I got Dragon's Crown from Gamefly a couple days ago, and I decided to put down the Guided Fate Paradox to play this. Very impressed with it. Vanillaware found a way to really elevate the beat'em up genre, which up until now I had considered to be a fool's errand. I've enjoyed it much more than I ever expected to. Breaking down mission by mission really helps with the pacing and seems to make it harder to put down than if I were forced to go directly into another level. I still shake my head at the art style from time to time, but overall I'm very pleasantly surprised and enjoying this.

Dvader said:

We they probably should have said something like bat mobile gameplay with the graphical quality we are expecting is not possible. Let's be real , most last gen games are barely running well. Dark Souls 2 broke cause they added light. AC is a complete mess. GTAVis the product of insane levels of polish and that is barely holding on to a steady frame rate.

i am sure a bat mobile would be possible on arkham city but it would look like ass.

NFS Most wanted runs great and doesn't look like ass. It runs faster and looks sharper and more detailed than the open world in arkham city. There's also almost no loading past the initial data load. Rocksteadys streaming tech obviously isn't as advanced as criterions. That said isn't AKnight running on a souped up ver of UE3? The screens look near identical in art and tone to the older games only sharper.

http://www.gamefront.de/archiv03-2014-gamefront/Batman-Arkham-Knight-Screenshots-Bilder.html

It's BS that they claim they can't make it run on older systems. What, so they can't gate a few areas with small loads? That would sooo ruin the game? Driving a car around a city is now umpossible on 360/PS3? Enough with the BS excuses, I just want a little honesty and realism from the industry. They don't want to bring a game over, fine. They want to make up fantasy scenarios, to BS gamers, I'll call them on it.

edgecrusher said:

Not boding well for Sony's 1st party future....something is going on.

Yeah the drive club director left too.

GG you can't compare it to NFS that is just a racing game. Batman needs to be playable on foot in the streets , in buildings instantaneously. The game needs to be loading the entire city at super speeds as the batmobile turbos around and at any second you can eject, fly through a window of a building shattering glass and battling a bunch of thugs were doing their own thing.

all this with incredibly detailed models. The demo shown to sites had frame dips to the single digits, so it's struggling to run on the next gen stuff.

Blizzard are masters at getting their games to run on crappy laptop hardware (Core i3 @ 2.3Ghz + Intel HD 3000 graphics). I played some World of Warcraft and Starcraft 2 today, and both were completely playable. Starcraft 2 even runs of medium settings! Free trials, FTW!

robio said:

A few months ago I swore I read something about Sony creating a rewards program that would allow gamers to exchange their gold and platinum trophies for other things. I haven't seen anything about it since though. Was that real or have I been imaging all of that?

I think you did.

edgecrusher said:

I've been playing almost nothing but Panzer Dragoon Saga this week, and man does it get good after a very slow start.

That's basically the biggest problem with this game. Like, say, Castlevania 64, it starts off very slow and boring for the 1st few hours, giving the impression that its not all that great of a game. Then suddenly it gets really good really fast...I'm on the 3rd disc now and its been a well paced ride since the 3 hour mark of disc 1. I can safely say this was one of the best RPG's back in 1998. Not as good as the Final Fantasy titles, or Xenogears, despite what hardcore SEGA fans want to believe. But better than nearly everything else? Mostly.

Just the act of exploration and combat being done on the back of a dragon instead of on foot sets this game apart from any other in the genre, still to this day. The only other game that has combat quite like it is Skies Of Arcadia Legends, and that's only during the ship battles. Controls, menu interface, and item management is nice and simple. Graphics are great for a game from 1998, and the sound is classic 90's RPG fare. I also like that the voice acting is Japanese with English subtitles.

So the game definitely gets overhyped just by being one of the last great Saturn titles. But at the same time, it IS a great game.

Add this to the list of franchises that I have no idea why SEGA hasn't revisited. This should be a staple of the genre right now. Even if SEGA's inhouse teams are worthless nowadays, at the very fucking least team up with another studio and start bringing back some IP's. Speaking of, I fucking LONG for a new proper Phantasy Star developed by Bioware. Knights Of The Old Republic + Mass Effect + Phantasy Star = Game Of The Year.

Havent played this game since it came out but I remember the slow start and then the middle amazing. I think the ending was kind of meh though. But yeah amazing title, incredible what they did on the saturn. And that combat is so sweet.

^ I need a +1000 button. !!!!

phantom_leo said:

Wouldn't the Buttmobile just sound better? Jus' sayin'!

"TO THE BUTTMOBILE!"

See?

Agreed. Buttmobile it is.