The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay - Page 2  

just got the game.for one its really dark(picture)his eye shine thing sucks.i need me some sam fisher goggles.did i mention that its really dark?

You can adjust the brightness in the config but the overall game is fairly dark, but that's on purpose. With eyeshine on I can see clearly so I don't really understand the complaint there.

My only problem so far is how pixelated it looks. I have a 56" Gateway DLP and it's a pixelated mess most of the time. I know this is probably agrevated by the extreme digital look of the DLP but I prefer that style. But with Riddick it's just very, very extreme. I have heard it looks better on non DLP's, which started making me desperate enough to think about trying out svideo. But I hate the idea of not using native widescreen progressive support when the game supports it.

While the game has some wonderful details it just looks so low rez. Reminds me of Shiney's Messiah.

If you just got the game then how do you know about the eye shine? You don't get it until a fair way into the game. Early on all you're using is the light fron the guns...The eye shine effect is fantastic imo. Exactly like how it looks in Pitch Black

your right,i tought the stalk move was the eye shine.the game has parts where the graphics look jaggy and then there's parts where they look mind blowing.i think the game should of been polished a bit more on the graphics part,then again its summer and there's very little good games in the summer.

Well i think this game is pretty damn fantastic. I don't understand what the hell these people are talking about with the 8 hours of gameplay crap. Maybe if you just blow through it and don't do any exploring or go on any of the side quests it would be that short. I'm a good 6 hours in and I haven't even gotten halfway through yet.

I have to agree. Sometimes the graphics really look great and sometimes they are really jaggy, muddy, and dark.
The game is good but even though it looks really good in parts it needed more polish to be one of the greats.

I think its great as is. And here's a comment sure to cause trouble: i like it more than halo. And its already longer for me as well...

This one for some reason gives me MAJOR motion sickness. I'm not usually affected by it but I can't play this for more than about 15 minutes before feeling woozy.

So is there any consensus here on whether the graphics are vastly improved from the demo?
Demo looked like it was running in an extremely low resolution but I hear it's been greatly improved for the full version. Also nice to know the full version is 16:9 (which the demo wasn't.)

Gray ,

--- I just checked out the demo after reading your comment and the final retail is much better IMO [ although not perfect ;) ] .

--------- Jason

I have only played the demo, and while I know the demo doesn't fully show off the game, I was a bit underwhelmed. I was expecting a real kick arse game. The demo was fun, but it didn't seem like anything too revolutionary and the controls were a little screwy for a FPS. The real-time shadows and lighting were impressive, though.

Thoughts? Opinions? Flaming tomatoes? :D

Like I said. I think this is a decent game with areas that have some really outstanding graphics. They were going for something here and I don't think they took enough time polishing it.
It's comparable to Deus Ex invisible war but not as good.

So far this year...Riddick is my GOTY. Don't let the demo keep you on the fence, I hated the demo. If you are at ALL an FPS fan...run don't walk.

I think its superior to Deus Ex Invisible war in every conceivable way. Better story, better graphics, more interesting people, better weapons, cooler character, more interesting things to do (boxing, for example). its my GOTY so far as well

"I think its superior to Deus Ex Invisible war in every conceivable way."

I did a double take when I read that as well. Never played Invisible War on the xbox but tried the PC demo and everything about it was poor, right down to the awful frame rate (which I've read is even worse on the Xbox). I loved the first Deus Ex so Invisible War was a huge disapointment. Judging only by the demos for each game, Riddick beats War hands down.

I love this game in all...but its not getting my vote for GOTY...its just waaaay to short for that.

Now I thought I'd be going back to this game over and over...but I'm not. I go back and try to fight but to be honest their are not to many people to fight cause most of the time the camaras are on and one swing and your dead. So your reduced to the tower 17 fights...and that gets old quick. (non of those guys are a challenge if u ask me....I MIGHT lose one bar of health in those fights..but thats it).

I really dont care if its multiplayer...games are using that as a crutch these days...I actually bought it cause I wanted a GOOD SINGLE PLAYER FPS. Besides...something is lame about a bunch of vin desiels running around fighting each other.

I'm not going to take anything away from this game..its damn good. I think its a must own...but not GOTY. If it offered two more levels that were action packed...THEN I think it would be a contender. When I say action packed I mean the exact opposite of the mine levels...that was tooooo much sneaking around....I hated every minute of it.

the shortness of a game is a relative term. i found the length of this game to be perfect. i don't play every night and i only have an hour or so each time i play. Back in the day i could wallow in a 200+ hour epic like Baldur's Gate, but now it's just not possible. I prefer my games to be short and sweet so I at least have a fighting chance at finishing it. 8 to 12 hours is perfect for me.

I happen to like Invisible War. The Xbox version was better than the PC version from what I have heard.

"I happen to like Invisible War. The Xbox version was better than the PC version from what I have heard."

Well, like I said Dean, I only played the PC demo, so maybe it isn't fair for me to judge the game based on that, but from reading the responses of others on the web, the problems with the demo were NOT improved when the full version was released ... and some of those problems - in particular, very inconsistent frame rates - turned out to be even worse in the xbox version, according to the reviews I've read.

I think I wouldn't have been so disappointed by the PC demo if I hadn't loved the original Deus Ex. I thought it was a terrific, ground breaking game. I wasn't expecting the demo to actually improve on that experience, but I was expecting it to at least match it in terms of graphics and frame rate, etc. But it actually looked and played worse than the original IMO. There seems to be a problem with the engine Ion Storm created for the game, as the new Ion Storm Thief game on the xbox, using the same engine, is also said by reviewers to have serious frame rate problems. Nothing takes me out of a game faster than watching everything suddenly turn into a slideshow ...

I'm not going to tell you you shouldn't like Deus Ex, Dean. (If I get a chance, I'll still give the full version a spin on the xbox, just to see if the game play can overcome some of the technical problems). I was just surprised, based on reading many reviews and my limited hands-on experience with both games, to see someone say that Deus Ex was superior to Riddick. I have yet to see a single negative review for Riddick, and most reviews have been very glowing ("a must have game on the xbox," etc) while the critical reaction to Deus Ex was far less unanimous. And I think it's safe to say that, strictly from a technical standpoint - graphics, frame rate, etc - Riddick easily bests Deus Ex.

I never said that Invisible war was superior. Talbain used that term. This is what *I* said:
I think that there are some elements of the Riddick game that are clearly superior. Most of them are technical. The Rpg elements of Invisible war are a bit more enjoyable IMO and I think Deus EX was a bit more polished when it comes to controls and certain gameplay aspects.
Riddick tries to impart some stealth elements and the Hitman style body dragging which I don't think was done particularily well in the Riddick game.

They are BOTH good games and BOTH worth playing, I just happen to like Invisible war a bit more. In Invisible war I had a lot of fun just playing with the environment.

"I never said that Invisible war was superior. Talbain used that term."

You are right, you did not use that specific word, but in this case it makes no difference, because you said essentially the same thing. To say that "game A is not as good as game B" is the same thing as saying "game A is superior to game B."

But talbain said 'superior in every way'. That's not what I meant. I found Deus EX to be a more enjoyable experience but I don't think it was superior to Riddick in every conceivable way.
To me the word superior would indicate that Invisible war is greatly better than Riddick where I just found the play experience better. It's just a small amount so I found superior to be a bit to grand of a description.
With Invisible war I really enjoyed being able to augment my character in ways that I chose and to choose the direction of the story based on my decisions.
I also found the levels very easy to navigate whereas with Riddick, I find myself not sure what direction to go as if I am in a maze. I did not find the mine area very enjoyable at all.
To say that the game was 'better' was my way of saying I liked it more.
I will be more cautious with my use of words in the future.

"I will be more cautious with my use of words in the future."

Come on Dean, there's no need for that. I understand your take on the two games. It makes perfect sense to me. (And I understand that it was talbain who said one game was superior to the other "in every way" and that was not what you had said.) I used the word "superior" to refer to your previously stated view, you pointed out that was not a word you had used, I pointed out that even so it added up to essentially the same thing, and that's that. No need for you to watch what you say. I don't want to feel like I'm a member of the "word police." Besides you were the one quibbling with MY use of a word, not the other way round :) I say no harm no foul and look forward to playing both games someday.

I'm just saying I should have worded what I meant a little better. I didn't mean that in a bad way.:)

Well for me Riddick is 'Superior' to Invisible War 'in every way' :D .

--- Not my GOTY either but damn good .

--------- Jason

Hehe, Funny guy. :D
How about saving the game? I think IW is 'superior' because you can save anywhere.

I'll bet that there's a direct correlation between the size of the TV you're playing on and how good you think the graphics are.

I can see this game looking spectaculaaaar on a nice 32" directview.

On my 65" CRT RPTV I notice the jaggies all too well.
To me it appears that they are rendering everything that has normal mapping at a lower resolution. Since 80% of the objects in this game use normal mapping, that adds up to a lot of jaggies.

Unfortunately I only got one night of play in before I had to leave for NYC for work. Initially I had planned on bringing my box and this game to play in the hotel, but at the last minute I picked up a copy of Aliens Vs. Predator (with expansion pack) for $20 from Fry's.

That was one game I wished I had time to play at the time, and I knew ran well on my beefy laptop, so I couldn't pass it up. So I just brought the laptop.

No he didn't say it was superior, i did. And I stand by my words. Chronicles of Riddick is the most fun and best game i've played this year so far. So yes, it is superior to Deus Ex as well as every other xbox game to come out this year. And that's as clear as I can be :)

It's a very good game but it isn't without it's problems.
Originally I compared Deus EX invisible war to Riddick because *I* found the games to be similar in gameplay. I would include BOTH in my top ten games for XBOX however I give Invisible war a nudge because of a few things I already listed in this thread. One thing I didn't list is the game's length. Both IW and Riddick are short. Ordinarily I don't have a problem with a short game but Riddick is incredibly short and unfortunately because of this I think it can be rented and completed in a couple of days.

If Riddick would have had an anywhere save system like Invisible War it could probably be completed in about 6 hours.

Also, another complaint I have about Riddick comes from being a fan of the FPS genre. In most games, you are introduced to a fairly weak weapon and work your way up to some really cool weaponry.
In Riddick, you are constantly teased by weapons you cannot use because they are DNA coded so most of the time in this game you use you fists or various pipes and things.
The other complaint I have about Riddick is finding buttons and various things to open doors. Usually, buttons are very obvious but in this game, the balance is off because they have stuff flashing when they want you to find something but other times, a button to a door is obscurely hidden in the corner of a window and does not really even look like a button.

And then there is a lack of polish in this game. Bullets going through steel walls and other objects, alighnment problems trying to jump to a bar, etc. or trying to use a pipe wrench to open a door. More than a few times I kept running around not knowing where to go only to keep trying to align the character with a hatch or overhead pipe to open or grab on.

The game also has some very cool moments as well that I don't want to spoil here. Some of the things the guards say when they are looking for you are rather funny.

Note: IGN rated Deus EX IW a 9 while it gave Riddick an 8.5, ao I'm not alone here. :)

I agree with dschroll, if a game doesn't have any replay value I won't buy it. I personally would rather rent a game a couple of times for $10 bucks then spend $50 bucks (59.99 plus taxes at my location puts the cost to around 70 bucks for Riddick as of today). Depite the problems renting can cause the industry I don't want a bunch of games I have no interest in playing again. If it's cheaper for me to rent, finish, and return a game, that's the way I'll go every time.

Slap a ounce of replay, split screen, new content, or online play, and I'm sold (if the game doesn't blow).

Riddick is a awesome rental. Just not a keeper. I just don't enjoy playing a game after I completed it, for the people that do, good for you. Those kind of players get the best value out of any game purchase.