Yeah, it's really bad when I check out of a story like twenty minutes in because the protagonist's IQ drops to sub 50 and tries to do something they would never do.
[QUOTE=Zeos;43558576]Yeah, it's really bad when I check out of a story like twenty minutes in because the protagonist's IQ drops to sub 50 and tries to do something they would never do.[/QUOTE]He acts like he's a big-game hunter and that he is going to bag the big one and have him stuffed.
[QUOTE=Doctor Zedacon;43558573]Really though, I still load up Absolution occasionally now just for the purpose of running around levels killing everything with nothing but melee weapons and other hilarious things like the landmines.[/QUOTE]
I love that mission where there is nothing but landmines everywhere, they were so damn satisfying to use
Or you smack some dude over the head with one and then instantly explode
Blood Money disguises were broken and "too OP" but they were fun to use.
Absolution disguises were broken and "too UP" and were not fun to use.
They need to find a balance. I hated that I pretty much needed "instinct" or whatever to use a disguise in Absolution, its a total gimmick feature.
Make it so disguises work a little bit better like in Blood Money, but people of the same profession can notice you easier if you A. Stand around them too much (aka exposure time to that person) B. Do something odd or revealing in disguise
So if you have a disguise and use it the whole time people who also use that profession will start getting suspicious after a while of being around you (even more if close), but not the second you get close to them. But if you switch disguises or are quick then nobody will suspect anything.
Most importantly, if people suspect something then don't have EVERYTHING BLOWN GAME OVER, make it so they might follow you and keep and eye on you until you throw them off, they might be more sensative to you acting out of character, they might talk to you, etc.
The worst thing about absolution was that the disguises were all or nothing. Would have been much better if disguises were harder to break in the short term (no instant "OMG YER AN ASSASSIN CAUSE YOU DIDN"T HIDE YER FACE!!"), but easier to break in the long term ("You've been here for a while and I'm getting really suspicious of you"), but the consequences of breaking a disguise isn't the end of the world - you just have to throw someone off your tail you might suspect you.
Contracts did disguises pretty damn good. If you hung around someone for too long they'd be like "uh hey wait a minute bill, the 4'11 albino 42-year-old guard isn't a 6'2 bald guy with a face like a slapped arse and a bean tin code on the back of his head..."
[QUOTE=Drsalvador;43558710]Contracts did disguises pretty damn good. If you hung around someone for too long they'd be like "uh hey wait a minute bill, the 4'11 albino 42-year-old guard isn't a 6'2 bald guy with a face like a slapped arse and a bean tin code on the back of his head..."[/QUOTE]
Beldingford Manor comes to mind. Shit was tense.
[QUOTE=Jojje;43558884]Beldingford Manor comes to mind. Shit was tense.[/QUOTE]
That's the level I was thinking of. That fucking mission turned my balls into diamonds and my asshole into a car crusher capable of turning a coke can into a bullet.
The absolute sheer tension of walking past the dog pens made me shrivel up in fear every single time it happened.
i also hope the movement is fixed for once. Please, give us good animations.
[QUOTE=Jojje;43557315]Absolution was neat because well it was more Hitman but the disguise system really was broken and counter-intuitive compared to how it was before.
Instinct was kind of shit as well but really it was basically the map screen and I tended to play the older Hitman games on higher difficulties where you could only use the map for navigation and seeing yourself and your targets.[/QUOTE]
The problem with Absolution's instinct is that not only was it a terribly unfitting mechanic, but the game was so built around it that it's almost impossible to complete the game without it. It's the same problem with the most recent Thief game : they are adding fairly gimmicky/idiotic features that they claim can be deactivated with higher difficulty settings, but the game becomes absurdly hard and unbalanced without them.
I understand why they made disguises less of a reliance factor, but they turned them into an even bigger hassle to the point where its easier to go the sneaky route. Though those routes are so goddamn hard to find. I love the Hitman series, but there's always that one little buggersome flaw that sticks out like a giant neon pink windmill.
[QUOTE=Ganerumo;43560800]The problem with Absolution's instinct is that not only was it a terribly unfitting mechanic, but the game was so built around it that it's almost impossible to complete the game without it. It's the same problem with the most recent Thief game : they are adding fairly gimmicky/idiotic features that they claim can be deactivated with higher difficulty settings, but the game becomes absurdly hard and unbalanced without them.[/QUOTE]
I like how you're played it and know that they haven't tried to work around that problem.
[QUOTE=simzboy;43557408]I'm so glad they're going back to the style of the previous games. I liked Absolution, but I hated how linear it was for a Hitman game. It kills any replay value for me. I only ever find myself replaying 2 levels from Absolution.[/QUOTE]
Not to mention, the biggest mode toted for its replayability in Absolution - Contracts mode - was really annoying and linear. Most of the Contracts ended up coming down to how fast you could pull off a Contract, and whether you could time everything perfectly so you could repeat the OP's exact playthrough but with slightly higher points.
While speed runs and perfect timing are part of the competitive side of Hitman, it felt like there was absolutely no room for creativity in the Contracts. One of the several competitive sides of Contract mode was that it was suppose to focus on the highest-paying way that you could creatively dispatch a target; instead, it just became a competitive mode which focused on jumping through hoops in order to perfectly time all your kills with the perfect weapon pre-chosen by the OP. The world was so linear to begin with, a lot of Contracts forced you to follow the same path of the OP. It just did not feel creative or open; it was extremely confined.
[editline]16th January 2014[/editline]
[QUOTE=chunkymonkey;43558295]Hope they officially retcon Absolution because I know I pretend it doesn't exist.[/QUOTE]
I think IO is going to avoid Absolution altogether by simply not talking about it, and placing the game in a timeframe which won't intersect with Absolution.
Like, FOX can pretend Alien Resurrection didn't happen by just never talking about Alien Resurrection and continuously creating projects that never focus on the world created by Alien Resurrection. It's the same thing tbh.
the thing i really didn't like about absolution over blood money was the insane focus on stealth if you wanted to do shit right. i love stealth games, but blood money was more of a puzzle game than a stealth game. yeah you had to stay out of sight and understand enemy patterns, but there's very little crouching down and doing stuff out of sight and more of just blending in with the crowd. in absolution, if you wanted the silent assassin rating you basically just had to stealth the whole thing. which was annoying!
[QUOTE=Coffee;43561049]I like how you're played it and know that they haven't tried to work around that problem.[/QUOTE]
If you are talking about Thief there is no way they can somehow work around features that let you see through walls and the presence of a minimap, when the essence of the game goes drastically against these ideas.
Thief is going to be an utter mess and unless they start the thing back from scratch, it's going to remain that way.
[editline]16th January 2014[/editline]
[QUOTE=BrickInHead;43561306]the thing i really didn't like about absolution over blood money was the insane focus on stealth if you wanted to do shit right. i love stealth games, but blood money was more of a puzzle game than a stealth game. yeah you had to stay out of sight and understand enemy patterns, but there's very little crouching down and doing stuff out of sight and more of just blending in with the crowd. in absolution, if you wanted the silent assassin rating you basically just had to stealth the whole thing. which was annoying![/QUOTE]
The fucking missions in Absolution where you had to get through a whole level from point A to point B without actually having to assassinate anyone were the worst. So pointless and boring.
Blood Money is the only game I have ever played that made me feel like an assassin, rather than a cat burglar or Mission Impossible wannabe.
The disguise aspect is what made the series, IMO. Hiding in plain sight is something that few games have attempted, and most of the go-to stealth/assassination games (Assassin's Creed, Splinter Cell, Metal Gear Solid, Thief, etc) rely instead on the player staying out of sight entirely.
That's why Absolution was a letdown. Not because of a few bungled game mechanics, but because those mechanics removed the one thing that made Hitman special and turned it into yet another stealth shooter.
While in some ways the disguises in Blood Money were broken- not so much that people don't recognize you, because hey, you're not going to know every guard or every partygoer or every sailor or whatever, but that they don't recognize suspicious and abnormal behavior like when you follow them into a room, it was still something fresh that gave the game real freedom to approach your objectives as you see fit. The sheer number of ways to pull off your hits made it feel like a sandbox, but still a tightly-scripted, interesting, emergent sandbox, basically the best of both worlds.
Going back to Blood Money's model, but putting more effort and nuance into the suspicion mechanic, would make for a hell of a game.
I hope it has better gunplay mechanics. It was a pain in the ass to shoot in Blood Money and it reminded me of Deus Ex 1's combat. I did like the snap to cover they put in Absolution.
[QUOTE=sp00ks;43557344]Blood Money is one of my favourite games of all times, and I absolutely hated Absolution. The fucking "mana" system (or whatever the fuck it was) was really stupid, disguises barely did anything and you had to hide the bodies in certain, pre determined places and not just where the NPC's wouldn't notice. Shit game.[/QUOTE]
You could hide bodies where nobody would notice too, if I recall correctly. I wasn't fond of some changes (instinct and such) but it was a great game in its own regard. It gets too much blame for not being Blood Money 2, but the later levels were actually really fun and well designed. Absolution may not have been the best Hitman but it was a solid game past the first few poor levels.
All I want is another Blood Money.
Low story, just playing as a super soldier choking out motherfuckers.
[QUOTE=KorJax;43558634]Blood Money disguises were broken and "too OP" but they were fun to use.
Absolution disguises were broken and "too UP" and were not fun to use.
They need to find a balance. I hated that I pretty much needed "instinct" or whatever to use a disguise in Absolution, its a total gimmick feature.
Make it so disguises work a little bit better like in Blood Money, but people of the same profession can notice you easier if you A. Stand around them too much (aka exposure time to that person) B. Do something odd or revealing in disguise
So if you have a disguise and use it the whole time people who also use that profession will start getting suspicious after a while of being around you (even more if close), but not the second you get close to them. But if you switch disguises or are quick then nobody will suspect anything.
Most importantly, if people suspect something then don't have EVERYTHING BLOWN GAME OVER, make it so they might follow you and keep and eye on you until you throw them off, they might be more sensative to you acting out of character, they might talk to you, etc.
The worst thing about absolution was that the disguises were all or nothing. Would have been much better if disguises were harder to break in the short term (no instant "OMG YER AN ASSASSIN CAUSE YOU DIDN"T HIDE YER FACE!!"), but easier to break in the long term ("You've been here for a while and I'm getting really suspicious of you"), but the consequences of breaking a disguise isn't the end of the world - you just have to throw someone off your tail you might suspect you.[/QUOTE]
I thought Hitman 2 had a really good system. It was basically a mix of Absolution and Blood Money. Whether people could see through your disguise or not was level specific. Like in this small mansion level if you disguise as a guard other guards will quickly see through it if you go too close since all the guards know each other. Meanwhile in the next level there are lots of Russian soldiers walking around and disguising as one works since they don't all know each other.
With some small tweaking the Hitman 2 system would be great, I think it was a bit too unforgiving at times, like people would see through your disguise almost instantly if you started running for example.
Contracts is my favourite Hitman game i think, there's something about the vibe of it that i really loved. It felt dark and real.
Aside from a few game mechanics and the Battle Nuns being a huge disappointment in Absolution, I would say it's a good game when it stands alone from the others.
I kind of preferred Absolution's system to be fair, it made a lot of sense. If I was a security guard stationed at a hotel, I'd probably know what the other guards looked like. On the other hand, I'd probably not really take note of who the janitor is.
[QUOTE=No Party Hats;43564715]I kind of preferred Absolution's system to be fair, it made a lot of sense. If I was a security guard stationed at a hotel, I'd probably know what the other guards looked like. On the other hand, I'd probably not really take note of who the janitor is.[/QUOTE]
It made a lot of sense in some areas and absolutely none in others (would you run to the cops if you saw a new stall vendor in this big Chinese marketplace?) . That's why I liked the Hitman 2 system, it was level and disguise specific.
[quote]We’ve adopted an open, non-linear level design approach to the game, ensuring the game will play out across huge, checkpoint-free, sandbox levels.[/quote]
Sheeet nigga, that's all you had to say. ALL OF MY MONEY
While Blood Money's disguise system was pretty broken, it was WAY less broken than Absolution.
[QUOTE=RautaPalli;43564306]I thought Hitman 2 had a really good system. It was basically a mix of Absolution and Blood Money. Whether people could see through your disguise or not was level specific. Like in this small mansion level if you disguise as a guard other guards will quickly see through it if you go too close since all the guards know each other. Meanwhile in the next level there are lots of Russian soldiers walking around and disguising as one works since they don't all know each other.
With some small tweaking the Hitman 2 system would be great, I think it was a bit too unforgiving at times, like people would see through your disguise almost instantly if you started running for example.[/QUOTE]
Sadly the game doesn't tell you any of that which, if it did, I probably would've finished Hitman 2.
I mean even the first level with the italian guy you need to kill was way too hard for me because jesus christ
[QUOTE=Jojje;43566214]Sadly the game doesn't tell you any of that which, if it did, I probably would've finished Hitman 2.
I mean even the first level with the italian guy you need to kill was way too hard for me because jesus christ[/QUOTE]
Yeah I have a lot of trouble with Hitman 2, because you can't jog without blowing your disguise and it is quite hard going from Blood Money to the older games.
Is Mr. Swing King back?
No deal if otherwise.
[QUOTE=Bread_Baron;43561812]You could hide bodies where nobody would notice too, if I recall correctly. I wasn't fond of some changes (instinct and such) but it was a great game in its own regard. It gets too much blame for not being Blood Money 2, but the later levels were actually really fun and well designed. Absolution may not have been the best Hitman but it was a solid game past the first few poor levels.[/QUOTE]
Yeah I agree. Absolution's more free-form Blood-Money style assassination levels were very awesome, even considering the annoying disguise mechanic. And the level design was pretty varied and good throughout the game too.
The problem was there were equal amounts of "escape" style missions which were awful for the kind of game that Hitman is, that involve no assassin business at all, and often relied on you sneaking around. And a handful of the assassination missions, especially late game, required you to take a mostly-linear path to get to the room your target was in, in which you did some cutscene or only had one option. These levels were by far the weakest in the game from a design standpoint.
But again that said the game is totally worth buying on sale. Even some of the non-assassiny missions were cool (I loved the whole barfight scene you start) and the game does some awesome stuff. Its clear that the devs behind it have some serious skill and talent at doing what they do, they just decided to focus the design of the game away from straight up assassination missions which was probably not the wisest of design goals to have for the game.
I recently started playing Absolution, and the disguises bothered the shit out of me. Is this really how it works? I thought I was just doing something wrong.
You can't walk within a square mile of another human being without them noticing you're not really who you're pretending you are.
I was playing on the hardest difficulty sub-Purist, because I needed to actually get the tutorial and shit, so I had access to Instinct. This it turned out was all but necessary to actually use any disguises.
For such a feature they promised wasn't necessary, it seems pretty god damn necessary. What if I was on purist? Would I then have to just never ever be seen by another person wearing my outfit ever?
It feels like a response to the long amount of pointing and laughing at 47 being the most obviously disguised person in the universe, but it just teaches us that we certainly don't want it to be treated realistically. There needs to be a balance between the two.
As it stands, you might as well never take off the damn suit.
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