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Bayonetta Vs Wonderful 101 (and just Platinum in general)

BashNasty

Member
Just recently finished Bayonetta 2 and absolutely loved it. The subtle improvements to the combat system, the many varied and fantastic bosses and the overall smoothness to every action has me very excited to play a whole lot more of it.

W101 never clicked with me despite putting in a good number of hours. There may well be a good game buried there somewhere, but I could never get over how janky it felt.
 

Fandangox

Member

Very good assesment, noting that the game had to have simpler combos because of the draw mechanic was something that I didn't really think of, despite it probably being the obvious reason why it was decided as such.

I also overall agree with W101 being easier in a sense. Enemy tells are a lot easier to notice than in Bayonetta, and pretty much everthing substantial is color coded.
 
W101 is so wildly different compared to other entries in the action genre that it doesn't need to be compared to bayo. It and Bayo are both great games that specialize in different areas of the combat experience.
 
I'll get W101 at some point, but having played the demo I can say I wasn't impressed. From what I can see, having to put all the gamepad gimmicks into the gameplay makes the experience not very pleasant. Drawing with the stick is less than ideal and having to play with the pencil in hand to draw in the gamepad screen is even a worst idea. The gamepad puzzles aren't even really fun and breaks the pace of the game hard. Maybe is just a demo, but yeah, I really don't feel the controls when is like I have to battle with them continously.

Imagine in Bayo 2 that the changing weapon button only works 75% of the time...yes, that what I feel playing W101.

Bayo 2 instead is a more focused game with traditional gameplay methods that are exactly what the genre needs. Is a more refined experience than the predecesor and overall a better game.
 

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
Wonderful 101 requires a particular mood, frame of mind, and commitment to get the most out of. There's nothing wrong with this, but it does limit the audience for it. Bayonetta is as deep, but its fundamental play mechanics and overall design are more in line with conventional action games. It's just much quicker to get to the sweet spot and is more pick up and play.

In a sense, W101 is the modern day Godhand, just with way, way higher production values.

I don't care personally, I live in a reality where we have both games, which is a pretty good reality.
 

Fandangox

Member
I'll get W101 at some point, but having played the demo I can say I wasn't impressed. From what I can see, having to put all the gamepad gimmicks into the gameplay makes the experience not very pleasant. Drawing with the stick is less than ideal and having to play with the pencil in hand to draw in the gamepad screen is even a worst idea. The gamepad puzzles aren't even really fun and breaks the pace of the game hard. Maybe is just a demo, but yeah, I really don't feel the controls when is like I have to battle with them continously.

Imagine in Bayo 2 that the changing weapon button only works 75% of the time...yes, that what I feel playing W101.

Bayo 2 instead is a more focused game with traditional gameplay methods that are exactly what the genre needs. Is a more refined experience than the predecesor and overall a better game.

Its the first time I hear someone saying the stick was less than idea, if it wasnt for the stick I wouldn't even play this game. It's really easy to input the weapon commands, never really had that trouble, when I made the wrong morph I just cancelled it with B and then tried again, the color of the line lets you know which morph is about to get united, anyways.
 
Its the first time I hear someone saying the stick was less than idea, if it wasnt for the stick I wouldn't even play this game. It's really easy to input the weapon commands, never really had that trouble, when I made the wrong morph I just cancelled it with B and then tried again, the color of the line lets you know which morph is about to get united, anyways.

I mean I prefer the stick, rather than drawing, but still I feel failing drawings pretty often or struggling. I mean that dosn't happen in other action games when switching styles/weapons are on a single button press.
 

Shun

Member
I can agree with the bolded. I still thought they were similar enough to draw a comparison and wanted to do it due to it being discussed in that other thread.

Yeah I felt the drawing was pretty good to be honest, like many have said, its more like inputting fighting-games commands.

I get the point in that it requires patience to learn the execution in the game much like in a fighting game. I don't think that it is complex at all and it should click. It's not like you need to remember that you need to SRK for an uppercut or QCF for a projectile. The game has obvious shapes that you draw to execute your moves.
Line = Sword, Circle = Fist, L = Gun. Once you know how to do a circle, you can do a bomb, hammer, and fist. Once you know how to do a whip, you can do claws and goggles. It's really just sitting down and practicing making those shapes, which you get an opportunity to do EVERY Loading screen. The power up where you hold a button to make your Unite Morph bigger is indispensable once you get it.

However, you would NEVER use analog for inputs for a fighting game when playing pad. Who does that? When you have no access to an arcade stick, it's D-Pad or bust.
 

Neoweee

Member
wiiu_screenshot_gamepv2koc.jpg


I love and hate TW101.
I'd still be playing it if it wasn't for:
- The shooter levels
- The Punch-Out fights/challenges
- The horrible two-screens sections
The loading for the Kahkoo-regah portals (when retrying them) didn't help either.
It's a shame. I really wanted to keep playing and try a Platinum run, but I just couldn't do it anymore.

The game could have easily been a genre-best for me if it weren't for spending so long doing things that I really didn't want to. There's so much in the way of me enjoying replays for better scores.
 

BatDan

Bane? Get them on board, I'll call it in.
I don't know anyone that draws the weapons with the GamePad. Always the right stick, it's so much easier. Especially when you have Speed Liner and hold down the L button (not ZL).

But people are right, Bayo and 101 are pretty different.
There are similarities (the scoring system of Time/Combo/Damage, emulating Space Harrier, rival battles with awesome character) but overall they are different.
 

Fandangox

Member
I mean I prefer the stick, rather than drawing, but still I feel failing drawings pretty often or struggling. I mean that dosn't happen in other action games when switching styles/weapons are on a single button press.

Well yeah, I am not gonna lie, its not like I 100% always got what I wanted. But the few times I didn't get the morph I wanted, I just simply cancelled the morph and tried again.

Practicing it enough and getting used to holding L for the speed liner made it so drawing the wrong morph was not a problem since I could quickly summon what I needed.

I get the point in that it requires patience to learn the execution in the game much like in a fighting game. I don't think that it is complex at all and it should click. It's not like you need to remember that you need to SRK for an uppercut or QCF for a projectile. The game has obvious shapes that you draw to execute your moves.
Line = Sword, Circle = Fist, L = Gun. Once you know how to do a circle, you can do a bomb, hammer, and fist. Once you know how to do a whip, you can do claws and goggles. It's really just sitting down and practicing making those shapes, which you get an opportunity to do EVERY Loading screen. The power up where you hold a button to make your Unite Morph bigger is indispensable once you get it.

However, you would NEVER use analog for inputs for a fighting game when playing pad. Who does that? When you have no access to an arcade stick, it's D-Pad or bust.

Well yeah, but this is not exactly a fighting game, your opponents are AI enemies with patterns, and the shapes only have to be close enough for them to work, not 1:1 precision. The comparison gets made in the first place because that's the mindset that'd help to have when doing the morphs, as opposed to seeing it as something one has to draw.
 
I haven't played Bayo 2 yet outside of the demo, but Wonderful 101 is quite a bit "better" than Bayo 1. I'd say they both pulled off what they intended extremely well, but 101 is what I'd call a much tighter project. You have to understand the workings of the mechanics very well to get anywhere in the have, where as in Bayo you are good so long as you understand Witch Time. Just mash combos to get through the game. Obviously that doesn't account for really mastering the game, but you can't mash nearly anything in W101. If you don't clearly know what you are trying to do, chances are you are going to get screwed, take damage, and have your squad dismantled.

Both quality games, but W101's requirement of understanding more of its mechanics just to survive is what puts it ahead for me.
 

Ein Bear

Member
I honestly think Wonderful 101 is Platinum's weakest game. It's a really novel concept, but I feel that the isometric perspective and morph-drawing mechanics don't actually work very well when put into action.
 

Griss

Member
wiiu_screenshot_gamepv2koc.jpg


I love and hate TW101.
I'd still be playing it if it wasn't for:
- The shooter levels
- The Punch-Out fights/challenges
- The horrible two-screens sections
The loading for the Kahkoo-regah portals (when retrying them) didn't help either.
It's a shame. I really wanted to keep playing and try a Platinum run, but I just couldn't do it anymore.

All good points. It's a love it and hate it game. The missions are my favourite part by far as they strip out all the crap and just let you enjoy the astonishing fighting system and fun enemies. The rest of it... ugh. (Not counting the story, which was fun as hell.)

I honestly think Wonderful 101 is Platinum's weakest game. It's a really novel concept, but I feel that the isometric perspective and morph-drawing mechanics don't actually work very well when put into action.

I had no problem with the morph drawing, and actually enjoyed it, but the isometric perspective drove me insane at times. There's no way of telling where you are in a jump in isometric perspective, and you're jumping all the time in W101. There's a little red cursor on the ground, but it can be hard to follow, and you're gonna want to be watching your guy in the air to make sure he doesn't get hit. I had so many problems with the camera angle it was insane.
 

Nharox

Neo Member
Oh, good thread! I just beat TW101 and want to pick up the Bayonetta 1+2 pack.

Can someone tell me the difference between these two in terms of the difficulty? I started playing TW101 on Normal but switched back to Easy on Operation
004
. Mostly because it was frustrating lacking some of the upgrades.
 
Bayonetta 2 is in a class of its own. I can not give enough praise to the greatest action game ever crafted. W101 is fantastic but Bayonetta 2 is the pinnacle of design.
 

Fandangox

Member
Oh, good thread! I just beat TW101 and want to pick up the Bayonetta 1+2 pack.

Can someone tell me the difference between these two in terms of the difficulty? I started playing TW101 on Normal but switched back to Easy on Operation
004
. Mostly because it was frustrating lacking some of the upgrades.

Bayonetta 1 is the hardest of the three, then Wonderful 101, then Bayonetta 2.

I'd recommend switching back to normal after a while, cause clearing stuff in easy doesn't counts towards a lot of the unlockables.
 

Seik

Banned
I love both, but I have a longer history playing Bayo so I would go with the Bayo series as my favorite.

BUT...it doesn't make Wonderful 101 any less good to me. In fact, since I heard the Bayo 2 and W101 teams were having a little competition about who would make the craziest game, now that I went through both game I can safely say that W101 wins for the most overall craziness.

The final boss and the ending alone blows anything that happens in Bayonetta 2 out of the water, imo.
 

Fandangox

Member
wiiu_screenshot_gamepv2koc.jpg


I love and hate TW101.
I'd still be playing it if it wasn't for:
- The shooter levels
- The Punch-Out fights/challenges
- The horrible two-screens sections
The loading for the Kahkoo-regah portals (when retrying them) didn't help either.
It's a shame. I really wanted to keep playing and try a Platinum run, but I just couldn't do it anymore.

Yeah, all fair criticism, I enjoyed the two screen sections, but I wish they weren't ranked like the shooter sections.

However I thought the Punch-Out fights were amazingly well done, and I am not even into Punch-Out.
 

ohlawd

Member
I love both but I'll give the edge to W101 for not having pacing issues.

I think, overall, I would go; Bayo 2 > W101 > Bayo 1 > MGR > Vanquish > Korra

Haven't played the rest of their games
 

Aiustis

Member
W101 felt less fluid. The combat was great, a little too chaotic for the way they action would just drop off and leave me feeling like the next part needed to be over because it just wasn't fun; I skipped a lot of cut scenes because of this. I enjoyed the learning curve though.

Bayonetta 2 had easier controls for me, but the combos felt like a lot more work to learn to execute. It was just a way more fluid. Nothing out of place.
 
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