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Oxenfree 2: Lost Signals Review (PS4, PS5): Stuck in a Loop

It seemed like Alex was damned to wallow in limbo until the end of time. 2016’s Oxenfree had a dark…

Reviews Michael Leri 2 weeks ago

These Platinums mainly suffer because of how laborious it is to replay these types of titles, which often call for a few playthroughs. Running through games again to nab trophies isn’t a bad proposition — as shown by the Resident Evil 4 remake and the Dead Space remake — but it can be in this genre. Dialogue and cutscenes are often unskippable and walking speeds are usually incredibly slow. Having to crawl from story bit to story bit and listen to most of the same conversations again means trophy-related replays aren’t snappy. Even just going back to grab a single collectible can take far too much time.

Oxenfree 2 falls into this trap, too, since Riley’s movement speed is sluggish, and there’s no way to blaze past anything. Players have to hear about Jacob’s insecurities again and clamber up the same ropes with very little in the way of expediency. Trophy hunting would be significantly more tiresome if every game had these restrictions and forced players to hit credits at least a couple times.

Supermassive Games’ titles have had the same issue, not only contriving multiple trophies to encourage another run or two, but also getting players to sit through a lot of the same scenes. This approach doesn’t do this genre any favors since it points out how truly limited they often are. While The Dark Pictures Anthology and games like Oxenfree pride themselves on variability, second playthroughs often don’t differ too much. 

Oxenfree 2 has a few splintering points, but many of the choices players are presented with are in regards to how they talk to Jacob. Some lines are different, but that doesn’t distract much from how similar the rest of it is. Few games are truly that unique each time, and the trophy list shouldn’t make that even more clear.

Oxenfree 2 is also full of highly specific and missable trophies. It’s easy to forget to ping Evelyn after every transmitter, not tune into Maria’s radio station, or even pick the specific dialogue choices in two scenarios in order to unlock the “3 AM Food Friends” and “Merry Scary Christmas” trophies. Supermassive’s titles are rotten with these types of trophies, and they’re not much better here. Having to deduce how to trigger certain events or closely adhering to a guide is also not the most ideal way to play these games, especially when ignorance or a slip up can force yet another run.

Detroit: Become Human also has a few scene-dependent trophies and 1979: The Revolution calls for players to not miss a single quick-time event, but those games, unlike Oxenfree 2, at least has a chapter select feature to mitigate frustration. It’s not possible to skip around and mop up collectibles or grab the aforementioned missable trophies in this sequel for some puzzling reason. Not even the game’s final autosave lets players pick the other endings; those who don’t back up their save right before that choice are completely out of luck.

Trophy Talk: Street Fighter 6’s Trophy List Is Divided Up, But in the Wrong Way

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Features Michael Leri 2 months ago

There are some narrative adventure games with friendlier trophy lists, though. The Life is Strange series not only lets players skip around, but each entry also has a Collector Mode that strips out the story and makes collectibles easily accessible. Telltale Games, with a few exceptions, also takes the easy road and gives players the Platinum for reaching the end. Not every narrative-heavy title like this needs to be so simple, but they also show that a less prickly path is possible.

Games like Until Dawn, The Quarry, New Tales from the Borderlands, Heavy Rain, Last Stop, Beyond: Two Souls, and The Medium all suffer from many of the aforementioned issues, but Oxenfree 2 still is one of the most hostile to completionists when compared to many of its genre peers. Its glacial movement speed, inability to let players skip dialogue, nearly identical events, lack of chapter select, and very specific and highly missable trophies make it a true slog to complete. There’s even one completely bugged trophy on PS5 (which Night School Studio is aware of), but that’s not nearly its biggest problem. Its biggest problem is that it’s a multifaceted pain to complete that succinctly illustrates this genre’s trophy-related struggles.

The post Trophy Talk: Oxenfree 2 Highlights the Tedium of Narrative Adventure Platinums appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.

Oxenfree 2 feels like it is repeating itself because it is so similar to the first game. The original was a novel take on the narrative adventure genre since it let players walk and talk at the same time, while utilizing a free-flowing dialogue system that ensured conversations progressed organically. Players weren’t usually doing much, but being able to move to the next story beat while also engaging in conversation was a meaningful iteration on the regimented style of Telltale Games, Supermassive Games, and Quantic Dream.

It’s still an effective way to build character and gives Oxenfree 2 ample opportunity to flesh out its new faces. The way characters speak is also one of its strong suits since they will talk all the way until the player picks a response, meaning conversations don’t have the dead air that is so distracting in many of its contemporaries. The naturalistic performances further ground these characters since they speak with hesitation markers and stammer much like real people without it being a hokey crutch. 

All of these small decisions play their part in making Oxenfree 2’s dialogue presentation so impressive, but it’s still the same formula. Night School Studio seemingly didn’t improve or expand these systems to further build on the foundation it laid all those years ago. After seven years, it would have been more enticing if the team pushed forward with some new tweaks or innovations since standards are different now. Oxenfree should have been the starting point, not the endpoint. The walkie talkie that can ping a number of different characters is the most noticeable difference, but those exchanges regularly get interrupted or overlap with other dialogue.

Carrying over the movement system is more detrimental since it drags down the pace and stretches out simple trips. Players can’t even control their walking speed, but it’s almost always too sluggish anyway. Taking a wrong turn is also particularly excruciating since it’s impossible to quickly course correct. Hunting for collectibles or potential secrets only to be met with a dead end is demoralizing and often not worth the effort.

Moving at a snail’s pace curtails the urge to explore and, more broadly, limits replay value. Oxenfree 2 has some hidden conversations and many dialogue choices, but it doesn’t appear to give players many opportunities to truly craft their own playthrough. When so many scenes play out the same way or only have negligible differences, the glacial walking speed and unskippable dialogue just make additional runs even more unappealing. Lengthy and persistent loading times also frequently hinder its forward momentum and are only made somewhat tolerable by its incredible horror-tinged ambient soundtrack.

The pacing seems deliberately dialed down to give players more time to adhere to the cast. Sprinting to the end with a stranger wouldn’t have as much weight as crawling to the climax with a friend. Riley, the protagonist, and her new colleague Jacob are given the space to grow and become more than two-dimensional caricatures simply trying to bust some ghosts. 

Riley is laid-back and has a nonchalant attitude that could have become grating, but never does because of its mostly competent (if sometimes overwritten) script. Learning her history and why she’s returned to her hometown are both intriguing hooks that also make her a more nuanced person. Jacob is less complicated and more of an upbeat nerd that hides his staggering amount of insecurity behind humor. His past is not nearly as complicated or compelling, and it seems like his main purpose is to add the levity that Riley is emotionally incapable of providing. It’s bizarre that the game lets players be mean to Jacob since he’s agreeable to a fault — his flaws are internal struggles that aren’t negatively expressed outward — but the two make for a solid team.

Oxenfree 2 uses Riley, Jacob, and the antagonists to comment on acceptance and fate. The ideas are woven together well since they manifest differently in each character and grant alternate viewpoints that all uniquely poke at the game’s themes. While some of those antagonists are faceless ghouls, having a more human opposition with understandable goals offers more subtleties that spooky ghosts aren’t equipped to supply.

These themes are also integral to the plot, which banks too heavily on knowledge from the original game. While it is a sequel, it’s more of a second chapter that demands an intimate familiarity of its forebearer. Despite that requirement, it does a terrible job at recapping those important events by glossing over major beats from the last game and neglecting to properly reintroduce characters. Sequels obviously can and should continue prior storylines and reuse parts of the cast, but it’s crucial for said sequels to give proper context for those elements within themselves; they shouldn’t almost solely depend on prior experience.

And while a clever utilization of New Game Plus, Oxenfree’s canon conclusion is locked behind a few playthroughs that require certain choices. This means Oxenfree 2 is picking up from a finale many likely aren’t familiar with, one that’s radically different from the most commonly seen ending. Given how vital these details are, it’s surprising Night School Studio leaned so hard in this direction without providing a more helpful and thorough synopsis, especially with the lengthy seven-year gap between games.

Oxenfree 2: Lost Signals Review: The final verdict

It seemed like Alex was damned to wallow in limbo until the end of time, but it’s Oxenfree 2 that ended up being caught in a loop. Some of those replicated features work in its favor, like its fluid dialogue and cast of decently well-realized characters, yet it’s too heavily anchored to its predecessor. The aforementioned dialogue system is mostly the same and hasn’t been further streamlined or upgraded. Traversal is still too slow. And even though its narrative builds on what came before, it struggles to provide a comprehensive summary of that first game and contextualize those all-important events. All of these stumbles mean that Oxenfree 2’s signal isn’t lost, just full of unnecessary static.

Disclaimer: This Oxenfree 2: Lost Signals review is based on a PS4 and PS5 copy provided by the publisher. Reviewed on version 1.02 and 1.002.000, respectively.

The post Oxenfree 2: Lost Signals Review (PS4, PS5): Stuck in a Loop appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.

Raf Grassetti is joining a Netflix team with other industry veterans

Grassetti revealed the move on Twitter, stating that he loves making games and that he’s “not going away anytime soon.” He noted that he will be joining the team led by Chacko Sonny, who left Blizzard Entertainment in September 2021. Some anonymous sources told Bloomberg that Sonny was a “stabilizing force” and “well-respected” within the studio.

Longtime Halo director Joseph Staten also left Microsoft in April to join Sonny’s team. Staten is known for working on many games at Microsoft from Halo 2 to Sunset Overdrive. Jerry Edsall is also part of this developer, and he was previously at The Coalition making Gears of War 4 and Gears 5, as well as Xbox Game Studios. Edsall left Microsoft in April and joined Netflix Games in May.

Grassetti joined Santa Monica Studio in 2013 after getting hired at Sony the year prior. He had previously worked as a senior character artist at BioWare for Mass Effect 3 and its many pieces of DLC.

Not much is known about this AAA new IP, but previous job listings have implied that it will be a shooter of some kind that has potential of being “worthy of a Netflix film/TV series.” It also called for applicants to have “extensive experience” with live service games.

The post God of War Art Director Joins Netflix to Develop AAA New IP appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.