Splinter Cell (demo) sucks (needs some work)
 

Okay, I've been anticipating this game more and more as the release date has gotten closer. I made numerous trips to get the demo disc from Toys R Us, and finally started playing it tonight with some friends. Well, we all agree: this game blowx0rs.
1) Beautiful graphics, but INSANE clipping. There is way too much "bling bling" in this game, as everything reflects like chrome.
2) There is absolutely nothing to interact with, except for cans and bottles.
3) The wall jump looks retarded.
4) This game cannot revolve around stealth. For instance, I take out the ONLY guard around, hide his body in an alley. There is NO ONE around, as soon as I walk away, "A BODY HAS BEEN FOUND!" and the alarm is sounded. This has happened time and time again.
5) Stealth door opening is utterly useless.
6) Heat vision hasn't even shown up a guard when he was right in front of me, bringing about death.
7) I have unloaded 10+ bullets directly into guards numerous times before they die. This includes multiple head shots.
8) The sound effects suck, really bad. I throw an empty can into a TV, it makes a heavy *THUD* sound. I whack a guy in the head with my gun, it makes a soft *bump* sound.
9) On other occasions, I swing doors open and go running in, guards don't even hear me. I go into a room with two guys at a computer. I take one hostage and he yells, but the other guy doesn't even notice, and keeps typing.
10) Enemy AI is crap. One enemy repeatedly fired at me through bulletproof glass.
11) You can't close doors - they close themselves. You can't pick up a body and open a door. You can't hold your gun and open a door. You can't take ammo from a guard.
12) You can't punch or kick, wtf. If you run out of ammo and can't find a bottle, then you're helpless.
13) Phone ringing, I can't answer it. I shoot it to shut it up - takes 3 point blank shots....

There are plenty more problems with this so far, but I think 13 will suffice for now. I took screenshots and videos of a lot of this crap. MGS is way better than this overhyped crap.

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I have to admit that you bring up some very valid points. I played the demo for the first time tonight & many of the statements you made are right on.

oh my -eek-

I agree. I bought the X-Box in anticipation of this game, but I was disappointed in what I saw at the demo. There was clipping, and the guards were dumb. I stood right in front of one, and he walks right by me. In the same room, I stood right in front of the same guard, and he starts shooting at me. Other times, I'm shoot a guard, and he starts running -- runs past me and does nothing.

I hope the final release will be much better.

It doesn't make sense to compare a demo programmed using older code to a game that is already fully developed and in final form.

Maybe you should rent the full/completed version of the game first instead of making unfair comparisons.

Just a thought.

The demo was just recently released, the game comes out in a week or so. AFAIK, it should be pretty final. A demo is released for play so a person can decide from what they play if they want it or not. From what I played, I am very disappointed in this game; My friends knew nothing of the game before we played it, and they disliked it much more than I did. SC received a lot of hype as the potential MGS Killer. I made 4 one-hour trips to Toys R Us before I finally got my hands on this demo, because of all the great things I had read about it. This was one of the games I was going to base an XBox purchase on. It lived up to nothing except the graphics, and even then, there are major clipping problems and completely pointless shiny surfaces all over the place. Pointless argument, but it does look totally out of place to have everything shining like it was dipped in chrome.
SC could be so much better than this, but as it is, I won't even waste my time or money renting the game. MGS Killer it is not.
P.S. Another thing lacking is personality. Solid Snake has it - Sam Fisher, at least in the demo, has nothing interesting about him.

Re: Splinter Cell sucks
 

You can most definitely punch people to knock them out...did you even try?

Yes I tried. When I was out of ammo, I tried every button and both alt/secondary fire buttons, nothing happened. Best weapons around were bottles and cans, yay.

You have to be standing next to the person you want to hit. Hit the right trigger and your character will throw a punch.

errr... correction... I think you mean " Splinter Cell DEMO sucks "

The proximity of the date of a demo being released and the release date of the game does not mean that it's near final code. The demo was probably submitted to OXM for approval and replication months ago.

You also can't judge the graphics of a game on crappy store demo tvs.

Lastly, you're comparing a finished product (MGS; MGS2) to a demo. It's no question that a finished game is better than a one level demo. It's apples and oranges. Further, how can you judge Sam's character if you haven't seen any cutscenes or played the entire story of the game!?!

Yes the demo does give some insight into the game. But you've prejudged the ENTIRE game based on a demo.

I suggest at least a rental of the FINISHED game before posting something like "SC sucks" A more appropriate thread title should be "SC demo sucks"


*edit* You should check out: http://www.computerandvideogames.com...iews_story.php{que}id=82466

hmm... The demo should be near the completion phase of the game, but it may not be, you never know.

Has anyone else played this demo? This is a game I was watching closely as I to was told it would blow MGS out of the water.

The demo is 3 months old to date. An Ubi-soft dev. posted how long they needed to give it to MS who plans, formats, and supplied this Demo disc to OXM.

I've played the demo and IMO many of your "observations" are caused by a lack of skill thus makes them silly. Let's run through them together.

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1) Beautiful graphics, but INSANE clipping. There is way too much "bling bling" in this game, as everything reflects like chrome.p

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I noticed some clipping, but that can be cleared up before release. As for your aptly named "bling bling", it's called volumetic lighting. It looked great on my TV. Try abjusting the brightness. That might help a little.

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2) There is absolutely nothing to interact with, except for cans and bottles.

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Please look on the packaging again. What you have is called a Demo. A demo doesn't contain everything you will see in the release. Read any preview to see the rest of the objects such as the fire extinguisher, lamps, various peices of furniture, etc.

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3) The wall jump looks retarded.

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Wow the importance of this has definitely changed my mind. :rolleyes:

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4) This game cannot revolve around stealth. For instance, I take out the ONLY guard around, hide his body in an alley. There is NO ONE around, as soon as I walk away, "A BODY HAS BEEN FOUND!" and the alarm is sounded. This has happened time and time again.

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Don't speak harshly about the game just because you can't handle it. Hiding bodies is tough, but very doable. First, knock out any lighting in the area. Second, don't leave the body in an open area. You need a confined space. Third, stay out of view from cameras and general patrols.

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5) Stealth door opening is utterly useless.

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Again, your inablilty to handle an aspect of the game causes you to complain about. The analog door control is easy to use once you get the hang of it. Do you need your hand held with MGS2's radar? I think the challenge is more fun without it.

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6) Heat vision hasn't even shown up a guard when he was right in front of me, bringing about death.

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You have to know when to use heat vision and when not to. It's as simple as that.

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7) I have unloaded 10+ bullets directly into guards numerous times before they die. This includes multiple head shots.p

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Your silenced pistol is only effective at close range since it's designed to be compact, lightweight and doesn't pack much stopping power. You're rewarded for being sneaky and getting extremely close to the victim and dropping him with a headshot, rather than shooting it out down the length of a hallway where your accuracy will be poor at best.

How close were you to the guard? Were you moving at the time?

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8) The sound effects suck, really bad. I throw an empty can into a TV, it makes a heavy *THUD* sound. I whack a guy in the head with my gun, it makes a soft *bump* sound.

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They sounded great on my sound system.

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9) On other occasions, I swing doors open and go running in, guards don't even hear me. I go into a room with two guys at a computer. I take one hostage and he yells, but the other guy doesn't even notice, and keeps typing.

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Sometimes Rambo tactics pay off and the guards are too far away to hear you come in. It's worked for me a couple times too.

As far as the hostage is concerned, I agree they probably need a higher voice alert system in place. Of course, I tried the same thing during 1 run-through, and the other guard turned around.

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10) Enemy AI is crap. One enemy repeatedly fired at me through bulletproof glass.

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Why are you getting fired at in the first place? Use stealth, not confontation.

In any case, AI will hopefully tweaked before launch. The last time I saw firing through bulletproof glass was Max Payne.

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11) You can't close doors - they close themselves. You can't pick up a body and open a door. You can't hold your gun and open a door. You can't take ammo from a guard.

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1. That means I don't have to worry about closing them.
2. Just like Kingsmooth opens up doors while carrying a body every day. It's so easy!
3. Perhaps the developers actually want you to check who is outside instead of busting in guns blazing.
4. The guards actually use different ammo than you. It's realistic.

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12) You can't punch or kick, wtf. If you run out of ammo and can't find a bottle, then you're helpless.

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1. Who are you, Jackie Chan? :D The devlopers want you to avoid guards, not beat them up. Besides, punching and kicking is noisy and attracts guards.

I suppose you are used to the 3 step Solid Snake move to taking out guards. There are other methods than the Solid Snake way.

2. You are not helpless if you didn't get caught in the first place. If you can't handle stealth, go play MGS2 some more. It's easy to hide in that game with it's time-based amnesia induced guards.

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13) Phone ringing, I can't answer it. I shoot it to shut it up - takes 3 point blank shots....

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This seems silly to me. What would you say into the phone? "Solid Snake, I need your help! Come find me. I can't fend for myself. The game is too hard."

You complain about not having enough ammo, yet you waste 3 bullets into a phone.


If you have actual gameplay concerns, that's fine. But if you keep posting skill-based observations, I will chew em up and spit them back out like I did the previous ones.

What about the aiming? Now that's sucks too! I'm agreeing with you that Splinter Cell sucks, maybe just SC Demo sucks....BUT how far off can the demo be? My heart was breaking while playing it, having high hopes that this game would be amazing....I'm left int he dark without night vision.

:lol:

It's so funny that people will say a game sucks based on a demo. While I agree with a few of the things that KingSmoth pointed out, it really sounds very fanboyish to slam a game before it's released.



For someone to say they are not even going to rent this game is pure fanboy bull. This game will be much more than rent worthy.

That being said, I as well as many others have really enjoyed playing the demo regardless of its few shortcomings.

It's very easy to make a poor list of bad points of a game, especially if it's a demo.

-rolleyes-

I think some of the previous posts show that people are not going to believe anything negative about this game until the final version is out...and probably even then won't believe anything negative.

I say everyone just waits a week (few weeks?) until the final game is out and then start the pro/con debate.

Not cool...this guy posted some valid observations/concerns about the demo and he gets flamed hard - and in my opinion personally attacked, which by the DVD Talk forum rules would result in a suspension/ban.

I agree it is a demo, and whether or not the demo build was three months ago or two weeks ago will be under debate until we see the actual final build in the stores.

This forum should be used for educated discussion, not for flame wars.

Jeremy

I've played the demo and there are some negative aspects about it. The clipping and some ai issues. Also the camera has a big learning curve that may be hard for some people to get used to.

It's not a matter of believing anything negative. I do. It's a matter of basing a purchase desicion on some skill-based observations.

Agreed. It's obvious there is a difference in opinion. Regardless of "how you play" the AI should not be trying to shoot throught bullet proof glass. Hopefully we won't be victims of the hype machine yet again.

I had been planning to preorder this game in the next few days, I think I'm going to wait now. I will never understand why companies release a crappy demo - if you're using that as a demonstration you should have most of the bugs worked out (it's a relatively small part of the game, there should be some extra concentration to make the demo as good as it can be).


That's right, just because he doesn't agree with you his opinion is moronic -rolleyes-.

Can someone name a game where the guards are not dumb? I've also never seen a game where clipping does not occur at one time or another.

Using the Jump-To-Conclusions mat?

I don't think his opinion is moronic. He brings up 3 vaild concerns, clipping and the 2 AI issues.

I think the majority of the rest of his issues are based on his skill and are not valid concerns to someone that knows what they are doing.

I can't think of a video game, but there may be some computer games out there (in the Tom Clancy series probably) that have smart guards in them. I am just reaching here though as I have played little of the TC games on computer.

Ok, well I guess the fact that you called his observations "silly t best" (and then edited that out) and that you would take 13 more observations and "chew them up" (and then edited that out as well) does not equate calling his opinion moronic. I'm sorry I misjudged you.....