The spin-offs are convenient. There is no need to invent setting or lor for a particular game, everything is ready, it remains only to fit the event to the necessary plot. In addition, sometimes you can save on production, creating a game on the same mechanics as the main series. Finally, you can just write a new story in familiar scenery or submit the same event, but at different angles. So Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio thought and decided to use the good old Camurocho once again, but with new actors. Did they succeed? Let's take a look at it. Welcome to Judgment.
As it was said, the action hasn't changed, we're in the same Camurocho, but with another hero. This time we will be watching the story of Takayuki Yagami. A former lawyer and now a private investigator. He successfully defended a seemingly failed case and became a celebrity for a while. However, the fame was not long, because the acquitted was caught again, but already at the scene of the crime, where he inflicted a dozen stab wounds to his girlfriend and burned down the house. After that Yagami leaves the law office to find a new calling. And finds him in a frequent search. The work is unstable, because there is not much money, and it is necessary to run not to the places of murder but to get the missing cats and debtors.
But in Camurocho, as usual, not everything is quiet. Two mafia groups collide with their foreheads over the territory, fights on every corner and even the serial killer got turned on. Yagami After a small case came to the former mentor in search of a job, but he gets not a case of divorce, and murder, and the handwriting coincides with the same serial killer. The suspect in all this is considered to be Yagami's acquaintance, with whom, however, he does not get along very well. But since he was hired by a man who replaced Yagami with his father, he accepts the case, plunging deeper into the swamp of conspiracies and intrigues.
Only the first chapter is filled with events on 2 or even 3 chapters of the usual Yakuza. The number of actors has grown slightly, but they are not confused, and the story itself, though bloated to the end in an epic confrontation, retains some locality. Disassemblages of gangs though remained, but now it is no collisions of the city on a city, and skirmishes of pair of small families. Thanks to the reduced scale, the history became more personal that forces to empathize with characters more. In addition, the story became much tougher. If someone was killed in the same Yakuza, it was a rare event. In Judgment, not only are there more murders, but they have become much more brutal. The only maniac mentioned is the maniac who tears out the eyes of the victims, which is worth it.
As a result, the story was very interesting and exciting, the characters are remembered, and each end of the chapter only awakens a desire to continue the process. The relationship between the characters is particularly good. Yagami is not Kiryu, but he has charisma no less, and his joking skirmishes with his partner are good to dilute the atmosphere of gloom. Although not without a couple of mistakes and "rubber bullets" (who played in Yakuza 4, will understand the latter).
The main thing that spoils the impression of the plot - the pace of the story. The chapters themselves are of approximately the same duration, although some are more authentic than others. But the problem is not in this but in the breaks. Very often there will be situations when the hero needs to wait for a call. And there is no other choice, and have to walk for 10-30 minutes, and the player is forced to run around the city in search of what to do yourself. Not a bad motivator to pay attention to side activities, but when the story reaches its peaks, and the player is forced to wait, it is annoying.
Another bad move is humorous inserts. Similar situations arose in the first Yakuza Kiwami, but there were not so many of them. There was a lot more of them, and their relevance is doubtful. Humorous moments in themselves are not bad and funny, but they have a place in the outside tasks. But while the player is waiting for some information, he is forced to take part in a clownery, where the kid took the Gopnik as a super-hero. Again, the situation in itself is ridiculous, but in the spirit of outside quests studio. But when, after the hero survived a rather shocking event, he is forced to take part in a parody on Ace Attorney, it looks very strange.
Another strange move - options in dialogues. At first, a feeling of nonlinearity is created, but it instantly collapses, because the options, in any case, are all clicked, and the punishment for the wrong answer is the loss of additional experience points, which in any case give very little. Sometimes some trophies are tied to the elections, but they are later. As a result, this function seems somewhat useless, though it does not interfere with the process.
But you won't get fed up with one story, so we have a gameplay component next. Here we will split into two parts - research and combat.
The research includes the city and related activities. In principle, everything is classical - there is Camurocho, which has a lot of different mini-games. Here you can find gambling games, both casino and traditional Japanese, and arcade machines, among which a full-fledged Virtua Fighter 5, and a lot of different snack bars, and drone races, and even VR tablets. The last, by the way, innovation is played as any tablet. There is a field, there is you, there is a cube, throwing which, you go to the specified value. On the field there are several types of points: a gift, a safe, a fight, and our task is to reach from start to finish, collecting as much loot as possible, which is then converted into real currency. Funny mini-game, which allows you to earn a little extra money. Drone racing, by the way, is also an innovation, but there is nothing unusual here. We put the details, fly along the specified route, win, repeat. The pleasure is expensive and long, you still need to collect for upgrades, but the thing is funny.
The number of activities was slightly reduced in comparison with the same Yakuza.
We cut hostess bars, internet cafes and, most unforgivable, karaoke. But this is rather a remark for those who have long played in the game studio, for beginners activities will be enough with the head, not to mention the outside quests. Speaking of them, now their receipt has changed slightly. If earlier in the course of the story, we either just bumped into them, or on the map appeared mark, now third-party quests are issued in three different places - the office of Yagami, a bar, where customers can plant a job, or a law office, where the hero used to work. But this is not enough for all cases to meet a certain condition, the basis of which is the reputation.
Reputation is obtained in the course of the game, at the expense of new acquaintances. For example, there is a waiter in a cafe who loves coffee. Communicating with him, we fill in the scale of friendship and, bringing it to a close, get a new friend, open the menu item in the cafe and, in fact, increase the level of reputation. Interesting mechanics, which, unfortunately, quite quickly irritates. Instead of getting and passing quests, it is necessary to improve your reputation, and the process is not always quick and simple (complexity ranges from "buy products for 7000 yen" to "help the girl hostess to save money for education"), and it, by the way, do not perform until the final chapter. The passage is strongly stretched out, and even funny situations do not save the situation. Mechanics do not spoil the gameplay catastrophically, but few people like it when his time is wasted.
As for the combat unit, it's much better here.
First of all, they returned the styles, even if they are now only 2, not 4, as before. The first one, the Tiger, is more suitable for battles with single opponents, thanks to precise and strong blows of one opponent each. The second, Crane, on the contrary, is aimed at battles with a group of opponents, as it uses wide blows. The change is tied to one button, is made quickly so that any style can be used in different situations.
Secondly, Yagami is much more mobile than the old Kiryu. Along with the usual techniques, it is possible to bounce off the walls, causing serious blows or hold captures, or climb a small height to conduct a single attack, which will neutralize several opponents.
Third, Heat Action, which is now called EX Action, is still there, but with the styles, there are variations of the same technique. If in "Tiger" you can put one opponent in one move, then "Crane", performing the same move, you can put three of them in. Thanks to these variations, the styles are in constant rotation and you want to experiment more. Rage Mode, which here is called EX Boost, is still there. Attacks are stronger and faster, a new extremely powerful combo appears, and you can also perform some EX Action, which is not available in a normal situation.
Fourthly, the download has been simplified. The variant from Yakuza 6/Kiwami 2 was interesting, but I had to bother a lot. Six points that need to be constantly filled in by everyone to pump up the health or power of attacking a couple of units. For some time, such a system looked interesting, but very quickly began to irritate. Now we have only one scale of experience, the number of characteristics reduced to three levels, but we need to fool around less. It turns out that expa is the same as before for everything: minigames, fights, food, special items, etc.
Finally, the last one is critical wounds. Particularly strong enemies and bosses can also enter EX Boost, and if they hit you in such a state, they will not only take away your health but also block the part of it taken away. As a result, if you are very careless, you can lose a fight in seconds. Treat such wounds either with a first-aid kit or a specific character in the city, which is not very cheap.
Thanks to such minimal innovations and changes, fighting in Judgment is much more fun than in Yakuza. The pace of the battles has increased, the variety of techniques makes you think about what to do in a particular situation, the opponents find something to answer, and in general, the game has become more cheerful.
However, there are a couple of reservations. From the game sawed out the loot. Now there are no jackets, pants, elbows and other things that will increase protection. There are fewer risky situations, but the risk of a quick fall has also increased. Also, now you can not carry a weapon, and some are not allowed to use it at all. As a result, pistols, swords, and other lethal items went under the knife, although the opponents are not shy about waving them. This fits into the character of Yagami, but the gameplay variety still affects. Finally, despite all the changes, it's still a Yakuza fight. Let the details change, but the skeleton remains the same, so if you didn't like the fights in Yakuza, there is a chance that you won't like it here.
As for the technical component, everything was very strange here. On the one hand, the game looks better in some places, especially at night. You can see that you've worked on the lighting and detail of the characters. The color scheme is pleasant to the eye, and in the videos and dialogues, everything is animated very cool. But if you look closely, the game has become even worse in some places than Yakuza 6. For some reason, there are a lot of soapy textures, facial animation of characters sometimes looks clumsy, the interior is often loaded on the move.
The level of Yakuza 6, where sometimes half of the city was lost, does not reach the level, but nevertheless the eye clings. Stability of the 6th part of the city has also migrated. Of course, there are no flights and errors, but for some reason, the frame rate is very often sagging, and the loading time has increased almost 2 times. It seems that Kiwami 2 experience has disappeared somewhere. And yes, the ragdoll is still funny.
But in terms of sound, everything remained at an excellent level. The sound is extremely pleasing, and the soundtrack competently emphasizes every scene and fight.
Despite some disadvantages of Judgment, it's still a great adventure that will give you a couple of dozens of perfectly spent hours. Judgment is just a very safe option. A new story with new characters and a different view of Camurocho, but the game does not go far from the basics of its older series. In other words, it's not Metal Gear Rising against the background of Metal Gear Solid, which is almost another genre. But it's still a must-buy for Judgment fans, because they have everything they love here, and for those who aren't familiar with Yakuza, it's a great chance to understand what Yakuza is like, but without having to write down all the relationships between the characters in a separate block diagram.
Rage 2 originally wasn't an interesting sequel to me. So also the change of color palette and ideological orientation somewhere in the direction of crazy post-apocalypse with some exaggerated fun, looked like a dad who tries to be in the board with your friends.
Observers somehow carefully praised her but advised not to run and play in a hurry, reinforcing everything with the phrase "not for everyone", which only warmed up the interest
- "Why is the game good and bad at the same time?"
As always, I made a video version, a text version underneath
I confess that I have always had a weakness for plots with mysticism, conspiracies, magic and all sorts of paranormalities. "The X-Files was the first episode I watched on videotapes. Then there was Poltergeist: Legacy, Beyond Reality, Twin Peaks...
In the '90s, the supernatural theme was at its peak. However, even today the writers return to the "truth somewhere out there". You can remember "Fringe", "Hangar number 13", "Missing Room". And, of course, I can't help mentioning my favorite MMO The Secret World.
In general, I think you understood why I couldn't pass by Control. The game is obviously inspired, if not all, by many of the abovementioned. And her heroine, Jesse Fayden, gets into the building of the Federal Bureau of Control - an organization that protects U.S. citizens from outside forces - on the very day when the Bureau is attacked by a paranormal nature. Coincidence? Do you really believe in coincidences?
The truth is out there somewhere...
Jesse herself combines the features of Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Olivia Dunham and the other characters of the series. And also some elements of their biography - to specify what exactly will be, of course, a huge spoiler.
However, you may notice from the very beginning that the inner monologues of our ward (which sound in large numbers during the game) very often refer to a certain essence. So the question of how Jesse sees the instructions that exist in the game's interface is gone. As well as the question of why she goes off as if by someone else's orders, she picks up a gun from the dead Director's hand.
By the way, this gun is not just a "service weapon", but an object of supernatural power. It never runs out of ammunition, it can change the shape and type of attack, and also obeys only the Director's will.
Yes, by taking the gun, Jesse automatically becomes the new FBK boss. However, she has no idea what's going on around her. Especially since the "Oldest House", the FBK building, is itself the center of all hell.
So before Director Fayden takes over her office, you'll have to run around solving staff problems, revealing secrets (where are they without documents or videos?), and of course fighting with former FBK employees, who have been turned into dangerous creatures by the other side by Jesse's easy hand.
Someone managed to keep their sanity through strange devices. And they will become our companions for a long time, and several central NPCs will provide Jesse with valuable information and quests to advance the story.
It's a pity that the "dialogues" in the game do not affect anything at all. All the tasks you get just by clicking. And the points of conversation - this is a simple chat, most often not even relevant.
As in The Secret World, the most "shocking" discoveries will be not in the main storyline, but in the side tasks. The Control doesn't reach the level of Dark Souls, where there are whole "secret" locations, but the world of the game is really wider and deeper after some "digging".
The character characters aren't exactly the same either. Players will definitely remember the eccentric Dr. Darling, his energetic assistant Emily, the depressive director of FBK Trench (that he's dead doesn't mean anything yet), and the most colorful character of all - janitor Ahti. But the rest of them look pale enough. Even Jesse herself.
Although the actors of the voice actors have really worked their money. During the game, there is no doubt that this is exactly how people should behave, whose daily work - to deal with paranormal phenomena.
I shoot with my mind
But Jesse and I aren't wrong either. In addition to the above-mentioned gun, during the game, we have various supernatural abilities. First of all, telekinesis, which can be grabbed at a distance of all sorts of objects (including grenades and enemies at death, if you pumped) and throw them with great force.
Then you will be available jerks (not to be confused with acceleration - it is responsible for another button), a shield of debris, luring enemies on your side of hypnosis and levitation. Of course not at once. Abilities also require energy that recovers quickly, but not instantly. The same applies to the gun - although the ammunition is infinite, the charge in the store is restored only when you do not shoot.
Therefore, the key to victory is to alternate attacks and techniques. Discharge the clip into a heavy machine gunner - finish off by launching a chair in it. And quickly and quickly jerk to the side, moving away from also throwing objects flyers. Then you can fly up to the ceiling to get the enemies behind the shelter or those very flyers - by that time the gun will have reloaded. And there, if there is an extra second - you can take control of the shortfall.
Do not stand still, constantly move and attack. Control, especially on the keyboard-mouse made the most convenient for such hurricane battles. Even telekinesis, if you do not point the crosshairs at a particular object, at the touch of a button will automatically attract a cabinet or even a piece of wall - the environment is almost completely destroyed.
One problem is that no matter how exciting the fights are, there are practically no differences between these fights. Yes, sometimes you have to destroy something else instead of destroying enemies. Or activate. But that doesn't change much. The tactic of destroying enemies near you and turning the lever until you get to the ones in the distance works without fail.
Actually, even additional forms of "service weapons" are not needed. I went through the whole game with the original barrel only a couple of times using the "rocket launcher" and still "shotgun" was convenient in several fights at close range.
We think the room and the poster are the whole worlds
The enemies themselves don't change much either. By the middle of the game, you will get acquainted with all types of people possessed by Issami - machine gunners, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, flyers, kamikaze (also sometimes fly), powerful telekinetics with shields of wreckage like yours. Yes, there are some variations - snipers shoot less often than machine gunners, but beat more painfully. But in the heat of battle, when a dozen soup traps are poured, there is no time to pay attention to such small differences.
Not too diverse and decoration levels. That is, it is clear that we have it in the office of an American institution. Hence the typical layout for offices, interior in the architectural style of brutalism. However, the writers did not just make the "Oldest House" a place of mystical power. In a few rooms, you can find a cord that takes you to the mysterious Hotel, and some items are redirected to the Astral Plane. There are also so-called "Limits", where the building seems to be giving way to other dimensions.
So the question is, why haven't they done more of these places? I'm not asking you to turn the whole house into the madness that the Ashtray Maze turns out to be (one of the steepest stages in the game, by the way). But was it really hard to come up with a few more anomalies that added rooms from other times and places? Or was there a budget for a different environment?
Well, at least there are anomalies in the gameplay. More precisely, aggressive objects of force that create these anomalies. And in order to neutralize them, it is necessary not only to deal with the "angry" artifact Issami but also to solve an unusual puzzle. The truth is usually not complicated.
There is nothing unique
The fact that Contol's ideas are based on stories of the unknown and supernatural is its main strength and main weakness. I've been stumbling upon the moments that responded to the memories of "The Secret Materials", "The Edge" or "The Secret World" (I bet on anything - the writer played at the Secret World Legends). And if you are fans of such stories - you will definitely feel at home in the FBK.
But on the other hand, for those who watched all these shows and are familiar with the stories about the paranormal, everything will be too predictable. And they, like me, will notice not only the flight of fantasy but also missed opportunities for the writer and designer.
Nevertheless, the dynamic battles really fascinate. And the fact that the developers managed to make convenient management of numerous psionic abilities is a serious achievement in itself. I'm like the person who played Psy-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy, I say.
In combination with the twisted plot (and in some places not devoid of humor and self-irony), as well as colorful characters and style, it creates not an original, but a tightening atmosphere. The atmosphere of adventure beyond reality and gaining control over the beyond.
The Coalition continues to develop the universe of "Gears of War" by creating new games in this universe, created in 2006 for the console Xbox 360 from Microsoft. After The Coalition studios gave a carte blanche to their first project, they rolled out an average "Gears of war 4". The studio itself later did not agree to this situation, and it, taking into account the wishes of the players, began to create a continuation of the series. Did they manage to create a better game than their debut project? Now let's try to find out.
Shelters? Again?
The game after being turned on throws us into the training mode, perhaps for the first time in the history of the series. This episode has been beaten in terms of the game and the atmosphere. Beard asks us to show a couple of tricks to load the data into the robots to better resist Roy. Here we are taught how to use the shelters, aim, shoot and interact with the environment. After a brief shooting at the robots, rides and mutual shots from Baird and our protagonist, the training ends, and we witness a secret operation, the details of which I will keep quiet. But what I won't keep silent about is that all the annoying elements of Gears of War 4 have been removed from the game, for example, the Horde mode, in which it was necessary to defend against the hordes of enemies, by gaining points.
After the events of Gears of War 4, all the characters changed their minds about the COG (United States Coalition) and joined its ranks, along with Marcus Phoenix. On this task we will meet our first opponents and already here we will start to notice small, but changes in-game mechanics. The enemies have reduced the so-called Time To Kill, which makes it much easier to destroy enemies. Just like in the previous parts of this series, there's a lot of brutalities here. The enemies are a little bigger, so the meat fairy continues for a little longer, and this can't but please a man who plays the meat shooter for the sake of meat. I would also like to point out that The Coalition changed the moment when a huge gear (the symbol of the whole series) appeared in the center of the screen, covering the sight, and either had to shoot blindly or hide cowardly behind the cover.
Now the visual display of the protagonist's ill health appears only on the edges of the screen, without interfering with the perception of what is happening. The partners in the new part of the screen have become a little bit smarter and run to you after a few tens of meters to raise you if you were seriously injured, but sometimes they show indifference to the hero's carcass bleeding out.
A little further we are presented with the third variation of Lancer rifle, this time it appears before us with a grenade launcher, which can easily thin the population of the omnipresent Horde. Further on in the game, we will meet a couple of new guns, and as for me, one of them was added more for a joke than for a full-fledged shooting. This barrel is called "Claw" and is called as if it is a few pieces of stone wrapped in a rag, and a huge drum of cartridges is fixed on top of it, the feature of this weapon is that the longer it is fired, the more accurate it becomes, but after a few accurate shots, the speed of fire drops, because it starts to blade, and the weapon starts spitting bullets extremely slowly. As you can see, firing from such a weapon is completely uncomfortable.
Among the innovations in the mechanics of firing, I would like to note "Active reload" now it can not be used very often, it is necessary to wait a few seconds before committing it again.
Long live the open world!
After the first act, which lasts about two and a half hours. We are moved to a different time frame, and the act is number two. From this moment on, our main adventure begins. This time the developers decided to move away from the theme of the military drama and decided to go into another path. We get the main protagonist of the 5 part Kate Diaz in our hands. She is suffering from headaches and nightmares after what happened in the last part of the series, and she wants to get rid of them and learn the secrets of her family by all means. With Kate on a quest to answer the questions, go her faithful comrade-in-arms and concurrently friend named Del, known to players in Gears of war 4. Del is a very clever and promising young fighter, he is well versed in science and technology, and also shoots well, which is why he was noticed by Beard and makes him his protégé, definitely a great partner in such a difficult campaign. Del takes a robot named Jack with him. At the beginning of the second act, we get access to two major innovations in Gears 5: the futuristic Jack and drone Jack. Jack will be helping us on our adventure in every way he can, bringing a little variety to the gameplay.
And now we're being released into the open world on this unusual vehicle. Our Yaliq is not afraid of snow, sand, or copper pipes. Kate takes over the control cables, and we go on a journey. Different points of interest are scattered on the map, you can find them yourself, or you can move on to the plot and use the scanner to dig them up on your map. At these points, you can find some information about the world of the game, or run one of the few side quests, after which you will find new abilities, or improve the old ones, for our drone Jack, which can really help you in battle. These activities aren't necessary, so if you don't like doing this, the developers won't make you waste any time, you can move on with the story. Next, we are met by the snow-covered plains of Sera. The protagonists dilute all the rides with their conversations about certain situations, or just making fun of each other, causing sometimes laughter, or a slight smile. Travel between the points of interest are quiet, you will not be attacked, and in every way interfere with the movement on the map.
Unfortunately, at this point, it feels like the narrative is slowing down a little, which makes the emotions between the bright moments a little blurred.