Hot takes

[moonbits]

I think it's valid to critique it's artistic interpretation.
Pixel art with depth of field and bloom just doesn't work for me

 

[Mr. Daddy]

Remember kids, if it's fun, regardless of it's intended market, play it.
Look at me, already got hair in my balls and I still watch grown men in spandex kung fu fighting rubber monsters every week.

...in?

 

[Xdqwerty Xdqwerty]

Being able to decrease level up requirements in some ports of games counts as cheating

 

[PrismRed]

...in?

On

 

[Xdqwerty Xdqwerty]

On

At

 

[miguk miguk]

I think it's valid to critique it's artistic interpretation.
Pixel art with depth of field and bloom just doesn't work for me

Yes, critique is valid. I've supported substantive critique multiple times in this forum, and still think it's fine even for an aesthetic argument. But a lot of gamers make weak, unsubstantiated critiques that end on Comic Book Guy style "worst game ever" nonsense after having said nearly nothing other than "I don't like it because I don't like it." And that's just not a good critique.

Okay, bloom can be annoying. (I, too, dislike JJ Abrams' films.) And depth of field is not always used correctly. Nonetheless, they are techniques that can be used well if done with subtly and purpose. And luckily they are not always overdone.

 

[moonbits]

Having to babysit 3D cameras has been a blessing and a curse for videogame design.

 

[Michael Frank]

Even with the Zero Project patch applied, Mega Man X3 is a painfully mediocre game that doesn't deserve to be compared to X1 and X2.

Honestly it's easy even without knowing the weaknesses of the bosses, BUT honestly the Sigma fight is kinda awesome tho.

Post automatically merged: Mar 13, 2025

YA KNOW WHAT I HATE??? In Ace Attorney, I really don't like all the spiritual mysticism BS that was added in Justice for All and stayed with the series for a very long time. It takes away from the atmosphere – what does a murder case matter in a world where ghosts exist and can be communicated with? What does investigation matter in a world where you can use a magical orb to see peoples' innermost secrets? That stuff always really bugged me, and, especially in the third game's last case, made me feel that a lot of what the characters were accomplishing was moot. Those games really needed to focus more on the hard science, not paranormal nonsense.

It's why the first game is my favourite, because it has precisely none of that "communicating with the afterworld" stuff, and why I actually prefer the Investigations series over the mainline one. (Though I've only played the first three main games, nothing after that.) I'm willing to stretch my suspension of disbelief to advanced technology or scientific research in a game about law – some of those things may not be "realistic", but at least they're believable. It's when you bring in mystical magical mumbo-jumbo that my eyes kind of glaze over. Trials and Tribulations is a great game, but I really do feel like that element of the last case dragged a lot of the experience down.

And while we're on the subject, paranormality is also what tanked the Ace Attorney/Professor Layton crossover right from the start for me. That game had an unbelievable amount of potential, and they threw it all away for some idiotic isekai plot about witches in fairyland. HOW DISAPPOINTING.

Once again Capcom pulling bullshit without any good reason, possesed tanks godammit, couldn't at least try to do cyberdemons?! or demons with guns, honestly that sounds more credible, fighting the demon/human halfling with guns WITH demons with guns.

Post automatically merged: Mar 13, 2025

DMC2 isn't so bad.

You apply the mod that changes some values in damage and combos, and your'e in for quite the experience tbh.

 

[Glimbo]

Panzer Dragoon Saga is a mediocre game. I stopped at the beginning of disc 3 (~5 hours total playtime).

The combat was interesting at first but quickly became boring. Too much enemy information is given so you never have to think about your next move.
The game is too easy which leads to things never needing to be used like items or dragon morphing. Some bits felt like padding in an already short game.
Story and characters didn't interest me.

 

[Deleted member 884]

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood is highly overrated. I'm acutally watching it, halfway to the end.
I remember I've watched the first anime aroud 15 years ago, and liked it. But this time it's hard to follow every episode staying focused on the TV screen.

 

[PepThePerson]

Yes, critique is valid. I've supported substantive critique multiple times in this forum, and still think it's fine even for an aesthetic argument. But a lot of gamers make weak, unsubstantiated critiques that end on Comic Book Guy style "worst game ever" nonsense after having said nearly nothing other than "I don't like it because I don't like it." And that's just not a good critique.

Okay, bloom can be annoying. (I, too, dislike JJ Abrams' films.) And depth of field is not always used correctly. Nonetheless, they are techniques that can be used well if done with subtly and purpose. And luckily they are not always overdone.

To me, it depends on how well it matches the art style. Octopath works well enough with it, since the muted colors and object layout work better with the lighting than the Dragon Quest 3 remake.

It's a subjective thing, but HD-2D works best when the lighting has the chance to show off how it looks. In Octopath it happens all the time, which looks way better to me than DQ3's "hey look the lights shine through windows or over hedges and clouds sometimes!". It looks half-assed as hell to me, despite the clear effort. It's not like Octopath doesn't have problems (the bloom is way too overwhelming sometimes), but it at least has something.

...and hey, both are good games. DQ3's a classic, and Octopath's quite alright. I just don't like the trend this is going towards of "let's put HD-2D in games not really designed for it because it looks nice, why not!" and it looking worse off than if it was a simple 2D or 3D remake. Reminds me of people going "let's put RTX in it, it'll be fiiiiine" and it looks kinda ass.

 

[_oBSOLEte_]

At this point HD-2D and all the other neoretro scams can rot in hell. It's a perversion of the indie scene. Pixel art was fine for struggling studios trying to make it. I wont give the same level of tolerance to multi-billionaire publishers just surfing on that trend to regurgitate yet another remaster AI-upscaled cashgrab.

 

[Gorse]

I don't have anything to add to this conversation besides the fact that, on the original-model Switch's screen, Octopath Traveler looked like an absolute lot of muddy shit. I genuinely think it's one of the ugliest professionally-released games I've ever played. I didn't really like the gameplay at all, either.

I think all this HD-2D diorama nonsense looks absolutely abhorrent. It was fine for one single game way back when, but the fact that it's now an art style that they're poisoning otherwise good games with is pretty revolting. I hope AI makes faux-hand-drawn art styles more prominent in the gaming industry, because I can't think of a single recent 2D JRPG that hasn't looked atrocious.

 

[ATenderLad]

I don't have anything to add to this conversation besides the fact that, on the original-model Switch's screen, Octopath Traveler looked like an absolute lot of muddy shit. I genuinely think it's one of the ugliest professionally-released games I've ever played. I didn't really like the gameplay at all, either.

I think all this HD-2D diorama nonsense looks absolutely abhorrent. It was fine for one single game way back when, but the fact that it's now an art style that they're poisoning otherwise good games with is pretty revolting. I hope AI makes faux-hand-drawn art styles more prominent in the gaming industry, because I can't think of a single recent 2D JRPG that hasn't looked atrocious.

It *is* a little disappointing that HD-2D is shorthand for JRPG's with a depth of field effect, and not something like KOF XIII.

 

[WarpKaiser]

I've thought for a long time that terms like Metroidvania or Souls-like are worthless band-aid terms thought up by people who are bad at naming things and no one should use them. I mean what do you do about people that have never played Metroid, Castlevania or Dark Souls when you use terms like that? Why can't we say labyrinthine platformer or just call Dark Souls a third-person action RPG? I understand trying to make sense to someone who does know what those games are but these terms have no longevity is my point and they're being pushed as official terminology to sell products.

For metroidvania there is already a proper name for that genre: Search-Action from the Japanese: 探索型アクション.
For souls-like. I didn't play them but they look like Action-RPGs. What is the difference between those and games like Diablo or Elder Scrolls beyond the camera perspective (and the mouse movement in the case of Diablo. Although the PS1 port you can control the player with the d-pad)?

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My hot takes: Silent Hill 1-3 have excellent combat, not bad or intentionally bad to make it more scary like some people like to say, and is better than the combat in Resident Evil 1-3.
With SH1 I can understand the complains because is janky. And SH2 lacks enemy variety. But with SH3 there is no excuse, that game is perfect all around.
Also I like to add that in the case of the original PlayStation 2 ports. Silent Hill 2 and 3 uses the pressure sensitive buttons of the Dual-Shock 2 to execute the combos. People who play this games with an emulator forget or ignore this fact and think the combat lacks deep and complexity.

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Another hot take: Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver and Soul Reaver 2 are the true 3D Search-Action/Metroidvania games and not the Souls-Born franchise. 1: Both SR1 and SR2 has exploration, back tracking, puzzle-solivg, platforming and unlockable abilities that you need to use to unlock the next area. 2: The first game in LoK franchise, Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain. Is a top down Zelda clone in a dark fantasy setting. And IGA himself said that for Symphony, he took more cues from Zelda rather than Metroid, turn out the map was misleading!

 

[Raziya The Seeker]

Many of the weapons in Elden Ring that weren't lifted from Dark Souls? Yeah, they look designed by an AI. With all that entails.

 

[Elwiwi]

Many of the weapons in Elden Ring that weren't lifted from Dark Souls? Yeah, they look designed by an AI. With all that entails.

That's impossible, they recycled everything from demon souls

 

[Xdqwerty Xdqwerty]

KoF>>Street Fighter

 

[fake-kun]

KoF>>Street Fighter

I'd imagine that a lot of South Americans would agree with you.

 

[Xdqwerty Xdqwerty]

I'd imagine that a lot of South Americans would agree with you.

Why?

 

[fake-kun]

Why?

I heard the King of Fighters is very popular there.

 

[Xdqwerty Xdqwerty]

I heard the King of Fighters is very popular there.

Street Fighter is a bit too complex for me

 

[Elwiwi]

Why?

KOF is very loved in south America for some reason

 

[MasterEn]

Why?

I heard the King of Fighters is very popular there.

KOF is very loved in south America for some reason

because mai > chun li.

 

[Elwiwi]

because mai > chun li.

A very HOT take