. Sorry if that opening sentence was a little hard to read but unfortunately the sentence was developed for the PS3 so the framerate chugged a bit. Not that it’s a technically functional game on either system but when the PS3 version of Silent Hill Downpour  collapses to the point of a Powerpoint presentation because it can’t handle movement and loading a trophy at the same time it feels worthy of mentioning.

Poor technical performance might come off as an odd thing to mention in the first paragraph of a review too but frankly after playing it on the Playstation 3 that’s the strongest impression it leaves on your brain. It’s certainly stronger than any of the themes Downpour attempts to convey through its story and gameplay so looking at it retrospectively “Low Framerate” would actually be a more appropriate subtitle. 

Enough of that though, Silent Hill: Downpour is a continuation of the series all about America’s worst tourist town and also a continuation of Konami’s company policy to keep giving the Japanese horror franchise to Western developers so they miss the point. This time the game surrounds the story of Murphy Pendleton, a convict who has some kind of dark past and ends up lost in the town of Silent Hill so he can be confronted with it in a selection of increasingly stupid ways. Why “Downpour”? Because at the start of the game you stab a bloke in the showers, so it rains a lot in the town, this is apparently “theming”.

Once again, the big issue here is Downpour isn’t scary, at all. One of the major issues is the monster designs, there’s only about half the amount other Silent Hill games have provided and they’re all pathetic. Three of them are pretty much interchangeable, and all of them are just guys with gashed up mouths and faces, it’s a stretch to call them monsters at all really. Some of the environments are okay but the general feeling of a gloomy and horror filled atmosphere is just non-existent, the other world especially is lacking the twisted imagery the franchise demands and look more like dumb Castlevania levels than Silent Hill nightmares.  It’s kind of like a haunted house for six year olds with its vague scary imagery and occasional jump scares, but even then the jump scares don’t work so in the end Silent Hill Downpour is just a creepy guy who hangs around six year olds.

Speaking of child abuse Downpour is all about that, it’s clear early on that dead kids are part of the theme this time round and maybe the fat bloke at the start of the game bought an ice cream van for reasons outside of gluttony. This is where the disappointment of Downpour comes through, there are some really mature ideas and concepts on hand here which on paper sound like a wonderful subject for the Silent Hill series to tackle, but it all falls under the “great ideas, awful execution” umbrella. The game has multiple endings which alter the story entirely which means depending on which one you get half the content is entirely irrelevant and off message anyway stripping away the tight focus the previous good Silent Hill games masterfully retained. It’s difficult to dive much deeper without spoilers, but let’s put it this way, you know something has gone wrong with a story when child murder starts to become funny…that or there’s just something wrong with you…

Downpour isn’t lacking one or two cool moments, perhaps the most creative being a puzzle recreating a child’s play which although probably doesn’t make it into the top 10 Silent Hill moments is a highlight for this game. The game also has some okay sidequests but they’re all done for their own sake considering the items you get from them all get taken away in the last level, and frankly the game isn’t good enough to warrant the effort so all making these bits sidequests really achieved was make the game seem shorter.

There is also the fact that as much as Downpour gets wrong it still seems favourable to other Western Silent Hill titles such as Homecoming and Origins, with the former being a love letter to all the worst bits of the Silent Hill movies and the latter being an unbelievably tedious affair aside one or two moments where it rips off other better games which is more frustrating than entertaining.

Really, the issue with survival horror games is that designers deliberately make the gameplay and exploration elements weaker and more frustrating to add to the stress and atmosphere, so when the game fails to excel the whole experience comes off as a bit cack. Downpour fails in atmosphere as nothing really feels like a threat, and any scare the game attempts gets mauled by the framerate so any stress comes from panicking that the game has crashed (which it did once) and you’ll have to do some of it again. Compared to other bad games in the genre like the aforementioned Homecoming, Downpour isn’t nearly as painful to get through, but when it ends there’s no feeling of emotional simulation or satisfaction so it’s impossible to recommend as there really is no point to play it other than maybe get annoyed at some of the missed potential in some of the ideas.

But if you’re a big Silent Hill fan and must insist on getting it anyway, for the love of Alessa get the 360 version.