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Post by Xeogred on Apr 6, 2024 22:00:12 GMT -5
Last night I felt like playing a PS3 game, as it's been four years since I last beat a PS3 game. Also felt like playing an FPS. So looked through my PS3 library for FPS games. I first fired up Haze. Made it about 20 minutes. Haze is abysmal, terrible... I understand why it put Free Radical out of business now. To the sell pile it went. Then I fired up Killzone, as in the original 2004 entry, by way of the Killzone Trilogy PS3 collection. Well it's kinda generic, but was better than Haze, so I finished a few missions. I may stick with it and finish it off, but compared to other 2004 FPS games like Far Cry, The Chronicles of Riddick, DOOM 3, Half-Life 2, Metroid Prime 2, Halo 2... Killzone is not particularly impressive for its time. Also made more progress in Gears of War 3 this evening. In a shooter mood lately apparently. Yeah, I remember Haze getting slammed a lot when it came out. Never looked great.
Any remastering done to Killzone 1? That game was kind of comical on the PS2, they were pushing the hardware too hard. I remember glitches out the wazoo, like dropships clipping through the floor and stuff. I thought 2-3 were pretty decent and leagues better than Resistance (didn't care to play those sequels). But yeah, wouldn't really eyeball the PS3 much for exclusive quality FPS's.
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Post by Ex on Apr 6, 2024 22:17:59 GMT -5
They call Killzone "remastered" on PS3, but it just runs at 720p up'res'd a bit, and I guess the framerate is better (hovers around 30fps). It still looks like a PS2 game by and large. I have beaten games in the Killzone and Resistance franchises before, both on handheld: But not on console (yet). I own the Resistance collection for PS3 also.
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Post by Ziggy on Apr 7, 2024 8:49:48 GMT -5
That's funny. I just turned on my PS3 for the first time in a long time and noticed that I had purchased the Killzone remaster from PSN. I completely forgot that I had it. So it isn't a very worthwhile port over the PS2 original?
I've actually been playing the Medal of Honor Frontline PS3 remaster these past few days. It's in 720p, but it looks like all of the textures were actually redone for the higher resolution. It's in widescreen, which is a nice bonus. And they added a more modern controller scheme along with "iron sights" (looking down the sights of your gun, which wasn't present in the original release of the game). So I would say this is a proper remaster. Although it's not without it's problems. There's constant screen tearing. And the audio is a little buggy. You can hear footsteps when you shouldn't. And one level, the music would cut out and stay off for the rest of the level.
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Post by Ex on Apr 7, 2024 20:58:50 GMT -5
So it isn't a very worthwhile port over the PS2 original? The PS3 "HD" version of Killzone is better looking than the PS2 original, in that it runs in a higher resolution, is adapted to 16:9 aspect ratio, and has a more consistent framerate. But it's not a full blown remake or anything like that. >I've actually been playing the Medal of Honor Frontline PS3 remaster I didn't know that existed. I beat the original Frontline many years ago on PS2. Only thing I really remember about it was the beach landing scene, they did a good job on that. In that series I've beaten Medal of Honor, Medal of Honor Underground, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, Medal of Honor: Frontline and Medal of Honor: Rising Sun. Of those, I'd say Allied Assault was the best.
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Post by Ex on Apr 8, 2024 11:36:48 GMT -5
Put more time into Killzone HD on PS3 last night. I remember when this game was originally being hyped, Sony marketing portrayed it as a "Halo killer". The actual end product isn't close to that. I'm not a big Halo guy, but I'll readily admit Killzone 1 isn't even that decent. If I had to describe Killzone in one word it would be "generic", in two "aggressively mediocre", in three "devoid of originality". And yet I'm still playing it, and intend to finish it, and I'll explain why. Killzone as a franchise consists of:
2004 Killzone (PS2) 2006 Killzone Liberation (PSP) 2009 Killzone 2 (PS3) 2011 Killzone 3 (PS3) 2013 Killzone Mercenary (Vita) 2013 Killzone Shadow Fall (PS4) Out of those six games, the only I've beaten so far is Mercenary, and it was quite good. That said, fans of this series generally agree that it didn't get good until Killzone 2. As an FPS aficionado, who has beaten very many FPS entries, I've had backburner interest in this series for years. But with series I like to start with the beginning and move forward when possible. The only reason I played Mercenary out of order, was because I wanted to play a quality exclusive on my Vita. So now I've got that mental block where, I'd like to finish (the middling) KZ1 before moving on to (the presumably much better) KZ2 and its sequels. Yes this is some sort of logical fallacy, but the urge remains. Hate to skip that first step up the stairs.
So at this point I'm about 1/3rd through KZ1's campaign. I'd say this is a 2004 FPS that feels like a 2000 FPS. It's nowhere near the quality level of its 2004 FPS peers. These days in our modern era of game design stagnation, four years hardly matters. But back in the early 00s FPS games were going through leaps and bounds in design evolution every single year. That's why a 2004 FPS that feels like a 2000 FPS is definitely a detriment. The developers were more focused on impressive PS2 graphics versus impressive FPS game design. This is the FPS equivalent of eating stale white bread over and over. Of the hundreds of enemies I've killed so far, 99% have been that same generic trooper in the screenshot above. As one example. And yet I've got that niggling feeling... gotta finish #1 before continuing to #2.
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Post by Sarge on Apr 8, 2024 14:20:48 GMT -5
I mean... for the PS2, it was actually pretty impressive, though. That's not exactly a system that was known for great FPS games like the XBOX was, and it was visually quite excellent. But the little time I put into it doesn't dissuade me from the same opinion - it's acceptable, but certainly no Halo-killer.
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Post by Ex on Apr 8, 2024 16:20:23 GMT -5
I mean... for the PS2, it was actually pretty impressive, though. KZ1 was fairly technically impressive for PS2, but its art direction is bland city. If you want to play an PS2 FPS game that both looks better and is incredibly funner than Killzone, check out Black. >That's not exactly a system that was known for great FPS games like the XBOX was The PS2 didn't have as many great FPS games as Xbox, but the PS2 still had plenty to chose from.
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Post by Ziggy on Apr 8, 2024 19:17:32 GMT -5
I was just going to say, Black is fantastic. I picked up a copy at the tail end of the PS2 era, but I only played a level or two because I was pretty burnt out on FPS at the time. But I finally gave it a go about a year ago, and I was very happily surprised with it. It felt more like a 7th gen game. Just about my only complaint is that it was a little on the short side. The game Bodycount (PS3/360) is a spiritual successor to Black, it was made by the same devs. I picked up a copy but I haven't tried it yet. I have high hopes for it, but critics didn't review it well at the time.
I owned a PS2 during the 6th gen. Briefly I had a Gamecube at the time, but not an Xbox. FPS made up about half of the games I played on the PS2. Aside from Halo, what other FPS games were exclusive and massive hits on the Xbox?
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Post by Xeogred on Apr 8, 2024 19:51:24 GMT -5
In the Xbox days I still didn't have much of a family PC to work with, so it was my main driver for all the cool ports it got. I'd like to boot up the Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 again someday for curiosity sake, it's kind of crazy they got those on there. Deus Ex Invisible War and Thief Deadly Shadows too, although nowadays I kind of take issue with those versions haha. Those games were clearly designed with the Xbox in mind first (tons of videos/documentation to verify this nowadays too straight from Harvey Smith himself and stuff), so the levels aren't nearly as big as they were in the older Thief games and Deus Ex. Mace Griffin: Bounty Hunter is a cool one I really enjoyed and harder to get on PC nowadays.
Despite FPS's consistently being one of my favorite genres over the years, it's not one that ages very well on consoles to me. Mostly due entirely to performance/resolution, framerates, and the dreaded FOV... yeah I've gotten real picky about that. Some of them like Killzone 2 would probably make me wanna lose my lunch now. Hate that weird zoomed in look lol.
But yeah most 90's/2000's PC FPS's have aged gracefully to me. As long as I can smooth those things out, still a great time to me. It wasn't until the 2010's when I finally hit up the Thief games, Unreal Gold, System Shock 2, etc. And I still like to revisit this stuff and do runs through Deus Ex again and again.
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Post by Ziggy on Apr 8, 2024 20:19:06 GMT -5
Ah, right. I forgot that the Xbox got those PC ports. That must have been very impressive at the time. Although that was lost on me, I didn't care since I didn't have an Xbox and I was aiming to play those games on PC anyway. Although at that time I struggled to play many PC games on my underpowered computer.
I've been slowly getting back into FPS's. I played so much DOOM, and then Turok and Goldeneye on the N64 (especially Goldeneye). When I got a PS2, I proclaimed that FPS was my favorite video game genre. I played so many that I eventually got bored with them. I remember when Call of Duty 4 came out, it was all the rage, but I just found it boring. During the 7th gen, I didn't play many FPS's. I really liked Bioshock 1 and 2, and I had a lot of fun with the Goldeneye remake on Wii, but that was about it. It wasn't until recently that I'm starting to like them again. I've been having fun occasionally replaying an old favorite as well as trying new ones.
One thing that holds me back from really jumping from game to game (console FPS's, I mean) is the controls. I don't know how I did it back in the day, but I find myself fumbling with controls these days. I mean, I can get use to the button mapping of a game after a while. But then after I complete the game and move on to another FPS, if it has a different controller scheme I feel like I can't adjust easily to it. Like I have to take some time off and circle back to it.
Some PC FPS's haven't aged all too well. I recently booted up Medal of Honor Allied Assault and I was kinda bummed how clunky it feels.
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