Game stuff
Feb. 11th, 2011 02:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amethyst73Finished Hotel Dusk a couple of days ago. I can't find an entry in which I say I started it (or finished Miles Edgeworth, for that matter), but Huz and I both think I must have started it in mid-to-late December, which makes it a somewhat shorter game than what I've been used to with the Capcom Attorney series of games. The final timer indicates that my playthrough time - not including reloading after wandering around aimlessly - was only about 8 hours. Given that I only paid $10 for it, that's okay. And I've heard that it has replay value, in that you can get a little bit of additional content (at the very end) on your second playthrough. I might just go watch the videos on YouTube, though; even though I know all the puzzle solutions, it would still be some hours of repetition before getting that payoff.
I have mixed feelings about Hotel Dusk. I have to concur with various reviews that the strength of the game is in its story and its characters. Come the end of the game, a good story has been spun, and the actions of all the important characters, present and absent, have been explained. There are a couple of times when the suspension of disbelief becomes a little difficult - it just strikes one as exceedingly unlikely that almost every guest in the small hotel has some connection to the mystery that main character Hyde uncovers over the course of the game. But the characters are so varied and well-drawn that you end up not minding too much.
The gameplay is where Hotel Dusk tends to fall flat - I've noted this before, so I won't rehash those issues here. But be warned, the last chapter has a couple of real problems in terms of gameplay. First, there's a room where you could die if you didn't happen to have picked up a key item that broadcasts its later importance only in its being not nailed down. Second, it's entirely possible to fail to even trigger one of the very last puzzles in the game - I had to look at a couple of walkthroughs to find out exactly how and where to walk just to make the puzzle available. That's just not cool, guys.
Overall, the 7.9 that IGN gives it seems about right.
However, the story and the characters make up for the flawed gameplay enough that if Hotel Dusk's sequel ever gets a US release (hey,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
nezumiko , an English version of the sequel, "Last Window: MIdnight Promise" was released in Europe this past fall - could you get it if you see it?), I'll likely pick it up.
Next up: I'll be starting Ghost Trick, made by the team responsible for the Phoenix Wright games. And I'm assuming that Miles Edgeworth 2 (subbed trailer here) will make it to the US in reasonably short order as well.
I have mixed feelings about Hotel Dusk. I have to concur with various reviews that the strength of the game is in its story and its characters. Come the end of the game, a good story has been spun, and the actions of all the important characters, present and absent, have been explained. There are a couple of times when the suspension of disbelief becomes a little difficult - it just strikes one as exceedingly unlikely that almost every guest in the small hotel has some connection to the mystery that main character Hyde uncovers over the course of the game. But the characters are so varied and well-drawn that you end up not minding too much.
The gameplay is where Hotel Dusk tends to fall flat - I've noted this before, so I won't rehash those issues here. But be warned, the last chapter has a couple of real problems in terms of gameplay. First, there's a room where you could die if you didn't happen to have picked up a key item that broadcasts its later importance only in its being not nailed down. Second, it's entirely possible to fail to even trigger one of the very last puzzles in the game - I had to look at a couple of walkthroughs to find out exactly how and where to walk just to make the puzzle available. That's just not cool, guys.
Overall, the 7.9 that IGN gives it seems about right.
However, the story and the characters make up for the flawed gameplay enough that if Hotel Dusk's sequel ever gets a US release (hey,
nezumiko , an English version of the sequel, "Last Window: MIdnight Promise" was released in Europe this past fall - could you get it if you see it?), I'll likely pick it up.Next up: I'll be starting Ghost Trick, made by the team responsible for the Phoenix Wright games. And I'm assuming that Miles Edgeworth 2 (subbed trailer here) will make it to the US in reasonably short order as well.
