Too Human Demo up on XBLA

MechaSlinky wrote:

"You have found a pair of boots of 2% more bootiness! They're just like your old boots, but, you know... more booty."

I used to have some boots that gave a bonus to booty. My wife took them away after we got married.

so i have played through a second time now. i finally saw that they tell you there are multiple camera types which i didnt know about before which did annoy me when fighting. So i changed the camera to iso and it was a lot better for fighting as i could see more of the area in which i was fighting. i did wish there was co-op in this demo. Air combat took a bit getting used too but once I got a hang of it, I was using it everywhere. Graphics dont seem bad or good, just average. The lip syncing of the characters was a bit off but it didnt bother me as I enjoyed the gameplay to much to worry about that part of the game. Menus seemed as slow as the mass effect menus so not really a big deal, it seems to be organized enough that I would not get lost in it when it gets filled up with all the pick ups.

MechaSlinky wrote:

Wait, how did MGS enter the discussion? I'm totally lost.

People are trying to defend the character models and animations, I don't see how it's possible when comparing it to the work done in other games recently . . . . MGS being one of them.

While there did seem to be a little bit of lag with the menus, I am sooo glad that they break the items down by category instead of just giving you a ridiculously long list to sort through like Mass Effect where just because an item was lower on the list, it didn't necessarily mean that it was worse than those above it.

Overall I liked, just seems it needs more polish...

Spaz wrote:

* Why is there a button (right stick click) that serves as the "Michael Bay dramatic 360 pan around hero" button?

I kind of liked the Vanity View. If it was inspired by Michael Bay your character would explode at the end.

LobsterMobster wrote:

I kind of liked the Vanity View. If it was inspired by Michael Bay your character would explode at the end.

Followed by a one-liner from a token wacky black guy.

It's not perfect but I'm almost certain to pick this up when it gets released. Looks like it can serve as a fun time filler until the big releases this fall.

I too played the demo again to try out the trick that allows you to play as the other classes. I couldn't figure out how the guy in the video had the berserker and the commando unlocked, so I only had the additional choice of the commando and the defender because of the way the trick works. I don't care so much for the defender class concept so I gave the commando a whirl, and actually had quite a bit more fun the second time around. Maybe it's because I never really got the hang of the air combat, but playing as a character that was more focused on gunplay and positioning was a lot more appealing to me. I do wish that there was a way to try out the berserker though, as that's the other class with appeal to me. Maybe I'll try to dig around on the internet a bit and see what I can find out.

zeroKFE wrote:

I couldn't figure out how the guy in the video had the berserker and the commando unlocked, so I only had the additional choice of the commando and the defender because of the way the trick works.

Apparently the other two classes are unlocked if you disconnect your 360 from the net and set the year to 2010. I didn't try this out, but that what I saw in the comments on you tube.

The trick, for those of you who hadn't heard of it, is to hit the 'A' button repeatedly on your locked class and then to select it at the same time that you press the left stick towards an unlocked character. It sounds like a pretty basic race condition, I'm not sure how somebody found this out in one day.

Apparently the other two classes are unlocked if you disconnect your 360 from the net and set the year to 2010. I didn't try this out, but that what I saw in the comments on you tube.

Ah, that makes sense. I read something about disconnecting from the internet, but I guess I missed the 2010 thing. I'll have to try that this evening so that I can try the berserker and the bioengineer.

zeroKFE wrote:
Apparently the other two classes are unlocked if you disconnect your 360 from the net and set the year to 2010. I didn't try this out, but that what I saw in the comments on you tube.

Ah, that makes sense. I read something about disconnecting from the internet, but I guess I missed the 2010 thing. I'll have to try that this evening so that I can try the berserker and the bioengineer.

Actually, you dont' have to bump it up to 2010. 2009 will suffice, and apparently, eve August of 2008 will suffice for that. Defender and Bio Eng require the tappy 'A' button glitch.

With regards to the demo itself, my list of good and bad.

Good:
-Swords + Guns = Awesome
-Game looks pretty good, but I'm on an old SD set.
-Story seems full of win
-Characters are norse gods!
-That's all I got
-There is no number 6

Bad
-Controls feel clunky. Attacking could be smoother.
-Audio was pretty washed out, but again, that could be my setup.
-Camera wasn't horrible, but it wasn't fantastic either. It quite often got in the way.
-Skill Trees are not trees. It's like three branches.
-Sluggish Menus. Once I had the layout figured out, they were a pain to maneuver through.

My verdict is that I enjoy it a lot, I can get used to the controls, deal with the menus but I'm not dropping $50 or $60 bucks on this one. I'll wait till it gets nice and cheap then pick it up used.

Yep, the classes will be unlocked based on weekly schedule from now til the game release. Some people seem to like this but personally, I would like to have access to all classes from the word go... without tweaking my time setting, glitches or waiting patiently until next week.

zeroKFE wrote:

I too played the demo again to try out the trick that allows you to play as the other classes. I couldn't figure out how the guy in the video had the berserker and the commando unlocked, so I only had the additional choice of the commando and the defender because of the way the trick works. I don't care so much for the defender class concept so I gave the commando a whirl, and actually had quite a bit more fun the second time around. Maybe it's because I never really got the hang of the air combat, but playing as a character that was more focused on gunplay and positioning was a lot more appealing to me. I do wish that there was a way to try out the berserker though, as that's the other class with appeal to me. Maybe I'll try to dig around on the internet a bit and see what I can find out.

I also gave the gun guy a run, and found the game to be about 20% more fun, mostly because the gunplay doesn't revolve around jerky animations that the melee combat does. It does make the game really easy, though.

souldaddy wrote:
Danjo Olivaw wrote:

I feel bad for the goodjers that get something out of collecting boots of 2% more bootiness. It's like developers are abusing players' sense of accomplishment in order to make up for a mediocre game.

This observation, while technically correct, is only a surface level conclusion. It's like saying guitar playing is no different than plucking strings; even so, noise and music are not the same thing.

Expert players of the loot-gathering genre focus on the character as a whole. It's a lot like Magic the Gathering, you build a deck, not necessarily the individual cards. So the expert players build sets out of items that you would think are worthless when taken by themselves.

Your comment is a classic beginner conclusion : "2% more bootiness," (ie, boots that are slightly more power than what you already have, but otherwise homogeneous). Say you are given a choice between Sword A which does double damage on every other attack (150% damage overall) or Sword B which does triple fire damage on every 10th attack (130% damage overall). A beginner chooses Sword A, the advanced player takes Sword B casts double fire damage (160%), while the expert also casts fire weakness on his opponents (220%).

One weakness of the RPG genre is that you can play completely oblivious of this strategy, because through leveling you will eventually kill anything. You can play smart and beat a boss at level 25, or you can play dumb and beat him at level 40. Either way the game doesn't tell you. That's why some people play games like WoW with such passion and others never make it past level 30 and feel it's pointless.

I'm all for strategic specialization. It requires thought and isn't artificial, give me that! I just don't like that specialization is always coupled with the logarithmic-level-up system implemented to present a false sense of achievement. It's been done to death and it's artificial. If you took out the exp and make every enemy level 1-5, the game would play identically.

Give me lateral progression instead of the false vertical progression that's been the defacto since before I was born. It reeks of creative stagnance and a reliance upon jackpot-mechanics to cover up boring gameplay.

A large part of this rant doesn't deserve to be hurled exclusively at Too Human, but at just about every RGP-ish kind of game.

Your guitar player analogy doesn't hold because there the player is genuinely getting better at playing the guitar, and you know me better than to suggest I'm oblivious to the intricacies of a complex system. I enjoy working out a complex system to tweak it, break it, abuse it, or make it sing. The problem here, and elsewhere, is the system isn't complex.

Nei wrote:

Yep, the classes will be unlocked based on weekly schedule from now til the game release. Some people seem to like this but personally, I would like to have access to all classes from the word go... without tweaking my time setting, glitches or waiting patiently until next week.

As annoying as that is, I have to admit...it's a pretty good way of keeping the game in peoples minds until release day.

Danjo Olivaw wrote:

I also gave the gun guy a run, and found the game to be about 20% more fun, mostly because the gunplay doesn't revolve around jerky animations that the melee combat does. It does make the game really easy, though.

I don't know if things have changed over the time but the monsters that you fight now are simply designed to be a combo fuel... things should get a bit more complicated later on.

LobsterMobster wrote:

I kind of liked the Vanity View. If it was inspired by Michael Bay your character would explode at the end.

But only after several scenes of product placement first.

I played through the demo, twice (defender then commando, using the "rapidly tap A while moving the cursor" trick). It was mostly enjoyable.

Before I knew any details, I thought I'd be drawn in by deeper RPG class and skill combinations, but that's fairly shallow. I'll get over it - that kind of customization (ala FFT or The World Ends With You) isn't what this game is about, and I'll try not to hold that against it.
The customization seems like it will come mainly from loot, which there is plenty of and it looks pretty good.

Combat works. I didn't get it right away, but I had a good handle on it by the end of my first playthrough, and on my second I played a ranged character and felt like I got the guns to work fairly well too.

The lip synch isn't good. I'm just not sure why that's such a big deal. I like it when it's present (Half Life 2) but I don't think it bugs me to the extent it seems to bug some of you, and definitely not as much as the screaming hordes.

It looks like a game I could enjoy. I'm not much of a "DAY ONE!" person, and I don't think this is a game that will make me drop everything to get it, but I'm sure I could enjoy playing through it in Co-op.

Danjo Olivaw wrote:

Your guitar player analogy doesn't hold because there the player is genuinely getting better at playing the guitar, and you know me better than to suggest I'm oblivious to the intricacies of a complex system. I enjoy working out a complex system to tweak it, break it, abuse it, or make it sing. The problem here, and elsewhere, is the system isn't complex.

Ah ok, I was wondering. So are you saying that you want all the items unlocked from the beginning? I could dig that, or at least allow a huge selection right from the start.

I guess a large debate could rage about how much carrot & stick is effective. I know that playing Crackdown with all the cheats on, I got bored much faster than with the game's normal progression rate. I guess one strength (or maybe for you and I, weakness) of RPGs is the ability to grow your character to overcome any challenge. Because RPGs are so stats based, it's very easy for me to see through the illusion and realize I'm just playing a Skinner Box. I prefer a game with enough variation that it takes on elements of physical sports, and manual dexterity is required.

Then again, I admire Edwin's knowledge of the internet and electronics. He built that through tiny little steps every day, something I don't have within my personality, but the knowledge he's amassed is impressive and I'm totally jealous (especially know that I've met you in person, Edwin).

The people I know who like WoW the most are mostly support techs here at apple, the guys who know those tiny little balance of tricks that only works in a 1-in-billion situation. They do very well in WoW, and their stories are amazing (one guy was the #1 rogue in the world for a time).

I strongly recommend trying the Berserker Class via the glitch method. A lot of people have been complaining about the unresponsiveness of the combat controls, but they don't have the contextual experience of paying a class that's not super low level and not designed for fast melee. As you go up in level and add skills and boots of bootness, your attacks are faster and more responsive on top of stronger and having weapons of booting.

Also, be sure to scrounge around in all the cyberspace areas and collect the hidden runes and stuff. The very first area with the Norns has like 5 different loot pillars.

As for the camera, I personally believe that they should have removed a couple of the closer-in ones, because they really make combat difficult.

coyo7e wrote:

I strongly recommend trying the Berserker Class via the glitch method.

Berserker is awesome, once I got him to combo level 4... battles turned to none stop slaughter, all I could see is goblins flying left and right! That certainly made my day.

Not to mention I was able to clear the 2 battle arenas with 12 sec to spare.

still not been able to get the glitch to work for beserker. haven't tried with the other ones yet

Do those combo meter things work for anything other than acting as "ammo" for the right-bumper superstomp thing? Is there any benefit to keeping them chambered?

ranalin wrote:

still not been able to get the glitch to work for beserker. haven't tried with the other ones yet

You can only do berserker if you change the clock as well, iirc. Worked first try for me.

Commando is fun, too. You end up doing a LOT of footwork to keep away from enemies at times.

Morrolan wrote:

Do those combo meter things work for anything other than acting as "ammo" for the right-bumper superstomp thing? Is there any benefit to keeping them chambered?

Yes, they affect attack response time and strength, and slide speed/strength. Berserker especially has a skill he can add points to, to get 4 ranks in combo instead of 3.

Also, there are more skills we haven't seen yet, look at the manual online; there are also human/cybernetic skills..

Morrolan wrote:

Do those combo meter things work for anything other than acting as "ammo" for the right-bumper superstomp thing? Is there any benefit to keeping them chambered?

From the manual Nei linked above somewhere:

"This [combo] meter increases as you execute attacks and special moves. When completely filled, your combo level increases—enhancing attack and slide speed and granting an experience bonus."

I'm not sure how significant the bonus is though, I didn't really notice it.

Edit: I'm a skimmer apparently.

coyo wrote:

As you go up in level and add skills and boots of bootness, your attacks are faster and more responsive on top of stronger and having weapons of booting.

Weapons of Booting, eh? Hmmm...

LobsterMobster wrote:
coyo wrote:

As you go up in level and add skills and boots of bootness, your attacks are faster and more responsive on top of stronger and having weapons of booting.

Weapons of Booting, eh? Hmmm...

So you can kick more a**?

Yeah, at least at the low levels available in this demo the commando and the berserker are the way to go. The hybrid/support classes might start to shine at higher levels of experience (or in co-op) but at low levels and alone they play more into weaknesses of the combat system rather than the strengths.

Out of completely innocent curiosity, how exactly does one unlock the other classes in the demo?

I only ask because a good friend of mine would like to know.

*cough*

Dr._J wrote:

Out of completely innocent curiosity, how exactly does one unlock the other classes in the demo?

I only ask because a good friend of mine would like to know.

*cough*

There's some button foolery, or you can take your XBox offline and set the date to 2009.

Dr._J wrote:

Out of completely innocent curiosity, how exactly does one unlock the other classes in the demo?

Filthy skimmer... Cough indeed.