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Singularity |OT| - Anyone? No?

JaseC

gave away the keys to the kingdom.
How the fuck are you supposed to deal with the initial flood of Phase Ticks (when you fall into the sewer after meeting up with Barisov in 2010) on Hard? It's practically impossible as I don't have any attacks with a wide area of effect, and aging the bugs only attracts a few to it as opposed to a number resembling a pack. It's also impossible to run-and-gun it past them as each explosion takes away about a third of your health. It'd probably be doable if you could run while healing, but Raven decided to leave that out (as well as the ability to adjust the difficulty mid-game).

Edit: Finally got through it. $50 says Raven upped the health and damage of the enemies for Hard mode and called it a day. That section is criminally unbalanced.
 

onken

Member
What started off as a minor annoyance is really fucking me off now, NO FUCKING SUBTITLES. I often play late at night and can't turn the TV up enough to hear the dialog/recordings properly because the gunfire would wake everybody up. Grah, missed a fair chunk of the story/background because of this.

On the plus side, I love the way when you shoot people on this game they actually react like they've been shot, unlike most games where they flinch slightly (if at all) and carry on like nothing happened. One thing you cannot knock Raven for is their gunplay, always top notch.

JaseC said:
How the fuck are you supposed to deal with the initial flood of Phase Ticks (when you fall into the sewer after meeting up with Barisov in 2010) on Hard? It's practically impossible as I don't have any attacks with a wide area of effect, and aging the bugs only attracts a few to it as opposed to a number resembling a pack. It's also impossible to run-and-gun it past them as each explosion takes away about a third of your health. It'd probably be doable if you could run while healing, but Raven decided to leave that out (as well as the ability to adjust the difficulty mid-game).

Edit: Finally got through it. $50 says Raven upped the health and damage of the enemies for Hard mode and called it a day. That section is criminally unbalanced.

lol I was stuck on that exact same bit yesterday. In the end I gave up trying to kill them and ran like a motherfucker the whole way, spamming dead-lock over and over.
 

JaseC

gave away the keys to the kingdom.
Stallion Free said:
Use your freeze-time bubble. While inside, kill a bunch and prep your next bubble. Rinse and repeat.

I tried that a million times (I'd been attempting to get through this section for about an hour-and-a-half), but the amount of the Ticks is far too great considering the huge amount of damage their attack does. I ended up getting through it by throwing a Deadlock in front of the main door, running up there after releasing the valve, using an Impulse to blow up all the nearby Ticks, then throwing Deadlocks around like a madman as I bolted toward the ladders.

This took me a good half-dozen tries or so, but fortunately luck decided to be on my side sooner rather than later.

onken said:
lol I was stuck on that exact same bit yesterday. In the end I gave up trying to kill them and ran like a motherfucker the whole way, spamming dead-lock over and over.

Haha, exactly!
 

JaseC

gave away the keys to the kingdom.
onken said:
That claw tunnel thing right afterwards was kinda cheap too, literally no way to avoid it first time through.

Yeah, that was cheap. It explains the two health packs in the Phase Tick room.

The claw attack instantly reminded me of the identical-looking creature you have to burn to a crisp in the blast pit level of Half-Life.
 

Stallion Free

Cock Encumbered
I gave up on that part on hard waited a couple months and then restarted the game on a lower difficulty haha. I was so pissed at it on hard.
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
It's amazing to me how solid the fundamentals are in this game. We spend so much time bitching about aiming acceleration, movement speed, input lag, etc. It feels so perfect in this game.

Very fun. I just got the TMD and it feels great to use it. The game is a little overdone with the Bioshockiness and makes some critical mistakes (I can't listen to audiologs as I move?), and the story has made me lol for real once ("Hey! Stop for a minute and watch this video on my computer!"), but the gunplay is great.

Also I think it's the first third party UE3 game that doesn't run like shit on PS3 excepting UT3.
 
Y2Kev said:
It's amazing to me how solid the fundamentals are in this game. We spend so much time bitching about aiming acceleration, movement speed, input lag, etc. It feels so perfect in this game.

I couldn't agree more - same goes for Wolfenstein. These games might not do anything you haven't really seen before, but the core mechanics are very solid and for that I think Raven deserve a lot of credit, as their games are far more playable than a whole lot of recent FP titles with a whole load more hype.
 

todahawk

Member
Once I get done with Dead Space 2 I'm going back to finish up Singularity. It's been a hell of a lot of fun, love the overall feel, story and weapons. Just a straight up nice solid game.
 

onken

Member
Y2Kev said:
Also I think it's the first third party UE3 game that doesn't run like shit on PS3 excepting UT3.

Wolfenstein ran great on PS3 too, Raven are (were?) awesome.
 

erlim

yes, that talented of a member
this little game is awesome. raven software is underrated completely. madison represent.

edit: i wish activation would let raven stretch their wings and continue making original IPs. this one went under the radar completely. would not have gotten it if best buy didn't put out a 20$ coupon for it, and that I regret.
 

erlim

yes, that talented of a member
I just beat this game. So under the radar, so awesome. Go buy this game instead of whatever FPS you're planning on buying.
 

C-Jo

Member
I picked this up for $10 last week and just started playing. It seems pretty cool so far, but what's up with the lack of subtitles?
 

Johnny

Member
I picked this up after someone mentioned it was like Bioshock and because it was only $10. I've only put an hour into it so far but the controls, environment and scripting are really solid. Would recommend.
 

Seventy5

Member
Gamestop has this in their power saver sale for $18 right now, and they're also running buy 2 get 1. I've played about 3 hours so far and I think it's likely worth the price. The multiplayer was filled with level 1s, and I had no problem finding a match, so it seems other people are grabbing it too. Multi is kind of fun. It's not going to replace CoD or Bad Company 2, but it's pretty decent. I recommend it, especially considering the price.
 

Brandon F

Well congratulations! You got yourself caught!
Just started this up and am liking it quite a bit.

I fear some of the earlier comments above about certain sections on Hard. Already it is very clear that many of the environments don't lend themselves well to the encounters. Often the cover isn't protective enough, and on Hard difficulty, enemy AI suffers from the 'psychic' syndrome of locking immediately to you even before line of sight is engaged.

I've been managing so far though, and love the little puzzles involving the TMD. Also how about dat Seeker gun!
 

Althane

Member
So it's today's Midweek Madness sale, is it worth the $10?

I really loved Wolfenstein, so the fact that it is a Raven shooter makes me happy, but I haven't really heard much, and the thread hasn't given me much feeling for it either way.
 
Althane said:
I really loved Wolfenstein, so the fact that it is a Raven shooter makes me happy, but I haven't really heard much, and the thread hasn't given me much feeling for it either way.

I was a big fan of Raven's Wolfenstein, despite the shortcomings it had, but I can only say that Singularity improved on it in every way. Just a highly enjoyable first person shooter with a great story and, as to be expected from Raven, very solid gunplay. Singularity is going to go down as one of the most underrated games of the generation, imo.
 

LogicStep

Member
Well good to see people like it, saw the mid week deal but wasn't too sure. It shall be mine... Now I see why people curse at Valve so much :lol
 
SalsaShark said:
oh god tell me there's subtitles on the PC version

fuck ;_;

I remember playing with subtitles, so yeah, they are in it.

I wouldn't go as far as saying 'totally worth it @ 10 bucks' (this IS Steam we're talking about, so 5 bucks max on sales :p ), but the story is a magnificent soab. The gameplay is bit bland at times though.
 

Erasus

Member
Althane said:
So it's today's Midweek Madness sale, is it worth the $10?

I really loved Wolfenstein, so the fact that it is a Raven shooter makes me happy, but I haven't really heard much, and the thread hasn't given me much feeling for it either way.

I got it, have not played it yet though.
 
It is a bit annoying that some of GAF complains about COD over exposure, and then goes onto ignore this :/

...I will stop before I rant.
 

Noogy

Member
I'm very excited to finally play this, and regret waiting so long to jump in. Jumped in as soon as I saw the Steam sale (and verified that I can play with a 360 pad).
 

JohngPR

Member
Does anyone know if the steam version has XBL achievements?

I picked up the 360 version a while back on Goozex but have yet to play it. Was going to Goozex it back and buy the Steam one if it did. Thanks!
 
Keyser Soze said:
It is a bit annoying that some of GAF complains about COD over exposure, and then goes onto ignore this :/

...I will stop before I rant.
Yeah I mostly blame Activision, they really dropped the ball by not marketing this more. It was a fantastic change of pace.

Sadly now Raven is probably stuck in CoD map pack hell for the rest of their careers.
 

Joe Molotov

Member
I played the opening bit this morning where you flash back in time and save the scientist, and then there's a statue of him in the entrance instead of Stalin. Then I got a gun and shot some mutants. Seems pretty awesome so far.
 

soultron

Banned
Picked this up for $8 the other day. Pretty solid so far. At the phase ticks part in the sewers.

I can't really say it does anything exceptionally well, but it doesn't do anything really terribly either. Enjoying it. This really makes me want to check out Wolfenstein too.
 

Kritz

Banned
Usually I don't care much for derivation in games, especially not the games I pay ten dollars for, but all throughout Singularity I felt that I could instead be playing two other, better games. Namely Half Life 2 or Bioshock.

Mechanically the game was fine, despite being wholly unbalanced by the time you put three upgrade points into the assault rifle's damage stat. Which is... about two hours into the story. Like, you pointed guns at people and they died very quickly. And the time magic spell things you had were kind of interesting, although they suffered from the problem of taking longer than firing two bullets into a man's torso before they could kill anything.

I kind of got really tired of just how darn much Singularity took ideas from Half Life 2 / Episode 2. They had the big glowy skybox citadel in the background when possible, you were essentially fighting a Russian Dr Breen the entire time, you had an Alyx clone and a Dr Kleiner clone and there were quite a few bits of machinery around that looked suspiciously like D0G's head. You're fighting some pseudo-combine for the time you're not fighting zombie monsters from space times, and they weren't fun to fight at all.

The horror / thriller elements at the very start of the game and during all the monster sections were also kind of the worst things ever because they forgot they gave you two extremely powerful future weapons to murder everything with.

While suspension of disbelief is usually a thing I posses when playing games, by the third or forth TMD upgrade station I kind of started to wonder who decided it would be a good idea to stick these things down the bottom of sewers and near big fans, and why they weren't in one big centralised room. I also found it kind of baffling how Past Dr Kleiner gave you that one SUPER PROTOTYPE GUN that he seemed to imply was one of a kind, and then two rooms away you find another one on top of some guy's fucking workstation. And then there were like 10 more of them littered in various places in the future.

The gravity gun puzzles were also pretty boring, mostly consisting of the same "yo you make this box small then you make it big and then you move on" mechanic. It wasn't a very good puzzle the first time they didn't bother explaining how it worked, and unfortunately it never became a very good puzzle the other 20 times they tried to trick you with it.

Also, morale choices in games not about morale choices are pretty terrible. As well as random slow motion "shoot all the bad guys in the room" light-gun mini-games. Especially ones that happen after you've read like three space-chalk messages about
not trusting the person who is about to be space-hostage killed, making you wonder why they bothered sticking those in your face if you hit a failure state for letting the character that doesn't fucking ever do anything in the story ever die
.

As far as bad, derivative, ten dollar video games go, this sure was bad, derivative and ten dollars. But to give them credit, it takes an awful lot of effort to make time travel stories unappealing and boring.

But also the shooting was okay.
 

Stallion Free

Cock Encumbered
Kritz said:
Usually I don't care much for derivation in games, especially not the games I pay ten dollars for, but all throughout Singularity I felt that I could instead be playing two other, better games. Namely Half Life 2 or Bioshock.
Wait, so the cheaper a game is, the less tolerant you become of how derivative it may be?
 

chixdiggit

Member
Just finished this last night. Was a fun ride but the game could have used a lot of tweaking. I upgraded the assault rifle and minigun and it made them way overpowered. I would purposely avoid picking them up at times just to make the game a bit more challenging. I also never came close to running out of health packs or ammo.

it was a pretty fun 5 hour game though. Not bad for the $10 I paid off Steam.
 

Kritz

Banned
Stallion Free said:
Idk, I tend to be a lot more forgiving the less I pay.

I paid one hundred and twenty dollars for Fable III.

Also, while a double negative may or may not have implied otherwise, what I intended to say was "y'all this game is ten dollars so I don't give a fuck".
 

Stallion Free

Cock Encumbered
Kritz said:
I paid one hundred and twenty dollars for Fable III.

Also, while a double negative may or may not have implied otherwise, what I intended to say was "y'all this game is ten dollars so I don't give a fuck".
Ahh that makes more sense now.
 
Pretty nice little game, a classic B-grade bargain pickup, exactly how the last Wolfenstein felt. Every one in a while it's nice to just cruise on through a tightly scripted linear FPS campaign, it was a fun ride. I kind of feel bad not giving such a competent, fundamentally solid game day-one money, but y'know, I'm not Rockefeller.
 

soultron

Banned
Finished it today. Trying to keep track of everything (and altering time + consequences) made my head hurt a little bit.

All in all though, it came together nicely in the last few hours. I really enjoyed the latter half of the game since, only then, it used all of its unique mechanics really well. The first half was a boring by-the-numbers shooter.

More games need to try to copy Deadlock. That was probably my favourite ability in the game.

If you've been on the fence about it, it can be had for 10-20. I'd say it's very much worth it at that price. A must for "Pre-Collapse Soviet Union" buffs.
 

gdt

Member
Played 6 hours straight today, just finished it (Steam count says 8 total).

Really enjoyed this game, the story was great, and the gunplay was excellent. The Deadlock ability is so satisfying to use, I would wreak havoc on a room of baddies before they shot a single bullet. SO. GOOD.

This gets a very solid 8.5 from me. Some balancing issues at the end, in addition to a general feeling of...familiar territory (think Half Life 2 + Bioshock) set it back a bit.
 
I've been playing this and it's an alright game, but good lord the fov is so low. I literally need to stop playing because my head hurts. This game has something against sight, seeing as how there are no subtitles either.

I'm trying to stomach it because, again, it's an alright game; kinda like Bioshock meets Resistance. This is one of the few games I've played that make me feel nauseous.
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
Linkzg said:
I've been playing this and it's an alright game, but good lord the fov is so low. I literally need to stop playing because my head hurts. This game has something against sight, seeing as how there are no subtitles either.

I'm trying to stomach it because, again, it's an alright game; kinda like Bioshock meets Resistance. This is one of the few games I've played that make me feel nauseous.
Perfect comparison. Bioshock + Resistance is really perfect. The carbine even feels right!
 
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