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Vita port impressions


dcdfan

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I got the Vita version for free as a cross-buy benefit. I've spent some time playing this installment and here are my first impressions:

 

Graphics:

Good and fluid. Nearly no frame rate drops, there was only one brief moment where the video skipped for around one second, but I haven't seen anything since.

 

Audio:

They got the graphics right, but they messed up the audio. Voice and BGM are fine, yet the sound effects tend to stay even though you moved away (or destroyed) the "source" of a sound effect. Once it ended up in blaring distorted white noise in my face. Switching weapons seems to reset the audio again. Annoying, as the PS3 remake didn't have these kinds of problems.

 

The Game itself:

Well, this wasn't designed to be played on a tiny screen in a well lit surrounding. Most levels are very dark, forget about recognizing enemies on a bright summer day, even at max brightness. Do you remember those flying black cannon ball like things? If you don't know where they appear by heart you're in for a lot of surprises...

 

Gameplay:

It could be me but I'm struggling a lot. The Vita sticks are way more sensitive then the average DS3 sticks and that isn't very helpful in a game with no lock on feature. The same is valid for the turret mini games and (you probably guessed it) hoverboard. It took me a lot of retries to at least win the mandatory hoverboard sequence on Rilgar and I had to stop after that because my hands hurt. According to the manual they remapped the :l2: and :r2: buttons to the upper left and right areas of the rear touch pad. Beats me how it works correctly, early on I crashed a lot because I must have accidentally triggered the emulation, yet when I want it to trigger, it doesn't work. Probably because I don't do it correctly, but I have no idea what's wrong. Good bye, Twisty McMarks skill point.

I have reached the hoverboard sequence on Kalebo and I'm pretty much sure that I won't pass it. :circle: to boost, :cross: to jump while steering with :ls: in conjunction with pressing :vital: or :vitar: or some tiny areas on the :touchpad: for some stunts challenges (and most likely exceeds) my skills.

 

Or will give me some serious cramps.

Edited by dcdfan
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The controls on the vita for this game are just bad. I keep dying/failing most of the times because I'm struggling with the controls. I haven't tried the other games yet but I hope its better in those games.

Edited by XRNOFEAR17
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So are we looking at a significant increase in difficulty then? Wanted to get this for the Vita but I'll stick with the PS3 version if it's unnecessarily frustrating/hampered by the control system.

 

Can deal with it needing a bit of persistence but not with fully completing the games being nigh-on impossible!

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This installment is a bit harder, simply because of the controls. As I said, the sticks are way more sensitive on the Vita, and these games rely on the use of all sholder buttons on the PS2 & PS3 controllers. Yet contiouously hitting the correct areas on the touchpad for the emulated :l2: and :r2: buttons takes some practise. I've started with R&C2 now and there you need those a lot more often for strafing/locking on, but it's more like pressing them and keeping them pressed, which is easier than switching quickly between all shoulder buttons for R&C1's hoverboard stunts. If you keep struggling, taping off the unused parts of the touchpad is very helpful, believe me.

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  • 1 year later...
  • 1 year later...
Why is every single fking Vita game pure shit?! God I regret buying the damn thing!

 

Resurrecting this thread just to agree. I picked this up a while ago during a sale and never got around to playing it until recently and wow, it's just unbearably bad. It's really unfortunate because there are several of these "collection" games I wanted to play on the Vita during my commute, and without exception all of them absolutely suck on that platform.

 

As has been mentioned, the game is quite dark in places, and even with the Vita screen brightness at maximum there are sections where it's really hard to distinguish objects. Even playing in a dark room doesn't make it much better, and forget about playing anywhere there is daylight. The camera can be annoying and there are times when you have a lot of trouble judging distance and depth, dying as a result. This wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the fact that the game has 2002-era checkpoints (i.e. hardly any), so when you die you have to repeat a lot of the content again just to get back to where you died in the first place.

 

The problems are especially bad during the first hoverboard race on Rilgar where there are boost pads and explosive crates on the track that you often have a lot of trouble actually seeing until it's too late. Add to that the wonky camera, overly sensitive Vita control sticks, and the lack of :l2: and :r2: and you're just asking for a hard time with this game. I tried repeatedly to win the first hoverboard race (a relatively simple thing on the PS2 original) so that I could progress the damn story, and after a couple of hours (yeah, really) I just gave up because it was just the same shit over and over. Flying off the track because of the super-sensitive sticks, crashing into explosive crates because I can't see them properly, getting bumped off the track by the NPC competitors, and on and on.

 

This is unfortunately very typical with Vita ports in my experience. They just clean up the graphics a bit and send it out the door. They don't give any thought to the actual experience of playing the game on the Vita, and most of the time this results in an unpleasant player experience. These games were not designed to be played on this device, and it shows every time.

 

Personally I wouldn't recommend this port to anyone, and to be honest after owning a Vita for a few years I wouldn't suggest anyone buy a Vita unless the only thing they want to do with it is play JRPGs. While I have played a few good games on Vita, they have been few and far between.

 

As for the R&C collection, I deleted it off the Vita and am seriously considering just selling the thing at this point.

Edited by swotam
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I need to play R&C for a staff list and was planning to get it on vita since I don't have many unplayed games left for it but I believe I'll rethink that idea. How is Sly on vita? I bought that collection over a year ago but haven't played any of them yet.

Edited by Shanehi185
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I need to play R&C for a staff list and was planning to get it on vita since I don't have many unplayed games left for it but I believe I'll rethink that idea. How is Sly on vita? I bought that collection over a year ago but haven't played any of them yet.

 

I definitely suggest that you do not start R&C on the Vita, especially if you want the Platinum, otherwise you will be setting yourself up for a lot of frustration.

 

As for Sly, which I also have, my 8% completion percentage suggests I don't recommend that either. I played the first couple of chapters and then gave up on it. Same general issues, bottom line is these games were never designed to be played on a device like the Vita and they all inevitably suffer as a result.

 

Personally I have the R&C, Sly, Metal Gear, Jak, and GoW collections on Vita and odds are, based on my experience with the first three, I will never touch the last two ever. The only game out of these collections that I enjoyed on the Vita was Metal Gear Solid 3, the rest can just go die in a fire.

 

That's not to say I haven't played other games on the Vita that I enjoyed, but those were games that were either specifically designed for the Vita, or ported to the Vita with some thought given to the differences that the Vita has so that the end user experience wasn't unpleasant.

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