The Last of Us

[Sexton Brackets Drugbust]

Yeah, surely there's room for both kinds of games and everything in between.

[Josef K]

So they showed a decent chunk of gameplay at E3 last night.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7Bdrb1Vkq0

I haven't been this impressed by some gameplay footage in a long time. The little details like how he actually takes items out his backpack, how he interacts with his surroundings and the context sensitive combat are all jaw-dropping. It's exactly how a Walking Dead game should have been.

[Still Not George]

And, indeed, not the least hint of a zombie, except possibly at the beginning.

The human-on-human violence actually left me a little nauseated. It's incredibly visceral and brutal - the scene with the forearm smash into the wall actually made me wince rather a lot. That's quite an accomplishment, although it strongly suggests I'll not actually play it.

As you say, Josef, was very impressed by the "taking your items out of your backpack" mechanic too.

[Thursday]

I did think the clip looked good, as you say the combat actually looked brutal, and the idea of shooting some in the face with a shotgun actually looked like something you might regret, something that was actually quite harrowing to do.

But I've a feeling it won't sustain that throughout, and eventually it'll just be Uncharted style cover shoot-outs towards the end.

[Mister Six]

There is a 30+ man at work who announced to me that he will buy anything with zombies in it. WHO ARE THE REAL ZOMBIES, EH GUYS?

The businessmen, in their suits and ties.

[Josef K]

They showed another , extended version of the E3 gameplay at PAX

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBH19F4h8hc&feature=player_embedded

Puts to rests any accusations of what was shown being scripted. The AI on show is phenomenal and I don't think I've seen a game this brutal since Manhunt.

The lack of music is a nice touch too, the last 5 minutes or so of the firefight were nail biting stuff.

[mobias]

Looks amazing. If someone told me this was a PS4 launch title I'd pretty much believe them. Unfortunately everything else about it is the computer gaming equivalent of watching paint dry. The Uncharted series had enough of a mix of decent originally done gaming elements to make you almost forget you were in an otherwise fairly dull linear game with a very derivative story. This looks beautiful but utterly dull and charmless. I hope it bombs and takes the zombie gaming genre with it.

[chand]

I dunno why people get their pants twisted about linear games, it's not like the games industry is starving you of 40-hour open world sandbox RPG timesinks.

[Old Nehamkin]

The Uncharted series had enough of a mix of decent originally done gaming elements to make you almost forget you were in an otherwise fairly dull linear game with a very derivative story.

I don't see why being linear as opposed to open-world is an inherently bad thing though. Surely they're both equally valid approaches depending on the nature of the game? Uncharted for example is clearly modelled after Indiana Jones and the like- it's all about chasing a trail from one location to the next while being pursued by baddies between spectacular set pieces, never looking back and always pushing on to the next challenge- the linear nature completely suits it.

The story is certainly derivative of countless movies but it's well structured, quite well-written and crucially, relatively unobtrusive. If you're looking for an innovative and immersive storytelling experience you'll definitely be disappointed, but I don't think that every game should be automatically expected to provide this. Uncharted is basically a video game equivalent of a big, silly, fun action movie- no one's saying that that's all that games are or should be capable of, obviously, but games like that can easily co-exist with more involved or open-ended stuff.

[mobias]

I don't see why being linear as opposed to open-world is an inherently bad thing though.

Its not a bad thing at all for other people obviously. I just don't personally like linear games so was just coming from the angle of my own personal point of view. I really enjoyed Uncharted 2 and 3, amazing games in a lot of ways but like most linear games they're just CGI movies that you have a certain amount of control over. Its just way too procedural.  A lot of people love that of course but personally its not usually for me. The Uncharted games just did a better job of drawing me into them than a lot of other linear games I've played. 

[Old Nehamkin]

fair do's.

[Thursday]

This doesn't look particularly linear though, unlike Uncharted which basically had several semi-scripted sequences, this looks like there's a few different ways the battles could go.

[mobias]

Major new preview. I'm really not into zombie games but this does look incredible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6jIK_cHF5c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HA2cuwYSIqs&list=UUQXR8pItAoKDAJSbphFxbrg&index=1

[VegaLA]

Just goes to show there is life left in the old Zombie yet, if done in the right way. A Day Z type stealth survival game for the Consoles would be welcome in my book. If the developer was daring enough some sort of time lock death feature would make the gameplay that much more intense. Imagine not being able to play the game till the following day, losing every item you had aquired and starting from scratch as a new character. Would add an intense new dynamic to the game, but will probably filter out the bawlers which may worry the publishers, but for the serious gamer this would make an interesting angle.

[chand]

Just goes to show there is life left in the old Zombie yet, if done in the right way. A Day Z type stealth survival game for the Consoles would be welcome in my book. If the developer was daring enough some sort of time lock death feature would make the gameplay that much more intense. Imagine not being able to play the game till the following day, losing every item you had aquired and starting from scratch as a new character. Would add an intense new dynamic to the game, but will probably filter out the bawlers which may worry the publishers, but for the serious gamer this would make an interesting angle.

Why would 'serious gamers' want to be locked out of a game they'd paid good money for?

[Puffin Chunks]

Why would 'serious gamers' want to be locked out of a game they'd paid good money for?

Indeed. Locking me out of content I paid for is pretty much guaranteeing that I

a) wouldn't buy it in the first place

and, if someone were to buy it for me,

b) would probably not feel inclined to revisit it once I first got booted out the first time.

Having to start from scratch, fair enough. Being locked out of the game? Nah, that's bollocks, and it sounds like a way to free up bandwidth or make money with the inevitable "buy back in" option *cough* WarZ *cough*.

[VegaLA]

Having to start from scratch, fair enough. Being locked out of the game? Nah, that's bollocks, and it sounds like a way to free up bandwidth or make money with the inevitable "buy back in" option *cough* WarZ *cough*.

Oh they did, did they?

By serious gamers I mean..I dunno, more hardcore. When you can respawn 5 seconds later you are less inclined to worry about getting offed, but if you are locked out till the following day, or even just for more than an hour you may consider playing the game a little more carefully. I don't imagine any Devs would dare go this route but I think I made that point clear in my previous post.
But paying to get back in? No... NO, NO and NO!

[Hank Venture]

I think this looks great. Like the video game version of The Road or something.

[Mister Six]

By serious gamers I mean..I dunno, more hardcore. When you can respawn 5 seconds later you are less inclined to worry about getting offed, but if you are locked out till the following day, or even just for more than an hour you may consider playing the game a little more carefully. I don't imagine any Devs would dare go this route but I think I made that point clear in my previous post.
But paying to get back in? No... NO, NO and NO!

I think losing all your possessions and starting from scratch is enough punishment, no?

[mcbpete]

Major new preview. I'm really not into zombie games but this does look incredible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6jIK_cHF5c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HA2cuwYSIqs&list=UUQXR8pItAoKDAJSbphFxbrg&index=1

Zombie games & films bore the bloody hell out of me and yet (and yet) this looks so great. Survival horror that appears to successfully meet both 'survival' and 'horror' criteria.

[Still Not George]

I absolutely love the idea of blind, insane, but living fungus-zombies. Such more potent body-horror than reanimated corpses.

[mobias]

I absolutely love the idea of blind, insane, but living fungus-zombies. Such more potent body-horror than reanimated corpses.

I know. Its the premise which really sells it as much as anything. The game was apparently inspired by this clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuKjBIBBAL8

[jutl]

Why would 'serious gamers' want to be locked out of a game they'd paid good money for?

I'm sick of this so-called 'cooperative' gameplay, where you launch the game and it actually works. One of my favourite games ever was Quake II, which I couldn't run on my computer.  It required 3D acceleration and I only had an Amstrad PCW 8512 with Locoscript. Before that I fondly remember Hypersports on the ZX Spectrum, that had a special loader which made it load much faster but actually not at all. Kids these days don't understand the pure gaming thrill of caressing a box and crying. I get quite angry when people describe Dark Souls as retro. It makes the same mistake all modern games do by actually running. 

[Beagle 2]

Similarly, I had a pirated copy of Monty Python's Flying Circus on the Atari ST that would never load. I wanted to play that game so much. I have never revisited it on an emulator like I have other games I lusted after because it can never match up to how amazing I had built it up to be in my mind.

[Mister Six]

Ultimately I think there should always be variety.  As long as the game is good at what it's trying to do, I have no problem really.

This is the only sensible position to take. Anyone who thinks that sandbox automatically = BETTER THAN LINEAR LOL is just wrong in the braintubes. It depends entirely on the atmosphere you're going for and the kind of story you want to tell.

Silent Hill 2, for example, works brilliantly as a linear game, because it creates a tremendous sense of claustrophobia, and an oppressive feeling of inescapable doom. And it fits the narrative of the game, too, as the town is literally teasing James deeper into its dark folds.[nb]Fnaar. But seriously - I bet you could do a cracking interpretation of Silent Hill 2's town as some kind of vengeful female figure, pulling James inside her, eventually to be reborn or trapped forever. Or maybe I'm just projecting...[/nb]

Comparitively, even the toughest sandbox worlds (such as low-level Skyrim, when you spend half your time running from ice cats, or in New Vegas, if you stumble into giant moth territory) place the player in a different mindset; the map is something to be explored, charted and conquered, not cowed by, or escaped. Even when you find yourself being mauled by some awful fauna, the feeling you get is more 'Right, I'm going to craft some better armour and make a rug out of you, you cunt,' than 'Aaaargh, oh god, I don't want to be here any more.' You are the rampaging colonial bastard, not the oppressed minority.

That Slender game does do horror with an open map, I guess, but it's a very small map and it's much more about frantically running from temporary safe house to temporary safe house than exploring distant corners and seeing what's in the forest.

I've been quietly pondering how a 'proper' sandbox horror game might work, but I think whatever you do, the nature of the genre will be at odds with the format. Still, you could do something interesting with an ever-changing, mercurial map, I guess, and maybe creating 'danger zones', where the player has to run through, say, dark woods to get to objectives, rather than wandering about looking for secrets. Then again, that is half the fun of these games...

[Theremin]

I've been quietly pondering how a 'proper' sandbox horror game might work, but I think whatever you do, the nature of the genre will be at odds with the format. Still, you could do something interesting with an ever-changing, mercurial map, I guess, and maybe creating 'danger zones', where the player has to run through, say, dark woods to get to objectives, rather than wandering about looking for secrets. Then again, that is half the fun of these games...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/gamesblog/2012/nov/07/sir-you-are-being-hunted-preview

8 words. Procedurally-generated survival horror with upper-class androids.

[Mister Six]

Ah, yeah, I'd forgotten about that! Well there you go, then (though I imagine it's not quite as 'sandboxy' as the people upthread would like - from the sounds of it, you basically have one immediate goal and one long-term one, rather than being given a great big world full of challenges to immerse yourself in.

[Josef K]

Lots more information + gameplay out today.

Game is due in a month, shaping up to be fantastically atmospheric:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klXm_3okyaw

[Thursday]

This is getting 10's all round. Could it actually have lived up to the hype?

[mobias]

It does sound like its pretty mega after some mixed reviews of the demo.