Be Excellent To Each Other

Whoever decided the fourth mission in should be an irritating-beyond-all-belief escort mission can get to fucking fuck. I lost eight or nine times in a row because the truck I was protecting got wedged into an impromptu road block of multiple bad guys, while I desperately attempted to protect it without being tossed miles away by an errant explosion, fighting the controls to get back. Eventually, it just randomly succeeded when the truck casually drove around the road block on the 10th attempt. I didn't do anything different.

I played JC2 on easy, and felt the game well-suited to this; it becomes an overpowered romp. It's a game that doesn't know how to be challenging without getting irritating IMO. I am most annoyed that JC3 doesn't have difficulty levels.

I'm a fair way in and weirdly have no recollection of that mission

This sounds like a game I could be interested in but I haven't played the first two. Does that matter?

I've not played 3, but I can't imagine not playing the first two would matter. Story and character are not this game's strong suits.

But the fact you haven't played JC2 is negligent in the extreme. Not playing JC1 is excusable because it's actually pretty pap.

I don't think I'm having fun right in this.

I'm about 3 missions from the end and it's all a bit repetitive for my tastes. The missions are alright and they do try and vary what you're expected to do but missions soon get locked behind conditions such as clearing an entire region of enemy occupation. You do this by going into a town and have to smash all the destructibles (a statue, 5 fuel things, a propaganda van, 3 speakers, 4 of this and 3 of that). It starts off alright and you're like "Pew pew pew" but by the 20th town you just smash stuff until a helicopter arrives, hijack it (piece of piss cause they soon fly within grapple distance) and then use the rockets to blow everything up without much effort. Or just rock up in a helicopter.

Repeat and rinse that for every single town on the map and you have a boring gaming cycle. Some bases are so small that I could circle strafe an outpost with rockets and blow it to shit in seconds. Some of the larger installations require more time but if you do manage to die cause you're a spaz the you'll restart outside the installation with all the stuff you've blown up remaining blown up leaving you free to get a helicopter and finish it off.

You "could" however use your tethers, all the different guns, vehicles and what not to destroy a base in the most creative way but where's the incentive when a helicopter will be along any minute? The cheevos perhaps? Well when they're done; they're done (I might be wrong but there's about 10 I think for things such as finishing a base without weapons, and such like). The challenges perhaps? You'll notice a list appear every now and again showing you, say, that you're 10th in a list of your friends for staying in a 5 star wanted rating and a timer is ticking showing you that you've got another minute and you'll grab number 9 spot of Krazywookie or whatever. It's kinda interesting but they don't affect the gaming cycle of smashing towns.

I think the main problem is that I'm playing it in chunks when it's more designed for a quick in and out (title) to maintain the fun factor. If you start looking closely at closely it becomes more of a chore to play.

Anyhoo, occasionally something mental might happen and you'll pull off some wacky stunt by accident...



... before a rocket blows you up.

I've been playing this for a few days now and am generally loving just roaming around the islands freeing up the towns and military installations by blowing shit up. It is repetitive as a few people have mentioned but I like the zen-explosioning of it all. I had almost completely neglected the main missions and spent some time following them last night, which is about where the wheels are likely to come off I reckon. The first few were okay but I've now hit a fucking escort mission. Obviously escort missions are a crime against game design at the best of times, but this is an especially egregious offender because of the unpredictable nature of JC3s physics sandbox. Also, because the game designers hate you, you need to protect two vehicles--one on the ground and one in the air--from the combined assault of various tanks, jeeps, attack helicopters and missile battery emplacements. It's exactly the type of mission I despise and the nature of this makes it the worst example of such so I'm not entirely sure I'm going to bother going any further lest I smash my control pad to bits. I'll give it another couple of shots then probably fuck it off and just go back to freeing all the islands. Once that's done so is the game for me. Which is fine, albeit slightly annoying, because it was 'free' and I've already had loads more fun with it than I ever expected to. Still, I genuinely don't understand why anyone in a modern game dev studio who suggests an escort missions isn't just fired instantly; it's hardly a secret how much pretty much everyone hates this shit.

Agreed. Escort missions are the worst. I can't think of a single one that has been good.

Yeah I gave up on one of those after it checkpointed when the car I was meant to be escorting had a sliver of health left and the loading takes fucking ages.

Jesus, that's even worse than I expected. I know there are checkpoints throughout these missions so I'd assumed they'd be generous and refill the escortees health at each one. Yeah, fuck that noise.

ICO is an alright game and it's basically one long escort mission. It's good despite that, not because of it though.

JC3 is hateful for this. From this very page:

All Ghillied Up.

Good time for a page break.

The thing about ico is that it was designed entirely around being an escorts quest. Most escort missions don't have this focus.

See also: shitty stealth sections in games with no well realised stealth system.

I like splosions.

Aye, I agree in general about ICO, though it was still fucking infuriating in places and I don't really believe that having to dig the useless fucker out of yet another hole actually added much to the game.

Right.

There is literally nothing else to JC.

I did prefer 2, though. This one feels a bit off in comparison... Can't really articulate why but its just a bit meh-ish. The missions are less fun, and the aiming is less intuitive. But lovely lovely splosions.

Why would you put up with mediocre crap, though, even if there's some bits that remind you of something great...

Oh.

If I hadn't virtually rolled my eyes at you there, would you have bothered to come through with that genuinely constructive post? And, if not, why not? I ask out of genuine curiosity.

do you have a bookmark file for everyone for "if he says x, I have y"? You obsessive bastard

Edit - also they ARE empirically ace.

honest answer is I'm posting on a tablet and that drives me towards short posts as I hate typing with these ducking things. If I was on a laptop I'd be typing something linger. Simple as that really.

Fair enough.

Also you scare me

Also fair enough.

No just for this one time

And I will never tire of dunking on you for it

I have no problem with you continually pointing out how right I am.

Do you have to, do you have to, do you have to...

The best gif winner.

https://gfycat.com/CoarseImpeccableAmphibian

Shit a brick!

Let me know when he lands it on the top.

Right? "On the tallest building" my arse

Well, it is; just not "on top of the tallest building".

He ain't impressing me with technically correct.

That will be in the next Fast and Furious movie now.