Godzilla vs. Kong Review (SPOILER WARNING!)

This is a review of sorts, but it’s not my standard review style of trying to help the reader decide if they’d like to go see the movie or not. Really this is meant to be more of a detailed discussion about the movie and my specific thoughts concerning a number of topics within it. So while it is a review, it’s not intended to be read by those who haven’t seen the film yet. Just to make sure you’re aware before moving forward, as the title suggests, there are massive spoilers ahead. Read at your own discretion.

The first thing I want to say is that there is a long history of kaiju (titan) films in both the Godzilla and King Kong franchises with more than one instance of the two franchises and titans meeting. I could write an entire book just about the history and cultural meanings of these two characters and their clashes with each other without ever mentioning this particular movie. But I don’t think it’s fair to judge this movie based on that history, so for the purposes of this review we will ignore all past films concerning either character that don’t specifically fall within the “MonsterVerse”. Yes, that is the official name of this franchise, and yes, it is a terrible name. Obviously they should have called it the Monarch Cinematic Universe, or Titan Cinematic Universe if they didn’t want to use the acronym “MCU” for obvious reasons. To reiterate, I will not consider past Godzilla and/or King Kong films in my judgement of Godzilla vs. Kong (2021).

Whenever I see a titan movie, or really any movie within the gigantic mayhem sci-fi genre, I always go in with the mindset of visuals first. The writing matters. As a writer myself, I find it offensive when badly written films get produced. There are countless talented writers out there that will never get a shot, so the idea of badly written movies getting made by rich, undeserving hacks angers me. That being said, people go to watch this genre for the action. A perfectly crafted character driven romance film set in a world of giant monsters might be written at the quality of Shakespeare, but if it doesn’t have awesome looking giant monster fight sequences then what’s the point?

Godzilla vs. Kong is a visual treat. The multiple (5 – 7 depending on what actually counts) fight sequences were good. They put the monsters in multiple settings and had them change their fighting styles based on those settings, showing that these “characters” have been given some real thought. They learn, adapt, and change over time based on their experiences and surroundings. The first encounter between Godzilla and Kong takes place on the water. Kong gets beaten, and rightly so, as Godzilla is an amphibious reptile that can basically breath under water, while Kong is a mammal with presumably no deep-water experience, based on what we’ve seen. Kong tries his best to fight in this arena, even using ships as jumping platforms, but he simply can’t compete with Godzilla’s aquatic supremacy. This fight worked because they didn’t give Kong a crutch. They didn’t make you think he had a fighting chance and just happened to lose. It was a clear victory for Godzilla. The true value in this sequence, from a storytelling and visual standpoint, was twofold.

The first benefit was that it breeds sympathy for Kong. I have no problem admitting that I was rooting for Godzilla going into the movie. I’m on OG Godzilla fan. I can still remember the first time I watched a Godzilla movie in theater. I have seen more than 20 Godzilla films. I’ve seen only five Kong films, and Godzilla was in two of them. This movie is aware of film history’s stanning for Godzilla and actively goes out of its way to make Kong more sympathetic. Godzilla is not painted as the sympathetic friend to humanity we saw in Godzilla: King of the Monsters. To be clear, Godzilla is not painted as evil in this film. He’s painted as chaotic neutral. The movie at first, and marketing, plays up the idea that Godzilla is attacking people. But this isn’t actually the case. He’s attacking technology that’s threatening his supremacy much like how they used that soundwave machine in Godzilla: King of the Monsters to draw titans in. So you have a sympathetic Kong pitted against a mostly neutral Godzilla who shows anger at threats but isn’t actively attacking civilians. This allows/pushes the viewer to root for and sympathize with Kong, while not actively making the viewer dislike Godzilla in the process.

The second benefit of this first fight sequence is that it allowed Kong to learn. In their second bout, which takes place on land, Kong had clearly learned from their first fight. This is best expressed by the fact that Kong actively attempts to prevent Godzilla from using his fire blast. I really appreciated that. These are not big dumb creatures that just flail around until the other stops moving. They learn. They strategize. They practice different combat philosophies. They even experience fear of death.

All the fight scenes have a bit of epic flair. But what makes them great is the use of mostly real locations. Some of the biggest fights in the movie take place in Hong Kong. I’ve been to Hong Kong and stood in locations shown in the movie. Seeing that skyline toppled by two titans was a very impactful experience that wouldn’t have been as effective with fictional locations.

There were other visually impressive and impactful parts of the movie outside of battle sequences as well. Seeing Kong through the deaf girl’s eyes/ears was a stunning interpretation. It was a cool way to depict her experience both visually and audibly and explained why she was comfortable interacting with Kong while others were so afraid. I also really liked the entry into Hollow Earth sequence. It was classic trash sci-fi but it was great visual storytelling. Pretty much all the Hollow Earth visuals were really well done.

Sound was done well in the film, but that shouldn’t surprise anyone. They’ve handled sound effects pretty much perfectly throughout this franchise. I’m still impressed by the camera sequence in Kong: Skull Island because of the sound effects used for the camera going off inside of the Skull Crawler’s stomach. In Godzilla vs. Kong they made use of music a lot more as well. At least with Kong anyway. Not dramatic compositions for effect but actual songs with vocals to set the tone of what Kong is doing.

My biggest complaint about the movie is the writing. No not the science fiction ideas. Those are mostly solid. In fact, some of them are downright brilliant. Like the entire Hollow Earth theory. That setup works great for sci-fi monster movies and has been used effectively in multiple films within this franchise for various plot points. In Godzilla vs. Kong they have some great ideas like using Ghidorah’s brainpower to control Mecha-Godzilla because Ghidorah had telepathic communication. But rather than just saying it they justified it by saying Ghidorah’s necks were so long that the heads used telepathy to communicate. That’s great sci-fi writing. But then they go and do stuff like imply the Kongs were a super intelligent race that built statues of themselves, a temple, and a throne.

Apes are intelligent, but none of that Kong civilization stuff made any sense. And it wasn’t necessary. How would a race of giant apes craft a statue that was about the size of Kong? Their hands would be too big. Why would they construct a throne? What use would they have for it? This isn’t The Jungle Book. They had this great idea about Hollow Earth being home to a power source that allowed the titans to grow and thrive. That made sense. They implied that the titans, as animals, would be naturally drawn to this power source much the way that birds migrate. That made sense. But then when they reach the power source there’s way too much technology present. Not futuristic technology, but still way more than a race of giant ape monsters should have had. Not to mention a drawing of Godzilla, or a member of his species anyway, crafted out of the power source’s light. Why would the Kongs have done this, and more importantly how? The axe was fine. Apes are capable of making and using simple tools. An axe might be a little advanced, but not so much that I would have complained. You are allowed one ridiculous assumption that’s nearly impossible to explain. Not several. This movie contains several, all of which are tied to the Kong’s history in Hollow Earth.

The only other explanation is that humans lived in Hollow Earth and built this massive Kong temple in praise of them. But that opens up an entirely new can of worms that these movies just haven’t tried to setup, and in my opinion shouldn’t. There are other issues in the canon of this movie as well. Especially concerning time. Kong’s main advocates are a girl that can’t be more than 13, which is me being extremely generous because she comes off more like eight or nine, and a scientist who infantilizes Kong worse than she does this girl who she sort of has adopted. The scientist claims that she has been on Skull Island for 10 years. The movie starts off with Kong being held on Skull Island in a facility while the island is covered in a continuous storm. The storm isn’t explained in detail. They just say that it took over the island and wiped out the native population shown in Kong: Skull Island. The girl is the soul survivor of the tribe, because Kong saved her. If the girl isn’t more than 13 and the scientist has been on the island for 10 years, when did this storm hit, how did Kong save a girl who was less than five without crushing her to death, why didn’t the scientists save the natives, and how did they even trap Kong in that facility to begin with? Also how long did it take to build? On top of that, the movie implies that Godzilla: King of the Monsters took place just three years earlier in the timeline. Continuity problems abound concerning Kongs in this movie. Also, the entire premise of the movie is that Kong and Godzilla will fight, because legend says their races had an ancient feud. What legends would say this?

If titans are ancient beings that have lived for thousands to millions of years in Hollow Earth, and the war between Kongs and Zillas took place in Hollow Earth, then how would a bunch of humans have known about it? Where did these legends come from? These prehistoric monsters didn’t show up to human settlements and start telling them stories. People would have had to witness these battles to write legends about them. Which was the case with Ghidorah in Godzilla: King of the Monsters. They state that Ghidorah was an alien titan that fell to Earth and threw off the balance of power, and that it happened during recorded history, as shown by its appearance in ancient legends. But the war between the Kongs and Zillas even predates that in this timeline. Because logically it would have to for the appearance of Ghidorah to throw off the balance of power, where Godzilla was already on top. So it makes absolutely no sense that there would be any legends recorded by humans about Kongs and Zillas having a war. And remember that they imply this was a war. Not a battle between a single Kong and Godzilla. A conflict between two warring species for dominance of the ecosystem.  

Another glaring issue I had with the writing was the all-too-common offense of infantilizing apes. Kong is a giant ape that is part of an ancient species of giant apes. He has been alive since before the Vietnam War and is certainly older than any other character in the movie save for Godzilla and possibly some of the monsters that appear during the Hollow Earth sequence. Yet all the humans treat Kong like a little kid. The entire premise of Kong’s part in the story is that humans have decided he can’t defend himself against Godzilla, so they’ve decided to lock him up. But why? The movie starts off by implying that both Godzilla and Kong have toppled several other titans each. They literally show a monster battle bracket that ends with Godzilla facing off against Kong. Ignoring the fact that Godzilla: King of the Monsters ends with the other titans literally bowing down to Godzilla and thus wouldn’t have challenged him to a fight, if Kong has won all these other fights, when did they take place? Kong has been trapped in a Monarch facility for at least three years, but maybe 10 or more. Were the scientists bringing titans to the island and organizing their own dog fighting matches? And if Kong had defeated all these other titans previously, why is this scientist so sure that Godzilla will kick his ass? Ignoring the fact that Godzilla does ultimately kick Kong’s ass in this movie. This woman goes out of her way to treat a giant, decades if not centuries old, ape like a defenseless child. Even other scientists call her out for it in the movie.

I want to make clear, I actually did enjoy watching this movie. It had a number of glaring plot holes, but it was really fun. They totally wasted Ghidorah’s head on that super computer story, but at least it made sense. And I liked the Transformers: Age of Extinction style plot where Ghidorah is reincarnated via Mecha-Godzilla. The movie was fun to watch and brought out the big guns in more ways than one. But this is an interconnected cinematic universe in a post Avengers: Endgame world. Gone are the days of being able to get away with soft balling it in. These studios need to take continuity seriously the way Marvel does. Every franchise that plans to run for more than three films needs a Kevin Feige. A single person that lives or dies by the success of the franchise whose only job is to make sure all the films make sense together. I really like the MonsterVerse. It has good ideas. But this movie was both wasteful and sloppy. Not DC Cinematic Universe sloppy, but sloppy all the same. I had fun, but I expect better. I want to see more movies in this universe, but that can’t happen if they don’t build an actual plan that makes sense. So I’m gonna give Godzilla vs. Kong an 8/10 as a monster movie, but a 6/10 as a movie in general.

Galvatron from Transformers: Age of Extinction

Finally, I’d like to end on a super nerdy note and debate the Godzilla vs. Kong rivalry. The movie pulls a classic Batman vs. Superman and has the two characters team up in the end to fight and even greater threat, Mecha-Godzilla, but let’s actually discuss who the true apex predator is between the two. As I already stated, I’m a Godzilla stan, but I want to have a serious discussion in this instance as devoid of bias as possible. As with my review, we will only consider the current MonsterVerse iteration of these monsters within this debate. In my opinion, Godzilla vs. Kong argues that Godzilla is the superior monster of the two. They fight two full bouts and a rushed, much shorter third bout. Godzilla wins the first in a landslide victory, but uses the unfair advantage of a water based arena. Kong wins the second round, but it’s a much less definitive victory, and he had the advantage of both an axe and climbable buildings. The third and final round takes place in the same arena as the second, but with damage from the second round having affected the landscape of the arena. Kong still has the axe, but doesn’t really make use of it like he did in round two. Both titans go into round three severely winded from round two. In fact, I was shocked at how quickly they jumped into round three after round two. Godzilla crushes Kong in round three. It’s such a definitive beatdown that Godzilla steps on Kong’s chest, calls him a punk-ass bitch, and doesn’t even take the time to kill him. He just walks away so Kong can suffer his loss. But the beating was so hard that Kong’s heart almost stops and the only reason he survives is that humans hit him with a defibrillator. Meaning that for all intents and purposes, Godzilla killed Kong.

Based on what we’ve seen in the movies, Godzilla has several natural advantages over Kong. He’s got armored scales, making him more resilient to most attacks. He has spikes on his back, making him extremely difficult to grab from behind or attack safely from above. He has a long, heavy tail that he comfortably uses as a flail type weapon. He can breathe both under water and on land. He has nuclear fire breath. Godzilla also has claws and many barbed scales, making much of his body capable of tearing through flesh. I’d argue Kong’s lack of natural armor, other than a bit of fur, is his greatest disadvantage against Godzilla. Finally, it’s implied but not necessarily confirmed that he has way more battle experience than Kong. Again, plot errors abound in this latest movie so it’s hard to say exactly how many monsters Kong has actually faced and defeated in battle.

Kong has advantages of his own though. He can climb, has much longer reach, and his hands are actually useful for more than just scratching. He can wield an axe for instance. But his hands can also do things like snap necks and close Godzilla’s mouth so he can’t use his fire breath. He’s also way more agile than Godzilla. Kong is more intelligent and self-aware. I really appreciated the Hong Kong fight scene where he dodges around buildings and uses them for cover. Yet I wouldn’t say Godzilla was mindless by any means. Kong’s intelligence makes him better at using his surroundings for weapons and cover, but Godzilla can definitely implore strategy as well. Trying to pull Kong into the water in the first fight and then pushing him into the water in the second fight were clear indications that Godzilla understood and employed strategies to gain an advantage in battle. Kong can learn though, which is why he quickly got back out of the water during the second fight, after getting pushed into the bay.

One of Kong’s key weaknesses is his heart. Ironically I don’t mean that literally in this instance, even though his heart almost stopped in the movie. Kong has a conscience and cares about humans. On multiple occasions he goes out of his way to protect people during fights. In Kong: Skull Island we see him do the same thing with Brie Larson’s character. He often gets distracted in battle by humans, usually female ones, and goes out of his way to protect them at the cost of his own safety. In my reading of the character, I think this also prevents him from going full throttle. Kong is afraid of unleashing the beast. He cares about humans and his connection to them and thus he cares about hurting them and scaring them. So he never fights to his full abilities. This was extremely apparent in round two. He has this axe and yet he never lands a serious blow with it. You could argue he tries and fails because Godzilla is just too strong and defensive, but I didn’t see it that way. Kong wasn’t giving it all he’s got. This was made clear in the final fight against Mecha-Godzilla. He picks up that axe and starts chopping like a king. Where were those moves in the fight against Godzilla?

Godzilla never holds anything back. He respects his adversaries by always giving 100% of his fighting ability. When a monster survives a fight with Godzilla, that monster knows it wasn’t because Godzilla pulled punches (bites). Godzilla is the superior of the two titans. This was made clear in the movie and expressed in previous films as well. That’s why he’s known as “King of the Monsters”.

As always, thanks for reading. Please take the time to follow my blog, leave a comment, and check out some of my other channels if you enjoyed what you read.

Square Enix Presents (Spring 2021) Review

Last week Square Enix finally unveiled their version of Nintendo Direct. If you’ve been reading my blog for a long time then you know I believe E3, and events like it, are on the way out and that digital presentations are eventually going to replace them altogether. COVID has definitely helped speed up this process and we’re now seeing many brands do their own digital presentations. Just as I’ve done with other brands, I wanted to take the time to review Square Enix’s debut into the Nintendo Direct style presentation game.

The first thing I want to say about this presentation is that I appreciated the format. I’ve said many times that I prefer PlayStation’s tight State of Play format to that of Nintendo’s Direct format, because I have no interest in hosts. I like a presentation that’s straight to the games and wastes as little time as possible. Admittedly Nintendo’s presentations vary on this point from Direct to Direct. Square Enix presents goes straight into the games. It literally opened with a trailer and no setup. No riff raff introduction. No millennial trying to relate to me. Just games. There were some speakers as part of specific game presentations, but that’s not a format thing. That’s the individual studios presenting their games the way they see fit. I’m fine with that. The point is Square Enix Presents was straight to the point and stayed focused on games.

Even the transitions in the presentation were simple and quick. Maybe even a bit too quick at certain points. When they got to mobile games, they just quickly flashed a screen that said “Mobile”. No speaker trying to build suspense for the next section, no elaborate showing of irrelevant 3D art (looking at you PS5 Reveal). I will say that there was a fair amount on non-game promotional content. Especially during the Lara Croft’s 25^th anniversary section. But even that was all directly related to promoting a specific game franchise. So while I didn’t love it, I understood it. Finally, I appreciated that they ended the presentation by telling us when the next presentation would be. Something the other brands don’t often do.

Square Enix has opted to tie their presentation schedule to seasons. This was the spring presentation and they ended by saying the next Square Enix Presents would be in the summer. I love that. It’s clear, logical, and measurable. And it’s much better than trying to squeeze everything out at one time for a single annual presentation that forces brands to prematurely announce a bunch of stuff just because they paid an exorbitant amount of money to be there so they feel obligated to fill the time. I also prefer updates peppered throughout the year rather than a mountain of them all at once. It also leads to more immediately important and relevant information being shared in each presentation. Like Outriders being the opening of the presentation. The game releases in less than a month from the time of the presentation. Nintendo often does similar things with Nintendo Direct announcements. But that’s much harder to do with events like E3 and can only happen during special physical events which are few and far between.

Finally, this was a fairly tight presentation. They showed 13 games in 40 minutes. 15 if you count Lara Croft Trilogy as three. That’s not the most I’ve seen in a single presentation of this length, but they managed to do that while giving a fair amount of details about multiple AAA titles. I definitely felt like the presentation was paced well and had a lot of information about several games. By the end of it I didn’t feel like it was too long. I will say that two of the games felt like they got more time than they needed or really even deserved though. But all in all I was very happy with the format of this presentation. Now let’s actually talk about the games.

Outriders

I loved the Outriders demo. In fact, I’ve published two different blog posts about it in the last month. I am absolutely going to buy it at some point. I’m still seriously considering making it a day one purchase. Though I know I shouldn’t. This presentation was long and effective, for a game that hadn’t already released a fairly robust demo weeks ago. A lot of information was shared. The problem is that pretty much anyone who was already interested in the game, which should be most people planning on buying it since it drops in less than a month, knew most of the information given going into the presentation.

Whether you played the demo yourself, or watched videos/streams of it, this presentation told you basically nothing you didn’t already know that should actually have an effect on your purchasing decision. The only two crucial pieces of information given that you couldn’t have figured out by playing the demo were the post campaign expeditions and the convoy. The post campaign content was new information but nothing that shouldn’t have been expected for a game like this. An open world RPG co-op shooter with no post game missions? Not in this decade. The Outriders convoy is just a glorified cosmetic built around achievements and almost certainly currently unannounced microtransactions.

It’s not that Outriders doesn’t look great. Quite the contrary. But this long presentation that told people who already played the demo next to nothing was basically pointless. At this point they should have just plugged the demo and added a reward for logging in during the last 2 weeks before release.

Lara Croft Trilogy

I can’t in good conscience condone presentation time being spent on a trilogy of games I’ve already played in the last 10 years. These are excellent games worth playing, but they look great in their current forms and have been on sale or free multiple times since release. I played the first one in 2014 because I got it for free on PS+. I’m not a big fan of recent games being rereleased. I will say that they announced a bunch of stuff that wasn’t part of the actual games. Multiple crossovers and special 25^th anniversary memorabilia. They even announced a Tomb Raider cook book. It was a lot of time used unnecessarily in my opinion.

Mobile Games

I liked that they put all the mobile games together in one section and just tossed them out quickly without too much time being given to them while still making sure to clearly present what each game was and who it might appeal to. I was especially impressed by the Just Cause Mobile trailer, even though I would never personally play such a game. Hitman Mobile was also very clear in their presentation, but much more efficient about time. For me, the star of the mobile section was Space Invaders AR. The presentation was too long and Nintendo style in its nostalgia trip, but the message was crystal clear and effective: Space Invaders as an AR game! Sign me up.

My one major complaint about the mobile section of the presentation is that it wasn’t clearly marked when it had ended.  They just went straight into a collection of other Taito games after focusing on Taito making Space Invaders AR. Because of this, I was misled into thinking Touhou Spell Bubble, Darius Cozmic Revelation, and Bubble Bobble 4 were all mobile games. To be fair, the presentation did have a transition to usher in the Darius Cozmic Revelation section. But it didn’t say anything. I just thought it was being pushed as a special featured mobile title that they wanted to focus on. Now it’s also true that the Darius Cozmic Revelation presentation did end with a note saying “available on Nintendo Switch and PS4”. But it was in hard to read thin white letters and disappeared quickly. I didn’t notice it until my second viewing of the footage. But that still doesn’t account for Touhou Spell Bubble, which had nothing anywhere showing what platform it was for. And it absolutely looks like it could be a mobile game.

Touhou Spell Bubble

I had never heard of this game before and this presentation was to plug additional content for the game. The presentation was fine if you already knew what the game was, but this hasn’t exactly gotten the marketing push of Outriders. I didn’t even realize it wasn’t a mobile game until several days after the presentation. In context the presentation was fine, but in practical terms, this game was not presented properly. With what I assume is a fairly limited audience to begin with, I don’t even know what the point of including it in this presentation was.

Darius Cozmic Revelation

The presentation of this game was a bit weird and misleading. I had never heard of it before but apparently it was released in February. At least in Japan anyway. Then literally three days later I walk into a game store, here in Taiwan, and they have it on the shelf. I was astounded. But also that’s cool and only possible when you do digital presentations like this throughout the year rather than trying to squeeze everything into one big presentation at a specific point in the year. What I learned days later is that this presentation was also to promote an update rather than the base game. They really need to get their presentation of details in order.

I couldn’t find the official footage from the presentation as a separate video so here is a trailer for the game.

In any case, I was impressed with what they showed. This genre is always bitter sweet for me, so I probably won’t pick it up unless it goes on sale. But once I understood exactly what the game was I did seriously look further into it.

Bubble Bobble 4

Apparently this game was released in 2020 and it was included in this presentation to promote an update. I guess that’s fine to include. Bubble Bobble is one of those games that you don’t really sell at this point. You just let people know a new one is coming and then people who played it back in the day decide if they’d like to play another one. All that being said, the presentation did not make it clear to me that this was promoting an update. I thought it was announcing the game’s release.

I couldn’t find the official footage from the presentation as a separate video so here is a different trailer for the update.

Marvel’s Avengers

If nothing else, I have to commend Square Enix for sticking it out with this game. I jumped ship after that disappointing beta, which I went into looking for an excuse to preorder it. I still have not been convinced to purchase the game, even though it has been on sale multiple times. But the team has continuously added and updated the content of the game, as they originally promised they would. The major problem with this presentation was that they focused on Hawkeye.

I’m sorry, but Hawkeye has never and will never be a selling point for me. I’m glad he’s included in the game as a playable character but there’s no draw for me to go buy the game now that he’s been added. His gameplay looks slow and overly technical, which is probably why they gave him a sword. I just can’t get excited about Hawkeye or his sidekick. And they showed quite a bit of gameplay focused on him.

What was a draw from this presentation was showing lots of additional story content. It looked like a completely different game from what I saw in the beta, plot wise. Plus there was a Black Panther tease. That being said, I feel like Square Enix needs to rethink their audience when presenting this game. The player base needs major growth. It has underperformed since pretty much day one. This presentation gave away a number of massive plot spoilers for those who played the beta but not the game. Now I get that, because the current player base wants new content and showing it in presentations like this are a major selling point. But most people haven’t played the game. So giving away things like Captain America survived, time travel, and Hulk getting an alternate personality and becoming a villain aren’t things non-players, the bulk of the audience for this presentation, want to be shown at this point. It’s definitely a tough issue though.

Balan Wonderworld

Like with Outriders, this game’s demo has been out for a while. The presentation might have caught my interest if that wasn’t the case, but since I did play the demo I know this game is fairly disappointing. They should have showed this before releasing the demo. Showing the co-op gameplay and additional powers/costumes was good for trying to sell this game, but no amount of promotion is going to make me forget how unhappy I was with the demo.

Life is Strange True Colors

This portion of the presentation was way too long for a general audience presentation about current announcements from Square Enix. This was more than 10 minutes about one game that’s not targeted at Square Enix’s core player base. Especially when we consider that it’s the third game in an established franchise. This should have been its own presentation. The information needed as part of this larger presentation could have been presented in three to four minutes tops. They were very effective in quickly establishing the setting, general conflict/mystery of the plot, main protagonist, and power for this installment of the Life is Strange franchise. But then they just kept going. Giving background information people who aren’t already invested in the franchise just didn’t need. We didn’t need to know it was fully motion captured. We didn’t need to see multiple real people talk about their part in the game in detail, including a singer talking about the music. That is content for a Life is Strange focused standalone presentation.

Just for reference, Outriders was given less than nine minutes of screen time and Marvel’s Avengers less than six. Now we can adjust slightly and account for the fact that they also announced Life is Strange Remastered as part of that time, but they still spent way too much time on this franchise during this presentation. Especially when you consider that the people who will play a third Life is Strange game don’t need to be sold. People who played and enjoyed the first two installments will definitely play a third. For the most part everyone else will ignore it. Not because the franchise is bad. But because people don’t tend to jump into the third installment of a franchise that’s only six years old. Not to mention the fact that they aren’t particularly long games. If people wanted to play them, they would have by now. This just isn’t a walk-in late franchise. The inevitable trilogy pack will be a better seller than this standalone third game in the long run. They have an established player base that can and should be addressed directly with content of this level of depth.

Forspoken (Protect Athia)

This was a strong way to end this presentation. Brand new title that had been previously teased with just a small slither of epic looking movement gameplay and a look at some monsters. They definitely captivated the audience and made us want more. I didn’t particularly need the actress to present the game but even with that it wasn’t an overly long presentation. I absolutely can’t wait to see more of this game.

Probably my only major complaint about the presentation, other than the nightmarishly ridiculous number of YouTube ads, is that a lot of it was unnecessary and unclear. While I felt like the presentation was structured well overall, a lot of the content was kind of pointless and unneeded. Or at the very least didn’t accomplish anything. Outriders and Balan Wonderworld presentations post demo were unnecessarily long. Those games have already found their audience, if such a thing will exist. Life is Strange True Colors was way too long for this specific presentation and in no way increased the sales numbers in doing so. Really the Marvel’s Avengers presentation, though full of plot spoilers and focused on a weaker draw character, was really the best portion of the presentation as far as presenting AAA titles is concerned. Ignoring Forspoken, which was just a tease at this point. The Marvel’s Avengers portion wasn’t too long for what it needed to show, was informative, and included major announcements that genuinely may have affected people’s decision to purchase the game. Including those who had already decided to pass on the game previously.

I was surprised that we didn’t see anything about Project Triangle Strategy in this presentation, considering the demo has been out for a while. But in a way, that’s a good thing. You don’t need to present games that you’ve already released a demo for, unless you’re presenting new information that has some actual value in helping people make a purchasing decision.

Overall I liked this as a first try from Square Enix, but they absolutely need to iron out some bugs. Clearer transitions and readable notices, more concise presentations unless providing market shifting content/information, and some clearer release dates would be nice as well. Especially with games that have already been released in certain regions like Darius Cozmic Revelation. I’m not unhappy though. The total length was good and for the most part paced well enough. I look forward to the summer presentation.

As always, thanks for reading. Please take the time to follow my blog, leave a comment, and check out some of my other channels if you enjoyed what you read.

The Game We Almost Got (Outriders Demo)

This is not my formal review of the Outriders Demo. I published that last week. You can find it here.

For the record, I really liked the Outriders demo. Like way more than I expected to. There’s nothing particularly special about the game. It’s a basic coop third person shooter with simple RPG mechanics, a fairly common visual aesthetic, and some cool but not necessarily original powers. In fact, the only two powers I’ve seen so far that felt somewhat original for a game were those of the Trickster. Specifically the slow area and light blade powers. And even those were mostly visual in originality rather than in actual behavior. As I said in my review, I describe the game as Fuse (2013) with a Destiny coat of paint and a splash of The Division for flavor.

What I liked most about playing Outriders was that it’s not a hardcore shooter. It’s a shooter for people like me. Any gamer with a fair amount of general gaming experience can excel at Outriders without too much trouble. I was able to solo every available mission and side quest with no deaths, except for one unbalanced boss fight. With that particular boss fight I just abandoned the fight and came back later once I had better gear. By that point it was no problem to beat. I never had to lower the difficulty (world tier) for any of the challenges the game presented. It’s a shooter for gamers rather than a shooter for people who like shooters. I hate shooters and I had a blast playing this demo.

I especially appreciated that the game is very playable solo. It’s being marketed as a 3 player coop experience, and that option is there. But you can absolutely play this game solo. Even the boss fights, for the most part, are manageable without teammates. I will definitely pick it up at some point, but probably not day one, since I’ll most likely be playing it solo. If I had a squad to play with, I’d definitely go in for day one. It’s a fun game and I highly recommend the demo. But as I said, this post is not meant to be a review of the Outriders demo. It’s a discussion about something else.

Outriders has one of the most surprising and jarring introductions I’ve ever seen in a game. It starts off as if you’re about to play a game about exploring and conquering the untouched wilderness of a previously undiscovered planet. You’re released into a beautiful landscape that in many ways reminded me of Xenoblade Chronicles X or the Calm Lands in Final Fantasy X. A large open world with new fauna and flora to discover, catalog, and at times subdue. It was amazing and exciting. It was certainly not the game I was expected from the marketing I had seen, but since it was Square Enix I had no problem accepting it. In fact, I was really looking forward to it. And that intro is long. They do a lot of work establishing this game you think you’re about to play. They really sell you on the experience, and I was ready to buy. Then suddenly everything changes.

Once you’ve started to get comfortable, the game radically shifts from being about exploring the untamed wilderness of a new planet to a dirty warzone where people continue to repeat the same mistakes that led them there to begin with. It’s surprising but also well written. You basically jump from Xenoblade Chronicles X to The Division in a matter of minutes after like 30 minutes of misleading introduction. As I said at the beginning, I like Outriders. The game they appear to have made is fun and I’m looking forward to it. But I want to talk about the game we almost got that we probably never will.

We almost got an open world Mass Effect: Andromeda with arguably better gunplay, less convoluted writing, and Square Enix monster wildlife designs. I’m drooling just thinking about it. I would have loved playing that game. It wouldn’t be this depressing last chance for humanity story. It wouldn’t be another pessimistic look at the future of humanity. It would be inspiring, majestic, and beautiful. It could have been like No Man’s Sky with better gameplay, a coherent RPG narrative, and one giant open world with diverse terrain and wildlife all working together as a singular ecosystem.

I was excited to explore, drop flags, and discover the secrets of a presumably untouched world. That game I probably would buy day one. Square Enix accidentally sold me a game they didn’t even make and now I’m depressed that I won’t get to play it. I’m not knocking Outriders. As I said at the beginning, I really liked the demo and plan on eventually buying the game. But there’s another game there that would have been amazing.

This is actually where I think the demo failed. It showed off these concepts about exploration and discovery during the introduction that didn’t translate into the post introduction gameplay. I can’t say if it’s because they didn’t want to give too much away in the demo or because the game is actually not meant to be anything like the introduction, but the post-intro demo didn’t really feature any actual exploration. The post demo trailer implied it’s there, but the gameplay didn’t show it. Mostly you’re just following paths in a faux open world that is extremely limited. Of course the game will open up into more areas, but if the layout is always the way the demo was post introduction, then it’s certainly not an open world even if there is some exploration.

It’s disappointing knowing what we almost got. I would rather have had the game throw me straight into the shit than give me so much hope and then rip it away. That’s the problem with writing versus gameplay. Writing wise the game’s introduction is powerful, jarring, and effective. It draws you in, gives you hope, and then rips it away. That’s the way a game should treat the player. It will make the ending so much more cathartic. But now I want a Xenoblade Chronicles X styled world as a third person coop shooter. Who do I have to bother on Twitter to get that game made?

If you’re interested in learning more about Outriders without playing the demo yourself, I streamed most of it. You can find the videos here.

As always, thanks for reading. Please take the time to follow my blog, leave a comment, and check out some of my other channels if you enjoyed what you read.

Outriders Demo Review

I had not originally intended to write a review of the Outriders demo. The only reason I did is that the feedback survey asked for a full review, “as if you were writing for IGN”, so I wrote one. Since I don’t write for IGN it felt like a waste not to publish it here, since it had already been written anyway. I actually wrote a completely different post about the Outriders demo, which is not a review, so I’ve pushed that back to next week.

Outriders is a treat to play. Not because it’s particularly original but because it learned from the past and implemented the things that worked well in the games that inspired it. If I had to describe Outriders, based on the demo, I would say it’s Fuse (2013) with a Destiny coat of paint, and a splash of The Division for flavor. It’s a game that knows its audience and delivers what they want. Not what publishers want that audience to want.

Right off the bat, I’ll commend the game for its core gameplay. It’s a simple third person cover-to-cover shooter that doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel. The shooting is good. The movement, though a little sloppy about jumping over obstacles, is good. You’ve played this game before, and that’s a compliment. You know these guns. You know this gear system. You know how this loot works. It’s a game an experienced gamer can drop into very easily but it’s also not too hard to learn for new players to the genre.

The class system is simple, clear, and effective. There’s long range, mid-range, and short-range classes. For whatever reason, two of the four available classes are close range. Each class does what it needs to do and is rewarded for doing it well. Long range class players get health back for killing at long range. Short range class players get health back for killing close up. It’s a simple and effective way to coordinate co-op strategies. But the game is also extremely well balanced for single player and your chosen class doesn’t have to limit the way you play the game. I play the Devastator class. That’s the more defensive of the two close range classes. After trying out both close range classes, I determined it to be the best class for my preferred style of single player approach. Kudos to the demo for letting you skip the introduction in a second playthrough so you could get directly into the class based gameplay when trying out a second character/class. I do hope the game eventually lets you change classes mid game though.

As a close range class, the Devastator is most rewarding when you kill up close. That’s not a metaphor. The game literally rewards you with additional health when you kill enemies at close range with this class. The distance mechanic is quite interesting because it’s set in stone. There is a specific number of feet/meters that you can be away from enemies before you no longer get the class benefit from killing them. It’s often irritating to be on the line and step back while shooting to put yourself just out of range. But the game is very clear in indicating the enemies within range, so the system is definitely transparent and by extension fair. But the fact is that during solo play it doesn’t always make sense to play up close to your enemies. That can be detrimental to close range class players. However, the game accounts for this with gear bonuses.

While my chosen class is close range, and I prefer large clip, fast RPM guns like light machine guns and auto rifles, I also enjoy a good sniper rifle. I’d never play the long range class, because I absolutely don’t like the powers it has, but I love sniping enemies from down town. The game allows players like me to thrive by including leech life weapons. My favorite sniper rifle is a small clip, high damage, maximum range gun with a leech life bonus. This means that even though I’m a close range class, every time I get a kill with that sniper rifle I still get health back. So I can play both close range and at a distance and continue to get healing bonuses regardless of what class my character is. This is great for single player and allows me to adjust to the situation at hand in any situation.

I have to assume my constantly shifting between long and close range as a short range class player was intended by the developers, because of the powers both short range classes have. Both the Devastator and Trickster classes have a power that quickly warps you forward into a targeted enemy, or group of enemies, depending on how you use the powers. These powers let players quickly and effectively shift from long range to close range battle without taking damage during the transition period. This allows for some excellent strategy implementation both in single player and co-op scenarios.  And by combining powers together, you can quickly deal large amounts of damage to entire groups of enemies. These same techniques work well on bosses too.

I really like the drop in/drop out co-operative system they’ve created here. You can join other players’ games at any time and vice versa. But progress is always shared. That means that if you join a game and do a mission you haven’t completed yet, the game will credit your game with having completed that mission as well. That’s the way co-operative games should always be. The voting system, though a little unclear at first, works very well. It lets you vote to move forward into new areas, vote to start new missions, and vote to skip cutscenes. Sadly Outriders appears to have the same matchmaking problems that so many other games have in that it’s not robust enough. It’s really easy to set your privacy settings and begin the matchmaking process. And thankfully you don’t have to sit in the matchmaking lobby while waiting. You can just start it up and then continue playing solo until you’re invited to join a game, which you can then do with the push of a button. It’s very similar to The Division. The problem I faced was an inability to control the type of matchmaking I wanted.

Where are the options?

Sometimes I wanted to join other games and other times I wanted people to join my game. I had no control over this. Not once did I ever get anyone to join my game. I had my privacy set to open at all times but that was basically all you can do to host, unless it’s a private game with friends. When you use the matchmaking system it seemed to only be to join other games. Why is this system always so limited in games? Let me use a set of matchmaking options to define the co-op scenario I want. If I want to host, let me set that in matchmaking. If I’m looking to join players to do specific types of activities like side quests, let me set that in matchmaking. Also, let me set the world tier for the players I’m looking to play with. The game also does the make the game harder when you play in co-op thing, which I hate in every game, but it’s fine I guess. Certainly didn’t make the game too hard to play. 

Outriders also has a lot of little quality of life features that I really appreciate coming from many other games in this genre. For instance, the respawn system is by encounter/room. Missions are mostly pretty short and divided into a sequence of encounters. When you die, you always respawn at your current encounter. Even if it’s the boss fight. But what’s really nice is that the game actually respawns you in the room before the encounter so you can walk into it rather than just dropping you right back into combat unprepared. Even better is the fact that you can leave without losing your progress. If you get stuck on a boss fight, and feel like it’s a gear/level issue rather than a performance issue, you don’t have to give up all your progress and leave the mission to restart it later. You can just backtrack to the mission door, walk out, and then return at any time and walk right back up to whatever fight you were in. This might sound a bit cheesy to hardcore players, but it’s actually super convenient. Especially in solo play. One of the side missions in the demo had a boss that I just didn’t have the right gear to beat. It wouldn’t have mattered how many times I fought him. I was never going to beat him with my current gear. This was because he had the power to heal and the only way to defeat him was to completely destroy him without stopping to reorient yourself. That meant I needed a gun with a larger clip and better defense in order to whether his attacks while shooting non-stop. So I left the mission, thinking I’d have to replay the whole thing. After I found a machine gun with a 100 shot clip and some better gear, I was able to walk right back up to the boss fight and I quickly defeated him with my more appropriate gear.

Another great feature is the vendors. A lot of games have vendors with rotating items that work on a timer. Outriders is no different. But what Outriders gets right is much faster rotation times for items. A lot of games make you wait hours or even days for vendors to rotate stock. The vendors in Outriders rotate stock in minutes. Sometimes it’s too fast. I think the longest I’ve seen a vendor hold items for is 30 minutes. That’s about what it should be. The problem is that often they have a really good item disappearing in minutes while you don’t have enough money to buy it. It would be nice if you could have the store hold one item for you while you’re going to get the money. But in general the quicker store rotation times make for a better gear experience. Chances are if you miss something you want, something just as good or better will appear in the store later. The quality of gear also improves as you raise your world tier, so that plays a factor in returning to vendors for better gear later as well.

I really like the fast travel system. Having random points you find on the map and unlock as fast travel points is superior to the safe house and mission location fast travel points you see in The Division. This really comes down to map design though. The missions are constructed around the fast travel points so one fast travel point is conveniently located near the start of multiple missions. I prefer that map design. That being said, I wasn’t particularly impressed with the map shown in the demo. It was a far cry from the open world planet exploration experience the game’s trailers keep implying. I assume the map opens up into a much larger world at some point. At the same time, the combat works best in a closed lane scenario, which is exactly how the map in the demo is constructed.

This is a Square Enix published RPG, so we definitely need to talk about the writing. It’s interesting enough for this genre of gameplay. There is a larger story at work and mysteries to solve. There are clear antagonists and allies, though it’s unclear who the good guys actually are. The story is compelling enough for me to want to learn more. And the few characters I have met are entertaining enough for me to want to continue engaging with. I would like to mention that the demo killed off my favorite character, so far, during the introduction. That really sucked. Especially since the demo didn’t let me have his cowboy hat, or some gear equivalent to it.

I played this demo on PS4, so my experience of the graphics was adequate but I don’t assume it’s the best version of the game to play. I was fine with the way it looked, but the loading times were pretty long. I didn’t experience any noticeable lag in game though. I definitely would assume the PS5 and PC versions of the game are superior in every way visually and performance wise.

My only real issue with the demo was audio. Specifically dialog. The gunplay sounds fine. I had no problems with the sound effects either in game or during cutscenes. But I had countless instances of dialog dropping off and lagging behind subtitles. Characters would be talking and suddenly the dialog would just trail off. Subtitles were often shown way ahead of the dialog being spoken. It’s a demo so I assume these issues will get cleaned up in the final version, and it certainly wasn’t a deal breaker.

Overall, I really liked playing this demo. Much more than I imagined I would. I went into the game expecting to be disappointed or at best apathetic about it. But by the end I was sold on the game. If I had a dedicated crew to play with, this would be a day one purchase for me. I don’t usually score demos, especially in pre-release builds, but for a demo I’d probably give it an 8/10. I look forward to trying the launch build of Outriders.

As always, thanks for reading. Please take the time to follow my blog, leave a comment, and check out some of my other channels if you enjoyed what you read.

Roller Champions Closed Beta Review

I’m a big beta guy. I participate in every pre-launch build of every game I can. Even the games I’m genuinely not interested in and would absolutely never buy in normal circumstances. I also make sure to always take the time to give honest and detailed feedback. I take every survey, answer every poll, and often take the time to participate in a beta’s forum or Discord server. It’s important. In my experience, many of these studios do listen to feedback. I have seen countless games changed because of user feedback. And more importantly I’ve seen many games ruined because of the wrong user feedback. That’s why I take feedback so seriously. If a company changes their game for the worse because of user feedback, I don’t blame the company. I commend a company for changing their game to suit the demands of their player base, for better or for worse. I blame the users who gave bad feedback. That’s how I feel about this latest beta build of Roller Champions.

Sports games are hard. I can’t think of a genre that’s harder to get “right” than a competitive PVP sports game. Especially one that’s not based on a real sport. Every player has their own ideas about how a game should play/feel. But experienced gamers can draw upon their past gaming experiences to determine how a game should most likely feel for a modern/contemporary audience. It’s easy to design a football game in 2021. Because we have multiple decades of football games to draw from. A studio might want to make slight deviations from Madden for originality and perceived improvement, but in general, it’s gonna mostly feel like Madden. Why? Because 99% of your player base will have been raised on Madden and consider it the established standard in football games. Because it is, for better or for worse. It’s worse by the way. NFL Blitz for life! Now try to apply this same logic to something like Rocket League. It’s impossible.

Rocket League may not be the first game where you can use a car to hit balls into a goal, but it’s certainly the only mainstream example that has that as the major selling point from the last 10 years. Now imagine trying to make Rocket League without the existence of Rocket League already present. It would be really hard to get perfect. The concept might click but things like balance, weight, speed, HUD, and so on would all need to be created from nothing and feel good to a large variety of players that possibly have no common gaming experience, because there’s no established community that can easily be pushed into playing a game of soccer with cars. If you make an open world fantasy RPG, you can technically do whatever you want. Nevertheless, everyone who tries your game is going to compare it to something they’ve already played. So logically you’ll work towards another game in terms of feel so players don’t feel like your game is working against their desires for how it “should” feel. But there’s nothing like that for Roller Champions. The only thing that feels like Roller Champions at this point is Roller Champions. The problem with that is that the game isn’t out yet so we have no consensus on how exactly Roller Champions is supposed to feel. 

In this mode of thinking, I want to say a few things right off the bat before I get into the nuances of this review. The first is that I absolutely hate this build of Roller Champions. I loved the previous builds and played them for hours. I genuinely was interested in trying to play this game at competitive level. With this current build, I’m playing about three matches a day and even that feels kind of burdensome. For context, three matches is less than 30 minutes of play. You can literally finish a match, including matchmaking and loading times in under five minutes when the servers are active, assuming someone opens the game with a three-lap goal. I can’t even comfortably enjoy this game for 30 minutes any more. That’s because of monumental changes in how the game feels for me.

The second thing I’d like to say is that I absolutely do not blame Ubisoft for my disgust with this latest build. This happened because of community feedback. More specifically the closed development feedback team, which I was invited to participate in personally, but couldn’t because I live in Taiwan rather than Europe. I know exactly who is to blame for these changes that I find terrible and can even name some of them. Though I won’t here, because that would be both inappropriate and petty. This is the fault of those who were given the privilege of providing feedback rather than that of the developers who made the game.

Finally, I want to clarify that there is no right or wrong way to make Roller Champions. The way I want the game to play and feel is no more or less correct than anyone else’s opinion, because again this is a game that has never existed before. So there’s no previous test cases to cite as the right or wrong way to make this game. It’s the first of its kind. Sure, there are other PVP sports games with wacky concepts, but none of them are the same exact concept as Roller Champions. So none of them are perfect games to draw on for how this specific game should play. My only argument for why I think my opinions on how the game should feel and why the new build is worse are in any way valid come from the fact that I played all previous builds of the game for several hours and want the game to continue to feel that way. Moreover, I am not alone in that opinion. However, after spending many hours in the Discord I can say that many players like the new build and are happy with those changes. Not just the elitist assholes who got to be part of development first hand but also members of the rest of us who only got to play the “public” builds. So again, there’s nothing definitively wrong with the latest build of Roller Champions. It’s just not a version of the game that I’m personally interested in devoting much time to.

I don’t want to write a full review of this beta. It’s several public builds in, I’ve already streamed several hours of previous builds, and the game will change more before launch. So rather than do my traditional review I just want to address my thoughts on specific changes, both good and bad, that I’ve observed since the previous build. I’ll also include some general notes that I think need to be addressed. I think that’s more useful to readers who have been following the game long term, other people playing the beta, and the developers themselves. If you are curious about previous builds of the game, you should definitely go check out my streams of them on my YouTube channel. Here is a list of Roller Champions videos available on my channel from past builds. At the time or writing this, I’ve not streamed any sessions of the current build due to lack of interest.

1.       Changing the Shooting Button

In the previous builds, the shooting button was the left or right bumper. I can’t recall which one specifically. Now technically speaking you should always be able to remap any and all buttons in 2021, and that was most likely always the plan, but you couldn’t in previous builds. So it was never a guarantee until this latest build. In any case, they remapped the default shooting button to be the left trigger and that was 100% the best simple design change I’ve ever seen. It drastically improved the gameplay experience. I hated having to shoot with the bumper. Now sure the bumpers on my controller always feel a bit spotty anyway so maybe I have a bias against those buttons, but I still think the change to a trigger was a phenomenal decision. That being said, nothing in the game told me that until I looked up the buttons in the menu myself, so I played the first few games thinking it was still the bumper and that the game, or my controller, wasn’t working.

2.       Changing the Shot Targeting Design

I absolutely hate this design change. In the previous builds, you had an arc line appear when you aimed your shot. Now you have a reticle that functions similarly to a crosshair in a gun shooting game. The reason that design works in a shooter is that your bullets fly straight. Or at least close enough to straight for the reticle to accurately depict where your bullets will hit. In Roller Champions, you are not firing bullets. You’re throwing a large ball while roller skating on ramps at high speed while trying to dodge other players so you don’t get tackled. And the ball flies with a fairly pronounced arc.

Now I’m not saying you can’t make shots with the reticle. I’ve made several. But what I am saying is that the barrier to make shots has gotten considerably larger. Trick shots have become way more rare, at least in unranked play. Long distance shots are pretty much dead. Pretty much every goal I’ve seen in this build has been from extremely close to the goal. That makes sense because it’s the closest thing to firing a bullet. And even then I’m seeing way more missed shots by so many players. Many players, most of them hardcore ranked players, will say this is a good thing. They like the idea of shots being harder because it makes it easier for players that have countless hours to practice to go uncontested. But it’s a terrible change/design for the casual players. With such short games to begin with it’s easy for new players to go several matches without being able to score a single goal just because of how hard it is to aim this new reticle. I think it’s fine for ranked play, but the original design is way more accessible and should be re-implemented for at least unranked play.

3.       Tackling Changes

Tackling is extremely broken in this build. Even weirder is the fact that it’s broken in both directions. Landing a tackle is much harder now. I can’t explain why but aiming a tackle at an oncoming player just seems much harder. Even players that aren’t doing too much maneuvering are getting dodges, without using the dodge button, that just don’t seem realistic. At the same time, getting tackled from behind has become preposterous. It’s a constant bloodbath. It’s incredibly hard to hold the ball now if you catch it near opposing players. There seems to be no invincibility time after gaining possession and you can easily be combo tackled by multiple players. Even when your team is the one getting tackles, it’s just not fun for the whole game to be a tackle fest.

The increase in tackling has forced players to pass more, which is a good thing. But it becomes useless when you can’t get away from the crowd after catching a pass. It’s hard to say exactly what the difference is from previous builds, but so many people complained about it in the Discord.

4.       Dodging Changes

The dodge button is now pretty much useless. You can’t use it when you aren’t carrying the ball. Or at least it seems like you can’t. When you do have the ball, it’s no longer effective. Even calling it a dodge is a misnomer at this point. In previous builds you did a spin and actually could dodge a tackle. Now it just sort of fake moves the player a little and you can still be tackled while using it, even when timed correctly. When you consider how broken tackling has become, this change has monumental and noticeably detrimental consequences.  

5.       Speed Button Changes

I won’t say the speed button is completely useless now but it has been nerfed past the point of reasonable. I can’t even tell if it’s actually working in this build, because you get almost no gains to speed at all. You used to be able to catch up to players holding the ball with well-timed uses of the speed button. Now your only hope is the team boost button or swinging around the opposite direction and hoping to head them off at the pass. Breaking away has become extremely difficult. Since you can’t quickly boost your speed anymore and you can’t dodge, you’re basically at the mercy of how good or bad the opposing team is at tackling, which as I’ve already stated has become a shit show.

6.       Defensive Maneuvers

The game was honestly never really a defensive game outside of tackling and getting midair interceptions. That actually worked in previous builds because of things like the speed button and an easier time of landing oncoming tackles. Now that those other features are so broken, you realize that the game definitely needs more defensive options. Much of the game now is just land a tackle or hope the player can’t aim the shot with that reticle. Because you almost certainly won’t catch up to them if you miss and getting an interception is actually really tough because of how hard it is to get air from a normal vertical jump. I don’t necessarily know what those additional defensive features should be, because the game does need to remain simple. But other than rebalancing the other functions to the old build, the current defensive options just aren’t effective enough to turn the tide if you already missed your tackle.

7.       Tutorial(s)

The game needs a more robust and specific tutorial system. The tutorial amounts to a video that explains the rules and how things work, but not actually what the controls are or how to do anything. It just throws you into a game with bots and lets you fumble around until you figure everything out on your own. There needs to be a move specific tutorial that goes through each aspect of play. There needs to be directed practice/drills for everything from passing and shooting to tackling and dodging. A practice room for specific aspects of gameplay, such as aiming tackles, would be great as well. I’d also like to see a tricks tutorial that helps players learn how to do things like get big air and dunk. I see certain players pull off moves that are definitely possible but completely unintuitive. Even just getting high jumps quickly is something that fundamentally changes your approach to gameplay once you learn how to do it but you may never figure out on your own.

8.       Skate park

I really like this concept but in my experience it has been almost completely useless. I’ve never encountered another player in the times I’ve entered the skate park, save for one time when the official Twitter account announced that an event was happening. There are supposedly special limited time events/challenges in the skate park regularly but I’ve never had any of them start while I was in there, save for that one they announced on Twitter. It lasted exactly 60 seconds, had a prize for only one of the six players present, I lost, and that was the end of my experience with skate park events. There definitely needs to be a notification that tells you when skate park events are occurring and I guess better matchmaking for the skate park so it’s not always empty. I can’t even really say if it’s a good or bad concept because I haven’t experienced anything other than being alone in the skate park enough times to give a serious judgement. I’d also like some sort of directed practice in the skatepark. There are clearly useful practice obstacles in there but without some sort of tutorial I can’t figure out how to do the moves in there I’d like to pull off.

9.       Daily Challenges

I really like the daily challenges thing. It’s probably the only thing that motivated me to login almost every day of the beta. And the days I didn’t login I felt disappointed because I didn’t complete the daily challenge. Currently it’s just play three matches, which is fine. But there definitely needs to be a more robust set of daily challenges with multiple prizes. Three matches for a lootbox is good. Nevertheless, I want additional challenges that change daily, with other prizes, on top of that basic daily challenge.

10.   Lootballs

I like the lootball concept. Yes it’s a lootbox and yes ultimately Ubisoft will charge money for them, but the ability to get at least one free item a day, with the chance to get a legendary, is a great way to keep players coming back. Keep the daily challenge at just three games a day to get a lootball and add additional challenges to get additional free lootballs and it’s a winning concept. In many ways it was the thing that kept me playing throughout the beta once I had played enough to decide I was unhappy with this build. I do hope they add a way to get lootballs with free in-game currency amassed through playing/winning matches.

At the same time, lootballs have the same problem as lootboxes in every other game. You can get useless drops that amount to just a paltry amount of credits and presumably doubles that convert to credits. I see some benefit to credits and fans being in a lootbox but really that’s not what people want. People want new gear. Even if it’s common gear they don’t particularly like, it’s preferred to getting nothing they can use. Rather than credits, it would be cool if you could draw a 24 hour chip that let you claim any one item in the store. If you have all the items in the store, then the chip should convert to credits. That being said, this sort of mechanic where you can draw the equivalent of nothing or not enough currency to do anything useful is part of the lootbox money making scheme in general, so it doesn’t surprise me.

11.   Fans

This is a problem I noticed in past builds as well. Fans in general are kind of weird because they give you benefits that are a bit unclear and not necessarily useful other than for gaining access to ranked mode. And let’s be clear about something that many people don’t seem to want to acknowledge about PVP games in general. Not everyone cares about ranked mode. In fact, I’d be willing to bet that the actual percentage of people who seriously care about ranked mode in these sorts of games like Splatoon, Rocket League, and such are a drop in the bucket. This isn’t CSGO, Dota, or FIFA. These are fun, unrealistic PVP experiences that make normal people who aren’t tied into e-esports happy. E-sports is fine and there’s definitely logic in creating a space for that. But games like this should not consider e-sports level players as the target/core audience. Ubisoft already has a game like that and it’s called Rainbow Six Siege. It actually makes sense to categorize as an e-sports focused title. So my first real issue with fans is that I don’t see a point in them at this stage other than for leaderboard placement and gaining ranked access. But this is also why they added the tier system, which makes sense.

The tier system is something I first noticed and took seriously in Ghost Recon: Breakpoint. In the case of Roller Champions, it’s essentially the seasonal XP system used in Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout. By amassing fans, you increase your tier level and unlock prizes. You only have a certain amount of time to reach the top tier before this resets. Presumably there are seasonal exclusive prizes to win. This is fine I guess. But honestly even that wasn’t enough to motivate me to care more about playing this particular build. The concept works though, because I definitely busted my ass to hit max level in the first season of Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout. That being said, I was so burned out by the end of the first season that I played the second season only maybe two times and then never picked up the game again. My one beef with the Roller Champions’ tier system is that there’s a paid pass. You get way more and presumably better prizes if you’re willing to pay for a season pass. You still have to unlock all the tiers, but they’ve added a paywall for several prizes. Think gold passes in Mario Kart Tour. I understand it, as this is a F2P game, but I definitely don’t have to like it.

My biggest issue with fans is how you amass them. This was an issue I commented on in past builds as well. Currently fans have almost no skill or performance component to amassing them. You just have to play enough. Playing a game gets you 22 fans and winning a game gets you 30. That’s not 22 plus another 30 for winning. That’s 22 plus 8 for winning. That’s the only way I have observed to get fans in this build. That’s terribly unimaginative. There should be performance based fan distribution like in The Crew 2. Every goal should net some fans. Certain, or maybe all, successful tackles should net some fans. Blocks and interceptions should net some fans. You should get fans for lots of stuff. They’re called “fans” after all. People get fans in real life for doing special stuff. Not just for participating. Currently the only thing fans actually measures is who plays the game the most. There is only a minor skill based component to it by giving winners an extra eight fans per game, but that’s nothing in the grand scheme of things. If someone plays five games and wins all five and another person plays seven games and loses all seven, the losing player ultimately has amassed more fans. Remember, a game can end in under 5 minutes from starting matchmaking to back to the main menu. That means the losing player just needs 10 more minutes to amass more fans than the player winning. You stand to make more fans faster by throwing games than playing to win them.

12.   Sponsorship Challenges

These are basically achievements with prizes and hopefully no time limit. There was only one during the beta. It required you to win 10 games. In general, I’m fine with that concept but in a limited time beta I didn’t really like having a win requirement to unlock a limited edition beta participation reward. It should have just been to play 10 games so all beta participants would be guaranteed to get one. But in general I like the sponsorship achievements concept.

13.   Store Transparency

I don’t recall if this was in previous builds, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t. Now when you go to your character closet to change wardrobe, it doesn’t only show you what you have. It also shows you what’s currently available in the store and the cost to buy it. You can even buy it directly from your closet rather than going to the store page. It’s a simple yet extremely effective quality of life improvement.

I don’t want to imply that there was nothing good about this game build. I’ve pointed out a number of changes and additions from this build that I like. Conceptually, I’m still very enthusiastic about Roller Champions and believe it to be an award winning concept. My major issue is the changes to the core gameplay. I’ll admit that this comes from having played all the previous builds and being able to see those changes drastically alter my previous enjoyment of the game. Had this of been the only build I played, I may not feel so unhappy with it. I’d just accept it for what it is. Ignorance is bliss after all. At the same time, even as a veteran player, I wasn’t able to adapt to this build to a level where I enjoyed or even got fully comfortable with the nuances of the gameplay. So chances are without previous experience I would have tried it, liked the concept, not really liked the gameplay, and quickly moved on. I remember my journey with Rocket League and Splatoon. In both instances, I didn’t learn to love the game. I loved the games immediately at a gameplay level. I had to learn to excel at them but not to enjoy them. I don’t get that feeling from this latest build of Roller Champions. I would have to learn to love it and that’s something I simply shouldn’t have to do when so many games I do love are currently available and ever growing.

As with all competitive games, the real question is who is Roller Champions for? Most of my complaints are focused on the fact that the game has become less accessible to casual players. Many competitive players will say the game is now “harder”, which in simplest terms is true. But the question being ignored is what was gained for the majority of players by making the game “harder” to play? Is it more enjoyable? Is it more accessible? Are more or fewer players more likely to enjoy and play the game regularly in the current build? I’d say fewer, but I don’t know what Ubisoft’s intent for the game actually is. If they want a super exclusive game with a serious e-sports community and very few causal players, then the current build is fine for that. But the players that work all day and then just want to come home and play for an hour or two without having to take the game too seriously are not the target for this build. Interestingly enough, Ubisoft’s most recent Roller Champions gameplay development video is literally called “Making a game for Everyone.” As I said at the beginning, there is no definitively correct way for Roller Champions to be. Nevertheless, the current build has definitely turned me, a person who played the previous builds for several hours a day, almost completely off the idea of taking the game seriously at launch. Honestly that’s fine. If I’m not Ubsioft’s target audience then that’s their choice. Developer intent should be the defining factor in how a game evolves. All I can really say is that I am not happy with this current build, I observed via the Discord that I am not the only person that played previous builds that feels this way, and I’m no longer excited to continue following this game. That being said, I will of course play the next beta, were I to be invited to participate again, because as I said, feedback is extremely important to me.

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