
|
|
|
As someone who has been rolling his eyes every time Dennis Dyack opens his mouth, I felt like I needed to give the Too Human demo a try, and subsequently ramble about it in a c-blog. If there's one thing that turns me off, it's genuine, serious pretentiousness, which the Too Human team seems to have in droves. Does Too Human appear to be everything that they've talked it up to being? If it is, does that excuse the pretension? Hit the jump to find- Oh. Uh, nevermind. Just keep scrolling down. Random thoughts. Go. My first impression: "Man, this doesn't look that great, for ten years of development." The cutscenes tended to chug a bit. Not very smooth. Also, is this a cutscene demo? I felt like there were too many cutscenes, which should have been replaced with more varied gameplay. And the story that those cutscenes relayed... Did it seem slightly incomprehensible to anyone else? I mean, I get that I'm apparently the Norse god Baldur, and there's some carnivorous machines out there, but I didn't feel like I had much in the way of context. Or maybe it's just me. I could easily be mistaken. And perhaps the full game is... fuller. (Can someone explain to me what the nature-based areas are about, and those women with the purple clothes? I didn't really understand their purpose in the game's world. I probably just missed some of the explanatory dialog. Also, that one snarky Purple Chick was kind of hot... Do I see nipple? 0_o) Aspects of the graphics and the frequent cutscenes were really my two biggest gripes. But do I have anything good to say? Yeah. The gameplay is pretty nice, if not a bit repetitive. The right-thumbstick-based melee system is surprisingly manageable, as is the gunplay. In fact, I had little trouble picking up most of the combat mechanics, and this is impressive since, as we all know, I'm a retard. I had a lot of fun hacking and shooting through the Too Easy goblins (except for the damned shielded ones). I also really appreciate the whole "Nordic cyberpunk" motif.
Okay, now back to the bad stuff. It was Nick, I believe, that mentioned the confusing menu system. I kind of agree. It took me a few trips through the menu before I figured everything(?) out. It's a bit clumsy in places, and I would've hoped that they'd have streamline it a bit more, given the development time. It's not game-breaking, just sloppy. In fact, that perfectly describes the entirety of the demo: Playable, not terrible, but kind of sloppy and forgettable. Now, let's talk about death. When you, or any of your squad mates die, a fairly cool-looking Valkyrie descends from above to take you/them to Valhalla. This is kind of cool, until you have to sit through it every single time you die. It's not a long wait, but one thing I like about games like Halo is the quickness of your respawn. You don't have to sit through a cutscene or a load screen before retrying. The game seems to try very hard to be epic and impressive, and this is a fine example of how it manages to fall on its pretentious face. I did, however, kind of enjoy the fact that, when you respawn, all your prior progress is left intact, including the status of your enemies. I.E. you respawn with full health, but they're still hurting from the damage you previously inflicted. It helps to keep down the repetition and boredom, of which there is much. The only potentially game-breaking aspect of Too Human (or maybe just its demo?) is how generic and lackluster the whole thing seems. I wasn't particularly impressed with any aspect of the game. I think it was Mxyzptlk who said that it seems like a generic sci-fi action movie mixed with some Norse mythology. In fact, if I didn't know this game's history, I would assume it was just some no-name bargain title. Some of the character models look shoddy (particularly the females, save for a couple of the Purple Chicks), and the dialogue and voice acting tend to be extremely forgettable. That said, I would have to give the demo a 7.0. I would probably buy this used or cheap, then sell or trade it after a playthrough or two. Maybe the full game is a bit better than the demo. I'll reserve final judgment, but I'm not holding my breath.
|
|
|
|
Post a comment! You can also post a photo below:
|
Comment with FacebookClick connect and comment instantly! |
Comment with Dtoid
New? SIGN UP - it takes 5 seconds |
Comments policy
Destructoid is an open discussion community. You don't need to "audition" to post a comment - just speak your mind. We respect differing opinions on the site, so have at it. Be smart, funny, insightful, clueless, or cute -- but back it up with substance. Keep your cool, keep it fun. We only ask that you act respectfully and above all: don't be a troll and ruin it for everyone else. Don't bring down gamers or we'll, you know, gently shoot you in the face and stuff you into a flaming mailbox. Each comment is your opportuntity to make this community awesomer. Is that even a word?
Avoiding the banhammer only requires common sense: spamming, trolling, racism, NSFW stuff, and other forms of sucking will not be tolerated. If anyone is griefing please report abuse. Be good. Don't suck!

Follow
RSS
Contact
10 years is entirely too long to have ANYTHING clunky, let alone what seems like everything.
It was pretty much as expected, I guess :)
Have 360, will download.
This game does not feel like 10 years well spent.
What were we talking about?
I like the score for the demo because then I can just skip the writeup and go straight for the good stuff(the score) which is all that matters.
While I'm not a graphics whore by any means, I felt there was just something "off" about the character animations (I didn't like that Baldur has the same landing animation for jumping straight up in the air as he does for running forward and landing... a simple tuck and roll animation would suffice). I also didn't feel as though the characters had any weight within the context of the world. After seeing a game like GTAIV in action it's hard to watch a game that clearly doesn't use any sort of advanced physics system, but instead uses canned animations (and some downright fugly ones at that). It's little stuff like that that make me feel as though this game deserves a lot more polish.
I also didn't appreciate the over-abundance of cutscenes for a demo. Especially when all they did was highlight the fact the in-game graphics engine doesn't hold up to close scrutiny.
The gameplay itself took me a little getting used to, but I think it was fun enough, not mind blowingly cool as I hoped, but fun enough (I will surely have to take jkh3's advice next play through and try out the advanced combat options, 'cause I clearly didn't understand enough on my own). I'm a whore when it comes to collecting shit and upgrading my character in games so I can see myself getting addicted to collecting all the cool armors and stuff.
Also, the camera sucked TOTAL BALLS no matter which option I tried. None of them fucking worked. Thanks, Denis, ya twat.
Unfortunately, this demo didn't quite sell me on the game being able to last me as long as I hoped. A playthrough or two may be likely, but if things stay as repetitive as I don't know if it will be as purchase-worthy as I anticipated, sadly.
I don't have beef with Dyack. I really could careless who he challenged to what or what promises he's making about that game.
But playing this game makes me wish I was playing Gauntlet or No More Heroes, but with a "Too Human" skin.
I guess I can get behind the Norse Cyber Punbk thing. Its a cool motif. But the I think I've found the point where I can recognize horrible voice acting. You'd think saying something like "It is a good day to die" would afford a character a little life and personality. Maybe I've been down the RPG road too many times, but I that whole bit/character came off as really artless.
Then again, I'm not a Dungeon crawler type of guy.
I want this to control like Mark of kri (I think? its been a while) or God Of War.
I dunno. Maybe its just not my thing . . .
"It's a good day to die". Somebody has been watching too much Star Trek.