Die Squirrel Die
Member
Picked this up today, 'cause I'm a big Onimusha fan and really like the idea of a Roman set game. Played around 4hrs30mins.
Graphics/Presentation/etc. - It's pretty. Modelling's a bit funny. It's like they've tried to give the clothes bulk but it ends up making everyone look like they are wearing 2 sizes too big for them. Quality of the CG is a bit dissapointing. It's basically all done using ingame assets. No lovely Robot CG intro to gawp over each time, like Onimusha3. Cutscene direction is generally very nice, with an eye towards emphasising epicness. Sometimes the technical aspects let them down though. Things like closeups in the arena showing off the lovely low-res 2D sprite crowd or the senator models, where apparantly there wasn't enough animation to go around, so some of them are frozen in motion.
Music's good, subtle but with a distinctive flavour that helps the atmosphere. Voice-acting unfortunately is up to Capcom's usually high standards. Nothing says emotion like a robotic, emotionless rendition of 'NOOOOOO'.
Gameplay - Let's talk the stealth bits first. They aren't that bad (so far - I've done 3 of them), but then again they aren't great either. There's some nice ideas in there. For example, when in disguise you have to make sure you don't act suspicious, running, creeping along. When carrying a vase or a rope (your only forms of attack as Octavianus) you have to make sure you hide them behind your back when in sight of people. Even when in disguise, guards may stop you to question you, give them the wrong answer and you'll be rumbled. Done right these elements, particularly the disguising/answering right bit could have done a nice bit option filled approach to O.'s bits. Unfortunately it doesn't. If there's a particular guard you're meant to knocked out to steal his uniform, then no amount of clever answers will stop him pulling him out his sword and ending you. Yep, you guessed it's it's trial and error gameplay.
There's an interesting adventure style twist to O.'s section which I think it's a shame they didn't make more of, 'cause it's here that the Roman atmosphere really comes through. Basically with O. you don't get chucked at the start of his levels. Instead at the start of his sections you are at his base of operations. Exiting this area brings up the map, with a number of possible areas to explore, including the marketplace, the Forum and the Senate house (that's all I've unlocked so far, looks like there's at least 4 or 5 more areas.
In the market you can use the coins you find around the place, to purchase items and furniture to decorate your pad. And in the forum I've even given a public speech and convinced the people to protest outside the Senate. Obviously it's possible that this may develop into something more, but so far I think they could have done with doing more in this section.
Agrippa's gameplay is of course the action portion of the programming. It's definitely the stronger of the two, but not without it's own problems. Generally it feels a bit clunkier then Onimusha. And I have to be honest, I'm not a fan of the weapons wearing down. Not necessarily in principal, but in pratice the game has set it so they are far too easily broken. I've been in a few situations already when there is one weapon between 4 or 5 people because the rest are all broken, because of a lot of blocking back and forth. In theory appealing to the crowd should supply new weapons, but they're a tempremental bunch and unless you have full, or nearly full, energy they have a tendency to throw bread, cheese or meat, rather than a mace.
I also think there's a bit of an issue with weapon balance. The spear in particular strikes me a seriously overpowered. It's strong, quick and with a long reach. Great if you have one, not so great if the enemies do. It has a thrusting attack, which is not only tricky to dodge, but also takes away a large portion of your life bar, the life bar of your weapon should you block, and knocks you right back. This can make getting near enough to a spear wielder to attack something of a chore. And it seems to me that when the enemy is holding a weapon it gets a little bit of a defence boost.
But these are minor niggles, and overall the sheer visceral pleasure of slicing three guys clean in half with a Great Halberd is hard to top. So it may be bringing about the downfall of all human kind, but damn the gore is fun.
Summary - I'm liking SoR. The atmosphere is impeccable, and for the most part the gameplay is a lot of fun. I'd really like to see this series continue, not just 'cause it's nice to see a game that isn't WWII/Sci-Fi/Medieval/Gangsta and Rome happens to be a kickass setting, but because there's so much potential for crazy politicals, Imperialist expansion etc. Rome: Total War showed how to cram that all into a strategy game, it'd be nice to get it in action/adventure form as well.
Graphics/Presentation/etc. - It's pretty. Modelling's a bit funny. It's like they've tried to give the clothes bulk but it ends up making everyone look like they are wearing 2 sizes too big for them. Quality of the CG is a bit dissapointing. It's basically all done using ingame assets. No lovely Robot CG intro to gawp over each time, like Onimusha3. Cutscene direction is generally very nice, with an eye towards emphasising epicness. Sometimes the technical aspects let them down though. Things like closeups in the arena showing off the lovely low-res 2D sprite crowd or the senator models, where apparantly there wasn't enough animation to go around, so some of them are frozen in motion.
Music's good, subtle but with a distinctive flavour that helps the atmosphere. Voice-acting unfortunately is up to Capcom's usually high standards. Nothing says emotion like a robotic, emotionless rendition of 'NOOOOOO'.
Gameplay - Let's talk the stealth bits first. They aren't that bad (so far - I've done 3 of them), but then again they aren't great either. There's some nice ideas in there. For example, when in disguise you have to make sure you don't act suspicious, running, creeping along. When carrying a vase or a rope (your only forms of attack as Octavianus) you have to make sure you hide them behind your back when in sight of people. Even when in disguise, guards may stop you to question you, give them the wrong answer and you'll be rumbled. Done right these elements, particularly the disguising/answering right bit could have done a nice bit option filled approach to O.'s bits. Unfortunately it doesn't. If there's a particular guard you're meant to knocked out to steal his uniform, then no amount of clever answers will stop him pulling him out his sword and ending you. Yep, you guessed it's it's trial and error gameplay.
There's an interesting adventure style twist to O.'s section which I think it's a shame they didn't make more of, 'cause it's here that the Roman atmosphere really comes through. Basically with O. you don't get chucked at the start of his levels. Instead at the start of his sections you are at his base of operations. Exiting this area brings up the map, with a number of possible areas to explore, including the marketplace, the Forum and the Senate house (that's all I've unlocked so far, looks like there's at least 4 or 5 more areas.
In the market you can use the coins you find around the place, to purchase items and furniture to decorate your pad. And in the forum I've even given a public speech and convinced the people to protest outside the Senate. Obviously it's possible that this may develop into something more, but so far I think they could have done with doing more in this section.
Agrippa's gameplay is of course the action portion of the programming. It's definitely the stronger of the two, but not without it's own problems. Generally it feels a bit clunkier then Onimusha. And I have to be honest, I'm not a fan of the weapons wearing down. Not necessarily in principal, but in pratice the game has set it so they are far too easily broken. I've been in a few situations already when there is one weapon between 4 or 5 people because the rest are all broken, because of a lot of blocking back and forth. In theory appealing to the crowd should supply new weapons, but they're a tempremental bunch and unless you have full, or nearly full, energy they have a tendency to throw bread, cheese or meat, rather than a mace.
I also think there's a bit of an issue with weapon balance. The spear in particular strikes me a seriously overpowered. It's strong, quick and with a long reach. Great if you have one, not so great if the enemies do. It has a thrusting attack, which is not only tricky to dodge, but also takes away a large portion of your life bar, the life bar of your weapon should you block, and knocks you right back. This can make getting near enough to a spear wielder to attack something of a chore. And it seems to me that when the enemy is holding a weapon it gets a little bit of a defence boost.
But these are minor niggles, and overall the sheer visceral pleasure of slicing three guys clean in half with a Great Halberd is hard to top. So it may be bringing about the downfall of all human kind, but damn the gore is fun.
Summary - I'm liking SoR. The atmosphere is impeccable, and for the most part the gameplay is a lot of fun. I'd really like to see this series continue, not just 'cause it's nice to see a game that isn't WWII/Sci-Fi/Medieval/Gangsta and Rome happens to be a kickass setting, but because there's so much potential for crazy politicals, Imperialist expansion etc. Rome: Total War showed how to cram that all into a strategy game, it'd be nice to get it in action/adventure form as well.
