Board 8 > how did people end up liking Catherine?

(+) Yeah! (+)

despite the initial interest level, I haven't seen much of anything about how people ended up liking the game. I couldn't get away from Persona 4 topics when that came out but I haven't heard anything about Catherine.

how is it? I'm hoping not to get into specifics, just kinda curious if people liked it or not. I've seen some pretty mixed critical response.

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xyzzy

It received very favorable reviews, and pretty much everyone liked it.

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

seems like everyone liked it, but its prolly not being talked about as much cos its a shorter game than Persona 4.

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Vote for this guy in every contest: Sess

That's how.

... seriously, though, response is pretty good. I'm not sure where your mix is coming from, actually.

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There's always hope for better things in life. But you can't let anything, friend, lover, God himself, be your hope. You have to be your own hope.

I really liked it.

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Ya ain't in Mrs. Quitter's School for Resettin' Babies no more. It's time ya graduated, kid.

Giant Bomb kinda killed it. I've also heard a number of people talk about how disappointing the on-screen Catherine/Katherine meter is, turning everything into a sort of binary choice.

like I said, I don't know a lot about it! I know there's some cool themes and block puzzles but I don't know how well executed it is.

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xyzzy

How did Giant Bomb kill it? Jeff didn't like it, Partick thought it was decent and no one else there has played it.

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

In fact, there's a news article on Giant Bomb now telling people to play Catherine.

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

Patrick said he had a lot of the same complaints and kinda groaned when it went into 'jrpg territory'. I haven't listened to this week's show yet so maybe he revised his negative thoughts.

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xyzzy

I was able to convince a friend of mine to impulse buy it, and he's had a lot of good things to say about it. He's never played a game from the developer, so I thought he might be initially be turned off, but he was hooked right away.

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snowpork
Guru winner BlAcK_TuRtLe: http://i51.tinypic.com/2r7txtx.jpg THAAAAANKS!

Catherine is flawed, an experience that, with every frustrating stumble, one sighs in response, and each misstep underscoring how close to greatness Catherine was. And how it mostly blew it. And how, despite that, you should probably play it.

Every day of the week, I'd rather spend my time exploring an interesting misfire than the same old thing with a new coat of paint, mulling the lessons we can learn. Catherine is anything but the same old thing brought out for another man-this-feels-familiar trip around the deja vu block. If you're desperate for different, Catherine and Katherine are two gals worth calling up.

For the purposes of this slab of writing, I'm going to pretend Catherine ends a few hours before it does. There's a moment, a very specific moment, where the game embraces the worst tendencies of Japanese video game storytelling. Yes, yes, I know Catherine comes from the Persona team, so to encounter supreme weirdness should be expected, and yet, here I am, trying to erase this particular twist from memory, despite acknowledging we're talking about a game whose central metaphor is block puzzles in a dreamscape full of sheep.

So…let's pretend that moment doesn't exist, or else I'm going to stop writing this. Flame away in the comments, if you must.

Still with me? Okay.

not exactly dropping praise upon the game! it's like the ultimate backhanded compliment. I think the thing that sounds cool is how it's a very "mature" story about the late-20s internal crisis that a lot of men go through. that really appeals to me. but if the actual puzzles and execution is botched, I'm worried it'll lessen the experience.

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xyzzy

Well, keep in mind Giant Bomb has a minority opinion, and most people including myself enjoy all the aspects of Catherine. Although I suppose if you are only going to listen to Giant Bomb you are probably going to skip it.

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

nah, I don't trust GB on most opinions. that's why I asked, after all.

I just hadn't seen any big Catherine topics like I would Persona topics. I thought it would get more buzz here.

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xyzzy

The thing about Giant Bomb's take on the game is that they barely even talk about the block puzzles. I believe that both the review and the remainder of the text you posted allotted one paragraph to say "the block puzzles get old fast / are too hard" and that was it. It's also wrong.

How they manage to produce so much text about the game while saying so little about the core gameplay is beyond me.

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.

I enjoyed the block puzzles

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

well, that's because they're playing it for the story. what's there to say about block puzzles?

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xyzzy

That they're awesome and varied and challenging and the reason you should play game. Quarter-life crisis is just a bonus.

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.

The puzzles are a very big part of the game.

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

c'mon persona 5

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Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.

'thank god for easy mode' says everything you need to know about how they feel about it, I think. almost every review talks more about the narrative than the story because that's where the core of the game is. hell, look at the box art - ain't no block puzzles there!

it's cool that you like the puzzles though and I'd be interested to hear more about them,

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xyzzy

when i end up playing catherine, it won't be for the block puzzles. if they're fun, cool. if they're not, i can deal.


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ICON:
Can I kick it?

One of the better games this gen IMO.

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Falcon Punch
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFtw7qW7Vcw

From what I've seen, not worth buying at all.

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I have no idea who you are, but I thank you for arousing me. - Beruga
Brawl FC: 3823-8243-5663

the block puzzles are interesting, but the story is where it's really at

so good

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Ryoko
http://img.imgcake.com/fffuujpguv.jpg

KJH....

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

From: Xiahou Shake | #022
One of the better games this gen IMO.

This, it's my personal Game of the Year at the moment.

topic beat me to it, but yeah, it's generally met with a lot of praise on all fronts. which is good considering it was met with a lot of sales.

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The future must protect the clone's past.
"Maybe it's a tentacle, molesting the planet itself. - Aschen Brodel.

I did not play Catherine thinking I would like the block puzzles. I've been playing it for the block puzzles exclusively for the last week.

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Connecticut Huskies

Catherine is a nice game. The block puzzles are awesome so there is reason to continue playing after you already have gone through the story.

some of the puzzles are soooo damn frustrating though hnng

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Ryoko
http://img600.imageshack.us/img600/7619/cyclokle.png

Yeah, but once you figure it out you feel stupid for not figuring it out faster. >_>

Meh. The block puzzles seem too easy and freeform to hype that much. Just fundamentally, it's easily broken in every situation even with such limited options as you're given so that it's just... not that satisfying.

Knowing exactly how far into the stage you are in reference to the end is kinda a buzzkill on tension too.

Lacked any reason to be attached to either choice too. Vincent rarely if ever really interacted with them.

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I have no idea who you are, but I thank you for arousing me. - Beruga
Brawl FC: 3823-8243-5663

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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.

it's a visual novel. do you like porn games without porn?

KJH posted...
Meh. The block puzzles seem too easy and freeform to hype that much. Just fundamentally, it's easily broken in every situation even with such limited options as you're given so that it's just... not that satisfying.

Knowing exactly how far into the stage you are in reference to the end is kinda a buzzkill on tension too.

Lacked any reason to be attached to either choice too. Vincent rarely if ever really interacted with them.

The block puzzles? Easy?



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There's always hope for better things in life. But you can't let anything, friend, lover, God himself, be your hope. You have to be your own hope.

Didn't say necessarily easy or too easy.

It just stays unsatisfying to me because if you get the basics of spidering and making staircases down, you're pretty much able to solve any puzzle.

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I have no idea who you are, but I thank you for arousing me. - Beruga
Brawl FC: 3823-8243-5663

It was amazing, imo.

Completely satisfied with my purchase and I usually never buy games new!

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"Duel audio? You mean like rap battles?" - termina_rzident
KrahenProphet and Kana are on opposite ends of the Awesome Spectrum.

Have you played the game or not. Because your first post made it seem like you haven't, but the other posts make it sound like you finished the game.

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Connecticut Huskies

Played some, seen the entirety of it streamed by a friend too.

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I have no idea who you are, but I thank you for arousing me. - Beruga
Brawl FC: 3823-8243-5663

How far into the puzzles did you play? And which difficulty?

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Connecticut Huskies

If he called the puzzles easy then he has not played the game.

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Black Turtle keeps that Guru Jeep ridin'.

Normal, played a bit of the later chapters and a lot of the arcade.

What I don't really get is why you're so defensive about it as if the difficulty is the focal point so much as the fact I don't find it satisfying. The game's not that much about twitch reactions, the bottom falls out slow enough to allow for mistakes, and the limited area to really move in the first place means there's only so many combinations of blocks you could push or pull for the sake of going up, even less if you actually think about it. Which generally turns out as:

1. Spider around to push blocks to make space.
2. Make a staircase.

Which I know is just a simplification because you have to push and pull each one and move, but I don't really find what makes it up engaging either.

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I have no idea who you are, but I thank you for arousing me. - Beruga
Brawl FC: 3823-8243-5663

I liked Catherine, but I agree that it fumbled with the last chapter. The puzzles were surprisingly entertaining though and the story is pretty good for most of it, even if the morality choice system is stupid like it is in every other game. Can't really change the plot as much as you'd think. Still. It's worth playing. It's a pretty inspired game nontheless and I liked it a lot.

Also yeah, puzzles easy what? Chapters 6 and 7 are a real b****. I thought the puzzle element was way better than I expecting and it fits the game's narrative more than most disconnected gameplay elements in story-driven games do. The puzzles are not a reason to not buy the game.

The main complaints I'd have with Catherine is that its moral system is completely binary and the major plot twist at the end kind of turns what was a cool psychological thriller into something... a bit stupid.

My only two complaint are the cutscenes get shorter and shorter while there's more and more block puzzles, and you can't skip the puzzle sections unless you got a Gold rank. It made replaying the last night annoying to view all the endings.

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SNARGLEBLAGH
SSBB Friend Code: 1891-0824-9639

From: KJH | #042
What I don't really get is why you're so defensive about it as if the difficulty is the focal point so much as the fact I don't find it satisfying. The game's not that much about twitch reactions, the bottom falls out slow enough to allow for mistakes, and the limited area to really move in the first place means there's only so many combinations of blocks you could push or pull for the sake of going up, even less if you actually think about it. Which generally turns out as:

1. Spider around to push blocks to make space.
2. Make a staircase.

Which I know is just a simplification because you have to push and pull each one and move, but I don't really find what makes it up engaging either.

Just checking, are you simply trying to complete the levels or actually get gold rankings?

Because yeah, just advancing to the end of the level isn't the main challenge most of the time. It's not particularly satisfying to just finish the level.

And I'm not defensive at all really. It just seems peculiar for someone to say the game is too easy. No one (but you) seems to think the game is easy at all.

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Connecticut Huskies

LordEmbok posted...
it's a visual novel. do you like porn games without porn?

LordEmbok sighting

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One other thing... how can someone complain about the puzzles being too "limited" near the end, when you get the monster blocks and random blocks involved. The blocks are freaking moving around on their own sometimes and randomly turning into any other kind of block.

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Connecticut Huskies