As a fan of infamous 1 and 2, Second Son was a massive disappointment. Spoilers

From what I read and saw before its release, it's pretty much exactly what I expected. All the powers they picked were because they would look cool (they did look really good).
 
In a way I kind of look @ Second Son the same way I look at Infamous 1. They've laid the foundation and now they can blow us away with a sequel, similar to what they did with Infamous 2.

I do agree with a lot of your critiques of the game OP. I found Seattle pretty lifeless/forgettable and I thought all of the side characters sucked, but Reggie the least.

And just personally, I enjoyed being the Electric Man much more then the multipowered man. After I played Infamous 1 & 2 I said to myself "Damn, I wish I was an Electric man!" After I played Infamous: SS, I said "Damn, I wish I was an Electric man!" :p

Also I really, REALLY loved the first 15 minutes of Infamous 2, it's easily one of my favorite scenes of Last Generation. The music, the tension, Empire City, this creature appearing, the people panicing and yelling for help, the water, the boats, and Cole's confusion/panic that he has to face it then and there. Was such a great moment.
 
sjay1994 said:
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I couldn't agree more. The first half hour just sets the bar so high and then drops off as soon as you get to Seattle. Augustine's actress did an amazing job at making her convincing.

-It's disappointing to me just how little variety there was in the powers themselves aside from the way they look. Especially considering how much SP hyped them up and wanted to keep them a secret. Just imagine how cool would it have been if we had something like a neon tether or digital shield instead of just slightly different versions of the missile power.

-Also I would've loved to see side quest arcs for Eugene and Fetch, because that was definitely needed considering there are no actual side MISSIONS since you can complete every side activity in less than 30 seconds. For example, WHO was controlling the army of drug dealers? There should've been several side missions with Fetch that expanded on that. Also some context for the side content would've been nice, like at least some kind of dialogue where Reggie tells Delsin about the D.U.P. agents disguised as citizens or that there are hidden cameras. Or maybe some dialogue where Delsin talks about how his graffiti would lighten people up or instill fear.

-And even some cutscenes ended up being pointless besides just being an indication that the mission has started
"Come on supergirl, got people to see and powers to steal."
^ This was just Troy Baker pacing back and forth talking to himself. Such a waste of a cutscene.

It's a good game and it has it's high points, but it's still disappointing, especially when it comes to the same black and white moral system that ends up barely changing anything and also hurts the narrative. Seriously, a good amount of dialogue doesn't make sense if Delsin is evil and he isn't set up as an evil person to begin with so it's very jarring compared to good Delsin who is very believable, likeable, and well written but also pretty predictable.
For some context:"I'm so proud of you" <----Reggie still says this regardless of the karma path you choose, so basically he doesn't care at all about all the cops you've murdered.

I enjoyed it but I was expecting a GOTY/system seller, not a game that's more of a visual showcase with little substance and variety.
 
sjay1994 said:
World building

There was a lot of hype going into SS about Seattle. SP would brag about it saying they really captured "the feel" of Seattle, and this was the first time they are building a real city. Problem is, Seattle has no character, story or atmosphere to it. In comparison Empire City and New Marais had established tones way better than seattle. With Empire people are sick, they are starving, the city is in ruins, and people were struggling to stay alive. With New Marais, each of the districts where characterized by the enemies that inhabited them. The city was plastered in Betrand propaganda, but they were still full of life and lights. The swamps were barren and swarming with corrupted. The flood Zone was dark, and people were begging for help. Each of these zones in the world established a tone.
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Bingo. Seattle was such a disappointment compared to the atmosphere of the previous 2 games. It was just...bland.
 
sjay1994 said:
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Remember the tone Nate Fox was trying to sell at the PS4 reveal? Can you honestly say that it translated anywhere into Seattle? Do you ever see citizens being put into those pens? Do you ever see anyone failing a scan except Delsin? No. That feeling of oppression is not seen at all in second son. Seattle has no tone to it.
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To be fair to Nate, the auto-cue froze up during his speech - thus the improvised hamming it up. But I agree, my main (well, to be honest my only) gripe was that the city didn't feel alive because all the NPC characters were just sheep, and outside of the main story and characters it didn't feel like there were enough triggers in the game world to make it feel like a living, breathing, oppressed city. It would have made sense to have had some side-content where you get to see people with powers (albeit useless ones that are not worth stealing) being dealt with.
 
Yep. I agree with you. The two side characters weren't even in there that much and the side missions were lacking. I mean, only one good/evil mission for the both of them? Bah.

Big disappointment for me and ultimately a very shallow experience.
 
Zomba13 said:
So you've not even really finished the tutorial and you've had enough?
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Pretty much, I'm just not compelled to play it over Trials or GZ right now. It's not grabbing me.

I did finish (and like) infamous 1 but this is not getting it's hooks in. I fire it up, wander about a bit, think it would be cool to climb the space needle then get shot at and lose the will to fight off the cops so just go back to something else.
 
Hate to sound hipster, but I had a sneaking suspicion the game wouldn't be nearly as... "complete" as the two first games, since it was a Launch-Window title or just for the fact that it was released within the first half of PS4's first fiscal year.
 
going to have to disagree.........second son took me and had me easily wanting to finish and 100% everything within the game. I never wanted to even touch the first two ever again........while second son I keep popping in after beating it on good and evil.
 
I should clarify I did enjoy second son, but in comparison to my experience with the first 2 games, it was really disappointing.
 
I think it's the best instalment, but only just. Outside of the main missions, it is very slight in content, and so it feels a lot like a early gen game in that regard. Lots of simplistic, repetitive side-content to bulk up the whole package without it actually offering all that much in the way of fun. The story is bobbins too. I dislike the first game, but at least it had a compelling narrative that far exceeded the familiar story beats of Second Son's "oh dang, the villain did this, so I have to collect this and this and this in order to undo what the villain did."

But in terms of actual gameplay, it soared. It controls in a fluid and precise manner, with traversal and combat representing a big jump from before. And it all happens to look gorgeous as a bonus.
 
Being forced to siphon different things to change powers was a major step backward for me. inFamous 2 had a quick menu power selector and you had access to all your electricity powers as well as the ones based on whatever side you were on (ice or smoke/oil)

I get that maybe it would have been too many powers to choose from, but a lot of them in Second Son were just reskinned versions of the same powers from one to the next.

I felt like your overall power set was too limited in those regards because it was an "all or nothing" thing. I would have preferred full choice of powers, even if they kept 3 or 4 separate power bars or something so that it was still balanced around siphoning the correct resource.

Being forced to swap your entire power set each time you siphoned was a step back I felt.
 
The first infamous was such a unique experience, i loved it to death. While the second game improved a lot but the general feeling i have with this game is "i feel like played this before", it just didn't click with me. It just felt more of the same. Second son on the other hand didn't have this feeling but what was great in infamous 2 was gone in this to be replaced to what was bad in infamous 1. Sounds confusing? Right? But its how i feel, all three games are flawed in some way. The only thing that bothers me is that second son is rushed to some degree, i felt that they had to remove a lot of stuff to meet the release date. The fact that the first and the second infamous games had three major area but second only has two.
 
I had more fun with second son. It could've used more content and better side missions but I had a ton of fun using the upgrades than any of the other games, especially neon. Characters I think might not of been as good, I only really cared for fetch. I think you can have a case why this isn't the best in the series as it doesn't beat the other games in certain respects, but at the end I had more fun with this game.
 
I don't get the love for inFamous 1. Maybe it's because I played it maybe 2 years after it came out, but it was bland, boring and repetitive a lot of the time. Not to mention Cole is such a boring character, until Kessler & other revelations happen towards the end of the game. inFamous 2 improved on a lot of it, but I think Sucker Punch just isn't in the top tier quality of ultimate developers that 4/13 studios of WWS are. They can get there, but they're unfortunately not that good. They're in the very good ratio at the moment. I was going to get into detail on what inFamous SS lacks a month after its release, even though I really enjoyed the game despite several shortcomings. Maybe I'll get to it this long weekend and write a long summary of it, I think I still have that "how can inFamous move forward" topic subscribed. :)
 
Having played Infamous 1 & 2, I'd say the Infamous:SS is the best game so far. I enjoyed the story, the characters....it just looks freaking amazing.
 
To me it was that the story wasn't as interesting, it was shorter, and the city somehow felt even less immersive.

I only admired its graphics and audio, which don't entertain me much.
 
LegendofDragoonLives said:
I don't get the love for inFamous 1. Maybe it's because I played it maybe 2 years after it came out, but it was bland, boring and repetitive a lot of the time. Not to mention Cole is such a boring character, until Kessler & other revelations happen towards the end of the game. inFamous 2 improved on a lot of it, but I think Sucker Punch just isn't in the top tier quality of ultimate developers that 4/13 studios of WWS are. They can get there, but they're unfortunately not that good. They're in the very good ratio at the moment. I was going to get into detail on what inFamous SS lacks a month after its release, even though I really enjoyed the game despite several shortcomings. Maybe I'll get to it this long weekend and write a long summary of it, I think I still have that "how can inFamous move forward" topic subscribed. :)
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I think some of the bigger fights felt more epic. Especially when they're giving you the electric grid to stand on and unleash everything you have while multiple elite conduits are attacking. That's something that didn't really happen in inFamous 2 as much.

There were still epic feeling fights in 2, but it was a bit more of a "power management" thing while inFamous 1 had some fights where they let you unleash unlimited power.
 
dragonbane said:
gwahahahaha. Do you normally play in French or English? And what influences your decision?
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Some games force me to pick French audio if I want to have French menus. Since I don't like to read English unless I'm forced to* I usually pick French in those cases, unless the audio is particularly atrocious. For instance, the Call of Duty games have shit French VAs so I'll put up with English menus in exchange for decent audio.

I've played Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls in English because the actors gave both their likeness and their voice to the characters (i.e. Performance capture) so that's more or less how the games were meant to be played.

For games where the voice actors are less important I'm OK with French audio. For instance, Left 4 Dead 2 and Team Fortress 2 have very good French VAs - and so did Infamous: Second Son.


* (it's particularly important with menus: having many bits of English text on the same screen makes it hard for me to even know where I should look - it's cognitive overload)
 
Regarding the powers, I definitely agree that it was disappointing how they were pretty much identical besides traversal styles. I wish the way you interacted with enemies dramatically changed with each power. In the end they ended up feeling pretty much like skins of one power.
 
Uh, no!

As a fan of inFAMOUS 1 and 2, Second Son was an awesome sequel.

Delsin is great, the world was beautiful and I liked the story.
Great start for a new era of inFAMOUS with a new lead character.

Can't wait for Second Son 2 ^_^
 
TheBaronOfNA said:
Is not heal citizen event. Is a rescue a person with a conduit gene... so it make it worse, actually.
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Feels like a disconnect to the story from the gameplay. Like, the developers wanted to give a visual reward for saving someone so in previous games it's been crowds applauding you but in this game's world where the general public hates these mutants, it comes off as a contradiction.
 
ComputerMKII said:
Some games force me to pick French audio if I want to have French menus. Since I don't like to read English unless I'm forced to* I usually pick French in those cases, unless the audio is particularly atrocious. For instance, the Call of Duty games have shit French VAs so I'll put up with English menus in exchange for decent audio.

I've played Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls in English because the actors gave both their likeness and their voice to the characters (i.e. Performance capture) so that's more or less how the games were meant to be played.

For games where the voice actors are less important I'm OK with French audio. For instance, Left 4 Dead 2 and Team Fortress 2 have very good French VAs - and so did Infamous: Second Son.


* (it's particularly important with menus: having many bits of English text on the same screen makes it hard for me to even know where I should look - it's cognitive overload)
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Thanks. Makes a lot of sense :) I also play games in German if the voice acting is not that important.
 
Way too much nostalgia in here.... 1 is so pedestrian it hurts. The missions and the people giving them are laughable. 2 is an improvement in most ways. I have yet to play the whole thing as I assume it will be ported to PS4.

At any rate 3 is a pretty great game considering launch constraints and new tech. Calling this a massive disappointment is an embarrassment imo.

I'd feel proud to have put out that game.
 
I am the exact opposite, I hated Infamous 1 & 2 but I loved Second Son.

Not sure quite what it is exactly but the 'feel' of Second Son is a lot more gratifying than that of the other games. The others felt lifeless to me.
 
I can respect some of those negs you mentioned but I just feel as a whole, people are basing their criticisms on expecting it to actually be a different game.

It's not an open world game in the normal sense of the genre.

It's not meant to be an in depth, character driven story.

It's an action game that gives you freedom to rule the world they put you in and have fun whilst there.

And for that, it's one of the most enjoyable and polished games you'll ever see.

edit: and in general, whenever someone takes the effort to make that much of a case for why they dislike the game it's pretty obvious you care enough to have actually really enjoyed it in at least some ways. So stop being the cool kid and hating things that are popular.
 
The main story thread is somewhat enjoyable, of which I'm about 75% complete. The lack of variety in the side missions is pretty underwhelming.
 
inFAMOUS 1 - Awesome story and repetitive gameplay
inFAMOUS 2 - Incredible gamplay and decent story

Haven't played SS yet.

I think inFAMOUS 2 is the best in the franchise for me (out of the ones I've played). I hope we have another inFAMOUS with Cole. The relationship between Cole and Zeke was awesome. I loved it.
 
I Hated Both Infamous 1 and 2 Because Cole is a Souless,Horrible character. Delsin Redeemed the Franchise for me.. sometimes you need a character change to keep it interesting.
 
I vastly prefer inFamous 2 over SS. I think my biggest gripe with SS is that I never felt getting more powerful as I unlocked more powers. In 2, I felt that I'm become more and more badass as Cole with each new ability unlocked. In SS, not so much. I think it stems from the fact that since you can't change your power set on-the-fly, Sucker Punch was forced to make all the powers perform the same or very similar functions. In my opinion, this made the powers feel more like reskins of the smoke power rather than an upgrade and addition to Delsin's repertoire of moves. The last power was especially disappointing as it felt that they'd half-assed it (no Karma bomb, no Good / Evil specific moves).

Another issue I have is with the city itself. Or to be more specific, the NPCs that inhabit it. While from a graphical standpoint the city looks stunning, I never felt that it's alive. The NPC seem more like robots rather than humans. They walk around and they react to you but it all feels fake. Like they have no other reason to be there than to react to your actions.

Overall, I think my biggest issue is with the powers in SS. I never truly felt that I had fun while using them which was the direct opposite of how I reacted to the powers given to you in inFamous 2. Nevertheless, I'm still cautiously optimistic that the planned DLC might be worthwile on the caveat that they'll go crazy like in Festival of Blood with the power sets.
 
I feel the exact opposite. When I first played inFamous 1, I immediately turned it off. I thought it was way too goofy and I hated the Zeke character. The graphics and animation just looked bad as well.

I eventually gave it another shot and ended up enjoying. It wasn't anything special but it was fun for what it was and reminded me other sandbox super hero games like Incredible Hulk and Spiderman. I would give it a 7/10.

inFamous 2 was just way too over the top for me with the monsters and insect creatures. I hated the change to Cole's appearance and voice but the graphics were nice and the gameplay was still good. They refined a lot of what was annoying in the first game. Based on the refinements, I would give it the same 7/10.

Second Son felt like a breath of fresh air. It didn't even feel like an inFamous game in a lot of ways which I can see why people wouldn't like that. I enjoyed the acting, the more realistic story and the different powers. I thought I would hate Delsin but he won me over quickly. The graphics were pretty mindblowing and the gameplay was good. The city felt a bit small and the same but it was actually fun to do the side missions and taking over cities. 8/10
 
I liked second son better than the first infamous. No filler material. Every thing is well polished. I played through 3/4 of the first infamous and then I got tired of it.

Infamous 2, shooting electric missiles to fire up transformers was lame. Especially with re-spawning AI. Also I hated the stealth chase missions in 1 & 2.

SS was a filtered version of the first two. Where I loved all the side missions. Nothing dragged. It was a good fun 10-12 hrs and I played it twice .. may play it again one more when the DLC arrives.
 
Messofanego said:
Feels like a disconnect to the story from the gameplay. Like, the developers wanted to give a visual reward for saving someone so in previous games it's been crowds applauding you but in this game's world where the general public hates these mutants, it comes off as a contradiction.
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It has more to do that, in most cases, the same people that were celebrating the beating are cheering when you rescue someone (some escape at see you, but I remember some stay to applaoud if you are fast enough)

.
 
I love nearly every aspect of the game, but my biggest disappointments are probably both the story not being as good as the Cole games, in addition to the length being around half of the previous two.
 
OP, are you me? Because I also felt the same way, even down to wanting to go back and play inFamous 2 to see what was wrong, and my conclusions were basically the same.

I think ultimately what hurt Second Son was the fact that it was a launch window title. They had to cut down the scale so much just to get it out in time. Like ShockingAlberto said, all of the game's issues are due to a lack of content. With more missions they would've had the chance to flesh out the side characters and keep them relevant to the story. More side missions would've upped the character of the city, help in establishing the atmosphere, provided much-needed mission variety, and let players take their time to take in the world.

More content alone would've solved the vast, vast majority of my criticisms with the game.I really hope SP can make a follow-up title that's truly the next-generation inFamous that the series deserves.
 
I just finished Festival of Blood last night and thought it was really good. By the time I get a ps4 I'm hoping SS's dlc is out or will be out soon that adds a substantial chunk of game time to SS. The first two games are fun but the open worlds felt a bit shallow.
 
i liked, my favorite in the series although it is short and i wanted the relationships between delsin and the other characters to flow more naturally but still, i enjoyed the game a lot

second son > infamous 1 > infamous 2 imo
 
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