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Penny Arcade - Comic - The Hollow Ones

DogDog Registered User, Administrator, Vanilla Staff admin
edited June 2019 in The Penny Arcade Hub

imagePenny Arcade - Comic - The Hollow Ones

Videogaming-related online strip by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins. Includes news and commentary.

Read the full story here


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Posts

  • dennisdennis aka bingley Registered User regular
    This is fantastic news. Especially the part where Jerry says that it might actually be a better game without having to be a slave to rhythm. I was going to get this game, but fully expected to fail and be sad. Now I know I can actually turn it into the kind of game I like best: one where you can take your time and plan out your moves. Seems like it turned it back into a regular roguelike. Just with awesome background music (and for CoH, fantastic world).

  • DjiemDjiem Registered User regular
    My only issue with fixed beat is that the game is easy enough as it is, I'm afraid all challenge would be stripped out if I had unlimited time to plan any move.

  • Hahnsoo1Hahnsoo1 Make Ready. We Hunt.Registered User regular
    dennis wrote: »
    This is fantastic news. Especially the part where Jerry says that it might actually be a better game without having to be a slave to rhythm. I was going to get this game, but fully expected to fail and be sad. Now I know I can actually turn it into the kind of game I like best: one where you can take your time and plan out your moves. Seems like it turned it back into a regular roguelike. Just with awesome background music (and for CoH, fantastic world).
    The Original Crypt of the Necrodancer had the "Bard" character which does something similar.

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  • dennisdennis aka bingley Registered User regular
    edited June 2019
    Hahnsoo1 wrote: »
    dennis wrote: »
    This is fantastic news. Especially the part where Jerry says that it might actually be a better game without having to be a slave to rhythm. I was going to get this game, but fully expected to fail and be sad. Now I know I can actually turn it into the kind of game I like best: one where you can take your time and plan out your moves. Seems like it turned it back into a regular roguelike. Just with awesome background music (and for CoH, fantastic world).
    The Original Crypt of the Necrodancer had the "Bard" character which does something similar.

    Yes, I'm familiar with this. And Jerry had already told Mike about that back when they did the First 15.

    But I just have never had much interest in playing CotN, even with its superb soundtrack. The world and creature design always seemed a bit bland.

    This is a big improvement, in that you're not slotted into the "can't dance class", and can explore all the classes in this mode. At least, that's what I'm getting out of this.

    dennis on
  • SharpEdgeSharpEdge Registered User regular
    edited June 2019
    I think "better game" kinda oversells exactly what Fixed Beat Mode is doing though, but I do see one advantage to the high end of mastery to this game.

    In both modes they are the exact same game, with the exact same mechanics, and the exact same logic and the exact same means of interaction with things in the world.

    The only difference is "Do you want the game to play out in real time or not?" and "Your window for inputting the next command is limited to a specific window."

    Naturally someone who can play the game perfectly in Fixed Beat Mode is also capable of playing it perfectly without fixed beat mode, it's just a matter of how able you are to make decisions quickly vs taking as much, or more importantly, as little time as you want. The window for inputting a command "on beat" is actually more loose than you'd think, and I think the intent is that a player eventually will know the 100% predictable logic of every enemy that being able to succeed in "real beat time" is still very manageable.

    But I have a question, and I don't know the answer...

    Can fixed beat mode be played FASTER than beat mode?

    If you've mastered the logic of every threat in the game, does waiting for the next beat become more of a boring wait gimmick for the sake of the musical aesthetic?

    The game often gives you screens full of enemies that, given their 100% predictable logic, the screen can be "solved" before you make the first move (The game doesn't start the movement until you make the first move even in Beat Mode for this reason)

    You could look at every bad guy on screen, write down a solution like your programming a robot, and see how fast you can clear the screen in mininal steps (another point of data measured on speed run leaderboards), and in fixed beat mode, that would be undoubtedly faster than in beat mode.

    I'm going to test this. I don't think it'll be faster than Doubletime mode though.

    SharpEdge on
  • YoungFreyYoungFrey Registered User regular
    edited June 2019
    dennis wrote: »
    Hahnsoo1 wrote: »
    dennis wrote: »
    This is fantastic news. Especially the part where Jerry says that it might actually be a better game without having to be a slave to rhythm. I was going to get this game, but fully expected to fail and be sad. Now I know I can actually turn it into the kind of game I like best: one where you can take your time and plan out your moves. Seems like it turned it back into a regular roguelike. Just with awesome background music (and for CoH, fantastic world).
    The Original Crypt of the Necrodancer had the "Bard" character which does something similar.

    Yes, I'm familiar with this. And Jerry had already told Mike about that back when they did the First 15.

    But I just have never had much interest in playing CotN, even with its superb soundtrack. The world and creature design always seemed a bit bland.

    This is a big improvement, in that you're not slotted into the "can't dance class", and can explore all the classes in this mode. At least, that's what I'm getting out of this.
    I'm pretty rhythm challenged, so CotD was really hard for me. But I found the turn-based version of CotN almost too easy. It was more about what order I'd kill all the enemies than how I'd do it. I'd prefer something that was just very tolerant of my arrhythmia. Maybe if the turn-based version was made harder in some other way to compensate. Like more monster health, or more enemies.

    YoungFrey on
  • SharpEdgeSharpEdge Registered User regular
    edited June 2019
    Djiem wrote: »
    My only issue with fixed beat is that the game is easy enough as it is, I'm afraid all challenge would be stripped out if I had unlimited time to plan any move.

    As someone who went and beat Necrodancer only after Cadence was announced, I agree, but the time it took me to beat Necrodancer was mostly spent learning how to play against each zone and all the tricks each new zone brings in.

    It was like 10 hours for me to beat Necromancer the first time, but I could immediately after that beat the game again in 1 hour because of the mastery I earned in those 10 hours.

    That mastery also carried over to Cadence of Hyrule, and as I was still well practiced with the previous game fresh in my mind, the game only mildly challenged me only a handful of times, and it took me 5 hours only because of the scale of the world and the exploration.

    I can't tell if Cadence of Hyrule is "Easier" or "Exactly as Hard as the first one, I'm just better at it now."

    The penalty for death and mechanics like keeping weapons after death is certainly easier though.

    I hope they add more granular difficulty options because right now the options are too harsh between "too easy" and "too hard."

    Make me drop all weapons aside from dagger/Short Sword on death would be a good start.

    SharpEdge on
  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    I've got Necrodancer on the PC and quite enjoy it. Is this different enough to savor?

    Also, how is the couch co-op? That'd be another distinguisher that might make it worth buying.

    What is this I don't even.
  • DjiemDjiem Registered User regular
    edited June 2019
    SharpEdge wrote: »
    I can't tell if Cadence of Hyrule is "Easier" or "Exactly as Hard as the first one, I'm just better at it now."

    There might be a bit of being better at it, but CotN kinda kicks my ass and I kicked CoH's ass, so I'd say Cadence of Hyrule is much easier, if only for the heart pieces, the potions/fairies and the fact that you keep a lot of your stuff on death.

    I think I should try Fixed Beat + Permadeath and see if that difficulty is right for me. But I like the rhythm part of the game...

    Djiem on
  • ShowsniShowsni Registered User regular
    Well, if you want a challenge you can always try double time permadeath Yves only...

  • FireballDragonFireballDragon Registered User regular
    (Reads comic title)
    "You shall seal the blinding songs that plague the game. You are the Vessel. You are the Hollow One."

  • DelzhandDelzhand Hard to miss. Registered User regular
    Are the leaderboards just plagued with hackers, or what? It doesn't seem possible to beat this game in a little over 3000 steps.

  • dennisdennis aka bingley Registered User regular
    edited June 2019
    Showsni wrote: »
    Well, if you want a challenge you can always try double time permadeath Yves only...

    For the most challenging mode, choose fixed permadeath.

    You die and it uninstalls from your machine.

    dennis on
  • DooplissDoopliss Registered User new member
    Delzhand wrote: »
    Are the leaderboards just plagued with hackers, or what? It doesn't seem possible to beat this game in a little over 3000 steps.
    The times are legit, and at least as of Necrodancer the leaderboards were aggressively policed. Here's the fastest time last I recall.

    Both Necrodancer and LTTP had really active speedrun/race communities!

  • lionheartssjlionheartssj Bartertown Chief Merchant BartertownRegistered User regular
    My innate lack of rhythm has made me scared of these games, but I may have a shot now!

  • YoungFreyYoungFrey Registered User regular
    Doopliss wrote: »
    Delzhand wrote: »
    Are the leaderboards just plagued with hackers, or what? It doesn't seem possible to beat this game in a little over 3000 steps.
    The times are legit, and at least as of Necrodancer the leaderboards were aggressively policed. Here's the fastest time last I recall.

    Both Necrodancer and LTTP had really active speedrun/race communities!

    I think the Necrodancer record is something like max speed not missing a single beat for the entire game? Something the dev's didn't think was possible.

  • RatherDashing89RatherDashing89 Registered User regular
    YoungFrey wrote: »
    Doopliss wrote: »
    Delzhand wrote: »
    Are the leaderboards just plagued with hackers, or what? It doesn't seem possible to beat this game in a little over 3000 steps.
    The times are legit, and at least as of Necrodancer the leaderboards were aggressively policed. Here's the fastest time last I recall.

    Both Necrodancer and LTTP had really active speedrun/race communities!

    I think the Necrodancer record is something like max speed not missing a single beat for the entire game? Something the dev's didn't think was possible.

    Well I guess that sorta kills the speedrunning aspect. Though from what I gather, having the human world record be the fastest possible time makes speedrunners pretty happy, so I guess it's a good problem to have.

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