I made a drunken decision that other day that I only recalled when I turned on my PS4 the next day: I had subscribed to the upgraded PlayStation Plus service called "Extra." At first I was a little upset with myself until I saw that the total cost for the next two months was going to be $8. Seeing as how I was given access to more than 100 new games, I figured that I would be able to get $8 worth out of it. I have already achieved that actually by playing Spiritfarer which although a bit slow, is one of the best stories I have seen in a game, ever.
I actually completed that game in just a few days and it kept me from going to bed at night, it was that good.
I knew that whatever I moved onto next was going to be a bit of a downer and at least it ended up being Observation, which is not my style of game and honestly, it one of the worst games I have played in a long time.
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Observation had me annoyed before I even played any of it because after selecting the correct brightness for the screen I was treated to one of the longest loading screens I have ever seen on the PS4. This isn't directly related to Observation but I don't care what the game is like, if you are going to make me wait a full 5-minutes looking at a loading bar before I even get to do anything in the game, we are off to a very bad start.
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At least the game doesn't have a massive lead-in story because honestly, at that point I probably would have left the game without even playing it at all I was so frustrated. The story is presented as something unknown has gone terribly wrong on a space-station 315 miles (it might have been km) away from Earth and only one of the crew are responsive. Surprisingly, you are not playing the role of the crew, you are playing the role of the space-station's onboard computer, similar to HAL from the film 2001. I didn't play enough of the game to find out if you end up becoming and evil computer, but that is where the title Observation comes from. You are not capable of doing most of the actions that need to be done in the game, but are just in charge of electrical and computer functions that the human crew can not.
This is meant to be a survival-horror game so I would imagine that at some point some sort of alien or supernatural presence ends up being part of it. I suppose I will never know because the way that this game works was so frustrating to me that I gave up after an hour.
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This isn't really so much of a game as it is an interactive experience. The "action" if you can even call it that are a series of computer diagnostics that you relay the information to the humans to carry out based on the information that you give them. Then you get to watch them perform the actions that your data recommended. For the most part you can't give intentionally incorrect information because you are only able to give information that is displayed by your diagnostics.
The game becomes tedious when you are given access to 3 cameras per room in the 12 or so rooms and you spend your entire time switching from camera to camera attempting to gain access to various things that are on the walls.
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You are just scrolling and scrolling looking for that one thing that you are meant to be looking for even though the thing that you are being told to find by the crew looks exactly like everything else on the space station. It's maddening and not very fun. To make matters worse, you get thrown into time-sensitive mini-puzzles such as detaching a portion of the space station and you have never done this before nor is there any sort of tutorial. When you are performing this you also have the space station commander's shrill voice shouting at you to "hurry the frig up!" even though you are doing the best you can with zero information having been given to you.
If this game gets better later on I would be surprised because games are supposed to reel you in right from the start, right? They aren't supposed to bore you to death in order to get to the fun stuff later.
This game feels as though it was originally designed to be played on a PC because your main control is a "pointer" akin to one that you would use with a mouse. For me this is NOT FUN using a controller because it makes an already slow game, dreadfully slower.
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The above is one of the first objectives. You have to scroll through a series of menus looking for that one thing that the commander is actually looking for. It is extra fun when each of the menus takes some time to load as the game is attempting to replicate how a rather antiquated computer system would function in real life.
If you enjoy scrolling through camera options and looking endlessly for something to click on so that you can enjoy another cutscene of a human going through the rooms in her spacesuit only to give you another, very similar objective immediately following it, this might be the game for you. It should be obvious that was said in jest. I don't know anyone that likes this sort of thing but you never know - they must exist.
I think that this game was likely added to the PS Extra library as filler. I know that if I had the choice of either playing this game or studying a foreign language, I would find the studying more entertaining.
Games played so far in my trip through all the "Extra" games on Playstation Plus
- Windbound (survival game with rogue-like elements - not recommended)
- Magicka 2 (top-down humorous multiplayer hack and slash-sort with immense spell system - maybe recommended)
- Tearaway: Unfolded (charming casual 3D platformer with inventive graphics and gameplay designed for all ages - recommended for casual players)
- Spiritfarer (casual simulation / resource-management style game with an extremely good story - recommended for all)
- Observation (point and click survival sort of... interactive game of sorts set in space - found it very boring after just one hour and do not recommend
After seeing the graphics, I was going to comment that "8$ is worth this single game".
But after reading the whole post and knowing how it bores players, doesn't give players many options to choose from. Also using a controller like a mouse can be really slow and irritating. I agree with that. But, I believe that if they solve these problems. Players are going to love this game.
well i guess it could appeal to the right person but there are some games out there that are designed with a keyboard and mouse involved and later when they port it to the lucrative console market it just doesn't work with a controller. The graphics are pretty fantastic but you have to keep in mind that most of the epic graphics are from cutscene sequences. I suppose I can still appreciate them though even though it is kind of not anything you control at all.
Dear @whoisjohn, sorry to jump in a bit off-topic.
May I ask you to review and support the new proposal (https://peakd.com/me/proposals/240) so I can continue to improve and maintain this service?
You can support the new proposal (#240) on Peakd, Ecency,
Thank you!