Sunday, September 22, 2013

PAX Impressions: "Might Monday": Part 3

Bayonetta 2
I enjoyed the first Bayonetta (not on hard difficulty, though), so I was anxious to see how the sequel is shaping up on the Wii U.  I really don't like her with short hair, but the game was really fun.  I was definitely very rusty at getting the Witch Time dodge at first, and the normal grunt troops were hitting me a lot.  After a few of them it was time for the miniboss, which I did much better on.  The demo ends with a gigantic boss fight, and the whole game was very flashy, as you might expect from a Platinum Games game.

The controls were responsive, and I really like that getting hit does not completely deplete the magic meter like it did in the first game.  When it's full you can activate Umbral Climax mode, which will make your attacks very powerful and hit a very wide range for a limited time.  I stood in line for 3 hours, and it was pretty much worth it.  I was apprehensive about the game heading to the Wii U (before I knew why), but it plays really well on it, and I hope it supports the Wii U Pro controller, since I recently picked one up.

Bayonetta 2 also has a touch screen play style, where you can play the whole game just using the touch screen.  The guy in front of me tried it out, the brave soul.  First thing I noticed was the massive health bar.  At least they give you lots of leeway, and it made me question just how accurate it all was.  Sliding the stylus around the screen would move Bayonetta, and flicking it up would make her jump.  Sounds good in theory, but games like that have had spotty platforming because of it.  You can tap on enemies to unleash stylish combos automatically, so I imagine it's better if you would rather watch the game than play it.  Dodging was done by flicking the stylus away from the enemy.  I had trouble getting the timing right when I could push a button, so trying to time that would be a nightmare unless they were very generous with the timing.

While the demo sometimes had Jeanne (from the first game) fighting beside you, the demo assistant was tight lipped about her being playable in the main game.  Either way, I'd like to try the release version, as the demo was fun.  Now if only we could get a costume for Bayonetta that makes her look more like the design in the first game...

WWE 2K14
The graphics appeared better than last year, but I thought last year's game looked fine until Chriz aka The Mole showed me some comparison pictures that highlighted just how bad they were.  The game was pretty fluid, but felt as fast as WWE 13.  Supposedly they were going to slow it down, but wrestlers still got up from moves quickly, which admittedly I prefer earlier in the match.

The match I played was from the "story" mode, 30 years of Wrestlemania, and it was the Undertaker vs. HHH match #2 3 (Hell in a Cell).  Thankfully I was the Undertaker.  If you have played any historical matches in any of the Smackdown vs. Raw or WWE games, you know that you are given a laundry list of things to accomplish besides winning the match, all in the name of accuracy.  Just like previous years, you don't have to do them all (but will likely get a bonus for doing so), and some of them are probably hidden.  The first two were visible, but the rest came out as the match went on.  Unfortunately, when fulfilling one of them, getting HHH to moderate damage, caused a cut-scene that also put me in moderate damage.  Yeah, not fun there.  Pretty much all of the bonus objectives I did would result in a scene of some sort, like last year's game.  I still managed to win, but I had to work for it more than I wanted to.  The match I did was pretty fun, but the "story" match reminded me of last years, which wasn't my favorite (but should have been).  We will see how the final version is later this fall.

EDF 2025
I really liked EDF 2017, and even kinda liked Insect Armageddon.  2025 goes back to the style of 2017, and played really well.  Pale Wing, from the PS2 EDF, returns and we get another "class" in the form of the Lancer.  He has a mechanical apparatus on his head/shoulders that allows him to wield heavier weapons.  It also makes him really slow.  The weapons I saw him use were a big hammer and two shoulder-mounted vulcan cannons.  Pretty cool looking, but probably not ideal for every mission, and likely best with another player to help you out.

Each demo station was set for co-op, so some random dude and I jumped on.  Since I really liked the jet armor in IE, I wanted to try out Pale Wing.  I didn't read the weapon descriptions thoroughly enough.  I though I was picking a rapid fire weapon and a grenade launcher, but I ended up with a single-shot rifle and a grenade.  The rifle was ok, but ate through energy quickly if I fired it quickly and the grenade...sucked.  I tried it a few times, but it flew really slowly toward the target.  After helping up my partner (he set it to hard, sigh...) I flew to the top of a building and tried to throw a grenade down on the ants/spiders below.  The grenade then proceeded to fly backwards and destroy the building I was on and kill me in the process.  Thanks, I hate you too grenade.  It was funny to watch my poor soldier fall down 300 feet while flailing her limbs around and crash onto the floor.

After waiting a bit to get help, we tried to wade through the enemies.  It didn't go so well and my partner was quickly overrun.  The problem is, the spiders were all over his body, so I couldn't rescue him.  They flooded toward me and it was soon over.  Oh well, it would have been much better on a different difficulty and if I had read all of the weapon's stats.  One cool thing I will also mention is the larger enemy spiders.  They will still shoot webs at you, but if one hits you, they will slowly drag you toward them.  It's a small thing, but pretty cool.  I imagine it will be annoying after it happens a lot, but still pretty neat.  I'm looking forward to the release of EDF 2025 since 2017 was lots of fun and this is more in 2017's style than Insect Armageddon.  I'm sure my buddy DTJAAAAM is looking forward to it as well.

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