Days Gone (Sony Bend) [PS4, PC]

[swaaye]

True, but they are very economical with fuel and relatively easy to maintain. Plus by the time noise draw enemies, you're long gone. Hopefully.

Unless your motorcycle is so slow that wolves can run you down at full speed. That initial bike is possibly a bit too pathetic. That wouldn't happen in some random subcompact with doors.

What else would you use? An electric car? Motorcycle has:

Versatility - can travel open road, off road, through city streets and back alley
Immediacy - jump on and go
Economy - good range for fuel
Maintainability - lack of electronics means a good mechanic can keep them going for decades
Availability - the loud motorbike you possess is better than the quiet Tesla you don't

A motorbike strikes me as pretty good. Another option would be a Toyota Hilux pickup with a bicycle in the back - use the truck as a home base and bike for silent exploration from that, although realistically that's not great if you are carrying gear.

Still there are lots of cars and trucks around. Almost any of them would be lots quieter. I have a feeling it would be easier to keep the standard Ford/Chevy/Dodge up and running around these parts.

Gas doesn't seem to be a problem for them. There are filled gas cans every few hundred feet. Good thing too because the dude's bike seems to do about 5 gallons per mile. Gotta coast as much as possible to restrain its hearty thirst just to get to town!

 

[Xbat]

There are lot of places that would be inaccessible in a car or at least take much longer to traverse than with a bike and for goodness sakes it's a game where the motorcycle is one of the big gameplay features.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Isn't the bike also sentimental somehow?

 

[Rootax]

Isn't the bike also sentimental somehow?

It is. Then you customize it, so, it's wasn't very important it seems : o

 

[swaaye]

I thought the original bike got chop shopped by the parts guy in Copeland's camp right in the beginning and was gone for good. Opportunity to switch to the nearest, stealthy Ford Tempo.

Last night after clearing out a camp of angry bad people, I discovered I could steal bandit bikes. Unfortunately the game doesn't consider that a legit bike. I had to trek all the way back to where I left my official sanctioned vehicle.

 

[bgroovy]

I thought the original bike got chop shopped by the parts guy in Copeland's camp right in the beginning and was gone for good. Opportunity to switch to the nearest, stealthy Ford Tempo.

Last night after clearing out a camp of angry bad people, I discovered I could steal bandit bikes. Unfortunately the game doesn't consider that a legit bike. I had to trek all the way back to where I left my official sanctioned vehicle.

I think mechanics at the camps can "tow" you bike for a fee.

 

[swaaye]

I swapped out the PS4 Pro's hard drive for a Samsung 840 EVO last night. That does seem to improve loading times and get rid of some stuttering I was seeing as I cruised the landscape.

Installing PS4 games is an interesting process. It dumps about 16GB off the BD, but then proceeds to download 36GB and that is about the final size too. And somehow you can play the game as it is updating, but it's not fully functional, and who wants to play v1.0 anyway? I feel like you should be able to tell it that you want it to be fully updated ASAP and skip the BD data if it's not useful. I suppose v1.0 was getting all 60GB from the BD? Mysterious.

I also wonder if the 840 EVO will deteriorate in a PS4. I don't think it trims and 840 EVO has early TLC problems. Gonna keep things backed up to a USB stick.

 

[PSman1700]

Installing PS4 games is an interesting process. It dumps about 16GB off the BD, but then proceeds to download 36GB and that is about the final size too.

Ive noticed this with multiple games, it doesnt matter for me as im on a gigabit connection. Origin has a similar system, you can start downloading the game, and from x % you can start playtng portions of the game already.

 

[swaaye]

So thus far the compelling aspects to this game are the NERO mystery, the hordes and the exploration of the game world. And of course it is pretty. Unfortunately the ultra-repetitive errand-boy gameplay and the unlikable characters are a bit of a nuisance.

I think the main menu should have a random horde scenario generator! That is fun stuff with addictive strategic gameplay.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

So thus far the compelling aspects to this game are the NERO mystery, the hordes and the exploration of the game world. And of course it is pretty. Unfortunately the ultra-repetitive errand-boy gameplay and the unlikable characters are a bit of a nuisance.

Yup. The bad guys are cartoonishly absurd and in a bunch of places the game does not respect the player's time, e.g. drive here for 2 sentences of dialogue - which could have been said over the radio - then drive back. I think the world and story are great and I really liked the way the different systems interact out in the the wild, e.g. animals, humans (good and bad) and different type of freakers. It's GTA chaotically good at times.

I think Bend they missed a opportunity by not having freakers represent more of a threat to the camps. It would have been great to have the freakers pose a genuine threat and have you chose to spend time scavenging for items to improve defences and if not you lose people. Losing people means losing some camp services, like less things to buy because there are less people to scavenge items to sell to you. This would also give rescuing survivors and directing them to a camp have more meaning. E.g. you rescue somebody who is a great mechanic, but he's also ex-army and could boost mechanic options for your bike or he could effectively man that .50 cal machine gun and make the base safer. Choose which base he goes to and what he does there. It would create more investment in the camps above camp currency.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

That quite possibly was considered and dropped simply because of time constraints. it's the sort of evolution you could see happening, first not having a camp, then deciding to have a camp, then deciding to have survivors that could populate, then...hang on, we need to release this some day!

 

[Xbat]

Yeah I think people forget that Bend is quite a small team but even so they really impressed and hopefully with the success of Days Gone they can make the same kind of step up that Naughty Dog made going from Uncharted 1 to Uncharted 2.

 

[goonergaz]

I think it’s a really strong first game that is clearly a bit bare bones and will hopefully be fleshed out.

what they did do is create a space where the player can exist and have fun

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Yeah I think people forget that Bend is quite a small team but even so they really impressed and hopefully with the success of Days Gone they can make the same kind of step up that Naughty Dog made going from Uncharted 1 to Uncharted 2.

While not a pure numbers game, consider that Sony Bend has more than twice the number of employees of Undead Labs (State of Decay), and are two-thirds the size of Sony Santa Monica (God of War). I reckon the biggest challenge for a small team is building a diverse, interesting open world and they nailed that in Days Gone. Oh and fighting with Unreal Engine, with their two-wheeled car physics!

 

[PSman1700]

Yeah I think people forget that Bend is quite a small team but even so they really impressed and hopefully with the success of Days Gone they can make the same kind of step up that Naughty Dog made going from Uncharted 1 to Uncharted 2.

Uncharted is a real quality high budget game with their own engine. They are not on the same level and probably wont be for a while. There were high ish expectations about days gone but after first reviews popped up, and the game released, well lets say its not uncharted territory. Game’s been forgotten now.

 

[Xbat]

Uncharted is a real quality high budget game with their own engine. They are not on the same level and probably wont be for a while. There were high ish expectations about days gone but after first reviews popped up, and the game released, well lets say its not uncharted territory. Game’s been forgotten now.

I disagree.

 

[bgroovy]

Game’s been forgotten now.

False. It's incredibly well like among players and sold very well.

 

[Xbat]

Only just saw that it has motion control aiming, weird at first but actually makes fine adjustment normally very hard to do on a controller easy and it becomes quite intuitive pretty quickly.

 

[zed]

Not sure how liked it was but it sold very well
https://theplaystationbrahs.com/202...est-selling-ps4-exclusive-on-the-psn-in-2019/

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Good for Bend! It wasn't even that hard pushed by marketing. In fact, it's quite curious why it sold so well - yet another zombie survival game with a mediocre Metacritic score. I wonder if Sony's first-party is getting such a reputation that they'll sell on the strength of the PS brand?