Mature gameplay and thin stories, and those fancy bugs.
In order to create a more realistic "parkour" effect, they recruited one of the founders of the "parkour" movement, David Bell, who has the title of "father of parkour", as the action director of the game. But even so, it is still not an easy task to make the "parkour" process "fun" in the first person -
That's one of the things that impressed me the most in my last interview with Gone With a Glow 2 and its production team, Techland. The success of the original game gave the Polish a deep understanding of where their strengths lay. It's just that trying to transcend your past self is never an easy task.
Fading Light 2: The Battle of Man and Benevolence
Whatever your opinion on this game based on "moving" and crazy stacking gameplay, it is probably difficult to deny that it is indeed the most unique work of its kind at present. After all, game manufacturers, for the "first-person parkour" gameplay exploration, as early as a decade ago, but finally really found their own path, but really only a few.
During the Spring Festival holiday, I got the early play qualification of "Fading Light 2" from Techland, because I had a good game experience in the earlier trial activities, so I had great expectations for the official version of the game, but what I did not expect was that this expectation was repelled by various strange bugs in the early days of the game. In order to give a truly appropriate and objective evaluation of the actual quality of the game, the actual experience of the game must not be postponed until years later, that is, after the first day of the patch update.
This review is for the version of the game after the first day of the update. As a result, I didn't encounter a bad bug like "bad gear".
To be honest, "fun" or "fun" is my first thought about Gone With the Wind 2: The Battle of Man and Humanity. Climbing and jumping between buildings, flexible combat derived from the protagonist's flexible action, when the two are combined, the rapid reaction mechanism and high-paced action that are born - these have been proven mature gameplay in the first generation of works, and naturally there are many in this work. And, as Techland said in previous campaigns, they further tweaked the speed, gravity, and other parts of the character's movement in the original generation, allowing players to run more fluidly (at least most of the time).
But for this part, I really don't want to repeat it. First, since the release of the game, the same content expression has been publicized, and I don't know how many times; second, it is because these things were originally taken by a generation. To put it bluntly, people who like the first generation of gameplay will most likely not hate the second generation.
So I want to talk about things that are different from the previous ones.
When players enter the game soon, they will find that although this game fully inherits the advantages of the original generation, it is somewhat "catching up with the trend" in many key designs. For example, like many of today's "open world games", strengthen the growth and numerical weight of RPGs; for example, rely on some inexplicable elements to pile up the gameplay until it is full.
Of course, I want to talk about more than just the fact that the enemy has a blood bar on his head
As seen in the previous demo, Fading Light 2: The Battle of Man and Ren adds a "stamina" limit to the player's climbing. Each climb will continue to consume the stamina slot in the center of the screen, and once the stamina slot is exhausted, the protagonist will fall from the building. The stamina consumed by climbing and fighting forces players to make faster action decisions while climbing buildings. Although this change is very reasonable from the design level, it inevitably brings a lot of pressure to players who want to enjoy the climbing experience in the early stages of the game.
In addition to "stamina", the "immunity" mechanism is also an important embodiment of the RPG elements of this game. As a "hapless egg" who was infected shortly after the opening, the protagonist of this game, Aiden, has the fatal characteristics of "no physical strength" and "low immunity to viruses" at the beginning of the game. If the player stays indoors without light, or outdoors at night for more than a certain period of time, the protagonist will usher in the doom of "transformation".
Whether you want to strengthen your nighttime immunity or increase the stamina needed in combat and parkour, you need to find an upgrade called "inhibitor". Because "inhibitors" are mostly hidden in the most dangerous or plot points in the map, it also makes them one of the most precious collections for players when exploring the world.
How many inhibitors are collected will largely determine the player's game pace
In terms of player skill growth, Techland has adopted the same set of "more and more mature" design as the original generation, encouraging players to make more use of the game's combat and parkour mechanics. However, in the division of skill types and panels, this game has made a considerable degree of optimization.
After deleting the "survivor skills" such as "picking up garbage" and "making props" in the previous game, the initial skill ability of the protagonist of this game has been improved to a certain extent. Whether it's collecting items to craft on the go, or perceiving abilities similar to "perspective scanning", there is no need for additional learning. The really important "combat" and "parkour" skill trees have also been streamlined to a certain extent. Although this streamlining does not change the growth rhythm of the character, it helps players to reduce their understanding of the skill derivation relationship to a certain extent.
From a UI point of view, the arrangement of skill trees in this game is more reasonable and intuitive
The larger proportion of RPGs naturally leads to a stronger character growth experience. At the same time as the character's ability grows, similar to the "health bar" on the enemy's head, the huge and conspicuous value or effect entry on the equipment are all very reasonable ability detection modes. I know that for some players who have traditional FPS game feelings, these visual elements from the outside will affect the player's sense of substitution in the game, but in general, this "catch-up" is still a low-cost high-return, or "simple and easy to use" logic.
But then again, although there is no problem in the gameplay and mechanics, after being put into the game flow, this amplified RPG gameplay will still bring some rhythm and experience "violation" to players who have played the previous game.
Having said that, let's break down the whole of Gone With the Wind 2: The Battle of Man and Benevolence into three parts for its analysis. As Techland said in the promotion, the story of this work takes place twenty years after the outbreak of the first virus, and the protagonist "Aiden" in order to "avenge", in order to find his sister who was lost in childhood, traveled thousands of miles to the city "Villedo", known as the "last fortress of mankind".
Then, when the game is split into three parts, they represent the import, exploration, and final ending. The impact of RPG elements is also the strongest in the import part of the tutorial.
It is true that when the protagonist first arrives at "Villedo", the player needs to learn from the basic operation, to the rules of the world and advanced mechanics, etc., but the whole "import" gives people the actual physical feeling is a little too long. It's not that this process takes a long time, but because under the influence of the growth factors such as "stamina" and "immunity" mentioned in the above paragraph, players will have to experience a slow-paced opening of "fear of heights" and "fear of darkness", which will somewhat make players in the previous game feel a little uncomfortable - although this "opening slow pace" itself is also familiar to most RPGs.
Thankfully, although the "cool spot" of Vanishing Light 2: The Battle of Man and Ren came a little later. But in the degree of "refreshing", it is no less than the original.
In the import part of the game, Aiden is left in Villedo's "Old Town". The positioning here is somewhat similar to the original "Haran City Slum", from the architectural style to the arrangement of the streets and alleys, there is a strong European style. Because the houses are generally shorter and more compact, players can travel up and down without any worries, the overall depth of the map is weaker, and the gameplay is more traditional.
But as the story progresses, Aiden arrives at Villedo's "central district," home to a cluster of modern skyscrapers, a large powerhouse that powers the city, and even a towering signal tower that sends waves to survivors. These new elements make the usual parkour tricks no longer universal. In turn, players will be given "gliders" and "hook locks" that can quickly shuttle between buildings, and with proficiency in the "updraft" from ground and air-conditioned outdoor units, players will be able to explore deeply between buildings in a mode that has never been seen before. Just don't think about the unreasonable "updraft" and the stamina that is consumed all the time, this process will definitely make you think of Villedo as a giant parkour playground – not to mention how cool it is to give a flying kick to an enemy standing on the edge of a skyscraper.
If you are skilled, paragliding can be used in conjunction with parkour skills
Since we want to talk about the gameplay, it is difficult not to mention the changes to the day and night system in "Gone With The Light 2: The Battle of Man and Ren".
I believe that as long as the players who have played the original game have more or less some impressions of those "night devils" haunting nights. In order to better shape the game world, but also to enhance the depth of play in the middle and late stages, the original Techland designed two sets of zombie ecology for the game day and night: the day when the risk is low and easy to explore, and the night when the risk is extremely high is suitable for serving the plot.
These two sets of ecology are naturally integrated into the second generation, and the makers have also made a large degree of enhancement on the basis of night play, hoping to ensure that players will actively go out to explore even at night. The way it is used, including a large number of "night missions", high-reward "night nests" and "boss battles", etc., as long as the player is willing, not sleeping all night does not seem to cause any major problems.
But the problem is that under this new night ecology, although players can do a lot more at night, they have less of the nervousness of being chased by madness in the past. Even if the alarm of an infected person is triggered, all that is done is to flee to the nearest human building, and the presence of the terrifying monster "Night Devil" is greatly reduced.
The reward for winning it is an "inhibitor"
While there are some elements that don't satisfy everyone, overall, The Lost Light 2: The Battle of Man and Ren is absolutely qualified. Most of the time, shuttling between rooftops and fighting enemies is enough fun for me —really, except for some power plant puzzle tasks that force me to find switches in the dark, or the load mechanism of those automatic windmills is a bit outrageous, you really can't pick out anything big.
But if you talk about the story of this work, you can't find any advantages.
In an earlier interview with Techland, we talked about the "plot" part of Gone With the Wind 2: The Battle for Man and Ren, and the subtitle "Stay Human" is the key to everything. Because the story takes place in a world similar to the "post-apocalypse", the existence of "zombies" is not too much of a problem. Therefore, the story of this work focuses more on the conflict of ideas between the two groups of human beings, and how the protagonist maintains humanity between selfish desires and human survival. According to them, every choice a player makes will bring a different gaming experience to the player.
Key decisions like these are extremely common in games
The reality is that, as they say, the plot is filled with a lot of "moral dilemmas." Aiden always needs to choose one of the vigilantes who advocate "order" and the survivors who advocate "freedom"—even if they know which side may not be a good person.
But as a coherent story, there really isn't much logic between these so-called moral choices. This is not only because the player can control the protagonist to make the opposite choice at any time, but also because these seemingly far-reaching choices do not fundamentally change the key direction of the plot. Even if the player betrays many times, or even attacks a certain faction, it will not bring too much problem to the subsequent cooperation between the two. And those who choose limbs will eventually change, which is basically the infrastructure in the city.
The so-called "allocation of resources" is more like two additional skill trees, except that it does not act on the characters themselves
More crucially, from the beginning of the story to the end, the protagonist "Aiden" is like a "faceless" person. It's not that he really doesn't have facial modeling, it's just that his character and story are a little too thin compared to his purpose of "revenge" and the painful memories that appear frequently in the prologue. This is even worse than the most illogically speaking villain characters in the show.
No matter what kind of request he faces, Aiden will always choose to nod at the end. He is more like a warm-hearted neighbor youth than a "wanderer" who has survived alone from the end times. What's even more outrageous is that after blowing up so many zombies and bandits' heads, he even feels sick to the stomach of a piece of human skin...
Some of the NPCs in the story are also really owed
Finally, let's go back to the game itself and talk about bugs. I really haven't seen the vicious bugs that go viral on the Internet, but if you want to say that the game has no bugs, the answer is yes. While most of them are innocuous issues like "stuck walls," "NPC pathfinder errors," or "T-poses," and are commonplace for "open world games." The epidemic and some internal factors that we do not know have obviously had a considerable impact on the quality of the game's final product. If you do have some quality pursuits for this game, then maybe now is not the best time to start, but regardless of the outcome —
Flying kicks are very cool.
After I gave him a flying kick