Splinter Cell Conviction

[CurdyMilk]

It comes out tomorrow on XBOX 360!!!  I can't wait!  I have the game pre-order too.  Hopefully the game can keep me busy until the PS beta.  :P

[YaYz0r]

Hopefully the game can keep me busy until the PS beta.  :P

Haha, as if that would be possible.

[LoChang]

No PC demo.

[AgentX_003]

well you can officially call it the bullet that killed the series .

[Farley4Fan]

I can not tell you how absolutely horrible this demo was.

I really can't.

But I'd still like to say some things that happened in the demo. 

The demo opens with the same interrogation we've seen multiple times.  I thought it would be fun.  It was not.  There were only like 3 things you could interact with.  The sink, the toilet, and the bathroom stall doors.

The very first box I tried to jump over (it was during the tutorial moment) Sam goes through the floor and falls through the map.  Yay, a glitch in the first 5 feet.  As Sam fell and the map got smaller I couldn't help but notice the symbolism.  The game is a failure.

There were only TWO ways, count them - two, to get into a generic warehouse and Ubisoft said there would be "multiple" ways.  Well, they didn't lie.  Mini Sandbox, they say.  It's mini mini mini.  Even the corridors inside the generic warehouse were tight and restricting other than the main room.

There were a couple times when I thought I was fine and hidden.  The screen was black and white.  Then all of a sudden Sam was not black and white anymore, and the enemies fire at me.  Luckily, Sam can absorb bullets and return them with ease.  Even though I should have been shot dead (normal mode) I killed everyone and regenerated health quickly after.  No punishment from what I can tell.

There is no designated jump button anymore.  It's only contextual button presses even for climbing pipes.  (Yikes)

The game just feels cheap.  Kind of like an open world game except it's not an open world game.  Ever play Mercenaries, Just Cause, or even GTA?  Feels like that.  Sam moves WAYYYY too fast.  The movement is just, off.  Animations are ugly.  Graphics are pretty bleh - amazingly, the old conviction looked better. 

Sam can throw enemies at least 10 feet no problem.

I heard Sam speak like one time other than in the interrogation scene.  Minimal Ironside you guys  >:(

The gunplay was bad.  The guns sounded like airsoft guns and the aiming system was terrible.

Mark and execute was as bad as it sounds.  Luckily, you don't have to use it.  Unluckily, the maps are designed so that you use it. 

The demo ended with a cheesy cutscene.  You are chasing a guy for some reason during the demo, no name or anything, and he holds a scientist hostage (how original).  Then the camera zooms in on his face.  His face goes "uh oh" and then the screen is filled with an incredibly cheesy blood effect ala James Bond.

This is just the tip of the iceberg.  I'm serious.

Remember back when I was kind of excited?  I thought it might be fun to play, a good rent, 10 dollar ticket for the story.  No no no no no no.  Wrong wrong wrong.  I'm glad I did not get my hopes up just to be heart broken.

I'd like to end this with a quote I saw on gametrailers.com.

I'm no fan of the Splinter Cell genre, but after playing the demo I can't wait to play the full game.

Get Project Stealth done right and quick.  Please. :-[

[frvge]

Check back soon for new stuff.

[VaNilla]

I got the demo about 3 hours ago and I disagree with FarleyFan on almost every level, full stealth walk-through uploading as we speak :).

[Farley4Fan]

Oh yeah, I forgot to say, you CAN go *kind of* full stealth.  However, the stealth that is there is just the same Double Agent red light green light stop go bullcrap.  I can't for the life of me figure out why the removed the sound meter and light meter.  Still haven't really figured out if the enemies can EVEN HEAR YOU.  The only reason I can think of is making the game more accessible, but how friggin hard is it to pay attention to your meter?

Further more, while in the dark, you can't see jack shit.  It goes black and white and makes it miles harder to tell where you can and can't stay hidden.  As I said before, I've seemingly been walking in the shadows and then suddenly became visible to all.  If there were a meter, I'd be able to tell if I was gradually becoming easier to see.  But alas there's not even a street light on your back ala DA.

Same ole garbage AI, btw.  There is a part where guards are scripted to guard an entrance and there is another guy in the room they are guarding.  You can go in above them.  I did.  I pushed the left trigger to jump on someone (yeah, it's that easy) and knocked him out.  I took cover.  One of the guys guarding the entrance looked at him and said "Shit!" and went back to guarding the door that I obviously did not come through.

[Spark Mandriller]

The very first box I tried to jump over (it was during the tutorial moment) Sam goes through the floor and falls through the map.

ahahahahaha

[Farley4Fan]

I swear.  It happened.  I fell through the first box in the game.  I was like WTFacepalm...

[VaNilla]

Still processing, but you can watch it here :).

So, what are the problems with this game? Let's start with the AI. Despite being a vast improvement on other games in the series, it's still orientated towards finding stealth players, in a fire-fight they're useless. This a problem because as we've known since E3, Conviction has been modelled around the use of Mark & Execute. This makes it pretty difficult to play the game with full stealth until you have played through and learned the map, other games in the series had better support for stealth through the level design, and as such never used to be a problem. The controls are mainly great, but there are few problems. Reloading is assigned to the analogue stick button, and crouching is assigned to the left bumper, making it really annoying to co-ordinate your actions. I personally prefer the controls of Chaos Theory, but this is almost as responsive. However, because of this problem I ended up making a lot mistakes during my first play-through. People complain about the removal of whistling but to be honest, I can see see why it was removed, the game would just be so easy had we been given the option to do that. However, the removal of dragging bodies is to put it bluntly, just retarded. You will find many situations during normal play-throughs were guards will spot bodies you have shot and increase their alert status, this wouldn't happen if we could move bodies.

It would also be nice if when you're in the dark, and the black & white filter is applied, to have dark areas significantly darker than light areas. Not only was this a bad idea as we're unable to appreciate the games graphics, it's inaccurate and when the filter is applied, finding dark spots is a guessing game. I had to memorise the dark spots of the map for this play-through or I would have been spotted many many times (as I was on my very first play-through).

I am nitpicking, but the release date is still just under a month away, and most of these problems are relatively simple to resolve. Despite these shortcomings, I loved everything else about the game. It's a lot fun and hits the mark on so many levels, I would be surprised if it were not a contender for the game of a year, Splinter Cell: Conviction is just brilliant.

[Farley4Fan]

Stonecoldkilla, you said it.  Having to memorize the dark spots in the game is fucking retarded.  In previous splinter cells you could FREAKING SEE.  God it's so frustrating!  WHY?

You aren't nitpicking.  That is a major issue.  If it's visually impossible while hidden to tell where you should go next then the light/shadow stealth system is royally effed. 

The removal of the whistle is hardly an issue at all.  I didn't have any problems getting the attention of guards with sticky cams (which, by the way, you now throw instead of shoot - it looks stupid visually).

With a month of time left, there is no way they'll be able to fix half the problems I have with the game.  If I encountered a glitch less than 2 minutes into the game then I can only imagine what other crocks of shit I'll find within a few hours. 

The only people, excluding you ofc stonecold, that enjoy the demo are people who never play stealth games.  I posted a quote earlier in my first rant about the game.  "I've never liked stealth games before, but this one is a real hoot her her har har lololol" Fucking pisses me off dude.

Splinter Cell is dead, as if we all didn't know already.

[Farley4Fan]

Good topic here:

http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums?a=tpc&s=400102&f=5271091065&m=5511048248&r=5511048248#5511048248

*I didn't type it wink wink*
Highlighters at the ready:
you can ban me once or twice but you can't ban me thrice

[CurdyMilk]

Yeah I am neutral up to this point after playing the demo.  The mark and execute idea seems ok, but sometimes I feel like it is the only choice I have.  I would rather use a different option because sometimes it makes it less fun or too easy.  I like the jump down and grab from above option.  My favorite part was being able to shoot wires connected to things above and watch them fall on the guards.  It was too short of a demo to get an accurate assessment of the entire game, however.  The coop mode may be better than the single player.  So far I would say it is better than DA but worse than CT and PT.  It is sad to see the games getting worse in general rather than better.  I have a feeling the series has come to an end with conviction.  My rankings go like this:

1. CT
2. PT
3. Original
4. Conviction
5. DA

Could the shooting of above objects be used in PS?  It is similar to drop boxes but along with switches to drop them you could also use your shocker gun and in a sense "heat the support wire or rope" until it burns open and breaks which causes the box or object to fall.

[Ion.67]

Could the shooting of above objects be used in PS?  It is similar to drop boxes but along with switches to drop them you could also use your shocker gun and in a sense "heat the support wire or rope" until it burns open and breaks which causes the box or object to fall.

I believe traps have been discussed and have been left up to the map maker. It has nothing to do with the core game, instead being a map object.