Platinum Games (P*)

[The Boston Crab]

They make great games, don't they? Not sure how many I really love, but they're good.


They're also easy to overlook a bit because they tend to be deep and difficult to master but also very easy to pick up and mash through.


I've just started Vanquish on the 360 which I've never played before but heard great things. It seems to have great movement but it's also a cover shooter so it feels pretty dated.


What are your fave Platinum games?


Bayonetta is the one that I've really rinsed, but I'm still not that good at it. The aesthetic and music and weapons and dialogue and story all fit together perfectly. Kind of beautiful, kind of grotesque, excessive, quite vulgar, very gamey. The kind of thing that pisses people off because of the gooch crash zooms but then people have to defend it from some abstract angle because it's too good a game to cancel. It also has some terrible QTE and mini game kind of levels that go on forever. For a tight arcade experience, it's full of longueurs. Some of the bosses are insane in scale and execution.


Nier: Automata is equally flawed, probably more flawed, but it captures certain feelings and ideas that both transcend, exemplify and celebrate gaming as a medium. Utter wank of a comment but literally word for word spot on description of what it does. The combat is sub-Bayo but also more interesting in certain ways. The shmup stuff is total average, sub-Astebreed nothingness and goes on forever while the twin stick stuff is almost all rubbish even if it does make for some very tense and interesting meta moments. The music is an all-timer, the graphics are alternately stunning and bland. I think a lot of dev time went into 2B's ass. The true ending is one of the best things I've experienced in any game. It is one of the most memorable deliberately memorable moments from any game.


Aside from these, I don't really have much affection for P* but I hope Astral Chain is up there. It's supposed to be great from those in the know and a mix of all the best of P* so we'll see.


Anyone like Platinum Games games?

[Thursday]

Mechanically interesting games with stories written by people's who's only cultural interest is shit anime. Apart from Nier Automata which is from someone who only watches shit anime but also reads the occasional philosophy book.

It doesn't really matter of course, but with Bayonetta, while she's a good character it really is bafflingly insistent upon it's shit story. They could saved so much time, money and resources by just not.

[madhair60]

Can't think of one I've enjoyed besides Revengeance, which is also a bit of a wash really. They seem to cater to everything I don't like in gaming; stern ranking systems, emphasis on mechanical complexity, etc.

[The Boston Crab]

They're games for people who make games or write about games, you know what I mean? There's a distilled purity and immediate feedback to them but they also feel strangely superficial and shit. The traversal in Bayo is garbage, for example, completely weightless and fiddly jumps and angles, but the fighting is fun. Janky but really tight at the same time. They're so incredibly gamey that they're kind of beyond criticism. Kind of weird. I love that they're quite pervy but great because I know they make people uncomfortable but they don't dare criticise for fear of losing cred so they go through these leaps of abstract delusion. I love it. Fuck the police.

[bgmnts]

+1 for Platinum here. One of the few developers who still actually know what the medium can offer beyond interactive films.

Metal Gear Rising was fucking ace and i dont care what anyone says.

[Thursday]

They're games for people who make games or write about games, you know what I mean?

Mmm, I often feel like there's a weird righteous superiority to the way people like them and talk about them. Sort of like how you get about Schmups.

[The Boston Crab]

Yeah, that's it exactly. They're like objectively so gamey that if you don't like them, you're a casual pleb or malco or something despite them being stuffed with total crap at the same time, but even the crap has the bulletproof gamey excuse. Those bits are deliberately crap or something. Shmups are genuinely pure but too distilled for most people, like drinking straight Vimto.

[Bazooka]

+1 for Platinum here. One of the few developers who still actually know what the medium can offer beyond interactive films.

Metal Gear Rising was fucking ace and i dont care what anyone says.

I'll throw in a crispy baguette for MGS: Rising, makes me want to play it now.

Anarchy Reigns is worth picking up for a couple of Quid's.

[popcorn]

The traversal in Bayo is garbage, for example, completely weightless and fiddly jumps and angles, but the fighting is fun. Janky but really tight at the same time.

This might just have figured out what it is I don't like about Bayonetta. I played several hours of both games but found it boring and unsatisfying, unlike Ninja Gaiden which I fucking rinsed. Maybe it's just the traversal?

They're so incredibly gamey that they're kind of beyond criticism. Kind of weird. I love that they're quite pervy but great because I know they make people uncomfortable but they don't dare criticise for fear of losing cred so they go through these leaps of abstract delusion. I love it. Fuck the police.

Yes, there's a certain amount of stupid ogling perviness I find, for some reason, completely inoffensive, though I suppose I'm not in a position to not be offended by it. It's a sort of out-there schoolboy nonsense.

[Thursday]

It's odd, I've nodded along to people saying "Bayonetta is actually feminist and empowering and she's in control of the objectification, and her designer is a woman actually!"

But you know... the camera is still looking at her arse so that men can enjoy looking at her arse.

So I just avoid having any opinion on it at all.

[The Boston Crab]

That's it, exactly. Totally exemplifies my point. I'm not having a go at you in any way but you nailed it perfectly. The Cane and Rinse episode was particularly interesting because it explored that awkward tension and concluded that it's so excessively sexualised, it's almost satire, but it's definitely having its cake and eating it, only the cake is a fanny.

[Mister Six]

Can't think of one I've enjoyed besides Revengeance, which is also a bit of a wash really. They seem to cater to everything I don't like in gaming; stern ranking systems, emphasis on mechanical complexity, etc.

Hmm, I found Bayonetta very forgiving, though. Yes, if you want to get an S* rating you have to play like a robot until your thumbs twitch in your sleep, but people like new can just flap about and get through the level, occasionally getting a B rating and going "WEYYYYYY!"

Maybe that means I missed out on getting some special prize or upgrade to my skills or whatever, but I wouldn't know about that as I didn't play the game until completion - although I did "play" (manipulate) "the game" (my penis) until "completion" (orgasm), if you know what I "mean" (wanking)!!!!!!

[madhair60]

Mm, but it's no fun to finish a level having thought "mate, did alright there" only for a massive statue of Goatse to fill the screen with the text RANK: POND SCUM to appear along with an aggressive italian-american voiceover hollering EYYY WHY DONTCHA KILL YERSELF YA LIMEY FUCK

[madhair60]

YOU ENT NO BEDDAH DAN A LOW DOWN DUTTY DAWG

[The Boston Crab]

AMMA USE YA A-HOLE AS A COOCH YOU DORTY RET

[Swoz_MK]

Transformers Devastation was fucking welllll good and one of the best looking games on the 360.

[Mister Six]

AMMA USE YA A-HOLE AS A COOCH YOU DORTY RET

That's my kink though.

[Bazooka]

Transformers Devastation was fucking welllll good and one of the best looking games on the 360.

I'm afraid you are thinking of 50 Cent:Blood on the Sand.