Maark Abbott, on 29 November 2018 - 08:50 AM, said:
Mentalist, on 28 November 2018 - 05:18 AM, said:
Played about 2 hours of Darksiders III. Initial impressions: it's different, but not bad.
I'll await some more detail before I decide. I enjoyed DS2 well enough.
Preliminary: all reviews across the board agree that PS4 version is not great. Might be worth waiting on a patch.
That being said: there's a bunch of changes to the formula. Given there were also a bunch of changes between 1 and 2 that's not bad in itself, but it's certainly a leaner game. Probably due to Gunfire being a slimmed down version of Vigil and THQ Nordic giving them only AA budget, when opposed to DSII that had all the money tossed at it and contributed in a big way (along with Homefront: The Revolution) to THQ going bust.
1) character progression. This is most drastic. Skills are gone. Diablo-esque loot system is gone. Levels and stats are still here, but it's RPG-lite- you level up, you get 1 attribute point. You choose to use it to boost your HP, Physical attack strength, or Arcane damage for the AoE special abilities and counter strikes (see below).
-you also get a range of consumables to temporarily boost stats in combat, a la potions. Once you use one, there's a cooldown before you can use any more. Haven't bothered with these much, tbh.
-Ulthane the Blacksmith is back. He can upgrade your weapons (increasing base damage), or improve weapon enhancements (these can be slotted into weapons to convey buffs, just like in the original game). Upgrading requires special materials, and you can use either Angelic or Demonic components, depending on what kind of buffs you want.
-oh yeah, you level up by "cashing in" your Souls to Vulgrim.
2) the things that are like Dark Souls that aren't combat.
The game draws a lot of inspirations from Dark Souls and incorporates them using mechanics from previous Darksiders games with a twist
-just like in game 1, you collect Souls. It's the currency you exchange with Vulgrim to buy stuff and level up
-Vulgrim's locations act as your fast travel points (serpent holes from Game 1). They are also where you revive when you die.
-when you die, all enemies (except for those that existed only to drop crafting materials when dead) revive.
When you die, you drop your souls on your corpse, and have to go collect them, Diablo-style. Unlike Diablo, if you die again they don't all vanish, so collecting hasn't been a problem yet.
-you can also pick up "clumps" of souls that need to be broken down in your inventory before they get added to your total. One of the reviewers complained that this is redundant, but I like that, because until they're broken, I can't lose them when I die- meaning I only break them down when I'm next to Vulgrim and want to trade.
-each "life" you get a limited number of health restore items. These can be upgraded if you find upgrade tokens (I started with 2, now I'm at 4). By finding (and not using, b/c they can ALSO be used to restore part of your health) 3 "health shards" you can recharge this item (there's also an option very early on to buy an enhancement that gives you a health regen buff. Oh, and leveling up insta-heals you).
3) traversal and exploration
-there is no map. It feels very old-school (think Soul Reaver the 1st). I see lots of things I can't access yet because I don't have the appropriate power, but only being 5 hours in it's too early to tell how "interconnected' this world really is, and how many shortcuts I'm not seeing yet. There are 6 " zones" according to the fast travel menu. Having killed 2 Sins I uncovered 3 of them. (You get transported from 2 to 3 in a cutscene). I just found a connection between 2 and 3, but I haven't yet mapped a complete path from my "hub" in zone 1 to get back to 3. I will say that if you don't like orienteering and making a mental map of how stuff is interconnected, you are likely to get frustrated. I'm loving it though.
-there are secrets. You are trying to find lost humans to deliver to Ulthane, and I also stumbled onto a "Chosen" mini-boss (their essences are needed for higher lever weapon enhancement upgrades), but didn't engage it cuz I was busy exploring.
-your forms open new traversal options, prompting revisiting old areas metroid style.
-there are no zelda-esque "dedicated dungeon areas" . Puzzles are scattered throughout. Nothing crazy difficult yet.
-after you kill the second Sin and get your first Hollow form, the game starts giving you options. My compass is pointing at 3 Sins currently, and I I have a general idea of how to get to 2 of them, in whichever order I want. I'm not really focusing on that, because I'm a indulging my inner cartographer and kleptomaniac.
4) Combat.
-so first thing first: it's like Dark Souls in the "everything hits hard and a few hits can kill you" sense.
-it's no longer a spectacle hack'n'slash brawler at its core, because the combo counter is gone
-that being said, there's no stamina mechanic, and you can hit enemies as often as you want
-there's still some of that spectacle fighter DNA in how your combos look on those rare occasions you can pull off a combo without interruption. There's also a heavy whiff of Bayonetta to the core new mechanic
-Arcane Counter: when you time a dodge well, Fury gets a "bullet-time" animation (a la Witch Time, kinda), and if you tap attack in this interval, she delivers a powerful "counter" attack. The key to fighting seems to be chaining these together.
-generally fighting multiple enemies equals guaranteed damage. The camera is... not good. Lock-on actually helps (unlike Darksiders 1 or 2), but it doesn't auto-shift once you kill your target, which is annoying, b/c each time you need to tap it to turn it on.
-that being said, the 2 times I was in an arena rushed by a dozen skeletons, Fury's AoE whip swing (hold attack button down) did wonders to clear a large area. It just takes a bit of time to wind up, and during this time you're vulnerable to any quick strikes.
-enemy AI isn't greatest. Since Fury's primary attack is a barbed whip that strikes at a distance, I ambushed beefy enemies from side of flight of stairs, being ever slightly above and out of their reach. I also lured skeleton champions to over-strike after me into lava to their death (Fury's flame Hollow form makes her immune to lava). More glaringly, I think dodging
towards enemies with wide, sweeping attacks might work every time due to poor collision detection, but I haven't tested that thoroughly yet.
Overall impression of combat is that aside from some camera issues it's pretty fair. Fury's a glass cannon, but it's generally possible to reduce the combat to 1 on 1, where pattern recognition and timely dodge-counters carries the day. I haven't had a lot of truly "cheap death" moments.
The story is...not much right now. But that's OK, because the original didn't have much story until 3/4 in either.
So far I'm just enjoying exploring the interconnected map. Hunting the Sins is a secondary consideration atm.
Help
Although I might play something different for a while first.
