Hit-Reset Review: The Last Story

Xander dusts off his Wii to review The Last Story

[TheDivine]

LOL i was up all morning (work the nights) and into the afternoon playing, couldnt put it down. I think its the best jrpg this gen along with Lost Odyssey and i think its better than Xenoblade which most people seem to compare it to. Its just freaking bad ass and the most innovative rpg since demon's souls. Has all the great jrpg stuff like story, romance, beautiful world and music, and they cut out the boring bullshit like random battles, slow combat, and grinding for days on end. It has stealth, a cover system, interactive moments all over, platforming, and flows together like a movie. So far (in chapter 10 or 11) id give it a near perfect score just cause theres some chugging and slowdown sometimes and id like to explore more.

The first edition is one of the nicest packages ive ever seen. Truly beautiful. Buy this one or you will regret it.

[McLuvn]

Can't wait to play this game, should have it by late afternoon tomorrow.
Reviews are for sheep.
Can't wait to see what Mistwalker studio does with the Wii U which is obviously the next console they will develop for.

[dragon_rocks]

Didn't read the article as I don't want to give them hits. The first comment shows the fail with the article anyway. Obviously they are trying to the "that site" and gather hits.

[LycanGav]

Don't agree with my writers score, that's more than your right, but your final statement is highly offensive and complete codswallop. Games, like any media medium, are subjective and not everyone will enjoy every game. Xander found the game to be middling, and scored it accordingly. It's his personal opinion. To suggest my writers score games low deliberately to gather hits though when we've recently scored Sleeping Dogs, Orcs Must Die! 2 and Spelunky towards the higher end of the scale shows just how wrong you are.

[dragon_rocks]

The reviewer himself has claimed that he has very little knowledge of JRPG games. Then he should not even be trying to review one in the first place. I have very little knowledge of RTS games. You know why? Because they do not appeal to me and hence why I never spend time on those to gather more knowledge. If you ask me to play any RTS game one fine day and ask for my opinion then you can bet its not going to be very +ve and surely not going to be rated properly as I do not know what is expected of one and I do not like the genre much as well. Someone should have used common sense in the site (you or the reviewers) to assign someone who is familiar with JRPGs to review the game so that it gets a proper assessment. Having it reviewed by someone who is not familiar with the genre is not respecting the game and giving it the right assessment it deserves.

Doing bad reviews (not in terms of score but in terms of not assigning the right reviewer to it) will hurt your site only in the long run as it hurts the credibility of the reviews done and hence people will stop taking your site reviews seriously.

[LycanGav]

Again, absolute codswallop, if only writers who are experienced with specific genres are "allowed" to review games, then how do you go about reviewing a game that creates a new genre or sub? It's not the score that matters, but the meat of the writing, and if you had even bothered to actually read the article you would realise that.

[kasasensei]

Obviously, if You admit that You don't have the slightest idea of what you're talking about, then don't claim to do an objective review of that thing you ignore.
You need some experience to review something, to say why it's good or bad.
If You don't have any references, then how do you want people to treat your point of view with anything else than indifference or/and sufficiency ?

[Xof]

It is true that writers do not need to be terribly experienced in a genre to review a game of that genre. HOWEVER, if you're going to review a game you do need to be aware of the "key point of engagement."

That is to say, you have to be able to identify the primary element of a game from whence players derive enjoyments. Let's look at a few examples, first.

Gears of War. What's the key point of engagement? The combat. It's really ****ing fun. Easy to understand, right? Right. That's why it would be profoundly stupid stupid to say the game sucks because it failed to tell a decent story.

Call of Duty. What's the KPE here? Competitive multiplayer. You can't really rip into these games for boring, linear level design in single player or for clunky, incoherent narratives when all of 0% of the audience is looking for the game to provide that.

Mass Effect. KPE? The dialog system, interrupts and all. This is why people who defend ME3 as a good game because they like the shooting elements and multiplayer don't know what the **** they're talking about--the key point of engagement for a Mass Effect game is interacting with characters, and the world, and seeing your actions impact the narrative.

Total War. The KPE is that whole idea of 'guiding' the entire military might of an empire on the move. Is it fair, then, to criticize the game for not having Diplomatic victories or Wonder victories like a Civilization game? Of course not. That would be stupid.

Which brings us back to this review. Everyone here is right, some for the right reasons, some for the wrong reasons, and some (you) a tenth or so.

Your "writer" made several mistakes, such as (very clearly) judging the game by inapplicable standards. You don't compare a wii title displaying at 480p to a PS3 game at 1080p. That 'blurriness' is an element in -every- Wii game due to hardware limitations. It is not a valid point of critique.

But more importantly, this "writer" failed to understand The Last Story's key point of engagement. It is most certainly not, as is often the case with RPGs, about doing new and inventive things with combat mechanics. The key point of engagement lies in how the player is drawn into a compelling narrative, populated with vivid characters, well-written dialog. It is about the ambience and setting, too--the beauty of the art design, the mystery and magic of the world, and the emotional resonance of the music.

Those are the key points of engagement. All of which your "writer" said clearly, undeniably, overwhelmingly positive things. As has, I should mention, everyone else who has reviewed or played this game.

So we're left with two explanations:

1) Yours is a hack site attempting to garner hits with controversial scores, and should therefore be summarily dismissed.

2) Your "writers" are a bunch of incompetent boobs, and your site should therefore be summarily dismissed.

Take your pick. Either way, don't expect to get away with this crap without anyone taking notice. And hopping into an N4G comment thread to "defend" this crap by flinging insults at your audience? Yeah, really classy. We won't be forgetting that, either.

[3-4-5]

I have to agree with Xof....His post above mine did a better job breaking down game elements than the review did.

I'd give the reviewer a break though as he might be new.

The problem with most "writers" and "reviewers " is that they are very close minded. They need to open up their mind a bit and think about the things the may not have.

EX: Write the review....then go read other reviews and do some research and come back to your review before posting and correct some mistakes you may have made.

We expect our Dev's to polish games...I expect writer and reviewers to polish their reviews.

I can't totally dismiss the site though as ever body makes mistakes and deserves that second chance to redeem themselves.

I haven't played the game....but I've read about 10 reviews on it and all of them included multiple things the writer of this review forgot to mention.

Lessons should be learned.