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Great thread idea OP I'm kinda cheating by talking about a whole open world, but: When people talk about Grand Theft Auto: Vice City in 2022, they'll usually bring up the bright 80s day-glo aesthetic and sunny beaches that made the game such a memorable follow-up to GTA III. And while it's true that the game has that neon sleaze people love, there's honestly a lot more to it.  The original version of Vice City is actually a pretty gray and dreary game. The story of the game makes it clear that this is a violent place, but even if you only caught a glance of someone driving, Vice City does NOT look like a nice place to live. The textures on the roads and sidewalks look dirty, many buildings have a bland utilitarian style, and even the sunny days have a sickly pale haze to them. Sure, there are spots of that signature Miami Vice glamor at points, but it's mostly relegated to the more exclusive parts of the city. And even then, they have a sinister juxtaposition with the gray decay of the off-streets and industrial areas.  It's made very clear in the fiction of the game Vice City is supposed to be a place to go vacation, party, and live The Good Life, much like how real-world South Florida is pitched to retirees and tourists today. But as we go through the story, we learn that a lot of this glitz is propped up by lies, violence and exploitation. It's one thing to be told about this in mission dialogue, but the oppressive melancholy of how Vice City looks and feels really takes you in and makes the game stand out from the wave of clones that came out at the time. And it's beautiful, in its own way. Looking back, I think Vice City was something that helped shape the way I see media in general. Playing it at 12 years old, it was the first time I was actively thinking about how things like visuals and music are more than just "good" or "lovely", they work to shape a unique mood. I have not played the remastered version from last year, but from what I've seen they've given VC a plastic-y, oversaturated look that completely took away this vibe, which is a huge shame. To this day there are very few "game feels" that hit as hard as zooming around this palm tree-laden hellscape blasting the sad boi synths of Tears for Fears: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-71epZjXXY chibi luda fucked around with this message at 17:30 on Jan 26, 2022 |
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Jan 26, 2022 17:27
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| # ? Apr 25, 2024 16:04 |
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Panzeh posted:This is true- it's a pity the rest of E4 really doesn't hold up. Id making challenging maps was interesting. I like E4M6 a lot, that's the one with the fun four-sided teleporter in the middle and that big central area which is great for sniper enemies. I think it was like the last Non-Final Doom map to have a recorded Nightmare demo at all.
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Jan 26, 2022 17:30
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SCheeseman posted:E1M1 is a statement and an embodiment of everything id had learned during development of Doom.
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Jan 26, 2022 18:27
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From my limited understanding a lot of studios do that so that the first content a player engages with is done at the best the team has been with the tools.
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Jan 26, 2022 23:04
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Someone mentioned the time travel level in Titanfall 2 vs. the factory level, and for me it's very nearly a tie. But I'd have to give the slight advantage to the time travel level. Not just because it was cool, but for something they did with the story. If you listen to all the audio logs, when you first get there you hear a fighting force in terror of something that's ripping through their ranks, disappearing at random, and everyone is scared as poo poo. It's not until you're a little bit into the level that the realization hits you - you are who they're talking about, the mysterious force demolishing their forces without mercy. It wasn't really a visual spectacle, it just sets you on edge early on that you're going to be facing whatever killed these people, only to realize the horrors these soldiers endured would be at your hands after all. It just hadn't happened yet - for you.
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Jan 27, 2022 00:16
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The Shaded Citadel from Rain World. I have never, before or since, been more afraid of a 2D video game than when I was progressing through there. Also, all of Shovel Knight.
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Jan 28, 2022 18:43
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In all honesty it was a time and place thing and the level itself doesn't hold up all that well, but Mario 64's first real level Bob-omb Battlefield was a mindblowing proof of concept at the time for how 3D was going to change everything.
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Jan 28, 2022 19:37
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My favourite chapter in Half-Life Alyx is the Invincible Monster Interlude, "Jeff". That's the name of the chapter, "Jeff" This is Jeff:  You meet him in an abandoned brewery and other than a few headcrabs and barnacles he's the only threat. He's invincible, will kill you instantly if you get too close but is also completely blind and relies entirely on sound to find his prey. The place is full of Combine forcefields you can't pass through, but Jeff is a mutated Combine worker so he just walks straight through. You might think that this is would be a chapter about running and hiding from the unkillable monster, but it's not that at all. It's all about manipulating him into getting out of your way so you can proceed through the brewery. Almost everything you do will make some noise, so throw a bottle down the hallway (it's a brewery, there's tons of them) to make room. In one of my favourite moments in the chapter you need to turn a wheel to open a shutter, but it's noisy as hell so he'll come running before you can finish (and it'll slam shut if you let go of the wheel before it opens all the way), so what do you do? You toss a bottle in a walk-in freezer and lock him in. Problem solved! Shortly after you get to an elevator but as soon as you push the button the power goes off. To get it back on you need to do a wire puzzle like you've done a dozen times before in the game. Simple! You follow the wire and...oh no. It goes straight into the freezer, you have no choice but to let an angry Jeff out so you can get the power back on. Also once you have the elevator working it takes so long to move that he'll walk into it before it goes up, forcing you to hide in the corner as it goes up to the next floor. Every time you move forward, something makes a noise that causes Jeff to follow you from one room to another all the way to the end of the chapter. As you move forward you start looking for ways to avoid making noise (catching bottles as they fall out of cabinets, staying away from 'Snappers'; otherwise harmless mouths on the wall that make noise when you get close) or distracting Jeff long enough that you can do something noisy without getting killed. At the end of the chapter you have to lock him in a trash compactor so you can operate a super noisy panel to open the exit, but you don't have to turn it on. You get the choice if you want to kill him or let him walk away at the end. I got pretty attached to the dude, I let him live when I left. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2OpqkxEWaE
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Jan 30, 2022 00:13
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Great Jeff post, but I assert that the Zoo could have been the best level had there been a headcrab gorilla/bearWhybird posted:Less a triumph of game design and more of atmosphere -- but The Outer Wall, from Cave Story. This post got me to play Cave Story for the third time to get the best ending (I opted to escape with kazuma the first time when it was released) and I'm not regretting it (but I'm not to Hell yet)
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Jan 30, 2022 03:49
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bf3: damavand peak (rush) you jump off a loving cliff in this level to get to the objective. the whole level has a ton of verticality, constantly attacking down and then you jump off that cliff edge and its such a rush. unlike anything i'd ever encountered, a whole team attacking down a cliff. plus the tunnel is pretty cool. the whole level escalates nicely starting with light vehicles and then escalating to tanks by the end. all in all, one of the best experiences in an incredible game
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Jan 30, 2022 04:49
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Veotax posted:(catching bottles as they fall out of cabinets, staying away from 'Snappers'; otherwise harmless mouths on the wall that make noise when you get close) What the gently caress is this?  
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Jan 30, 2022 12:13
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Part 3 Chapter 13 from Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn. It makes the standard defend the point objective much more interesting by expanding the loss condition to any enemy reaching the top section of the map. You have to watch out for and take out Hawks so that they do not reach the goal and also keep a strong defense to prevent the Tigers from breaking through. At the end it becomes clear that the Dawn Brigade is not going to hold out as the Greil Mercenaries start to appear.
Mamkute fucked around with this message at 05:58 on Jan 31, 2022 |
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Jan 31, 2022 05:27
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Kortel posted:I'll toss up Monster Hunter World's Forest map. Expansive, always something going on. Feels like a legitimate location you'd be exploring and a whole lot to explore there is! Monster Hunter intro stages in general feel like a great showcase of whatever that gen's looking to focus on. My absolute favorite has been the Ancestral Steppe from MH4/U. Plenty of small cliffs to get jumping attacks off of, a sheer cliff face area, and the early training areas 1 and 3 becoming the primary battlegrounds against Gore Magala are big highlights for me.
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Jan 31, 2022 20:58
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Hell in painkiller is an amazing level Warehouse in thps
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Jan 31, 2022 23:21
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Cathedral of the Deep in Dark Souls 3. It's just beautiful, majestic, the first real taste of the dilapidated glory the game's iconography has to offer. Also smh at noone having mentioned yet Rooftop Run from Sonic Unleashed, Metal Harbor nor Final Rush from Sonic Adventure 2, Speed Highway nor Red Mountain from Sonic Adventure. What the hell guys edit: now that I re-think about it, Sonic Adventure was as full of jank as was full of ambitious level design. Char fucked around with this message at 01:56 on Feb 2, 2022 |
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Feb 2, 2022 01:48
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