Star Wars: 1313, a 'Darker, Grittier' Star Wars Game 133
MojoKid writes "When it comes to Star Wars, the gaming industry has a long history of cranking out titles of uncertain quality. For every brilliant title like Knights of the Old Republic, we've seen several clunkers and a few outright failures like Republic Heroes. LucasArts demonstrated a new Star Wars game at E3 this week, Star Wars: 1313 and despite the brand's uneven history, folks are cautiously optimistic. The 1313 moniker refers to a specific level of Coruscant which is a haven for criminals, bounty hunters, and crime lords. You take on the role of a bounty hunter looking for information on an unspecified criminal conspiracy who descends to 1313 in search of data. This will likely be the first Star Wars game to be rated 'M' for mature, and it focuses on the seedy underbelly of the universe."
Re:Lame (Score:5, Insightful)
Er, yeah, sure, I like open games too, but Uncharted was really fun. Really really really fun. Uncharted is one of the few games I've played through many times (and similarly for Uncharted 2, which was arguably even better).
So while I'm generally kind of down on overly linear games, when done well, they can be wonderful. So don't write off "1313" just yet...
Chest high walls....chest high walls everywhere (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously. Can we all move past the GOW cover based shooting formula already? It's been obnoxious for a long time now. The Dark Forces series was awesome back in the day. Noticeably absent were chest high walls.
Meh ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Looks like a lot of button mashing, which means we'll most likely end up with a fucking dumbed down console port again that barely works on the PC (e.g., Force Unleashed 2, where the game's toughest enemies were the character controls, camera controls and other assorted bugs).
Quick time events suck. (Score:3, Insightful)
The demo video they showed looks like it's entirely quick time events. Which means as pretty as this game may be, it'll be complete garbage.
Quick time events ruin everything they're put in and make the game suck. I cant think of any example where they actually add anything but frustration. You can't pay attention to the action that they trigger because you have to focus on hitting the combination it throws up on the screen.
Re:Literally blown away? (Score:5, Insightful)
Literally, when people say literally, the almost never actually mean literally. Literally.
PC gamers o_O (Score:3, Insightful)
One thing that jumps out at us from watching the video is that the game clearly isn't running on legacy console hardware. Creative director Dominic Robilliard confirms this a little later in the interview, when he states that the demo is being powered by PCs using Nvidia hardware.
Obviously we can't say for certain, but there's some good circumstantial evidence that the game is built for DX11. Shadows are always the best thing to check -- DX10/DX11 shadows are softer and more realistic than their DX9 counterparts. Fog is another area where DX11 implementations tend to noticably improve on DX9, and the 1313 scenes are impressive on both counts.
There's no reason LucasArts couldn't develop the title for current consoles and cutting-edge PC hardware simultaneously, but this is good news for computer gamers -- games built on our platform tend to play better (and look nicer) than console ports that offer better textures but otherwise keep to the limits of six year-old hardware.
Nobody cares about PC gaming epeen. Really, nobody. Prettier shadows.. got it, that's one of those boxes we uncheck for consistent framerate when playing against other people.
These guys are as bad as the audiophiles that are made fun of on /. all the time. First it was frame rate, 200+ FPS with 85/75/60 display refresh rate... /eyeroll
Now that the average PC gamer has found vsync it's teh softer shadows and highlights. Lets be honest, if you can't do pretty with a moderately consistent frame rate, it gets turned off by any serious gamer.
I'm not saying your shadows _aren't_ super pretty, just that the money you have to spend for slightly prettier visuals at smooth not-disrupting-gameplay frame rates reminds me of $200 audio cables.
And... as nearly all of us are typing and reading this on a PC.. we most likely play/have played games on them. There is no us v them, just mostly people who already have played PC games and still don't give a damn about ridiculous epeen contests.
Attn: LucasArts (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, just give us a new TIE Fighter or X-wing vs TIE Fighter game already, okay? That is what the market has been demanding for years.
God I hate IP laws. With LucasArts sitting on the Star Wars IP, it's impossible for any competitors to come out and make a TIE Fighter game.
Re:I'm burned out, thanks to TOR (Score:2, Insightful)
These days? It's so tainted and diluted with an abundance of junk that it no longer represents any particular tone, style, or theme.
Re:Literally blown away? (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless you're talking about the most illiterate users, most are using it as a form of ironic emphasis.
Of course, due to Poe's Law, you never really know. Make your best guess, but at some point you just gotta let go, man.