Idle News Podblast - 02/05/09: With Joe Pesci

[Chris]

It's a new segment! Please enjoy it.

"With Joe Pesci"

Special Report! Duck for cover, commandeer a Jeep, and man a turret: Resident Evil is back, and Idle Thumbs is blasting through the gates of a midnight embargo. With Joe Pesci.

Sometimes something comes up mid-week that we want to talk about. This time we actually did. We may do more of these in the future.

Games discussed: Resident Evil 5, Resident Evil 4

[Alex P]

Glorious! Two Idle Thumbcasts in two days!?! :tup:

I am awarding your hard work, Chris, with this wonderful image, which I came across this evening.

[80's Bad Guy]

"A good survival horror game would have you limping around afraid of death".

So true.

If you went through a checklist of game elements I was afraid would show up in RE5, it seems like they all made it. It just sounds so...dumb! Someone at Capcom needs to be taken out back and slapped.

Granted I'm one of those guys who considers REmake the best RE, but I still really liked RE4 for the most part. Here though, the setting, co-op gameplay, real-time inventory and the rest of the like just makes the whole experience sound about as scary as a calendar (it was right in front of me). And yeah, I noticed the delay of the chainsaw dude in the demo, but hoped that was more of a "dumbing-down the demo" issue. Instead it sounds like they just dumbed down the whole damn game.

[miffy495]

Holy crap, that makes almost 2 hours of thumbs this week. As I can go through about 45 minutes in an average day, that's 3 days of thumbs! Hooray for you!

[SignorSuperdouche]

I often get confused between Joe Pesci and Joe Pasquale. I'm not even being facetious, I genuinely get them mixed up.

[elmuerte]

this review so wants me to buy RE5

and blow it up

in daylight of course

with my bros

while covering behind a turret

[nonamermcgee]

Holy crap, I just spit out coffee from laughing at the Joe Pesci bit. This podcast makes me laugh everytime.

[Marek]

Damn that image is amazing. That's gonna be my new desktop background!

(Will listen to the podcast at some point also.)

[mike]

guys I'll be back in a second, I've gotta drop a podblast

[T-Matt]

"With your tongue as the penes":grin:

It's a disappointment that the game went this direction. It sounds like they basically just take all the elements that made it resident evil out to make it generic shooting game with no atmosphere.

Resident evil you were my friend

but now that's over it all must end

I really loved RE4

But you wanna be prince of persia, and gears of war

I want to be scared that I will die

I want a horror that I have to survive

But I'll come back if you get your act right

How about a game that happens at night?

[James]

  SignorSuperdouche said:

I often get confused between Joe Pesci and Joe Pasquale. I'm not even being facetious, I genuinely get them mixed up.

Me too. Seriously. Not as often as I used to, though.

[Chris]

  SignorSuperdouche said:

Joe Pasquale

That is awful.

[Roderick]

Wow, I REALLY enjoyed the Podblast! You can certainly do more of them, like a, like a... BLAST in the form of a pod!

Also, I need that Shadow of the Katamari image in wallpapersize! =)

[soupface]

So, what would you imagine Resident Evil 5 would play like to someone that hasn't played Resident Evil 4 (and only about ten minutes of Resident Evil — Code: Veronica)? It may be a let down for those that have followed the series, but is it so bad that even those intrigued by the demo should stay away?

Edit: Ends up that "piqued" was not the best word to use here. For future reference: "piqued" != "piqued my interest"

[gdf]

Soupface: I know you're ideally looking for a response from one of the Thumbs guys, but I would like to take a swing at this and say that, from my experience, someone coming into it fresh would probably think of it as a slightly awkward, yet moderately enjoyable, action game.

[toblix]

I look forward to being able to play Resident Evil without having to sit on a rubber sheet.

[DanJW]

You're such as wuss Toblix. That's why we love you. You're angry and scared and cuddly all at the same time. Like Eyeore.

In other news I had a minor epiphany about review scores. Not sure where to post it so I will do so here, just because.

What if we consider review scores not as a measure of the quality of the game, but as an estimate of what proportion of players will enjoy it? Not a measure of how much they will like it - some will love it to bits and some will think it's just OK, but that happens anyway no matter the perceived'goodness' of a title. It simply says than in the like/dislike divide, say 8 out of 10 gamers will find it worth playing and 2 out of 10 will not.

Suddenly it all makes sense! Ok 10/10 |100% seem an impossibility this way but then they have always been silly. But besides that I can reconsile all kinds of scores for various games. Forget your degree of joy in your entertainment experience, the review just tells you your probability of having any satisfaction at all. How satisfying is up to you personally to decide.

I just saved game review journalism. You can all applaud now.

[LetterT]

Interesting take on RE5. I've only played the demo, and for maybe 15 minutes at that. I just couldn't get into it. Sure, it looks pretty good, but I guess I'm not down with the RE4 mechanics.

I found it very frustrating because the character just didn't do what I was thinking he should.

On an interesting tangent, I was listening to the RebelFM podcast to fill the time between thumbs, and they have a completely different take on RE5. According to their playthrough (Ryan Odonnell, I believe) RE5 is all about co-op play and the dynamic completely changes when played co-op as opposed to single player.

Either way, I will probably skip RE5. Too many other games I need to catch up on/finish first.

[Cigol]

  DanJW said:

You're such as wuss Toblix. That's why we love you. You're angry and scared and cuddly all at the same time. Like Eyeore.

In other news I had a minor epiphany about review scores. Not sure where to post it so I will do so here, just because.

What if we consider review scores not as a measure of the quality of the game, but as an estimate of what proportion of players will enjoy it? Not a measure of how much they will like it - some will love it to bits and some will think it's just OK, but that happens anyway no matter the perceived'goodness' of a title. It simply says than in the like/dislike divide, say 8 out of 10 gamers will find it worth playing and 2 out of 10 will not.

Suddenly it all makes sense! Ok 10/10 |100% seem an impossibility this way but then they have always been silly. But besides that I can reconsile all kinds of scores for various games. Forget your degree of joy in your entertainment experience, the review just tells you your probability of having any satisfaction at all. How satisfying is up to you personally to decide.

I just saved game review journalism. You can all applaud now.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/12/18/symposium-part-one-review-scores/

I never read it. Too wordy, no high scores or pretty pictures - but maybe you'll like it.

[soupface]

  gdf said:

someone coming into it fresh would probably think of it as a slightly awkward, yet moderately enjoyable, action game.

Hardly a ringing endorsement. I'll just try to convince one of my friends to buy it so I can borrow it later.

  LetterT said:

RE5 is all about co-op play and the dynamic completely changes when played co-op as opposed to single player.

That makes sense. I enjoyed the demo, but I was playing co-op, not single-player. If you're right, LetterT, it's yet another reason to convince a friend to buy it: so we can play through together.

[gdf]

I would get it, if I were you. I'm me, and I'm definitely getting it, if only so I can troll people who like it on /v/.

[MrChaz]

Sounds like Resident evil 5 out of ten

[Jayel]

The demo pisses me off with bad controls. I know it's deliberately bad, but that just pisses me off more.