'New' Lair Screens (Possibly from the same batch seen in Oct)
- Thread starter Zenien
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Pretty interesting article.
I decided to just post in on the threads about the 2 games it's talking about, instead of creating a new thread.
Why PS3's latest blockbusters failed to impress the gaming massive.
September 4, 2007
So the results are in. With two of PlayStation 3's biggest titles now being reviewed around the world, it has to be said they haven't been as impressive as their initial promise suggested. We're talking scores as low as 40 for Lair and 6/10 for Heavenly Sword. How could such massive releases be so disappointing?
Didn't someone look at Lair somewhere along the line and say "Er... this really isn't working"? And why does Heavenly Sword feel so disappointing despite its beauty? We take a look at concensus opinion across the games review media and condense it into four main issues that can be learned from by all software houses.
1) Unfinished business
We know it's important to meet deadlines and that spiralling development costs can sometimes put developers out of business. But when it comes to a possible 'killer app' for a system, surely it makes sense to wait until it really is finished, optimised and ready.
Take Grand Theft Auto IV as an example - seriously, how long ago did you last hear someone complain about the delay? Exactly. It was devastating, of course, but people do get over it and can rest assured the end result will be worth the wait. Heavenly Sword and Lair both have frame-rate issues and tearing, which isn't really what we expect from next-gen machines.
What the critics said:
"As polished as the game is 90 per cent of the time, there's a lingering feeling the game was deemed 'good enough' rather than fully honed in all areas." - Eurogamer on Heavenly Sword
"It's obvious that all the development effort went into Lair's production values, rather than into making it fun to play." - Gamespot on Lair
2) Controls
The motion-sensitive debate. When it works, it works really well. Just look at Wii Sports to see how motion-sensing control can add greatly to the gameplay experience. Even WarHawk's Sixaxis controls are ok, but - crucially - they're optional. Thing is, when motion control is done badly, it's terrible. And sadly, both Lair and, to a lesser extent, Heavenly Sword both incorporate dubious SixAxis control. But there's an option to switch them off and revert to the tried and tested analogue sticks, right? Not so for Lair. The game's message would appear to be: 'Having trouble flying a dragon? Deal with it.'
What the critics said:
"Buy it if you want to justify all the thousands you spent on your PS3 and that 1080p HDTV you can see from the International Space Station. Don't buy it if you want a dragon that does what it's damn well told." - 1Up on Lair
"Although it feels rather fantastic when you wobble your pad to your target, it's horribly imprecise. After a few hours of struggling with it, we couldn't quite believe how much easier it was to control the direction with the analogue stick in comparison. Nice try, but no thanks." Eurogamer on Heavenly Sword
"A quick jerk vertically is supposed to make your dragon do a 180-degree turn, but that only seemed to work about three-quarters of the time. Either the controller did not read the motion or the game’s AI decided to ignore the command." - Gamezone
"You shouldn't play Lair. Not unless you have some morbid interest in experiencing what is quite possibly one of the worst control schemes ever devised." - Gamespot on Lair
"The people behind the solid reinvention of Warhawk chose - in their kindness, and in their wisdom - to let the player decide if they want to wrangle their flight gameplay via Sixaxis or the analog sticks, a move that'll prove prescient." - Penny-arcade on Lair
3) Combat
When a game's main point is to engane in combat, it has to work perfectly. Both Heavenly Sword and Lair have variety in their combat scenes, but sadly neither is enough to go the full distance. The lesson? Give the player varied enemies and fun ways to kill them. Not chance kills and cookie-cutter clones.
What the critics said:
"Combat mechanic is 1/3 broken" GamingTrend on Heavenly Sword
"A number of the skirmishes are essentially arena battles where you wind up trapped in a room and need to fend off swarm after swarm of enemies. This just makes it feel like you're trudging through that section of the game and that the designers are keeping you put for a while to rack up the overall game time." - IGN on Heavenly Sword
"In theory, you can lock on to other flying enemies and spew flames at them or dive into them from a fair distance. But the targeting system is a tragedy. You can't choose what to lock on to, so all you can do is keep an eye out for the fuzzy white circle to appear on an enemy dragon." - Gamespot on Lair
"There are some who derive a kind of perverse superiority from their mastery of the game's ambiguous mechanics. For my part, I don't give a good Goddamn if someone has trained themselves to eat **** and like it. The game is not challenging, it's difficult to play, and it's taken many years but I'm ready to begin making this distinction." - Penny-Arcade on Lair
4) Hype
The final lesson is simple. If you've got a promising game, be careful what you say about it. There's a lot to be said for releasing a carefully-managed drip-feed of new screens and videos instead of shouting 'AAA TITLE!' from the rooftops. If the games hadn't been hyped up so much in the first place, we wouldn't have been so disappointed. But as it is, everyone's feeling dejected. Especially this guy:
"There have even been positive impressions at several game conferences for this beast and yet the final release is one of the largest steaming piles I’ve ever had to endure. After failing many of the missions an insane amount of times I headed to the bathroom for some relief only to realize that my latest bowel movement was more fun than the 'game' I had been playing." - Gamebrink on Lair.
Conclusion:
So what have we learned? Be careful what you say, take your time and make sure gameplay is the primary element of any game. And if you really must incorporate Sixaxis controls...
...make sure there's an option to switch them off.
I decided to just post in on the threads about the 2 games it's talking about, instead of creating a new thread.
Why PS3's latest blockbusters failed to impress the gaming massive.
September 4, 2007
So the results are in. With two of PlayStation 3's biggest titles now being reviewed around the world, it has to be said they haven't been as impressive as their initial promise suggested. We're talking scores as low as 40 for Lair and 6/10 for Heavenly Sword. How could such massive releases be so disappointing?
Didn't someone look at Lair somewhere along the line and say "Er... this really isn't working"? And why does Heavenly Sword feel so disappointing despite its beauty? We take a look at concensus opinion across the games review media and condense it into four main issues that can be learned from by all software houses.
1) Unfinished business
We know it's important to meet deadlines and that spiralling development costs can sometimes put developers out of business. But when it comes to a possible 'killer app' for a system, surely it makes sense to wait until it really is finished, optimised and ready.
Take Grand Theft Auto IV as an example - seriously, how long ago did you last hear someone complain about the delay? Exactly. It was devastating, of course, but people do get over it and can rest assured the end result will be worth the wait. Heavenly Sword and Lair both have frame-rate issues and tearing, which isn't really what we expect from next-gen machines.
What the critics said:
"As polished as the game is 90 per cent of the time, there's a lingering feeling the game was deemed 'good enough' rather than fully honed in all areas." - Eurogamer on Heavenly Sword
"It's obvious that all the development effort went into Lair's production values, rather than into making it fun to play." - Gamespot on Lair
2) Controls
The motion-sensitive debate. When it works, it works really well. Just look at Wii Sports to see how motion-sensing control can add greatly to the gameplay experience. Even WarHawk's Sixaxis controls are ok, but - crucially - they're optional. Thing is, when motion control is done badly, it's terrible. And sadly, both Lair and, to a lesser extent, Heavenly Sword both incorporate dubious SixAxis control. But there's an option to switch them off and revert to the tried and tested analogue sticks, right? Not so for Lair. The game's message would appear to be: 'Having trouble flying a dragon? Deal with it.'
What the critics said:
"Buy it if you want to justify all the thousands you spent on your PS3 and that 1080p HDTV you can see from the International Space Station. Don't buy it if you want a dragon that does what it's damn well told." - 1Up on Lair
"Although it feels rather fantastic when you wobble your pad to your target, it's horribly imprecise. After a few hours of struggling with it, we couldn't quite believe how much easier it was to control the direction with the analogue stick in comparison. Nice try, but no thanks." Eurogamer on Heavenly Sword
"A quick jerk vertically is supposed to make your dragon do a 180-degree turn, but that only seemed to work about three-quarters of the time. Either the controller did not read the motion or the game’s AI decided to ignore the command." - Gamezone
"You shouldn't play Lair. Not unless you have some morbid interest in experiencing what is quite possibly one of the worst control schemes ever devised." - Gamespot on Lair
"The people behind the solid reinvention of Warhawk chose - in their kindness, and in their wisdom - to let the player decide if they want to wrangle their flight gameplay via Sixaxis or the analog sticks, a move that'll prove prescient." - Penny-arcade on Lair
3) Combat
When a game's main point is to engane in combat, it has to work perfectly. Both Heavenly Sword and Lair have variety in their combat scenes, but sadly neither is enough to go the full distance. The lesson? Give the player varied enemies and fun ways to kill them. Not chance kills and cookie-cutter clones.
What the critics said:
"Combat mechanic is 1/3 broken" GamingTrend on Heavenly Sword
"A number of the skirmishes are essentially arena battles where you wind up trapped in a room and need to fend off swarm after swarm of enemies. This just makes it feel like you're trudging through that section of the game and that the designers are keeping you put for a while to rack up the overall game time." - IGN on Heavenly Sword
"In theory, you can lock on to other flying enemies and spew flames at them or dive into them from a fair distance. But the targeting system is a tragedy. You can't choose what to lock on to, so all you can do is keep an eye out for the fuzzy white circle to appear on an enemy dragon." - Gamespot on Lair
"There are some who derive a kind of perverse superiority from their mastery of the game's ambiguous mechanics. For my part, I don't give a good Goddamn if someone has trained themselves to eat **** and like it. The game is not challenging, it's difficult to play, and it's taken many years but I'm ready to begin making this distinction." - Penny-Arcade on Lair
4) Hype
The final lesson is simple. If you've got a promising game, be careful what you say about it. There's a lot to be said for releasing a carefully-managed drip-feed of new screens and videos instead of shouting 'AAA TITLE!' from the rooftops. If the games hadn't been hyped up so much in the first place, we wouldn't have been so disappointed. But as it is, everyone's feeling dejected. Especially this guy:
"There have even been positive impressions at several game conferences for this beast and yet the final release is one of the largest steaming piles I’ve ever had to endure. After failing many of the missions an insane amount of times I headed to the bathroom for some relief only to realize that my latest bowel movement was more fun than the 'game' I had been playing." - Gamebrink on Lair.
Conclusion:
So what have we learned? Be careful what you say, take your time and make sure gameplay is the primary element of any game. And if you really must incorporate Sixaxis controls...
...make sure there's an option to switch them off.
Spidey17
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I can see both points, and I admit I really wanted this game to be well received, but I have heard overall good reviews from gamers like myself, who choose to spend money on games, instead of being paid to do so. I think it makes alot of sense that reviewers generally didn't like the game because of the controls, but there have been others who actually learned the controls, and they liked the game, take Miller from GI for example. Yet Gammy only put negativity in his post, so whatever. And I think you would really have to play it to have an INFORMED opinion. And whoever said that people don't complain about good review scores, take a second and think about this: WHY WOULD YOU!?! If thats a game you've been following since you were really interested then you won't argue when someone praises it, yet you will take offense if they say its horrible. I'm guessing you just flipflop, whilst I'm going to stay true to what I thought earlier, and try it for myself. Until you can say you played Lair for several hours with, and here's the kicker, an open mind, and you still find it to be crappy, then I'll put weight in your opinion. But hey, I've done that as well about games I've never played, and people have called me out just like I'm calling you out, and thats a good thing. And its really pathetic when you just go and call people crybabies cuz they defended their game. Does it make you feel better to put others down or what?
Mr. Smash'n Bash
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If the average review for a game is 60% I'm not about to go out and buy it/rent it to get an "informed" opinion of the game because it would seem that the "informed" opinion is that the game is trash.
Zenien
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Apparently a demo will be coming soon. It might change a few people's opinions or expose them to the game when they wouldn't otherwise have had any experience with it. Given the reviews, I certainly wouldn't buy Lair, but maybe I'll end up really liking the demo (whoever chances are I won't but you never know).
Good article, Gammy. THough I feel that article skews twoards the negative, it's very quick to talk about examples where motion controls didn't work, but forgets about the instances where it have worked incredibly, like Motorstorm.
Good article, Gammy. THough I feel that article skews twoards the negative, it's very quick to talk about examples where motion controls didn't work, but forgets about the instances where it have worked incredibly, like Motorstorm.
But maybe the Lair controls will be much better with that update, did you see the video?
Gametrailers review: http://www.gametrailers.com/player/24533.html?type=flv
Story 7.0
Design 7.0
Gameplay 4.5
Presentation 6.5
Overall: 6.0
Story 7.0
Design 7.0
Gameplay 4.5
Presentation 6.5
Overall: 6.0
http://www.penny-arcade.com/2007/09/03
What People Are Saying
Mon, September 03 2007 - 12:00 AM
by: Tycho
You couldn't pay us to play Lair any more than we have already. The game has given me a new respect for the professional reviewer, because when a game like Lair hits their desk, they have no recourse. They must tread, as Dante did, down that scarred staircase and into the greasy throat of hell.
The people behind the solid reinvention of Warhawk chose - in their kindness, and in their wisdom - to let the player decide if they want to wrangle their flight gameplay via Sixaxis or the analog sticks, a move that'll prove prescient. Controls aren't the only problem in Lair, though, so altering the controls wouldn't represent a complete solution. You're using those controls to accomplish frustrating, unimaginative, sometimes enigmatic tasks. People will forgive a good game its indulgences if they feel they're being met halfway, and one never gets that impression here. You may find yourself in disbelief an hour into it, the Electronics Boutique receipt crumpled in your fist, trying to correlate Lair's non-stop torrent of anguish and your missing sixty bucks.
I would never ask you to take my word over your own experience, though, and you'll certainly find those online who will bolster you in your choice to purchase. There are some who derive a kind of perverse superiority from their mastery of the game's ambiguous mechanics. For my part, I don't give a good Goddamn if someone has trained themselves to eat **** and like it. The game is not challenging, it's difficult to play, and it's taken many years but I'm ready to begin making this distinction.
This is an indictment of Lair, and not an indictment of the Playstation 3 as a platform like you might see burst online in some flammable thread. Playstation 3 owners will have plenty to crow about soon enough. Heavenly Sword, well... We'll talk about Heavenly Sword later. But
Lair and Sony aren't synonyms, it isn't emblematic of your choice of console. It's just... bad, a raw-feeling launch title that even an additional year could not rescue.
We don't need Lair to be good, and so we don't need to make excuses for it. It has been extremely strange to watch the community react to reviews like the one at IGN, with claims that the site is "known" to be biased against the Playstation 3 - as though a site with IGN's expenses could afford to play such a dangerous game with one of the pillars of the medium. The reality is that IGN delivering a four-point-nine review of a title this anticipated is a sign of their allegiance to the reader. I'm not a fan of the site. IGN.com is not my homepage. But scoring a game this low, so at variance with their average numerics, is the sort of maneuver that should restore faith.
(CW)TB out.
What People Are Saying
Mon, September 03 2007 - 12:00 AM
by: Tycho
You couldn't pay us to play Lair any more than we have already. The game has given me a new respect for the professional reviewer, because when a game like Lair hits their desk, they have no recourse. They must tread, as Dante did, down that scarred staircase and into the greasy throat of hell.
The people behind the solid reinvention of Warhawk chose - in their kindness, and in their wisdom - to let the player decide if they want to wrangle their flight gameplay via Sixaxis or the analog sticks, a move that'll prove prescient. Controls aren't the only problem in Lair, though, so altering the controls wouldn't represent a complete solution. You're using those controls to accomplish frustrating, unimaginative, sometimes enigmatic tasks. People will forgive a good game its indulgences if they feel they're being met halfway, and one never gets that impression here. You may find yourself in disbelief an hour into it, the Electronics Boutique receipt crumpled in your fist, trying to correlate Lair's non-stop torrent of anguish and your missing sixty bucks.
I would never ask you to take my word over your own experience, though, and you'll certainly find those online who will bolster you in your choice to purchase. There are some who derive a kind of perverse superiority from their mastery of the game's ambiguous mechanics. For my part, I don't give a good Goddamn if someone has trained themselves to eat **** and like it. The game is not challenging, it's difficult to play, and it's taken many years but I'm ready to begin making this distinction.
This is an indictment of Lair, and not an indictment of the Playstation 3 as a platform like you might see burst online in some flammable thread. Playstation 3 owners will have plenty to crow about soon enough. Heavenly Sword, well... We'll talk about Heavenly Sword later. But
Lair and Sony aren't synonyms, it isn't emblematic of your choice of console. It's just... bad, a raw-feeling launch title that even an additional year could not rescue.
We don't need Lair to be good, and so we don't need to make excuses for it. It has been extremely strange to watch the community react to reviews like the one at IGN, with claims that the site is "known" to be biased against the Playstation 3 - as though a site with IGN's expenses could afford to play such a dangerous game with one of the pillars of the medium. The reality is that IGN delivering a four-point-nine review of a title this anticipated is a sign of their allegiance to the reader. I'm not a fan of the site. IGN.com is not my homepage. But scoring a game this low, so at variance with their average numerics, is the sort of maneuver that should restore faith.
(CW)TB out.
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