Thirith on 23/4/2019 at 09:14
Thanks. I might read the article after the end of chapter 6, or I might wait until the very end.
I'm definitely interested in what FCH has to say, as he's one of the smarter cultural critics I've found on the internet, but when I looked through the article very briefly I saw that he mentioned the dread word "realism" a couple of times and that he linked Mark Brown's critique of RDR2, which I think was far from one of Brown's best analyses. (IMO Brown is simply a better critic when he looks at games he likes than those he doesn't like; I don't think he's always very good at distinguishing between "I dislike that the game does X" and "The game does X badly".)
Thing is, I'm not sure that Rockstar did what it did because it wanted to make the game more realistic, or at least that's not all it wanted, nor do I think that it aimed at making the game as fun as possible. Which isn't a get-out-of-jail card for every design decision they've taken, but a number of the more critical texts and videos I've checked out to date haven't really convinced me in terms of trying to understand what the game is trying to do. Not that I fully understand this yet (or I might misunderstand what the game is trying to do), but my impression is that many of the critics have brought a heap of assumptions to the game that they're either not really aware of or that they're unwilling to examine critically. I hope that the FCH article does a better job of this.
Sulphur on 23/4/2019 at 09:42
I've only my impression of the gameplay mechanics in RDR2, not having played it, but the crux of the critique does come down to horse poop, yes. What's your take on the decisions made behind the gameplay? I'd gander from my current distance that a degree of verisimilitude was the real intention, de-abstracting what you'd nominally shortcut to pull players in, but that's without having played the game.
Thirith on 23/4/2019 at 10:27
Some of what's there is definitely due to Rockstar striving for realism, but I think they were also trying to veer away from making a power fantasy, which IMO is why some of the controls are so... odd. Realism is the method they've used but not, or not exclusively, the objective. The game forces you to slow down to do things. Interacting through violence is less than a centimetre away from talking to people. The thing that comes easiest is shooting people and being done with it; other things take more concentration and time. I think that many reviews overstated the awkwardness of the controls (I found that the kind of mistakes many went on about at great length mainly happened during my first hour or two with RDR2), and I'm not sure I've made up my mind as to how successful Rockstar was at what I think they were doing, but there's a willfulness to many of the design decisions that IMO requires critics to think harder about what their purpose might be - which FCH may have done, but others (e.g. Mark Brown) haven't, or not enough, as far as I'm concerned. They're right to say that Rockstar's design made the game less fun in various ways, and it's perfectly okay to dislike RDR2 for doing so, but I've found that the game has forced me to take it in in ways that are different, and interestingly so, to games that make all these things easier and that strip out things that aren't seen as essential to the genre.
Note: I think it's quite likely that I'm giving Rockstar too much credit in terms of the thinking that went into the design decisions. I think that many of the critics that I've read/watched don't give them enough credit, but the result may be that I overstate my own observations and interpretations.
Sulphur on 23/4/2019 at 10:39
If that's true, I'd applaud them for trying it - but FCH makes a fair point in the article about the usability of the tools you're given. It's one thing to make a non-violent option take deliberation and commitment, but it's another thing to make two functionally different things (talking vs. shooting) easy to fuck up mechanically in a 100+ hour game by tying them both to the same button.
I don't quite buy R*'s design ethos in general when it comes to controls, and they've always had a bloody-minded commitment towards making things obtuse since the early GTAs, for reasons that elude me. At least half of why I can't stand GTA 3/4 is because of how weird and clunky aiming and taking cover is, something they've only improved in GTA 5.
Thirith on 23/4/2019 at 10:51
That thing about the two different things on one button isn't entirely accurate, though, and it's been misrepresented in a few things I've read. You generally use L2 both to talk and to aim your gun if it is drawn, but not to shoot (unless I misremember - but at least in the vast majority of cases you're unlikely to shoot someone you wanted to talk to by accident). It's a detail, but I think it's a relevant one.
However, while I generally think Rockstar's decisions in RDR2 had a purpose, I definitely won't defend them across the board, and I do think that some things could've been done in more interesting ways. For instance, by and large I like the way they tell a story, develop characters and make thematic points through their missions, but I also think it's a shameful waste that the missions are restricted the way they are and to the extent they are while being set in a world that would offer so many possibilities. If they did indeed want to express something about agency and the lack thereof, you can lend these points more nuance by making at least some missions more open and by varying the parameters.
Sulphur on 23/4/2019 at 12:21
Quote Posted by Thirith
That thing about the two different things on one button isn't entirely accurate, though, and it's been misrepresented in a few things I've read. You generally use L2 both to talk and to aim your gun if it is drawn, but not to shoot (unless I misremember - but at least in the vast majority of cases you're unlikely to shoot someone you wanted to talk to by accident). It's a detail, but I think it's a relevant one.
Fair. I'm going to shut up about it now until I actually play the game at some point.
scumble on 23/4/2019 at 12:34
I grant the points of FCH and it was well written if a bit rambling - Thirith mentioned that tendency. It goes off on a few tangents and kind of concludes as I might - it's still a good game but not a revolution either. He's got a similar overall opinion to Jim Sterling. I don't know if it's “realism” or redundant detail that people have trouble with. I was quite happy to flick through catalog pages in the shops or just find what I wanted on the shelves. It's a bit hard to sustain the realism argument when Arthur can down a tin of baked beans and strawberries in two seconds. It's more - where do you put the detail to create the feeling of immersion. Do we need the horse poop and simulated testicles?
henke on 24/4/2019 at 15:04
I've been playing a lot of RDR2 Online over the past few days, and I'm gonna do a write-up on it soon, but right now I just wanted to share my first victory in an Open Target Race.
[video=youtube;TCbc1LKkAI8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbc1LKkAI8[/video]
I finally get what people saw in that The Club game now. The concept of racing+shooting didn't appealed to me, but on a whim I tried out this mode and was instantly hooked by the combination of accuracy and planning required for success. I probably played the above map 10 times before I worked out the optimal route and executed it well enough to get the gold medal.
henke on 26/4/2019 at 18:48
RDR2 Online does a lot of things I was wishing the singleplayer game would do. It's a more user-friendly, unconstrained experience and it actually remedies a lot of issues pointed out earlier ITT and in the FCH article. Its missions might lack the production value of the singleplayer, but they make up for it by actually letting you play it your way instead of directing your every goddamn step.
There's also something about the increased difficulty and scarcity of money that forces you to get more familiar with the game's systems and content. By the end of the main story I had a dozen guns in my inventory and I could barely tell them apart. They were cheap enough to procure that I picked most up on a whim, and the game was easy enough that I never had to think about my equipment. Just pick a gun, any gun, it'll do. In Online, money is so hard to scrape together that when time comes to spend it on an expensive gun you can bet I'm reading the stats for each one before deciding, and thinking carefully about which extra components to install. This makes me feel a much stronger bond to my bolt-action rifle, my horse, and my thick coat I bought so I can travel north and explore without freezing my ass off.
There's also plenty of user-friendly changes here. For instance now you'll always have your last-used rifles with you when you get off your horse. Y'know, unlike the single player game which frequently un-equips your rifles for no reason so you always realize you're about to wade into a shootout naked and then have to turn around and painfully slowly waaaaaaaalk back to your horse for your rifles because the game has decided that it would be out of character for you to run in that particular moment.
Other user-friendly improvements include:
-your horse appears nearby when you whistle for it (Roach-style). It'll never be out of range.
-some character animations, like getting rifles from your horse, have been removed to speed things up.
-you always have a store-catalogue with you so you can order equipment at any time(tho you still need to pick it up at a post office).
-fast travel posts are much more plentiful.
Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of flaws in the Online as well. I never got into RDR1's Online because of how skewed it was in favor of high-level players, and that same anti-handicap bullshit is present in the deathmatch modes here. Higher level players who already are much more familiar with the game than noobs like me ALSO have the benefit of perks which increase bullet-resistance AND better weapons. Wonderful. :nono: However I did find some of the other modes remarkably doable. Even the races I did ok at despite having a starter horse VS some people rididng around on the kinds of horses you only get when you reach rank 80. My free roam experience wasn't particularly mared by high-level assholes tho, most people mind their own business, and thankfully at least on PS4 barely anyone speaks.
Another big drawback is that, if you're playing on your own like I am, you do kinda have to make your own fun. There is a story here but it doesn't seem to be particularly strong, tho I haven't done many of the story missions yet. Mostly I've been setting my own goals to work towards, hunt certain animals, rank up enough to buy a fishing rod and bandana, explore the northern areas. Truth is, after a week with this the charms are wearing off, and I think I might be done with it soon. Still gonna do the remaining story missions tho.
Anyway here's a video.
[video=youtube;oc8BF6wPVu4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc8BF6wPVu4[/video]
Malf on 29/4/2019 at 15:28
I've been slowly but surely getting back in to this, but then last night it did one of those things that is just so damn infuriating.
I noticed that I only needed a perfect cougar pelt in order to get the best satchel upgrade, so I dutifully went out in to the wild and spent a couple of hours hunting waiting for one to show up.
First one did and mauled me as I panicked, but the second one I took down with an improved arrow (progressing the Master Hunter task as well).
I subsequently skinned the cougar and sold its corpse to the nearby trapper, then started the long ride back to camp to hand it in to Pearson and get my lovely new satchel.
On the long ride back, I got ambushed by the largest pack of wolves I've ever had to fight off. There were six of the buggers, but I managed to get all of them, and as I had a spare horse with me, I grabbed a couple of them to heft back to camp too. There were a couple of perfect specimens amongst the dead.
A bit further along the road, I got distracted by a shack I regularly get distracted by.
There's a little farmer on the coast south of Valentine who keeps pigs and chickens. I wanted to see if he remembered me. However, the results were... inconclusive.
See, he didn't like me the first time I met him, telling me to get off his land, and just being downright ornery in general. So I hogtied him, and killed his pigs and chickens, knowing they were good for some more perfect pelts. And ever since then, I've stopped by to do the same.
So I dutifully stopped off to chuck a quick "Howdy!" his way last night, and to no-one's surprise, he took umbrage to my presence.
And once more, he ended up face-down and hog-tied while I rode off on my way back to camp now with yet another horse (a pretty little Palamino Morgan he had stabled), laden down with even more dead animals.
I finally rode in to camp feeling well-chuffed that I'd gotten back with so much booty. And I was really looking forward to getting my new bag from Pearson... who wasn't there.
Only Javier, Uncle, Lenny, Hosea and Dutch were there.
I hung around for a bit to see if he would show up, but nope.
I did the chores around the camp in the hopes he's show up, but nope.
And all the while, Dutch and Hosea were nattering in the house about some bank job Josea had planned.
So obviously, the game wanted me to progress the story before granting me access to the camp regulars again.
Feeling already pissed off that I was being rail-roaded in to doing a mission before being able to get my bag, I took the mission.
Only to end up in fucking GARMA.
I strongly suspect that by the time I get back to a stage where I'm able to interact with Pearson again, my cherished perfect cougar pelt will have magically disappeared.
Like I said before, it's an easy game to admire, but a hard game to like.