Sulphur on 29/1/2011 at 08:25
Sure, they were long, but not 80 hours. A lot of backtracking and labyrinthine corridors like you said, but at a maximum of 15 hours even with all that, maybe 20 for the few that were really big.
driver on 29/1/2011 at 16:20
I got it yesterday and finished it today, roughly 8 hours long which felt about the right length.
The Good:
*Zero-G areas are much better than the first. Full 360 movement is a very welcome addition
*Nice variety of environments. The setting helped here, there's only so many things you can do with a mining ship.
*The scripted scenes were very well done. Particularly the one where you meet up with Diane
*Giving Isaac a voice. If we ever seen HL3, Valve take note: Silent protagonists do not work if a game has any sort of interaction between characters.
The Bad:
*Voice acting was pretty terrible all round. The only half-way convincing person was the fruit-loop.
*Still as linear as the first. It would have been nice to have some freedom to roam. Even a little choice in the order you did objectives would have been nice.
*Replacing Nicole was a bit jarring. I suppose there's a good reason they didn't get back the original voice actress, but still...
The So-so:
*The plot was nothing special. I could predict pretty much everything before it happened, but it did its job.
Sulphur on 29/1/2011 at 17:27
I'm playing it now and, an hour in, it's not as disturbingly horrific as the original. But that's to be expected given it's familiar territory now, so apart from that, the action and level design has been supremely polished so far, and it looks like everything's been amped up for the sequel (Alien -> Aliens, basically? Perhaps, gotta see if that holds once I get further in).
I'm thinking I should shelve the game for now until I connect my Z-5500 speakers back to the PC. Headphones are nice and all, but a game like Dead Space needs that surround sound for maximum effect. (Also, I'm shelving everything until my eye infection disappears completely. Must remember to blink often. :()
gunsmoke on 29/1/2011 at 17:34
Man, I feel for you. Back in the 80's before disposable contacts (when we had to use the heat disinfection) I used to get eye infucktions constantly. Don't go outside without sunglasses, or you'll be snow-blind instantly.
Sulphur on 29/1/2011 at 17:49
Thanks, man. And yeah, I'm going nowhere now, snowed in at the moment (figuratively, that is). Hope this blows over in time for tomorrow's party, or I'm going to be all sunglasses at night -- which is a look I can rock, anyway. :cool:
Until I trip over someone's stupid dog lying in the hallway because I couldn't fscking see it.
GRRRR on 30/1/2011 at 13:18
Same boat as Sulphur - the first one always managed to build some sorta base tension, even after playing it like 3 times id still be creeped out. This is totally missing now except for a few good jump scares.
The Isaac Insanity stuff is kinda meh. Nicole is now a pestering nuisance with a jack o lantern head going "abloo abloo you keeld me". Its prolly supposed to represent Isaacs guilt and i guess the new marker the new nicole comes from is kinda pissy but still, misses the mark imo. Compared how she was portrayed in the first one its really bad actually.
Nothing to complain about on the technical side, saves faster, looks better. Shooting crap is still hella fun. More action, Amount of monsters being thrown at you raised. Also some real graphical gory stuff. Replaying on zealot (fuck limited saves).
Phatose on 31/1/2011 at 05:07
The contact beam in this game is really absurdly powerful. It was pretty nasty in the first game, but adding the stasis effect to the secondary area affect attack improves it a heck of a lot.
Plus, even if you never intend to actually fire the damn thing, it's worth a slot in your inventory simply because carrying it around makes the ammo for it drop. And the ammo sells for 1000 a pop. Just keeping the thing in your inventory ends up giving you enough extra credits to buy quite a few power nodes.
Edit: Just another note. The hardcore reward Volition's Advocate posted above currently does not get awarded on the PC mode. It's currently borked, like the elite suits. A patch is supposed to be in the works.
Malleus on 1/2/2011 at 00:18
Quote Posted by GRRRR
Also some real graphical gory stuff.
They certainly tried to up the 'fucked up factor' in this one. We have two new monster types
based on children - those freaked me out a bit, and there are some supposedly cringe inducing scenes in there (
needle in the eye, uhh).
By the way, new enemies - I totally like the
peekaboo monster. Though they missed the opportunity for its introduction IMO. It's
the usual 'door is blocked'-'hold on I'll unlock it'-'quickly, there's something in here' and then they storm the place. It should have been just a random room or corridor, no prior warning or hint, just letting the player walk around and notice (or not) a strange head peeking out from behind a corner. :)Phatose on 1/2/2011 at 04:21
Those were nifty creatures.
"OMFG, Zombie Velociraptor. FUCK."
