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Spider-Man has won 37 E3 Awards out of 47 nominations this year.
- Thread starter patapon
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Check out this scene: https://youtu.be/bso_HL0lhqQ?t=3962
This is how most scenes play out. Ratchet and Clank are side by side, no one's really moving or doing anything, and the camera just lazily cuts back and forth so they can deliever the bare necessity dialogue. It's really boring. I guess you could argue the movie scenes make up for it but they have their integration have their own slew of problems...
I don't necessarily mind reinvention. I mean, this is basically the Ratchet that the series has been edging toward ever since Going Commando. But it's still the most boring display of his character and didn't do much with him, Clank and their dynamic at all.
Doesn't really change my opinion but in the context of being concerned about Spider-Man it's a valid point.
C'mon. The original's music is so so dank.
In the case of James Stevenson, he's a community director, so I am sure he is used to seeing stuff like this all over the place. But I really agree with you here, I dunno what it is, but I feel lately it has been a little ridiculous, I'm getting tired of it and I'm not a person involved in games in a professional capacity, can't imagine how they do it.
I think it's why you see a lot of community oriented games industry people flame out or move on to other things in the industry or outside of it.
it takes a toll over time, for sure. Some can compartmentalize that differently than others
I started without interest at all. After all, I can't think in a single good Spider-man game.
But with time and some recent videos, they kinda manage to impress me and change my opinion entirelly. Now I have high hopes for this game. Hope its live for its praise...because the way it looks its gonna bomb hard(in a good way).
But with time and some recent videos, they kinda manage to impress me and change my opinion entirelly. Now I have high hopes for this game. Hope its live for its praise...because the way it looks its gonna bomb hard(in a good way).
The video you linked isn't confined to shot reverse shot. I just skimmed through a video that has all the scenes from R&C, and I can assure you there's a lot of variety.
What would you have them do?
How is it a valid point when you're talking about cut content from a budget title?
Dank?
You need to check this collection:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO4jlmGoc6uDmQZaPcYppFxMAUMJWdfhE
Maybe not "confined," but it's still really flat.
Let's look at this scene for example. Everyone's standing nice and still, Ratchet and Clank of course side by side like every other scene, the camera has like two modes of either being a close up of the character speaking or wide enough to see all three, there's the strange cut to Ratchet's blank stare in the middle of him upgrading Clank, neither Ratchet and Clank seem all that enthused with the new power, Clank doesn't move his arms in and out of the mode or anything cute like that. The scene is just there.
I mean the original is nothing special. But just looking at a random scene I found, you can already see it's better in every way. A character jumps down from a stool, Ratchet and Clank are always expressive, the camera actually moves around a bit and cuts accordingly, when Ratchet gets the boots he looks genuinely excited instead of just no response...
Make something good. I'm not a writer.
I said you have a valid point.
I appreciate the effort to combine the "epic orchestra" new style with the funky old stuff, but it still leans to hard into the former and results in the soundtrack being completely unmemorable, which I would call a horrid soundtrack.
Yassssss Best Spider-Man Game incoming
So much awesome in this comic panel.
Think I need a drink after reading this thread.
Some of you all are making me depressed throwing shade at Insomniac.
Congrats to Insomniac, I know I'm hyped. Only game I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on this year.
The 3rd costume reveal is this month right? Can't wait for all the "concerns" in that thread.
Some of you all are making me depressed throwing shade at Insomniac.
Congrats to Insomniac, I know I'm hyped. Only game I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on this year.
The 3rd costume reveal is this month right? Can't wait for all the "concerns" in that thread.
Oh for sure, I truly don't think I would be able to do it. On a positive note I think one thing that helps is that you post in other threads other than Spider-Man, makes you more a part of the community and not just someone here to promote something.
It's nice to have confrontation with your audience, but if there is no confrontation and mostly passive-aggressive answers to legit criticism... well, I don't know why some developers are still here.
I really liked R&C (see avatar) but still the writing was off, Clank is a backpack most of the time and doesn't participate to the dialogues, the game had it's limit (budget, time, whatever) but those limits are there, like Trigonometrize said.
Respond at those criticism (like Spiderman webswinging) with:
-big number of people at E3 loved it so we nailed it (your opinion doesn't count)
-huge metascore and best selling game ever so we nailed it (your opinion doesn't count)
Doesn't help or contribuite to the discussion in any way, it's just PR stuff and diminish the other users opinions.
If you guys didn't make a secret insomniac museum within the city then Insomniac has lost a fan. Preorder cancled.
Yassssss Best Spider-Man Game incoming
Did Torch say "Web Of" after this?
While I won't deny this scene, I think you're cherry picking to make a point that doesn't affect the entire game.
Rather than explaining, I'll just timestamp a few scenes from the R&C 2016:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBhqh1qYntU&t=25m3s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBhqh1qYntU&t=19m55s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBhqh1qYntU&t=2m24s
okay.
Ah, my bad.
"Epic orchestra" makes the new soundtrack completely unmemorable?
Here are all of Insomniac's previous Metascores for reference:
Spider-man does have the opportunity to become their highest rated game, if the impressions (Wired's excluded) are anything to go by. It'll certainly be their highest selling game.
I've read through the rest of your posts, and just wanted to come back to this one to make a point: If you are willing to discount any and all factors surrounding a game to manufacture concern, why should anyone take anything you say seriously?
You're comparing a game that was on a 12 month development cycle to one that has been in development for something like 4 years. Comparing a game that had a small budget and was developed (for the most part) by their smaller NC studio (~50-75 people) to this one (Marvel & Sony backed, 200+ people working on it). You're comparing a title that had its hands tied in certain areas to work and function with a movie tie-in that Insomniac only had some influence and control over, to a title that is essentially free to tell its own story without relying on an external production studio / writer.
It feels a lot more like concern trolling and reaching just to be negative on a product that has received a lot positive press and response. It doesn't feel like any of it is actually genuine in any capacity. If all of those points were things you were unaware of, fine, but maybe it's best to get the whole picture before you start slinging around concern for something you haven't looked into that deeply.
Here are all of Insomniac's previous Metascores for reference:
Spider-man does have the opportunity to become their highest rated game, if the impressions (Wired's excluded) are anything to go by. It'll certainly be their highest selling game.
It still blows my mind how R2 scored higher than R3, considering R3 was a better game by every measurable metric. Just makes me wonder if Reviewers were soured on the Resistance franchise by then and went in with a certain attitude / mindset.
I'm willing to bet this game will succeed regardless of 80 or 90 meta . Anyone willing to bet that this game will "fail miserably" is on hard stuff or not paying attention.
I'm not saying that this game will fail, I'm saying that E3 awards it's not something to take into consideration.
People predicting low metascore : remember some of you gave a prediction of 80 for God of War. That's all I'm saying.
Bit isn't it literally the job of community managers to engage in such critical discussions?
All this shows is they like games that start with R and SHere are all of Insomniac's previous Metascores for reference:
Spider-man does have the opportunity to become their highest rated game, if the impressions (Wired's excluded) are anything to go by. It'll certainly be their highest selling game.
Spider man
SPYRO
Sunset Oversrive
Slow Down
Song of the Deep
Resistance
Ratchet and Clank
Let's just hope they don't make another game beginning with F.
I mean, I don't have these scenes like on file ready to machine gun out. I just scrubbed through a "Ratchet and Clank movie" YT video like you to find some and the first two to pop up were the Skid one and the Clank wings one. It's hard to support your point with examples without "cherry picking" or litigating the entire game. It's just the feel I got by the end of the journey and a lot of what is in the game supports that.
These are a fair bit more animated than the ones I've been posting, but what I noticed is this are all pretty front loaded. It seems like the further you go into the game, the more likely you are to be hit with a "flat" scene or a — gulp — movie scene. If you scroll around in the last 2/3 it's much easier to find a scene like this: https://youtu.be/zBhqh1qYntU?t=7038 (and that ISN'T the one where that character makes a "old guy is out of touch with modern social media" joke, ugh).
So basically, even if I can't say my very brief summary in the original post was accurate that "every scene was a shot-reverse-shot", the cutscenes still never excited me, intrigued me, entertained me, or anything.
It's kind of a sister complaint of my "they went from a cynical Ratchet and cynical world to wide-eyed ranger boy planet hopping" comment. The soundtrack to me reminds me a lot of Star Wars with the blaring horns and always loud and kind of obnoxious presence (which is something I equally level against the Star Wars movies mind you), but it's obviously not as good at making memorable melodies that stick with you when you think of character x, world y or what have you. And the story also gives off the Star Wars vibe to, where a planet-locked, dissatisfied Ratchet breaks out and is ready to save the world from beat one, just like Luke.
None of this is anything like the original. The original's story first of all is about how Ratchet grows into a person that eventually wants to save the world. The music isn't all "epic" because the story wouldn't work with that — Ratchet is for a large part of the game just going around, getting new toys, and not giving much of a fuck about the conflict unfolding around him. And the funky chops of the original reflect the more defined, grimy capitalist world the two are wading through. The planets you stop at feel more than just like beats on your space adventure in that the people are scummy and Ratchet is apathetic. It genuinely feels inspired when you're on this bleak shitty little planet and this starts playing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0o5v7Sj9S_Y
...or this when you get to the logging planet... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmrrlnNXFCE&t=2s
The worlds are just worlds, not everything is there for Ratchet to fight, "save" and win win win! if that makes any sense. So to summarize why "epic orchestra" is a criticism, it's because it gives off a much less interesting aesthetic to me. It makes the game about threats against the worlds that Ratchet wants to vanquish. It's adequate, but it's so much less a mark of creativity.
This is pretty much as far as I can go without digging into every individual track and saying why it doesn't work for me.
I'm not trying to discount "any and all factors." The problem is people tend to talk about this Spider-Man game like everyone should start at 100% excited and only things that you've clearly articulated and rigorously justified should drop the excitement level down from that. When really, it starts at 0% and is brought up by factors that do actually excite me.
So what happens is every time I have a trepidation about the game, it somehow gets handwaved away. At the E3 2017 showing after the combat section that looked alright, they show a bunch of QTEs that didn't look very fun at all to play. It's just baby game design to give the illusion that the player is "doing" the crazy thing the character is doing but the illusion doesn't work. It never works. I'm just mindlessly pushing a stupid button. But then when someone levels that criticism there just so happen to be a billion reasons why it doesn't matter. Oh, there might not be that many in the game. Oh, it's just for bringing in the casual audience. Oh, it's just a couple QTEs, who cares amirite boys? But it's like mother fucker this is what they're showing to get me excited about the game and it's not working. The combat looked fine but this is just dumb.
And then when I bring up Ratchet and Clank, of course there are a million reasons why it's not a good jumping off point to not be excited about Spider-Man (reasons I have acknowledged which make my trepidations less valid). Oh, it was a low-budget game. Oh, the move hampered it. Oh, there were fewer people working on it. Fine, but I want to be excited for Spider-Man, not be somewhat less validated in being not excited for Spider-Man. With the volume of games coming out I'm not in a position to shell out benefit of the doubts for a game I can barely muster a 25% for.
If you think I'm being disingenuous because I'm a fanboy or something, I'm not. It seems like people keep seeing a correlation between the people that are down on this game and the people that are down on God of War, and although with that game I might've been ever so slightly dissapointed they were moving away from the old style, I bought it day 1 for $60 and loved every minute of it.
I've never discredited anyone that is excited for the game. I can understand why. But that doesn't mean I have to lie and say I am too. The people that are not 100% ready to preorder Spider-Man for some reason have to work so much harder to articulate why they're not interested, and even when they do they're discredited as being disingenuous and shown the door.
I'm not saying you don't have room to not be excited. I'm saying the reasons you've given don't seem like they're grounded much in what this game is.
Like, what Ratchet and Clank is has no bearing on what Spider-Man will be. Even if you want to say "look at the cutscenes in Ratchet & Clank!" we've seen numerous quick cutscenes like that in Spider-Man that have good direction, varied camera angles, good writing, and seamless integration into gameplay, so I'm not sure where the concern is there, if at all.
As for QTEs, I can totally understand that as a point of contention for some users, and I wouldn't discount that. I think that's considerably more valid than trying to draw a comparison from a game from a different genre that was developed under entirely different circumstances.
I'm not saying you can't have your criticisms or your own concerns, just that any and all of your concerns related to Ratchet and Clank, as a basis to be concerned about this game, are not applicable in the slightest.
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This post is fucking embarrassing. This should be a meme. You really are clutching at pearls. Talk about looking for shit to complain about jfc.
Well, the reason we started to talk about the cutscenes wasn't because I was trying to directly compare them to what we've seen of Spider-Man. Ratchet and Clank just in general gave off a really meh vibe for me, and so any reference to Insomniac's legacy as a developer that I've seen in this thread is a little less pertinent to me when their previous game (and the three R&C games that came before it too) were underwhelming. We started talking about more specific stuff because Equanimity asked me. The direction of Spider-Man does feel like a step up, so that's a plus.
One thing I really dislike about framing the discussion like this is I haven't played Sunset Overdrive. I feel like my tone could drastically change if I tried that and liked it a lot. It's more similar to Spider-Man with the open world, seems like it got more time to develop, so overall seems like a much better point of comparison. But I just haven't, and won't because no money for X1, so I can't do much but shrug at Spider-Man.
The phrase is "grasping at straws." "Clutching your pearls" is different.
Which one do you prefer? Cause both terms applies to you.
It's OK, you said the wrong phrase. We all do that sometimes.
Is that all you got after that embarrassing rambling post? I used the wrong phase? I'll take it.
What did you want me to write another 1,000 words in response to your one line so you could make fun of me again?
Even then, Resistance 2 and 3 had really great direction for their cutscenes (though Resistance 3 had more Half-Life inspired dialog delivered during gameplay, as well). Sunset Overdrive is also better, in this regard. Even the ill received Fuse did well with story delivery, for what it's worth. This is explicitly why I'm making this point though, as it's been pointed out that without the full picture here, it's a rather pointless comparison to make, because it's quite literally apples to oranges.
I don't really think you should worry that Sony, Marvel, or Insomniac will drop the ball here. Concern over gameplay issues that don't clique with your tastes are totally valid, but I think you should really just drop the whole cutscene business. We've seen enough to know it's going to be a step above literally every other game they've released.
Lol did you read some of this thread? You call stuff that's posted in here as critical discussions? Come on now, I'm obviously talking about the bullshit posts, if your posts don't fall into this category then fine.
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Yea, th y'all toxic behavior and attitude on the internet feels like it's gotten worse in the last few years. Maybe just cause ive been paying attention more, but it's really tired and annoying. It needs to be checked otherwise it's gonna get way worse.
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