Returnal Thread

Started by Xevross, Apr 22, 2021, 10:08 AM

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Xevross

#30
May 01, 2021, 11:04 AM
I was worried I'd take forever to get through this game but I finally reached the secojd boss, killed it first try and then go through the whole third biome and killed the third boss first time as well.

Minor spoilers for game structure
Spoiler for Hidden:
The game does a kind of reset here and goes to act 2. There&#39;s 6 biomes but you only ever go through 3 in one run, so now I&#39;m back at the start of a run again but it&#39;s for act 2 / the second half of the game. <br><br>I believe after act 2 you can select which half you want to run from that point but not sure

Xevross

#31
May 01, 2021, 01:44 PM
Act 2 has a good change in the structure of it. The bosses in this game are truly excellent as well.

I just crashed again though, good job it wasn't too far into a run. The crashing is an annoying flaw of the game but understandable, what I don't understand is the lack of a save system though. It has to be one of the most baffling design decisions in AAA history. I've seen loads of people saying they've had to kill themselves hours into a run because they want to change games to play with their friends, or their kids are going to use the console, or any other reason. So weird, I just can't understand it.

Fix the crashing/ bugs and implement a save system and I think this is a 90+ GOTY contender for me.

Xevross

#32
May 02, 2021, 02:39 PM
Hit the credits after 9 hours, 10 deaths total.

The game isn't that hard, you just gotta get into it. It has to be one of  the most unique games I ever played, such an interesting spin on the rogue-like genre.

Need to decide if I'm gonna go for the secret ending.

Xevross

#33
May 02, 2021, 07:12 PM Last Edit: May 02, 2021, 07:22 PM by Xevross
I said this to Pi yesterday and its about right:


QuoteReturnal is making me appreciate Hades even more. Not that Returnal is bad, far from it, but it's helping me out my finger on exactly what Hades did that was so amazing. It's something you don't necessarily notice, but they just got the balance of all their systems spot on. Runs felt a perfect length with new mechanics introduced at perfect times to make you want to keep on playing and playing. Returnal just hasn't got that balance that would elevate it. Runs feel too long, progression systems aren't quite nailed and I don't feel a strong drive to keep playing "one more run".


To elaborate more on that, Returnal has minimal permanent progression and its not really grindable like with Hades. The main permanent progression is the metroidvania style unlocking of new platforming features that allow you to access more side areas, which helps in runs a lot with giving you more healing, more currency etc. But you only get that stuff by progressing, either after a boss or into a new biome, so it doesn't help people who might be stuck and struggling early on.

Then there's stuff that isn't explained so well, like apparently one of these things that I thought was a metroidvania system is actually just a shop upgrade that does explain well what it does and I never tried (upgrade to your melee to break through yellow barriers - I think its part of the increased melee damage upgrade). Also some systems just don't feel worth it like the malfunctions and parasite systems, you're better off just avoiding them because they often make you worse off and even if you end up being better off the gains are somewhat minimal so not worth the risk.

Runs can be way too long, which is a problem, but this is also the game's greatest strength and innovation. Incorporating metroidvania into a roguelike is pure genius. It means that when you beat a boss you have a teleport key so you just find the teleport room and don't fight the boss again. It would take forever to run all the way through the 3 biomes to boss 3 if you died and had to try again, but the grapple you unlock by beating boss 2 means you can completely skip that biome and just find a room in biome 1 that lets you skip straight to biome 3. For act 2 its similar, the second biome ending gives you another big metroidvania upgrade which means you can skip straight from biome 4 to 6. And lots of the rooms are labelled clearly as side rooms, meaning they won't be the way forward. So runs can be as long and customizable as you want.

If you were to speedrun through all the biomes you could get through them and beat all the bosses in probably less than an hour (if you're a gaming god). But you could also spend over an hour in each biome exploring every nook and cranny to get all the loot and to prep yourself as best you can. You could also choose to do that with only one biome then skip ahead to the rest. That's a really nice option of playing the game the way you want rather than it being the exact same length and structure every time like with most roguelikes.

Its a level of customization of your runs and your experience through the game that is really interesting and I think is a fantastic idea, it basically creates almost a new subgenre of games - metroguelikevania, and I love it. I hope they evolve this formula and other devs have a go at improving it, with some refinement of other systems it could result in a GOAT game.

Xevross

#34
May 05, 2021, 08:29 PM
They just put out a new update that seems like its corrupting and deleting everyone's saves.

Legend

#35
May 05, 2021, 08:44 PM
Quote from: Xevross on May 05, 2021, 08:29 PMThey just put out a new update that seems like its corrupting and deleting everyone's saves.
Well I bet people aren't complaining about no mid run saves atm  8)

Xevross

#36
May 05, 2021, 08:45 PM
Quote from: Legend on May 05, 2021, 08:44 PMWell I bet people aren't complaining about no mid run saves atm  8)
Lol yep. The launch of this game has been a real hot mess of issues, its a shame really.

Legend

#37
May 05, 2021, 08:58 PM
Quote from: Xevross on May 05, 2021, 08:45 PMLol yep. The launch of this game has been a real hot mess of issues, its a shame really.
I'm really glad I didn't impulse buy this day one, I was close!

Will be great once I play it eventually.

Xevross

#38
May 05, 2021, 09:04 PM
Quote from: Legend on May 05, 2021, 08:58 PMI'm really glad I didn't impulse buy this day one, I was close!

Will be great once I play it eventually.
Yeah.

Since I finished it and tried to play it a bit more I've soured on it a bit as well. Its just not good for dipping your toes in, I said before about how you can play what you want and make runs long or short but if you try and go short it just gets super hard and there's not much you can do. With the lack of any real permanent power gain, you're still super weak and you have to be really into it and concentrating hard and going all in on every run you play, so while skipping ahead and keeping runs short is an option you just don't want to do it.

So what that means is if I want to farm biome 2 for the rare item needed for secret ending, I'm probably going to have to farm biome 1 for at least half an hour or so before I head to biome 2 each time, which I really don't want bother doing.

I guess its not too much of a fault of the game, its feeling like any other roguelike now that I've finished it once and am just replaying (mostly) for the sake of it. And I normally lose motivation to play roguelikes very quickly, so no change here.

Xevross

#39
May 05, 2021, 09:53 PM

Big oofs all round

Dr. Pezus

#40
May 05, 2021, 11:02 PM
Jeezus

BananaKing

#41
May 06, 2021, 03:50 AM
Even more reason to not buy games day 1 these days. All these sort of things would be ironed out if you wait a few months

kitler53

#42
May 06, 2021, 01:53 PM
Quote from: Xevross on May 05, 2021, 09:53 PM
Big oofs all round
dang, that's bad.

Quote from: BananaKing on May 06, 2021, 03:50 AMEven more reason to not buy games day 1 these days. All these sort of things would be ironed out if you wait a few months
indeed.   day-1 games are the worst.   ...thank god i don't subscribe to gamepass.  xD
         

Featured Artist: Emily Rudd

the-pi-guy

#43
Mar 22, 2022, 03:05 PM

Legend

#44
Mar 22, 2022, 03:28 PM
Waiting on ps+. Roguelites are not my thing but I want to try it.
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