I also played a few demos. Notes to follow (I can't remember the names of the games) and I'll add 'em to my evaluation list.
There was:
After doing a bunch of brick smashing on Astropop (a fun XBLA game that, sadly, is too hardcore in terms of its Achievements) I fired up Clive Barker's Jericho.
I'd played through the demo and quite enjoyed it. It was moody, suspenseful, and the characters were reasonably interesting as they combined both magic and conventional weapon skills.
The retail version denies you the swap-between-characters ability for the first hour and a bit. This makes some sense in terms of letting the player get familiar with basic controls and in-game conventions. It was a little frustrating to watch the other squad members do cool things while I just had my guns, so I was happy when I finally got the ability to body swap.
Unfortunately the whole thing became kind of hoaky. I wasn't really sure why I needed to sacrifice myself (other than to complete the level) and it wasn't quite as dramatic as I was expecting because I already knew that I was going to be able to transfer my soul from character to character at some point in the game.
And, really, I needed the game to really sell me on story and character because the game play was pretty mediocre. The weapons did not feel very satisfying, the enemies were not very interesting, and mission success didn't seem to require tactics beyond "stay behind your squad mates and revive them when they die".
Some of the special powers feel cool, but I almost wish there were fewer powers (and characters) and that they were more differentiated from each other. This would make it easier to follow the story and would make choosing the right character fun instead of a chore.
I guess in some ways it's like a slightly less engaging Darkness. That was another game that promised a mix of conventional and super natural combat techniques and squad tactics, but delivered mediocre game play. However, the story was much simpler and more powerful and kept me wanting to keep playing until I finished the game.
Like Republic Commando, some of the banter amongst characters is humorous (especially when they first get possessed by the main character). But, ultimately, controlling the squad and interacting with them is tedious. The squad commands are confusing (you control 2 squads via the D-pad -- I still haven't figured out how it works) and your squad mates don't really seem to do anything super interesting on their own.
A few other nits to pick:
I haven't been this excited about a Facebook game since Griddle.
I just completed a couple of rounds of Word Scraper -- Live Play and it is going to be terribly addicting. Think of a mash-up between Scrabble and a real time strategy game. Well, maybe more Tetris than RTS, but still... You take a random map (the 15x15 grid, but randomize bonus tiles) and a time constraint and then feed players letters as they try to maximize their score. To be successful, players need to grok the "map" and position themselves in ways that max out the scoring. There's a constantly updating leader board that lets you know how you're faring against the hundreds of other players.
Yeah, it's laggy.
Yeah, it needs some UI love.
But it is incredibly addictive and will likely become the next major drain on my time once a more polished version comes out.
Improvement suggestions:
Game Shell UI:
It was inevitable. Hasbro was going to insist that Scrabulous be removed from Facebook and replaced by an official version (developed and published by EA).
Sadly the official version pales in comparison to Scrabulous. Although I shouldn't be, I am still amazed that folks think that it's OK to release an inferior product when the killer app already exists. Hasbro/EA released a flashy, bulky version of the game that completely missed the mark in terms of what users craved: A polished, light weight version of the game that allowed for quick and effortless play.
In a stroke of genius, the inventors of Scrabulous released an application called WordScraper. This game is a generic letter tile laying game where users can create custom boards and rules sets. Of course the feature set makes it super easy for someone to create a custom board and set of rules that mimics Scrabble (I'm currently playing a couple of games using this rule set). But it also lets folks be amateur designers and iterate on novel rules and board set ups. This is some really cool stuff -- especially when combined with some community features that will allow people to rate other people's custom games/rules and, presumably, surface the most popular variants.
Kudos to the creators of Scrabulous (and now WordScraper). They've put power back into the hands of the passionate community -- and this will likely inspire more loyalty in its users... Even those who simply play using traditional Scrabble rules.
The developers have also been super responsive to community feedback in the past and it wouldn't surprise me at all to see them add some really cool new features that promotes user generation of content in new and interesting ways.
Eternal Sonata...
I'm trying to get into it and like it, but it's just not working for me. The story and characters are not very engaging to me and I've skipped every movie because they are simply painful for me to watch.
The combat system seems interesting on the surface, but for a tactical rpg I find it frustrating. I can't seem to choose who I target when doing a ranged attack; I can't seem to choose which ally I want to buff; I can't even seem to choose which ability I get to use. I realize that there is some kind of system in the background whereby my character positioning relative to other characters and enemies affects my options, but it's simply not understandable to me after playing an hour of the game.
The game tries to explain combat in a series of boring and non-skippable tutorials. There's no learn-as-you-play, just a bunch of billboards that explain a bunch of concepts by way of annoying banter between characters. I'm now "Party Level 2" and instead of becoming stronger, I actually feel weaker. I'm not sure what (if any) advantages there are to leveling up my party -- nor am I sure how I reached the next level other than by beating a certain boss. Weird.
The equipment/inventory system is a confusing mess. After fumbling around I finally was able to change equipment and add some items to my combat inventory selection.
I find myself unsure of what to do/where to go next. And, instead of providing me with hints or a map, I instead wander all over the place until I hit a place where I'm NOT supposed to go and then the voice of the machine comes up and says "don't go there. Go to this other place (and I'm not telling you where it is."
I'm also a little confused about why I seem to have 2 different parties of 2 characters. I'm guessing that this was explained somewhere in a movie, but I missed it. I'm not opposed to this, but it just seems weird that I have two completely separate parties that share a single inventory system.
I'm going to give Party Level 2 a try for a bit. If things don't start to get a lot more interesting I'll probably just complete the first level and quit.
I've also played some XBLA demos that I'll talk about in a future post.
EDIT: I played through the first level and while the game started to get more fun when I had 3 characters in my active party (which I could select from a subset of 5), combat was still not exciting enough to overcome the various annoyances that made me feel less strategic and more a victim of bad camera angles and status notifications.
I'll return it tomorrow and get started on Clive Barker's Jericho.
