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Fez (XBLA)|OT| If you have no interest in discussing the game, don't enter the thread

neoism

neoism

Member
While I'm focusing on negatives, Fez also suffers from some embarrassing technical issues. For starters, the game's audio constantly cuts out when you're transitioning from zone to zone (and even during play, too!). The game also crashed on me a few times, as well as threw me into an infinite death loop which forced me to restart in order to continue. Luckily, Fez saves often so I didn't have to replay much when this occurred.

Maybe one of the game's most shocking technical issues centers around how long you play. If you play for a few hours in one sitting, the load times in Fez get longer and longer. Transitioning from zone to zone is seamless when first starting to play, but then you start getting loading screens every time you walk through a door if you play for extended periods of time.
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wow hope it's not that bad for me... a game in development for 5 years shouldn't have issues like this. :/ still Day 1
 
H

hearsaybear

Member
Is the "leaderboard" in this just the first to a # of cubes? If so, what's the point? Bastion had a similar issue. Really looks great when a game reviewer is permanently number 1 before the game even comes out.

At least rank according to lowest time for cubes or something.
 
M

Magnalon

Neo Member
ghibli99 said:
Don't want to derail too much here, but how bad? I mean, I hope he doesn't just suck, but on the flipside, I sometimes have a very hard time relating to reviewers who are just gifted at games and don't find anything difficult.
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He's not awful, I just notice that a lot of times in his commentary (video or written), he complains about things that are pretty easily overcome. A lot of times he's referring to design flaws (like fake difficulty and the like), but often I'll scratch my head and say "really, Jeff?". He'll also occasionally dump on a game for being difficult -- basically, not the person you'd want reviewing Dark/Demon's Souls (GB also never reviewed Dark Souls).
 
S

SapientWolf

Trucker Sexologist
Magnalon said:
Personally, I think it's streets ahead of Braid. With Braid, you followed a linear set of stages, and were required to do everything Jonathan Blow wanted you to do. I had similar moments with both games where I had that "puzzle grin" on my face, when I realized how to do a certain task.

But IMO, Fez far exceeds Braid in the sense that you can pretty much play the game the way you want to play it. If you don't want to be in a certain area, you don't have to be -- you can go explore a new area, or just do a bunch of puzzles. Conversely, you basically don't have to do any complex puzzles to beat the game. To me, that's the biggest improvement.



IIRC Xbox Live updates around 5-6AM EST for content deployment every week.
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There's no point in doing anything in Braid besides solving puzzles. You would lose your sanity if you just went around reading the story books.
 
M

Magnalon

Neo Member
neoism said:
wow hope it's not that bad for me... a game in development for 5 years should have issues like this. :/ still Day 1
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My game crashed twice and I got the "infinite death" glitch once. It sucks, but the game saves as often as an MMO, so you just have to load the game up again.
 
S

see5harp

Member
Magnalon said:
Personally, I think it's streets ahead of Braid. With Braid, you followed a linear set of stages, and were required to do everything Jonathan Blow wanted you to do. I had similar moments with both games where I had that "puzzle grin" on my face, when I realized how to do a certain task.

But IMO, Fez far exceeds Braid in the sense that you can pretty much play the game the way you want to play it. If you don't want to be in a certain area, you don't have to be -- you can go explore a new area, or just do a bunch of puzzles. Conversely, you basically don't have to do any complex puzzles to beat the game. To me, that's the biggest improvement.



IIRC Xbox Live updates around 5-6AM EST for content deployment every week.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the impressions. Some guy earlier in the thread was asking why I was bringing up Braid. It's nice to hear this isn't a simple trial and error platformer like that guy seemed to think the game was.
 
M

Magnalon

Neo Member
see5harp said:
Thank you for the impressions. Some guy earlier in the thread was asking why I was bringing up Braid. It's nice to hear this isn't a simple trial and error platformer like that guy seemed to think the game was.
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Some puzzles can be seen as trial and error, but thankfully you can just walk out of the room and go anywhere else. It's much appreciated given the usual linear nature of puzzle games (especially the Angry Birds iOS model of "must beat stage 1, 2, 3, 4 in sequential order).
 
D

Diamond

Member
DaBuddaDa said:
That's what I'm confused by: "a movement." There have always been indie games, long before these recent guys, and it wasn't so much a movement as it was a group of people that happened to be in the right place at the right time to ride the rise of Steam, XBLA and iOS platforms which allowed them to get in front of more people. I find it a bit full of itself. There is nothing inherently groundbreaking about the actual games we're talking about here, just the circumstances around them due in part to good fortune.
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Interesting subject. I partly disagree with this. Sure, you have to take the rise of digital distribution into account, but you seem to brush off too easily the actual quality of the games and the impact they had on gamers. In the context of the indie boom, with hundreds of games suddenly playable, you had to have something special in your hands to stand out. Games like Braid, World of Goo, Super Meat Boy or Limbo all had a big impact on people when they came out, and it wasn't just because a lot of people could play plenty of 2D games again. And I would go as far as saying that the actual quality of these games added momentum to the development of digital distribution.
Maybe you, on a personal level, didn't find them groundbreaking, but their impact on video games as a whole could justify the term "movement", to me at least.

Now I'll have to play Fez to know if Schatz's tweet is justified or not. :)
 
V

Visualante2

Member
So all the reviews are fairly high, wonder why Eurogamer wasn't allowed to publish today- they're a big site.

I'm okay with the difficulty issues but I'm a bit saddened by the performance problems mentioned.
 
neoism

neoism

Member
Magnalon said:
My game crashed twice and I got the "infinite death" glitch once. It sucks, but the game saves as often as an MMO, so you just have to load the game up again.
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That's good to hear... I my just play for 2 hours at a time, and maybe wont get to many bad load times, and glitches...
 
W

whatevermort

Member
Visualante2 said:
So all the reviews are fairly high, wonder why Eurogamer wasn't allowed to publish today- they're a big site.

I'm okay with the difficulty issues but I'm a bit saddened by the performance problems mentioned.
Click to expand...

Yeah, curious about the EG review. Wonder if it'll still be a 5 when it reappears?

I'm looking forward to trying this either way. Graphic style alone guarantees that.
 
M

Misguided

Banned
Magnalon said:
Personally, I think it's streets ahead of Braid. With Braid, you followed a linear set of stages, and were required to do everything Jonathan Blow wanted you to do. I had similar moments with both games where I had that "puzzle grin" on my face, when I realized how to do a certain task.

But IMO, Fez far exceeds Braid in the sense that you can pretty much play the game the way you want to play it. If you don't want to be in a certain area, you don't have to be -- you can go explore a new area, or just do a bunch of puzzles. Conversely, you basically don't have to do any complex puzzles to beat the game. To me, that's the biggest improvement.
Click to expand...

While I'm not going to say that Fez isn't better than Braid (I haven't played Fez yet), in defense of Braid, you have the ability to do levels in whatever order you choose; if you get stuck on one, well, the door's right over there! So I would argue that that sense of freedom is most certainly maintained.

Also, for those worried about the technical issues:

https://twitter.com/#!/renaudbedard/status/190082435571122177

Renaud Bedard said:
Some reviews are mentioning glitches/crashes; I'm working on a title update (that won't be day-one) that should address some of them.
Click to expand...
 
Riposte

Riposte

Member
Can you fight enemies in this? If you can't then it isn't much of a "heir of Super Mario" at all. Stupid game journo speak.
 
F

Fortinbras

Member
Visualante2 said:
So all the reviews are fairly high, wonder why Eurogamer wasn't allowed to publish today- they're a big site.

I'm okay with the difficulty issues but I'm a bit saddened by the performance problems mentioned.
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Rumor has it that Eurogamer gave Fez 5 out of 10. Two gaffers mentioned this earlier in this thread.
 
Vire

Vire

Member
Riposte said:
That's what I thought. It looks like a puzzle game first and foremost. Are there tough jumps to make, sequences where you have to use your reflexes?
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I don't really think the Super Mario comparison is really apt since this game is just about relaxing with no external stressors put on the user. There is no fear of death, it's just about zoning out and having fun being in this strange, but beautiful world. If you are looking for this to be the next Super Meat Boy in terms of platforming, I think you are interested in the wrong type of game.
 
Riposte

Riposte

Member
Vire said:
I don't really think the Super Mario comparison is really apt since this game is just about relaxing with no external stressors put on the user. There is no fear of death, it's just about zoning out and having fun being in this strange, but beautiful world. If you are looking for this to be the next Super Meat Boy in terms of platforming, I think you are interested in the wrong type of game.
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Of course not, since Super Meat Boy is also no Super Mario Bros. (There is no fear of death in Meat Boy and you don't kill stuff either lol.) Just confirming the idea that this is a puzzle game and not so much a platformer one. Now to determine whether the puzzles or good or not (and not just wacky).
 
O

OldJadedGamer

Banned
toythatkills said:
The thread title should have been "YES. It DOES come out on Friday."
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So weird, every game for XBLA comes out on Wednesdays. I'm bummed as my girlfriend is working second shift tonight so I had time to play. I'll get it but very odd that it's releasing Friday. I wonder how many other games have broken releases like this.
 
B

Beaulieu

Member
OldJadedGamer said:
So weird, every game for XBLA comes out on Wednesdays. I'm bummed as my girlfriend is working second shift tonight so I had time to play. I'll get it but very odd that it's releasing Friday. I wonder how many other games have broken releases like this.
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giant bomb said someting about this on their last podcast.. I think exclusives will come out on fridays, or something like that.
 
D

DaBuddaDa

Member
Beaulieu said:
giant bomb said someting about this on their last podcast.. I think exclusives will come out on fridays, or something like that.
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The idea is XBLA is too jammed with games on Wednesday and lots of them are getting lost in the shuffle and/or not advertised at all. The solution recently has been to release some games Wednesday and move others to Friday.
 
O

OldJadedGamer

Banned
Beaulieu said:
giant bomb said someting about this on their last podcast.. I think exclusives will come out on fridays, or something like that.
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I think that is a good solution to the problem of too many games. Give exclusives their own release date. I'm not complaining but I'm a little bummed cause I thought I was going to play it today :(
 
G

ghibli99

Member
Magnalon said:
He's not awful, I just notice that a lot of times in his commentary (video or written), he complains about things that are pretty easily overcome. A lot of times he's referring to design flaws (like fake difficulty and the like), but often I'll scratch my head and say "really, Jeff?". He'll also occasionally dump on a game for being difficult -- basically, not the person you'd want reviewing Dark/Demon's Souls (GB also never reviewed Dark Souls).
Click to expand...
Gotcha. I can relate in a way, but those are probably not qualities that should come out too often when your job is to review games. :) Who knows, though, perhaps that makes it easier for folks to relate to him who might have similar skills and difficulty tolerances.
 
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