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| war
220th Post
 
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|  "Siren 2 [old]" , posted Mon 25 Sep 10:55
So what were people's thoughts on it?
I remembered some good topics about the first one that were posted here before and didn't see any topics on Siren 2 in the archives (although the fake ff12 hate thread was pretty awesome.) I might have missed one though....?
As for my own thoughts (which are usually required to start up a thread on nearly 2 to 4 month old game):
I didn't like it, because I am bitter and stupid and wasted around 315 dollars just to play it. More on that at the bottom as for the game itself and much rambling……
Ikuko's voice was 
First time booting the game up…. Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker (sorry for the early name drop haha) the game. Pretentious pant tightening and all that. Especially once you head up the ramp from the docks and into the old mining complex. I pretty much spent 15 minutes just examining everything with the first person camera. All the tiny little details and debris, etc. So good, no great first impression. The type of first impression that makes you waste $315.
But then...... TOO MANY GODDAMN GUNS! Some of the levels felt like you were playing Half-Life 2 or one of those generic World War 2 sims that come out five times a year. The dilapidated environment full of shit loads of tiny little details like abandoned children's toys and half-washed dishes were still there. Only problem is half the time you were dealing with those fucking infinite spawning worms, or were kicking down doors like Rambo and filling yamabito's full of lead. In fact, excepting a couple of missions, the entire game had a much more frantic, gung-ho feeling then the first. Even in the levels where you were clearly outgunned (Abe) or couldn't equip the ten thousand assault rifles the yamabito were carrying around, I always charged around like an idiot until I memorized the patrol routes and never really had any serious problems even on hard. Not that that's a huge problem, something different is always great, but the environments were just asking to be hidden in. So I could have more time to check the garbage on the floor until the patrol passed, ofc. Speaking of Abe, did anyone else actually use the hunting traps or washers/bolts? I never used them on normal and always ended up killing myself with them on hard.
As for other things I want to complain about, too many columns in the grid were used up characters with only one or two minor scenes, the link navigator spoiled too many second mission objectives (turn it off turn it off, play on hard play on hard), blah blah blah. Only 2600 in game hours made it feel like there wasn't enough character development beyond the ugly moetaku and Nagai. Or maybe depth was there, but I just ignored some of it because of Ikuko’s whiny voice and tsundere personality 
As for the story, as it's the only reason I played the first one all the way through besides the excellent difficulty:
Spoiler (Highlight to view) -
Mother was introduced waaaayyy too early.
No likable monsters like Miyatan.
Too many loose ends in general.
Otoshigo’s role is either too simple or requires too much Lovecraft lore to decipher.
Tower blowing up suddenly? (was this Abe? I heard something about a time attack reward resolving this.)
The light around 1400-1600 hours, I don't remember exactly. That being completely unresolved made me feel like typing up a useless petition to Toyoma like any proper American fanboy would.
It really pisses me off when people compare the second game to the first, especially with games like Siren.....BUT, I liked how the first Siren game threw all those folklore red herrings up until the very end. And all the "what the fuck" moments were at least pleasantly silly like the nun returning the god's head from the future. Siren 2, not so much.
FIRE THE TWIN WRITERS NO MORE TWINS FOR CHRISAKES
End of Spoiler
Errr, I can't think of anything more to write that wouldn't be excessively negative. I really liked the music though.......
Anyway, sorry to waste your time with this long a post with no crappy Pierre Takei-tan AA at the end. Hell, was that even the name of Misawa's model? I know he had a western first name but I forget.
Commence bitching about wasting money on getting the game up and running with no one to blame but myself for the costs incurred:
Spoiler (Highlight to view) -
First off I made the mistake of buying the PAL version blindly. So $65 dollars to start things off. First disappointment: No 50/60 selector. Not horrible, but a bit of inconvieance, I heard the first Siren had some issues with the feature in its Europe release. So I have to get a PAL TV. Problem is only TV I own that can display PAL is currently ferreted away in my sister's apartment and she refused to give it up.
So because I'm a cheap ass, I rip the game, patch it with a NTSC to PAL video switcher and some sort of shit to prevent a vertical roll. Then after two days of fiddling with the mod chip/game rip I've forgotten how to use with HD Loader, I finally get the game on my hard drive. But, of course, there's a but, damn game is dual layer and crashes after the first mission. So I fiddle with it some more for another week, only to find out the NTSC patch doesn't work properly with dual layer games and it crashes during all the cut scenes.
Around this time my ps2 dies during the Nth alternatively patched disk version being installed. Sparks, near carpet fire, etc. $200 down the drain. @%#@ it all and all that, so I just buy a knockoff VGA box for $50, and two weeks after buying the game, finally get down to actually playing it. I probably should have done this the second I found out it didn't have a selector, but eh, I’m cheap.
End of Spoiler
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| Iggy 7923th Post
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| "Re(1):Siren 2 [old]" , posted Mon 25 Sep 20:56
Waoh... Too bad you went through all that (expensive) trouble just for it, now I feel bad for not saying enough here how much I hate the game.
But yeah, Siren 2 just sucked. They improved the "game" part because of all the western people who found the game too compicated, too rigid, and oh god you have to push two buttons to get in the car, and then they rapped everything else.
The characters suck, the scenario suck, the new enemies (yamibito) suck AND they make the shibito suck, the dialogues suck, the general theme sucks, the evil persons suck, the general feeling suck, and every map has a dozen of military zombies with machine guns that aren't even as intimidating as just any peasant with a 50 years old rifle from the first game.
So, yeah, now the "game" part is enjoyable. But if I wanted to play a gamey game with zombies, I'd go to Bio Hazard 4. Siren 2 has nothing to take it appart from any of the tired survival horrors we've seen since the first BH.
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| war
225th Post
Frequent Customer
| "Re(2):Siren 2 [old]" , posted Tue 26 Sep 02:12:
quote:
Waoh... Too bad you went through all that (expensive) trouble just for it, now I feel bad for not saying enough here how much I hate the game.
Nah, I still would have bought it. Things I read elsewhere (from non-gamefaqs posters, mind you) made the game sound like "more of the same" which = compulsive buy. At least the PAL version had Japanese dialogue.
quote:
But yeah, Siren 2 just sucked. They improved the "game" part because of all the western people who found the game too compicated, too rigid, and oh god you have to push two buttons to get in the car, and then they rapped everything else.
I actually had a written a long rant about the newbie friendly atmosphere the UI had this time around. I took it out of my post because it felt too mean for some reason. Also it seems kind of petty complaining about such a small (but large haha) part of the game I completed back at the beginning of August. But, yeah friendly orange buttons popping up everytime you pass by something that could possibly help you. Also, like you said, you no longer have the idiot "HAVE YOU READ THE MANUAL" test of getting into the car, instead, you have firearms training with Lord Misawa. Who happens to be the only part of the game I liked. I wish you could play more as him yamabito-fied. and inflict jealous revenge on Nagai for not accepting his stern, manly friendship.
[this message was edited by war on Tue 26 Sep 02:17] |
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