Gamer Horizon After Hours E05 – The Last of Us/Best of E3

You thought E3 was over? Not for us at Gamer Horizon! There is still some things left to talk to about, namely our best games of E3, our biggest disappointments, and biggest surprises. Also on this episode, we talk about The Last of Us – what we love and what we don’t. Ted enjoys taking people’s money in Tekken Revolution and Ari explains what Animal Crossing is to Sean.

So sit back, listen, and let us know what you think!

Intro and Outro music from Hypno Jam with Dan by Quicksand

Download this episode!

I’ve been hoping Sean’s review would have been posted shortly, but this is okay too. Spoilers, obviously, will follow for The Last of Us and Tomb Raider, so be weary while reading.

I do want to start off by saying The Last of Us isn’t the perfect game, but that is completely okay. My favorite games are all flawed games, because what comes through is such a memorable experience that I can indeed look past the problems that hinder it. I will personally create reasons on my own as to why certain mechanics are the way they are. It’s like taking the plot of a film and trying to bend it around an idea you have, to make it relate to yourself. Silent Hill 2 was/may still be at the top of my favorite games list, but The Last of Us is giving it a solid run for it’s money. Silent Hill 2 with it’s wonky controls, obnoxious voice actors, and somewhat convoluted story relating to the game on it’s own and the narrative set out by the story, but it all comes together to something that I truly love.

I understand exactly the two biggest gripes in The Last of Us, which are the disappearing ammo and the invisible Ellie/Bill/every other NPC who joins your party. I’ll first hit on the invisible characters, and the other topic Sean and I have already discussed, but I’ll throw it here as well. The best reason I can honestly give for the enemies not being able to see those other characters is hardware limitations. No, I’m not saying it’s impossible to make a second character visible to those other characters, but given just complex of a character Ellie is in technical terms, her AI is still far from perfect, which you can tell with no problem by playing the game. It would be horribly frustrating to have her run over to a wall only to be spotted… Multiple times. It does break immersion, but finding a completely flawless game is still impossible. Everything will be flawed, be it a game, a film, a person, or even the world we live in. Accepting the flaws and moving on is the most important part of really being able to enjoy something. I’m not saying you need to love shitty games or movies or people, but flaws are what make things unique.

As for the ammo, one Redditor made quite a solid point… In which there are many, many types of guns out there. Just because you have a handgun and another person has a handgun, doesn’t mean his ammo will fit in your gun. Of course, you may argue “why not just be able to pick up that gun too?” Justifiable response, but at this point it’s just becoming too big of an issue, it seems. Maybe that particular enemy fired off his last bullet before you killed him. It all just comes down to trying to make the game as close to survival horror as possible. I played on hard and would not play on medium. I rarely, if ever, play on hard, because most games feel cheap. But, thankfully The Last of Us felt very right on hard. Ammo and supplies were scarce, which made every single item you used seem all the more important. You can argue that if they wanted to remedy the ammo problem, why not take away some of the enemies with guns and replace them with enemies who were more physical? Because the physical combat isn’t really great in the game. Hell, I am having trouble remember any game that you could pick up ammunition off of every dead enemy who had a gun. It’s a mechanic that is indeed flawed, but in our current generation, I don’t quite think we’re to the point where it’s possible. Plus, you would become increasingly dependent on your weapons, and you’d feel overpowered. I will gladly take disappearing ammo over making a game too easy because you have so much ammo.

So now, it all comes down to the three games that I really enjoyed from this year and which one stands out the most. Tomb Raider, Bioshock: Infinite, and The Last of Us.

I put a solid seven or eight hours into Tomb Raider. About the same in Bioshock, and at 100% on The Last of Us hard difficulty, just over twenty hours. It’s hard to compare all three, as two are realistic third-person shooters, and one is a first-person shooter with a far more fantasy-oriented story.

Growing up on the Tomb Raider series, I did like what Crystal Dynamics did with the series as of late, but I felt like it lost a bit of it’s sight. The newest entry I found to be quite enjoyable, but a game I would pay maybe $15 to $20 to play. It felt short, I felt the writing was quite subpar, especially the supporting characters, who were quite cookie cutter. The gameplay was fantastic, and the setting was damned near perfect, but the biggest glaring flaw was just how much of an over-powered being Lara was. We have this twenty-odd year old girl who survives multiple traumatic experiences, one of which almost killed a character in The Last of Us. Lara? On a rainy, cold, Japanese island, patched herself up and got back to a’ killin. It all became so ridiculous, that she was mostly unstoppable. The tombs were a great addition, but were too short and too little. I wish they would have expanded upon those and had a few more to be honest. Still, as a whole, a solid 7/10 for me.

I’ve gone over how I feel on The Last of Us, and yes, I do see where your problems lie, Sean. I know the game is flawed, and that is okay with me. From the years I’ve “known” you, I know changing your opinion is impossible, and I’m not trying to do that at all. I just don’t want something like this to affect how you feel about the complete package.

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0 thoughts on “Gamer Horizon After Hours E05 – The Last of Us/Best of E3”

iwontcomebackalive says:

June 25, 2013 at 10:09 AM

I’ve been hoping Sean’s review would have been posted shortly, but this is okay too. Spoilers, obviously, will follow for The Last of Us and Tomb Raider, so be weary while reading.

I do want to start off by saying The Last of Us isn’t the perfect game, but that is completely okay. My favorite games are all flawed games, because what comes through is such a memorable experience that I can indeed look past the problems that hinder it. I will personally create reasons on my own as to why certain mechanics are the way they are. It’s like taking the plot of a film and trying to bend it around an idea you have, to make it relate to yourself. Silent Hill 2 was/may still be at the top of my favorite games list, but The Last of Us is giving it a solid run for it’s money. Silent Hill 2 with it’s wonky controls, obnoxious voice actors, and somewhat convoluted story relating to the game on it’s own and the narrative set out by the story, but it all comes together to something that I truly love.

I understand exactly the two biggest gripes in The Last of Us, which are the disappearing ammo and the invisible Ellie/Bill/every other NPC who joins your party. I’ll first hit on the invisible characters, and the other topic Sean and I have already discussed, but I’ll throw it here as well. The best reason I can honestly give for the enemies not being able to see those other characters is hardware limitations. No, I’m not saying it’s impossible to make a second character visible to those other characters, but given just complex of a character Ellie is in technical terms, her AI is still far from perfect, which you can tell with no problem by playing the game. It would be horribly frustrating to have her run over to a wall only to be spotted… Multiple times. It does break immersion, but finding a completely flawless game is still impossible. Everything will be flawed, be it a game, a film, a person, or even the world we live in. Accepting the flaws and moving on is the most important part of really being able to enjoy something. I’m not saying you need to love shitty games or movies or people, but flaws are what make things unique.

As for the ammo, one Redditor made quite a solid point… In which there are many, many types of guns out there. Just because you have a handgun and another person has a handgun, doesn’t mean his ammo will fit in your gun. Of course, you may argue “why not just be able to pick up that gun too?” Justifiable response, but at this point it’s just becoming too big of an issue, it seems. Maybe that particular enemy fired off his last bullet before you killed him. It all just comes down to trying to make the game as close to survival horror as possible. I played on hard and would not play on medium. I rarely, if ever, play on hard, because most games feel cheap. But, thankfully The Last of Us felt very right on hard. Ammo and supplies were scarce, which made every single item you used seem all the more important. You can argue that if they wanted to remedy the ammo problem, why not take away some of the enemies with guns and replace them with enemies who were more physical? Because the physical combat isn’t really great in the game. Hell, I am having trouble remember any game that you could pick up ammunition off of every dead enemy who had a gun. It’s a mechanic that is indeed flawed, but in our current generation, I don’t quite think we’re to the point where it’s possible. Plus, you would become increasingly dependent on your weapons, and you’d feel overpowered. I will gladly take disappearing ammo over making a game too easy because you have so much ammo.

So now, it all comes down to the three games that I really enjoyed from this year and which one stands out the most. Tomb Raider, Bioshock: Infinite, and The Last of Us.

I put a solid seven or eight hours into Tomb Raider. About the same in Bioshock, and at 100% on The Last of Us hard difficulty, just over twenty hours. It’s hard to compare all three, as two are realistic third-person shooters, and one is a first-person shooter with a far more fantasy-oriented story.

Growing up on the Tomb Raider series, I did like what Crystal Dynamics did with the series as of late, but I felt like it lost a bit of it’s sight. The newest entry I found to be quite enjoyable, but a game I would pay maybe $15 to $20 to play. It felt short, I felt the writing was quite subpar, especially the supporting characters, who were quite cookie cutter. The gameplay was fantastic, and the setting was damned near perfect, but the biggest glaring flaw was just how much of an over-powered being Lara was. We have this twenty-odd year old girl who survives multiple traumatic experiences, one of which almost killed a character in The Last of Us. Lara? On a rainy, cold, Japanese island, patched herself up and got back to a’ killin. It all became so ridiculous, that she was mostly unstoppable. The tombs were a great addition, but were too short and too little. I wish they would have expanded upon those and had a few more to be honest. Still, as a whole, a solid 7/10 for me.

I’ve gone over how I feel on The Last of Us, and yes, I do see where your problems lie, Sean. I know the game is flawed, and that is okay with me. From the years I’ve “known” you, I know changing your opinion is impossible, and I’m not trying to do that at all. I just don’t want something like this to affect how you feel about the complete package.

LikeLike

1. Sean Mesler says:
  
  June 25, 2013 at 1:52 PM
  
  Hey Kirby,
  
  Thanks for listening an commenting!
  
  My review will be up shortly, possibly today, definitely tomorrow, so we can continue that specific discussion there since I have amore complete view of the package now having beaten it.
  
  What I will say is that I generally can look past certain things in games but I never make concessions or “why’s”. It’s a decision the designers made and for better or worse its in there and as such it can affect the players overall enjoyment of the game.
  
  And you’re insane abut Tomb Raider. Easily a 10/10 for me and the best game I’ve played this year.
  
  LikeLike
  
Mr.Louis says:

July 1, 2013 at 9:53 PM

Question does Sony charges developers for updates on the PS3, I know that Microsoft used to, but not anymore. I think at that time, Microsoft just wanted money, I can’t see the logic of paying an update for games.

LikeLike

1. Sean Mesler says:
  
  July 1, 2013 at 10:51 PM
  
  Sony doesn’t charge for updates.
  
  LikeLike
  
  1. Mr.Louis says:
    
    July 2, 2013 at 6:53 PM
    
    Wow, didn’t know that.
    
    LikeLike
  2. Alex Inigo says:
    
    July 2, 2013 at 7:40 PM
    
    This is wrong. Patches are $10k. New features added are free
    
    LikeLike
  3. Mr.Louis says:
    
    July 9, 2013 at 10:25 AM
    
    Now, I’m confuse.
    
    LikeLike
  4. Alex Inigo says:
    
    July 9, 2013 at 5:49 PM
    
    If a patch delivers new content for the game, then it’s free. Otherwise, if it just fixes things, it will cost the submitter $10k
    
    LikeLike

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