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The Order: 1886 |OT| Gears of Yore

So on my second playthrough I discovered I could tilt the left stick up while in cover to get a better view of the enemy without getting my head blown off. Ah, needed that.
 
So the "fight through the ambush" part in Chapter III, that shit is a clown closet of respawning AI,where am I supposed to go?

heh, that bit.

Just keep fighting the spammy waves of regular Joes/shotgunners/grenadiers/snipers until it's over. I had to drop the difficulty there because I was sure I was missing a 'walk-to' trigger point, but no, it was fight to the end.

Wait till you see the room all those guys were dropping from on the left-side :D
 
Really, is that why it looks so good? You are telling me to not get used to this? I thought this was real next gen and everyone else is just playing catch up. :(

Well Yeah because they were developing a brand new engine from the ground up while making the game. That takes a huge investment of time. Now that it's done the sequel would afford them the opportunity to focus on integrating the gameplay more.
 

JNT

Member
Overall I enjoyed the game. Solid shooting mechanics and entertaining story. What I didn't enjoy was how otherwise fun gameplay was broken up too frequently by cutscenes. The game was also a bit too linear in terms of traversal. I would have enjoyed alternate routes, maps that promote exploration, as well as combat areas and AI that force the player to move around more. Still, the reviews so far have been baffling. Far worse games have scored better, but to each their own I guess.

The ending sequence where you get an overview of city got me thinking how awesome this game would have been if it had some free roaming aspects. Walking around in a gas-lit Victorian London fighting werewolves in cramped alleyways would have been amazing.

Definitely hoping for a sequel that doesn't restrict the player as much as the original does.
 
The gameplay falls far short of something like Uncharted 1&2, but the story is somewhat interesting and the world so lusciously rendered, I just wanna walk through every area at a snails pace and soak in the extraordinary detail. Thus far, I'd say my experience has been decent.
 

Cth

Member
Finished the game as well last night.. took a little longer than expected but I'm glad I rented it.

POSITIVES
- Atmosphere (fairly immersive aside from some bugs/design choices, interesting alt-history setting makes for fun twists on familiar events/settings, etc)

- Set design (the levels themselves are gorgeous, sometimes to the point where the characters models fail and look out of place, some questionable choices on layouts/variety given how people have complained about hallway shooters in the past)

- Characters (While borrowing from King Arthur mythos and others can be viewed as lazy, it's a quick way to lend gravitas and familiarize the audience without a lot of exposition) I liked that characters aren't infallible and make mistakes instead of Mary Sue'ing everyone.

NEGATIVES
- Gameplay (It felt like a chore to get through some segments as there's simply not enough variety, add in the constant QTEs and limiting the player's input was frustrating (someone mentioned not being able to run earlier in the thread -- I agree, while immersive it was noticable, as was not being able to use certain weapons, etc)

- Variety (the boss fights as mentioned already)

- Over reliance on motion capture. This is one of my biggest pet peeves by developers. It's costly, and makes things look great, but they always throw me out of immersion because I'm constantly aware that it wasn't manually done. Maybe this comes from having had to manually animate models and having an awareness of the process involved but it seems lazy to me. I see many people credit this as "great graphics" when all I can see is the hard work having been done by actors.

MISC

- It was nice to be able to play without installing, but my first thought was, what needs to be installed if the first couple of scenes are cutscenes (which took me out of things a bit)

- Too many loose ends as someone already mentioned (feels like they ran out of time or were aiming for a DLC ending -- especially with the abrupt tease during the credits)

- Kudos to the team for addressing proactively player complaints in game (Galahad tells everyone not to kill and then systematically goes on a genocide and is called out for it; Characters complaining about city design and dead ends, etc)

- I liked the theory about Galahad
being a vampire
based on the
no reflection thing (an odd choice given all the attention to detail elsewhere graphics wise). Honestly I thought that from the get go with the whole blood vial that heals thing and werewolf feud thing. So, it was surprising to see the vampires being the bad guys in a way.

- Was anyone else reminded of the Empire/Deathstar during the Knights of the Roundtable meetings?

- What was the deal with the
cloaked man
again? I forgot.

EDIT:
Liam Neeson for Galahad and Emily Blunt for Isi, amirite? :D
 
That's the game's biggest problem really, there's nothing really remarkable about it outside of the visuals. Everything is either well done or serviceable. My biggest complaint really ended up being just how little there is for you to do when you're not shooting at guys. The game could have done a lot better for itself if they gave you more to do when you were walking around its environments. It almost felt like an adventure game during those parts, but they didn't go far enough with it. It felt a bit like a super stripped down Heavy Rain during the non shooting parts. The game would have been a lot more interesting if they leaned into that more...

or less...

the game's biggest flaw is in it's attempt to fuse quantic dream gameplay to uncharted gameplay. all it results in is watered-down versions of both (sooo much 'press 'x' repeatedly'), & awkward, all-over-the-place pacing...

the order's much too ambitious for its own good. if they're gonna do a sequel, rad needs to either greatly improve on the both the interactive-adventure & combat gameplay, or just ditch one for the other. it's obvious what they were attempting to do here, but also obvious they had neither the time or the manpower to pull it off really well...

that said, it's not nearly as awful a game as all that. unfortunately, it's not a whole lotta fun, either. glimpses of what it could've been abound, which tend to make what it actually is all the sadder...
 

hohoXD123

Member
Chapter 8 now, still really enjoying it. Can't say I have a problem with the gameplay, it doesn't offer anything revolutionary but that shouldn't be expected for every game out there, the guns are fun to play with at least. World building is pretty great, especially with the newspapers, and story is decent. The acting is awesome, although some of the character interactions seem off, particularly with
the rebel leader in the bar scene
. Aside from the camera being way too close, I've also found the different levels to feel too similar, with the slight exception of the airship, hope that garden we saw in the concept art is still in, looked amazing.
 

slade

Member
Finished the game today. Overall, I enjoyed it and had fun but this is a game that would have been on my GOTY list ten years ago. These days I don't think I could overlook some of the more questionable aspects of it such as the QTE's. I would have been more lenient of them back around the time RE4 came around but that was a long time and billions of games, which aped the feature, ago. Ditto for how every single non QTE lycan fight played out. It was always in the same exact room with the same exact furniture placements and the same exact behavior from the lycans.

The game deserves the scores it got but there is potential there. RAD need to explore how to do storytelling in games without the whole filmic approach. It is nice and all but if I'm going to be watching a movie, don't throw a QTE in there to ruin my enjoyment. Get a bit more game in your videogame if there is a sequel.

Edit: Forgot to mention but this is the first game in a long while where the character you start out with is the same one you get at the end. I talk in terms of gameplay of course. There were no character enhancements aside from the blackwater and you can't upgrade its efficacy either. Not sure how I feel about that yet. Going from Saints Row 4 to this was a change of pace and not just because I kept pressing O to change weapons.
 

Jito

Banned
I really think they should have gone all out with the QTEs, they feel random and lazy as they are now just popping up at "intense" moments throughout the game. Might as well go all out and make it like Heavy Rain, I wouldn't have minded so much of the game being taken out of my control if I was vaguely controlling Galahad and his actions. Why not throw in some pointless dialogue trees as well that have no repercussions (like Walking Dead/GoT).
 

Animator

Member
- Over reliance on motion capture. This is one of my biggest pet peeves by developers. It's costly, and makes things look great, but they always throw me out of immersion because I'm constantly aware that it wasn't manually done. Maybe this comes from having had to manually animate models and having an awareness of the process involved but it seems lazy to me. I see many people credit this as "great graphics" when all I can see is the hard work having been done by actors.

You have no idea what you are talking about.

I got news for you, mocap is a very manual process. First of all there is no point in animating humans. This is not a stylized game. If they were to manually animate the body mechanics in all the cutscenes this game would have come out two decades from now and cost quadruple more. Mocap is not "costly" compared to traditional animation and has it's place. Second you never just record the actor and drop it straight into the game and call it a day. Mocap always looks wrong when dropped on a cg model and requires an animator to go in and finesse. I have worked with cutting edge mocap tech on movies like Rise of the Apes , Avatar etc and trust me even that is not a plug and play solution, you don't see it in the making of videos because those are always made to promote "look guys actors did all the work" but it is a shitton of work by artists to make it look good.

Not to mention the faces are almost always heavily hand animated. (fun fact: all facial animation in Uncharted 2 cutscenes were hand animated at Technicolor. They never got mentioned or got props. I know because I have a coworker who worked on that)
 

bombshell

Member
Finished my first playthrough just now, on hard. I'll for sure be there day 1 again when, hopefully, a sequel is out.

Story question: Who was
the hooded guy together with Tesla when Galahad was recovering?

There was a couple of times where I quit and used chapter select to restart a section because I knew I had missed a collectible thanks to a sudden triggered cutscene.

In the end I hadn't missed any, so a platinum for me in one playthrough without a guide :D

Q9f8ZpV.jpg
 

Lnkn52

Member
I've really enjoyed the game. Like everyone have said, the lycan battles were lackluster but the
elder
fight was one that could have been implemented more to make them dynamic.

I hope there will be some announcements of DLC or patches to make me not trade the game right now. But overall I think RAD deserves a pat on the back, they've really hit the nail on the gaming cinematic experience.
 

JohngPR

Member
or less...

the game's biggest flaw is in it's attempt to fuse quantic dream gameplay to uncharted gameplay. all it results in is watered-down versions of both (sooo much 'press 'x' repeatedly'), & awkward, all-over-the-place pacing...

the order's much too ambitious for its own good. if they're gonna do a sequel, rad needs to either greatly improve on the both the interactive-adventure & combat gameplay, or just ditch one for the other. it's obvious what they were attempting to do here, but also obvious they had neither the time or the manpower to pull it off really well...

that said, it's not nearly as awful a game as all that. unfortunately, it's not a whole lotta fun, either. glimpses of what it could've been abound, which tend to make what it actually is all the sadder...

Good points. My outlook is, if you are going to attempt that go all the way. The half measure they took resulted in it feeling watered down like you said. I don't think there should be more of it or anything, they should have refined what they had there further.
 

Jito

Banned
Just finished it.

Galahad is Batman.

It actually blows my mind anyone creating a game/TV show/movie these days bothers to use the "where is she?!" line after Batman. It just makes me laugh and think of Bale Batman going apeshit, whilst completely ruining the moment for Galahad.
 
Good points. My outlook is, if you are going to attempt that go all the way. The half measure they took resulted in it feeling watered down like you said. I don't think there should be more of it or anything, they should have refined what they had there further.

my fear is that asking rad to refine both the interactive & combat gameplay might be asking too much. i think it could potentially be done, & done effectively, but it's a lot to ask of a relatively small developer...

if they actually could pull it off, i think it'd make for a genuinely interesting, fun game. but so could them simply focusing on one or the other, which i think would have to be a somewhat easier to deal with option...
 

d00d3n

Member
I posted these impressions in the review thread:
As someone who rarely watches movies these days, and someone who usually has no patience with press button to win cinematic games, I am surprised how much I liked The Order in the end. A poster in the OT said that hardcore third-person shooter fans expecting an experience like Uncharted or Gears of War will probably be disappointed, while people expecting a cinematic experience like Beyond or Heavy Rain will probably get more out of the game. I tend to agree with that, but in my opinion the game has a broader appeal than those cinematic games.

The third-person shooter gameplay loop is very simplistic compared with other games in the genre due to restricted weapon choices, low enemy variety and level design emphasizing "shooting galleries" over "mini arenas". However, as a means to engage the player in a cinematic experience, the gameplay loop seems successful at doing just this. The game strikes a middle ground between third-person shooters and cinematic games, although heavily tilted towards the latter. If Beyond or Heavy Rain didn't engage you, The Order very well may.

The quality of the cinematic presentation is unlike anything I have seen before in a game. It is something about how the game obviously breaks new ground in real-time graphics and how this technical edge is used to showcase a visually striking and cohesive setting. Meanwhile, the main cast of characters is designed and voice acted distinctively and beautifully. The "plot" has some issues, especially when it is obviously cut short in the end, but the presentation, the characters and the setting keep you interested in the game.

From what I can see, the professional reviews have judged the game too harshly. It does not get credit as a cinematic game because the plot is too conventional and it does not get credit as a third-person shooter because the gameplay is too simplistic. However, a cinematic game does not need to have a complex plot to be a memorable experience. The Order does not have a plot of the same quality as say The Walking Dead (to name a cinematic game that was widely praised in professional reviews), but it was a better cinematic experience for me due to the superior cinematic presentation and the use of third person shooting gameplay to keep me engaged. It seems like the game may be a victim of an assembly line review process where a cinematic game with a conventional plot is discarded as "dysfunctional".

Personally, I can see The Order ending up on my GOTY list this year. I highly recommend it.
 

Apt101

Member
Just finished chapter 3, heading into chapter 4... this is a good game. If it gets even better, as I am led to believe, I can understand why so many people are finding issue with the poorly-scored reviews. And man, I've written before, but damn this game looks good.
 
Finished it a few hours ago. Had a really good time with it although it has quite a few shortcomings.

Pro:
- Graphics are insane
- Amazing soundtrack
- Great voice acting
- The world is interesting
- Gunplay feels satisfying

Con:
- Too short
- Way too linear
- The ending was pretty meh
- Fights against the lycans were underwhelming

Looking forward to the sequel.
 

Ramza

Banned
Just finished the game. I rather enjoyed it. Great shooting mechanics, good variety of weapons. Damn beautiful, too. Can't wait to see what RAD does with the sequel.
 

Marvel

could never
It actually blows my mind anyone creating a game/TV show/movie these days bothers to use the "where is she?!" line after Batman. It just makes me laugh and think of Bale Batman going apeshit, whilst completely ruining the moment for Galahad.

Yeah that was unintentionally hilarious to me also.

Just kept seeing Batman lol.
 

ike_

Member
The sound from that duelist pistol!

Finished it yesterday and really enjoyed it. Not being able to skip cutscenes (even the longer ones with no user interaction) is going to kill replayability for me, but I'll be there day 1 for DLC or a sequel.
 

hydruxo

Member
It actually blows my mind anyone creating a game/TV show/movie these days bothers to use the "where is she?!" line after Batman. It just makes me laugh and think of Bale Batman going apeshit, whilst completely ruining the moment for Galahad.

I thought it was hilarious because it reminded me instantly of Bale haha. Galahad gives off a Batman vibe anyways so I'm cool with it.
 

antitrop

Member
So the "fight through the ambush" part in Chapter III, that shit is a clown closet of respawning AI,where am I supposed to go?

It's a fun section, but I wish they would just tell you in the Mission Objective that you have to kill enemies until they stop coming.

It's not hard to just assume it's like Call of Duty, where enemies will spawn forever until you cross a magical line.
 
Yeah, during the first playthrough after getting taken down a few times on those enemy spawn sections, I tried running forward thinking there was some objective I needed to get to for the waves to stop... Nope
 

bombshell

Member
It's a fun section, but I wish they would just tell you in the Mission Objective that you have to kill enemies until they stop coming.

It's not hard to just assume it's like Call of Duty, where enemies will spawn forever until you cross a magical line.

Yeah, if I remember correctly the objective was actually "Fight through the ambush" or something close to it, so it could definitely sound like you had to progress before the enemies would stop spawning.
 

Footos22

Member
It's a fun section, but I wish they would just tell you in the Mission Objective that you have to kill enemies until they stop coming.

It's not hard to just assume it's like Call of Duty, where enemies will spawn forever until you cross a magical line.

I've not once felt like there is an Infinite supply of enemies like the cod of old. Prob having too much fun to notice tbh.
 

Paganmoon

Member
So just finished this up, and honestly, the only thing I didn't like was the story from chapter 9 and onward. Gunplay was great, the stealth section was good and so on. But the story, oh god... it started out so good though.

75 on the metacritic scale for me.
 

antitrop

Member
I've not once felt like there is an Infinite supply of enemies like the cod of old. Prob having too much fun to notice tbh.

As the other poster mentioned, the MO makes it look like you just have to run across the street. "Fight through the ambush" is pretty direct, but not quite exactly what you have to do. More like "Defend against the ambush".
 
I cleared up all the combat trophies today.

Now, I just to need to play through and find the documents and what not I missed. Game would definitely benefit from some sort of indicator in the chapter select menu!
 

Ricker

Member
Yeah, there were a non issue for me as well. I just sniped everyone with the
crossbow
as soon as they were on their own (no one else around). I was really struck by all the lanterns in the garden grounds... incredible lighting.

I was dumb and didnt think of using the crossbow in the first section lol...I thought I couldnt use it,that it would fail the mission,so I got caught a bunch of times but finally made it...then in the next section,I thought wait,there is a trophy for killing at least once with any weapon and this is probably the only time I will get the chance,so I killed one guy with it lol...

Just like the collectables,I am sure I missed one the first time you have a ''follow'' someone objective,which was Isi and I just dashed following her thinking it would fail if she got too far...

I hope this sells well enough that we get a sequel,that last scene at the very end had me hoping to keep playing,how fun would it be if they did little open world type gameplay,not a full fledge open world,just a little more exploration in the streets.
 

Stevey

Member
None of that matters if the native TV res is 1920x800. If it is (and it should hopefully be), then the game would be scaled down by default, and then when you zoom it in, it would be natively mapped with 1:1 pixels and black bars cropped. Same would go with watching any 2.4:1 bluray movie, as they too are encoded with black bars.
.

There's no such thing as a 1920x800 TV, they don't exist
 
We went from Killzone>InFamous>DriveClub and now the Order.

All different types of games too all look fantastic.

Yeah these studios have nailed the visuals so far. I think all of them also had to deal with creating a new gen game and dealing with time constraints, hopefully for each of their next titles they can focus on improving content and gameplay now that the engines are up and running
 

EGM1966

Member
=Story question: Who was
the hooded guy together with Tesla when Galahad was recovering?
My current guess is
King Arthur
and that he'll feature more fully in the follow up (assuming there is one and I think there will be).

Might as well throw in my final summary thoughts too since others are clearly done and doing so:

Good

Visuals and world creation - really excellent all round and I loved the escape boats on the airship.

Characters and voice acting - the animation and little facial movements are terrific and really deliver performances aided by uniformly strong voice work (although Galahad does come across a little too gravely on occasion).

Shooting mechanics - really solid and one of the best TPS in terms of sound, feedback and general ooomph to the shooting

Overall story - while it has problems in the detail I'll come to the core "plot" as it were I thought was pretty solid. Knights of the Round Table, Mythic Creatures and an advanced London of 1886 thanks to Telsa and others makes for a pretty good foundation when mixed with intrigue, mysterious goings on and a mounting sense of escalation.

Mixed

Level design and gameplay execution. While the gunplay rock solid the actual execution and level design is sadly mostly pedestrian for the most part with the odd highlight. RaD really need to come up with more compelling encounters going forward IMHO.

Plot execution. While the world building and foundation is superb again the execution feels garbled and the results are mixed. Going by what's revealed in The Order alone a number of characters do not seem to behave consistently given what we know by the end and the plot exposition is murky at best. Mysteries and plot threads for sequels are one thing but no clear sense of purpose for the main characters or clarity as to who's doing what and why isn't good at all. At times it feels very The Phantom Menace and you wonder why the bad guys are even doing what they're doing and why the good guys are doing what they're doing and whether the bad guys even are the bad guys. RaD really need to tighten this up too for any sequels. They also allow to many core characters to waver in and out of the narrative with uneven pacing.

Lack of use of traversal and platforming. The game clearly supports decent traversal and platforming, climbing, etc. and really doesn't do much with it at all. A few nice moments but overall again this area felt underexploited and could really have mixed up the gameplay better.

Bad

Lycan encounters - really dull and wasted opportunity all round. They've got to rework this from the ground up going forward IMHO. What should be tense, dangerous encounters with fast, nimble and deadly foes are clumsy exercises in potentially waiting for your moment to get in a bit of damage leading to easy victory every time unless you get impatient and bork an opening.

QTEs and in general most non-TPS gameplay. Overall I didn't feel any of these worked that well or even added to the game with the possible exception of the slowdown pick a choice moments. They also used QTEs for stuff that didn't even need a QTE.

The opening mission. I really feel RaD hurt the game with a weak design for the first mission that I'm sure soured many reviewers and players with a poor early impression. Unnecessary QTEs all over the place and constant funneling of the player when they could clearly have had an interesting and tense escape that leveraged traversal, unarmed melee combat and stealth combat (which on the evidence of this game I'd say the franchise desperately needs added) and delivered a really engrossing opening that would have paved the way to then flash back to the slower opening that gently reveals the world of the game. I gueninely came out of the first mission thinking I could have used the available mechanics better than RaD did.

Inconsistent availability of options. I find this a real killer and I'm sure it also added to much of the negative criticism. The game way too often decides to limit the player agency in terms of mechanics they know should be available. You can run here but not here. You can shoot here but not here. You can stealth here but not here. You can climb here but not here. I really hurts the game and IMHO is unecessary. The same plot and levels could easily accomodate always allowing the player all their options. Take a moment when you creep up on an enemy and the game insists its a QTE. That's just wrong. I've crept up on them using all my available mechanics. Let me decide whether to creep up and take them out or just shoot them. If you want have the game then respond differently (maybe being stealthy gains me an advantage and being noisy brings in a few more foes) but don't use a QTE where there clearly shouldn't be one.

Overall: enjoyable and a first entry that holds promise. But narrative and gameplay execution needs sharpening up and the QTEs need to go this franchise doesn't need them it has terrifically smooth controls (best 30fps combat I've played in a while) and solid traversal. RaD please leave the QTEs to games better suited to it and focus on pure player agency interaction as your engine supports it wonderfully and its so much more immersive in the terrific world of Victorian London created.
 

Intrigue

Banned
So I finished this game last night ( 12-13h in total to get my platinum ) I was playing hard mode with no aim assist.

Best way to describe the game is Heavy Rain mixxed with Uncharted/Gears of war but without loading times. If you expect one or the other you will probably not enjoy as much.


+ Best graphical console game to date
+ Voice acting is superb
+ The music was very, very satisfying ( i kept thinking penny dreadful )
+ gunplay nothing new, nothing revolutionary, they stuck to what works in many other games (gears/uncharted)
+ Seamless gameplay, no loading times, unless you and then we talk a few seconds
+ Story kept me intrigued ( no pun intended ), not a master piece, but I kept asking myself where does it go next and it has enough twists and turns, did not feel like there were a lot of "filler".


- stealth missions ( not many thankfully, but just not in my taste to sneak around stuff )
- lycan melee fights were, way too much like heavy rain, no control just response clicking
- no statistics/trophy menu, no real way to figure out what you missed for an achievement except memory
- Left very open ended ( no closure if no sequel comes around )


From someone that loves Heavy Rain for all its graphics/qte/cinematics combined with another top 10 game in my book Uncharted this game is close to as good as it gets.

Imho, best console exclusive game for this gen consoles so far.

Rating: 8/10 ( would buy again, and if a sequel is announced ill pre-order it for sure )


Wish I had pre-ordered collections edition.
 

Radec

Member
Count me in for the ones who didn't liked the stealth sections.

I hated it due to the added qte. Should have went with the normal melee kill. :/

- -

Are there any RaD dev active here at gaf after release?
 
My current guess is
King Arthur
and that he'll feature more fully in the follow up (assuming there is one and I think there will be).

What would give you that impression at all, and why would said person
be working against the Order, when the lot of them are blinded by power and centuries of obedience to the cause?
 
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