The best classic game music and more
I have faith that this game will be great. It has
1)beautiful cutscenes
2)music by Grieg
3)zombie sheep
4)oh, and did I mention that the cover art is... uhh, well let's just say many guys will not complain
http://www.siliconera.com/2010/12/02/ca … -catching/
Atlus strikes again!
There are many great things about it, but the core gameplay is ridiculously hard (so much so that they've announced a patch to fix it), and not very interesting in the first place.
Here's my review on gamefaqs:
I have faith that this game will be great. It has
2)music by Grieg
In any event, game looks sexy as hell.
In any event, game looks sexy as hell.
That soundtrack is woefully incomplete.
All action stages use arrangements of classical music, and none of it is on that particular album.
There are many great things about it, but the core gameplay is ridiculously hard (so much so that they've announced a patch to fix it), and not very interesting in the first place.
Here's my review on gamefaqs:
Thanks for the link and review. So if I follow you correctly, you mostly liked it, but the difficulty was too much. I'm hoping that Atlus USA will realize that and tone-down the difficulty. Also the puzzles were too simple, is that correct? Well, I wonder if Atlus USA will change any of that? Also, it's disappointing to hear that decisions you make have little to no effect on the outcome of the game (if I followed your correctly). At any rate, despite all this, I will eventually get this game, although perhaps not on day one.
There's another album with the classical music
http://vgmdb.net/album/21743
Think the game will be a limited print, much like Atlus's other releases?
This might be the game I get a PS3 or 360 for...
successful games get several print runs from atlus. if it bombs, it'll never get a reprint.
Thanks for the link and review. So if I follow you correctly, you mostly liked it, but the difficulty was too much. I'm hoping that Atlus USA will realize that and tone-down the difficulty. Also the puzzles were too simple, is that correct? Well, I wonder if Atlus USA will change any of that? Also, it's disappointing to hear that decisions you make have little to no effect on the outcome of the game (if I followed your correctly). At any rate, despite all this, I will eventually get this game, although perhaps not on day one.
Let me put it in less convoluted terms, since it can be hard to distill from such a wall of text:
- I LOVE the story, writing and characters. They are really really GOOD.
- I dislike the action parts because difficulty is unbalanced. If you play on Easy, the game can still be stupid hard, but is a walk in the park for the rest of the time. On Normal it's just mostly stupid hard.
Easy is the best way to go, but it will still mangle you at times, and replayability suffers as a result.
In fact, even though there are multiple endings, it's not much fun to play through again due to the nature of the puzzles. In short: the game fails on the action front, because it's too unbalanced and simply not fun. Which is a shame because everything else is SO DAMN GOOD.
- The decisions you make influence your "Karma" which determines which "set" of endings you can get access to. The exact nature of the ending is determined by a couple of questions you have to answer in the very last chapter. The entire story, up to the ending movie, will be completely the same every single time. The endings are all nice though in their own way, which makes it a shame that you have to suffer through the action parts of the game over and over.
That said, if you like Atlus, or if you like mature narratives with loveable characters and great, humorous writing, you need to get this.
I think everything about this looks great expect for the gameplay which looks pretty awful. I might just watch all the story scene videos once they hit YouTube in English.
ign just gave Catherine a 9.0
I don't know why they took off points, they didn't really have anything negative to say about it (except it was a bit hard), but at any rate the video review made it look even more awesome than I originally suspected! Yes, I think this will be gaming great. I imagine quite a few gamers will not like it though, since apparently the game involves thinking (that's hard for most people), and is not easy (imagine that, a game that's actually challenging 
Yup, I can't wait!
July 26th is the release date.
I played the demo, and I'm not a fan. That Atlus thinks they can charge $60 for this simply because it's edgy is mind-blowing. The fact remains that this is a supposed to be a video game, not an anime. As a video game, the gameplay fundamentals must be there, and they simply aren't. The controls are too touchy, and I don't care how good the story is, I'm not putting up with 10-15 hours of block pushing puzzles to experience it.
I played the demo, and I'm not a fan. That Atlus thinks they can charge $60 for this simply because it's edgy is mind-blowing. The fact remains that this is a supposed to be a video game, not an anime. As a video game, the gameplay fundamentals must be there, and they simply aren't. The controls are too touchy, and I don't care how good the story is, I'm not putting up with 10-15 hours of block pushing puzzles to experience it.
To each their own of course. It's not for everyone, I know that I will love this
Well, I guess I should say my confidence interval is 2-sigma...
Well, the demo confirmed my skepticism. It looks as though the development team was at a loss as to how to comprehensibly integrate gameplay into the story that it wanted to tell and ultimately gave up.
Yeah, in addition to my own playtime with the demo, along with the comments already expressed here, and Gamesradar's review of the import version, the game doesn't fill me with a whole lot of confidence either. Says GR:
"The story of Catherine is an amazing achievement. Its tale is a profound, Haruki Murakami-inspired coming-of-age story that addresses important sociological changes happening in Japan and the rest of the world. Unfortunately, the game that must be played in order to experience the story is a simple puzzle game irreparably marred by anachronisms and poor design choices.
Despite the game's amazing story, at least fifteen of the twenty hours it took us to complete the game were spent climbing blocks. The reason it took us so long is the game's brutal difficulty. Normally, difficulty wouldn't be an issue. Modern games like Super Meat Boy have proven the worth of masochistic difficulty. However, Catherine's underlying mechanics can't support such difficulty. The lack of an auto-save feature is compounded by the game offering players limited lives, and no continues. Once you lose your lives, it's back to the titles screen, where you have to reload and sit through whatever dialog sequences and cutscenes lie between the save point and the actual level on which you died. The difficulty is compounded further by the addition of enemies which bring a bit of randomness to the game's puzzles.
We often found that after we'd solved a section of a puzzle, our path would be blocked by enemies upon retrying the section. With no alternative solutions, we'd be forced to sacrifice a life and hope that the enemy AI behaved differently the next time (sometimes it would, sometimes it wouldn't). Progression relies upon controlling how the wall of blocks collapses. Because of the game's limited field of vision, there was no way to know whether a move that allowed us to progress in the moment would lead to a no-win situation ten minutes later, and the sheer randomness of enemy behavior meant that trial and error wasn't even a reliable method of progression. Things got even worse during the game's boss sections, where the game wrests control of the camera from the player during massive attacks."
Unless they've done a major overhaul to the game design for the localized version, this is sounding like a pretty shitty title to play through.
Unless they've done a major overhaul to the game design for the localized version, this is sounding like a pretty shitty title to play through.
See, that's the thing, it's not shitty in the least.
It's got many problems, and it's incredibly frustrating above all, but there's an amazing game in here, somewhere.
I have this nagging feeling that if Atlus had "played it safe" and had not made this about block puzzles but just about random, Persona-esque dungeon crawling, it would've been absolutely brilliant.
Angela wrote:Unless they've done a major overhaul to the game design for the localized version, this is sounding like a pretty shitty title to play through.
See, that's the thing, it's not shitty in the least.
It's got many problems, and it's incredibly frustrating above all, but there's an amazing game in here, somewhere.I have this nagging feeling that if Atlus had "played it safe" and had not made this about block puzzles but just about random, Persona-esque dungeon crawling, it would've been absolutely brilliant.
You can't please everyone, no point in trying. I predict this game will have a cult following, much like other quality games that are not for the general public. I'm sure it has its problems, but what game does not.
I liked the demo quite a bit during the parts I didn't actually have to play. That's probably not a glowing endorsement. I just can't imagine myself messing with blocks for twenty hours.
(And this might actually be the first time I found the limited voice talent pool in localized games to be jarring. Vincent sounded just like "Tales of Vesperia's" Yuri and it took me out of the moment many a time.)
Unless they've done a major overhaul to the game design for the localized version, this is sounding like a pretty shitty title to play through.
In fact, they are lowering the difficulty of the puzzle sections for the US release, where US Normal will correspond to JPN Easy, and Hard to JPN Normal. Perhaps not a major overhaul, but I'm pretty sure it's something like that, anyway.
And while Persona 5 would have undoubtedly sold more copies, I think this game's design is about as safe as they could have played it! Add in the social story and gameplay elements from Persona that everyone loves and wrap it around a puzzle game rather than needing to render and balance 150 Kaneko demons around combat mechanics in a new engine, and you've got the perfect way for Atlus (I mean, Index Corp., lol) to test the HD waters. This low-risk strategy seems to have paid off, as the game did sell pretty well in Japan and I'm sure it'll do decently in the US too, spurred from chomping-at-the-bit Persona and SMT fans (such as myself). If nothing else, playing Catherine will help me imagine how Mara will look in HD.
Premise of this game feels genuinely refreshing in a world of first/third person shooters being released every month.
Premise of this game feels genuinely refreshing in a world of first/third person shooters being released every month.
Agreed, and that's why it's so tragic that they couldn't come with some better gameplay to go with the refreshing story.
Premise of this game feels genuinely refreshing in a world of first/third person shooters being released every month.
Absolutely. I'll be picking it up solely out of principle. Not that I won't enjoy the actual game. I dig weird shit like this.
I played the demo last night and while I had some hangups on the second puzzle portion, I did end up getting to the top eventually. Of course, these hangups were my own stupidity, but it was fairly enjoyable overall.
That Atlus thinks they can charge $60 for this simply because it's edgy is mind-blowing.
what?
XLord007 wrote:That Atlus thinks they can charge $60 for this simply because it's edgy is mind-blowing.
what?
I do have to agree with Dais here. $60 for a game, while not pocket-change for most of us, is not exactly a bank-breaker either. Most "big-name" games start off at around the $60 tag. Not to mention that Atlus usually sweetens the deal by adding goodies to the those who pre-order (in this case an artbook and soundtrack... seriously, what more can you ask for
I do have to agree with Dais here. $60 for a game, while not pocket-change for most of us, is not exactly a bank-breaker either. Most "big-name" games start off at around the $60 tag. Not to mention that Atlus usually sweetens the deal by adding goodies to the those who pre-order (in this case an artbook and soundtrack... seriously, what more can you ask for
I'm of the opinion that $60 is too much to ask for any game, let alone something like Catherine. Catherine is not an established IP. Atlus can't afford to market the game beyond the internet. Catherine is essentially a puzzle game. Outside of the faithful, who's going to pay $60 for it? Look how poorly Shadows of the Damned sold at $60 and that has conventional gameplay. By charging $60, they're just setting themselves up for failure and then future games that take risks like this one won't come here because this didn't sell well. They should charge $30 or $40 to get more people to take a chance on it.
I'm of the opinion that $60 is too much to ask for any game, let alone something like Catherine. Catherine is not an established IP. Atlus can't afford to market the game beyond the internet. Catherine is essentially a puzzle game. Outside of the faithful, who's going to pay $60 for it? Look how poorly Shadows of the Damned sold at $60 and that has conventional gameplay. By charging $60, they're just setting themselves up for failure and then future games that take risks like this one won't come here because this didn't sell well. They should charge $30 or $40 to get more people to take a chance on it.
There was a thread recently on neogaf about $60 games, and I totally agree with the idea brought up in there that $60 makes sense from the perspective of skimming. I'm sure that Atlus knows that most of the sales of this game are going to be at the $40 and under range, but why not take advantage of the faithful who are going to pay however much they ask for the first month the game is out? 
Unusual to see Atlus price a game that high. Sounds like a no bullshit kinda game.
edited.
I'm of the opinion that $60 is too much to ask for any game, let alone something like Catherine. Catherine is not an established IP. Atlus can't afford to market the game beyond the internet. Catherine is essentially a puzzle game. Outside of the faithful, who's going to pay $60 for it? Look how poorly Shadows of the Damned sold at $60 and that has conventional gameplay. By charging $60, they're just setting themselves up for failure and then future games that take risks like this one won't come here because this didn't sell well. They should charge $30 or $40 to get more people to take a chance on it.
But if they did that, and then a sequel continuing the story were to come out at $60, people would complain about overcharging. People are fickle.
I am willing to indulge publishers their full price point for anything that both triggers my interest and has a high probability of being buried by higher-profile releases. There have been too many times where I've come across something amazing I missed the first time around, and the series and the team who made it have flatlined since. I'd rather take a chance on something and regret showing too much interest in something disappointing than regret not showing enough interest in something wonderful back when it would've meant something. To that end, I just preordered the deluxe edition.
XLord007 wrote:I'm of the opinion that $60 is too much to ask for any game, let alone something like Catherine. Catherine is not an established IP. Atlus can't afford to market the game beyond the internet. Catherine is essentially a puzzle game. Outside of the faithful, who's going to pay $60 for it? Look how poorly Shadows of the Damned sold at $60 and that has conventional gameplay. By charging $60, they're just setting themselves up for failure and then future games that take risks like this one won't come here because this didn't sell well. They should charge $30 or $40 to get more people to take a chance on it.
But if they did that, and then a sequel continuing the story were to come out at $60, people would complain about overcharging. People are fickle.
I am willing to indulge publishers their full price point for anything that both triggers my interest and has a high probability of being buried by higher-profile releases. There have been too many times where I've come across something amazing I missed the first time around, and the series and the team who made it have flatlined since. I'd rather take a chance on something and regret showing too much interest in something disappointing than regret not showing enough interest in something wonderful back when it would've meant something. To that end, I just preordered the deluxe edition.
ohhhh, deluxe edition! very nice. I pre-ordered the regular edition, but that too comes with the artbook and bonus soundtrack, so I'm happy
I do think the price will likely go down, but you never know. The Deluxe Edition of Demon's Souls is worth quite a bit more than $60. And at any rate, I don't mind supporting Atlus for releasing such a unique and refreshing game. Also, when was the last time two beautiful women fought for you!! Huh? that hasn't happened to me in at LEAST a week...
There was a thread recently on neogaf about $60 games, and I totally agree with the idea brought up in there that $60 makes sense from the perspective of skimming. I'm sure that Atlus knows that most of the sales of this game are going to be at the $40 and under range, but why not take advantage of the faithful who are going to pay however much they ask for the first month the game is out?
Yeah, there's something to be said for skimming, but there's also something to be said for getting more people to buy in on day one and have the network effect generate excitement. If Catherine started at $40, I'd consider buying it just to support the idea of such a wacky game being released in the U.S., but at $60, it's too much for me to be willing to buy it out of charity. If it takes too long to drop in price, I might have already dropped the game from consideration and be focusing on the next talked about release.
Concerning the problem of making the sequel more expensive, I think you can get away with that if the first game proves itself. Remember Katamari? The first one was $20 and did well so Namco put the second one out at $30. People sure did bitch, but the game still did well.
Remember Katamari? The first one was $20 and did well so Namco put the second one out at $30. People sure did bitch, but the game still did well.
I actually think each Katamari game rose $10 from the last in the U.S.. The original was $20, We <3 Katamari was $30, Me & My Katamari was $40, Beautiful Katamari was $50, and Katamari Tribute was $60. Does someone remember differently?
I actually think each Katamari game rose $10 from the last in the U.S.. The original was $20, We <3 Katamari was $30, Me & My Katamari was $40, Beautiful Katamari was $50, and Katamari Tribute was $60. Does someone remember differently?
I know for a fact you're right on the first two. I never bought any of the others, so I checked out IGN since they list the MSRP of a game when they review it and I'm pretty sure they don't update the MSRP over time. According to IGN, the original prices for the other three are as follows:
Me & My Katamari (PSP) -- $39.99
Beautiful Katamari (360) - $39.99
Katamari Forever (PS3) - $49.99
Personally, I don't remember the 360 one being that cheap when it came out, but I'm fairly certain they're right about the PS3 one not launching for $60.
I should have been doing research last night, but instead I had some fun with Catherine
By some fun, I mean FANTASTIC! The game is SO refreshing, SO well done, and very very addictive. I know people have bitched about the difficulty level, but I will say that on Easy, it's not particularly hard. Oh yes, you will die, but it's not frustrating, at least not on Easy. And if you still suck at Easy (for whatever reason), Atlus has included a "very easy" mode for you wussies! Of course, the real draw here is the amazing storyline. Simply a work of art! I will however say that I found the puzzle portion of the game extremely enjoyable as well. The boss levels are hard, but there's a reason they are called "bosses". Also, for anyone who is single or in a relationship, in their late 20s-30s, I think the storyline will really resonate with you. Enjoy!
By some fun, I mean FANTASTIC! The game is SO refreshing, SO well done, and very very addictive. I know people have bitched about the difficulty level, but I will say that on Easy, it's not particularly hard. Oh yes, you will die, but it's not frustrating, at least not on Easy. And if you still suck at Easy (for whatever reason), Atlus has included a "very easy" mode for you wussies!
Today's Word of the Day....