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Yooka-Laylee- Review Thread

Spacejaws

Member
Movies, music, and books aren't interactive media. They don't require effort on behalf of the user to enjoy. If gameplay doesn't measure up to modern standards, it can be an unpleasant experience.

Also, classic movies, music, and books are "classics" for a reason. They rose up above their peers and succeeded in delivering their message to future audiences. For everything we consider a classic, there's 1000 that are forgotten.

Yet here we see what was an apparant classic, reviece a mediocre reception in less than 20 years, in another 20 I guess it would be considered borderline unplayable. Will the same extend to the likes of Halo, Deus Ex, Mario Galaxy and even the moments darling Zelda?

It's not just this one game, I would argue the majority of older games are considered outdated and have very little going for them/unplayable. I just wonder if we have passed a threshold of quality and user friendliness or will we constantly lose favour with our 'Game of the Year' in due time.
 

thumb

Banned
This is where we're at in 2017

To equate is to regard as equal, which was not the point being made. Jim's comments treat Laylee's focus on insulting others' appearance as a distant but uncomfortable reminder of bigotry in general. It's the JonTron event that creates the context to be reminded of such a thing, but that doesn't mean he believes them to be equivalent in severity.
 

Easy_D

never left the stone age
As much as I like Jim, I have to shake my head on his final score. 2/10 means this game is Sonic '06, Dead to Rights kind of territory.

I still need to play the game, but I doubt when I play it, it's not a 2/10.



Dude. No. Do you even know what free speech is? Is this what you think about JonTron's comments? That if we think what he said was racist, we are infringing JT's "free speech?"

Joke post?

I was being sarcastic :p

.
 

Stop It

Perfectly able to grasp the inherent value of the fishing game.
The reviews are about what I expected.

Hoping the PC version runs well on my rig and that I'll have fun knowing this is a facsimile of past gaming rather than taking any great leaps forward.

I expected little different when I backed the Kickstarter and honestly feel like despite it not being the best game ever that it was certainly justified to be made.
 
I think with Jim these days you have to just ignore the number he gives a game now after the whole Zelda thing and just read the whole review and compare it with others.
 

Cyanity

Banned
But how does PS4 fare? Are most games on Unity that bad?



Hold on. You mean you really can't release updates for games on Unity?

So common sentiment in the gaming community seems to be that Unity is good for smaller titles or proof-of concepts, but once you start making a fully realized, large game world with layered mechanics, it becomes a bogged down mess.
 
Yooka Number 9.

I always thought Banjo Kazooie was a fairly uninspired and worse controlling/playing Mario 64 clone. It didn't justify why it needed to exist.

It's just kinda there, and was a lesser version of something that came earlier and was better.
 

Seik

Banned
Performances worry me, though these reviews are for PS4/X1 version which were outsourced.

Hopefully the PC/Swtich versions done by Playtonic will show the game under a more glorious light.

And wow, Jim, 2/10?!

I need to go read his thoughts after work, but that's very fucking harsh, I mean, 2/10 is for a broken-ass, glitchy game, imo.
 
To equate is to regard as equal, which was not the point being made. Jim's comments treat Laylee's focus on insulting others' appearance as a distant but uncomfortable reminder of bigotry in general. It's the JonTron event that creates the context to be reminded of such a thing, but that doesn't mean he believes them to be equivalent in severity.

*gasp* a nuanced opinion! In this thread? Run, man. Run fast, and run far.
 

Spacejaws

Member
Hold on. You mean you really can't release updates for games on Unity?

I think he's being sarcastic as in no matter what you patch in it's always going to be Unity. Like you can paint shit but it's still shit. The game can be patched fine I know because Wasteland 2 recieved a whole bunch of performance updates. That said I think it patches differently, like in large portions or something but I can't rightly remember.
 

Skittles

Member
To equate is to regard as equal, which was not the point being made. Jim's comments treat Laylee's focus on insulting others' appearance as a distant but uncomfortable reminder of bigotry in general. It's the JonTrom event that creates the context to be reminded of such a thing, but that doesn't mean he believes them to be equivalent in severity.
i don't think some posters realize there are different degrees of racism. people are still racist, but stereotyping and white supremacy are two sides of the same coin; so "black people always steal" to "i want to enslave all black people"
 

Cyanity

Banned
Yooka Number 9.

I always thought Banjo Kazooie was a fairly uninspired and worse controlling/playing Mario 64 clone. It didn't justify why it needed to exist.

It's just kinda there, and was a lesser version of something that came earlier and was better.

Revisionist history at its finest
 

Salvadora

Member
Watched the GameXplain review.

Confirmed what I had suspected about the game based on what has been shown.

One thing they definitely can do, and should, is fix the technical problems.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Where exactly are people running into performance problems on consoles? Going to be testing this but the entirety of the first world is perfectly fine. I guess we'll see.

Still haven't tried it on my OG Xbox One, though, just the S.

The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.
 

DeathoftheEndless

Crashing this plane... with no survivors!
Sounds like its a decent game. It was obviously never going to lead to a resurgence of the genre like some had foolishly hoped for, but I assume I'll have some fun with it down the line.
 
Depends on what modern games he was raised on and what kind of kid the temperament has, but I would say YL is likelier to appeal most to returning/older Banjo fans. A lot of kids, especially older kids/preteens, will probably be frustrated/turned off by the good-but-not-great graphics and myriad performance problems (on Xbox One, at least; can't speak for PS4 or, naturally, Switch).

Yooka-Laylee isn't unplayable on consoles or anything, but the performance problems are very real, so definitely play it on a decent PC if you can... and I say that as someone who is strictly a console gamer.

Thanks. :) He couldn't get into Banjo and he'd also be playing on Xbone. Oh well.

I still might grab it for myself but I dunno about 40 bucks.
 
Videogamer - 4/10

CGMagOnline - 9/10

Thanks a lot. So now I have to play the game myself to find out if it's good or not...

John Tron save us.
 

sanstesy

Member
Would the game have gotten better scores if they left JonTron in?
G2tCkCr.png
 

nkarafo

Member
The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.
Was it that bad?

I only have Banjo-Kazzoie and that runs fine at 25 fps (since i have the PAL version). There are some drops here and there but nothing as awful as, say, Perfect Dark's multiplayer.
 
Yeah. I thought they lacked that typical focus that made Mario 64 so brilliant. They were charming, sure, but very similar in approach and very collect a thon.

I loved the Donkey Kong Country games, but while charming, I wasn't captured by their 3D efforts — especially Donkey Kong 64. The charm is there, and I can see why it appeals to people, but I was also much more a fan of Mario 64. In fact, I still think it stands the test of time despite the Galaxy games dethroning it for me. I fired up the Banjo games a year or two back to see if they would appeal to me in my late twenties, but I felt largely the same.
 
The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.

Well, the XBLA ports fixed that and run at a consistent 30 fps, I believe. So there's that.
 
The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.

Standards change. Framerate aside Tooie was otherwise pretty polished (and it looked amazing for its time.) Yooka-Laylee doesn't look especially impressive today, and it seems to run even worse than Tooie did, despite coming 15 years later
 
I did this review! If anyone has any burning questions about the game they'd like me to answer, ask away. I'll be avoiding particularly spoilery questions since the game isn't even out yet and that's not fair to hardcore fans and Playtonic IMO.

I'll check the thread throughout the day and answer what I can.

Hey, in your review you mentioned that that game runs at a smooth 60 FPS on a decent PC. Can you be more specific about the specs of the PC you used? Also, what is there in the way of customizable graphics options? Is it a limited Low/Medium/High overall setting, or are there individual settings we can turn on or off?
 
D

Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
I didn't think they were that great back in the day, either. Not awful, but nothing truly great, either.

Yeah, that was my take as well. Thus I really had no interest in this game. They'd have had to really knock it out of the park to get my interest as 3D platformers just never really grabbed me outside of Mario 64 and the Galaxy games for the most part. Especially the collecthon ones like Banjo.

At least this looks decent enough for people who love those type of games though.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Standards change. Framerate aside Tooie was otherwise pretty polished (and it looked amazing for its time.) Yooka-Laylee doesn't look especially impressive today, and it seems to run even worse than Tooie did, despite coming 15 years later
No no no, it definitely does not run worse than Tooie. Not even close.

I need to get to the bottom of what Game Xplain posted in its video as I have NOT been able to reproduce those massive stutters and drops yet. Those same areas are perfect on an Xbox One S - perhaps it's much worse on a standard XO? I'll find out soon.
 

emb

Member
Where exactly are people running into performance problems on consoles? Going to be testing this but the entirety of the first world is perfectly fine. I guess we'll see.

Still haven't tried it on my OG Xbox One, though, just the S.

The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.
Polish doesn't have to mean performance though. Could refer to design, or mechanics, or bugs that aren't frame rate related. But I may be forgetting part of the context the quote was in.
 

jstripes

Banned
Yet here we see what was an apparant classic, reviece a mediocre reception in less than 20 years, in another 20 I guess it would be considered borderline unplayable. Will the same extend to the likes of Halo, Deus Ex, Mario Galaxy and even the moments darling Zelda?

It's not just this one game, I would argue the majority of older game get are considered outdated and have very little going for them/borderline unplayable. I just wonder if we have passed a threshold of quality and user friendliness or will we constantly lose favour with our 'Game of the Year' in due time.

The problem is it's an early 3D platformer. Early 3D platformers weren't very good. You may disagree, but you were probably in primary school when you played it, so you have the nostalgia factor in full effect.


Let's look a Super Mario Maker. It was widely loved. Why is that? Let's go back 30 years.

Super Mario Bros. was a groundbreaking game. It defined the platformer genre. But, Nintendo learned a whole lot between that game and Super Mario Bros. 3. SMB3 is a masterpiece of gameplay physics and level design. It still holds up today. Now, go back to SMB1, and the physics and level design feel antiquated. Mario is harder to control, you can only go forwards, and levels scroll horizontally only.

Super Mario Maker went with SMB3's physics for that very reason. Even when SMB1's graphics mode is used.

That doesn't mean I don't hold SMB1 in high regard, it's a true classic. But, if you were to make a throwback platformer today based on SMB1, rather than SMB3, it would feel old and outdated.

So that's what's going on here. They made a pure "early 3D platformer", and ignored all the lessons learned since then.
 
I read Jim's review. I played Banjo & Kazooie for the first time a couple years ago and I thought it was one of the best games I've ever played. In terms of controls and design ot is far superior to platforkers today. His complaonts about movement and jump accuracy make little sense to me as that was the title's strengths. So I can't agree with him there. Unfortunately, his other points seem sound.

Hey, look at that, someone who criticized Jim in a sensible manner. But yeah, I get the feeling you hit the nail on the head. He probably isn't particularly into 3D platformers, so that combined with the camera and voices/noises that others agreed were bad probably exacerbated a 4 or a 5 to a 2.
 

Nerokis

Member
what compels people who haven't played a game to assert that people who have played the game are wrong?

Let's be fair, though: the game is approaching a 7/10 on Metacritic, most things we've seen and heard indicate this is a game that offers at least some value, and it's pretty rare to see a game scored less than a 3/10.

Jim's review, as far as I can tell, is both a significant outlier and literally the lowest score from any site of significance. Take all this context, and suddenly his 2/10 implies a level of particularity that is perfectly fair in a review, but also strains understanding.

Now, should people be jumping to the worst assumptions? Nah. It's possible his 2/10 will end up being closer to the average experience than the 9/10s, after all, and I don't see a lot of people questioning the latter.
 

Stop It

Perfectly able to grasp the inherent value of the fishing game.
Where exactly are people running into performance problems on consoles? Going to be testing this but the entirety of the first world is perfectly fine. I guess we'll see.

Still haven't tried it on my OG Xbox One, though, just the S.

The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.
From the video reviews I seen on the Xbox version? Pretty often but I couldn't tell you what number the world numbers were.
 
The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.
Nobody really cared about frame rate during the N64 era. Perfect Dark is considered one of the best games on the N64, and it runs at like 5fps. Most games had frame rate problems back then.
 
To equate is to regard as equal, which was not the point being made. Jim's comments treat Laylee's focus on insulting others' appearance as a distant but uncomfortable reminder of bigotry in general. It's the JonTron event that creates the context to be reminded of such a thing, but that doesn't mean he believes them to be equivalent in severity.

This is basically what I was trying to mention, so thanks for clarifying better than I could have.

They may not be identical, but it's the sort of thing that starts the downward trend, especially with younger audiences that consume the media.
 
The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.

Banjo ran smoothly as far as I remember. Tooie was a different story, however.
 
To equate is to regard as equal, which was not the point being made. Jim's comments treat Laylee's focus on insulting others' appearance as a distant but uncomfortable reminder of bigotry in general. It's the JonTron event that creates the context to be reminded of such a thing, but that doesn't mean he believes them to be equivalent in severity.
The Jontron event doesn't create any context for this at all. It's completely different. Jon would likely have been fired from South Park, or any job for his comments. It doesn't matter how crass your humor is.

If people want to ponder over the possible impact of a video game bat's sense of humor on children will have, that's fine. Knock yourself out. But mentioning how they handled the jon thing as any part of it is so astoundingly stupid.
 

Kinyou

Member
Combat in BotW doesn't require those things even though there's potential for them though. I think his love for Dynasty Warriors is a better counter point in regards for brainless combat.
Yeah, compared to other scores he gave it imo get as a bit strange. I mean, am I really to assume that this game is worse than Hatred (4/10)? He put Yooka Laylee on the same level as the completely broken "Wander"


It feels like he was overly harsh
 

benzopil

Member
Hey, look at that, someone who criticized Jim in a sensible manner. But yeah, I get the feeling you hit the nail on the head. He probably isn't particularly into 3D platformers, so that combined with the camera and voices/noises that others agreed were bad probably exacerbated a 4 or a 5 to a 2.

I might be wrong but that's the problem when a single person plays and reviews almost everything. I know Laura helps him sometimes (Persona 5 etc) but still.

If someone asked me to review FIFA 17 it would be 2/10 because I don't play these games, don't watch football and know only basic rules.
 
I think with Jim these days you have to just ignore the number he gives a game now after the whole Zelda thing and just read the whole review and compare it with others.

Even then he's just wrong. He is terrible at reviewing.
You can't criticise a game for what it isn't.
This game is a spiritual successor to Banjo Kazooie. An N64 Rare style platformer.

If you don't get this you shouldn't write a review. Jim did get it but refused to accept the style of the game. His whole Review is similar to a port begging neogaf thread ..."why is this game like this, why is it not like that blah blah blah"

I still can't believe people trying to defend what he does. Maybe this game is a 5 or 6 for someone but a fucking 2 is a pretty broken game. One of the worst games ever. The metascore shows that Jim is completely wrong....again.
He does this on purpose.

But that's the last time I'm commenting on his reviews. I'm just surprised many people are defending him. And no, this has nothing to do with opinions.

Would you take any reviewer seriously that says Citizen Kane is a 2/10? I'm not comparing this game to Citizen Kane btw, it's just an example.
Of course you wouldn't. And you wouldn't say "Hey, it's your opinion". No it's just a wrong opinion. Maybe the reviewer didn't like the movie but that doesn't mean it's a 2/10. If you're know what you're doing (reviewing movies or games) you'd know this. You can appreciate what a game/movie is achieving even if you don't like it.
 
Banjo ran smoothly as far as I remember. Tooie was a different story, however.

Yeah, the original actually was pretty smooth, especially by N64 standards. The sequel was where it really started to chug along as they started to make their worlds even more complex/filled with effects and that just continued on in the rest of their games after that point I think.
 

Red Devil

Member
The Game Xplain review made me chuckle, though - the reviewer claims that the original Banjo games had the polish to back up their vision. Banjo-Tooie runs at like 10-15 fps. Come on guys.

I keep reading that but I don't recall Banjo-Kazooie/Tooie being unstable even though they ran at a low framerate.
 
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