• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

The Last Guardian early copy impressions thread

A

Adryuu

Member
OK gaf, I just rented it before PSX (in fact I arrived home and started the stream while the Uncharted dlc video was already running).

Gonna start this as soon as I oven a pizza.

Could have bought it for 61 EUR but decided to rent it for now, as I had the option, because I don't work tomorrow and either tuesday or thursday so I can play without hurry and for cheap, and if I really like it I can always buy it later and play again.

I'm much more a Shadow of the Colossus guy than an Ico one, so my expectations are maybe lower than a lot of people's. And after the framerate talk and all that, I'm going in with care.

Also I'm pretty slow in ALL games, and no doubt it will take me more than anyone else yet, so don't rely on my time especially but I'll say if the game counts it (I played through TLoU for the first time in over 24 hours, maybe over 30).

I'll try and be objective. I wasn't going to buy this yet, but my FFXV had a problem and it's not here until at least monday or wednesday, and I got a chance to rent this so I jumped right in. I'm hyped anyway.

Btw I refused to watch today's trailer! I had the disc in front of me lol so I changed the chome tab until it ended.

I'll be back. As you see I seem to have difficulty getting away from the keyboard. Hope it doesn't change later!

Also disclaimer: I have a dog and I love him more than most people. lol
 
Y

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
H6Mc7x9.jpg
Click to expand...

GOT IT
 
S

Servbot24

Banned
Kieli said:
Framerate drops are completely unacceptable, regardless of how you may personally feel about them. If you're delivering a technical product, make sure if delivers a smooth 30 fps. Make some compromises if necessary. Ugh.
Click to expand...

I accept them. Hell, I welcome them if it helps to weed out the people who aren't in this for the beauty of game design.
 
H

HStallion

Now what's the next step in your master plan?
I hope Y2Kev apologized profusely to his copy of TLG. I mean on his knee's, face down on the floor prostrating himself for how wrong he was.
 
S

sarcoa

Member
Pretty tight embargo till Monday (and I wouldn't want to reveal details anyway) but here are two interesting/non-spoilerly things:

Trophies all popped in succession at the end of the game. I have no idea what they are, or what they were for (trophies are not always available before a game's release), but they appear to be unloaded only when it's over.

And this is probably obvious but pay attention and watch TLG through its credit roll.
 
M

More_Badass

Member
sarcoa said:
Pretty tight embargo till Monday (and I wouldn't want to reveal details anyway) but here are two interesting/non-spoilerly things:

Trophies all popped in succession at the end of the game. I have no idea what they are, or what they were for (trophies are not always available before a game's release), but they appear to be unloaded only when it's over.

And this is probably obvious but pay attention and watch TLG through its credit roll.
Click to expand...
How many hours for you?
 
C

Council Pop

Member
Omnistalgic said:
Why is it so hard for people to accept some gamers don't mind frame drops or controls that don't feel as responsive as Dante in DMC?

- people still watch DVD's
- people still play SNES Games
- people still stream low quality shows over the net
- people watch entire series on YouTube

Some of the post in here sound straight out of DF, and when people are saying "I don't care about that at all" it's being dismissed as blind Ueda love. Man get outta here with that crap. I play stuff like SFV and MGS:R on hardest difficulty, you adjust, period. frame drops or animation heavy controls are just not a big deal to a lot of gamers. Get over yourselves...

Next comment "we aren't allowed to critique anymore, only posters gushing over TLG allowed"
Click to expand...

I wholeheartedly agree with this.

I actually wish we could have separate threads to discuss tech elements and gameplay elements of games. I basically only ever want to read what people think about game design, game play, narrative, how a game makes them feel etc, but threads tend to get bogged down in discussions about frame rate, resolution, HDR and so on.

Not saying there's anything wrong with discussing those things, just they tend to stifle discussion about the actual content, just because talking about tech stuff is so fact based and therefore easier to argue about/quickly respond to other posters.
 
B

Big Green Anus

Member
How long is Shadow of the Colossus? My Plus membership ends in three days and I'm want to beat this for the first time before getting Last Guardian. Shadow is unique so far, but I'm very early so far.
 
J

Jetku

Member
For those looking, I saw some copies at target tonight. They had them in a "stocking" cart. I was able to pick one up and look at the box. If I was going to get the game, I would have been super stoked at finding it early.
 
J

jacksepticeye

Member
Council Pop said:
I wholeheartedly agree with this.

I actually wish we could have separate threads to discuss tech elements and gameplay elements of games. I basically only ever want to read what people think about game design, game play, narrative, how a game makes them feel etc, but threads tend to get bogged down in discussions about frame rate, resolution, HDR and so on.

Not saying there's anything wrong with discussing those things, just they tend to stifle discussion about the actual content, just because talking about tech stuff is so fact based and therefore easier to argue about/quickly respond to other posters.
Click to expand...

People are just fixated on the tech right now because they're actually getting to hear about it for the first time from the general public playerbase. Most other things have been talked about before from previews or trailers and will wait for the OT to dive deep into discussion on.
That and people either can't or don't want to talk about the feeling yet due to embargo or spoilers
 
J

Jugendstil

Member
Council Pop said:
I wholeheartedly agree with this.

I actually wish we could have separate threads to discuss tech elements and gameplay elements of games. I basically only ever want to read what people think about game design, game play, narrative, how a game makes them feel etc, but threads tend to get bogged down in discussions about frame rate, resolution, HDR and so on.

Not saying there's anything wrong with discussing those things, just they tend to stifle discussion about the actual content, just because talking about tech stuff is so fact based and therefore easier to argue about/quickly respond to other posters.
Click to expand...

I agree. I don't mind discussion of it from people playing the game, but people who come into a thread about early impressions of a game just to share the fact they hate framerate issues in general or expect every game to be 60fps... no one cares. I want to hear about the game from people playing, not some rando's drive by outrage about the state of fps in new releases in this console generation. That being said, I need more TLG impressions!
 
C

Council Pop

Member
jacksepticeye said:
People are just fixated on the tech right now because they're actually getting to hear about it for the first time from the general public playerbase. Most other things have been talked about before from previews or trailers and will wait for the OT to dive deep into discussion on.
That and people either can't or don't want to talk about the feeling yet due to embargo or spoilers
Click to expand...

Talking about the content of a game doesn't have to spoiler anything though. Like if you read basically any film reviews or film criticism they will hardly ever mention the technical aspects of making a film. They talk about content.
 
C

ChrisD

Member
I bought it myself because it was really expensive + I wanted to play earlier, but I had to go with Standard Shipping, so I'm looking at the 12th or 13th! It kind of sucks haha.

Trying not to get too excited. Not gonna' lie, I didn't like Ico much (three years ago). This, though, has the animal aspect. Something I know will absolutely destroy me... but I have to play it. Also the legacy thing, I also really want to play just for that reason.
 
S

sarcoa

Member
Drewfonse said:
Yeah....I'm going to need more non tech related impressions.

Stat.
Click to expand...
I literally have a shrine to PlatinumGames in my basement and I found no part of The Last Guardian's technical performance distracting. Frame rate sensitivity varies, but I don't recall any of the gameplay-affecting chugs that were present in Colossus.
 
J

jacksepticeye

Member
Council Pop said:
Talking about the content of a game doesn't have to spoiler anything though. Like if you read basically any film reviews or film criticism they will hardly ever mention the technical aspects of making a film. They talk about content.
Click to expand...

Of course, I'm not saying that either. I just think people are either not allowed say anything yet or some don't want to until everyone else has a chance to play it. There could be a number of reasons but people didn't know about final product performance until just this weekend hence the influx of talk on it :)
It'll change once the OT is done
 
Fbh

Fbh

Member
Have been waiting for this a long time.... seriously long. Was even considering picking up one of the special editions because of it

But I've yet to finish FFXV (and have quite a bit left) and after reading the comments about terrible framerate on OG Ps4 I think I will give this a pass for now.

Ps2 was a different time and a different me. I can accept games with some framerate dips here and there, but this thread is making them sound severe and frequent and I'm done paying full price for games with shit like this. I mean shit, people on this thread are saying it's worse than the swamps in The Witcher 3 pre patch, and that was dangerously close to what I personally consider unplayable.
Specially regarding the Ps4 pro, I think the only thing I can do is vote with my wallet and let Sony know that I'm ok with the Pro getting better versions of games as long as the OG Ps4 version still reaches certain standards.

To be clear, I'm not saying the people enjoying this and the ones that can look past framerate issues are wrong. Just saying that to me it's a big deal.
 
A

Adryuu

Member
Ok for anyone interested. I've played for almost 4 hours. OG PS4 (not even slim). Key points:

- I love Trico. Genuinely even if he's a bit stubborn and probably smells, being that big, and moistured.
- Trico has had several puppy-like cute moments.
- Music appears and dissappears quite seamlessly, mostly it isn't there, but when it is it's very nice and film-like. Not Otani but very nice.
- The boy. Oh boy the boy. At first it was automatically worse than Wander because of being just a child but this cute little rascal has A LOT of personality, due to him being animated like only the gods can do, in every and each action he does.
- The game is pretty much Ico in another setting, with another story, etc. That means linear, mostly just puzzles, same base idea, similar execution, similar fortress-like place... but it feels easier. And more frustrating. Because of Trico not doing what I want, even when the game told me he should understand more things. I guess that's a matter of getting used to it and point the camera in the right place, I seem to be improving on giving him orders. Other times it may be me wanting to do something that I'm not supposed to do.
- A lot of indoors/outdoors/indoors/outdoors, always nice environments.
- Quite some ugly textures when zoomed, but it's not a problem, specially when you grasp the scale of the whole thing, which is barbaric, in the same way Ico was for ps1, with not a single loading screen.
- I've died. Several times. Mostly (always?) because I fell to my death.
- Easier than Ico I said: because so far the puzzles are more evident and less about tricky timed jumps or involve less thinking over various items, I repeat: for now (bit less than 4h).
- I feel like I'm still quite at the beginning.
- The game's annoying reminding me what the hell some buttons do repeated times over and over, with a quite big message.
- Frames do indeed drop. My theory: grass is the frame killer. It's got pretty bad in some spots, but the most I had to do in those was to make a pair of jumps and get to other place with better framerate. Mostly solid 30 everywhere else, some little stutter here and there for half a second, some other zones with prolongued 25-27 fps (the really bad zones must be like 20 or a bit less when real bad - whatever, I don't have a way to measure it but it's very noticeable). Never hurt the gameplay but I definitely noticed some input lag due to that in some places, which only really hurt my experience of moving the camera around.
- Ah, the camera is a bitch.

I regret a bit having rented it instead of buying it... because I see I could just fuck around for a lot of time. But I don't really know how much progress I've made and all that. Anyway I don't think it's very replayable, unless there's things later or after finishing once.

The story beats so far have been almost none. But there's a story there waiting to explode (I think... maybe not). There's more narrative than in previous games at this stage that feels like very early in the game still (or so I think). Still have to see things and decide if this time the story is more fleshed out or it's just... narrative... in a new approach. It's not even remotely bad. It's just less silent.

Some more things:
- The scenery is really nice. Beautiful game. Technically it's what you can see in trailers/gameplay, what you can reallistically expect. Beautiful.
- As a puzzle/adventure game, it can get tiring to some people. I'm eager to continue tomorrow and maybe do more than 4 hours at once.
- The game has a way of hinting you what to do. Sometimes it makes it obvious, other times very subtle. I imagine it would get totally subtle, if any, moving forward.
- I've recognized some little fellas from SotC. ^___^
- Climbing Trico can get awkward because of controls and strange poses like climbing up head down. Some clipping, etc, type glitches.

Was going to comment on something else but I forgot. Anyway ask away if you want. Will answer tomorrow lol. Just don't ask spoilery things, won't answer.

I've made some pngs from my base ps4, can post some (tomorrow) if you want.
 
C

ChrisD

Member
Just wanna' add that I appreciate all the tech speak. Movies aren't a fair comparison; we don't play movies. Performance changes a lot in games! Entire experiences in some people's cases.

....Just don't let the OT turn into nothing but tech talk like how the N3DS thread turned into TN vs IPS. :p
 
B

bigmac996

Member
For the record, after playing it for a total of about 6 hours now, the framerate isn't as solid as I thought. It doesn't bother me very much, but there were a couple outdoor instances where it tanked pretty bad. Doesn't affect my enjoyment of the game, but it's disappointing it's like this.

On Pro by the way. It's mostly fine, but there are definitely dips.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Dragon Age: The Veilguard impression video: Full-blown God of War action meets Guardians of the Galaxy story tone
Opinion 2
81
5K
Dr.Morris79 replied
  • Poll
The Last Guardian and the Tests of Patienceヾ(#｀0´)ﾉ
Opinion Poll LTTP 2
76
4K
GenericUser replied
Recommend me some casual puzzle/card deck games for my mother (on PC)
7
329
Syphon Filter replied
CLICKOLDING | click click click click click "Very good. First time clicking in front of someone?"
7
844
DryvBy replied
LTTP: The Last Guardian, just a boy and his bird/dog/rat/cat/dragon/duck/monster friend
2
53
3K
rofif replied
Top Bottom