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miscellaneous14 posted:FWIW, when I worked a contract at a game company releasing somewhat of a high-profile title, they said something to the extent of "any reviews below 8 or 9 aren't allowed to be put up early". What game was it that you worked on? Also, I don't know why they weren't called out on that, because at least one of the more reputable game sites would raise quite a stink about it if they weren't allowed to give their honest opinion.
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Mar 2, 2013 23:04
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User0015 posted:The fact is, reviewers are terrible at their jobs. AAA games that come out don't get less than a 9, and DmC is the golden child on why that is. In that exact same vein, games like Tomb Raider get hit with B's and people think it's garbage due to review score inflation and games are unplayable sub-80%, and a lot of that is exactly because of AAA games, reviewers being nothing more than PR shills for those AAA games, and the publishers paying out bonuses for metacritic scores. Reviewers inflate lovely games to 9's which makes good games at 8's look like trash in comparison. Even the "big o' wall of text right before the arbitrary number?" is usually nothing but praise for AAA games and niggling details (load times are slightly long, it doesn't massage my feet quite as well as I'd like, etc...) are the only criticism offered, while people will harp on little details in smaller games for entire reviews, only to end up giving it a nice 8. It's obvious dissonance. AAA games should be reviewed more critically than smaller games specifically because of their larger financial backing and access to better development resources, and yet it's never, ever the case. None of this makes a bit of sense. You're talking about a game published by Square Enix like it's a loving bedroom indie and not also a part of the exact same system. And why does it bother you that a game that you haven't even played, unless you have a review copy, "only" got an 8? We have evidence that reviews don't always translate directly into sales because DmC tanked and got great reviews, so why do you assume you know so much about what "people" think? Baku fucked around with this message at 23:44 on Mar 2, 2013 |
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Mar 2, 2013 23:39
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So I've played the game for a couple of hours today and these are some random thoughts I have: - I haven't really been following the game at all, so I wasn't sure what to expect from it but there was a part at the beginning where you have to hunt a deer for food. It got me excited because it made me think there'd be some kind of survival element to things, but it ends there. You can keep hunting animals, but they just get you exp and salvage to upgrade your guns. - Minor complaint, but close quarters combat is kinda clunky for the first hour or so because you have no melee attack. It's not too bad against men, but fighting two wolves at close range with a bow is a little awkward. However once you can use the melee weapon, the combat starts to flow in a similar way to Uncharted, where you can meld gun play with melee. - There are tons of collectables. I get pretty hooked on searching for things like this in games and there's plenty to keep me busy. - The game is gorgeous. - As far as I can tell there's no button to take cover. If you're beside cover Lara will crouch, but to an extent you're still vulnerable. It also makes stealth a little trickier because enemies might see you when you think you're actually hidden behind cover. (I'm chalking this down to me just being bad at the stealth though) - There are lots of shots of Lara's butt/chest and it gets tiresome fast. - There've been some really neat set pieces so far. I hate to bring up it again but there have been of couple of set pieces that are literally Uncharted. (Which isn't such a bad thing I guess) - Too many QTEs but I guess just about every game is doing that now. - Some of the animations don't really transition very well into each other, especially some of the climbing ones. - I'm hoping for some more puzzles. There are optional tombs where you have to solve a puzzle to reach the treasure and I like them a lot but all the ones I've found have been pretty straightforward so far. I'm hoping the puzzles get harder with the difficulty setting. (I think some of the past Tomb Raider games might have done this? I'm not sure) I guess it's nothing you won't already know if you've been following the game, but yeah I'm really enjoying it so far. It basically plays like an Uncharted game with a bigger focus on exploration.
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Mar 3, 2013 00:31
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Is it possible to turn off the collectables notifications?
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Mar 3, 2013 00:35
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Alex WS posted:Is it possible to turn off the collectables notifications? I'm looking through the options and it doesn't seem like you can turn them off, no. For what it's worth though, the HUD is really minimal. Your ammo counter will pop up when you're aiming your gun, and a little text box will pop up when you pick something up but 90% of the time there's no HUD on screen. Help Im Alive fucked around with this message at 00:44 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 00:41
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Zombies' Downfall posted:None of this makes a bit of sense. You're talking about a game published by Square Enix like it's a loving bedroom indie and not also a part of the exact same system. And why does it bother you that a game that you haven't even played, unless you have a review copy, "only" got an 8? We have evidence that reviews don't always translate directly into sales because DmC tanked and got great reviews, so why do you assume you know so much about what "people" think? I don't know what the hell you're talking about. A lot of people were discussing the reviews earlier and how it was being picked apart because it's a new reboot. I was pointing out DmC is also a new reboot but was never picked apart (by critics) because it has a huge marketing push by Capcom. It wasn't even two pages ago.
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Mar 3, 2013 02:05
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KimT posted:I'm looking through the options and it doesn't seem like you can turn them off, no. For what it's worth though, the HUD is really minimal. Your ammo counter will pop up when you're aiming your gun, and a little text box will pop up when you pick something up but 90% of the time there's no HUD on screen. How is the platforming? Is it challenging at all?
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Mar 3, 2013 02:22
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mistermojo posted:How is the platforming? Is it challenging at all? Not really, the climbing plays pretty much exactly the same as Uncharted where you hold the stick in the direction you want to climb and press jump to climb to another ledge occasionally. I hate to keep comparing the two games but in this regard they're basically identical.
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Mar 3, 2013 02:37
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KimT posted:Not really, the climbing plays pretty much exactly the same as Uncharted where you hold the stick in the direction you want to climb and press jump to climb to another ledge occasionally. I hate to keep comparing the two games but in this regard they're basically identical. Bah, that is a bit disappointing, and I like Uncharted. Just rolled the dice and preordered on steam.
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Mar 3, 2013 02:40
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User0015 posted:A lot of people were discussing the reviews earlier and how it was being picked apart because it's a new reboot. I was pointing out DmC is also a new reboot but was never picked apart (by critics) because it has a huge marketing push by Capcom. It wasn't even two pages ago. How is this not a AAA title? How does it not have a marketing push? You said: quote:AAA games that come out don't get less than a 9, and DmC is the golden child on why that is. In that exact same vein, games like Tomb Raider get hit with B's and people think it's garbage due to review score inflation and games are unplayable sub-80%, and a lot of that is exactly because of AAA games Tomb Raider is a AAA game. Why do you believe there's a double standard, and that it's impossible for the majority of critics to have simply preferred DmC? Am I just completely misunderstanding your perspective? Baku fucked around with this message at 02:51 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 02:46
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Zombies' Downfall posted:How is this not a AAA title? How does it not have a marketing push? He's suggesting that Capcom's people paid up. Is that clear enough?
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Mar 3, 2013 02:55
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DrNutt posted:He's suggesting that Capcom's people paid up. Is that clear enough? Yeah, that's what I thought he was saying. I just prefer people quantify perspectives like that instead of spouting conspiratorial nonsense. Where was Capcom's hush money when Resident Evil 6 came out a few months earlier? He seemed to be suggesting that this is always the case with AAA games, while using Tomb Raider (a AAA game) as an example of a game that gets hosed over by it, and ignoring Resident Evil 6 (a AAA game from the same publisher as DmC) which got critically savaged. Baku fucked around with this message at 02:59 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 02:56
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Zombies' Downfall posted:Yeah, that's what I thought he was saying. I just prefer people quantify perspectives like that instead of spouting conspiratorial nonsense. Where was Capcom's hush money when Resident Evil 6 came out a few months earlier? One only needs to go back and take a look at the Kane and Lynch fiasco to see that there's a bit of truth to "conspiratorial nonsense." I mean, I think this is kind of a silly argument in the first place, considering the reviews for Tomb Raider have been overwhelmingly positive so far, with minor quibbles made for issues surrounding objectification (to the surprise of basically no one) and disparities in tone between story/gameplay (to the surprise of no one who's kept up with the marketing for this game). But it doesn't mean that reviews aren't bought and paid for in this industry.
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Mar 3, 2013 03:04
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DrNutt posted:One only needs to go back and take a look at the Kane and Lynch fiasco to see that there's a bit of truth to "conspiratorial nonsense." Yeah, it's clearly rampant and universal. Except regarding Resident Evil 6. And Tomb Raider, the game this thread is about. So it, you know, isn't universal. I'm not saying it isn't a problem or a thing that happens, but even if you make the claim that all the DmC reviews were flat-out bought (which "but it's a bad game!" is an insufficient proof for), it's crazy to extend that to every review and every reviewer. It's also fallacious to say that the fortunes of these games are tied to those reviews, because DmC is selling poorly despite its high review scores. If Capcom paid everybody who loved DmC off, they sure wasted a shitload of money. Baku fucked around with this message at 03:10 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 03:08
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Between Nier, RE6 and Deadly Premonition, it is clear that game reviewers have no idea what they are talking about. It is why I value Giant Bomb's quick looks, since they offer a good glimpse of actual rote gameplay, and not just trailers or a summary by a reviewer--you can see for yourself what a typical game session plays out to.
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Mar 3, 2013 03:25
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Zombies' Downfall posted:Yeah, it's clearly rampant and universal. What are you on about? No one has made the crazy claim that it happens 100% of the time. Did you just wander in this thread to pointlessly argue or are you that driven to white knight reviews for a lovely game?
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Mar 3, 2013 03:31
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DrNutt posted:Did you just wander in this thread to pointlessly argue or are you that driven to white knight reviews for a lovely game? Maybe Big Games Journalism cuts me a $50 check every time somebody quotes one of my posts  RentCavalier posted:Between Nier, RE6 and Deadly Premonition, it is clear that game reviewers have no idea what they are talking about. It is why I value Giant Bomb's quick looks, since they offer a good glimpse of actual rote gameplay, and not just trailers or a summary by a reviewer--you can see for yourself what a typical game session plays out to. Man, Nier is a loving good game, but I totally understood why it reviewed poorly. And honestly DrNutt, I agree with your greater point about TR: I'm not even sure why that conversation turned into a thing in the first place, because it isn't like this game is reviewing badly. In fact, it seems like it's reviewing almost exactly how it should.
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Mar 3, 2013 03:47
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ymgve posted:What game was it that you worked on? Also, I don't know why they weren't called out on that, because at least one of the more reputable game sites would raise quite a stink about it if they weren't allowed to give their honest opinion. I'd rather not mention what it was specifically, but it was a THQ company. I could be recalling incorrectly, but I remember them mentioning that only the higher reviews could be put up before release. For all we know it could just be an industry standard at this point. I don't believe that the industry issues are as cut-and-dry as "here's a check gimme them tens", it's that people working in the gaming journalism biz are going to be inundated with positive marketing media promoting the hell out of these games, which creates a preconceived notion from the reviewers that the game is going to be good, and to ignore smaller issues. I do believe there's at least a little bit of pressure on these people from management to score the game well, because they don't want to risk bad relations with the publishers supplying review copies. Also for that guy asking what I meant by RE6 "flipping you the bird", I mean in the sense that it's a game that's often killing you for reasons outside of your control or beyond reasonable human reflexes, which is going to piss off even the most hardcore Resident Evil fan. I think even with a lot of pressure to rate it well, it's difficult to justify it when the game is legitimately hard to play for the wrong reasons.
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Mar 3, 2013 03:55
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Zombies' Downfall posted:Man, Nier is a loving good game, but I totally understood why it reviewed poorly. I love Nier, it's one of my favorite games, but taken objectively it has a lot of problems. I don't care because I'm willing to overlook them but if you're not they can easily ruin the game.
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Mar 3, 2013 03:57
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Zombies' Downfall posted:I'm not even sure why that conversation turned into a thing in the first place, because it isn't like this game is reviewing badly. In fact, it seems like it's reviewing almost exactly how it should. The reason people are bringing it up is that it does get a fair review, but some games don't get a fair review, and it's almost always not fair in the publishers favor because publishers exert enormous pressure on journalists. That means a really good game with an 8 or 8.5 or 89% gets glossed over by a lot of buyers for shittier games with highers scores, because journalists clearly get bought and paid and jack up their grades. Considering the cost of games, who wants to risk their cash on an 85/100 game? Developers also get screwed due to grade inflation. Just ask Obsidian. Hopefully Tomb Raider sells well enough. I still need to buy it before the pre-order 10% sale ends, but it sounds perfectly fine for a $45 game.
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Mar 3, 2013 04:06
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ImpAtom posted:I love Nier, it's one of my favorite games, but taken objectively it has a lot of problems. I don't care because I'm willing to overlook them but if you're not they can easily ruin the game. I am not sure the "objective" measure is super relevant though. Everybody I've persuaded to play it says "This game is super awesome"! And they have a great time, even if they realise there are things cavia should or could have done better.
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Mar 3, 2013 05:18
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So for the PC release I guess we should be able to just unlock it using the Korean proxy like everyone did before with Deus Ex right?
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Mar 3, 2013 06:13
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Grey Fox V2 posted:So for the PC release I guess we should be able to just unlock it using the Korean proxy like everyone did before with Deus Ex right? Is it Steamworks? Because if so I gotta let you know that Steam bans for that now, be warned.
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Mar 3, 2013 06:35
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The thing is, a good critic's goal is to disseminate a product, be it a book, movie, song or game, and explain to the viewer why it is/is not worth their time. For a video game, this requires even more, since a good reviewer should be able to explain a hard-to-understand game to their audience, or at the very least take the effort to learn the game. Resident Evil 6 is the best modern example I can think of--the game has one, fairly small, flaw in that it doesn't really explain its core mechanics very well, especially dodge moves. Because of this, game reviewers shat on the game because they didn't understand how it worked, and covered that lack of understanding by saying idiotic things like "this doesn't FEEL like a Resident Evil game" and "enemies don't react to gunfire!" despite the former being a kind of superfluous statement considering how radically RE has changed between 4 and 6, and the latter is proof positive of just how badly they failed to understand the game, since every enemy DOES have a means to stun it with gunfire, but like every previous RE game with the new engine, you have to carefully aim at the appropriate individual limb to do so. A reviewer dismissed Nier because he didn't think to check his map, nor did he bother to really attempt to understand the task he was having trouble with. His review focuses entirely on this one incident in the game, extrapolating wildly from it. This is lazy reviewing, but since games reviewers serve a gatekeeper role between the industry and the audience, it means that a good game that was already criminally undermarketed ends up being dismissed as garbage without even a decent explanation as to why.
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Mar 3, 2013 06:43
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RentCavalier posted:The thing is, a good critic's goal is to disseminate a product, be it a book, movie, song or game, and explain to the viewer why it is/is not worth their time. For a video game, this requires even more, since a good reviewer should be able to explain a hard-to-understand game to their audience, or at the very least take the effort to learn the game. If the game fails to communicate that to the average player, much less to someone who makes their living playing and writing about games, then it has failed on a basic level. Look, I'm sure I'll give RE 6 another go at some point, but it's a pretty big letdown following 4 and to a lesser extent 5, and for good reason. Nier may have a brilliant storyline that goons love to champion or whatever, but Cavia failed to make it any loving fun to play. It's okay to like these games and tell us why you did, but don't act surprised and indignant that they didn't review well.
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Mar 3, 2013 06:58
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DrNutt posted:If the game fails to communicate that to the average player, much less to someone who makes their living playing and writing about games, then it has failed on a basic level. Look, I'm sure I'll give RE 6 another go at some point, but it's a pretty big letdown following 4 and to a lesser extent 5, and for good reason. RentCavalier turned into some kind of whackadoo RE6 evangelist all at once, his opinion on the topic is a little too skewed to bother with. Game reviews, especially for AAA games, have become extremely unreliable lately, but that doesn't mean they're always the opposite of correct no matter what.
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Mar 3, 2013 07:00
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Volt Catfish posted:Is it Steamworks? Because if so I gotta let you know that Steam bans for that now, be warned.
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Mar 3, 2013 07:23
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Grey Fox V2 posted:They didn't when Deus Ex came out a few years back? It wasn't specifically listed as banned in the terms of use until after Human Revolution and Skyrim, I believe.
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Mar 3, 2013 07:38
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Volt Catfish posted:It wasn't specifically listed as banned in the terms of use until after Human Revolution and Skyrim, I believe. That sure did not come up while people (myself included) were unlocking Farcry 3 early.
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Mar 3, 2013 08:14
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I don't think it was a Steam TOS thing so much as a publisher/developer discretion issue as I recall Square or the dev commenting that they wouldn't punish those who unlocked DEHR early. It was a long time ago now but I vaguely recall something to that effect.
Grey Fox V2 fucked around with this message at 09:49 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 08:22
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Does anybody know if the PC version's going to have controller support? The last few Square Enix titles worked out great if you had your PC hooked up to a television, but theres no mention of it on the store page as far as I can see Hurray! VVVVVV Doctor Doctor fucked around with this message at 10:31 on Mar 3, 2013 |
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Mar 3, 2013 10:23
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It does.
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Mar 3, 2013 10:29
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Bought this on Origin - didn't realise this was Steamworks and that means no pre-load so I'll have to wait for the full download on release day 
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Mar 3, 2013 11:44
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Oxxidation posted:RentCavalier turned into some kind of whackadoo RE6 evangelist all at once, his opinion on the topic is a little too skewed to bother with. This is really true, and I'll stop mentioning the game from here on out...outside the LP thread. It IS a criminally underrated game though. I can't wait to get some goon feedback on Tomb Raider, but to be honest, the more I remember Uncharted, the less interested I am in it. Uncharted is basically a shooter with really pretty window dressing and time-padding climbing sections. I hope Tomb Raider's gameplay is a bit more involved, at least. Give me boss fights at least!
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Mar 3, 2013 11:52
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/mar/03/tomb-raider-violence?CMP=twt_fd Tomb Raider firm denies pressure to include more violence Eidos said 18 rating for Lara Croft's latest adventure not due to influence of shooter games such as Call of Duty quote:The makers of the new Tomb Raider computer game have insisted there was no outside pressure to include more violence after it became the first in the series to receive an 18 rating.
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Mar 3, 2013 12:44
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quote:Audiences today want realism in their games.The pillars of Tomb Raider are exploration and adventure, puzzle-solving and combat. Combat had always been an after-thought in previous Tomb Raiders so we though we want to raise the combat. Now why would one of the pillars be an afterthought? And I'm assuming that the game won't feature realistic platforming where you can't just jump your own height while hanging from a ledge or can't just grab a ledge when falling without ripping out your shoulder and stuff like that. The gruesome stuff might be realistic but i get the feeling that it's not there because of realism.
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Mar 3, 2013 13:01
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I'm just glad a major title hasn't been watered down to 12A just to get sales a la Hollywood movies in recent years.
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Mar 3, 2013 13:05
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I've played it for a few hours now, the brutal death scenes aren't as rampant as everyone seems to think they are. The combat feels a lot like resident evil 5 but a little looser, only complaint I have is it's been very easy, I started out on hard mode and only died to thing that would be almost impossible to avoid the first time through.
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Mar 3, 2013 14:17
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Team Beagle posted:...I started out on hard mode and only died to thing that would be almost impossible to avoid the first time through. That's the first thing I've heard which makes it sound like the classic Tomb Raider I remember. 
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Mar 3, 2013 14:44
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When will AMD ship the Never Settle codes for this? The release date of the game is already tomorrow and still nothing! I'd actually like to preload the game since my DSL connection isn't the fastest around.  quote:We will be sending you a download code for Tomb Raider as soon as the code is That pretty much means they don't have the codes yet, but sure they like to leave things for the last moment.
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Mar 3, 2013 23:49
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