Скорошни рецензии на Waffle McSpicy

Buggy and unoptimized on release, like a lot of games from 'established' game studios.
P.S. 2 months later and the game autocrashes 5 minutes in.

Game literally only has one loading screen since beta

I've missed this game so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ much, regardless of the scummy monetary scammy wammy bs they tried to pull in the past.

TLDR: Overall rating: 5/10 (6/10 for all the shibe and cat petting)

1. aesthetic - 10/10
   
2. graphics - 0/10*
   
3. EN translations - low-tier-day-1-anime-fansub/10**
   
4. gameplay - 5/10
   
5. story - 4/10
   
6. lore - 8/10

Enjoyment of the game heavily relies on the player's interest in Japan, Japanese folklore and urban legends, as well as its physical setting of Shibuya, Tokyo. This is because it falls short in all other aspects, including gameplay (which I won't talk about because you can look that up on youtube).
Recommended to only play it as a Tokyo/Shibuya simulator. (This would've been perfect as a VR game)

Onto explanations of my earlier ratings for different aspects of the game:

• Environments: very detailed (of rainy, night-time tokyo, shibuya), but..
  
• *Graphics: settings shipped out of the box makes everything ugly and muddy, requires fiddling with UE4 config ini settings to get it perfect
  
• Lore: game is packed full of popular japanese/asian folklore and folk horror elements
  
• **Translations: weird - casual banter is oftentimes inaccurate, but somehow 'formal' talk (i.e. explaining events) looks to be accurate most of the time

Graphics FYI: The game ships with maximum TAA Anti-aliasing (i.e. blur), motion blurring, Chromatic aberration (also adding blur), and film grain, but only motion blur can be turned off in-game.
I also can't see my character reflections in this game through mirrors (i.e. exactly the same as in CP2077), which is weird, because world reflections are fine.

Regarding weird japanese-to-english translations
I'll start with a random example:
One time, when the protag's partner comments a girl they were helping was "playing the piano really well", the protagonist says something like "I didnt know the likes of you were into good music", in japanese.

The protagonist's partner then angrily/irritatedly replies with "what the hell do you mean?" in japanese, but the translation butchers it by displaying "Well, now you do" (doesn't translate as angry at all does it?).

You might say this is a minor one-off issue, but since there are lots of casual back-and-forth banters like this throughout the game, it then becomes an issue especially since these dialogues help with character development.

While I may have managed to pick out mistranslations with what little understanding I had of (spoken) japanese, I understand that most people won't.

Granted, not all things in japanese can be translated 1-to-1 into english, especially japanese folklore lingo that have no equivalent in english.

In other words, if you're going into this game, expect to lose a bit of context with the translation. Unfortunately, unlike anime, you can't "switch subs".

My advice? It helps if you have some understanding of spoken japanese going into the game.

Written knowledge of japanese isn't critical, but helps with world-building as you are then able to read and understand physical labels/signs littered throughout Tokyo/Shibuya - these aren't translated for obvious reasons, and also aren't critical to the game but helps if you want to really immerse yourself.

P.S. switching to negative recommendation to balance the scales until the time that they they fix the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ graphics and add an FOV slider, amongst other things.

I don't agree with some of the decisions the devs have made over time (like increasing global font size for everyone, just for 4K reso users) but I keep coming back to this game regardless.

You know the game's (going to be) good when it doesn't show up in ALL CAPS anymore on your feed.
Monster Hunter: World = good
MONSTER HUNTER WORLD = bad

Same logic probably applies to RISE.

Cool game with significantly higher production quality compared to other similar games of this type (the co-op zombie slaying kind) - and this game is focused on fun (i.e. action and combat) over realism (which is severely lacking in the VR industry), i.e. it's not a survival game just like how L4D was never about survival and resource management - meaning no need to worry about durability, hunger, etc.

Bugs
There ARE a couple of game breaking bugs however, and the most significant one is the presence of ghost lobbies/hosts that prevent players from jumping into a game - you can't choose to explicitly 'host' a game; if the game netcode determines that someone has started a party for the same mission before you, you are forced to join them instead, and since you can only 'actually start' (i.e. load into) a mission if you are host, you'll never be able to play because the dead host is dead and won't let the party load into the mission, ever.

Anyways that's all I have to say for bugs.
Onto the good stuff!

Great focus on action and combat over cookie-cutter 'realism' and 'survival'
No 'durability'.
No 'hunger'.
No 'fatigue'.
Just lots of action and gun combat against hordes of zombies.
The only thing you have to 'manage' between games are your gun upgrades (sight, stock, grip, magazine, etc.).

This is exactly why I like this game a lot - because it's simply not focused on 'realism' at all, which almost every other VR game of this type irritatingly seems to be obsessed about, specifically with regards to resource management - in this game you have tons of zombies to shoot, and fittingly, you therefore require lots of ammo, which the game does provide in abundance.

Restocking ammo isn't a chore, meaning more shooting and less fumbling. (this alone puts this at the top of my personal list of 'VR co-op zombie slaying' games)

Ammo/item pickup design
There are L4D-esque ammo stashes that appear at multiple points throughout each segment of a mission - you need only touch the ammo cache or shoot it once to restock on all types of ammo - no need to manually reach over and pick them up individually, magazine by magazine, like in other games.

The game also borrows HL:Alyx's convenient method of picking up items in-game - when you're in (close) proximity of an item, the game allows you to hover your hand in its direction and grab to pull the item to you from a distance, except in this game the item doesn't 'fly' towards you, it just teleports into your hand.

They also have the same the wrist pouch storage concept that Alyx had, and there's nothing wrong with copying a good concept from another game - if anything, this is good, because it encourages the better VR interaction design patterns to become the standard rather than the exception, i.e. more VR game devs need to adopt this type of interaction.

For physical VR gunstock users
This game works extremely well with a gunstock, but only for the two handed weapons (obviously), and there's only two of them in the game.. and both are assault rifles.
There's also the pump shotgun.. but you don't use a gunstock with that for obvious reasons.

After a lot of trial and error, I found that these are the most optimal settings for use with a VR gunstock:

• MOVEMENT > Control Scheme: Sliding (i.e. continuous locomotion - if you get motion sick don't use this)
  
• MOVEMENT > Sprinting mode: Muzzle sprint (same as pavlov where you autosprint when gun barrel is pointed down)
  
• GAMEPLAY > Inventory Mode: Selection Wheel*
  
• GAMEPLAY > Reload Type: Quick**
  
• GAMEPLAY > Grip Mode: Toggle
  
• GAMEPLAY > Hand Item Swap: OFF
  
• GAMEPLAY > Weapon Weight: OFF

*'Selection wheel' inventory mode uses HL: Alyx's method of switching weapons, but if you prefer VR immersion, use the other one ..I think it's called the 'belt/holster' option - basically your weapons are shown physically on your hip and you grab it to swap your weapon. Personally I don't like using this anymore because of the amount of fumbling that occurs when you're trying to swap your weapon or grab an item that's also overlapping with where your hip weapon is etc. The other reason to use selection wheel mode is because of the ease of usage with minimal hand movements needed to swap weapons

**'Advanced reloading' is cool and immersive but at higher difficulties the quick reload makes a world of a difference, and not worth the extra harvest bonus that it gives - just remember that you can collect partially used magazines which gets discarded when you do a tactical reload (i.e. you reload with a few bullets still available in mag). You can do this for both types of reload modes

Note that bolded options are the critical ones, while the non-bolded options above are just my personal preference, and is additionally also subject to whether you like your experience to be 'realistic/immersive' or not. However, regardless of your preference, this specific configuration will minimize fumbling outside of combat, thereby maximizing your time spent in combat (which is what the game is about, really).

This game evokes a profound sense of warmth and fuzziness at the beginning.
It then poetically multiplies that feeling tenfold at the end.

More importantly, once at the end, the game confronts you with a most beautiful realization.
Music isn't just a universal language; it IS the true language of any and all universes!

That being said however, you won't make it to the end that easily - especially if you have fear of
- Heights
- Space (and being stranded alone in deep space)
- Darkness
- Ocean Depths
- The Unknown
- Small Spaces
- Falling into Black Holes
- Falling into the Sun

But trust me (and trust everyone else that made it through) - it's worth it.

If you do find the courage to embark on this experience, remember - it's not about the destination, it's about the journey, so try to avoid spoilers as much as possible for maximum enjoyment!
Happy trails!

TLDR: Somewhat-unique BR game with lots of bugs.
Game plays like it's still in beta, with lots of bugs and (potentially) unfun balance decisions for the future - imo the balance is fine right now, but it's never a good thing to see the devs willing to cave in so easily to crybabies.

As for bugs, there are NPCs (that you have to eat for buffs/heals) but they are frequently stuck in walls and in the ground.
Reload is bugged and doesn't work if the server decides you didn't "reload".
In solos, sometimes you respawn OUTSIDE the gas ring.
NPC line of sight detection is bugged. It feels like it's server-sided and if you eat civilian NPCs too fast after going into a corner, you still end up alerting the whole map as if you ate the NPC in public and in front of other NPCs.
Game is still fun though

This game is absolutely DRIPPING in atmosphere.
If you want a game with Blade Runner-esque feels, this is it.

The (sound and visual) artists for this game are really just flexing on us at this point - I'd say they're almost on par with environment designers from Mirror's Edge/Catalyst (though both games have vastly differing themes).

Seriously, I could just slowly eat my hot bowl of ramen while AFK in this game, soaking in the sounds and scenery as I eat - they really, really nailed the ambience in this game.

If you want to compare this to CP2077 - atmospherically, it's better, AND doesn't come with vulgar BS like dildos and sex everywhere.
You get a clean, SFW, family-friendly sci-fi experience with this game (a bit of cussing and swearing though).

The developers made sure to steer clear from any SoCal 'woke' narratives constantly being peddled by others today, choosing instead to focus on properly paying tribute to iconic futuristic sci-fi movies like 'The Fifth Element' and 'Blade Runner'.

Gameplay
Fundamentally, the gameplay feels like Alien Swarm (though Alien Swarm feels slightly more fluid), but obviously - this isn't Alien Swarm.. play it and find out!
Also there's little to no grinding in this game.

Technical Issues
Like with any other game, there are a few outstanding issues with The Ascent (mostly technical and should be fixed soon):
- Flaky DX12 and RTX support, but frankly this game doesn't need them
- 'Headphones' audio preset is extremely soft, while the others are extremely loud: you will need to do some tuning/balancing to the individual audio settings for voice, game, music, etc. individually to suit you
- Invisible/missing female models (you see wigs walking around) in certain environments like the bathhouse
- Certain mismatched dialogues from nogHead in the later missions (99% of the missions are fine though)


TLDR: Alien Swarm with a BIG map: you basically get a futuristic scifi 4-player co-op game that is DRIPPING in atmosphere, and is mostly family-friendly too.

Final protip: try to leave the film grain on - it adds to the atmosphere while not being too in-your-face.