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Author Topic: Saints Row 2  (Read 5401 times)

Ioric Kittencuddler

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #15 on: April 28, 2009, 01:21:38 am »

Necro!  I just got it and need someone to play with!  Come on who wants to bring glorious mayhem to the streets (And skies, and waters) of Stillwater with me?!  No one plays this multiplayer!
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JoshuaFH

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #16 on: June 08, 2009, 06:59:41 am »

REVIVE!

I finally got around to renting this game, and I'm having a blast with it. Besides the couple of side-missions which might as well be impossible (Some Mayhem and septic avenger stuff), I'm playing with a guy that looks like Dog the bounty hunter:



and I'm enjoying myself.... Kinda sorta.... Not really.

I only wish more of the game's humor were more tasteful, because it's really grating to the senses to hear all this unfunny, unwitty garbage that's thrown at you constantly. There's a few chuckles here and there, but it's not nearly enough to make up for forcing me to turn down my tv's volume to near-silence just so I can tolerate the endless stream of drivel the game slathers over every area of the game.

Also, one thing that's bothersome is how watered down the difficulty is. I don't know, perhaps I just play too much Nethack, but there seems to be something terribly wrong with how lenient the game is to the player. I mean, it's nice, it really is. I enjoy the fact that all my weapons aren't taken from me every time I die. I like the fact that I can easily save my favorite vehicles, and then summon them, presumeably from the bowels of hell, at any of my land-based "cribs". I also enjoy the fact that I can "warp" out of most bodies of water (although this is mostly because there would be no way of getting out of the water otherwise), but I still find myself irritated, abysmally bothered by the game. The game developers took into consideration everything that could make the game genuinely difficult, and then thoroughly steamrolled it into a much less difficult, flattened version of it's former self. They wanted the main character to appeal to everyone, and thus made them fully customizable, and the character himself is so flat and bland that it is provbly impossible to be able to see the world from his perspective, because he's bonkers, of course, and so his persona doesn't encroach on the attention span of any player. What I'm trying to get at here, is that the dev team thought to make the game appealing to everyone, but only succeeded in making the game feel homogenized and, get this, trite. The game that supposedly prides itself in it's 'uniqueness" turns out ot be so poorly lacking in originality that it inspires in me painful headaches.

If they were gonna make the game so lenient, they miight as well have added in a teleporter, because I'm NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT interested in driving around the FUCKING HUGE city they've prepared for me, which is both giant and labyrinthine, if I only want to get back to my safehouse or get to the next goddamn mission or if the retarded side-mission places me on the wrong side of the map and then tasks me with driving all the way over before I can start doing what it is I WANT TO DO! I'm trying to say, is that they made the game lenient to avoid some headaches, but they ran face first into some collossal migraines because they took an idea, and then only half-assed it.

The mayhem missions, which, as I said might as well be impossible, are the victims of poor foresight on the part of the development staff. The missions themselves are randomly generated, and the game tasks you to do ABSOLUTELY LUDICROUS amounts of property damage within a set amount of time at a certain location. The PROBLEM with this is that I sincerely believe no one bothered to sanity check these mission generators, or the missions themselves actually. I say this because doing the ABSOLUTELY LUDICROUS amounts of damage requires you to use your (conveniently provided for you) infinite rocket launcher to blow stuff up. The problem with this is that you live in a world made of diamonds, where most things cannot be scratch, let alone blown up. So, with your infinite rocket launcher, you might think that blowing up high value objects like vehicles might bring you victory, but if you think this, then you're wrong. The key to victory is using the rocket launcher to blow up fences, piles of garbage bags, dumpsters, and TABLES! The reason behind this is that the game has an arbitrary "combo" system tied to these missions, and these objects are usually put into large groups, and so destroying many garbage bags in fast succession will net you more points than destroying 100 swat vans, helicopters, and tanks. The main problem with this is that these small objects are preposterously rare and hard to find, depending on which zone the game tasks you with your mission. SO whether or not a mission is possible is determined entirely by chance.  That is thoroughly aggravating, nad someone deserves to be punched in the face for that one.

Also, there are a set of missions called "hitman" missions, which task you with killing generic characters that live all over the game world. To coax these characters into spawning, you have to do certain things, fulfill certain criteria before that character will spawn and you can kill them. One character, Roje, has given me endless grief. His description says that he likes to hang out at a very particular store. I go to this store. His description says that to lure him out, I need to buy some Music from said store. I buy some music. The description of this person says nothing else, so now I'm sitting inside a crappy music store, twiddling my thumbs, waiting for Mr. retarded NPC to spawn BECAUSE HE NEVER SPAWNS, NO MATTER WHAT! The game does this as a way to torment me. That has to be the case.

Also, I scored an achievement (a system I absolutely abhor as is) called "soprano", and, wondering what this was, I looked into the achievements sections to see. The game said that I had earned the achievement by "singing along with the music"... I have no idea what this means, but I was NOT singing along, and how the game even deduces this in the first place is beyond me.

TL;DR? I hate all console games today, for we live in a dark age where nothing good ever gets made. I make one exception, to see if my feelings still hold true, and I'm only completely right.
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wallish

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #17 on: June 08, 2009, 09:04:01 am »

I'm thinking you took it too seriously.  It's a "have fun and don't give a shit" sandbox game!  Driving around the city is supposed to encourage you to do random things.  Mayhem missions can get just a little tedious but if you're grinding away at them (for whatever reason) and not having fun doing so then you're doing it wrong.  Especially since you hate achievements! Also, I found that the main character had plenty of, ahem, character.  I played with the British voice and was a big fan of the sarcasm present in many scenes.  Sure, it's not Shakespeare but it's a sandbox game about being an urban gang leader!  It was not supposed to be difficult and it was fairly unique as far as sandbox games go.

I'm not going to sit here and pick apart your post, responding to everything you said (because then I'd guess I'd be taking it too seriously).  I will conclude by saying that it seems that most of what you disliked about the game were features of sandbox games (large map, pointless side-missions, low-level difficulty, etc).  As such you'd be better off not playing sandbox games, I guess.

tl;dr:  Different strokes for different folks.
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Keiseth

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #18 on: June 08, 2009, 12:58:53 pm »

I gotta agree with Wallish. Nethack is a game that needs to be difficult to be fun (usually). SR2 is a game that doesn't need to be difficult, the fun is in the customization, the absurdity, and weaving around traffic. The only missions that are ever tough are ones where you have to chase a vehicle, and that's if, instead of bringing your own, you steal an SUV or something.

Fun moment: Playing online with another chap, flying up into the sky in a helicopter. He decides to be cheeky and jump out of the driver's seat, parachuting to safety. I jump out and fall toward him. He hits the ground lightly, I slam into it at eighty miles per hour and bounce forty feet, then dust myself off.

Unlocking no fall damage is awesome.

Also, there is a difficulty setting if you didn't notice! Not a huge difference, but it is noticeable.
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umiman

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #19 on: June 08, 2009, 01:25:16 pm »

Josh: The mayhem missions are impossible...? Seriously? Septic Avenger is difficult?  :-\

JoshuaFH

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #20 on: June 08, 2009, 05:21:26 pm »

Yeah Wallish, maybe I am taking it too seriously, maybe I should just mellow out and take all the shit the game gives me. Just because something is "wacky" or "absurd" or a satire of a genre doesn't exempt it from criticism. Obvious mistakes by the developers should be called out, not swept under the carpet with half-hearted excuses.

And yes, those missions are too hard Umiman, I've played them. Flinging an endless stream of septic waste at property becomes infinitely less fun when you're bound by an egregiously short time limit, and the large targets it gives you only give you a pitiful number of points, while you're not in control of the vehicle to accurately target any high-point objects.

I have to ask however, is their any jewelry store in the game that sells monocles? I want one. I want one BAD! Also, a white dress shirt, a red bow tie, and hard leather shoes are desired. I already have the top hat, the black dress coat and black silk pants. I'm so close to making Mr. Pennybags. I'm so close I can taste it.
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umiman

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #21 on: June 08, 2009, 05:44:57 pm »

Huh. The only mayhem mission I thought remotely difficult was the ...

I can't think of one. I usually beat them all in one go. Maybe I'm just awesome.

Ioric Kittencuddler

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Re: Saints Row 2
« Reply #22 on: June 09, 2009, 02:19:28 am »

Yeah Wallish, maybe I am taking it too seriously, maybe I should just mellow out and take all the shit the game gives me. Just because something is "wacky" or "absurd" or a satire of a genre doesn't exempt it from criticism. Obvious mistakes by the developers should be called out, not swept under the carpet with half-hearted excuses.

And yes, those missions are too hard Umiman, I've played them. Flinging an endless stream of septic waste at property becomes infinitely less fun when you're bound by an egregiously short time limit, and the large targets it gives you only give you a pitiful number of points, while you're not in control of the vehicle to accurately target any high-point objects.

I have to ask however, is their any jewelry store in the game that sells monocles? I want one. I want one BAD! Also, a white dress shirt, a red bow tie, and hard leather shoes are desired. I already have the top hat, the black dress coat and black silk pants. I'm so close to making Mr. Pennybags. I'm so close I can taste it.

I think you can find the shirt and bow tie in the store in Saint's Row, can't remember the name of it.  Also, if you haven't already check out the mall in downtown.  It's kind of hard to find since it isn't marked but it's a large structure, you have to find a glowing halo thing on the ground to get inside, it's got a bunch of unique clothing stores.
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