Chronicles of Riddick

[Marek]

Having just seen the GameSpot videos I must say it looks unexpectedly good. I actually got extremely immersed watching some of those videos, and I wasn't even playing the game! It looks really, really well done. I totally have to play this game.

Has anyone here played it yet? Any first impressions?

[Erkki]

I liked the videos too, but won't play it any time soon unless I suddenly become rich.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Gameplay looks fairly standard for a FPS. But I like the fistfight combat . And it's soooo damn shiny. SHINY SHINY SHINY!!!

[peb]

It's getting really good reviews which means:

a) It's a really good game

or

The kickbacks to the reviewers must be phenomenal!

[b0b]

Astonishingly, it is a really good game.

Played through a chunk of it last night, the melee combat works really well, the stealth sections are sensible, the graphics are solid and (especially the character models) rather pleasing to the eye. The much touted intro-tutorial sequence works good, and well, I've put a few hours in and I'm not even nearly bored yet.

yay!

Go Starbreeze!

[Chris]

A friend and I rented it last night and despite taking an MST3K attitude towards the dialogue we actually enjoyed it a hell of a lot more than we felt we should have. The combat system is really good. In one of the earlier fights I played, I was unarmed and my opponent had a shotgun. I managed to point the guy's gun at his head (while he was still holding it) and pull the trigger, giving him a severe case of head explosion. Craziness!

[Intrepid Homoludens]

A krazy obstakle kourse?

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Oh, and may I add this humble little bit of critiquing:

Vin Diesel is the most fucking ugly action hero ever! I can't look at him and breathe at the same time!

I almost don't want to play this game because they reproduced his likeness. God dang!!

[ysbreker]

Did you really have to say that in pink?

[Pappa]

  Intrepid Homoludens said:

I can't look at him and breathe at the same time!

But he's so shiny!

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Yeah, I know. Maybe next time I can wear a gas mask and just glance at him for a split second.

[OftenK]

It sure as hell looks beautiful. TeamXbox has a video on the Normal Mapping technique they used. It's pretty interesting, if you're into that kind of stuff.

Also, I played the demo, and frankly...the way of picking up health looks like it hurts more than getting shot. But hey, I've never had 2 foot long spikes jammed into my neck, so what do I know?

[LeChuckie]

Based on this and the Warner Bors thing... This may... just may... be the end of shit movie tie-ins. Of Course I'm jumping the gun but things are looking up... still for every one of these there will always be a cat in the hat.

[peb]

  LeChuckie said:

Based on this and the Warner Bors thing... This may... just may... be the end of shit movie tie-ins.

I'm confident that we'll never have to worry about the end of shit movie tie-ins.

[RLacey]

  peb said:

I'm confident that we'll never have to worry about the end of shit movie tie-ins.

There's always room for a shit movie tie-in on my hard drive...

[Chris]

This has got to be the first time in history that a film-licensed video game has critically outperformed its movie counterpart. The film has been almost universally panned, whereas the game has been almost universally acclaimed. Craziness!

[manny_c44]

You're forgetting about the Atari classic, ET.

Seriously though, there have been worse movies for better games. Like wing commander....although I've never seen the movie.

Or played the game.

But based on reviews, I think my statement is atleast partially correct.

[Jake]

Except that Wing Commander was a game first. That's a huge difference. You're not allowed to compare Wing Commander the game to Wing Commander the movie, or Super Mario Bros the game to Super Mario Bros the movie because in those cases its the movie that's the cheap licensing tie-in, not the other way around. Riddick is the first hollywood import to the games industry (of note at least) that's significantly outdone its parent movie franchise.

[RLacey]

  Jake said:

Riddick is the first hollywood import to the games industry (of note at least) that's significantly outdone its parent movie franchise.

What about Ecks vs Sever? You mean you went to see that?

[manny_c44]

  Jake said:

Except that Wing Commander was a game first. That's a huge difference. You're not allowed to compare Wing Commander the game to Wing Commander the movie, or Super Mario Bros the game to Super Mario Bros the movie because in those cases its the movie that's the cheap licensing tie-in, not the other way around. Riddick is the first hollywood import to the games industry (of note at least) that's significantly outdone its parent movie franchise.

Ah, I see. But Laceyware is right about Ecks vs Sever that game was reviewed quite well.

[shbazjinkens]

  OftenK said:

It sure as hell looks beautiful. TeamXbox has a video on the Normal Mapping technique they used. It's pretty interesting, if you're into that kind of stuff.

Eh.. that video is a little confusing to me. They mention RGB values but they show a traditional grey bumpmap in the demo. That and they leave out that you could just paint the Normal Map instead of making a hi-poly mesh to get it via scripts.

Now there is a different technique that uses RGB values to a better effect, maybe they just used a flawed demo?

Here is a huge (probably more than you want to read) discussion about Normal mapping by game art pros (and some novices).

http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=129627

[Fastback]

I played the demo on Xbox, it was very nice.

It surpassed my self imposed time limit of '1 minute time limit to impress' and I was still there 15min later!

Full game has impressed the boys in Cert.

-Ash

[Chris]

  manny_c44 said:

Ah, I see. But Laceyware is right about Ecks vs Sever that game was reviewed quite well.

What, the GBA game?? It got ok reviews, nothing even close to Riddick.