|
 Part 21: Ray Sphere   inFamous is an action-adventure (open world) game for the PS3. It was developed by Sucker Punch Productions (makers of the first 3 Sly Cooper games) and published by Sony Computer Entertainment, released internationally in May and June 2009. It stars a man named Cole can shoot lightning and be grumpy all the time. He also has a friend named Zeke that bounces between being a douche and an awesome friend. Cole also has a girlfriend named Trish who seems to barely like him.  This is a game with choice, during some missions we will have to make a choice that effects our Karma. When the bigger of these choices happen you will be able to choose which video to progress with (Good or Evil). Some will have different commentary and some will just have a few minutes of new dialog. Depends on the choice. The Good side is going to be the main run for the most part and we will cover all the unique side missions (and some of the nastier repeat ones). Unlike my last few threads a friend of mine named Jester is joining me on the commentary. He hasn't played this before (aside from the demo)                                    
Fragger fucked around with this message at 00:08 on Aug 11, 2014 |
#
?
Apr 21, 2014 16:43
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 16:29 |
|
|
"Would you like to know more?" SOLD. That running sound, though. What, is everyone wearing swishy pants? Also, pretty sure Zeke ran down four flights of stairs in a matter of seconds when you jumped off that building.
|
|
#
?
Apr 21, 2014 17:01
|
|
|
I loved this game until I got to a certain mission to be named later; at which point I put it down and never picked it back up. I enjoyed your Transformers LPs and am really looking forward to it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 22, 2014 22:40
|
|
|
I got this game for free thanks to the PSN hack way back and I enjoyed the hell out of it for two playthroughs. Then I played it another two times for the platinum trophy. The second game is loads better, but this was a great stepping stone and I wouldn't have felt bad if I had paid full price for it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 22, 2014 22:48
|
|
|
Played through this one probably about 4 times. Maybe 5. I absolutely love how it tells a modern day superhero (or super villain) story. You don't get a lot of those in the recent wave of all the Marvel and DC movies. One of the best games on the PS3.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2014 15:13
|
|
|
I think this game is really good, though I remember one huge mistake they made. I won't need to mention it when it happens because I'm sure lots of people will complain about it when it happens.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2014 15:43
|
|
|
Do you think you'll be doing the other inFamous games as well?
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2014 16:47
|
|
|
ZenVulgarity posted:Do you think you'll be doing the other inFamous games as well? That is the plan! inFamous 2 and Festival Of Blood but Second Son is an unknown due to not having a PS4 yet EDIT: Oh, forgot to mention something. Jester and I have a few of the commentaries already done so there won't be too much downtime between updates. Expect them every 3-4 days!
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2014 18:07
|
|
|
At least your'e doing the good games (I'm not a big fan of Second Son having played it...) For the record, Sucker Punch declared that the "Good" endings for both games were the ones they used as reference points (because something like 70% of people did the good ending first)
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2014 19:21
|
|
|
Calax posted:For the record, Sucker Punch declared that the "Good" endings for both games were the ones they used as reference points (because something like 70% of people did the good ending first) Oh cool. Having never played the games myself, I'm interested to see how well they do the "evil" side of the story. To be honest, in most games the "good" version seems to be more canon simply because it has a slightly better story (and 70% of the time the "evil" story is actually just the main character being a total rear end in a top hat).
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2014 19:24
|
|
|
gregory posted:That running sound, though. What, is everyone wearing swishy pants? He actually has thirty-five dollars in change in his pants. Most of the dollars burnt up so everyone just has to use change now. [This is a very large un-truth] RareAcumen fucked around with this message at 00:58 on Apr 24, 2014 |
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2014 00:40
|
|
|
Trojan Kaiju posted:I got this game for free thanks to the PSN hack way back and I enjoyed the hell out of it for two playthroughs. Then I played it another two times for the platinum trophy. The second game is loads better, but this was a great stepping stone and I wouldn't have felt bad if I had paid full price for it. Got it the same way. In fact, I think it was the first PS3 game that I ever got permanently, rather than just renting. I'm still in the process of (very slowly) beating it. I only just got the shield power, but I have no clue how far along that is. quote:(and 70% of the time the "evil" story is actually just the main character being a total rear end in a top hat). That's one of the biggest flaws in so, so many games with a karma system. It feels like they write the story for the "good ending" first, and then they go back and start adding the evil stuff on top of that. But they always go for either "supreme good vs. supreme evil" or "good or otherwise not evil vs. evil". There's rarely any shades of gray, and it's far too often that whichever side you get simply depends on which end of the scale you most tip toward even if your character becoming evil at the end doesn't fit, because he was really just a slightly darker gray than he could have been. To my knowledge, I can't recall any game that actually has a properly done moral system that doesn't waver between extremes or let you balance your karmic checkbook through good actions vs. evil actions (you know, like in the new Fallout games where you can be a complete rear end in a top hat sociopath but still have tons of good karma just from killing the bad guys enough).
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2014 01:18
|
|
|
I think the hardest part of writing a proper morality system would be connecting it enough to the game mechanics to make the player care about it while divorcing it enough to give it weight on its own. inFAMOUS and its sequels fail at that second part because the rewards are tied entirely to extremes - there's nothing but a penalty for taking actions against your chosen alignment, so once you've made the first choice, there's never any reason to make any other choice but the same one over and over. There are no rewards of any kind for treating each decision as its own event, or even for bothering to make decisions at all after that first one. By contrast, just to pick a very different example, Dante's Inferno provides rewards for either outcome of every decision you make, but none of the decisions have any actual weight - you never interact with any actual characters in a way that reflects any moral judgment. (Also, the reward for picking the Good outcome far outweighs the reward for the Evil choice on the few decisions that actually could be said to have any weight, so that's a bit lopsided.) I believe that a meaningful morality system would have to give separate rewards or penalties for every decision, however small, instead of somehow aggregating the rewards in some fashion that makes them all blend together, mechanics-wise. Each decision also needs to have at least two viable alternatives, both of which are enticing to the player regardless of past decisions. The player is, of course, always free to decide in advance that they will choose a particular type of outcome in every choice even before starting to play, but a really good morality system should make that HARD. The rewards for choosing evil should increase as the player devotes himself or herself to good - the choices need to provide temptation, or they might as well not even exist. And naturally, if the player does give in to the temptation, the reward is honest and well-earned - along with the shame of having given in. It's a bit harder to provide meaningful choices to a player who's choosing to be evil, but decisions in such a situation should lead the player to question whether what they're doing is right or acceptable. Are they just being evil for the sake of being evil, or are they really getting something that they want out of it? Perhaps the NPCs of the game world will offer even greater rewards for changing their ways, because the possible respite is worth that much to them. Or maybe the game offers the player the chance to go too far. In any case, building the player's attachment to the world is vital to making the morality matter at all - a world full of nameless, blank-slate simulacra of people just isn't going to work for that. I have actually come up with the idea for a game that would do most of that, but it seems way off topic for this thread, so I'll just leave it at inFAMOUS being pretty bad at one of its main selling points, but no games that I can think of have done it much better.
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2014 03:29
|
|
|
 So now it is time for Moya to show off a few extra mission stuff, Cole to get a new power and us to start doing some of the side quests!
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2014 18:43
|
|
|
Yeah, "Because electricity" is definitely the best answer for the new superpowers that Cole suddenly has. edit: And we see with the good/evil choice at the end of the video, that the "paths" don't really make much sense. 1) Why wouldn't you just tell him his wife dies either way? 2) As Jester said after Brandon tells you to kill everybody, "Wait that's GOOD?" gregory fucked around with this message at 21:17 on Apr 24, 2014 |
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2014 21:05
|
|
|
The only thing that I really dislike about the whole morality system in this game is that it takes a WHILE for things to change based on your alignment. There are very few times that anyone in the game will say (or do) something different based on where you are with your karma naturally without a choice that happened seconds ago. On the other hand, PLAYING either side is very different. Good Cole is entirely about precision and not hurting bystanders while Evil Cole is about making things explode as often as possible.
|
|
#
?
Apr 26, 2014 19:10
|
|
|
Oh okay...so the morality isn't very effective story-wise, but it makes a lot of difference in gameplay? Which do you think is more fun, good gameplay or evil gameplay? (Also, I forgot to mention this earlier, but Fragger & Jester have a really good co-commentating dynamic)
|
|
#
?
Apr 26, 2014 19:31
|
|
|
as other reviewers and the previous LP of this game demonstrated, raining death down on everyone Sith-style is a lot more important than precision. However if you're kinda poo poo at the game and trying to still get all of the stunts, going good is better
|
|
#
?
Apr 26, 2014 19:46
|
|
|
  Now it is time for us to learn a bit about our first villain, gain two new powers and maybe some other things too!
|
|
#
?
Apr 29, 2014 19:59
|
|
|
Man, not only did that explosion mess up his voice but it screwed his brain up too! I mean seriously, dude just turn the valve from the side!
|
|
#
?
Apr 29, 2014 23:05
|
|
|
That choice is actually one of the few that has any significance aside from the direct effect on your morality - if you get splashed with toxic water, it reduces your available batteries for a while, so even for a good character, there's some incentive to take the evil approach and avoid the handicap. If only there were a few more choices like that in the game... like, any more choices at all.
|
|
#
?
Apr 30, 2014 02:23
|
|
|
RareAcumen posted:Man, not only did that explosion mess up his voice but it screwed his brain up too! I mean seriously, dude just turn the valve from the side! Cole hates learning! I mean this black goop is NEVER coming back so he's good right? Nidoking posted:That choice is actually one of the few that has any significance aside from the direct effect on your morality - if you get splashed with toxic water, it reduces your available batteries for a while, so even for a good character, there's some incentive to take the evil approach and avoid the handicap. If only there were a few more choices like that in the game... like, any more choices at all. There is one or two more that do have that kind of direct impact other than "Will the people of the city throw rocks at you that can gently caress up you climbing up buildings or take pictures of you"
|
|
#
?
May 1, 2014 17:06
|
|
|
 Cole rides a train. Cole like train! The first half (or so) of the Evil video has different commentary than the Good video Fragger fucked around with this message at 17:53 on May 8, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 4, 2014 17:38
|
|
|
The rear end in a top hat video goes mute as soon as you finish the watertowers mission and go back to the good video.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2014 18:19
|
|
|
Mehuyael posted:The rear end in a top hat video goes mute as soon as you finish the watertowers mission and go back to the good video. poo poo, how did I not catch that, fixing now but will keep the video up since the unique content is still ok EDIT: Video is fixed and all links point to the right one now Fragger fucked around with this message at 20:01 on May 4, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 4, 2014 18:26
|
|
|
Is Trish ever going to stop hating Cole? Sure, he killed her sister, but it wasn't intentional, and Cole (good Cole at least) has been doing all that he can to make up for it. The two of them may never get back together, but at least she could stop being a jerk whenever she sees him.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2014 20:54
|
|
|
BlazeEmblem posted:Is Trish ever going to stop hating Cole? People deal with grief differently. Having someone to blame, even if it's not completely true, can help.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2014 20:58
|
|
|
RareAcumen posted:People deal with grief differently. Having someone to blame, even if it's not completely true, can help. Thanks, Obama.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2014 23:54
|
|
|
Willie Tomg posted:Thanks, Obama. It's me, I am the greatest of killjoys.  That is not meant to be a slam on Obama, however. Edit: Wow, holy poo poo that is a lot of garbage. RareAcumen fucked around with this message at 03:31 on May 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 5, 2014 02:02
|
|
|
I don't think any enemy in the game killed me as much as those trains. They are the true Conduits.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2014 16:09
|
|
|
So are Cole's buddies watching him through secret spy cameras or something? He walks up to a train *ring ring* "Hey Cole, see that train?" "Well, yeah, but...how do YOU see it?"
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2014 18:46
|
|
|
gregory posted:So are Cole's buddies watching him through secret spy cameras or something? He walks up to a train *ring ring* "Hey Cole, see that train?" "Well, yeah, but...how do YOU see it?" Good old fashioned spy satellites? Drones? GPS tracker on Cole? People on the ground? A pair of binoculars? It's not a problem with few solutions exactly.  EDIT: VVVVVV Nevermind, that's clearly what's happening here. MiddleOne fucked around with this message at 21:28 on May 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 5, 2014 19:08
|
|
|
gregory posted:So are Cole's buddies watching him through secret spy cameras or something? He walks up to a train *ring ring* "Hey Cole, see that train?" "Well, yeah, but...how do YOU see it?" They're not real. They're all hallucinations created as a side-effect of Cole becoming a conduit. That they existed before he was a conduit was an effect of his brain trying to cope by "filling in" troublesome gaps.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2014 19:23
|
|
|
Blind Sally posted:They're not real. They're all hallucinations created as a side-effect of Cole becoming a conduit. That they existed before he was a conduit was an effect of his brain trying to cope by "filling in" troublesome gaps. I
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2014 23:45
|
|
|
Xoidanor posted:Good old fashioned spy satellites? Drones? GPS tracker on Cole? People on the ground? A pair of binoculars? It's not a problem with few solutions exactly. Isn't that every game, though? Your character always seems to have some kind of camera mounted on their face that lets Mission Control not only know your location, but also see everything that you see. Metal Gear Solid is the worst offender, but I don't think anyone takes that series seriously anyway.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 00:35
|
|
|
chitoryu12 posted:Isn't that every game, though? Your character always seems to have some kind of camera mounted on their face that lets Mission Control not only know your location, but also see everything that you see. Metal Gear Solid is the worst offender, but I don't think anyone takes that series seriously anyway. But there is an invisible camera floating around behind the player character...
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 00:41
|
|
|
Neruz posted:But there is an invisible camera floating around behind the player character... BURN THE WITCH
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 00:45
|
|
|
Neruz posted:But there is an invisible camera floating around behind the player character... I'd like to believe that it's like in Mario 64 where there's literally a cameraman following the player character around in the gameworld. 
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 05:27
|
|
|
Xoidanor posted:I'd like to believe that it's like in Mario 64 where there's literally a cameraman following the player character around in the gameworld. I like to imagine that instead of a random cameraman or Lakitu, it's the entire Mission Control stuffed into a single hovercraft just right wherever the camera is pointed. Like in MGS2 Raiden has Campbell, "Pliskin", and Rose all in a comically tiny UFO right over him at all times and seeing everything that goes on. Yes, I know Campbell and one of the Roses is an AI. How, exactly, does that stop them from being a physical presence in a hovercraft? It's a Metal Gear game, come on.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 06:04
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 16:29 |
|
|
chitoryu12 posted:I like to imagine that instead of a random cameraman or Lakitu, it's the entire Mission Control stuffed into a single hovercraft just right wherever the camera is pointed. Didn't MGS handwave it by saying that the nanomachines let them see what he sees and monitor where his position's at? They even have to have a codec conversation for stealth purposes although it doesn't really make sense in the context because they are still RIGHT in front of each other.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2014 19:41
|
|
