wild wild rice
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Vanquish 2
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The Evil Within 2 |OT| "Something not quite right"
- Thread starter SlasherJPC
- Start date
Vanquish 2
Lord of Ostia
Member
There is a difference between having a few light moments and the game not taking itself seriously. RE4 is a game that doesn't take itself seriously. TEW2 does, it just has a few lighter moments (very few, tbh). I mean, Silent Hill 2 has that ridiculous dog alien ending, would you say that game doesn't take itself seriously? Come on now.
decisions
Member
Yup, it's this.
PushingButtons
Member
Are these red goop jars pretty rare or hard to find? I've found one so far and it looks like they are needed to further open up upgrade paths?
I'm surprised none of you are picking up the pure ham vibe. I'm really getting it. Like legit Resident Evil 4 style ham the entire time.
I've barely noticed any issues with dialogue or VA because the whole thing is so hammy.
Seb's awkward one-liners aside, the story cinematics definitely fall into "95% taking itself seriously". The game seems more badly written than intentionally hammy most of the time, lacking the same self-awareness as RE4. For one thing, Leon is nowhere near as uh... vocal as Seb from what I remember, sharing more personality with his TEW1 incarnation.
They are pretty rare but not that hard to find. You get bunch of by just progressing through the story.
thehillissilent
Member
I ended up switching to the Japanese Dub and it seems to fit better, IMO. I love how Seb calls Kidman "Kiddo".
Sanctuary
Member
Every time Sebastian would open his mouth, it just came across like someone trying really hard to channel Leon, yet sounding more like a bad combination of Chris Redfield, Batman or Snake. The overall dialogue wasn't as intentionally cheesy, but some of Stefano's lines made me think of Salazar.
Yes. There's no way to select each one individually anyway in the upgrade menu.
Having finished Survival and almost done with Nightmare, the enemy health pools seem to be about the same, if not exactly the same, and only the damage they deal goes up. Ammo and crafting materials are rarer, and it might be more frustrating on your first attempt (I probably would have started over twice when finally realizing to upgrade the pistol 0 times at all), but I have a much higher surplus now than on my first playthrough, and it actually costs more to craft ammo too on Nightmare. I'm actually more frustrated that I have to leave shotgun shells behind than anything, and I've maxed out the capacity and haven't even crafted any shells yet. So basically, my playthroughs have mostly been the same other than not having quite as many materials to experiment with weapon upgrades. You basically have to stick with two weapons to upgrade for most of the game, with maybe a third by the end. I ended up just going with the shotgun, smoke and harpoon bolt (still seems weak) and for the end I'll upgrade the
Sniper Rifle
Assault Rifle.
I guess my point is only that for the way I played my first run, stealth felt encouraged for at least half of the game. But then I just kept playing it that way after being used to it, and not wanting to ever have to fire the pistol ever again. So other than playing on Casual, I'm not sure anything above really plays too differently.
Other than a few scripted encounters, there's literally no reason for this to need to happen when you can simply run away and crouch. Enemies will forget about you every time.
I've done a critical before too. Once. Even fully upgraded the melee was weak as hell and pretty much never worth using over a stealth kill since it wasn't strong enough to actually kill them without you taking any damage. About the only use for it would be to save a bullet or two by using it to finish an enemy off, not use it exclusively.
Yes. And a single high-grade part will unlock an entire tier of upgrades (damage, fire rate, etc.) for a weapon type.
Badpsychometry
Member
So I just noticed that on new game plus the dialog seems to change for the projector slides.
Chaos2Frozen
Member
Okay Ive just reached the second open zone. Ive got a couple of questions:
1) is there anyway to go back? I kinda didnt do the
side quest and Im worried if I get locked out of the reward.
2) is there a fixed number of times the
1) is there anyway to go back? I kinda didnt do the
ghost lady
2) is there a fixed number of times the
Guardian respawns? Ive already killed her once but it seems she can come back
Just reached Ch. 9. This is my first playthrough, and I'm playing on Nightmare. The boss of Ch. 8 was TOUGH. Great fight, but I feel compelled to share my strategy I eventually figured out, on the second phase in particular. Bookmark this post for later, if you haven't reached the fight yet. It might save you some trouble.
Ch. 8 Boss - Phase 2:
Awesome fight. Definitely the hardest encounter in the game so far, but also the most satisfying to master and complete.
Ch. 8 Boss - Phase 2:
When Stefano summons the camera eye in the sky (apparently called Aperture), my strategy was to stay at the top of the room right under the eye at all times. There are several reasons for this.
First, if you fight at the top of the room, you'll never have to worry about running into his time-frozen grenade bursts. Second, if you stay near the top and in the right corner in particular, your back and right sides will be protected from an ambush, allowing you to focus on what's in front of you and to the left of you. This makes it much easier to sidestep Stefano's lunging grab, which has absurd range and is very deadly. And finally, when Stefano warps around rapidly, about five to six times, he's about to throw his knife at you, so if you stay in the right corner near the top, you can angle the camera to see the three paths in front of you where he may stop to throw his knife, allowing you to flee at the last second down one of the other paths so the wall blocks his knife. If you quickly step back in view, you'll actually have a small opportunity to shoot him after he throws his knife.
After about four hits, he'll say "There will be nothing left of you," or something like that, and that's your cue to start running from the upper right corner to the upper left corner, dodging the left tentacle. Run back and forth along the top of the room, as the eye alternates from tentacle to tentacle, always running -toward- the tentacle that's about to slam down. It will miss you each time. Be forewarned that after several phases, the tentacles will slam four times instead of three.
Also note that there is a syringe and two shotgun shells near the top of the room if you need extra ammo, and if you run out entirely, a few extra handgun bullets appear in the back of the room. I ended up finishing the fight with harpoon bolts, however.
First, if you fight at the top of the room, you'll never have to worry about running into his time-frozen grenade bursts. Second, if you stay near the top and in the right corner in particular, your back and right sides will be protected from an ambush, allowing you to focus on what's in front of you and to the left of you. This makes it much easier to sidestep Stefano's lunging grab, which has absurd range and is very deadly. And finally, when Stefano warps around rapidly, about five to six times, he's about to throw his knife at you, so if you stay in the right corner near the top, you can angle the camera to see the three paths in front of you where he may stop to throw his knife, allowing you to flee at the last second down one of the other paths so the wall blocks his knife. If you quickly step back in view, you'll actually have a small opportunity to shoot him after he throws his knife.
After about four hits, he'll say "There will be nothing left of you," or something like that, and that's your cue to start running from the upper right corner to the upper left corner, dodging the left tentacle. Run back and forth along the top of the room, as the eye alternates from tentacle to tentacle, always running -toward- the tentacle that's about to slam down. It will miss you each time. Be forewarned that after several phases, the tentacles will slam four times instead of three.
Also note that there is a syringe and two shotgun shells near the top of the room if you need extra ammo, and if you run out entirely, a few extra handgun bullets appear in the back of the room. I ended up finishing the fight with harpoon bolts, however.
Awesome fight. Definitely the hardest encounter in the game so far, but also the most satisfying to master and complete.
Spieler Eins
Member
Seems pretty sincere to me. And even then, the constant babble is awful either way.
Chapter 6's hub world is butt-clenching-ville.
What does it do? I read the ingame description, but i'm still not super clear on how it works.
What does it do? I read the ingame description, but i'm still not super clear on how it works.
The more shots you land the more damage you do
Soul of the Beast
Member
The slow down time skill is awesome, makes fighting against multiple enemies so much easier.
Too bad the slow time stamina bar looked so ugly, you can't turn it off either.
Too bad the slow time stamina bar looked so ugly, you can't turn it off either.
No need for that. You can crouch behind a crate right in front of their noses and they will wonder where the hell you went. The AI is a joke in this game, and that's why stealth is so grossly OP in it.
Astral Dog
Member
He says he has been "managing" Tango and wants younger Devs to take lead we don't know if that means working on another game or not.
psychotron
Member
I remember that part. I lured them over to the trip wire and quickly climbed down the ladder. It was fun.
Head shots, or just general shots? The latter would be crazy.
Shadax the wizard
Member
All right, thanks.
Sumio Mondo
Member
God Hand 2 comes first.
I've just hit chapter 5.... amd while I'm loving it, I'm wondering if i shouldn't restart on nightmare. Too many health items on survival. I'm always flush with flowers which sorta kinda kills the tension. However, then we have these boss fights... I want to restart but I don't want to brick wall myself. Hmmmmm.
Sanctuary
Member
Usually, but some enemies will keep aggressively chasing you around whatever you're crouched behind. When that happens, you need to put some space between the two of you, or they won't stop dogging you. That might actually be another difference between Survival and Nightmare too. It seemed like enemies stayed aggressive slightly longer and also ran a little faster.
It's just shots in general, not specifically to the head. Cascade is decent enough, but it seems like it really only shines with two different weapons, one specifically. Now Synaptic Focus on the other hand is godlike. It's like playing a Soldier with a Widow in ME2.
Peroroncino
Member
Any tips on how to quickly dispatch those crawling fuckers? Is it possible to stomp them? I stunned them a couple of times but the prompt doesn't appear at all.
Sanctuary
Member
A single axe swipe will kill them (Nightmare). Although I don't know if hitting them directly on their head results in a critical/instant kill this way or not, but that might be the key. I tried killing one later on that dropped down from a tree, and when I slashed its torso as it was falling, it didn't actually kill it. It took 2x shotgun blasts more. After that, I always made an attempt to only hit them when they were on the ground, so I could be sure to hit their heads. They've always died that way from a single hit.
Otherwise, burning them works too whenever there's a barrel around. They will die from a single bullet that way. If you have the bolts to spare, stunning them and then two harpoons to the head seems to work as well.
Peroroncino
Member
I see, thanks for answering quick, welp, back to Union through the mirror I go.
The game feels GREAT on nightmare. I feel like it's the difficulty the game is properly tuned for.
J3nga
Member
Just finished it on nightmare in 15 Hours. Absolutely loved it and it's a blast to still have games like this , but it's a shame people don't want to support games like this anymore, it seems people prefer shite with bunch of grind, paid dlc, paid lootboxes, season passes and other gaming cancer or just another multiplayer shooter. This has none of them. I hope sales will catch up once the price drops, also it's big shame Bethesda didn't promote it too well.
Wolf2, you're the next, buddy.
Wolf2, you're the next, buddy.
Autoignition
Member
Beat the game. Absolutely hated it.
I can't believe none of the reviewers mentioned how bad the hit detection is, how the guns have no stopping power and feel unsatisfying as a result, how Nightmare difficulty is terribly balanced, how some of the hit boxes are broken, how glitchy some parts of the game are, how big of a step down the stomp system is compared to the match system.
The pacing is godawful. The game spends way too much time in Stefano's domain for him to be a nothing underling grunt of a boss and character. Not enough time was given to Theodore, who was way more of a main villain. There's no personalized connection to any villain the way that we got with Ruvik; we were never given a chance to feel for them as characters and are meant just from the get-go to hate them as villains because they're villains.
All of the characters in general are very wooden and one-dimensional. Pretty much everyone other than Sebastian and Juli (and that's just by virtue of them being fleshed out well in the first game, not in this game at all) is just a job description. Almost all of their dialogue centers around their occupation, and they're not fully realized characters in their own right.
The game is offensively sexist in its portrayal of women. I understand Sebastian and Joseph's friendship better than I understand Sebastian and Myra's marriage. Myra is reduced to a babymaker; her entire reason for existing centers around either taking Sebastian's dick or pushing out his children. She's basically an oven with eyes. The classical "save the princess" plot reduces Lily to an object that Sebastian feels entitled to have in his possession. There's zero relationship between father and daughter; we don't ever get a sense of what family life was like for either of them, and I don't get why Sebastian cares about her so much. (And before you go, "well, duh, that's his daughter" lol that is not an automatic given for parent/child relationships. Relationships are nuanced and oftentimes difficult, even with small children. What did having a child do to Sebastian? How did it change the way he saw the world? What was their relationship like as she was growing up? What did he teach her? What did he learn from her?) All of the other women
. The relationship between them is ultimately worthless from a narrative perspective and just exists to make him feel guilty.
The dialogue in general is horrendous, but I've already posted about that here. It's simplistic and repetitive, and it ultimately feels soulless. Huge chunks of Sebastian's characterization from the first game were just dropped or rewritten. The entire crux of Sebastian's character in the first game was that he was a drunken, paranoid conspiracy theorist who went off the deep end after his wife disappeared, and it got so bad that he ended up abusing his power as an officer and conducting a private investigation where he would beat the shit out of/murder/intimidate people. It was the part of his character that made you look at him and go, "That guy's dangerous. Yeah, he's the protagonist, yeah it seems like he has a big heart, but there's something scary lurking in there." All of that's gone from him in this game, and it's never really addressed.
I didn't like how impersonal the game's storytelling felt. The entire game operates under assumptions. It assumes that you should care about Lily because she's Sebastian's kid, but it doesn't actually engage the player in a way that makes you care about her as a character. It assumes that you should be invested in Sebastian and Myra's marriage just because they were married, but it never shows you what their actual marriage was like and what they were to each other. The relationships that Sebastian has with the random Mobius jobbers in the game don't go anywhere and have no real substance to them.
A friend of mine brought up the parallel between this game and Other M. Lily is just THE BABY THE BABY THE BABY THE BABY. There's no real depth to this narrative, and there's no emotional hook keeping you invested in its shallowness.
There's so many plot points from the first game that are just completely dropped. Leslie is never once mentioned by name, making the entire Leslie plotline feel extraneous. Like, why did Mobius NEED Leslie so badly if they were just going to fuck off and create a new system on their own anyway? Why bother? Also, Ruvik has been reduced to more or less just a boogeyman, even though the first game beat us over the head with the idea that once you get connected to Ruvik through STEM, you can't really uncouple yourself from his brainwaves. You'll always have one foot inside, right there with him. That's completely dropped. Kidman promises Sebastian that they'll talk about
once this is all over, except
. It's all very unsatisfying.
Kidman and Myra
. It's just very rushed and feels hollow.
I could go on and on, but man, what a colossal letdown. I don't understand what anyone sees in this game.
I can't believe none of the reviewers mentioned how bad the hit detection is, how the guns have no stopping power and feel unsatisfying as a result, how Nightmare difficulty is terribly balanced, how some of the hit boxes are broken, how glitchy some parts of the game are, how big of a step down the stomp system is compared to the match system.
The pacing is godawful. The game spends way too much time in Stefano's domain for him to be a nothing underling grunt of a boss and character. Not enough time was given to Theodore, who was way more of a main villain. There's no personalized connection to any villain the way that we got with Ruvik; we were never given a chance to feel for them as characters and are meant just from the get-go to hate them as villains because they're villains.
All of the characters in general are very wooden and one-dimensional. Pretty much everyone other than Sebastian and Juli (and that's just by virtue of them being fleshed out well in the first game, not in this game at all) is just a job description. Almost all of their dialogue centers around their occupation, and they're not fully realized characters in their own right.
The game is offensively sexist in its portrayal of women. I understand Sebastian and Joseph's friendship better than I understand Sebastian and Myra's marriage. Myra is reduced to a babymaker; her entire reason for existing centers around either taking Sebastian's dick or pushing out his children. She's basically an oven with eyes. The classical "save the princess" plot reduces Lily to an object that Sebastian feels entitled to have in his possession. There's zero relationship between father and daughter; we don't ever get a sense of what family life was like for either of them, and I don't get why Sebastian cares about her so much. (And before you go, "well, duh, that's his daughter" lol that is not an automatic given for parent/child relationships. Relationships are nuanced and oftentimes difficult, even with small children. What did having a child do to Sebastian? How did it change the way he saw the world? What was their relationship like as she was growing up? What did he teach her? What did he learn from her?) All of the other women
get fridged for the sake of Sebastian's manpain
The dialogue in general is horrendous, but I've already posted about that here. It's simplistic and repetitive, and it ultimately feels soulless. Huge chunks of Sebastian's characterization from the first game were just dropped or rewritten. The entire crux of Sebastian's character in the first game was that he was a drunken, paranoid conspiracy theorist who went off the deep end after his wife disappeared, and it got so bad that he ended up abusing his power as an officer and conducting a private investigation where he would beat the shit out of/murder/intimidate people. It was the part of his character that made you look at him and go, "That guy's dangerous. Yeah, he's the protagonist, yeah it seems like he has a big heart, but there's something scary lurking in there." All of that's gone from him in this game, and it's never really addressed.
I didn't like how impersonal the game's storytelling felt. The entire game operates under assumptions. It assumes that you should care about Lily because she's Sebastian's kid, but it doesn't actually engage the player in a way that makes you care about her as a character. It assumes that you should be invested in Sebastian and Myra's marriage just because they were married, but it never shows you what their actual marriage was like and what they were to each other. The relationships that Sebastian has with the random Mobius jobbers in the game don't go anywhere and have no real substance to them.
A friend of mine brought up the parallel between this game and Other M. Lily is just THE BABY THE BABY THE BABY THE BABY. There's no real depth to this narrative, and there's no emotional hook keeping you invested in its shallowness.
There's so many plot points from the first game that are just completely dropped. Leslie is never once mentioned by name, making the entire Leslie plotline feel extraneous. Like, why did Mobius NEED Leslie so badly if they were just going to fuck off and create a new system on their own anyway? Why bother? Also, Ruvik has been reduced to more or less just a boogeyman, even though the first game beat us over the head with the idea that once you get connected to Ruvik through STEM, you can't really uncouple yourself from his brainwaves. You'll always have one foot inside, right there with him. That's completely dropped. Kidman promises Sebastian that they'll talk about
Joseph
Joseph's not in the ending and they never have that conversation
Kidman and Myra
take out the entirety of Mobius in a single goddamn cutscene, so there's no real catharsis or payoff for taking down such a huge global entity
I could go on and on, but man, what a colossal letdown. I don't understand what anyone sees in this game.
PushingButtons
Member
AMxKaOtIcDeV
Member
So i just got to the end of chapter 13
im like dead out of ammo, whats the easiest way to kill these bastards.
after fighting the flamethrower boss and im heading back to the mobius agent in that shack by the theater, and i see more flamethrower guys....
Kind of spoilery... watch out. For the ennemies you mentioned...
upgrade your smoke arrows so you stealth kill them. Requires 2 or 3 hits if you are lucky you can get that with 1 or 2 arrows max.
J3nga
Member
Just Ignore 'em.
PushingButtons
Member
Can you spoiler tag that? There's probably people out there who don't want to know what the bosses are.
AMxKaOtIcDeV
Member
Sorry about that, done.
I really fail to see how anyone can trash this game pacing while liking the first one's. EW1 was a complete and utter disaster pacing wise, it's what made me really dislike it by the end of the game. The game's completely disjointed and doesn't know where it wants to get what, changing mechanics and scrapping cool things like it's nothing, leaving a mess of a game that has some cool moments, but they unfortunately don't make it up for all it does wrong.
Also, wow at hating the story while also finding any semblance of quality in the fucking mess that was EW1 narrative. For me, both suck. I'm in for the cool gameplay, atmosphere and setpieces. ¯\_(ツ
_/¯ Although i will say that the whole sub-plot of why people are turning into monsters in EW2 is really cool. Each to his own i guess
Autoignition
Member
If you read my entire post and thought that pacing was my big complaint, I really think you ought to re-read the post.
Sanctuary
Member
Don't ignore them. You need to kill at least two of them
to repair the flamethrower
Also, 3x sneak attacks kill them. Two upgraded Smoke Arrows take them out with ease.
I really fail to see how anyone can trash this game pacing while liking the first one's. EW1 was a complete and utter disaster pacing wise, it's what made me really dislike it by the end of the game. The game's completely disjointed and doesn't know where it wants to get what, changing mechanics and scrapping cool things like it's nothing, leaving a mess of a game that has some cool moments, but they unfortunately don't make it up for all it does wrong.
Also, wow at hating the story while also finding any semblance of quality in the fucking mess that was EW1 narrative. For me, both suck. I'm in for the cool gameplay, atmosphere and setpieces. ¯\_(ツ
Each to his own i guess
The first game definitely had pacing problems. That was one of my biggest issues with it, but it was also infinitely more creative and memorable.
No, i just focused on that point. I disagree with pretty much everything you said, but that stood out to me.
I can't agree with that. I just don't think throwing cool different shit on screen without thinking about how it would fit into the overall vision, making it actually cohesive and something that is fun to play makes it memorable.
Sanctuary
Member
Look, I agree the pacing was a problem, and I also didn't like how the game so heavily "borrowed" from pretty much every horror game in existence, throwing everything at the wall to see what stuck. It felt like it was too interested in being everything but its own thing or simply throwing splatter/gore everywhere to be "edgy". I felt like it started out extremely strong, then went downhill, kind of picked itself up later again and then turned into total shit during the last three chapters.
Despite that, it had a lot more interesting set pieces and creature designs than almost everything in this game. That makes chapter 14 a big "Haha fuck you" too.