Killzone 2 Back in Action

After a bout of radio silence, yesterday Sony unveiled Killzone 2 as it stands today. Those attending the event seem duly impressed. Eurogamer's Tom Bramwell points out that the level of cynicism has been set quite high, after the pre-rendered 2005 trailer prompted a lot of hard feelings among journalists. Just the same, Susan Arendt of Game|Life is of the opinion that the wait was worth it: "Most of the action we saw was basic run-and gun--working your way up and down, through the buildings of the city to reach various checkpoints. We saw a fight with a mini-boss that was relatively unremarkable, but it did at least end with a fairly satisfying 'boom.' The level culminated with the destruction of an arc weapon--basically an antenna that draws electricity from lightning and releases it to destroy troops ... Killzone 2 is loud, dirty, and violently elegant. If you have a PS3, you're going to want this game. If you don't have a PS3 you might have to figure out how you're going to get one." For more details, check out the Killzone 2 trailer Sony has released as well as the quick Q&A on the game at PS3 Fanboy.

Consider the hate..

that Sony/PS3 get for everything it seems these days, and the millions of Xbots, bloggers and even proper news sites, that will gun down everything Sony does, or spind things in a negative way, the fact they all came away saying great things about Killzone 2, means that, for a rational gamer, without Sony hate blurring things, this is some seriously impressive stuff.

huh?

Review : It's generic, you just shoot shit and it's got loud sound.
Review conclusion : YOU MUST BUY THIS GAME! IT IS BEST GAME EVER!!!

Excuse me while I work out what the fuck is going on with these guys. Why would a generic, shoot 'em up be a must buy when it's being labeled as a generic shoot 'em up with no real originality or redeemable qualities at all?

Game journalism, because Mario didn't make sense either.

Darn, that looks good.

I'm still not willing to take that as the actual graphics till I see someone playing it on a box attached to a HiDef Screen. Trailers, even ones with "gameplay" footage can be very misleading.

Still as an xbox owner I am rather impressed, and competition between the companies is a good thing.

umm

is this sony's secret weapon to save the ps3?

Wait, what?

If you don't have a PS3 you might have to figure out how you're going to get one.

Um, walk into a store, grab one of the shelf, proceed to checkout counter, pay?

Ha ha.

"We saw a fight with a mini-boss that was relatively unremarkable,"

Ya not a good first impression

You'll Want This Game!

If you have a PS3, you're going to want this game.

If you have a Playstation 3, you'll probably want any game by this point.

The excitement is palpable

Ok so... that was one of the most nonsense reviews of a supposedly "AAA" title I've read in some time. The wait was worth it for a "fairly linear... basic run and gun... mini boss that was quite unremarkable..." ????? If that's all it takes PS3 owners to get super-excited about a game, then things are grim indeed.

It's a generic shooter with a fittingly generic name. Even the "favorable" review manages to make this painfully obvious.

Rating

Has it been rated yet? It would be quite interesting if this were rated AO.

What is the real difference between playing a game that has the sole purpose of killing a bunch of people a game that has the sole purpose of killing a bunch of people in a different country? Someone recently joked that Manhunt should have stated that the people were terrorists, and they'd have been okay on rating.

For my money, a game that attempts to realistically recreate the experience of war -should- be Adult Only, as real adults don't even fair all that well for the real experience. (Mental trauma is almost unavoidable when taking someone's life.)

It's too bad the ESRB doesn't have to stated exactly why they chose the rating they did, because we'd soon know if they chose AO out of spite or because it genuinely warranted it.

Developer quote

"We've captured things like muzzle flashes, reloads, and how a weapon feels and reacts in your hand. We want it to be as realistic as possible."

Everything except for actual damage, presumably. Show me a level where someone gets shot in the foot and limps for the rest of the level, and I'll be impressed. How about head-shots that actually kill or incapacitate an enemy?

I'm also pig-sick of 'futuristic' shooters where the available weaponry for 90% of the game is a pistol, a shotgun and an assault rifle. Where's the gauss-rifles, the beam weapons, the wire-guns, the imagination?

But hey, why bother, when you can churn out another corridor run'n'gun game, but with more polygons. 'Cause that makes everything better, right?

Well. . ..

I just watched the trailer, I was not impressed.

It just looks like another FPS.

If they are going to make FPSes on consoles, there needs to be a keyboard and mouse adapter, I'm tired of trying to play games like this with a controller.

I hooked my computer up to my HDTV, and I have my fill of FPSes that way. Theres no reason to buy a game like this when I have countless other FPSes that are amazing on my computer.

Halo killer my rear end

I remember when Killzone was touted as PS2's Halo-killer, but when I watched the intro and saw him fight in one of the levels, I found it to be another cookie-cutter shoot-em'-up with the same trench-based battles, running n' gunning, and post-apocalyptic scenario that every other shooter on the PS2 had. Best cheesy line? "What the f---'s a Shakespeare?" At this point I realized Killzone was ripping off Battlefield Earth, and anyone desperate to ripoff that storyline - whether it be the film or the novel the film was based upon - should consider a creative writing course at their local community college.

It seems like once Halo and Halo 2 (and now the upcoming Halo 3) came out, everybody and their grandmother wanted to release a FPS to cash in on the hype. It's a shameless attempt at earning "easy money" through derivative, overused game design and unimaginative storytelling. The most unfortunate problem with this is the fact that this is the state of the video game industry at present. Everyone wants to stick with what's safe, nobody wants to do anything unique or imaginative.

Don't even make me go into bitching about the title. "Killzone"? How about "Place where you blow stuff up real pretty?" Pardon the cynicism, I just can't stand how easy it is for people to get into this industry with such severe lack of imagination.

Pleased non-gamer

I might be in the minority here, but I'm not a huge gamer. I didn't grow up with Nintendo or Sega, I'm not a Counterstrike master, I prefer Bejewled to Tetris, I never played Duke Nukem or DOOM or Myst. That said, I've always found the Killzone games irresistably attractive due to their Saving Private Ryan-esque, post-apocalyptic, frantic atmosphere, the sweeping environments and orchestral score, the sound work, the surreal environments, and most importantly, the Helghast, who are so frighteningly sinister and menacing that I enjoy the game most when I'm inflicting the most painful death possible on them. The whole franchise is like an interactive sci-fi action movie. It's not groundbreaking, it's not revolutionary, it doesn't draw me in. It's something I can sit down and enjoy after a frustrating day at work, something I can fire up when friends are over and there's nothing on HBO.

Why isn't Sony catering to people like me? I don't give a shit about the next gaming revolution, I want a centralized, versatile media center with stuff I can play with, listen to, watch, and hack. If they just laid off the overly aggressive DRM, worked in tandem with the movie and music industry to implement a cheap, online distribution model, pumped out more games like Killzone and Assassin's Creed and brought down the price a little, I would be out the door right now and taking the weekend off.

These claims of Nintendo and Microsoft dominating the "casual userbase" are overstated, I think. I have no desire to play Resident Evil 4, neither does my grandmother. So are the arguments that game consoles shouldn't be used as media platforms. I'm sure there are countless people out there like me, and it's sad that Sony is skimping on so many little things. Everything is in place. The hardware is there, the market is there, the potential is there. Why can't Sony just go the extra mile?

Damn, I can't believe I'm seriously considering buying a PS3.

Typical fps controls, and what a shame.

I've never been a big fan of FPS games on consoles because their gameplay simply isn't suited for a gamepad controller, not in my hands anyways. So the first, and only, console FPS that really did something for me was Gears of War - which I hoped would spark a trend in Console FPS games. Well it sure doesn't look like Sony has picked up on that yet, because it sure seems like Killzone 2 will be doing every single mistake in terms of gameplay that puts me off the gameplay.

Re:The Game Looks Amazing

The cell processor has nothing to do with the graphics.

Re:I'm sorry, but..

is there a reasoning behind your pompous bullshit comment or you just wanting to thread crap? killzone had amazing graphics and a great concept, good all around gameplay. what are you looking for? i am guessing you want to go play pokemon arena or something along those lines... if you don't think killzone is a great game your wrong

Re:The Big Graphics Question

Provided cutting-edge graphics would be provided by PS3 hardware instead of removed PS2 hardware from the PS3, the big answer is yes.

It's not like they're using the Emotion Engine as a coprocessor while running PS3 games.

Re:The Big Graphics Question

The PS3, for all intents and purposes, had a PS2 inside it for emulation. That was taken out in the new revisions. The PS2 hardware can't be accessed by a PS3 game.

Re:The Big Graphics Question

So removing hardware only used for playing PS2 games is going to somehow reduce performance on games that don't even use the aforementioned hardware?

Doesn't your question basically ask "Are they going to defeat the point of a console by removing the idea of one performance standard in game? At least a performance standard that can't be change by the user in a cheap fashion.

Re:The Big Graphics Question

What are you talking about? Even if future PS3s consolidate hardware, it does not break their ability to play existing PS3 titles.

Re:The Game Looks Amazing

Gotta love how not many people have looked at PC games on high end systems then... I heard the same crap about the Halo 3 beta, HD or not, I was not that impressed by it, It had graphics I saw 2 years ago with things like Half life 2: episode 1 and battlefield 2142. Cell or not, I'd rather see it on a PC anyway.

Re:I'm sorry, but..

Killzone wasn't that appealing to be either, but there's no reason to think them team can't take feedback from that game and make a better game this time round.

Re:The Big Graphics Question

OK, we have found out 1st idiot...

Unless Killzone 2 is a PLAYSTATION2, game, removal of the Playstation 2 from from Playstation 3 will make zero difference to a Killzone..

Did you skip school some something, or does stupid run in your family?

Re:The Big Graphics Question

Uhh, you don't understand. The software emulation is for PS2 titles...not PS3 titles. So your "big question" is irrelevant.

Re:I'm sorry, but..

Mediocre, maybe. Sucks? I think that's overstating it a bit.

I wrote an in-depth review of Killzone when I finished it, which you can find here:

Killzone Review [blogspot.com]

For those who don't want to read the whole thing or skip down to the summary, I concluded that it was not as good as the "Halo Killer" hype, but not as bad as the post-release reviews would have you believe. I did manage to extract some enjoyment from it.

But if Killzone 2 is more of the same with some pretty added to it, it certainly won't be a system-seller for me.

Re:I'm sorry, but..

Killzone 2 got so much hype because

1) pretty pre-rendered trailer
2) there's not much else to get excited about on the PS3