While this demo has been out for about a week now, I just got my Xbox 360, aka my off-white albino turd, back from it’s Texas repair center. After playing my old favorites, I went online to pick up the latest demos and Silicon Knights’ Too Human Demo was there, waiting for me. Everybody has heard all about Too Human and it’s tales of woe. We’ve heard that it’s been in development for 10 years. That people hated on it’s first showing at E3 2006. How about Silicon Knights suing Epic over the Too Human engine issues. Who could forget the latest gossip about Dennis Dyak going after moron forum trolls on NeoGaf.
Yes, the game has a ton of baggage, but, ya know what? The demo is pretty friggin’ good. I am now genuinely excited for this game. I’ll explain, after the jump.
Eoco, one of our slave laborers here at Sarcasticgamer.com wrote about his impressions of the demo last week. Needless to say, he was less than thrilled.
I don’t know what class he played or what he was doing the whole time, but I had a totally different experience with the game. Here’s some common gripes I’ve heard about the game:
The camera sucks. I don’t know if the people that complain about the camera really even played the game, but you can control it with the left bumper, or zoom in or out with the D pad. I zoomed out to the “strategic” or “far” level and had no problem whatsoever finding enemies to smash.
The combat is too easy. I don’t know what people expect in their dungeon crawlers, which Too Human surely is, but difficult, technical combat is not one of the common features of these games. With these types of games, like Diablo or Dungeon Seige, you pretty much click on the mouse over and over and over and over, until you complete the game or carpal tunnel syndrome sets in, whichever comes first. Conversely, Too Human does feature a neat set of advanced combat maneuvers that allow you to juggle baddies and do a bunch of other damage dealing moves. Sure, you can simply attack by pressing forward on the right stick, but you won’t survive long, against some of the higher level enemies.
To be clear, I played through the demo twice. Once as the Champion and once as a Berzerker. While all of the classes are locked in the demo except for the Champion class, Silicon Knights left some easy to do things to unlock the other four classes. Here’s a link, if you’re curious. The Champion is basically a jack of all trades. He excels at juggling the baddies and then using ranged weapons to destroy them in the air. It’s a common tactic used in the game and playing as the Champion will give you a leg up against some of the tougher monsters. I liked playing as the Champion, but I thought he was a bit bland. I was looking for something a bit more berzerkery…
Ah the Berzerker. This class can dual wield and attacks with crazy-fun, crazy-fast attacks. After leveling up a few times, the Berzerker was blowing through mobs of robo-monsters. I was zipping around the screen in a blur, killing everything that moved, as fast as I could move the right stick. Now I was having fun. While the Berzerker has less hit points, I was blasting through everything so fast, I was barely ever hit. On the other hand, as the Champion, I died a few times, though I admit, that probably had to do more with my general unfamiliarity with the controls and attacks than anything else.
There are other attacks as well. The first is called a Ruiner, which is an area effect attack that just blows up everything around you. As you level up your combo meter by attacking enemies, you’ll gain access to your Ruiner. It’s great for when you get surrounded or when you need to deal with a more powerful enemy quickly.
The second is the spider bot. Each class’ spider bot has different attacks. For instance the Champion’s bot turns into an auto turret, while the Berzerker class’ bot will seek out enemies, attach itself to said enemy and blow it to kingdom come.
Another attack is the Battle Cry, I haven’t used it, because the demo doesn’t allow you to progress that far, but from what I’ve seen in screenshots and videos, it works like an magic spell that will buff yourself, or you and your group. Each class has different animal forms that they use with this attack… but that’s all I know at this point.
In the end, I encourage you to play through the demo at least twice. It’s not a long demo, probably no more than 30 to 45 minutes. Your first playthrough will give you the general feel, while the second play through, probably with a new class, will give you a much better idea of what’s going on, which will allow you to enjoy or hate the class you’re playing.
I think you should try the Bezerker class and stop hating on Too Human, until you give it a try yourself.
|
Related posts: |