8/4/2023 0 Comments Zone of the enders kenone who was created with an explicit purpose to eventually self destruct. The most interesting character may well be the ADA A.I. And yet Viola somehow becomes the sympathetic character, when you realize she is basically damaged goods and has nothing real to live for, and probably secretly seeks her own death in battle. ![]() An almost child-like insistence on not killing those that can be spared is contrasted by Viola's wanton disregard of human life. Leo goes by the Batman rule - thou shalt not kill. The entire story juxtaposes a naïve and whiny Leo against the inexplicably cruel and cynical Viola. With all Hideo Kojima games, the narrative is probably a big point, so then what really, was the message, if any? In hindsight, Hard gave the usual satisfaction from beating extra difficulty, but I do wonder if the sub weapons would actually hit more often on the Normal difficulty - and whether that would make things more fun? The final bosses aside, none of them really felt like a big deal narratively - just extra big robot gatekeepers. ![]() The boss fights, whilst spectacular enough for their time, simply had no build. (And yes, shortcut keys was definitely sorely missed.) That said, Halberd is surprisingly solid against the (edit: second-last) boss. ![]() Also - scrolling through a long list of sub weapons that looks interesting conceptually, but are arguably useless on the Hard difficulty. And so, it comes off as extra bad.Īnd so the saving grace comes within the actual gameplay, which on Hard, is a strange mix of desperate hack-and-slash, evasion-shooting, stealing in the odd Charged shot, and trying to strategically pace yourself on the Metatron - the game's full heal mechanism. It's not even that such routines no longer exists today, but in this game, it is blatant. it's not marked on the map), Suffice to say that modern gaming has evolved map markers and objective markers for a reason. (I probably spent 1hr looking for one of these things. Another contrived problem - now you need to go fetch this other thing that I also won't tell you where to look. Oh, you need to take out a tower? You need some ancient mundane weapon that I'm not telling you where to find. Perhaps the worst part of it all is that the gameplay structure and presentation is plainly a matter of jump through Hoop C so you can jump through Hoop B so you can jump through Hoop A. Thankfully, the Sniper comes in relatively early and straightaway solves this problem. You're standing there not three feet away desperately shooting at it, and because the camera control is so bad, you end up just rolling your eyes at the horror of missing at that range, and no real way to fix the aiming without slow and tedious adjustments. The absurdity of it all hits home hardest when you have to shoot floating collectables - Porters - to unlock stuff. This is beyond infuriating - why can't you back dash like Sara Ryder like a normal person in 2021? To start with, every back dash ends with you disorientated because the camera resets where Jehuty faces, so every dash ends up making you look that way. More on the plot later.Ĭontrols will be the one category that will absolutely make you tear your hair out. plus I got stuck, so maybe much less on lower difficulties.). The entire campaign is short - I clocked in at maybe 7 hours (I used 30 continues on Hard. To not spoil an already wafer-thin plot, it is really bare-bones - get this gem of an Orbital Frame off station. It feels like watching a kid's cartoon, with a very emo and whiny protagonist. The game starts with an attack on the Jupiter Colony where you, Leo Stenbuck, finds yourself somehow the pilot (runner) of the Jehuty Orbital Frame. Had to fiddle with the monitor (and it's still dark). ![]() Why is everything so dark though? There is no brightness setting on the game. This is already a throwback to a lost era - when games bothered with things like this, and it is an incredible appetizer. If you're playing from the HD Collection, immediately, you start with a short opening video set to the ear-gasm that is Beyond the Bounds - quite possibly one of the best game tracks of all time. Zone of the Enders: HD Collection, felt like the perfect opportunity to right that wrong. A long time ago, I had the misfortune of playing Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner, and being quite properly pulled in at the start, then after the opening few moments, not being able to finish it for IRL reasons.
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