It seems reasonable, and in fact sort of obvious, that there are plenty of games which need to be played well to be enjoyed, games that might seem shallow or boring when played by novices but then reveal some measure of subtlety and depth when played expertly. It seems like you could make a good argument that games (even videogames) are more like sheet music than CDs, which means, yeah, sometimes your opinion about them is going to be misguided because you played it “wrong”.
/mc
Finally made it past the first stage or world or whatever. Makes me wonder if the IGN reviewer got this far. He spends a weird amount of time complaining that your health bar isn’t replenished between levels. Like this:
Generally the best course of action here is to simply let yourself be killed and choose to continue with a full life bar. It really doesn’t make any sense that your health isn’t refilled since you’re very likely to die a minute later anyway and then restart with no penalty.
The thing is, there is a penalty for continuing, as the end of stage screen clearly indicates. The less continues you use, the more gold you get. It’s pretty hard to miss assuming you play long enough to see it.
Also I anwsered my own question I think about the leveling. I think you do more damage with each level, and you also recieve a bonus for each kill you are at a higher level. Sorta like finshing each part of a stage with viewitiful rank in VJ
“Level up” apparently makes the baddies stronger.
Ah crap, thats what I get for not looking at the manual.
Looks like godhand might be Clover’s last game .
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3154381
edit: Looks like it was posted already.
That sucks, as Okami is one of the best game I’ve played this year.
This reminds me of Greg Kasavin stating that Devil May Cry 3 is extremely hard, and that the only reasonable way to play it is to avoid direct confrontation and instead chip away at enemies from a distance with the guns.
The only thing this proves, is that Chris Roper and the IGN staff can’t play games. Or are not willing to try to play them properly. What did IGN think of the combat in for instance Saints Row? A game where showdowns feel like circular ice skating with popguns thrown in for good measure? Did they enjoy that?
I suppose the only vaguely intelligent thing to do is disregard the entire review. Since when did IGN have anything worthwhile to say anyway? As in, really? When did they?
Question: why didn’t they release this as the 3d Final Fight instead of the by all accounts abysmal Final Fight Streetwise?
According to IGN, Streetwise is .6 review points better than God Hand, so Capcom made the smart play there.
IGN: It’s Good Nonsense
You know, every review site on the planet should really have the Masochistic Guy, who likes it when a game kicks your teeth out the back of your head.
We’ve got one, and he liked God Hand just fine.
I haven’t played the game, but that rebuttal video looked fucking stupid.
I’m the same way about Ninja Gaiden Black, even though it comes close to making me throw my xbox controller against the wall.
God Hand’s a great game. The “tutorial” is a joke, and so the learning curve is a little higher than it needs to be, but as a DMC3/NG fan God Hand totally clicks with me.
Gamers not accustomed to the real 3d action games of the last gen need not apply, though. The better you are at the game the harder will get, dynamically, and even the lowest dynamic setting (level 1) on normal will probably be rough for most gamers. If you can beat DMC3, NG, and/or Shinobi PS2, on non-gimp difficulty levels…yeah, go for it. It just expects you to figure out what you’re doing on your own mostly.
These are my impressions from NeoGAF:
RIP Clover.
OK, I know I said the first part, but having finished DMC3 multiple times, I don’t think I’d ever assert that shooting enemies is the way to kill them. Guns are almost useless against most of the game’s enemies, though they’re a good way of stalling against the bosses.
In short, the unfortunate problem I encountered while playing DMC3 was that all but the Trickster style are terrible choices for beginners, yet all but the Trickster style sound really cool and exciting (Gunslinger, Swordmaster, Royal Guard…who wants to be a Trickster when you can be one of those?).
To be honest, I don’t even know if you were accusing me of something wrong, but I figured I might as well clarify where I stood about DMC3. To tie this back into the God Hand thread, I found a lot of similarities between the two games and really liked playing both of them. Having played a lot of fighting games, it was easier for me to get accustomed to God Hand than to DMC3, overall. Both were tough games that felt really good to finally finish.
Sorry. I stand duly corrected … I don’t know where I got it from, but I firmly remember a big-site review stating that Devil May Cry 3 was unbelievably hard and that the only proper way of playing it was through avoiding direct confrontation and killing everything from a distance instead.
I remember fairly vividly noting that you wrote the review. Where the hell did I pick that up, then? I re-read your review just now, and you gave a very fair assessment of the strengths of the combat system, and the demands it makes from the player. All in all, a good review.
Jeez. This means I need to find the review in question. I refuse to believe that I just made that up. If it turns out I did, I’ll just have to start taking those Alzheimer pills. Really sorry about that; I didn’t mean to make an unfounded accusation (and I’m sorry I compared you to Chris Roper).
I’m almost sold on this, but question about the difficulty: Is it just a hard game (like Freedom Fighters), or is it difficult for it’s own sake (like Ghosts n’ Goblins)?
Also, please indicate how hard it is compared to God of War, which is the freshest in my mind of the [b]STYLISH HARD ACTION[/B] genre.
I wouldn’t compare the difficulty to GnG. because that gives you archaic and frustrating legacy gameplay mechanics and expects you to die+memorize. God Hand gives you a lot of powerful options in combat, and in normal mode against regular enemies at least you can take several hits without losing your entire health bar. Mostly you worry about when enemies guard (it gives them a counter opportunity if you don’t guard break or stop attacking), when you have multiple enemies circling you, and when the enemies are able to get an attack in in general.
If you haven’t played Devil May Cry 3 or Ninja Gaiden Xbox then it’s hard to say whether you’ll be comfortable with this sort of game.
God of War, well erm, most of my time playing on hard in GoW made me drowsy. That’s more about presentation than depth of combat. God Hand, on the other hand, you could equate more to a fighting game concept shaped into an action title. One target at a time (though multiple enemies are often attacking you and you can hit more than one baddie with kicks and such), reacting quickly to single actions of your opponents rather than mashing the button and doing “zomg cool explode the screen” stuff.
K, now I’m sold.
They want a free cam, which proves they have no business picking up a controller.